One Autumn night, in Sudbury town,Across the meadows bare and brown,The windows of the wayside innGleamed red with fire-light through the leavesOf woodbine, hanging from the eavesTheir crimson curtains rent and thin.As ancient is this hostelryAs any in the land may be,Built in the old Colonial day,When men lived in a grander way,With ampler hospitality;A […]
Daily Life of the American Colonies: The Production of Flax, Linen and My Bloodline in the Colonies
William Atterbury, my namesake was born in England ca 1700-1710, and was a laborer living in London, somewhere in the area of St. James Church and Westminster Abbey. Around the end of 1731, or the beginning of 1732, William went bad, and was nicked stealing five yards of linsey woolsey – a cloth made from […]
Daily Life of the 19th Century: Patent Medications and Homeopathic cures at Washington Irving’s Sunnyside
When you’re touring a historic home museum, keep an eye out for the little details which speak volumes about the people who lived there. Sunnyside was the home of American author Washington Irving, who wrote most famously, the short stories The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and Rip Van Winkle. Irving was a renowned man of […]
Exploring ancient Greece in Nashville, TN: The Parthenon
Nashville, Tennessee has been called the Athens of the South since the mid 19th century. In a part of the country which at the time, wasn’t renowned for educating its citizens, Nashville could boast not only a public school system, but several colleges and universities as well. By century’s end, Belmont University, Fisk University, Meharry Medical College, […]
Daily Life of the American Colonies: Spoons
We don’t give a lot of thought to our silverware, a part of our daily life our ancestors didn’t take for granted A quick history of spoons and status in colonial era Dutch and English New York, at Philipsburg Manor, Sleepy Hollow, New York
Haunted Graveyards: The ghosts of Williamsburg, Illinois and Ridge Cemetery
“In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”– Genesis 3:19 “Oh my name it means nothing, and my age it means less.For the country I come from, is called the […]
