Monthly Archives: November 2018

A Very Hawthorne Holiday

This year’s Christmas in Salem house tour, the perennial seasonal fundraiser for Salem’s venerable preservation organization Historic Salem Inc., is Hawthorne-themed in recognition of the 350th anniversary of the House of the Seven Gables and features 15 decorated interiors in the greater Derby Street neighborhood along with a full schedule of associated offerings. The tour is on Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday afternoon, and there are tie-in events (including a food tour, wine-tasting, meet-up of Salem history buffs, lectures on Hawthorne’s Utopian experience and the long history of celebrating Christmas) throughout the weekend. This tour is always a wonderful event for so many reasons: it supports preservation efforts and advocacy, does not exploit the witch trials in any way, and represents true collaboration between Salem’s heritage organizations. It’s a seasonal reminder of just how many beautiful old houses survive in Salem, and a great opportunity for decoration inspiration. I always emerge from the weekend full of empathetic gratitude for those generous homeowners who open their doors to hundreds of people during one of the busiest times of the year: I’ve been there, and done that (twice) and it is always quite the effort!

Hawthorne Poster

I like the theme of this particular tour as it harkens back to a time when Salem’s heritage identity was much more civic and civil, more diffuse, and much less commodified and concentrated on 1692. The neighborhood—and Hawthorne himself—are legacies of all of Salem’s history, dark and bright. Salem’s history and landscape gave Hawthorne his material: he always acknowledged his debt to his native city even as he distanced himself from it with obvious determination. In 1860, the Essex Institute had sustained a significant debt from moving their library (cabinet) into its permanent location (well, until the Peabody Essex Museum relocated it out of Salem) in Plummer Hall on Essex Street, and organized a fair to raise funds to pay off the debt. Hawthorne was asked for a story to contribute to the fair’s newsletter, The WealLeaf, and he acquiesced promptly, offering up an intense topographical memory rather than a story as his narrative inclinations had deserted him for the moment and he did not wish to be “entirely wanting to the occasion”. The relationship between the Essex Institute and Nathaniel Hawthorne was forged through moments like these, along with the deposit of Hawthorne family papers and the acquisition of additional papers and editions of all of Hawthorne’s works by the Institute, including The Spectator, his self-published (as a teenager!) newsletter.

Hawthorne collage

As Hawthorne evolved into a truly national figure following his death, the Essex Institute enhanced its reputation through its Hawthorne collections, most particularly during the centennial anniversary of his birth in 1904, for which the Institute organized a series of summer events: as this most American of authors was born on the fourth of July. National headlines all summer long focused on the author and Salem, and most particularly on the “ancient” houses associated with Hawthorne, in accordance with the form of heritage tourism that was popular at the time: the literary pilgrimage. Even a century later, the collections of the Essex Institute, now absorbed into the greater Peabody Essex Museum (PEM), were the focus of the bicentennial commemoration of Hawthorne’s birthday: consequently it’s not very difficult to imagine an open Phillips Library in an open Plummer Hall, and an exhibition of Hawthorne texts and papers assembled as a complementary and contextual feature of this weekend’s house tour. But we can only imagine such a scene, as Plummer Hall has been closed since 2011, and the Phillips collections, encompassing nearly all of Salem’s archival history, have been relocated to a vast Collection (not plural–specificity is discouraged) Center in Rowley. Nathaniel Hawthorne is gone.

Boston_Herald_1904-05-29_48 (1) Hawthorne

Hawthorne at Salem NYPLBoston Herald, May 1904; New York Public Library Digital Gallery.

Sorry—–digression into a rant: the anniversary of PEM’s reluctant admission to the permanent relocation (dislocation) of the Phillips collections approaches (December 6) and so this momentous move is on my mind. I fear that each and every historical occasion in Salem will be impacted by the withdrawal of its archives and the historical disengagement of such a large cultural force in the city. I’m trying to focus on what remains, and this tour provides a great opportunity to do that. The Salem houses in which Nathaniel Hawthorne lived, worked, and was inspired by remain, as well as organizations like Historic Salem, Inc., the Salem Maritime National Historic Site, and the House of the Seven Gables, which are devoted to their preservation—and his memory. We also have more than a century of scholarship on Hawthorne in physical context—and his memorial statue of course, a stark contrast to that dreadful marker to Salem’s other claim to “fame” on the other side of town.

Closson Hawthorne

Hawthorne book collage

SAAM-S0001933The emphasis on Hawthorne’s “Homes and Haunts” begins with the Prang publication of William Baxter Palmer Closson’s portfolio in 1886 and continues today! Salem: Place, Myth and Memory was edited by my colleagues at Salem State University and includes a great chapter on Hawthorne by Nancy Lusignan Schultz. I haven’t read Milder’s Hawthorne’s Habitations yet, but it sounds like it is more focused on his time in England and Italy. The Smithsonian photograph above, of the newly-installed statue in front of the newly-built Hawthorne Hotel in 1925, was taken by Salem’s great horticulturist and planner Harlan Kelsey.


Saturday Shopping in Salem

After Thanksgiving in Maine, I returned to do my civic duty and shop in Salem on Small Business Saturday. For almost as long as I’ve lived here, I have resolved to do all my holiday shopping in the smaller shops of Salem and generally that’s been easy to do. Last year it was slightly more difficult as I boycotted the Peabody Essex Museum’s wonderful store after their reluctant admission that they were shipping most of Salem’s history out of town, and I’m going to stick to that policy until it comes back. A few people on my list will no doubt suffer the consequences! There are more shopping options in Salem than there used to be—although the concentration of witchcraft/Halloween shops along Essex Street is concerning: I just don’t understand the year-round, needless-to say holiday attraction of such purveyors, but maybe I’m in the wrong demographic. I just wish they had nicer signs: actually Vampfangs (for which I know I’m really in the wrong demographic) has a dark albeit curated street presence, but FreakyElegant has looked like a temporary pop-up since it replaced a wonderful toy store several years ago. Further down on Essex there is our local independent bookstore, Wicked Good Books, which is a great place to shop in any season, but that’s about it for Essex Street unless you are looking for more witchcraft wares, PEM goods and PEM-sponsored chocolate, or empty storefronts.

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I wandered over to the Church Street to check out a relatively new craft consortium, Hive & Forge, but it was closed! Or rather the door was locked—I just couldn’t get in. Trying not to take it personally–and will try again. Fortunately the very active Salem Arts Association was holding its annual Holiday Artists’ Market at Old Town Hall, so I walked over there, and then I was in the center of Salem shopping–which is Front Street, and the adjacent Central and lower Lafayette Streets. Within about 2 blocks you can do all your shopping: there’s a very nice concentration of housewares, clothing, and food shops: all oriented towards the entire year rather than just Halloween.

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Shopping 15

Shopping 14Hive & Forge (to which I will return) and some of my favorite things at the Salem Art Association’s holiday market.

On Central Street you have Pamplemousse and Emporium 32 facing each other: both very dependable sources of gifts and everything for the home (including food & wine in the former). Emporium 32 always has the best-dressed windows in town, which are quite representative of the wonders within (plus it has great gifts for men, who dominate my list). Further down this way (which turns into Lafayette) there is everyone’s favorite Cheese Shop of Salem and Mark Your Spot for more eclectic wares. Back on Front, nearly every single storefront is a great shop, with the notable exception of our Congressman’s office (perhaps if he were on Essex he could drive some traffic over there?). The adjoining shops Roost and Oak+Moss, owned, operated, and curated by a Salem couple with great taste, are always go-to shops in Salem, and most especially at this time of year.

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Salem Shopping 21

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Shopping 2A well-dressed window (+reflection) at Emporium 32, plus hats and a wonderful book by Salem artist Sara Richard (from whom I have commissioned MY Christmas gift), The Cheese Chop of Salem, rocking horse at Mark Your Spot, Front Street, RBG at Roost and inside and outside at Oak +Moss.


Pilgrim Life

Life magazine was a different sort of periodical in its first incarnation, from 1883 to 1936, than after, when photographs characterized its style and substance. The earlier Life was all about illustration, and all the famous graphic artists of the era contributed to its pages: everyone from Charles Dana Gibson to Norman Rockwell. It seems to have been a humorous society magazine with some very cutting caricatures, and as I was leafing through a succession of Thanksgiving “numbers” I found a very dark view of the “Ye Merrie New England Thanksgiving of Earlier Dayes” by illustrator F.T Richards from 1895. Dark. Even Hawthornesque, you might say.

Life Thanksgiving Puritans 1895

Pilgrim LifePuritans and Witches 1895

And quite a departure from the more playful portrayal of Thanksgiving Pilgrims published in Life and other contemporary periodicals in the first decades of the twentieth century: First Thanksgivings, amorous encounters and myriad in-the-stocks scenarios. Then the war comes and changes everything for longer than its duration, followed by the cult-of-celebrity culture that still seems to define us.

Life 1904-11-

Life 1910-11-03

Life 1913-11-06

Life1923-11-22 (2)Life covers from 1904, 1910, 1913 & 1923.


Mid (19th)-century Thanksgiving

In the middle of the nineteenth century, Thanksgiving was a very different holiday in some ways, but familiar in others. It did not become a national holiday until 1863: before that the Salem papers (I’m using the Salem Register in this post) note with each passing year how many governors have issued proclamations adopting the “joyous festival, so long the ‘peculiar institution’ of New England”. How jarring to see this phrase applied to Thanksgiving—when I thought it was an exclusive reference to slavery!  I’m not sure I’m really comfortable with the phrase “Universal Yankee Nation” in this 1847 article either.

Thanksgiving 1847 collage

Apart from the provincial pride, Thanksgiving was also a busy public holiday, rather than merely a family gathering. It was both sacred and secular, and everyone was out and about in the morning (for church services) and the evening (for concerts and dances). I assume they ate their Thanksgiving dinners in between, as there were lots of advertisements for various foodstuffs  in the weeks before the big day, which was always in November in Massachusetts despite some December dates chosen by other states. Provisioning and preparations were very important: not just for family meals, but also for the meals that were prepared by different civic groups for orphans, prisoners, “inmates of the Alms House”, and (during the Civil War) soldiers.

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Thanksgiving Salem_Observer_1849-11-24_[2]

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Thanksgiving 1852 collage

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Thanksgiving Salem_Register_1854-11-20_2

Thanksgiving Salem_Register_1857-11-30_2

Thanksgiving Salem_Register_1863-11-05_2

Thanksgiving Salem_Register_1865-11-06_2

Thanksgiving Salem_Register_1875-11-15_2

These advertisements from the Salem Register (from 1847-75) give some semblance of what Thanksgiving festivities were all about in mid-nineteenth-century Salem but are an under-representation: people really wanted to give thanks in as many ways as possible, especially during the Civil War. But they also wanted to celebrate: Thanksgiving is always referred to as a “festival”. Turkey–and other fowl– was definitely on the menu as you can see from the “warning” to Salem’s resident birds, and cranberries as well. I remain extremely impressed by the entrepreneurialism of Mr. John Remond, an African-American man who served as the resident manager and caterer of (a very busy) Hamilton Hall while also running several provisioning businesses downtown: he arrived in Salem from the West Indies in 1798, all alone and only ten years old, and seems to have transformed himself into one of the city’s major players by the 1820s. He and his wife Nancy (who also had her own business–and they had eight children) were also active abolitionists and do not seem to have suffered the handicaps faced by most African-Americans in the nineteenth century, but then again, advertisements only reflect one small sliver of their lives. But they can tell us that year after year in Salem, oysters, whether individually or in pies, were much in demand for Thanksgiving.


Remembrance Roundup

Never have I been so happy to live in the time of the world wide web, as I could see and share all the forms of remembrance this past weekend as the world marked the centenary of the end of World War I. I have been profoundly touched by the cumulative efforts in Britain, starting with the amazing installation Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red four years ago, and under the auspices of the 14-18 Now WWI Centenary Arts Commission more poignant and engaging initiatives and installations followed, right up to the centenary of Armistice Day. The culture of commemoration in Britain appears deeply ingrained from my vantage point, but as the First World War was a global event so too is its remembrance: there were thoughtful exhibitions and installations in all of the Commonwealth countries, across continental Europe, and here in the United States. Here in Salem, I was really happy to see the Salem Maritime National Historic Site tell the story of the Second Corps of Cadets during the Great War on facebook all day long on Sunday, and more than a little confused that the Peabody Essex Museum decided to have a festive “dance party” the night before.

My favorite expressions of remembrance are below, but please nominate others! There is a much more comprehensive roundup of #ArmisticeDay100 in its entirety on Google Arts and Culture.

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Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red, Paul Cummins and Tom Piper, 2014.

Wave Poppies

Wave Poppies at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, 2015. Paul Cummins and Tom Piper. Getty Images.

Were Here

We’re Here because We’re Here, 2016. Jeremy Deller in collaboration with Rufus Norris.

There

There but not There Tommy Silhouettes in Arundel Cathedral, June 2018. An initiative by the UK Charity Remembered.

"La Nuit Aux Invalides : 1918 La Naissance D'Un Nouveau Monde" - 1918 The Rise Of A New World Show In Paris

La Nuit aux Invalides, Bruno Seillier, Summer 2018. Getty Images.

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Dame de Couer, October 2018. Ludovic Marin / AFP / Getty.

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Weeping Window poppies @Imperial War Museum, London, Paul Cummins and Tom Piper, 2018.

A visitor looks at a dove-shaped formation of thousands of artificial red poppies, made out of red bottle tops, at the Botanic Garden in Meise

A Dove of Poppies, Meise, Belgium, November 2018. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir.

Tervuren

A “Trench” of Poppies, Tervuren, Belgium, November 2018. Sven Vangodtsenhoven and Hans Tuerlinckx of Art-Ex.

Some of the 72,396 shrouded figures that form part of the 'Shroud of the Somme' installation by British artist Rob Heard are seen in London's Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, in Stratford, London, Britain

Shrouds of the Somme, 2016-2018, Rob Heard. Toby Melville / Reuters.

Pages of the Sea

Pages of the Sea, November 11, 2018, Danny Boyle.

Ghost Soldiers

“Ghost Soldiers” in a Gloucestershire cemetery, November 11, 2018. Jackie Lantelli.

Poppies

Sydney Opera House, November 11, 2018.


Salem during the Great War

I have been so impressed with the World War One centenary commemoration initiatives both in Europe (where they have been going on since 2014) and the United States (more recent initiatives, organized by towns, states, and the national Centennial Commission): poppies and lights galore, a real focus on humanity, and that amazing “We’re Here because We’re Here” living history event, which makes me cry every time I see more than one minute of video—nope, make that 30 seconds. Of course the commemoration has been more intense in Europe because the loss was more intense, but there have been some impressive American initiatives too: in our region, the Lexington Historical Society, in particular, has gone all out. Here in Salem, we have our veteran squares, which is a lovely program, but that’s about it: we have no organization committed to collecting and interpreting local history in its entirety and in context, and I doubt there’s much money to be made from commemorating the Great War. And that’s really too bad, because the history of Salem’s homefront experience during World War I is absolutely fascinating, and worthy of note. It took me about an hour to search for these items: just imagine if someone with more intent–and more time–did so.

By far the most news generated in local papers (besides reports of troop movements) in 1917 and well into 1918 is that concerned with fundraising, including relief initiatives and the Liberty Loan program by which the federal government financed the war. These were community efforts, involving drives, parades, and all sorts of events—and press. The national posters for the Liberty Loan are amazing (so many different themes and approaches, from full-on jingoism to fear to sentimentality) and the local response equally so. The Boy Scouts were deployed in this effort, and the boys of the Salem Fraternity clearly answered the call. The “Community Chest” initiative started just before the war, and during the war 300 American cities raised charitable funds according to set goals: Salem’s goal was $34,000 a month, which I’m not sure it met, but this big “War Chest” appeared on Washington Street so the effort must have been somewhat successful! There were several relief efforts in Salem: the one which seems to have been the most active was the American Fund for Jewish War Sufferers in the various war zones of Europe and Palestine, which raised 20,000,000 over the course of the war. Mrs. Nathan Shribman, the chair of the “Relief Bazaars” through which Salem would raise its share of those funds, is below in June 2017. One really does get the impression of frenzied fundraising during the entire war, even as the flu raged in the fall of 2018.

Liberty

World War Boy Scouts

WOrld War I Liberty Loan

World War I Salem 1918 Liberty Loan

Salem WWI Fraternity Liberty Loan

Salem World War I Treasure ChestLiberty Loan posters, 1917-1918, Library of Congress; Lining up to buy Liberty Bonds, Salem State University Archives and Special Collections; Salem Boy Scouts on Central Street during a Liberty Loan rally, October 1917, US National Archives; the War Chest on Washington Street, SSU Archives and Special Collections.

As we get into later 1917 and 1918, news from the front dominates the headlines of the Boston and Salem papers, but what happens over there always affects the home front. One of my favorite stories involves a film made by all the Salem families of soldiers in France and sent over there through the YMCA. A wonderful community effort—wish I could find it. Then there is the incredibly story of Salem’s own Ralph C. Browne, a self-taught “hitherto unknown Yankee inventor”, whose antenna firing device made possible the North Sea Mine Barrage in the closing phase of the war: local man wins the war!

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World War I 8 Browne November 3 2018Boston Globe clips, 1918.

So many soldiers. Salem has its very own Saving Private Ryan scenario with the Gibney family, who sent four sons to France and were commended for their sacrifice by President Wilson in the Spring of 2018: this was a national story. Both the Salem and the Boston papers covered the war in a very personal way, sharing as many individual stories as possible, so these are just a few Salem soldiers who experienced terrible loss, joyful reunions, and distinguished themselves with great bravery. Meanwhile, back home, Salem’s residents were supporting their efforts in myriad ways right up until the end, and the Boy Scouts were drilling on Winter Island. Many came back, some did not, but the entire city seems to have turned out for the spectacular Armistice Day parade, a century ago.

World War I April 1918 Gibneys

PicMonkey Image

November 1918

Salem Fraternity Drill 1918

Salem World War 1 Armistice ParadeSalem 1918: just a few Salem soldiers’ experiences as reported in November, Boston Globe; the Boy Scouts drill on Winter Island, US National Archives; Armistice Day Parade, SSU Archives and Special Collections.


The Red and the Black

I prefer the “transitional” seasons of fall and spring when change is apparent nearly every day. Of course all the seasons represent transition but when you think of them in terms of colors winter is white and summer is green whereas fall presents an array of colors and spring can too–though brown mud does prevail here in New England of course. There’s still quite a bit of color here in early November in Salem, though not for long: that late fall “starkness” is starting to set in. The welcome post-Halloween quiet is definitely here too, so I’ve been walking the streets and looking at houses again. For many years, one particular house on lower Essex Street has…….I guess the word would be drawn me. It’s not the most beautiful or well-maintained house, but there’s something about it that is very interesting to me. Stark, like this season. The juxtaposition of the windowless center gable with the rest of the house is curious. Anyway, I was walking by it the other day–a rather gloomy day–and it looked particularly striking, especially as contrasted with the residual bright foliage in other parts of town. It’s an old Crowninshield house, built in the 1750s and turned into a “tenement” in 1849 by a private housing trust named the Salem Charitable Building Association, and I think it’s been a rooming house since that time. I’m assuming that the center entrance gable (???? I’m really not sure what to call it) is an addition and would love to hear some expert opinions on this house!

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And the last of fall (and summer):

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Fireworks for the Fifth

I’ve been immersed in seventeenth-century English instructional texts during my sabbatical, so it wasn’t difficult to find directions for fireworks for Guy Fawkes Night. Whether it was the foiled Gunpowder plot or the aspirational magnificence of the Stuart court, clearly there was demand for some very fancy displays in the air, on the ground, and in the water. One imagines that these flagrant displays would have been one more thing to irk the Puritans, if they were ever produced. Lots of fiery dragons (to highlight St. George), serpents and dolphins. I just love the idea of fighting fire with fire by celebrating with gunpowder, the key ingredient in all of the firework recipes in John Bate’s Mysteries of Art and Nature (1634), John Babbington’s Pyrotechnia. Or a Discourse of Artificial Fireworks (1635, is there any other kind?) and John White’s A Rich Cabinet with Variety of Inventions in Several Arts and Sciences (first published in 1651). The “Green Man” wielding the “firecracker” introducing Bate’s fireworks chapter is one of my very favorite printed images. Remember, remember.

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Babington

Dragons

Dragons Pyrotechnia 1635

Bate 3Green Man

Bate's Fireworks Collage

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Fireworks CollageAll (embellished) illustrations from Bate (1634) with the exception of the Knight +Dragon (Babbington, 1635).


It started in Salem for John Derian

I’ve been a fan of decoupage artist and entrepreneur John Derian forever or what seems like it: since I bought my first piece at a little Marblehead shop named C’est la Vie, which is still very much up and running. And then I bought more glass trays: most from this same shop but I also took pilgrimages to his stores in New York City and Provincetown. Thanks to his collaborations with Target, I was able to obtain even more of Derian’s rediscovered prints, covering utilitarian objects like storage crates, coffee cups, and jewelry boxes. Beautiful stationery that I can’t even bring myself to use. So now there’s probably something Derian in every room in the house (except for those inhabited exclusively by my husband and stepson) but despite his omnipresence in my life I somehow never knew that it all began in Salem for John Derian! I knew he was from Massachusetts, Watertown in particular, but not until I read the forward to an engagement diary which my parents gave me for my birthday last week did I realize that a few colorful prints found at the Canal Street Flea Market in Salem in 1983 inspired his whole brilliant career!

Derian

Derian Collage

Colorful nineteenth-century floral prints found in a box of broken-up antique books and loose papers at a flea market in Salem, Massachusetts. I’m pretty sure this was the Canal Street Flea Market, which was before my time: I checked with Salem’s chronicler of record, Jim McAllister, to see if he had an image but no luck. This was a rather famous flea market though—I can remember hearing about it when I started poking around in markets a bit later than this—so I can understand how it might have drawn Derian up from Watertown. His description of how he was struck by the “power” of these particular images resonates with me completely—I’ve felt that power time and time again on my hunts. How impressive to be able to turn that reaction and appreciation into a decorative arts empire—and how neat that I can add this empire to the increasingly-long list of things that started in Salem.

John Derian around the house–not an exhaustive portfolio!

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Darien Sheep


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