Discover Concord magazine Winter 2021 issue

CONCORD Discover

Who Won the Battles of Lexington and Concord?

Robert Gross Explores The Transcendentalists and Their World

from the

FOUNDERS

Wonderland Welcome to Concord’s Winter

HHow do you celebrate winter – from inside by a warm fire with a good book or outside knee-deep in snow and happy to be dusting off those ice skates or skis once again? Either way, in this issue you’ll find everything you need to know to enjoy winter in Concord.

We love to read, and we know that many of you do, too. This issue reflects that passion with an array of articles that celebrate Concord’s literary tradition, both historical and modern day.

The release of a new book by Robert Gross is always cause for celebration. Historian Victor Curran spoke with Professor Gross about how he came to study Concord’s role in our national history in “A Place Fit for Poets: A conversation with Robert Gross about his new book, The Transcendentalists and Their World” (p. 12).

Concord is home to many celebrated modern-day authors and Sam Copeland takes us into the worlds of two of those fascinating people in “Concord’s Writing Tradition Continues: Alan Lightman & Samantha Power” (p. 18). How does a renowned physicist come to author an illustrated children’s book on the nature of the cosmos (Ada and the Galaxies) and what can a former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and current Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development teach us about the gulf between ideals and reality (The Education of an Idealist)? Discover the fascinating background behind these books and their remarkable authors.

For those with a passion for reading, learning, history, and much more we are fortunate, indeed, to have the Concord Free Public Library available to us year-round. This issue brings you up to date on the Library’s expansion in “A New Chapter for the Concord Free Public Library” (p. 46) and takes you behind-thescenes in our new column, “Stories From Special Collections.” The scope of the Library’s Special Collections is truly amazing and in this first column Anke Voss, Curator of the William Munroe Special Collections, will take you inside the history of Damon Mill (p. 26).

And finally, “Books for the History Lover on Your List” will give you two of historian Richard Smith’s favorite books – titles that any history lover will be delighted to find under the tree (p. 14). Here’s a not-so-easy question - who won the battles of Lexington and Concord? As Park Ranger Jim Hollister tells us, there are many ways to define victory in war. We invite you to hear his interpretation in “Who Won the Battles of Lexington and Concord” (p. 16).

In this issue you’ll also find articles on Concord’s link to the Salem witch trials, how the Concord grape saved many French vineyards, ideas for outdoor winter fun, Nathaniel Hawthorne in Winter, and much more.

As always, we wish you a happy holiday season and a wonderful New Year!

Cynthia L. Baudendistel Co-Founder

Jennifer C. Schünemann Co-Founder

©Pierre Chiha Photographers

Patricia Clarke

C. Schünemann

Pruett

Schünemann

AUTHORS/CONTRIBUTORS:

Pierre Chiha

Sam Copeland

Victor Curran

Marcy Eckel

Jim Hollister

Stewart Ikeda

Eve Isenberg

Jaimee Leigh Joroff

Anne Lehmann

Erica Lome

Barbara Rhines

Tammy Rose

David Rosenbaum

Brigette M.T. Sanchez Jennifer C. Schünemann

Richard Smith

Rob Velella

Anke Voss

Dianne Weiss

Dave Witherbee

Things to See & Do in Concord this Winter

1

Delight the Little Ones with Family Trees. Concord’s renowned literary tradition takes a creative twist during the holiday season with the Concord Museum’s annual Family Trees: A Celebration of Children’s Literature. The Museum is filled with trees and wreaths of all shapes and sizes, fancifully dressed for the occasion with charming original ornaments inspired by a curated collection of children’s picture books. Open now through January 2. More information at concordmuseum.org.

2

Get the Kids Excited About History. A special “Concord 101 Walking Tour” is designed to make the history of Concord Center come alive for elementary-aged children. This 45-minute visit explores everything from the Indigenous people who populated Concord to a notorious bank robbery on the Milldam! Come explore sites such as the Old Hill Burying Ground and the original schoolhouse where Henry David Thoreau taught. December 27-31 at 10am. Departs from the Visitor Center. More at visitconcord.org.

3

Visit the Exhibit ‘HOME: Paintings by Loring W. Coleman’ through January 30 at the Concord Museum. Loring W. Coleman, who lived and taught in Concord, is a nationally recognized en plein air painter of New England landscapes. This stunning display of 47 original works was featured at the Concord Museum in 2020, during the pandemic. To allow more people a glimpse at these beautiful works of art (now that the Museum is open to the public again), an encore exhibit – including additional paintings - is available now through January 30, 2022. Learn more about Coleman and his work in our article “Home: Exploring the Life & Legacy of Loring W. Coleman” in the Winter 2020 issue of Discover Concord, available online at issuu. com/discoverconcordma/docs/discoverconcordwinter20web/54. More information at concordmuseum.org.

4

Elevate Your Arts! Concord is filled with beautiful art on display and in live performance! See our article on p. 56 and discover a wide range of captivating live music, stunning visual arts, compelling theatre, and even classic opera. No need to travel into Boston – Concord has it all!

5

Explore the Concord Sign Museum. This fun journey through Concord’s history is now open to the public. Hosted at Bradford Mill in West Concord, the Museum offers a trip through Concord history via the hand-painted signs of businesses come and gone. Get a sneak peek at the Museum in our article on p. 28. Admission is free. Hours and directions at concordsignmuseum.com

Photo courtesy of Concord Museum

Photo courtesy of Concord Conservatory of Music

6

A Visit with President Lincoln Monday, February 21, 1-2pm. Concord Museum is pleased to again host Steve Wood and his amazing performance as Abraham Lincoln. Wood’s firstperson historical interpretation, “A Visit with Abraham Lincoln,” includes stories of Lincoln’s early life, campaign debates, the Civil War, and concludes with a stirring reading of the Gettysburg Address. Accompanying President Lincoln’s visit, families can participate in a President’s Day craft to learn about how we celebrate and remember past leaders. Ticket includes Museum admission and crafts after the performance. More at concordmuseum.org.

7

Tour Concord – and West Concord! Bundle up and get outside to explore the wonders of Concord’s natural beauty. A 75-minute Historic Walking Tour of Concord is available every day and departs from the Visitor Center at 1pm. You’ll walk down Concord’s historic Main Street and then visit sights such as the Wright Tavern, Monument Square, the Old Hill Burying Ground, and more. A rich array of topic-focused walking tours is available with 18 hours advance notice. Topics include: the Three Cemeteries, West Concord History, the Indigenous People of Concord, Little Women, the Emerson-Thoreau Amble, Women of Concord, or an African American History of Concord Walking (or Biking!) Tour. Learn more, or reserve online, at visitconcord.org.

8

Celebrate the Season at Louisa May Alcott’s Orchard House

The home where Louisa May Alcott wrote and set her beloved classic, Little Women, is as charming as ever with a dusting of snow. Open once more to the public, visitors are admitted under a reserve timed-entry admission. With close to 80% of the furnishings on display being original to the Alcott family, a stroll through Orchard House truly is like taking a walk through Little Women. To ensure entry, please reserve your guided tour in advance at louisamayalcott.org.

9

Sweet History: Colonial Chocolate Thursday, February 24, 10am – 4pm. Free with Concord Museum admission. Drop in throughout the day to immerse yourself in the colonial home as a living historian grinds cocoa beans, adds spices, and concocts delicious treats by the winter hearth. Read a colonial recipe or “receipt” and decipher the steps to cooking rare delicacies in colonial Concord. concordmuseum.org

10 Shop Local this Holiday Season The bustling shopping districts of Concord Center, Nine Acre Corner, Thoreau Depot, and West Concord each offer charming shops and delicious restaurant choices, as well as wonderful gifts for everyone on your list. Markets offer farm-fresh produce and delightful baked goods. And catering services and wine merchants help you put together the perfect holiday gathering. Please try to shop local this holiday season – you’ll make the season merry for your loved ones with a truly unique gift or experience – and you’ll be supporting a local family in the process! Our complete list of “Where to Shop, Where to Eat” on p. 41 (along with walking maps) is a great place to begin. And be sure to see our Guide to Holiday Gift Giving online at issuu.com/discoverconcordma/docs/giftguide2021

11 Go Outside and Have Some Fun This Winter! From a simple hike in nature, to the classic sledding, ice skating, snow shoeing, cross-country skiing, or even downhill tubing and skiing, our neck of the woods is filled with wonderful places to play and enjoy the winter season. See our article on p. 38 for inspiration and ideas to make the most of chilly days and snowy hillsides!

Photo courtesy of Concord Museum

Photo courtesy of Concord Museum

A Place Fit for Poets

A conversation with Robert Gross about his new book, The Transcendentalists and Their World

BY VICTOR CURRAN

“Why Concord?” asks historian Robert A. Gross in the preface to his new book, The Transcendentalists and Their World (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021). One drizzly October afternoon I asked him the same question about his own choice to devote much of his career to examining this singular dot on the map of New England.

W“I came to study Concord not because I was interested in the local history,” he said. “I was interested in the local history as it helped to tell a national history. And I’ve come to love living here. I love the fact that I’m telling a large story with broad implications in one place, a place that is not a backwater, not on the margins.”

He first came here in the 1970s, full of what he calls a “New Left-y” zeal to look

past history’s parade of powerful white men and examine the lives of ordinary workers, women, enslaved people, and indigenous people. America was about to celebrate the bicentennial of the Declaration of Independence, so Prof. Gross applied this approach to what he thought would be a “quickie book” about Concord’s role in the outbreak of war on April 19, 1775. That book became The Minutemen and Their World, which won him the 1977 Bancroft Prize in American History.

His new book takes on another rebellion— the intellectual revolution of the 1830s and 40s, closely associated with Concord authors like Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. We often assume that the upstarts who resisted the old ways of church, school,

and business were simply following a trail blazed by their grandfathers at the North Bridge. But as Prof. Gross reveals, theirs was a very different kind of revolution.

The minutemen “fought for collective ends,” he writes. They “founded a republic on the duty of citizens to serve the public good.” They guarded a Puritan heritage that emphasized “the interdependence of individuals and families within a common way of life.”

The Transcendentalists, on the other hand, were what he calls “cheerleaders for individual growth, education, and development” rather than the collective good. The Transcendentalists didn’t invent the primacy of the individual, but they offered a new way to understand the

© Pierre Chiha

Photographers

political, religious, and economic forces that were already undermining the communal coziness of colonial society.

In 1840, Massachusetts abolished the requirement for all able-bodied white adult males to train with the local militia, eliminating one important form of common participation.

Moral crusaders—many of them evangelical Congregationalist ministers—denounced the strong drink that was enjoyed in taverns and shops, driving locals away from the very places where community bonds were forged and news was shared.

The early 19th century saw the rise of banks in the U.S., and more cash in circulation. More cash meant farmers could pay for goods and services, where before they had “changed works,” e.g., lent a neighbor a pair of oxen in exchange for help with the harvest.

In 1833, Massachusetts voted in favor of disestablishment, ending the colonial-era mandate that every town collect taxes to support a church and a minister. Whether and where to worship was now a matter of personal choice, not of community solidarity.

Ralph Waldo Emerson saw all this, and in his essay “The Present Age” he declared, “incessant change is the condition of life and mind.” He asked his readers to envision religion not as a building, a list of rules, or even a group of people, but as the spirit of divinity that is within you. His prescription for an unsettled world was to look inward for meaning instead of turning to society for guidance.

toward his subject. He acknowledges that Emerson was too slow coming to the aid of the enslaved as he struggled to overcome white racism and a misplaced faith in the power of self-reform to improve society. He was put off by the abolitionists’ selfrighteous tone and their growth into a large, faceless bureaucracy.

Writing The Transcendentalists and Their World drew Prof. Gross closer to Emerson than he had expected. Like many historians, he had thought of the Sage of Concord as dispensing wisdom from a comfortable place of privilege and wealth. And he was deeply troubled by the years it took Waldo to align himself with the antislavery movement.

As he researched more deeply, Prof. Gross says, he grew more sympathetic

Emerson didn’t like to think quantitatively, but he lived in an era when society was increasingly dependent on big numbers to make big decisions. Between the 1830s and the 1850s, the population of Boston nearly doubled, to over 100,000. While Transcendentalism emphasizes the uniqueness of each individual, statistical methods have a democratizing effect. “Every one is a unit,” says Gross, “regardless of rank or order.”

Why are we talking about statistics in a story about Transcendentalism? Because that’s how we learn about the people who didn’t write books or give lectures, but whose

lives absolutely mattered. Statistics are an indispensable tool for social historians like Prof. Gross. And right here in Concord, Lemuel Shattuck pioneered the use of public data to document history in his 1835 History of Concord

Prof. Gross calls Shattuck “my progenitor,” devoted to unearthing every fact and to preserving original documents. But where Shattuck insisted that facts equaled truth, Gross believes it is the questions we put to the facts that point us to the truth. (Shattuck was not above scoring a cheap laugh at the expense of the Transcendentalists. In his 1849-50 public health survey of Massachusetts, he wrote, “What we are proposing is entirely practical; it is no transcendentalism.”)

For all its statistical underpinnings, The Transcendentalists and Their World is, first and foremost, a story of people. We meet familiar figures—authors, clergymen, politicians—but Prof. Gross employs the same lively detail to introduce us to their unsung neighbors and relatives. (My personal favorite is Thoreau’s uncle Charley Dunbar, an eccentric bachelor noted for entertaining taverngoers with card tricks and athletic feats.)

The Transcendentalists and Their World takes us back to the roots of Discover Concord magazine. Even before Nathaniel Hawthorne popularized Concord as a bucolic retreat in Mosses from an Old Manse (1846), the town consciously presented itself as the quintessential New England village, just a short train trip away from Boston, or as Gross puts it, “a quiet, pastoral place, fit for poets and philosophers.” Even as they reckoned with a society in change, the Transcendentalists were happy to affirm this assessment.

Victor Curran writes and leads tours of historic Concord and is an interpreter at the Concord Museum and the Old Manse. He teaches courses and writes articles about the men and women who made Concord the home of American independence and imagination.

Books for the History Lover on Your List

BY RICHARD SMITH

IIt’s that time of year again when we start to think about holiday gift giving. And what’s better than giving or getting a book as a present? So let’s talk about books! Since this is a magazine dedicated to Concord, let’s focus on books about that most important day of days in Concord history, April 19, 1775.

As a professional historian, I’m very picky about the books that I read, especially ones that deal with Concord. The books that I’ve chosen for this list are two of my favorites; books that teach me something new whenever I reread them. And while both books are older, it’s easy to find them online or in a used bookstore (I highly suggest Barrow Bookstore in Concord). If you want to truly understand what happened on April 19, 1775, and have a history buff on your holiday gift list, these two books are, in my opinion, the best.

Paul Revere’s Ride by David Hackett Fischer was published in 1994 and was required reading when I became a National Park Ranger at Minute Man National Historical Park in 1999. It starts in 1774 and recounts the months and days in Boston leading up to the Battles of Lexington and Concord. While the book is focused on Paul Revere and his now almost-mythical ride, other historical heavyweights are in the narrative as well, including Bostonians like John Hancock, Sam Adams, and Dr. Joseph Warren.

Fischer’s book paints a very realistic picture of what it was like in Boston in the year leading up to the Revolution. And the events in Boston had a very real effect on the villages of Lexington and Concord! His account of the battles on April 19 is accurate and well interpreted and the reader will come away with a better understanding of

not only the first day of the Revolutionary War, but how a silversmith named Revere became a legendary American hero (thanks to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow).

The second book I would suggest is a classic; The Minutemen and Their World by Robert Gross. Published in 1976, it’s still the best book ever written about Concord and the events of April 19, 1775.

The Minutemen and Their World is a social and cultural history of 18th century Concord. While we think of Concord as being a quaint New England town, in 1775 it was a bustling, noisy, farming village, and the Revolution was fermenting! Events in Boston were about to put Concord onto the world stage and on April 19th “The Shot Heard Round the World” would solidify the town’s place in history.

Gross’ book really brings Revolutionary Concord to life, and people with the names of Emerson, Buttrick, Bliss, Hosmer, and Davis are living, breathing characters. Their hopes, fears, dreams, and anxieties are palpable as the British redcoats march out of Boston and head for a showdown with the minutemen that was all but inevitable.

Both of these books are a must-read for any history buff, or for anyone who wants to learn more about the town of Concord. Both have stood the test of time and both are worth reading and rereading again and again.

Richard Smith has worked as a public historian in Concord for 21 years, specializing in Henry David Thoreau, the Transcendentalists, the Anti-Slavery movement, and the Civil War. He has written six books for Applewood Books and is a tour guide for Concord Tour Company.

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Who Won the Battles of Lexington and Concord?

BY JIM HOLLISTER, PARK RANGER, MINUTE MAN NATIONAL HISTORICAL PARK

IIn war, there are many ways to define victory. So, who won the Battles of Lexington and Concord? On the surface this may seem simple. The colonists were able to keep most of their military supplies safely out of British hands. The British soldiers then suffered heavy casualties during their retreat to Boston where they were trapped and besieged. However, though things certainly did not go the way they wanted, did the British Army actually lose on April 19, 1775? The answer depends upon how you define victory.

On April 18, 1775, General Thomas Gage ordered Lt. Colonel Francis Smith to march with several hundred soldiers 18 miles from Boston to Concord, to “seize and destroy all Artillery, Ammunition, Provisions, Tents, Small Arms, and all Military Stores whatever…”

This makes for a round trip of nearly 40 miles through a hostile countryside.

The mission did not start out well. Fighting erupted at dawn in Lexington where the first colonists were killed. At Concord, most of the military supplies the British came looking for had already been moved. Around 9:30 a.m. more fighting broke out at the North Bridge, where the first British soldiers died. All that was left to do now was to return to Boston. The British began their march around noon as thousands of rebel militiamen were fast approaching.

Marching a column of troops through hostile territory is a complicated and dangerous operation. Not surprisingly, there is a manual for that. Among the most influential military books of the 18th century was A Treatise of Military Discipline by Lieutenant General Humphrey Bland. Bland devoted an entire chapter to “…Marching of a Regiment of Foot, or a Detachment of Men, where there is a Possibility of their being Attacked by the Enemy.”

Bland recommended forming strong advance (van) and rear guards. The purpose of the vanguard was “to reconnoiter, or view, every place where any number of men can lie

concealed, such as woods, copses, ditches, hollow ways, straggling houses, or villages, through which you are to march or pass near…” The rear-guard was to provide security for the rear of the column. In between the van and rear-guard, were “flanking parties.”

These were “small parties, commanded by sergeants, marching on the flanks (sides) of the battalion with orders to examine all the hedges, ditches and copses which lie near the road…”1

There is strong evidence that the British column was organized for the return march using the principles laid out in Bland’s Treatise… For example, Ensign DeBerniere, 10th Reg’t of Foot, wrote “…we began the march to return to Boston, about twelve o’clock in the day, in the same order of march, only our flankers were more numerous and further from the main body…” 2 Later, Lt. Frederick MacKenzie, who marched with the reinforcements, wrote that his brigade “… marched in the following order, Advanced guard of a captain and 50 men; 2 six-pounders… Rear guard of a Captain and 50 men.”3

Smith was also fortunate that half of his force was made up of the light infantry. Light infantry were soldiers who were specially trained to operate in small units, take advantage of cover, and skirmish with the enemy. In 1771 the Army officially added one company of light infantry to each regiment.4

Despite this, the retreat to Boston was tough going. The column had not even made it out of Concord when they were attacked by newly arrived militia companies from Reading, Chelmsford, and Billerica.5 The broken agricultural landscape played much to the colonists’ advantage. According to Lt. John Barker, 4th Regiment of Foot, “…the Country was an amazing strong one, full of hills, woods, stone walls, &c., which the Rebels did not fail to take advantage of…” 6

In describing the activity of the light infantry, Captain William Soutar of the Marines wrote “Sometimes we took possession of one hill, sometimes of another…” 7 This indicates that the flanking parties were not simply sweeping across the landscape, but

4th Regiment of Foot Light Infantry Company

actively attempting to control key terrain, like hills. Imagine keeping that up for 18 miles!

As the afternoon wore on, the situation grew desperate. According to Ensign Henry DeBerniere “…when we arrived within a mile of Lexington, our ammunition began to fail, and the light companies were so fatigued with flanking they were scarce able to act, and a great number of wounded scarce able to get forward, made a great confusion…”

Sometime around 3:00 p.m. Brigadier General Hugh, Earl Percy arrived with about 1,000 reinforcements from 1st Brigade.8 The brigade, though delayed, arrived east of Lexington Center just as Smith’s column was falling apart.

Though temporarily halted by Percy’s arrival, the rebels again moved in to attack. According to Lt. Frederick MacKenzie, “During this time the Rebels endeavored to gain our flanks, and crept into the covered ground on either side, and as close as they could in

front, firing now and then in perfect security. We also advanced a few of our best marksmen who fired at those who shewed themselves.” These professional soldiers were neither easy targets nor sitting ducks.

As the march resumed, the Colonial militia’s numbers increased. The more thickly settled village of Menotomy (today Arlington) provided a new opportunity. Lt. MacKenzie wrote “…we were fired upon from all quarters but particularly from the houses on the roadside, and the adjacent stonewalls. … the Soldiers were so enraged at suffering from an unseen Enemy, that they forced open many of the houses from which the fire proceeded and put to death all those found in them…”

In Cambridge, Percy veered his column onto the road to Charlestown instead of continuing through Cambridge and across Charles River, where the rebels were waiting in ambush. This unexpected move temporarily threw off the pursuit and likely saved many lives.9

Pressing forward more danger lay ahead. A large force from Salem and Marblehead arrived within musket range of Charlestown Neck. For reasons still unexplained, these Essex County men, led by Colonel Pickering, did not attack. This allowed the British column to escape into Charlestown where they took a strong position on Bunker Hill.10 It was near 7:00 p.m. and the fight was over. Who won?

In terms of numbers, the British suffered more casualties than the colonists. However, Smith and Percy were able to bring the majority of their soldiers, outnumbered more than two to one, home after a march of nearly 40 miles –half of it under fire. In such a dire situation, survival is a victory in itself. In truth however, neither side considered the events of that day a victory. For the British Army it was a disaster. For the colonists, it was a tragedy.

1Bland, Humphrey. A Treatise of Military Discipline: In which is Laid Down and Explained the Duty of the Officer and Soldier, Thro’ the Several Branches of the Service. Ireland, D. Midwinter, J. and P. Knapton, 1743. 2Account of Ensign Henry DeBerniere, report to General Gage, Massachusetts Historical Society, Vol. 4, pgs 215-219. Also published in Kehoe, Vincent, “We Were There! April 19, 1775” 1974. 3French, Allen, “A British Fusilier in Revolutionary Boston: Being the Diary of Lieutenant Frederick MacKenzie, Adjutant of the Royal Welch Fusiliers, January 5 – April 30, 1775”, Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA, 1926. 4Macniven, Robbie, “British Light Infantry in the American Revolution” Osprey Publishing Ltd, Oxford UK, 2021 pg 11. 5Sabin, Douglass, “April 19, 1775, A Historiographical Study, Part IV: Meriam’s Corner”, Minute Man National Historical Park, National Park Service, Concord MA. 1985. 6Atlantic Monthly, Volume 39, “Diary of a British Soldier: John Barker, Lieutenant, King’s Own Regiment” April 1877. 7Kehoe, Vincent, “We Were There! April 19, 1775: Captain William Soutar, Correspondence” 1974. 8Boston National Historic Sites Commission, “The Lexington-Concord Battle Road Hour-by-Hour Account of the Events Preceding and on the HistoryMaking Day April 19th 1775” Eastern National, 2010, pg 25. 9Fischer, David Hackett “Paul Revere’s Ride” Oxford University Press, Oxford and New York, 1994. Pg 259. 10Ibid pg 260.

The agricultural terrain favored the Colonial militia

Concord’s Writing Tradition Continues: Alan Lightman & Samantha Power

BY SAM COPELAND

CConcord’s great tradition of writing lives on today. Here we highlight just two of the books published recently by Concordians: Alan Lightman’s Ada and the Galaxies, and Samantha Power’s The Education of an Idealist.

On a clear summer night Alan Lightman pushed a little boat out into the ocean from his summer home in Maine. The physicist, whose research covered topics like plasma and accretion disks, looked up into the night sky and, as he put it “fell into infinity.” The experience convinced him that the world of his academic work - of mathematics, observation, and physical laws - was not necessarily in conflict with the world of beauty and spirituality. On the contrary, it appeared that the vastness of the cosmos and the interconnectivity of matter, laid bare by science, was itself a path to the numinous. Despite the singular impact of this experience, it came to Lightman amid a long career of bridging the world of science with that of our inner lives. Lightman is perhaps best known for his book Einstein’s Dreams, which blended a fictionalized biography of the great physicist with the fantastical literary techniques of Borges and Calvino. Lightman’s current academic post is in

comparative media studies at MIT. In both his writing and his teaching, Lightman has settled neither in the sciences nor in the humanities, but in the lines of connection between them.

It seems only natural then that Lightman would move into the domain of children’s science literature, as he has with Ada and the Galaxies. The book was written with Olga Pastuchiv and illustrated by Susanna Chapman, whose lush paintings are intermixed with photographs from the Hubble Space Telescope. The idea for the book came to Lightman when he saw his granddaughter Ada looking at pictures of galaxies. “Ada was mesmerized,” says Lightman, “I’d never seen her react to pictures that strongly. So I thought that if Ada was reacting that way then maybe other children would as well.”

Ada and the Galaxies tells the story of Ada and her grandfather – or, as she says, “Poobah” – who is clearly modeled off Lightman. Ada visits Poobah from the city, where light pollution blocks out the stars. She wants to look at the stars with Poobah, but when night comes so do clouds covering the sky. To soothe Ada’s disappointment Poobah brings out pictures from the Hubble Space

Telescope. The clouds last long enough for Poobah to teach Ada some lessons about the nature of the cosmos, and leave in time for Ada to finally go out and look at the stars with her own eyes.

MIT Press chose Ada and the Galaxies as the first book to be published in their new imprint, MIT Kids Press. Lightman plans to write more books for them. “Ada was thrilled to have a book named after her,” says Lightman, “But now I have to write three more books since I have three more grandchildren.” Lightman says the next

grandchild will get her book “in the next ten months or so.”

Ada and the Galaxies takes place at the same summer house in Maine where Lightman had his vision of infinity, and the two share a strong connection. “The underlying message of Ada is that all things in nature are made out of the same stuff and are all connected,” says Lightman. In the book Ada asks Poobah if there are seashells in other galaxies. Poobah answers yes, saying, “Everything in the universe is made out of the same stuff. It’s all part of nature. Even things that we can’t see.”

Some scientists conclude from that idea that the meaning and beauty in our lives reduces to brute matter doing nothing but realizing mathematical necessities. Lightman, however, seems to draw the opposite conclusion - that our inner lives are somehow reflected in the cosmos from which they emerge. In Ada and the Galaxies Lightman communicates this optimistic philosophy to the next generation of scientists – and artists.

Like Alan Lightman’s work, that of Samantha Power traverses disparate worlds. But whereas Lightman occupies the connecting lines between worlds, Power jumps back and forth between them –between immigrant and citizen, social critic and social official, mother and public servant. Her recent book, The Education of an Idealist documents the complexities of jumping between these worlds.

Power rose to prominence with the publication of her first book, A Problem from Hell. The book criticizes the United States for not intervening in the many genocides of the 20th century, and argues that the United States should be more active in the use of its military and diplomatic might. The book came out of Power’s time covering the Yugoslav Wars of the 90s, during which she witnessed ethnic cleansings and despaired that developed countries were not doing enough to stop them. This experience prompted her to become an advocate for the “responsibility to protect” doctrine, of which A Problem from Hell is a founding document. Six years after the publication of A Problem from Hell, Barack Obama appointed Power to

the National Security Council, and then, for his next term, made her the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. Suddenly, after years of criticizing U.S. foreign policy, Power was in a position to make it. The Education of an Idealist is in large part about Power’s difficulty in translating the ideals of her advocacy days into realities as a state official. However,

Power insists that, although “some may interpret this book’s title as suggesting that I began with lofty dreams about how one person could make a difference, only to be ‘educated’ by the brutish forces that I encountered, that is not the story that follows.”

The Education of an Idealist does, however, show the challenges posed to Power’s “idealism” in her new role. On one side, there were the complexities of diplomacy, the intractability of foreign leaders, and the unforeseeable consequences of military intervention. On the other, there was Barack Obama himself, who had run on an antiinterventionist platform to a war-weary American public. But Power did not give up on her beliefs. In the face of harsh criticism she supported military intervention to oust Gaddafi in Libya and Assad in Syria, only the former of which was carried out.

Yet much of The Education of an Idealist is about family rather than foreign policy. Power tells the story of her parents’ meeting, of her mother’s fight to receive an education, and of her family’s emmigration from Ireland. The book covers the difficulties of balancing work and family life – how, for instance, Power’s plans to read bedtime stories were thwarted by sudden international crises. Power is someone with a deep passion for her political work, but there is a palpable sense of relief when the end of Obama’s terms relieves her of her post. She then turns her attention to things like teaching her son piano, and muses that his playing sounds like that of her late father.

But duty has once again called Power away. This year President Biden appointed her as Administrator of the United States Agency of International Development. She has once again jumped from one world to another, this time from the calm, quiet beauty of Concord to the high-stakes, frenetic energy of Washington DC. But Power is, if nothing else, a veteran of such jumps – between family and work, criticism and implementation, and, the greatest gulf of all, between ideals and reality.

Sam Copeland is a Concord native and a writer based in New York.

Public domain

Preserving the House at October Farm for Future Generations

BY BARBARA RHINES

OOften the owners of a beautiful home are called “lucky” or “fortunate” and the same can be said of this historic home, which has benefited from a caring line of owners throughout its 250 years of existence. Now, its current owners, Reinier and Nancy Beeuwkes, have arranged for its permanent preservation. Every historic property should be so lucky.

The Beeuwkeses purchased the classic center-entrance Georgian Colonial homestead in 1992 after raising their family in Wellesley and later outside of Philadelphia. Both Reinier and Nancy have deep New England roots, and Reinier is descended from old Concord stock. They agreed that it would be fun and fitting to “come home again.”

In 1992, they purchased October Farm, aware of the property’s rich and long history. The land has been in active agricultural use for over 300 years and was acquired by Humphrey Barrett in 1655. The house dates to the time of John Barrett’s wedding in 1744, a wedding gift. The Barretts held the working farm for 154 years, and in 1898, the property was sold to William Brewster who called it October Farm. Brewster was a famed Harvard ornithologist and the first president of the Massachusetts Audubon Society.

Upon Brewster’s passing, the house and land were sold to the Buttrick family. The house still shows the careful renovations of John Buttrick, including the 1930s redesign of the attached carriage house into a beautiful library and meeting space.

While the house was well cared for and its history appreciated throughout the 20th century, its 300 acres of land had been whittled away to 12 acres. Recently, 80 acres of the original farm was acquired by the Town of Concord and the Concord Land Conservation Trust and named the October Farm Riverfront, with public access. Then through serendipity, Nancy and Reinier learned of another 130 acres of Brewster’s original land that was coming up for sale and quickly closed the deal. They donated that acreage and the 12 acres that they already held to Mass Audubon. In a further

by

generous move, the Beeuwkeses created a life estate so that after their passing, the historic house itself will also be fully owned and protected by Mass Audubon.

In the meantime, Nancy and Reinier thoroughly enjoy living in their bucolic property. The gardens have been expanded and the house filled with family heirlooms and period-appropriate antiques. They also aren’t afraid to put their own stamp on the house. Nancy loves Provence and its cheerful colors. The house is currently a beautiful sunny yellow. Nancy admits that it is not a Colonial-era shade, but it makes her happy and complements the surrounding perennial gardens and autumn leaves. They also added a Victorianinspired conservatory to the home. It is something that seemed fitting for a fine estate, and the couple enjoys watching birds flit through the landscape.

The house has indeed been fortunate. But lovers of history, architecture, natural beauty, and conservation efforts are also lucky. October Farm will always be here for us to enjoy.

Barbara Rhines is a freelance writer in the Boston area specializing in architectural history, home renovation, and the decorative arts.

Photo

Barbara Rhines

©Pierre Chiha

Photographers

Taking It All In

A Busy Concord Family is Grounded by a Panorama of the Seasons

BY EVE ISENBERG

TThe original marketing material for Deck House, Inc., the company that built many thousands of kit-of-parts houses all over the country and abroad since its inception in 1959, is meant to be inspirational:

“The Deck House concept, as developed by its designer, Mr. William J. Berkes, evolved from the recognized need ... for a contemporary house that would satisfy most of the requirements of a considerable segment of the market. This should be a house of exemplary materials and construction... Deck House tries to satisfy many common desires - an organic house that will tastefully relate indoors

to outdoors and make it possible to enjoy both simultaneously... There are also the more subtle psychological urgings often contradictory, as in the wish to be free, uncaged, and yet to be enveloped and protected - to be an intimate witness to a winter storm, and yet be sheltered and warm - to live as a non-conformist, and yet to be accepted as a respected citizen of the community. ... we made the satisfaction of these needs the underlying premise of the Deck House concept.”

Bill Berkes designed his own Deck House here in Concord in 1962. He only lived in it for a short while, but the following two

owners lovingly cared for the home for more than 50 years. In 2016 ownership transferred to a new couple, both architects by training. I asked them what drew them to the house initially. “Upon entering the living room and seeing the expansive view of the wetlands, we knew immediately we’d found our next home. The thoughtful siting of all of the homes in this neighborhood maximize outdoor, private ‘rooms’ as well as views. We looked at many houses with views, or that successfully brought nature in through large windows, but none incorporated all of this so succinctly as this one,” said the homeowner.

“Upon entering the living room and seeing the expansive view of the wetlands, we knew immediately we’d found our next home.”

These Mid-Century Modern houses for “Everyman” are newly of interest for their historic significance as architect-designed, quality-engineered housing constructed in the tradition of fine craftmanship. But they can also be successfully updated for modern living. Shifting regulations, values and priorities require renovations with careful planning so as to preserve the Deck House concept. These homes can be successfully updated for modern living. The homeowner elaborated some of the projects:

“... the previous owner had replaced all of the windows with insulated glass. Ultimately, we reconfigured and updated the kitchen and bath to better accommodate our family’s lifestyle. We treasured the original double-sided fireplace, but it could only be ornamental, and the heat loss there was significant. So, we opted for a high efficiency wood burning insert which can heat the entire home on milder nights. We overhauled the HVAC system with whole house heat pumps - high efficiency heat, utilizing electricity through about 85% of the heating season.... We hope to blend the timeless qualities of the original home with sought after amenities of modern living.”

Residential architecture is an intimate study of the design of the environment, and I believe our homes influence our character and that of our children. When asked to comment on this theory the homeowners agreed:

“... the design absolutely impacts our family behavior. The expansive windows in every room invite constant interaction with nature and exterior views. The orientation results in morning light streaming into the kitchen, and relaxing views of the wetlands from several living spaces and patio. We both work from home, and are lucky to have our office space overlooking the wetlands.”

Eve Isenberg, Principal of the Concordbased, women-owned InkStone Architects LLC, is a MA and NH registered architect and a Deck House homeowner in Concord.

The existing patio was replaced with permeable materials, and retaining walls rebuilt to incorporate terraced garden beds to better control erosion.

Stories From Special Collections: Damon Mill

BY ANKE VOSS

Welcome to the first in an ongoing series that gives you a sneak peek into Concord Free Public Library’s renowned Special Collections. The William Munroe Special Collections seeks to cultivate the most comprehensive collection of Concord, Massachusetts’ unique history, social and political life, culture, people, and landscape. To provide an understanding and appreciation of Concord’s history and culture through developing, preserving, interpreting, sharing, and promoting our Special Collections. The Special Collections include primary and secondary resource materials - such as papers and manuscripts, books, pamphlets, ephemera, broadsides, maps, photographic holdings, and works of art. In addition, the holdings of the Town of Concord Archives include historical vital records (births, deaths, and marriages), town meeting minutes, select board records, annual reports, and early town records.

SSpecial Collections recently acquired family papers and business records related to the Damon family and the Damon Mill, a textile manufacturer which in the 19th century, operated on Main Street in West Concord, then known as Factory Village. Descendants of the textile mill owner Calvin Carver Damon donated a wealth of archival materials that enrich our understanding of the Damon family and their operation of the mill.

Thanks, in part, to the Assabet River, the Damon mill area has been associated with manufacturing since the 17th century, home to ironworks as well as saw, grist, and fulling mills. Calvin Damon, who had married Rebecca Poor Farnham in 1832, bought the mill in 1834, from James Derby, for $18,000. The mill had been producing satinet, a finely woven fabric made mainly from cotton, commonly used for men’s clothing. Calvin Damon eventually phased out the manufacture of satinet. Instead, he began manufacturing his original domett cloth (or domet), a cotton and wool flannel. Among the items donated is Calvin Carver Damon’s journal ledger, dated 1836-1851, which he kept while heading operations at the mill. Calvin Damon’s son, Edward Carver Damon, took over mill operation at 17 upon his father’s sudden death in 1854. Edward,

who had already spent considerable time working in all mill operations, increased production, made extensive repairs, and purchased new machinery. Edward married Anne Hagar Damon in 1860, together raising a large family and managing significant civic and social commitments.

In 1861, Damon Mill entered a contract with the United States government to produce fifty thousand yards of white cotton and wool flannel for the U.S. Army. As a result, business boomed, but a fire destroyed the mill only a year later, on June 19, 1862. Undeterred, Edward rebuilt the mill within just a year. He hired acclaimed Worcester architect Elbridge Boyden, who designed the new mill building in the Italianate style, which one can still admire today, at the intersection of Pond Lane and Main Street in West Concord. Edward also constructed tenement housing for his growing workforce, which employed men and women, and over the next two decades, the mill flourished, and the area, then known as Westvale, thrived and grew. In another decade, its name would change to Concord Junction, and later West Concord, as we know it today.

By the late 1880s, the mill was experiencing significant financial problems. Edward Damon, now joined in the business by his son Ralph, purchased controlling

Edward Carver Damon

Calvin Carver Damon

Anne Hagar Damon

interest and reorganized as Damon Manufacturing Company. As the bank panic of 1893 spread throughout the nation, the mill operation was mortgaged to The Middlesex Institution for Savings. Finally, in 1898, as the textile industry declined, the bank sold the mill, spelling the end of the Damon Mill era. The recent donation includes Edward’s daybook from 18621881 and an account book from 1863-1894, documenting the growth and decline of mill operations.

Anne and Edward Damon were important figures in the town’s social life, attending lectures and events. While Edward’s daily entries note notable events in the mill’s operation, there is also much “daily life” in

his journal, providing intriguing glimpses into Concord’s life in that era. Edward was instrumental in founding the Royal Arch Chapter of Masons, served on the Water Board, Library Committee (along with Ralph Waldo Emerson), Centennial Commission, School Committee (as did his wife, Anne), and was a member of the Social Circle. Anne was also an active member of the Concord Female Charitable Society and a director of Concord Home for the Aged. The recent gift includes a combination journal/ ledger kept by Edward and Anne of personal and household expenses from 1854 to 1858.

The Damon Mill complex continued to function as a site for various manufacturers well into the 20th century, including as a mill for the Strathmore Worsted Company and as a cold storage facility for apples for fifty

years. In the 1970s, developer Bill Sullivan, in partnership with Richard Damon, Calvin Carver Damon’s great-great-grandson, finally restored the building. After several years of work, it reopened as Damonmill Square and in 1980 earned a place on the National Register of Historic Places.

Anke Voss is Curator of the William Munroe Special Collections at Concord Free Public Library.

of

Damon Mil ca. 1863

Calvin Carver Damon’s journal ledger, 1836

Concord Sign Museum Preserves Memories

BY TAMMY ROSE

I“I don’t know if this one will make it,” says Billy Crosby, evaluating the badly deteriorated old Tourist Info sign that hung for decades outside the old Visitor Center. “They painted directly onto untreated plywood, so it’s flaking. The seal sticker is peeling. And look at how they tried to fix the lettering!” He shakes his head. Anything that does not make it to the display hallways still has no fear of the dumpster. Billy’s not about to toss any of it. “Someday I might do a hall of ‘Frauds’,” referring to signs so badly deteriorated that he has to stabilize them so they can hang in the museum. The gentle wear and tear of the handpainted signs reflects not only the patina of weather but also the quality of the original construction and he wants to be fully transparent about their condition. His main job for the past 40 plus years has been to create and refresh the signs around town. Anytime a Concord business closes, his creations will usually find a way back to his own collection. And now that collection has formed the bulk of the new Concord Sign Museum.

Some owners want particular colors, but Billy is the consultant to remind them that the signs need to be read from the street. Decades ago, when Friendlys on the corner of Sudbury & Thoreau Streets was being replaced by Dunkin Donuts, Guy DiGiovanni wouldn’t give it a lease unless he could approve the signage. He picked colors for the letters and the background that were literally almost the same color, not giving enough visual contrast to even be legible. Like any good signmaker, Billy created raised lettering and tweaked the colors slightly. The store has recently been remodeled and the corporate pink and orange logo is back, but the video of Billy talking about the famous beige on beige sign can be seen on the museum’s website, concordsignmuseum.com.

ABOVE: Billy Crosby contemplating the old Tourist Info sign for Visitor Center

LEFT: Original location of Tourist Info sign in front of old Visitor Center

hand. Before Billy, Charlie Mogan was the Concord sign painter in the 1950s and 1960s. Some of his work is signed, other pieces can be identified by his distinctive use of “gold leaf and a classic look.” In the Museum, the current arrangement is informal, everywhere they will fit, taken completely out of their native context. They certainly hold their own as objects of art.

In the decades before computers made everyone familiar with the notion of a font, consistent lettering was created by an artist’s

If you have grown up in town, like John Boynton, the other founder of the museum, you can point to the photography studio where your family went for their portraits when you were a kid, like Anderson Photo. Or a sign might trigger a funny memory from when you were a teenager about a town trend. The House of Good Spirits (HOGS) once was where Concord Provisions is now on Thoreau St. “When I was in high school, this was the Concord Package Store (aka a “packie” or liquor store). They had t-shirts that said HOGS. Lots of high school kids wore HOGS

shirts around. I hadn’t thought of it for years. Oh my god, I had that t-shirt!” John says with a laugh, knowing that other locals his age share the in-joke.

John was the one to connect the dots to make the Concord Sign Museum happen, aware that these artifacts were community treasures. Coming from generations of real estate businesses and builders in Concord, he had amassed a modest collection of signs himself, knowing that they were the last representation of a business before it moved, changed logos or names, or just plain closed. Being so involved in the local business community, he also wanted to create a way to honor the neighborhood institutions as well as the locals who shopped or worked there. He lights up when he shows off a video he did of a daughter and father dropping off a sign for donation.

Since opening to the public on September 15, 2021, with 60 signs, more have been added.

LOGISTICS

Most date from after World War II and are part of living memory. There are plans to post QR codes next to the signs; each has its own page on the main website. The ultimate goal is to create a crowdsourced repository of memories for today and for future generations, including pictures and videos.

The signs for the Toy Shop and the West Concord 5&10 are in the Museum; both shops have closed recently during Covid, but not directly because of it. The sight of them in a new context feels like a bit of a surprise. Like old familiar friends, they seem comfortable in their new home, no longer announcing an actual brick and mortar store, but still signifiers of more than anything a building could contain.

Tammy Rose is the founder of Transcendental Concord.com, a community platform which celebrates Concord’s history and literature and the people who keep them both alive.

SOURCES

Crosby Design Inc crosbydesign.com

Bradford Mill bradfordmill.com

Toy Shop bostonglobe.com/2020/07/09/ metro/toy-shop-concord-willclose-end-month/ Closed 7/31/2020 after 78 years

Concord Sign Museum is located off the beaten path, literally. Take a turn off Commonwealth Ave in West Concord onto Bradford St and you’ll enter the Bradford Mill complex. Drive past the three buildings which once housed the Allen Chair Company and are now full of coworking spaces, design firms, and art studios. The entrance is in the very back, between the smokestack and the commuter rail tracks. The museum can be visited online at concordsignmuseum.com or in person between 9am and 5pm. The building has an elevator for easy accessibility. Tours are selfguided; explore the building by following the signs that are displayed in the lobby, up the staircase, winding around the hallways and up a few stairs onto the outside deck. Admission is free. If you have a memory to share, go to the website and contribute your story. Bonus points for videos that document a genuine Concord accent! And if you happen to have an old Concord sign in the attic or garage, the museum is eager to grow the collection and might take them as a donation or even on loan. For walking tours of West Concord which start at the Sign Museum, go to visitconcord.org.

West Concord 5&10 wickedlocal.com/story/ concord-journal/2020/07/15/ changing-of-times-west-concord5amp10-closing-debs-planningexpansion/114659878/ Closed Jan of 2021 after 70 years

Guy DiGiovanni interview: concordlibrary.org/uploads/ scollect/OH_Texts/DiGiovanni.html

Anderson Photo concord.wickedlocal.com/ x1130688382/COMMENTARYAnderson-family-s-photospreserve-Concord-s-history. Closed in 2010 after more than 60 years

Tby John Adams Whipple, c. 1853

“There is snow in yonder cold gray sky of the morning! And, through the partially frosted window-panes, I love to watch the gradual beginning of the storm.” So writes Nathaniel Hawthorne in his sketch “Snowflakes,” one of many where the author takes his readers into the winter season. First published in 1838 and collected in the second volume of his Twice-Told Tales in 1842, the sketch describes everything from a winter storm (“reverently welcomed by me, her true-born son, be New England’s winter”) to a children’s snowball fight (“What pitched battles worthy to be chanted in Homeric strains!”) to the gloom of a winter burial (“Oh how dreary is a burial in winter, when the bosom of Mother Earth has no warmth for her poor child!”). No matter the season, it seems, Hawthorne’s thoughts were never too far from the grave.

To Hawthorne, winter is a symbol of change and an opportunity for reflection. Winter, like death, is something that unnerves people. As he also writes in “Snowflakes:”

How does Winter herald his approach? By the shrieking blast of latter autumn which is Nature’s cry of lamentation as the destroyer rushes among the shivering groves where she has lingered and scatters the sear leaves upon the tempest. When that cry is heard, the people wrap themselves in cloaks and shake their heads disconsolately, saying, “Winter is at hand.”

Though not as noted for his interest in nature and its seasons as his Concord neighbors Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry

Winter is at Hand: Nathaniel Hawthorne and Winter

David Thoreau, Hawthorne was a keen observer of New England’s changes from month to month.

BY ROB VELELLA

In an oft-quoted passage, Hawthorne’s wife Sophia Peabody recorded the three men’s attempt at ice skating in a particularly frosty Concord winter. As she wrote in December 1842, “Henry Thoreau is an experienced skater, and was figuring dithyrambic dances and Bacchic leaps on the ice—very remarkable, but very ugly methought. Next him followed Mr. Hawthorne who, wrapped in his cloak, moved like a self-impelled Greek statue, stately and grave. Mr. Emerson closed the line, evidently too weary to hold himself erect, pitching headforemost, half lying on the air.” That day of entertainment pairs well with a more subdued one not long after. Mrs. Hawthorne looked out the window with the couple’s first child, a daughter named Una, and saw the trees outside covered in ice. Her observation remains etched into the glass of a windowpane at the Old Manse: “Una Hawthorne stood on this window sill January

22d, 1845 while the trees were all glass chandeliers – a goodly show which she liked much tho’ only ten months old.”

“There seems to be a sort of illuminating quality in new snow,” Hawthorne wrote in 1851. Winter gave him time to slow down, to think, and to write. He claimed in 1843, “It is summer, and not winter, that steals away

mortal life,” according to the posthumously published Passages from the American Notebooks

In typical Hawthorne fashion, too, he found moral lessons in winter and snow. In “The Ambitious Guest,” collected in his 1837 volume of Twice-Told Tales, the titular character expresses his fear of being forgotten after his death to a family

©Rob Velella

Hawthorne’s gravestone at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord

Photograph of Hawthorne

An illustration for “The Snow-Image” by Marcus Watterman, 1864

overseeing an inn. As they huddle around the hearth for warmth, they are visited by nature’s wrath in the form of a tremendous rockslide. Ironically, in their attempt to find shelter, they are killed by falling debris and the guest, with no record of his visit, is forgotten.

Perhaps even more heavy-handed in its lesson is Hawthorne’s tale “The Snow-Image: A Childish Miracle,” which lent its name to Hawthorne’s collection The Snow-Image and Other Twice-Told Tales (1851). The story, clearly influenced by his own role as a father, features two children whose faith in the magic of winter somehow fulfills their wishes and brings to life a “snow image” (today’s “snowman”). Their mother at first believes that the joyful white figure playing with her children, Violet and Peony, is the daughter of one of the neighbors. But she begins to question that assumption the longer she looks from the window: “Indeed, she almost doubted whether it was a real child after all, or only a light wreath of the new-fallen snow, blown hither and thither about the garden by the intensely cold west-wind.

There was certainly something very singular in the aspect of the little stranger.”

Her children seem sincere in explaining that their new friend is made of snow brought to life by their love. Violet explains to her mother, “I have told you truly who she is. It is our little snow-image, which Peony and I have been making.”

Some of Hawthorne’s Winter Tales

“The Haunted Mind” (1835)

“The Devil in Manuscript” (1835)

“The Ambitious Guest” (1835)

“Snowflakes” (1838)

“The Christmas Banquet” (1844)

Their father, Mr. Lindsey, soon returns home. A hard-working, practical man, he is described by Hawthorne as a “good, honest father” and a “kind-hearted man” with “the best intentions in the world.” Wryly, Hawthorne also describes him three times as a “common-sensible” man, unlike the rest of his family, who show a “childlike simplicity and faith.” Mr. Lindsey does not have the same belief in the magic of a winter wish, and he insists the children bring their new friend indoors to warm herself by the fire. Alas, that fire is her undoing and Mr. Lindsey demands that his wife explain to him what happened to the strange child. “She found no trace of the little white maiden,

“The Snow-Image: A Childish Miracle” (1850)

unless it were the remains of a heap of snow, which, while she was gazing at it, melted quite away upon the hearth-rug.” Yet, the common-sensible father still does not see the magic of which he has brought to ruin. “After all, there is no teaching anything to wise men of good Mr. Lindsey’s stamp. They know everything, — oh, to be sure! — everything that has been, and everything that is, and everything that, by any future possibility, can be. And, should some phenomenon of nature or providence transcend their system, they will not recognize it, even if it come to pass under their very noses.” Indeed, Mr. Lindsey merely orders that someone clean up the puddle of melting snow that his children have apparently brought into their home.

Hawthorne himself was certainly not as unimaginative as the father figure in “The Snow-Image,” though he too often had difficulty finding the wonder in the world amidst all its tragedies. As he wrote in his sketch “The Vision of the Fountain,” first published in New-England Magazine in August 1835: “Let me hope,” thought I, “or my heart will be as icy as the fountain, and the whole world as desolate as this snowy hill.”

Rob Velella is an independent literary historian, a former New Englander, and a former living history performer who portrayed Nathaniel Hawthorne for more than a decade.

Library of Congress

The Wayside

A special exhibition on view now through January 30, 2022

Family Trees at the Concord Museum

26th Annual Celebration of Children’s Literature

32 fanciful trees and wreaths of all shapes and sizes, decorated with original ornaments inspired by acclaimed children’s picture books.

Open Now through January 2 • Tuesday-Sunday • 10:00 - 4:00

TIllustration of the Concord grape, produced by Jules Troncy, 1901-1910. From Traité Général de Viticulture.

The Rise, Fall, and Return of the Concord Grape in France

BY ERICA LOME, PhD

The world’s most famous grape began its life in a backyard in Concord. In the 1840s, Ephraim Wales Bull retired to the countryside to become a horticulturist after a career as a gold beater in Boston. At his farm, Bull set out to cultivate a variety of grape that would better withstand early frosts and severe winters. He did 22,000 crossbreeding experiments on 125 vines and in 1849 discovered a wild grape he thought looked promising – it was sweet, palatable, and hardy – and began to propagate it. He named this grape the Concord.

Bull exhibited the Concord grape before the Massachusetts Horticultural Society in 1854 and clippings soon found their way into the hands of every nurseryman in the country. The Concord grape came to dominate the American juice industry thanks to Thomas Welch, who began experimenting with the unfermented juice of grapes in 1869. Welch’s subsequent success overshadowed the career of Ephraim Bull, who lived to see the Concord grape enrich the fortunes of everyone but himself.

From the beginning, advertisers positioned the Concord grape as a remedy for all sorts of ailments, including as a health tonic, weight reduction aid, and elixir for the upper class. As it turns out, the grape did more than just quench thirst; it became the unexpected savior of another country’s industry. In the late 1850s, a tiny yellow insect known as grape phylloxera began infecting vineyards in North America, causing grape vines to form galls on the surface of leaves. Rapidly developing transatlantic steamship trade soon brought

this invasive species to Europe, where it had a much more harmful effect on native vines. In France, the damage wrought by phylloxera was particularly deadly, as the insects lived and fed below ground, injecting a toxin which caused the roots to swell and quickly die. Growers were unable to discover the blight before it was too late, and phylloxera destroyed 40% of French grape vines over a fifteen-year period.

On both sides of the Atlantic, scientists and growers searched for a cure, and the French government even offered a cash prize to any who could produce a method of total eradication. Meanwhile, in Bordeaux, Leo Laliman watched in surprise as parts of his vineyard flourished while other vines perished. Since the early 1860s, Laliman had collected North American specimens to use in his winegrowing experiments, and they

proved unexpectedly valuable once Laliman discovered their rootstock was resistant to phylloxera.

Laliman presented his findings to the national viticultural conference in 1869 and proposed that his fellow winemakers import American vines to grow in French soil. Such an idea was initially unpopular, as growers were reluctant to abandon their traditional varieties. Fellow viticulturist Gason Bazille later proved that native vinifera vines would resist grape phylloxera If grafted onto American rootstocks, thereby preserving European grapes.

Bazille and Laliman’s dual proposals sparked a widespread effort throughout the 1870s and 1880s to “reconstitute” French vineyards by importing massive quantities of American grapes. One varietal stood out: the Concord. Easy to cultivate and

Photograph of Ephraim Bull, 1890. Concord Museum Collection, Gift of Mrs. Margaret E. Thompson Sheldon (1926), 2006.50.

hardy against mildew and cold weather, the Concord grape turned out to be remarkably resistant to phylloxera. The insects could not fully penetrate its roots, leaving behind surface blotches that did not seriously injure the plant. As a result, hundreds of thousands of roots and cuttings were imported from the United States. Some growers opted to graft each individual European cutting on the American roots, which would enable the vine to produce European fruit. Others chose to replace their entire vineyards with Concord grapes. In either case, the plague abated enough to save the wine industry from complete and utter ruin.

The Concord grape was initially celebrated on both sides of the Atlantic for stemming the tide of destruction, but within the next decade this widespread experiment began to encounter some challenges. First, the peculiar, “foxy” taste of Vitis labrusca did not find favor with French growers. One source put it plainly: “no one accustomed to the use of European wine takes easily to wine from American grapes.” While certainly no luxury, the Concord grape did in fact produce a palatable wine that was popular among the working classes. By separating the juice from residue before fermentation, Concord grapes could even produce wines “which resemble some French white wines,” one source claimed. Though French growers complained, the wholesale

destruction of the European vine by the phylloxera made the direct cultivation of American grapes for wine necessary in many cases, with one report concluding: “he who does not own a horse must be content to ride a jackass, or plod along on foot.”

Soon, another pitfall emerged: while American roots had radically slowed the spread of phylloxera, they were not suited for long-term cultivation in Mediterranean soil. Those who transplanted their entire vineyards with American vines soon faced what viticulturists termed “the Concord catastrophe.” It would take many years for growers to determine the correct conditions

Label

of soil, exposure, and degree of moisture required for the Concord grape to thrive. Experience would also demonstrate that certain other American species were more suited to the French climate, such as the Spanish-American hybrid Jacques. These disappointing outcomes did not fully deter growers, many of whom attempted to further hybridize American species with French grapes, creating a

Franco-American cross that would be easy to propagate and would be resistant to phylloxera. Eventually, as these hybrid grapes began overtaking native French varietals in popularity and in direct competition, French growers began to fear the loss and displacement of their traditional wines –and cultural heritage. Realizing that these new grapes threatened the reputation of the French wine industry, the French government began to crack down on hybrids and eventually banned Vitis labrusca grapes as “low-quality.” Though traditional French varieties were and continued to be grafted onto American rootstocks, they retained their high status as “purebreds.” Meanwhile, the Concord grape – initially the savior of French wine - was effectively banished from French soil.

The monumental effort to combat phylloxera in the late nineteenth century did not end there. The bug remains an everconstant threat against the wine industry and scientists continue to search for a true method of eradication. Meanwhile, certain French American hybrids remain active in the United States and other parts of the world thanks to the enology departments at the University of Minnesota and Cornell University. These include Chambourcin, Baco Noir, and Seyval Blanc. None of these achievements could have been possible without the Concord grape, a wild species cultivated by Ephraim Bull whose legacy grew beyond its humble beginnings and blossomed into a global story of creativity, ingenuity, and innovation.

Erica Lome is the Peggy N. Gerry Curatorial Associate at the Concord Museum.

Photograph of Ephraim Bull in Concord, late 1800s. Concord Museum Collection, Gift of Mr. Charles P. Munroe and Mr. William M. Munroe (2008), 2009.4.72.

for the Chautauqua and Erie Grape Company of Westfield, New York, 1910. Concord Museum Collection, Gift of the Cummings Davis Society (1999), 1999.6.

The Phylloxera, a True Gourmet, Finds Out the Best Vineyards and Attaches Itself to the Best Wines” from Punch, 1890.

Locals know that the Cheese Shop of Concord is a wonderland of delicious food, with a holiday selection that goes far beyond its namesake cheese counter. Choose from a wall of cookies and crackers, shelf upon shelf of jellies, jams and chutneys, fine chocolates, local honeys, imported pastas, condiments, and more. There’s also a delicatessen counter (think party platters) and an outstanding wine and beer department. Can’t decide? Gift cards to the shop, or for its monthly cheese and charcuterie clubs, might be the answer. Come on in, call, or chat online with our team of cheesemongers. They are sure to help you find the perfect gift this holiday season!

Outdoor Winter Fun

BY DAVID ROSENBAUM

IIn the late nineteenth century, Currier and Ives made beautiful and iconic engravings of New England winter scenes. They depicted gleeful children sledding, or skating on frozen ponds, surrounded by a snowy landscape. Fast forward 150 years or so, and you can still do those things, and more, in Concord during the winter. Let’s look at how you can have your own Currier and Ives adventure in Concord, with all the rich winter sports opportunities we have today!

Ice skating is quite popular, and now there are indoor rinks you can enjoy. Local rinks are in Concord (Valley Sports on Main St, West Concord), Boxborough (Olympia), Bedford (The Edge Sports Center), and other local towns. All offer instruction and ice time, but not all have rental skates so check first. When the weather is cold enough, head outdoors with your skates to Macones Pond (Lowell Rd, near Barnes Hill Rd), or Kennedys Pond (more remote, off Old Mill Rd in the Old Rifle Range). If you do skate on a pond, make sure you know the ice is at least 6” thick and go with a buddy. Never skate outdoors alone. Finally, there are a lot of folks who have built their own ice rink in their yard and do-it-yourself kits are readily available on the internet. Have fun!

As soon as it snows, you can see the kids heading outside with their sleds. There are lots of hills in Concord where you can sled, including Nawshawtuc (off Nawshawtuc Rd by Willard Common) or the hill at Concord-Carlisle High School. I have seen kids sledding at other places, like golf courses or backyards as well-anywhere with a slope will do. Be safe, and make sure your path won’t drop you in the street!

Cross country skiing and snowshoeing are also fun family activities when you have a new snowfall, and there are many trails you can

use. If you have your own skis or snowshoes, the Bruce Freeman Rail trail (from Concord Prison to Powder Mill Rd), Walden Pond (Rte 126/Walden St), Reformatory Branch Trail (Lowell St at Keyes Rd to Bedford), and the Battle Road path that parallels Lexington Rd and 2A through Minute Man Historical Park are great! If you are just skiing and need to rent gear, and maybe want some instruction (or if you just like groomed trails), nearby Great Brook Ski Touring Center (greatbrookski.com) on Lowell St, in Carlisle has it all! A quick search on the internet will yield other, similar options in nearby towns.

While you can’t downhill ski in Concord, nearby Nashoba Valley (Westford) has downhill skiing and tubing options for you. A small hill, Nashoba is a great option for an early season tune-up, lessons for the kids (or yourself), or a quick half-day on the slopes. Larger, and about 45 minutes away, Wachusett Mountain (Princeton, MA) is bigger, has more varied terrain, and beautiful scenery—and you can get there by train from Concord or West Concord.

There is so much outside to do in Concord during the winter! If you have your own favorite places to ice skate, sled, ski, or snowshoe, or a favorite winter activity we didn’t mention, post or message us on Facebook @discoverconcordma, tweet @DscvrConcordMag or tag #discoverconcordmagazine and let us know what they are.

We hope you get outside and have fun this winter with some of these activities. But, even if you just sit outside by the fire pit sipping mulled cider or hot chocolate, you may still feel the Currier and Ives echoes from the past. Enjoy our beautiful New England winters!

David Rosenbaum is a Concord resident who loves outdoor sports, whatever the season. His day job is Solutions Engineer for Kaltura, Inc.

A Thoreau-ly Delightful Renovation at Concord’s Dunkin’

BY JENNIFER C. SCHÜNEMANN

MMegan and Mark Pesce, the Concordian couple who own the Dunkin’s around town, have always made community the focal point of their business. For years, they have donated coffee and treats to local sports teams and generously given to fundraisers and philanthropic events. So when the time came to renovate their Thoreau Street store, they wanted to find a way to pay tribute to the town that they and their family call home.

“Given the street where this store is located, Thoreau Street, we naturally thought about the Transcendental authors who are such an iconic part of our town’s culture,” said Megan. “Thoreau, Emerson, and the Alcotts were all such a huge part of the literary history of Concord – we thought it would be a nice idea to feature them in artwork in the newly renovated store.”

Keeping with their tradition of supporting the community, Megan and Mark looked around for a local artist to commission three paintings featuring Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and the Alcott family with a whimsical twist – they would be enjoying a cup of Dunkin’ coffee while writing, or treating themselves to a snack while picnicking on the lawn. The Pesces reached out to Margot Kimball of Village Art Room and were introduced to West Concord artist and resident Michael Sprague.

“This was such a fun and inspiring project,” said

Michael. “I loved the opportunity to connect our Concord heritage (in a lighthearted way) to the newly renovated Dunkin’. I really appreciate that Megan and Mark Pesce made a point of working with a local artist. It really demonstrates their commitment to our local community.”

“The pandemic has only reinforced our deep appreciation for our community,” said Mark Pesce. “The amazing turn-out of friends and neighbors is what made it possible for us to weather such a difficult storm. Thanks to them, we are still be here – serving up good food and great coffee - in the town we love so much. We thought this project would be a fun way of saying thanks!”

The artwork, and the newly renovated store, were highlighted in a Concord Chamber of Commerce ribbon cutting ceremony in November. Now open to the public, you can stop by and visit these fun paintings at the Thoreau Street Dunkin’ anytime. You can also learn more about Michael Sprague’s art by visiting his Instagram page @ mikesprague_artist.

With special thanks to Concord Dunkin’ for their support in making this article possible. Pop by to say hello to the hardworking team at any of the Concord Dunkin’ stores (there is a coupon for a free donut with any purchase at the back of this publication) and follow the latest happenings at @concorddunkin’ on Facebook or Instagram.

© Pierre Chiha Photographers

Megan Pesce at the ribbon cutting for the renovated store

Concord artist Michael Sprague with his Emerson themed portrait

CONCORD & Surrounding Areas

WHERE TO STAY

Concord Center

Concord’s Colonial Inn 48 Monument Sq

North Bridge Inn 21 Monument Sq

Concord Center

West Concord

Best Western 740 Elm St

Residence Inn by Marriott 320 Baker Ave

WHERE TO SHOP

Albright Art Supply 32 Main St

Artinian Jewelry 39 Main St

Artisans Way 18 Walden St

Barrow Bookstore 79 Main St

Best of British 29 Main St

Blue Dry Goods 16 Walden St

Brine Sporting Goods 69 Main St

Cheese Shop of Concord 29 Walden St

Comina 9 Walden St

Concord Bookshop 65 Main St

Concord Lamp and Shade 21 Walden St

Concord Market 77 Lowell Rd

The Concord Toy Box 32 Main St

Copper Penny Flowers 9 Independence Court

The Dotted i 1 Walden St

Fairbank & Perry Goldsmiths 32 Main St

FatFace 4 Walden St

Footstock 46 Main St

Fritz & Gigi

79 Main St

French Lessons 8 Walden St

George Vassel Jewelry 40 Main St

Gräem Nuts and Chocolate 49 Main St

Grasshopper Shop 36 Main St

Irresistibles 16 Walden St

J McLaughlin 14 Walden St

JACK + TOBA 10 Walden St

Jane Deering Gallery 94 Elm St

Lucy Lacoste Gallery 25 Main St

Nesting 44 Main St

North Bridge Antiques

Patina Green

Priscilla Candy Shop

Revolutionary Concord

Rewind Estate Watches

Sara Campbell Ltd

Tess & Carlos

Walden St

Main St

Walden St

Main St

Main St

Main St

Main St

Thistle Hill 13 Walden St

Thoreauly Antiques 25 Walden St

Three Stones Gallery 32 Main St

Vanderhoof Hardware 28 Main St

Walden Liquors 18 Walden St

Walden Street Antiques 23 Walden St

Nine Acre Corner

Colonial Gardens 442 Fitchburg Tpke

Verrill Farm 11 Wheeler Rd

Thoreau Depot

ATA Cycles 93 Thoreau St

Concord Optical

Concord Provisions

Thoreau St

Thoreau St Frame-ables

West Concord A New Leaf

Belle on Heels

Commonwealth Ave

Concord Firefly 33 Commonwealth Ave

Concord Flower Shop 135 Commonwealth Ave

Concord Outfitters 113 Commonwealth Ave

*Debra’s Natural Gourmet 98 Commonwealth Ave

Forever Tile 45 Commonwealth Ave

Joy Street Life + Home 49 Commonwealth Ave

Rare Elements 33 Bradford St

Reflections 101 Commonwealth Ave

Sun Stone Studio 107 Commonwealth Ave

West Concord Pharmacy 1212 Main St

West Concord Wine & Spirits 1215 Main St

WHERE TO EAT

Concord Center

Caffè Nero 55 Main St

Comella’s 33 Main St

Concord’s Colonial Inn 48 Monument Square

Fiorella’s Cucina 24 Walden St

Haute Coffee 12 Walden St

Helen’s Restaurant 17 Main St

Main Streets Market & Café 42 Main St

Sally Ann’s Bakery & Food Shop 73 Main St

Trail’s End Cafe 97 Lowell Rd

Thoreau Depot

80 Thoreau 80 Thoreau St

Bedford Farms Ice Cream 68 Thoreau St

Chang An Restaurant 10 Concord Crossing

*Dunkin’ 117 Thoreau St

Farfalle Italian Market Café 26 Concord Crossing

Karma Concord Asian Fusion 105 Thoreau St

New London Style Pizza 71 Thoreau St

Sorrento’s Brick Oven Pizzeria 58 Thoreau St

Starbucks 159 Sudbury Rd

West Concord

Adelita 1200 Main St

Club Car Café 20 Commonwealth Ave

Concord Teacakes 59 Commonwealth Ave

Dino’s Kouzina & Pizzeria 1135 Main St

*Dunkin’ 1191 Main St

Nashoba Brook Bakery 152 Commonwealth Ave

Reasons to Be Cheerful 110 Commonwealth Ave

Saltbox Kitchen 84 Commonwealth Ave

Walden Italian Kitchen 92 Commonwealth Ave

Woods Hill Table 24 Commonwealth Ave

Thoreau St

Thoreau St Juju

Thoreau St

* Money Saving Coupon on p. 78

THOREAU DEPOT

Points of Interest

Concord Train Station 90 Thoreau St

United States Post Office 35 Beharrell St

West Concord Train Station Commonwealth Ave & Main St

Featured Businesses

Adelita

Appleton Design Group

The Attias Group

Belle on Heels

Concord Flower Shop

*Debra’s Natural Gourmet

*Dunkin’ (two locations)

Forever Tile

West Concord Pharmacy

West Concord Wine & Spirits

Woods Hill Table

Verrill Farm

Our agents think in color. Not black and white.

At William Raveis, our agents are free to get creative.

Inspired by our entrepreneurial culture, they are empowered to thrive as themselves. Becoming the real estate entrepreneur they want to be. We provide a framework in which they can flourish. Equipping our team with state-of-the-art tools to make selling effortless. Acting as an accelerator of talent through our coaching and mentorship programs. Getting creative is better for everyone. Homes sold easier. Homes sold faster.

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A New Chapter for the Concord Free Public Library

BY MARCY ECKEL DIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT, CFPL CORPORATION

BBy early next year, the renovation and expansion of the Concord Free Public Library will be complete. This transformative project, eight years in the making, broke ground during the pandemic, but remained on-time and on-budget in spite of the challenges. Showcasing the designs of architects from Johnson Roberts and Associates, the newly renovated Library has something to offer everyone in our community, and as always, it’s free and open to all.

Sherry Litwack, President of the Concord Free Public Library Corporation remarks, “The Library is a place for civic engagement and dialogue; a repository of Concord’s heritage; a center of creativity and exploration; and a comfortable retreat to work, read, write, or meet. We are so proud that our Library continues to evolve and grow to meet community needs and look forward to welcoming you all into these new and updated spaces.”

In a typical day, over 900 people visit the Main Library. These visitors come for books, programs, to do research, find a quiet space, or a chance to connect. People from all walks of life find common connection here. The Library’s role in Concord is diverse and dynamic. It is a gathering place, a center of discovery and innovation, and an internationally recognized archive of colonial, revolutionary, and literary history.

When William Munroe founded the Library in 1873, he had a vision for a larger Library that showcased art in addition to lending books to the townspeople (a new concept since previously people came to the Library to read but could not check out books). Throughout the almost 150-year history of the building, seven significant additions and renovations have altered the original design to bring forth this vision: in 1889 (when a school building from Sudbury Road was annexed to the back); in 1917 (when the tower came down to permit the

construction of stacks); in the early 1930s (a renovation by Frohman, Robb & Little that enlarged the building and radically changed the style of its exterior from Victorian Gothic to Georgian); in 1938; in 1968; in 1990 (a renovation designed by Perry, Dean, Stahl, and Rogers); and in 2005 (a systems-driven renovation by Johnson Roberts & Associates that modernized and restored elegance to the Main Street Library).

Before meeting with the architects for this newest renovation and expansion, a yearlong study took place to allow community members and the Town of Concord to weigh in on the community’s current and future needs and how best the Library could adapt to serve our patrons.

The Library has evolved yet again to meet the diverse needs of our community. Project highlights include:

• A staggering 37% increase in size

• A new entrance on Main Street

• A children’s library with more space and a separate room for activities

• A reimagined space specifically for teens

• A commons area for coffee and conversation

• A 140-seat forum for daytime and evening programming

• A new makerspace for hands-on exploration for all ages

• A unique garden space designed to connect people with nature and offer outdoor activities

• Improved facilities including family bathrooms and accessible parking spaces

• An enlarged workspace and expanded vault in Special Collections

• Re-organization of spaces to allow patrons to more easily access books and find a cherished spot to sit and read or work.

The changes to the Library are evident even before stepping through its doors, as the new entrance on Main Street now includes two customized accessible parking spaces, a wide walkway, and a ramp just

inside the door. The building features include an additional elevator; modern and accessible bathrooms; more space for the Friends of the Concord Free Public Library to display books for sale; a large-print book area; more comfortable seating; community meeting rooms; and enclosed outdoor space. The new rooms are bright and vibrant, full of natural light. State-of-the-art technology and movable furniture make many of the spaces flexible for collaborative work.

The non-profit Concord Free Public Library Corporation owns the buildings and grounds of both the Main Library and the Fowler Branch. The Library Corporation contributes over $650,000 per year to maintain, improve and enhance the Library. Renovation projects are the sole responsibility of this organization and are largely funded through private donations.

As part of the project, an extensive sustainability study was conducted to not only make sure the project was meeting environmental goals, but to understand how to best align with the Town of Concord’s Climate Action and Resilience Plan.

The Library project was made possible through generous donations from over 1,100 donors in our community. We are humbled by this generosity and proud of the outstanding efforts to adapt our already thriving library into a more efficient and enhanced space for everyone.

John Boynton, Trustee and Chair of the Capital Campaign says, “The project allows us to offer a more welcoming and accessible Library space that will be easier to safely navigate. There will be noisy, active spaces and quiet spaces, reading nooks and study areas. There will be a space that allows for food and drinks and spaces to learn and innovate. This will become an even more amazing resource for everyone in our community — from babies to seniors, and I am so proud to have led the charge to accomplish this renovation and expansion.”

Learn more about the Library’s hours of operation to plan your visit: concordlibrary.org.

Warm Up to Winter With the Perfect Cocktail

BY BRIGETTE M.T. SANCHEZ

There’s something about curling up by a fire as the snow falls outside. With a good book or a good friend, it’s a wonderful way to spend a winter evening. Add a cocktail specially crafted to bring out the flavors of the season, and you have the perfect evening.

INGREDIENTS

1 oz silver tequila

1/4 oz Drambui

1/4 oz Licor 43

3 oz apple chai tea (see below)

1 oz water

Pour 3 oz of the apple chai tea mixture and 1 oz of water into a mug and heat until hot. Add the liquors, stir, and enjoy.

To make your apple chai tea mix combine 4 cups of Mott’s apple juice, 1 sliced apple, 5 star anise, 3 cinnamon sticks, and a dash of nutmeg.

Bring all ingredients in a pot to a slow boil till apples are soft, about 15 minutes. Remove from heat and add 6 vanilla chai tea bags (Twining Chai Tea is perfect for this) and let the mixture cool. Refrigerate overnight. Remove star anise, cinnamon sticks, and tea bags. The apple chai tea will remain good for two weeks in the refrigerator.

Brigette M.T. Sanchez is the founder of Ideal Mixology and head bartender at Fiorella’s Cucina. She enjoys bringing people together for warm, fun, and memorable experiences. Brigette was nominated by the Massachusetts Restaurant Association for “Stars of the Industry: Bartender of the Year” for her unique cocktail creations and unrivaled hospitality.

©Dante Sanchez

Illustration by Sylvia Sawyer

Bringing Thoreau to Life for Young Readers with Donna Marie Przybojewski

BY DIANNE WEISS AND VICTOR CURRAN

TThe Thoreau Society (thoreausociety.org) is a Concord-based organization with members all over the world. One of the most dedicated is Donna Marie Przybojewski, who teaches at St. Benedict Catholic School in Garfield Heights, Ohio. Five years ago, she set out to share her passion for the author of Walden—“not just [to] introduce Henry to children, but to help them develop a relationship with him.”

The result was “Saunter the Year with Henry David Thoreau,” a year-long, interdisciplinary curriculum for kindergarten through eighth grade students. (In the classroom she often appears in character as Henry, beard and all.) Resources for such an ambitious curriculum were scarce, so Donna

Marie began writing and illustrating books for elementary and middle school readers, presenting vignettes of Thoreau’s life and describing his ideas in age-appropriate ways.

Since 2016, Donna Marie, a 36-year veteran Language Arts teacher and selftaught illustrator, has completed seven children’s books about Thoreau, published by Streamline Publishing of Cleveland, Ohio. These books aren’t a series in the sense of a sequential narrative, but separate paths of discovery that invite children to enter into Henry’s world at their own pace. The purposes and age ranges vary from book to book; they also vary in theme, textual style, and media.

The first book, published in 2016, is Henry David Thoreau, Author, Philosopher, Naturalist, a discussion starter coloring book for Kindergarten through Grade 3. Each spread features a black-and-white scene from Henry’s life. On the facing page, there are open-ended questions (“Have you ever taken a hike in the woods? What kinds of things did you see?”) and a space for children to draw a picture of a suggested subject (“Draw a picture of an animal you watched in your back yard”). We see Henry’s boat and cabin, his animal and bird friends, his enjoyment of ice skating in winter and watermelons in summer, and even his epic pursuit of his father’s runaway pig. Donna Marie doesn’t

All photos are

Donna Przybojewski

shy away from difficult discussion topics, such as Henry’s helping refugees from enslavement and Henry’s death.

Henry David Thoreau, Who Can He Be? (2016) is an alphabet book for Preschool through Grade 3. Donna Marie used biographical details to introduce Henry as a nature lover, but also as a lover of good food and even, sometimes, good company. The book is written in rhymed verse (e.g., “P is for POPCORN Henry did make. The children enjoyed it better than cake”). Her illustrations are done in an exuberant style, reminiscent of folk art, with rich colors and bold brushstrokes. Parents and grandparents will recognize familiar images from Thoreau’s life, like his green desk that’s in the Concord Museum.

In Henry David Thoreau Loved the Seasons of the Year (2017), the cycle of the seasons provides a framework for Henry’s experiences of nature and glimpses of his daily life at Walden (swimming, gardening, cleaning house). It’s told in simple, ageappropriate language (Grades 1-4).

Donna Marie’s development as an artist is evident in these illustrations, with their notable detail and refinement, and brilliant color. An image of Henry walking in a November rain recalls Daniel Ricketson’s 1855 sketch of him “returning to his shanty from Concord.” Another illustration, of Henry leaning into the wind as snowflakes eddy around him, is an impressionistic gem.

Born in the Nick of Time (2017) is a discussion starter coloring book for readers in Grades 1-5. This is a thoughtful, detailed biography, and at 84 pages it is the longest of the series. We see Henry in the company of his family, neighbors, and colleagues. Ralph Waldo Emerson is there, of course, and Margaret Fuller, the Hawthornes, the Alcotts, Penobscot guide Joe Polis, and jailer Sam Staples. As a bonus, we learn something about the accomplishments of these other individuals, too.

If Henry David Thoreau Traveled the Southwest: An Imaginary Saunter (2018) is a full color picture book in landscape format. As in the previous picture books, the text is in rhyming verse, but there’s much more text per page, suitable for Grades 1-4. It opens with the quote where Henry famously calls for the creation of parks, “a common possession forever,” to be used “for instruction and recreation.”* Donna Marie imagines Thoreau visiting National Parks in Arizona, Colorado, and Utah, places where she had her own transcendent experience of nature. She uses the subjunctive to convey the idea that, although Thoreau was a real person, the story in this book is fictional. (“The sight would be a feast for Henry’s eyes.”)

While this distinction might be lost on some young readers, children don’t need to know about the historical Thoreau to enjoy the nature-themed rhymes and pictures bursting with color. These illustrations may

be among her best, alive with the dramatic forms and hues of the Southwest landscape.

Henry David Thoreau: Bell Ringer for Justice (2019), written in prose, is for Grades 4-8.

Donna Marie tells the story of the Thoreau family’s participation in the Underground Railroad and Concord’s Anti-Slavery Society, and of Henry’s famous act of civil disobedience and the essay it inspired. She includes profiles of some of Concord’s enslaved and formerly enslaved residents, as well as national figures in the abolitionist movement. The broader imperative of civil rights is apparent in the stories included about other marginalized groups, such as native peoples and—in Henry’s time—Irish immigrants. Thoreau’s lasting influence on social justice is presented in profiles of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mohandas Gandhi. This book features full-page color illustrations in Donna Marie’s trademark style, but more serious, as befits the subject. Each spread includes open-ended discussion questions, such as, “Have you ever been judged unfairly because of who you are? Have you ever judged others wrongly? How did it make you feel?”

In 2020 Donna published A Life of Joy: Childhood Memories of Henry David Thoreau, a color picture book for Grades 2-5 that shows Henry through the lens of loving family relationships. Each two-page spread tells something about the adult Henry—his

NOTES

boating, for example—and relates it to a formative experience in his childhood, such as fishing with his brother John.

Donna Marie has a new book in the works, inspired by her favorite story in Thoreau’s journal, when his father’s pig got loose, and Henry had to chase it all over Concord. Watch for it in the summer of 2022; it’s called Henry and the Runaway Pig—Retold from Henry David Thoreau’s Journal Entry August 8, 1856.

Donna Marie’s effort to create resources for teaching young children about Thoreau

was a remarkable challenge to undertake, one that involved considerable creativity and research. Her commitment to accuracy is obvious throughout the text and illustrations. In the artistic process, she has evidently taken her own journey of joy, discovering herself as an author/illustrator and inspiring a new generation with her love of Henry. (This article was adapted from a book review published in the Thoreau Society Bulletin, Number 312, Winter 2021. Reprinted by permission of the Thoreau Society.)

Dianne McConville Weiss is on the Planning Committee of the Transcendentalism Council of First Parish in Concord; she was the lead organizer for Concord’s Margaret Fuller Bicentennial. She served on the Board of Directors of The Thoreau Society. A Developmental Psychology specialist, Ms. Weiss conducted program evaluation research through Tufts University and for the State of Vermont Child Care Services Division. She has also published creative writing.

Victor Curran writes and leads tours of historic Concord and is an interpreter at the Concord Museum and the Old Manse. He teaches courses and writes articles about the men and women who made Concord the home of American independence and imagination.

Thoreau, Henry David. Journal XII: March 2, 1859 – November 30, 1859, ed. Bradford Torrey (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1906), 387; October 15, 1859.

Preserving Food for a Colonial Winter

BY ANNE LEHMANN

SSurviving a New England winter in the 1700s was no easy task. Food, shelter, firewood, and warm clothing were essential. One of the most important jobs of summer and fall was to preserve enough food to feed a family throughout the long winter months. Today, if you are interested in preserving food the most common methods would be freezing, refrigeration, or canning. These methods are very similar to how colonists preserved food in the early 1700s, however their techniques were complicated by a lack of freezers and mason jars. The reason food preservation began, and remains necessary today, is exactly the same — keeping food safe by slowing down its molecular movement. When microorganisms are dormant the food remains edible. When

the microorganisms grow, it changes the chemical composition within the food and then spoils the food. There are only a few cases when these changes are encouraged, most notably in cheese! Introducing the right type of bacteria and letting it develop is one way milk transforms into cheese.

Colonists preserved food using eight basic methods: fermentation, burial, drying, curing, cooling, freezing, pickling, and canning. Fermentation happens when starches and sugars react with microorganisms and produce alcohol. Fall harvest arrives, grapes are plucked from the vines and apples from the orchards. Wine and cider production is now on its way. These beverages are then stored in the coolest part of the home or in a root cellar. This was one way in which

colonists produced beverages that could be safely stored for long periods of time.

Burial was a common preservation technique. Meat is buried under hot coals. The lack of light, reduced oxygen, and heat from the coals kills harmful microorganisms, thus preserving the meat for consumption in later months. In addition, burying fresh eggs in sand or under layers of straw was a common practice. Straw is a good insulator and was frequently used to protect delicate foods from extreme temperatures. They would layer eggs with dry salt and lard to keep them from freezing and then cover them with straw, preserving them for up to a year. In addition, along the coastal areas burying oysters was common. Again, they placed the oysters deep in the sand

to keep them fresh and edible over the winter months. During the shoulder seasons they would keep the oysters cold, housed in woven baskets, sitting on rivers near tidal pools with saltwater coming in and freshwater washing out.

Drying enables the preservation process because the water in food can become a breeding ground for microorganisms. When drying spices or vegetables the lack of water stops the microorganisms from spoiling the food. In addition, salt was used to preserve food as salt draws out the water in the food by osmosis, acting as a natural drying preservative. At harvest time many fruits and vegetables were dried, but one vegetable was especially common — corn. Corn was stored in dry storage bins and used in meals throughout the winter months.

Curing or smoking food deposits phenols, guaiacol, and catechol on the food. Thus, the food has a taste of smokiness and the food can remain edible for months after being smoked and held in a dry storeroom.

Cooling and freezing again focus on slowing down the molecular movement, causing microorganisms that spoil food to be dormant. Many times, food was put in caves or root cellars which held consistently

cool temperatures even in the New England summers. To help keep temperatures down, ice blocks were wrapped in hay to keep root cellars cool - an early ‘refrigeration’ technique.

Pickling began by using wine or beer since both liquids have low pH levels and transform into vinegar. The alcohol in wine or beer is oxidized by certain bacteria and turns into acetic acid or vinegar. So, after the harvest cucumbers, peppers, beans, peas, and carrots were often pickled. Apples, peaches, and pears were some of the early fruits that were preserved through the pickling method as well.

Canning was used if glass jars were available. The process then was much like the process today. After harvest, the food was put in glass jars. The jars were sealed with cork and sealing wax and then placed in boiling water. The heating and cooling cycle creates a vacuum seal that prevents microorganisms from contaminating the food within the jar. Canning was a common preservation method for both fruits and vegetables.

Steve and Joan Verrill of Verrill Farm are well versed in food preservation techniques. “The art of preserving food is timeless,” Joan says. “What the colonists did is similar

to what we do today. Each type of food dictates how, when, and what process you use to preserve it.” For example, they shared that grain, beans, potatoes, eggs, herbs, pumpkins, tomatoes, and onions need to be kept dry to be preserved. Root vegetables such as beets, carrots, winter squash, and turnips need to be kept in damp storage to be preserved for lengths of time. Joan shared that mixing honey and water and then submerging peaches and apples in the mixture keeps the fruit preserved for months at a time.

The art of food preservation is alive and well in Concord today. Many homes have gardens and root cellars. Each autumn Concord grapes are transformed into jam at my home. We can them using mason jars purchased years ago from our beloved West Concord Five and Ten which is now, sadly, closed. This preservation artform in our home is akin to deep violet deliciousness.

Anne Lehmann has merged two disciplines, business consulting and journalism. Working for GE, Andersen Consulting, and Fidelity Investments, she uses this business background and now adds freelance writing for metro west publications, including the Boston Globe, into the mix.

Robert Lehmann

Arts Around Town

MUSIC

CONCORD CONSERVATORY OF MUSIC

1317 Main Street | concordconservatory.org

ARAB MUSIC ONLINE LECTURE

Did you know that a violin in Arab tuning is different from western tuning? Did you know that there is such a thing called a b half flat played in the Maqam system? In this exciting music history lecture, guest artist Layth Sidiq will show us the exciting potential of the Arabic style and teach students a different way to play and listen to music. Jan 27

MILE TWELVE CONCERT

Mile Twelve is a fresh, hard-driving young band beautifully walking the line between original and traditional bluegrass. Banjo luminary Tony Trischka says, “Mile Twelve is carrying the bluegrass tradition forward with creativity and integrity.” Feb 4

CONCORD ORCHESTRA

51 Walden Street | concordorchestra.com

SPANISH PASSIONS AND NORDIC VISTAS

OPERA 51

51 Walden Street | opera51.org

OPERA51 MESSIAH SING

The Messiah Sing concert, conducted by Alan Yost, promises to be a very special event. Proceeds will benefit 51 Walden. Featured soloists are Margretta Beatty, Debra Gleason Swartz, Kartik Ayysola, and James C.S. Liu. Dec 19 at 2 p.m.

Concord Orchestra will present Spanish Passions and Nordic Vistas, conducted by music director finalist Robert Lehmann. Featured works include Suite No. 2 from The Three Cornered Hat by Manuel de Falla, Symphonie Espagnole for Violin and Orchestra by Edouard Lalo, and Symphony No. 3 in C Major by Jean Sibelius. January 28-29

THE UMBRELLA ARTS CENTER

40 Stow Street | theumbrellaarts.org

HOLIDAYS UNDER THE UMBRELLA

The Umbrella’s beloved holiday concert returns to the mainstage! Familiar faces and Umbrella Stage favorites will return to sing seasonal songs and share their own holiday memories. Holidays Under The Umbrella is a family-friendly concert to put everyone in the spirit of the season! December 17 - 19

VISUAL ARTS

SUN STONE STUDIO

107 Commonwealth Ave. threestonesgallery.com/sun-stone-studio

CLASSIC & ALTERNATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY

Visit Sun Stone Studio in West Concord to see the latest work of Bremner Benedict (limited edition archival landscape prints), Cynthia Katz (alternative photographic processes including cyanotypes), and Fay Senner (encaustics, photographs, and handmade paper). Now through December 30

Courtesy of Concord Orchestra

THREE STONES GALLERY

32 Main Street | threestonesgallery.com

BIENVENUE

Join Three Stones Gallery at their new home on Main Street. Their first show in this exciting new space, Bienvenue, highlights fresh pieces by familiar artists as well as paintings and mixed media by new artists. Now through December 30

THE UMBRELLA ARTS CENTER

40 Stow Street | theumbrellaarts.org

OFF THE WALL: SMALL WORKS

Perfect for holiday shopping, The Umbrella’s exhibition of small works priced under $300 is on view in main Gallery during Winter Market and through the holiday season! Now through December 24

VILLAGE ART ROOM

152 Commonwealth Ave. | villageartroom.com

ART FOR ALL

Visit the Village Art Room website for the latest information on the “Project of the Week”, free art kits, and community artworks that enrich our town. While you’re there, check out the Gallery of Art Making and be inspired!

THEATRE

CONCORD PLAYERS

51 Walden Street | concordplayers.org

HARVEY

Concord Players will present the Pulitzer Prizewinning comedy Harvey, the story of the charming Elwood P. Dowd and his best friend Harvey … who happens to be a six-foot-tall invisible rabbit. Jimmy Stewart immortalized the role in the 1950 film version, which won both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award. Don’t miss this charming and insightful play. Feb 11-26

THE UMBRELLA ARTS CENTER

40 Stow Street | theumbrellaarts.org

THE COLORED MUSEUM

Serving as an elaborate satire of the prominent themes and identities of African American culture, The Colored Museum is set in a fictional museum where iconic African American figures are kept for public consumption. Told in a series of eleven sketches, each segment centers on a different “exhibit” in the museum and serves as a small oneperson play or monologue. January 28 – February 20

Courtesy of Concord Players

Courtesy of The Umbrella Arts Center

FAMILY PORTRAITS

We hope you’ll come explore our specially curated collections and whimsical creations this holiday season.

Open Monday - Saturday: 10 - 5. Sunday: 11 - 5.

Candles

Holiday Decor

Pillows

Accessories

Apothecary

Tabletop

Linens

Jewelry

Puzzles

What Lies Below: Concord’s Missing Elizabeth Barron

BY JAIMEE LEIGH JOROFF

IIf you were part of something awful, what would you do? Would you, or could you, apologize? Or would you bury the memory, let it lie forever with the you that once was. At the top of Concord’s Main Street lies the Old Hill Burying Ground. Squeeze through three narrow granite pillars, step up onto the hillside and begin climbing. You will pass the battered headstones of town founders like Reverend Peter Bulkeley; 18th-century patriots like Irishman Hugh Cargill; and many others. There are over 200 unmarked graves in this cemetery, and if you suddenly feel a chill, and an invisible hand starts pinching and prodding you back down the hill out of the graveyard, left onto Lexington Road and down a quarter mile until you stop outside a blue Colonial Saltbox house with yellow trim, you may be encountering the specter of Elizabeth Barron. Standing outside her former home, her spirit might beckon you inside. But would you enter? For not long before Elizabeth Barron was mistress here, she was known as Elizabeth “Betty” Parris, the first afflicted girl who started the Salem Witch Trials.

Born on November 28, 1682, in Boston, Massachusetts, Betty was born to Samuel Parris and Elizabeth Eldridge. Her father hailed from London, England, and after failed stints as a plantation owner in Barbados, and a merchant in Boston, he became a Puritan Minister. In 1689, he was invited to be the minister of Salem Village (modern-day Danvers), next to the larger Salem Town. Samuel moved to Salem Village with his wife, children Thomas, Elizabeth (Betty), and

Susanna, and two slaves whom he had brought with him from Barbados, Tituba and John Indian.

Ascending his new pulpit, Reverend Parris rose as the embodiment of the strictest Puritan doom, gloom, and fear.

In January of 1692, Betty inexplicably began barking like a dog, throwing objects, writhing, and screaming in pain, or freezing motionless. Reverend Parris summoned a doctor to examine her and called in the Reverend John Hale to lend his opinion. The doctor could find no earthly explanation for Betty’s symptoms. To the 17th century doctor, unexplained phenomena fell into the realm of “there be witchcraft!”

Surely, these strange symptoms must be caused by agents of the Devil attacking innocent Betty Parris. Soon, the affliction spread to Betty’s cousin Abigail Williams, who lived with the Parris family. And then, like a contagion, spread to more and more young girls from Salem.

As recorded by Reverend John Hale, “these children were bitten and pinched by invisible agents; their arms, necks, and backs turned this way and that way, and returned back again, so as it was impossible for them to do of themselves, and beyond the power of any Epileptick [sic] Fits, or natural Disease to effect. Sometimes they were taken dumb, their mouths stopped, their throats choaked, their limbs wracked and tormented.”

Reverend Parris and the doctor pressed Betty, Abigail, and the other afflicted girls; Who torments you? Name them! Under pressure, and perhaps by suggestion of village gossip and overheard murmurings, Betty and Abigail named their tormentors. They were the spectral shapes (disembodied figures) of Tituba the slave, old widow Sarah Osborne who had defied conventional norms

Old Hill Burying Ground entrance

Girl accusers at the Salem Witch Trials

by marrying her much younger servant man, and a poor beggar named Sarah Good. The three women were taken into custody and imprisoned.

The women were brought for trial in neighboring Salem Town where magistrates John Hathorne (ancestor of Nathaniel Hawthorne) and John Corwin were presiding, assisted by Reverend Samuel Sewall (ancestor of Louisa May Alcott). As documented in the court transcript, during the trial of Sarah Good, Judge Hathorne “desired the children all look upon her, and see, if this were the person that had hurt them and so they all did look upon her and said this was one of the persons that did torment them… presently, they were all tormented.”

Soon, Betty and the other afflicted girls, who before had been children to be seen and not heard, were centers of attention, their actions and words raptly attended by prominent community members.

By late March, Betty and the afflicted girls named more “witches”; more trials began. In the examination of Martha Corey, the court transcript reveals “Elizabeth Parris, Abigail Williams and Ann Putman” were present “and did vehemently accuse her in the Assembly of afflicting them, by biting, pinching, strangling…. And that they did in their fit, see her likeness coming to them, and bringing [the Devil’s] Book to them.”

Betty and the other girls’ behavior had a curious “on and off” pattern. As documented in the trial of Tituba, as her interrogation began, Betty and the other girls were sorely afflicted, but as soon as a desperate Tituba cried out that she was guilty of witchcraft, the girls’ behavior ceased, allowing a now quiet courtroom to hear Tituba’s uninterrupted confession.

The “witches” could be anyone, even four-year-old Dorothy “Dorcas” Good was accused of witchcraft and thrown into prison. By the spring of 1692, four jails held people accused of witchcraft. In May, Massachusetts’ Governor Sir William Phips established a Special Court of Oyer and Terminer (to Listen and Decide) for the Salem Witch Trials. The court was led by Chief Justice William Stoughton and

composed of nine leading magistrates, including Judge Nathaniel Saltonstall, the aforementioned John Hathorne, and Samuel Sewall. On June 10th, 1692, the Court convicted and hung their first “witch,” Salem woman Bridget Bishop. Horrified, and objecting to the heavy reliance on “spectral evidence,” Judge Saltonstall quit the court in protest.

But the hangings continued.

Midway through the trials, fearing that Betty was a spectacle, her family sent her to stay with a cousin and she disappeared

served as his workshop, and the home proved a safe dwelling for Betty Parris to quietly start anew as ordinary colonial wife Elizabeth Barron, and over time, mother to four children.

Unremarkable years passed. In 1754, Benjamin Barron died, leaving his house and property to Elizabeth and their children.

Elizabeth remained in the Lexington Road home until she died on March 21, 1760, at age 78. She was buried in Concord’s Old Hill Burying ground. At some point her grave marker disappeared, and like the 20

from the frontline of the trials. But it was too late to stop what had started. By the end, 20 people were executed and over 200 imprisoned.

Reverend Parris was invited to leave Salem. With her parents and siblings, Betty moved briefly to Concord and then to Sudbury.

Following the witch hysteria, Justice Sewall formally apologized for his role in the trials, earning him the nickname “the Repenting Judge.” Although just a child when it happened, Betty Parris never apologized but a new name was coming for her too. In 1709, at the age of 27, Betty married Benjamin Barron, a cordwainer (shoemaker). In 1716, Benjamin had the house on Lexington Road in Concord built for them. An out-building

innocents murdered in the Salem witch trials and initially buried in unmarked graves, Betty, too, lies in the ground, lost forever.

Special thanks to Anke Voss, Curator of the Concord Library, and Beth Schreiner Van Duzer for research assistance.

A Concord native, Jaimee Joroff is Manager of the Barrow Bookstore in Concord Center, which specializes in Concord history, Transcendentalism, and literary figures. She has been an interpreter at most of Concord’s historic sites and is a licensed town guide.

For complete source list, email: barrowbookstore@gmail.com

Trial of George Jacobs of Salem

Barrow Bookstore Presents:

CONCORD

1

Who was the royal monarch of England when Concord was founded in 1635?

Qa) Queen Elizabeth I

b) King George II

c) King Charles I

d) King James VI/I

2

Louisa May Alcott shared a November 29th birthday with her father, Amos Bronson Alcott. On Bronson’s 61st and her 28th birthday, Louisa gave her father a ream of paper. Bronson gave Louisa:

a) A tame barn owl

b) An apple

c) A new pen

d) A picture of Ralph Waldo Emerson

Questions 3-5: Victorian trends that you should never try at home.

3 Poisonous yet practical. If you lived in Victorian Concord and were preparing your house for holiday visitors, you might use alum, an aluminum compound, for which of the below?

a) Making Christmas trees sparkly

b) Adding to bread batter to make the bread heavier and whiter in color

c) Cleaning boots

4 You own a small apothecary shop in 1870s Concord. A lady comes in looking for something to make her pupils larger and her eyes more seductive. What might you sell to her?

a) Witch hazel

Trivia

b) Extract of mistletoe

c) Atropa belladonna

d) Rose water

5

New Year, new you! You’re a wealthy Victorian lady who is striving for a deathly-pale, about-to-keel-over look because that’s high-fashion at the moment. To attain this look you might try:

a) Eating arsenic wafers

b) Bathing in deadly nightshade

c) Consuming 20 raw egg-whites mixed with Prussian salt

d) Sitting outside in winter moonlight until you get consumption

6 True or False: In Colonial era Concord, winter decorations of evergreen boughs and wreaths would be decorated with oranges, lemons, and limes.

7

The year is 1818. You live in Concord and are planning a holiday dinner party. Your guests will include 15-year-old Harvard College sophomore Ralph Waldo Emerson, who will be home on break. Which of the below special drinks might you serve?

a) Welch’s Concord Grape Juice

b) Negus with wine

c) Negus without wine

d) Sweet tea

8

One of Louisa May Alcott’s favorite writers was also known as “The Father of Christmas.” Was he:

a) John Bunyan

b) Charles Dickens

c) Goethe

d) Ralph Waldo Emerson

9

Need inspiration for a holiday gift? In his essay “Gifts” (Essays: Second Series, published 1844), Ralph Waldo Emerson says the “genius and god of gifts” is:

a) Friendship

b) Marriage

c) Love

d) Short visits

10

Even though this column is written by a bookstore, we admit that some books are boring. But if you lived in early to mid-17th-century Concord and wanted a gossipy-good read, you might want to get your eyes on a copy of Thomas Morton’s book The New English Canaan. However, the book was hard to find because:

a) There was a paper shortage due to taxes by the king

b) The book was banned in New England

c) Everyone was illiterate

d) This must be a trick question because if you can’t find it, how do you know it’s not boring?

A1. c) Charles I. Born on November 19, 1600, Charles may have wished he hadn’t waited around to be crowned in 1625 and instead had hopped on the Mayflower in 1620 and landed safely in Massachusetts, because when he did become King, he angered a lot of people in England and Ireland and was parted from his head against his will.

2. d) A picture of Ralph Waldo Emerson. From Louisa’s November 1860 journal entry: “Our birthday. Gave Father a ream of paper, and he gave me Emerson’s picture; so both were happy.” A contemporary of Bronson Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson was an encouraging and much-admired presence in Louisa’s life, leading her to once call him “the god of my idolatry.”

3. All of them! In Victorian times, sparkly Christmas trees were the rage. To make branches sparkle, you could dip the branches in boiling water mixed with alum, let soak, dry, and repeat as needed. Alum was also added to bread mixes to make the bread heavier and whiter in color. Sparkly Christmas trees and shiny boots were nice, but consuming alumlaced bread could lead to severe and prolonged digestive problems.

4. c) Atropa belladonna, also known as deadly nightshade. Atropa belladonna

eyedrops might dilate high-fashion Victorian women’s eyes, but they could also cause blindness or permanent damage.

5. a) Eating arsenic wafers

6. False. While Colonial residents might have decorated their homes with evergreen boughs symbolic of spring’s return, oranges, lemons, and limes would have been too precious to waste on décor.

7. b) or c) 15-year-old Ralph Waldo Emerson could enjoy a hot Negus drink with or without wine as there was no legal drinking age in early 1800s America. Popular in the Regency era, Negus is a hot mulled wine infused with sugar, lemon, and nutmeg. Reportedly named after its creator, English Army Lt. Col. Francis Negus (16701732), the drink was served with or without wine.

adding 1/2 pound loaf sugar, 1 lemon, and grated nutmeg to taste. Mix the wine, sugar, lemon, and nutmeg, and pour 1 quart of boiling water over the mixture. Cover, and serve while warm. For a nonalcoholic version, replace the wine with cranberry juice or apple cider. (If you guessed a) Welch’s Concord Grape Juice, you’re only a few decades away from being correct. The Concord grape was first grown in 1849, and the first Welch’s Grape Juice bottled in 1869).

8. b) Charles Dickens, author of A Christmas Carol published in 1843

9. c) Love

10. b) It was banned in New England! Born in Devon, England, in 1579, Thomas Morton was a lawyer and writer and came to New England in 1620. He founded the town of Merrymount (current day Quincy) and tried to establish a friendly community integrated with the native Algonquins. This, combined with his stance against some of his acquaintances’ actions that included their selling indentured slaves to Virginia, angered his fellow Puritans and he was labeled by Governor William Bradford as “The Lord of Misrule.”

As found in Jerry Thomas’ 1862 How to Mix Drinks: or The BonVivant’s Companion, you would make Negus by starting with a pint of port wine and

In 1628, Morton was arrested and charged for selling guns to the Native Americans. He was banished to the Isle of Shoals in New Hampshire where he was dropped off and left to die. But his Native American friends provided him with food until, by a stroke of luck, Morton was picked up by an English fishing ship and taken back to England. He returned to America a few years later, where, now very annoyed, in 1637, he wrote The New England Canaan which cast a very poor light on his fellow Puritans and their way of life. The New England Puritans responded by banning the book, eventually recapturing poor Morton and trying him for sedition. Slowly dying, Morton was granted clemency from prison and spent the rest of his days in Maine.

Artist Spotlight

BY STEWART IKEDA

IIn this series, we highlight two of the many talented artists who continue Concord’s rich artistic tradition. From The Umbrella Arts Center, home to more than 50 local artists, to Village Art Room, a community-based organization in West Concord, our town teems with creativity. We encourage you to experience art in all its many forms at Concord’s galleries, exhibitions, live performances, studios, classes, and more.

SALLY LEE

Sally Lee, a Boston-based installation artist from Arkansas, is 2022-23 Artistin-Residence at The Umbrella Arts Center. Lee works in many mediums such as ceramics, painting, sculpture, textiles, and more. Her art practice has served as a mechanism to navigate her place in the world as a first-generation immigrant. These experiences inform Sally on how to create conceptual work through historical, political, and cultural contexts. Like her cultural identity, Lee’s combined aesthetic between Eastern and Western styles and philosophies is a part of her artistic fingerprint. Sally is currently an adjunct professor at Northeastern University, teaches at the New Art Center, is a Ceramic Studio Assistant at The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, and Program Director of Nearby Gallery. sallyleeart.com

ZACHARY MICKELSON

Zachary Mickelson is a ceramic artist, teacher, and Manager of the booming new Ceramics Studio at The Umbrella Arts Center. After eleven years of teaching at various studios throughout the Boston area, including nearly a decade at the Harvard Ceramic Program, he has helped multiple ceramic studios and programs develop. At The Umbrella, Zachary teaches several advanced ceramics classes, manages independent and teaching studios, and runs firing and glazing services.

Outside of teaching, Zachary continues to create and exhibit his own functional and sculptural artworks, drawing inspiration from his hometown of Cape Ann, MA, an island with a strong history of artist communities. He studied ceramic sculpture and pottery at Lewis and Clark University in Portland, OR. He then furthered his education in Saitama, Japan, where he taught, learned pottery techniques, and absorbed Japanese crafting traditions.

Zachary will be on hand for Ceramics Studio demonstrations and art sales during The Umbrella Winter Market and holiday season gallery exhibitions. zacharymickelson.wixsite.com

Stewart Ikeda heads the Marketing & Strategic Communications team at The Umbrella Arts Center.

Winter on the Web

As the temperatures drop and snow covers the ground, many of our cultural and historical sites will reduce operating hours or close for the winter. That doesn’t mean you can’t visit, though. Just head online to enjoy an amazing array of fun and informative programs that will keep you and your entire family entertained and engaged through the long winter days.

CONCORD FREE PUBLIC LIBRARY

While the Concord Free Public Library is open year-round, winter is the perfect time to explore its many online programs and resources. Visit the Library’s digital media webpage to access a variety of online resources. Watch a TV show or movie, or check out a book, newspaper, or magazine from the comfort of your own home. Check the events calendar for in-person and virtual programs scheduled at the Main Library and the Fowler Branch. Another exceptional resource is the Library of Things, a collection of items to encourage lifelong learning. It is where to go if you would like to borrow a GoPro camera, microscope, telescope, or the Scrabble® Deluxe Travel Edition. The Library’s William Munroe Special Collections seeks to cultivate the most comprehensive collection of Concord, Massachusetts’ unique history, social, and political life, culture, people, and landscape. You can access Special Collections resources online, including exhibits on 19th-century photographs of Concord’s people and landscapes, oral histories, and its renowned art collection. concordlibrary.org

LOUISA

MAY ALCOTT’S ORCHARD

HOUSE

Orchard House, best known as the Alcott residence where Louisa May Alcott wrote and set Little Women, is open seven days a week year ‘round. Winter is a magical time to experience the House. Visitors often say that it feels as if the Alcotts just stepped out of their cozy home because you are surrounded by their authentic belongings in every room. A visit to the Orchard House website will allow you to make a reservation ahead of time (even though the staff will accommodate “walk-ins” as space permits). On the website you can enjoy Executive Director Jan Turnquist’s vibrant “Facebook Live” recordings, “Eyes on Artifacts” that offer views of rarely displayed collection items, download Bronson Alcott’s Teaching Maxims and educational materials based on Little Women, and shop in their online store. An exclusive proprietary Orchard House apple tea is available both online and in their store on premises. Back home, brew a cup of that special tea and recall your visit with the beloved Alcott family or spend the afternoon browsing louisamayalcott.org.

Orchard House in the snow

Photo courtesy of Orchard House Painting is part of the art collection of Concord Free Public Library. Image © 2020 James E. Coutré

Main Street, Concord by Edward Motley, 1984

CONCORD MUSEUM

Concord Museum’s website is a treasure trove of exhibitions, virtual events, educational materials, and so much more. Take a 360° tour of “Beyond Midnight: Paul Revere and His Ride” and discover the man behind the legend - bringing to life his creative spirit, tremendous capacity to adapt to changing times, and his lasting impact on the social, economic, and political life in America. Or experience the events of April 19, 1775, including an interactive timeline, in “The ‘Shot Heard Round the World” Virtual Exhibit microsite, which was officially recognized by the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission. Concord Museum Forums draw our nation’s most respected thinkers for conversations on topics of both historic and current importance and dozens of past Forums are available to listen to online. You can even download information and maps for self-guided tours of Concord. concordmuseum.org

MINUTE MAN NATIONAL HISTORICAL PARK

Though park visitor centers are closed and ranger-guided programs have ended for the season, you can still explore Minute Man virtually this winter! Learn about the park and the Battle of Lexington and Concord from the warmth and comfort of your home by visiting their website. In the past year the park has created a page devoted to April 19, 1775. Learn about various battle sites, witness houses and the people who experienced the events firsthand. You can follow the action on an interactive map as well as an hour-by-hour chronology

of key events! The Photos and Multimedia page is full of educational videos, panoramic images, and an amazing photo gallery. If you want to bundle up and head outdoors, download the free National Park Service app and search for Minute Man National Historical Park. You’ll find lots of helpful information and self-guided tours created for you by park rangers! nps.gov/mima/index.htm

THE OLD MANSE

The Old Manse has stood at the center of Concord’s political, literary, and social arenas for more than 200 years. Overlooking the North Bridge, The Old Manse has been home to Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and others. Download the self-guided tour app and enjoy a walk around the grounds. The Trustees of the Reservations website even has engaging and age-appropriate resources for parents and educators to fill a long winter’s afternoon. thetrustees.org/place/the-old-manse

RALPH WALDO EMERSON HOUSE

While the Ralph Waldo Emerson House is closed until April 2022, the web site remains very active. In the “Looking Back” blog, you’ll find timely posts about winter traditions, antislavery activities by Concord women, Christmas Day events in Emerson’s life, the creation of the Concord grape, and other topics with broad-based appeal. The site is updated frequently. ralphwaldoemersonhouse.org

THE ROBBINS HOUSE

Delve into Concord’s rich African American history with The Robbins House. Explore online the early 19th century house formerly inhabited by the first generation of descendants of formerly enslaved African American Revolutionary War veteran Caesar Robbins, and by selfemancipated slave Jack Garrison and then learn more with a selection of short videos on related topics. Download a map and spend a winter’s day taking a self-guided walking tour of the African American and antislavery history sites in Concord. Stop by the house where Ellen, Caesar’s granddaughter and tester of the nation’s first civil rights act of 1866, was born and raised. robbinshouse.org

THE WAYSIDE

Over more than three hundred years, The Wayside and its families witnessed and influenced both Concord’s and America’s recorded history. In 1775, the Wayside was home to Samuel Whitney, the muster master for Concord’s minute men and a delegate to the Provincial Congress. In the 19th century famed authors Louisa May Alcott, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Margaret Sidney (Harriet Lothrop) lived at this incredible site. Follow three centuries of history and literature on the National Park Service’s website, including a timeline of The Wayside, information on The Wayside and the Underground Railroad, and even an article on the 160-year-old hawthorn tree that boasts two types of blooms. nps.gov/mima/learn/historyculture/thewayside.htm

From ‘The Shot Heard ‘Round The World’ microsite Photo courtesy of Concord Museum

The barn at Ralph Waldo Emerson house

Reflections on Concord

in Winter

OOur New England days lose daylight and might even be a bit bleak at times, but it helps to keep our eyes out for warm colors and interesting nature to brighten our days. Reflections of water and ice often glow. The slanting light of winter and patterns of ice are delightfully complex in contrast with the direct light of summer.

Critters can be more easily seen as they search further for food. Deer, coyotes, and beaver stand out when walking on the ice as opposed to tucked into the trees and undergrowth of the warmer seasons.

Wintering bluebirds are a delight to see as are the ducks, such as the Hooded Merganser, on our waterways.

Winter is not a time to stay inside!

STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY DAVE WITHERBEE

Dave Witherbee has been traveling the trails and rivers of Concord for 50 years and has been enchanted with the small and large aspects of its nature. Dave’s love of photography has enhanced the attraction.

Experience sustainable farm to table cuisine right here in West Concord. Choose from fine dining at Woods Hill Table or relaxed, casual Mexican cuisine at Adelita!

Celebrate the holidays with sustainable farm to table cuisine right here in West Concord. Choose from fine dining at Woods Hill Table or relaxed, casual Mexican cuisine at Adelita!

For more information, or to make a reservation, visit: www.woodshilltable.com www.adelitaconcord.com 978.254.1435

Experience sustainable farm to table cuisine right here in West Concord. Choose from fine dining at Woods Hill Table or relaxed, casual Mexican cuisine at Adelita!

For more information, or to make a reservation, visit: www.woodshilltable.com www.adelitaconcord.com 978.254.1435 978.254.0710

For

We hope to see you soon!

We hope to see you soon!

Curbside take out and gift certificates available

We hope to see you soon!

AND IN-PERSON! JANUARY 28 - FEBRUARY 20, 2022

STUDENT, SENIOR, AND REGULAR TICKETS: $15-$44

Flex Subscription Package Special! See all three with preferred rates, flexible ticketing, your choice of seats, and first-chance special events!

By George C. Wolfe | Directed by Pascale Florestal

Provocative exploration of the African American past that “has electrified, discomforted, and delighted audiences of all colors, redefining our ideas of what it means to be black in contemporary America.” – Dramatists

A dark comedy about Asian American Pacific Islander immigrant experience pursuing the American DreamNew Commision World Premiere!

HEAD OVER HEELS

MARCH 18 - APRIL 10, 2022 MAY 13 - JUNE 5, 2022

Adapted by James Magruder | Concept and Book by James Whitty Music by The Go-Go’s | Directed by Brian Boruta

A raucous return to musical theater and “a giddy neon anthem of acceptance” - Entertainment Weekly

40 Stow Street, Concord, MA 01742 978.371.0820

THE COLORED MUSEUM

MIDDLETON HEIGHTS [Working Title]

By Hortense Gerardo | Directed by Michelle Aguillon

Giving Back to COMMUNITY

Non-profit groups are at the core of Concord’s beloved cultural and historic heritage. They preserve our history, foster our creativity, educate, inform, and even feed our community. This year, in particular, has been challenging for so many groups as performances had to be cancelled, historic sites closed, and employees and volunteers furloughed. So please remember to include Concord’s non-profit organizations in your holiday giving.

Photo courtesy of Friends of Minute Man National Park

Friends of Minute Man National Park

THE ARTS

51 Walden 51walden.org

Concord Art concordart.org

Concord Band concordband.org

Concord Chorus concordchorus.org

Concord Conservatory of Music concordconservatory.org

Concord Orchestra concordorchestra.com/co

Concord Players concordplayers.org

Concord Women’s Chorus concordwomenschorus.org

Concord Youth Theatre concordyouththeatre.org

Dance Prism danceprism.com/index.htm

Opera 51 opera51.org

The Thoreau Society thoreausociety.org

The Umbrella Arts Center theumbrellaarts.org

Village Art Room villageartroom.com

THE ENVIRONMENT

Concord Land Conservation Trust concordland.org

The Walden Woods Project walden.org

Be Well Be Here bewellbehere.org

Concord-Carlisle Community Chest cccommunitychest.org

Gaining Ground gainingground.org

Minuteman Arc minutemanarc.org

Open Table opentable.org

The Scholarship Fund of Concord and Carlisle thescholarshipfundofcc.org

MUSEUMS, LIBRARIES & HISTORIC SITES

Concord Free Public Library concordlibrary.org

Concord Museum concordmuseum.org

Save Our Heritage saveourheritage.com

Friends of Minute Man National Park friendsofminuteman.org

Friends of Sleepy Hollow friendsofsleepyhollow.org

Louisa May Alcott’s Orchard House louisamayalcott.org

Trustees of Reservations thetrustees.org

Ralph Waldo Emerson House ralphwaldoemersonhouse.org

The Robbins House robbinshouse.org

These are just some of the many Concord organizations supported by charitable giving. Visit www.guidestar.org for a more complete list.

The Robbins House

Minute Man Arc

Photo courtesy of 51 Walden

Photo courtesy of Minute Man Arc

Concord Band

Real Estate Sold by Real Experts

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Tom Matthews and Joanne Taranto

Info@TomandJoanneTeam.com

781.795.0502

TomandJoanneTeam.com

Spread Some Holiday Cheer This Season

Support Your Local Shops and Restaurants

Here’s how much of your $100 purchase stays in your community when you spend at . . .

$48

$14 $1 … an independent local store … a local chain store … a remote online store (if the delivery driver resides locally)

package of Zand Elderberry Zinc lozenges

Free donut with any purchase at any of our Concord locations. Limit one per customer.

3/15/22

To include your business in our next edition, please contact Jennifer C. Schünemann: jennifer@voyager-publishing.com or 978.435.2266

©Jennifer C. Schünemann

Winter 2021

Advertiser Index

ANTIQUES

36 North Bridge Antiques

ARCHITECTURE, CUSTOM BUILDING & INTERIOR DESIGN

1 Appleton Design Group

75 Forever Tile

70 Inkstone Architects

81 Platt Builders

ARTS & ART SUPPLIES

53 Albright Art Supply

BOOKS, MAGAZINES & SCHOLARLY WORKS

15 Barefoot Books

15 Barrow Bookstore

65 Discover Concord

70 The Thoreau Society

70 Transcendental Concord

CATERING, RESTAURANTS, AND SPECIALTY FOOD & WINE SHOPS

71 Adelita

37 Concord Cheese Shop

78, 82 *Debra’s Natural Gourmet

39, 78 *Dunkin’

27 Fiorella’s Cucina

75 Verrill Farm

74 West Concord Wine & Spirits

71 Woods Hill Table

CLOTHING & ACCESSORIES

74 Sara Campbell

EXPERIENTIAL

77 Beede Center Swim + Fitness

32 Concord Museum

37 Concord Players

77 Concord Tour Company

71 The Umbrella Arts Center

FLORISTS

74 Concord Flower Shop

HOME FURNISHINGS, DÉCOR & UNIQUE GIFTS

65 Artisans Way

70 The Bee’s Knees

British Imports

53 Belle on Heels

78 Nesting

59 Patina Green

53 Revolutionary Concord

21 Wee Forest Folk

75 Woven Art

LODGING

49 Concord’s Colonial Inn

JEWELERS

36 Artinian Jewelery

PROFESSIONAL SERVICES

70 McWalter Volunteer Insurance Agency

78 My Side Virtual Assistant Professionals

58 Pierre Chiha Photographers

78 West Concord Pharmacy

REAL ESTATE

3, 7 The Attias Group C2, 80 Barrett Sotheby’s Int’l Realty

33 Coldwell Banker Realty

5, 23 Compass

9, 40 Engel & Völkers

74 Gibson Sotheby’s Int’l Realty

45 William Raveis

TOYS

53 The Concord Toy Box

VISITOR RESOURCES

20 Concord Visitor Center

*Money Saving Coupon on page 78