This Week @ MHS

By Elaine Grublin

We have a couple of interesting events planned this week, as well as two exhibitions open to the public 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM, Monday through Saturday.  As always, check the online calendar for more details about individual events. 

Tonight, 23 April, at 6:00 PM Heather Nathans, University of Maryland, author of Early American Theatre from the Revolution to Thomas Jefferson (Cambridge University Press, 2003) will present “Democracies of Glee: Boston’s First Professional Theatres, 1794-98.” A pre-talk reception, offering an opportunity to explore our current exhibition The First Seasons of the Federal Street Theatre, beings at 5:30 P.M. This event is free and open to the public.  Registration is requested. To register please call 617-646-0560 or click here.

Tuesday, 24 April, at 5:15 PM the final installment of the Boston Immigration and Urban History Seminar brings Andrea Thabet, University of California, Santa Barbara, to the MHS to present her paper “A Successful Integrated Development for the Central City”: Constructing the Los Angeles Music Center, 1954-1967. Samuel Zipp, Brown University, will give the comment. This event is free and open to the public.  Advance copies of the seminar paper are available for a small subscription fee. RSVPs are requested and can be submitted via email.

Saturday, 28 April, all are welcome to attend our tour, The History and Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society.  The 90-minute tour departs the front lobby at 10:00 AM.

 

 

 

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Recently Published Research

By Anna J. Cook

Putting together a summer reading list?  Here are some recent publications that we are aware of, completed by researchers that made use of our collections or publications.

 

JANUARY-APRIL 2012:

Baldwin, Peter. In the Watches of the Night: Life in the Nocturnal City, 1820-1930 (University of Chicago Press, 2012).

Dyer, Justin Buckley. American Soul: The Contested Legacy of the Declaration of Independence (Rowman and Littlefield, 2012).

Dykstra, Natalie. Clover Adams: A Gilded and Heartbreaking Life (Houghton Mifflin, 2012).

Gamble, Richard. In Search of the City on a Hill: The Making and Unmaking of an American Myth (Continuum Press, 2012).

Johnson, Laura. “American Blues: Printed Pottery Celebrating a New Nation” Antiques and Fine Art (Winter 2012).

Lynch, Matthew. Before Obama: A Reappraisal of Black Reconstruction Era Politicians (Praeger Publishing, 2012).

Newton, Ross. “ ‘Persons of worthy Character’: Slaves, Servants, and Masters at Boston’s Old North Church” Journal of the North End Historical Society (March 2012).

Platt, Stephen. Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: China, the West, and the Epic Story of the Taiping Civil War (Alfred A. Knopf, 2012).

Winship, Michael. Godly Republicanism: Puritans, Pilgrims, and the City on a Hill (Harvard University Press, 2012).

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Happy Birthday, Fenway Park!

By Elaine Grublin

 

Today hordes of people — Red Sox fans and baseball stadium aficionados alike — will descend on Fenway Park to celebrate the 100th anniversary of that venerable stadium’s opening in 1912.

We at the MHS are lucky. Being just a short walk from the ball park allows us to watch as a sea of red and blue outfitted fans make their way down Boylston Street toward the park for each home game. This morning, I was struck by the fact that the MHS has stood at 1154 Boylston since 1898, more than a decade before the park opened.  It made me wonder if Charles Francis Adams, MHS president from 1895 to 1915, and other MHS members stood before one of the large first floor windows and watched folks make their way to Fenway Park 100 years ago today. If they did, I would imagine they did not worry so much if the end of the day game coincided with quitting time at the MHS — as the current staff, anticipating traffic woes, now does.

The two images here are postcards held in our collection. The cards, sent to members of the Pond family in Connecticut, were posted in January and March 1914. Although there is no evidence on the cards how much before that date they were printed, it is safe to assume they offer a fun glimpse of Fenway close to the time of its opening. 

One final thought on Fenway’s special day. Although the season is off to a bit of a rocky start, let’s hope the Sox bring home another one of these!  Click here to learn more about the 1912 World Series medal held by the MHS.

 

 

 

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This Week @ MHS

By Elaine Grublin

Mark your calendar and plan to join us for an event this week.  More information about each event is available through our online calendar. 

Wednesday, 18 April at noon join us for a brown-bag lunch program and listen as Trenton Jones, The Johns Hopkins University, talks about his project “Prisoners of War and the Making of Revolutionary American Military Culture.”  After the presentation, be ready to join in the lively Q & A session. 

Friday, 20 April at noon, Fred Wallace, Framingham Town Historian, presents Framingham’s Civil War Hero, the Life of General George H. Gordon.

And on Saturday, 21 April, the 90-minute building tour, The History and Collections of the MHS, departs the front lobby promptly at 10:00 AM.

 

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A Battle Among the Icebergs

By Emilie Haertsch

“Since last we met a great battle has been fought among the icebergs and under the star-filled skies of the North Atlantic.” These words began Rev. Edward Cummings sermon at Boston’s South Congregational Church just one week after the sinking of the RMS Titanic on April 15, 1912. Over 1,500 people died on the Titanic – one of the worst peacetime death tolls from a sea wreck. Edward Everett Hale, the minister emeritus at South Congregational Church, admired this sermon, and the Society has his 20-page handwritten copy of it in its collection.

Often remembered today as the father of poet E. E. Cummings, Edward Cummings was famous in his own right in his day. His first career was as a professor of sociology at Harvard University, but his second, as a minister, began when Hale recruited Cummings to preach at South Congregational. Cummings became a prominent Unitarian minister and was active in many social causes, including the World Peace Foundation, the Russian Famine Relief Committee, Hale House Settlement, the Massachusetts Civic League, and the Massachusetts Prison Association.

The tragedy of the Titanic affected Cummings deeply. His language betrays a feeling that this, too, was a matter of social justice. In his sermon on April 21, 1912, he said of the passengers, “A little band of heroic men and women, betrayed into deadly peril by those in whom they placed implicit trust, found themselves battling empty-handed with the scythe-armed specter of inimitable death.”

News of the Titanic’s end spread quickly and the resulting public shock and outrage created political fallout. Another prominent figure, the historian Henry Adams, wrote in a letter to Elizabeth Cameron on April 16, 1912, “In half an hour, just in a summer sea, were wrecked the Titanic; President Taft; the Republican party, Boyce Penrose, and I. We all foundered and disappeared. Old and sinful as I am, I turn green and sick when I think of it.” At the time, the laws regulating sea travel and concerning ship safety were lax – one of the reasons, perhaps, why there were only 20 lifeboats on board the Titanic. In the aftermath of the Titanic’s sinking, Sen. William Auden Smith from Michigan launched an investigation that led to the passage of a law creating tighter regulation of maritime travel.

 

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Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch, Post 12

By Elaine Grublin

The following excerpt is from the diary of Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch.

April 13th, 1862

A year today since the surrender of Fort Sumter. The crime then committed has in part received its punishment. Not that I think we at the North are entirely without blame. The John Brown raid was more approved than it should have been, & there has been selfishness, scorn and violence here as there. Still, their conduct has been criminal, – deeply so. The statement of atrocities committed by the rebels on the bodies of Union soldiers disgrace their cause, and our common country. I suppose the President this day signs the bill abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia.

Look to the Beehive in May for Bulfinch’s observations of Union victories and the pending Confiscation Act.

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The MHS on a Television Near You . . .

By Elaine Grublin

The Sunday, 8 April 2012, episode of the PBS program Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates, Jr. has a strong “connection” to the MHS. Several items from our collection are featured in the program, which highlighted the genealogy of Hollywood couple Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon. Kyra Sedgwick is a descendant of Theodore Sedgwick, a man whose family is well represented in the MHS collections. Watch the episode to learn the story of Theodore Sedgwick and the important role he played in Massachusetts history.

While you are watching, keep your eyes peeled for MHS librarian Peter Drummey, along with documents and images from the MHS collection intergral to telling the story of Kyra Sedgwick’s family. Those familiar with our buiding at 1154 Boylson Street will also recognize the Dowse Library as the back-drop in many scenes. 

Minature portrait of Elizabeth FreemanIf you are interested in learning more about the end of slavery here in Massachusetts, visit our web feature African Americans and the End of Slavery in Massachusetts. You can learn more about the life of Elizabeth Freeman (“Mumbet”) reading a manuscript draft of the article “Slavery in New England,” published in Bentley’s Miscellany in 1853. The author, Catharine Maria Sedgwick, was the daughter of Theodore Sedgwick. And for those with the time and inclination to dive into a study of the Sedgwicks, the Sedgwick Family Papers, Catharine Maria Sedgwick Papers, and a number of other related collections are all available to researchers in the MHS library. 

 

 

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This Week @ MHS

By Elaine Grublin

Looking for stimulting conversation? Plan to attend one of the two seminars offered this week. You will find additional details about each event, and our current exhibitions, on our online calendar.

Tuesday, 10 April at 5:15 PM the Environmental History Seminar continues with Brian J. Payne, Bridgewater State University, presenting “Controlling the Cost of Fish: Weir Fishermen and Price Control in the Sardine Herring Fishery, 1875-1903.” Josh Reid, University of Massachusetts, Boston, will provide the comment. 

Thursday, 12 April at 5:30 PM the History of Women and Gender Seminar concludes its spring series with Stephanie Jones-Rogers, Rutgers University, presenting her paper “‘She thought she could find a better market’: White Women and the Re-Gendering of the Antebellum Slave Market and Slave-Trading Community.” Walter Johnson, Harvard University, will give the comment.

For both seminars advance copies of the papers are available for a small subscription fee. Whether you are a subscriber, or simply plan on attending one of the events, we ask that you RSVP so that we know to expect you. 

On Saturday, 14 April at 10:00 AM our 90 minute tour, The History and Collections of the MHS, departs the front lobby.  All are welcome to attend.

Also, remember that our current exhibitions, A Gilded and Heartbreaking Life: The Photographs of Clover Adams, 1883-1885 and The First Seasons of the Federal Street Theatre, 1794-1798, are free and open to the public Monday through Saturday 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM. 

Finally, make note that Friday, 13 April marks the opening of The Object of History: Colonial Treasures from the Massachusetts Historical Society.  This exhibition, on display at the Concord Museum 13 April through 17 June, is open to the public Monday through Saturday 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM and Sunday 12:00 PM to 5:00 PM.  Visit the Concord Museum’s website for directions and admission fee information. 

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Even Civil War Soldiers Played Ball

By Elaine Grublin

The Boston Red Sox meet the Detroit Tigers today in the first regular season game of the 2012 season. The arrival of baseball season is always a welcome treat in Boston. Getting myself into a baseball frame of mind, my thoughts wandered to a letter one of our volunteers, Joan, had shown to me several months ago. I know I love the distraction of baseball, a game that is simultaneously exciting and relaxing, but until I saw that letter I had not known that baseball was also a welcome distraction for soldiers during the American Civil War. 

In this 3 May 1862 letter Captain Richard Cary of the 2nd Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment describes for his wife a game played between men from the 2nd and men from the 3rd Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry.  The text reads:

The men of the Wisconsin 3d challenged our men to a game of base ball & this afternoon it was played & at the end the tally stood 75 for our side & 7 for theirs so I hardly think they will care to play a return match; we have some of the best players of quite a celebrated ball club from Medway & some of the playing was admirable. 

The men of the 2nd might have had an advantage, as Cary indicates there were baseball clubs in Massachusetts and some of the men were experienced players. I am not certain how familiar the Wisconsin men would have been with the game — and if the Massachusetts regiment was playing by the rules of the Massachusetts Game (common in the mid-19th century) the Wisconsin team may have been more familiar with a different set of rules.

As a final thought, wouldn’t it be splendid if another Massachusetts/Wisconsin match-up brought similar results? A Red Sox 75, Brewers 7 score the final game of the World Series sounds pretty good to me. 

 

 

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A New Way to Look at an Old (and forgotten) Story

By Peter Drummey

We have just opened a new exhibition, The First Seasons of the Federal Street Theatre: 1794-1798, that complements a larger exhibition, Forgotten Chapters of Boston’s Literary History, at the Boston Public Library. The controversy over a public theater that raged in Boston in the 1790s, an old and largely forgotten story, now has been brought to life through the efforts of Professor Paul Lewis of the English Department of Boston College and his very able students. Thanks to the audio production services of Boston College, it also is the first time that the Society—and the Boston Public Library—have used QR codes in an exhibition. QR codes, the ubiquitous matrix barcodes that appear everywhere in advertisements, now are used increasingly in museum settings so that smartphone users are able to call up additional audio information about what is on display. 

The First Seasons of the Federal Street Theatre will be on display, Monday-Saturday, 10:00 AM-4:00 PM, through July 30, but more than twenty items from the MHS exhibition also are on “virtual” display at the Forgotten Chapters of Boston’s History website, www.bostonliteraryhistory.com. The online version of the First Seasons section of the Forgotten Chapters exhibition will reach a wider audience than those who are able to visit the MHS and be available for a longer period of time, but it also is an informative and engaging introduction to the original materials on show at the Society.

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