"What's in a Name?" My Interpretive Sunday

After having researched for my interpretive Sunday off and on for a month I finally got to present it to the public. Overall, the excessive heat kept people away from the Bertolet Cabin where I was located. The few people who did stop by had mixed reactions to my presentation. I think that the public expects more action on an iterpretive Sunday, not just a static exhibit.



My display for "What's in a name" constited mostly of examples of various ethnic groups' family trees, and facsimile frakturs, that I was to explain to the public as they came though the cabin. I ended up with four ethnic groups: English Quakers, Pennsylvania Germans, Scots-Irish, and Lenape Indian. Basically what I found was that the Quakers, who belived in egalitarian relations between the sexes, tried to repsent both the maternal and paternal line when coming up with first names for their children. The Scots-Irish tended to name boys after their grandfathers, and the Pa Germans and the Lenapes usually didn't go by the first names they were given. I also included in the display handouts on genealogy, teaching people about different resources, and giving them blank family trees to fill out.

I was stationed in the Bertolet Cabin from noon until about 4pm. The heat was oppressive. It was about 100 degrees outside that day in the sun, and it was humid. I was wearing eighteenth century garb, so I was extremely hot, and had very little energy. The Bertolet cabin is in an out of the way location from the rest of the historic buildings and so I think that was a significant factor in keeping people away. I had four groups of people walk through the cabin. Most were not terrbily interested in my display. One older couple asked questions and took time to read everything that I had set up. Most people listened obligingly.

They asked me questions about the bakeoven most of all. I think that on interpretive days what the public really wants is a demonstration. They would have been perfectly happy to watch me bake something in the bakeoven, or to watch me cook on the hearth.

The Keystone Intern Tour of the Oley Valley

The other day the PHMC organized a trip to the Daniel Boone Homestead for the Keystone Interns. They toured the site in the morning, and in the afternoon Jim and I took them on a tour of the Oley Valley. Overall I was impressed with the other interns, they were a bright bunch who were all very serious about history, and they seemed to know their stuff.

When the Interns first arrived in the morning Jim and I took them on a our of the site. The tour of the Boone House consisted of a long discussion of the dendro-chronology of the house that we got last year, and whether or not we should believe the dendro, which dates the house at the 1770's and 1790's, or other historical clues that would date the house earlier. A tour of the blacksmith shop showed the interns different types of log construction. At the barn we talked about how the public complains about how we take care of our animals (which is silly because they live better than some people do!). Dave and I also got to talk to them about interpretive Sundays, and what we each got to research, and how we thought the first one went over with the public.

Then came the tour of the Oley Valley. I was placed in a van with most of the interns. Jim was in a car with a few others. I actually had to try to give them a tour of the Oley Valley. Jim and I had created a route the day before, but I had not had much time to prepare. Most of what I said was a mixture of things that I remembered from my reading, and other tours of the Oley Valley that I had been on with Jim. Although I felt a little bit bad that I was not giving them as thorough of a tour as Jim would have, the interns all told me that they enjoyed it and that they thought I had done a good job. Here are some pictures from the tour.

Here is the Exeter Friends meetinghouse. Jim took us inside. Note the symetry on the outside of the building.

Here we are at the Keim House.

A Day on the Farm: Interpretive Sunday Numero Uno

Interpretive Sundays at the Daniel Boone Homestead are a lot like any other day there, except we put on one or two interpretive programs and all of the staff gets dressed up in period garb. I spent the whole day in the visitor's center ringing up peoples' purchases and giving tours just as always. The only things that were different were that Dave, the intern, and Charlotte, a volunteer, demonstrated flax production and spinning to the visitors. Overall I got positive feedback from the visitors, and I think that the interpretive demonstrations really help people understand what life was like in the past.

When I first put on my costume this Sunday I had one thought: this is ridiculous. I had spent the entire morning pulling weeds in the garden, watering, and picking camomile. (We don't open until noone on Sundays so I always have the morning to do things like that). I thought that putting on a costume in the middle of the day while I wasn't doing anything particularly historical was kind of silly. In fact I spent a good portion of the day on the computer researching "fighting quakers" and institutions that carry eighteenth century quaker documents. It must have looked quite anachronistic. I gave a tour in the garb and I am not even sure if the visitors understood that it was a special occasion for me to be doing this. I think they just thought that it was something gimicky that we did every day. None of them even asked me about my clothing at all when we were on the tour. Maybe they just felt awkward bringing it up.

At the Boone House a loquacious volunteer named Charlotte spun wool in eighteenth century garb all day. She knew a great deal about spinning and told me she had been doing it for about twenty years. She gave me advice about purchasing a spinning wheel and answered my questions about spinning and dyeing wool. The visitors watched her spin as they waited for the tour to begin. In the barn our intern Dave demonstrated linen production. He broke flax up in a flax break, scutched it, and combed it through hackles. He also talked to the visitors about farming, animals, growing hay, food etc.

Overall I think that the people who came to interpretive Sunday and actually engaged in the exhibites had a good time and got a lot out of it. Dave said that he did not get a very good turnout at the barn, probably because his exhibit was around the back and no one could see it. A lot of what I told people at the visitors center about the exhibit seemed lost on them. But the ones who did go seemed to learn a lot. One man told Ryan that he thought our costumes really added something to the presentation, and that we should wear them everyday. People also seemed to reat well to the spinning exhibit. One little boy even asked if Charlotte would show him how to use a drop spindle.

My presentation in Harrisburg

I used to avoid detailing my down time at the Homestead because I didn't think it was very interesting. The truth is though that some days I have a lot of it. Today I am preparing the power point presentation that I somehow got stuck giving on July 23rd in Harrisburg. This is a slightly difficult task right now because none of the interpretitive sundays that I am supposed to be working on have taken place yet. Hardly a good way to get pictures for the presentation. And when it comes to powerpoint I am all about the pictures. Tomorow is our first interpretive sunday. I have to dress up in period garb again. This time there will be pictures because I have no choice in the matter.

When I originally began to work on the presentation I tried to make it a summary of my entire summer. Bad idea. It only has to be 15 minutes long. So I had to start over in a sense today, which was a shame because I really liked the slides I had made, and I normally hate powerpoint. But alas, now I am just detailing the projects I have been working on. This is much more maneagable. Interpretive Sundays is one. Driving tours is another. I am even thinking of throwing the iron conservation project in there. For a fifteen minute presentation I think this is all I will need.

Our Garden: An Update

Here are some pictures of our garden I snapped the other day to show how much progress it's made since we planted. Since Marcia has been on vacation this week I have been watering, weeding, and generally brooding over it.



Pumpkins.

The scarlet runner beans are growing up the poles. The wren's egg beans didn't grow, so I replanted them the other day.
I have always found it amazing how plants can cling to things like this.
Buckwheat.
Parsley.
Cucumbers.
Leeks. Look at these cabages!
Feverfew. You harvest the little white flowers once they start to wilt, and that is what you dry out and use for tea etc.

My Valley Forge Trip: Photos

When you first go into the welcome center at Valley Forge you are greeted by free standing displays like this one that are organized thematically.

The museum houses a lot of object from the extensive Newman Collection and some of them are on display.
There are reproduced and original redans and redoubts throughout the park.
There are also repoduction log cabins that are supposed to look like what the soldiers at Valley Forge erected. There are two types of cabins here today. The one below was built by the NPS and is based on the specifications that Washington gave to the soldiers about building cabins.
Here is a repro bake oven. These were fairly commom in both American and British camps. The original was probably bigger and had six or seven ovens around the entire mound.
Here's the inside of one of the NPS huts.

The triumphal arch. I have no idea what this piece's story is in relation to the rest of the park. Valley Forge pretty much consists of a bunch of different memorials that don't relate to each other in any way and don't make sense.

The PHMC also built huts in the 70's when they still owned the site. These were built by examining archeological findings of what the huts really might have looked like. The NPS is letting these basically just fall down now. The inside of a PHMC hut.
You drive past lots of monuments.
This house was restored by the same guy, Brumbaugh, who restored the Boone House.

A lot of the features are similar on each house. Note the shutters on this one are exactly the same as the ones on the Boone House. Washington's HQ. He, twelve other people, and Martha were living here.
What Washington's bed may have looked like. The summer kitchen is attached to the rest of the house by an arch. Pretty unique architectural feature, historians are not even sure if this would have been one there when Washinton was here.
There are storytellers planted throughout the site. This guy was very good.
More monuments.
Vermeer's HQ. Also a good example of an eighteenth century hall and parlor. They don't normally have this building open and Jim was really jazzed that it was.
The house was pretty much gutted at one point so nothing in it was original. Everything, right down to the doorway molded is based entirely based on supposition. The Washington Memorial Chapel. It made the whole trip worhtwhile.
This is what you see when you look up.
Some of this gets a little too patriotic and religious for comfort.

The Valley Forge Chapel

The most spectacular sight to see at Valley Forge is the Chapel. This is an extremely wierd building that you really have to see to believe. It mixes American history with religion to such an extent that it puts new meaning to that term "civil religion. " I have always been interested in the American phenomenon of considering anything related to our country's founding as sacred. The Declaration is a sacred document. The Founders are like deities in a way. We refer to them as Founding fathers, extending the patriachical symbolism that we create when we refer to God as the father.

In the Valley Forge Chapel George Washington is Jesus Christ. It's an Episcopal Church and there are not a lot of images of Jesus, or crosses. Instead there are images of Washington, continentel soldiers, colonial flags. The number thirteen is repeated throughout the structure as a reference to the thirteen colonies. The stained glass windows depict scenes from the American Reovlution.

For me the Valley Forge Chapel represents someting that I have been interested in for a long time; the equation of americanism with protestantism. America was founded on millenialist ideals, many in the colonial era believed the America would be where Christ returned, and during the revolution writers like Thomas Paine painted the war as a struggle between good and evil. The Chapel portrays the revolution as just this kind of struggle. In fact Valley Forge is in many ways viewed as a part of this struggle. The Continental Army is laid up there suffering all winter before emerging to carry on the struggle for independence. Through suffering they are able to combat evil. This is a christian notion if there ever was one, and that idea is represented visually over the entire Valley Forge Chapel.

My trip to Valley Forge

Jim likes to take his interns to various historic sites throughout the summer in order to see how other sites interpret history to the public. Today I will just be writing about the experience and then later in the week I will hopefully be posting some pictures. I just got all of the photos onto facebook and don't really feel like dealing with them anymore.

Valley Forge is a basically a mix of different memorials from many different eras, and in many ways they say a lot about the national discourse and feeling toward Valley Forge. There are rangers and other staff on site that interpret the buildings for the public, and one can learn a lot by taking advantage of all the educational oportunities there. The most modern addition, the welcome center, gives a comprehensive view of the encampment that touches on its wider social implications.

As you drive around Valley Forge you will see different structures scattered throughout the park. You will probably first come upon the reconstructed log cabins, which were constructed in two eras. The first were created when the PHMC operated the site in the 1970's. They based their constructions on acheological evidence. The cabins are low to the ground and are built atop pits, much like the soldiers who were hard up for lumber were doing at the actuall encampment. The other cabins were built once the NPS took over. They are built to the specifications that Washington gave to the soldiers, but they are a little less rustic looking. The chinking is cement; they are a little too perfect. Next you may come upon some redoubts built up from soil, some have cannons behind them. If you drive around long enough you will also find the triumphal arch. This thing is huge and based on the one in France. This to me was a little over the top. I am not sure when it was constructed but it was rebuilt in the 1990's with money from the Freemasons.

There are a lot of ways to learn about the history asociated with the site. The buildings that have been preserved or reconstructed are interpreted by rangers or other staff, some of whom are in period garb. Some of the rangers don't say too much, but some are willing to talk, answer questions, even start converstations with you. I talked to one ranger who had been a history major in college and had worked his way up in the system of the NPS. First he was seasonal, then part time, then full time. He was in Vermeer's quarters and he told me a little about the history of the house, and about the people who had lived there when Vermeer took up residence. Apparently they were quakers, but they didn't have too much choice in the matter, it was either let the army move in or lose the whole house. The interpretive staff in garb was also very helpful. There was one man stationed at the door of Washington's HQ who told us who was living in the house with Washington and who was sleeping where. There were also interpretive staff at the cabins talking about the camp life of the soldiers.

The welcome center was an interesting place. The collections at Valley Forge are apparently quite extensive, but only a few object are put on display. The displays are basically wall displays with artifacts in cases. The labeling system for the objects consists of a sheet of paper on the side of the case that you can look up and match the picture of the object and learn about it. The displays are divided up thematically with topics like, ethnic and religious groups, women, medicine, camp life, cooking, weapons, von steuben, washington etc. You can learn and see a great deal before you actually drive the site just by looking through the visitor's center.

I am going to need a lot more space to write about everything I saw at Valley Forge Today!

A drive through the Oley Valley

Today Jim took us on a trip through the Oley Valley in order to show us the John DeTurk house. We got to see a lot of beautiful archtecture on the way. John DeTurk was the father of the John DeTurk who bought the Boone's property, and he was quite an interesting fellow. Aparently he became a Moravian and allowed Zinzendof to hold the third Synod on his property. Here are some pictures of the trip that I took today. These photos are slightly out of order but you'll get the idea.

The ancillary house had lots of cabinet space and so Jim thinks that at one time John DeTurk and his wife lived in here as a retirement home while one of their married children took over the farmhouse.

A little storage space under the stairs.
Paintings on the door to the cellar that Jim thought were original.
A creek where Zinzendorf may have baptised some Lenape Indians.
Not the DeTurk Farm. This is an ancillary and springhouse on a farm that we drove by.
The Deturk house.

The ancillary house, may have been a sumar kitchen and a living space. The Berks County Historic Preservation Trust leases this house from the owners of the DeTurk property.
Nice tiles there on the pent.
Note the pully on the pent and the door to the attic. Probably used to hoist grains or other things to be stored up there.
A small fireplace used for heating purposes. There is a brick hearth extending from it. Little details like that show us that this house was probably constructed with human habitation in mind.
A nice house we saw enroute.

A ground barn that shows both Pa German and English features. The slits in the sides are vents.
Jacob Lesher's house. Lesher was a cantankerous iron master who served in the Pa assembly and was instrumental in the Revolutionary effort in Berks County.
The Manantawny Creek is nearby.