I submitted an encyclopedia article to the editor earlier tonight. It was a small, 500 word piece about Frederick Law Olmsted. My Olmsted was a little rusty and I thought it would be an opportunity to refresh myself. My great friend Charles Hirsch used to say that writing the occasional encyclopedia piece was good training in how to write to spec, work within tight guidelines, and give an editor what he/she wants.

It did not make its way into the piece, but Frederick Law Olmsted was a great friend of both Louisa Lee Schuyler and Theodore Roosevelt Senior. The three worked together in the U.S. Sanitary Commission during the Civil War; later they collaborated in the New York State Charities Aid Association. Roosevelt Senior died in 1878, and Olmsted in 1903. It is incredible to think, but Schuyler was still very much active when the Great War started in 1914. Indeed she continued in some of the same capacities she had with her old friends during the Civil War. New York State suffered greatly during the First World War, which had disrupted the economy and negatively impacted the social fabric of life in New York City. Schuyler was in her seventies by this time, and though her old friend were long gone she picked up the mantle yet again.