Category Archives: Heritage tourism

Sunday morning coffee

10 Sunday Apr 2022

Posted by in Benjamin Franklin, Heritage tourism, Independence National Historical Park

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I was up and out of the house before 6:00 am yesterday in order to meet some friends at the Museum of the American Revolution in Philadelphia. It was a June 2017 visit that spun me off on a different intellectual path that I am still on today. One of the friends with whom I was meeting too has been on something of a new trajectory these past several years relating to the Colonial, Revolutionary, and Early Republic Eras. We met at Federal Hall on Presidents Day 2020 just before the pandemic. He has been making great strides in his pursuits. All of us in our party found the museum overwhelming and exhilarating. There is so much to take in. The MOAR opened in April 2017 and has done such an incredible job in such a short period of time that it is difficult to believe it has been a mere half decade. A highlight of the day, one of many, was talking to the museum staff who intermingle and converse with patrons in the galleries. I struck up conversations with at least 3-4 and they have disparate intellectual interests. There is something in there about pursuing one’s own happiness. All were very knowledgable and dynamic. One thing I brought up with each was what they might be planning for 250th anniversaries coming up, especially for 2026. That is only four years away. It was on the radar of each of them.

We also took a guided tour of Christ Church Burial Ground. As you can see in the image above, somewhere along the way over the centuries church officials tore out a portion of the brick wall and replaced it with fencing that allows passersby to see Deborah and Franklin’s headstone from the sidewalk. Christ Church is still an active congregation and, in addition to the ecumenical work, its members have been doing a lot these past twenty years to archive and disseminate their historical records and heritage. That work has included upkeep and tours of the cemetery. You get a sense when you are here of how small a city colonial and revolutionary Philadelphia was. At the time this was considered the outskirts of town, even what we would today call suburbia. Yet it is all within walking distance of Independence Hall.

Sunday morning coffee

21 Sunday Feb 2021

Posted by in Film, Sound, & Photography, Heritage tourism, Jazz, Museums

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Mahalia Jackson, April 1962

Last night I finished watching the new PBS documentary “The Black Church.” Over these past several evenings I watched each of the four one-hour installments over four nights. I got into something of a routine where when each episode concluded I would email a friend who was also watching and we would compare notes, if you will, with our impressions. I can’t recommend the film highly enough. One of the things I like the most about Henry Louis Gates as a documentarian is the way he listens without judgment and lets the interviewee tell their story. One need not agree with everyone all of the time, or even any of the time, to respectfully let them have their say. The Black Church, like all human institutions, is a flawed—one might say fallen—institution whose stirring triumphs exist within the complexities and ambiguities inherent in human existence. Gates and his team capture that. It is hard to image an America without the Black Church and everything it has given over the centuries not just to its followers but to the country as a whole.

Last night the same friend sent me this article asking if I had heard of the recent opening in Nashville of the National Museum of African American Music. Almost twenty-five years ago now this same friend and I took in a great exhibit about jazz at the African American Museum of Dallas. I had not seen the opening of this new museum, or even heard of its creation. With the pandemic still very much on this is a tough time for a museum to open. Hopefully it can weather these crazy times until the world opens up again. I would love to visit this place some day.

(image/photographers Carl Van Vechten via Library of Congress)

These Old Houses

02 Thursday Jul 2020

Posted by in Heritage tourism, King Manor Museum, New York City

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King Manor Museum interior, Jamaica, Queens

New York City is not a place known for preserving its architectural heritage. Since the arrival of the first Dutchmen centuries ago the city’s entire philosophy has been to tear down and create anew in pursuit of mammon. That creative destruction makes what indeed remains that much more precious. A friend of mine and I had intended to pick up where we left off last summer in our visits to the five boroughs’ few remaining historic homes, but that is not happening for obvious reason. My friend, another Park service volunteer, recently emailed me this New York Times piece from early June telling the stories of the men and women entrusted with the care of the dozen or so historic houses spread through New York City’s diverse neighborhoods. The caretakers live, either alone or with their nuclear families, in these houses, literally keeping the lights on and making certain nothing untoward occurs. All of their stories are intriguing. I was especially interested in the brief profile of eighty-year-old Roy Fox, who has been keeping watch at the Rufus King Manor for over three decades now dating back to the late 1980s. I have not yet met Mr. Fox, but would love to when the shutdown finally does end.

I am still adjusting to the reality of this most unusual summer; though I regard myself as among the fortunate, it is so difficult to be closed off from the wider world on beautiful summer days such as today. Under normal circumstances, who know where we might have been or what we might have seen? Historical homes such as King Manor and the Bartow-Pell Mansion Museum have been quiet for more than three months now. As the article itself points out however, these sites have been around for a long time–centuries in most cases–and been through a lot: world wars, economic depressions, civic unrest, blackouts, petty vandalism, and more. Someday this crazy era too will be part of these structures’ history, and thankfully there are people there right now to preserve that ongoing institutional memory.

(image/CaptJayRuffins via Wikimedia Commons))

Patriot’s Day 2020

20 Monday Apr 2020

Posted by in American Revolutionary War, Heritage tourism

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Yesterday was the 245th anniversary of the firing at Lexington and Concord. The stamp above is a commemorative, one of a three-stamp set, from the 1925 sesquicentennial. As I understand it, one of the reasons people associate Massachusetts and Virginia–but not New York–so closely with the Revolutionary War is that in the 1920s the former two states out-hustled the latter in the heritage tourism game. It is something I intend to delve into more in these next few years during the 250th, which we are already in right now. I think the role the sesquicentennial in the 1920s played in our understanding of the Revolutionary War is under appreciated.

Today is Patriot’s Day in New England. The Red Sox would have played a morning game in Fenway concurrent with the running of the Boston Marathon. Even though I have not lived in New England for more than 40 years I still have many relatives there and feel a strong connection to Patriot’s Day. My relatives usually watch the marathon from a small town outside Boston itself. Also, I ran cross-country in high school and remember Bill Rodgers and the runners of that period so vividly. Hopefully they will get the race in this coming September as they plan.

 

Sunday morning coffee

11 Sunday Aug 2019

Posted by in Federal Hall National Memorial, Genealogy, George Washington, Heritage tourism, National Park Service

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One of the most rewarding things about volunteering with the Park Service, in addition to collaborating alongside the amazing rangers who work there, is meeting the public. Everyone visits a site bringing their own expectations to what they hope to get out of it. For some that means using the bathroom and leaving without saying a word, which is fine. Others however visit on some sort of mission or purpose. We had a few of these yesterday at Federal Hall. Here are two:

Two fellows came in from rural Pennsylvania in mid-afternoon. I showed them around and then got into a longer conversation with one of them. He told me had never thought much about history until earlier this year, when his sister discovered a trove of letters written by an ancestor who had served in New Jersey regiment during the Civil War. One thing led to another and after some digging he discovered that his family roots date back in the New World to the 1640s. This knowledge in turn led him to studying not just the Civil War but the Early American period. Thus he and his friend were making the rounds of various historic sites. They were on their way to Fraunces Tavern after Federal Hall.

He told me his son lives in Brooklyn and therefore he comes to the city frequently. So I quickly jotted the names of further historic sites in various boroughs he might try to see when time permits. I will never know if he follows through. Hopefully he will.

1989 presidential inaugral ticket

Later a man came in with his son and we too got into a conversation. As it turned out for decades, going back to the 1980s, he was a White House correspondent for a major newspaper syndicate. We got to talking about the evolution of the newspaper industry, which in turn led to a discussion of covering various historical events. I mentioned George H.W. Bush having been at Federal Hall in April 1989 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Washington’s First Inaugural. The man mentioned that the event had been part of a larger project that took place over that year starting in January called “From George to George.” The retired journalist had an extraordinary amount of institutional memory.

Stories like the above are just two examples of the things one only gets from being at the place itself. People, at least some of them, come in reflective and eager to share what led them to come and experience the thing for themselves.

(image/picclick)

The King Manor of Jamaica, Queens

07 Wednesday Aug 2019

Posted by in Federal Hall National Memorial, Founding Fathers, Heritage tourism, Incorporating New York (book manuscript project), Interpretation, John Alsop King (1788-1867), Philip Schuyler, Rufus King

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King Manor, Jamaica Queens

I ventured to Queens today for a visit to the King Manor. It is part of my wider project to visit places affiliated in one manner or another with Federal Hall. The home belonged to Rufus King, one of the lesser known but well-deserving Founding Fathers. King was born in what is now Maine and fought in the Revolutionary War before serving in the Confederation Congress. He helped write the Constitution and then served in the First Congress, where he worked in the upper chamber alongside Philip Schuyler as a New York senator. His son John Alsop King took over the house after his father’s death in 1827. The name John A. King fang faintly familiar and when I got home I checked the draft of “Incorporating New York,” my manuscript about Civil War Era New York City, and realized he was a minor figure in my narrative; King the Younger was defeated by Edwin D. Morgan in the 1858 New York gubernatorial election. Until today though the name John A. King had just been a name in a history book. That’s why place is so important.

King Manor library

King Manor became a historic site in 1900, the house itself owned by the New York City Parks Department and managed by the King Manor Association. As best I can tell, this is still the arrangement 120 years on. A perusal of online newspapers shows the house was used rigorously for various things and by various organizations over the decades. This would make sense. Queens developed later than the other buroughs and there probably much less infrastructure where groups could have gathered. Jamaica was more Long Island than New York City. The Daughters of the American Revolution, for one, created a Rufus King Chapter in 1918 during the Great War that met at the spacious house. The D.A.R. met there for decades. Like much of New York King Manor struggled in the harsh years before gentrification. In 1973 some punk teenagers started a fire on the porch that almost burned down the then-almost 250-year-old house. Thankfully the custodian kept it in check before the firemen arrived and put it out.

The tour was led by an extraordinary young person who incredibly is still in high school. There is no way I could have pulled off something like that when I was that age. I asked the person when they began at the house and the answer was July, just last month. I had to ask again because I thought I’d heard wrong. The is something about watching Interpretation done well. And when it’s done by a person so young and just starting out, it is that much more incredible.

 

James Monroe’s Ash Lawn – Highland

10 Wednesday Jul 2019

Posted by in Federal Hall National Memorial, Florida, George Washington's Mount Vernon, Heritage tourism, Interpretation, James Monroe, Thomas Jefferson

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Scholars at James Monroe’s Ash Lawn – Highland are incorporating the stories of the local African-American community into the history of the historic site. Many local residents descend from the original enslaved community at the Monroe estate.

One of the most fortunate things about volunteering at Federal Hall National Memorial this summer has been its broadening of my interests. The experience has less taken me in a different direction than expanded my awareness of American and even international history. This is especially true of the Revolutionary and Early American periods. I have a larger, more holistic approach to my scholarship than I did at the start of the summer, and really dating back to the beginning of the calendar year when we became members of George Washington’s Mount Vernon. Among other things I have been following the social media pages and online resources of various people and institutions with which I was unfamiliar just two months ago. One of them linked the other day to this extraordinary New York Times piece about James Monroe and the enslaved persons who lived and worked on his Virginia estate.

The parlor of Casa Bianca near Monticello, Florida. Some enslaved persons from Ash Lawn – Highland lived and worked here.

In a living example of Faulkner’s notion about the past being neither over nor past, it has developed that upwards of one hundred African Americans still live within a short distance of Ash Lawn – Highland, the 3,500 acre property Monroe purchased in 1793 while a U.S. senator from Virginia. Highland is adjacent to Jefferson’s Monticello. By all accounts as known today, Monroe did not father children in the manner Jefferson did with Sally Hemings; the Monroe connections to this local community relate to the conditions of servitude. Scholars have been piecing the history together over the past several years and adding this new knowledge to the interpretive experience at Ash Lawn – Highland, which is today owned by James Monroe’s alma mater William & Mary. The story extends further than Virginia however; to pay off debts Monroe sold some of his enslaved persons to an estate near Monticello, Florida in Jefferson County called Casa Bianca. Some of them, or more likely their descendants, showed up on census records and voter rolls after the Civil War. Read the whole thing.

(top image, RebelAt via Wikimedia Commons; bottom, State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory)

Mount Vernon in January

19 Saturday Jan 2019

Posted by in George Washington, Heritage tourism

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I hope everyone’s 2019 is off to a good start. My gosh, I have not posted since New Year’s Day almost three full weeks ago, the longest stretch with no posts since I began the blog eight years ago. I went on holiday January 3 and have spent the time since my return preparing for the upcoming semester. My co-teacher and I have been discussing the syllabus, narrowing down the reading list, and such. It is always exciting and a little nerve-inducing getting ready for a new term. I’m fortunate to have such a good colleague.

I am here in the DC area for the weekend. Yesterday the Hayfoot and I visited George Washington’s Mount Vernon. The last time I was there was more than forty-five years ago. I wanted to visit before starting the James Thomas Flexner four-volume biography, which I intend to begin when I get back to New York City. I am supposed to give a talk related to Washington at a particular historic site in Manhattan on Presidents Day, but with the government shutdown still ongoing we will see what happens.

George Washington’s Mount Vernon, January 2019

A cold January day is an opportune time to visit. They estimated at the information desk that they would receive 500 visitors for the day, as opposed to the 6000-8000 daily tourists they receive on a typical spring or summer day. When we arrived at the mansion itself, we walked right up as the tour was commencing. No lines. Alas photography was not permitted in the house, but my favorite item was the Bastille Key given to George Washington by the Marquise de Lafayette. I made a point to the tour guide that Lafayette gave the key to Washington with the idea that future generations might see and appreciate its significance–and that that was precisely what our little group was doing at that moment. She had clearly never thought of it like that before and lit up when I said it.

A little later in the tour we were in the outdoor kitchen when a visitor asked the guide to explain again why officials at the site refer to Mount Vernon’s enslaved community not as “slaves” but as “enslaved persons.” The reason, the guide explained quite well, is to affirm the humanity of this community and tell their stories with fuller nuance. A few in the group still weren’t getting it. As it happened this came at the end of the tour, after which we all exited into the courtyard area. We joined an informal discussion at this point in which our group was still discussing the terminology about the enslaved community. As she so often does, the Hayfoot stepped up and with clarity and compassion added a few salient points that built on what the guide had said. A few eventually “got it,” with or without necessarily agreeing with the premises being expressed. A smaller number never did get it. If they went home to ponder it, or put it out of their minds entirely right then and there, I will never know.

All in all it was a great day. There was so much to see and so little time to take it all in that we became Mount Vernon members. So come spring we’ll be there again, only this time with the great masses taking in the gardens and all else there is to see and learn at George Washington’s Mount Vernon.

 

 

Sunday morning coffee

09 Sunday Dec 2018

Posted by in Heritage tourism, Incorporating New York (book manuscript project), Louisa Lee Schuyler, Theodore Roosevelt Sr (Father)

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Louisa Lee Schuyler was a great granddaughter of both Philip Schuyler and Alexander Hamilton. She died in 1926 and is buried an hour north of New York City in Sleepy Hollow.

A friend and I traveled north of the city yesterday to visit Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. Neither of us had been there before and were not sure how it would work out logistically in terms of the distance from the train station, the size of the cemetery itself, how hilly it might be, and that sort of thing. We did not leave super early, as Sleepy Hollow is just an hour away from Grand Central. We caught 10:20, by which time the station was packed with people out enjoying the holiday season. We had a big checklist of potential headstones to visit, but only saw some of them because of the size of the cemetery. The one I was determined to see however is the one above: Louisa Lee Schuyler. Miss Schuyler was one of Theodore Roosevelt Sr.’s best friends; the two worked hand-in-hand on philanthropic endeavors for years until his untimely passing at age 46 in 1878. She carried on for almost another half a century until her own passing in 1926. They are two of the main characters in my book manuscript about Civil War Era New York City.

After trekking through the cemetery for a few hours my friend and I ventured to Philipsburg Manor, where the staff gave us recommendations on where to get lunch in Neighboring Tarrytown and helped us call a cab. They weren’t wrong about good restaurants on Main Street.

I am not going to go into the details today but will say here that, while also enjoying the holiday season, I have been laying the groundwork for some 2019 projects. Next summer I hope to spend a fair amount of time exploring Old New York in the Hudson Valley and making some connections to local and national history. The Colonial and Early American Periods are things I actually know very little about. Though I do explore the early years of European settlement a little bit in Incorporating New York I intend to explore the topic more thoroughly, including how it relates to the Hamiltons, Roosevelts, Schuylers, and other leading families.

 

Sunday morning coffee

03 Sunday Jun 2018

Posted by in General Grant National Memorial (NPS), Heritage tourism, National Park Service

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I am having my coffee getting ready to head out the door in a bit for my first day at Grant’s Tomb. Yesterday a friend and I took the bus to Philadelphia to visit the Museum of the American Revolution. The Revolutionary War period is something I know little about. My first experience visiting sites related to the period came a few years ago when my aunt and uncle took me to Lexington and Concord. It was an experience that has stayed with me. Of course we have a certain amount of Revolutionary War sites here in New York City as well, though the heritage tourism is less pronounced. Apparently the Museum of the American Revolution now stands on the site of what what used to be a visitor center for the nearby attractions.

The image of me above was taken yesterday outside of Independence Hall. If you look closely at the date, Lincoln’s visit fell on Washington’s Birthday 1861. This was while Lincoln was president-elect and on his way from Illinois to Washington for his inaugural. He was here in New York just a few days before this meeting with Edwin D. Morgan and others. Note that this tablet was put there by a Grand Army of the Republic post, though alas it does not give the year. A tablet next to this one mentions a John F. Kennedy visit to Independence Hall on July 4, 1962. We could not go into Independence Hall because tickets for the day were sold out but we weren’t too concerned because the museum was our main focus for the day. We did sit on an interpretive talk by park ranger of the adjacent Congress Hall. The ranger did a great job telling the audience about the significance of the hall and, among other things, about John Adams’s swearing in there as the second president.

I had an aunt who died about three years ago who lived in Greater Philadelphia. She loved visiting places like this and I’m sure over the years came here regularly with her elementary school students. There was a Boy Scout troop sitting in on the ranger talk and a group of young high schoolers in matching red t-shirts from Ohio in the museum. I love seeing the continuity and had to text my mother and tell her I was thinking of her older sister. Overall it made for a great day. We already have plans to visit again next year and take in the full experience. Now I’m off to the General Grant National Memorial. Enjoy your Sunday.