Suspended somewhere between autumn and winter. That’s Northern Virginia in late November. Late roses and confused azaleas bloom fitfully, while even the stalwart marigolds hang limp on sad brown stems. Patches of green grass struggle to poke through a thick scatter of crisp red and gold leaves. Hardy perennial rosemary and sage stay strong while their more delicate annual cousin, basil, has surrendered to the cold.
Meanwhile, on some porches pumpkins and fall decorations are still piled up artfully (in what my friend Peggy and I used to call “squash medleys”) while a few others already sport their holiday lights.
The morning after Thanksgiving, I took a walk around our neighborhood. A small boy half-heartedly raked some leaves. Two small dogs sat motionless on the side stoop of their house. Otherwise, there was little sign of life. Everything seemed to be holding its breath, waiting for the next move, suspended somewhere between autumn and winter.
Azaleas thought it was spring and bloomed despite their fall foliage.
Fall planted arugula is still going strong in our garden.
Burning bush displays holiday colors of red and green.
Fort Frederick is a National Park Service historic site in Big Pool, Maryland. Which is really not close to Frederick, Maryland. The fort was constructed way back in the years of the French and Indian Wars, predating the Revolution by some twenty years. It was also used during the Revolution though as well as during the Civil War.
Look hard and you can see a volunteer in costume in the shadows of the fort entrance.
After that, it was a farm for awhile, and then, just a pile of increasingly crumbling rocks in the middle of a field… until the good lads working for the Civilian Conservation Corps rebuilt the walls in the 1930s. At some point the barracks were also rebuilt.
The buildings on one side depict the typical living quarters of the men (and a few women) who inhabited the fort in the 1750s. On the other side, the doctor and higher ups. On the day we visited, a couple of interpreters in period costume were present to explain life in the cramped and dank digs. (Mercifully, they did not do so in first person. Because that is annoying.)
Eight men lived in each section of the barracks, two to a bunk bed in what was about the size of a twin bed today. Cozy, to say the least. A fireplace served as the heating and cooking source. Which probably kept the men closest to it overheated and the ones further away close to frozen in the bracing western Maryland winters. And everyone half roasted in the steamy summers.
The few women, who did the laundry, the mending, and other sundry things for the men, lived together in one small room. (Apparently, even those who were married to one of the soldiers…making “hanky panky” pretty tricky?) They had to adhere to all military rules and regulations. But they wore corsets, skirts and blouses instead of uniforms (and whatever the men wore under them, if anything).
On a bright and only slightly chilly October day, with doors open and breezes wafting, it didn’t seem like such a bad place. But still, it was not hard to imagine long, dark nights, seldom-washed bodies, smoky wood fires, and less than appetizing rations.
As the interpreters explained, we judge the inconveniences of living in the 1750s by current standards. But it made me appreciate a king-sized bed, a daily shower and fresh food that much more.
Reproduction of a period salt and pepper shaker. I liked the scrimshaw detail.
Corset sitting on a chair just like one of the fort ladies might have left it after a hard day of scrubbing dirty shirts.
Decidedly nicer dining room of the higher ups.
Bottles of medicine – wait, where’s the #ginseng ?
Doctor’s desk.
One of the interpreters showed how to load and shoot a musket. It took lots of practice not to blow one’s head off apparently.
I’ve been on the road a lot the past few weeks, eating well on all trips: in Murfreesboro, Tennessee; Wausau, Wisconsin; Asheville, North Carolina and Baltimore, Maryland. Two traditions stood out during these trips: the Friday night fish fry in Wisconsin and the search for the best crab cake in Baltimore.
Soon after arriving in Wisconsin to check out the cultivated ginseng scene as part of our larger American ginseng project (reported here earlier), my partner in crime Arlene and I started hearing about Friday night fish fries. It seemed that, no matter what sort of restaurant we ate at, fish fry was listed on the menu as the Friday special. This tradition seems to be rank right up there with that other Wisconsin culinary habit – smothering just about everything in cheese. Not that I’m complaining, mind you.
I stayed through Friday and experienced my fish fry at one of the recommended locations: Nueske’s at Gulliver’s Landing just outside of Wausau. This classic nautically themed, informal establishment was packed on a Friday night. I had a good 40 minute wait to take in the scenery (shelves of model ships and other maritime curios) and the multi-generational families who make up the clientele, many greeted by first names upon arriving. Clearly, this was a local favorite and I eagerly looked forward to my fish fry experience.
I was rewarded with two generous pieces of hand-breaded haddock, something called a “twice baked potato” (which, not surprisingly, was smothered in cheese), cole slaw and a large slab of rye bread. All that, and live music at the bar – two older gentleman playing Johnny Cash and John Denver tunes.
Side view of exterior
Fish fry menu options
Gulliver’s front entrance.
A couple of weeks later, I was in Baltimore at the American Folklore Society conference, a yearly ritual for all folklorists. Though I really should have grabbed a quick lunch and attended a section meeting, instead I set out at a brisk pace on the Saturday of the conference, with some co-conspirators from our Inner Harbor hotel to Lexington Market to try out Faidley’s, which makes it to many “best crab cake” lists. And, indeed, in no uncertain terms (via several large signs) proclaims itself as serving Baltimore’s Best Crab Cake.
The market has been in existence since 1782, and Faidley’s since 1886. It’s hard to argue with that depth of history. Our crab cakes were huge and delicious, tasting subtly of the bay and of Old Bay, and though one of them cost twice as much as my entire Wisconsin fish fry, it was worth it.
They say fish is brain food, and I feel smarter if not thinner for having indulged in finny wonders from the Great Lakes to the Chesapeake Bay.
It’s pawpaw season, and festivals celebrating this regional native fruit are popping up all over. Visiting one of these seemed like the folkloric thing to do, and in fact I couldn’t believe that I had somehow reached my advanced age and had not done so already.
The Pawpaw Festival in Albany, Ohio (near Athens, and also near the United Plant Savers sanctuary which my adventurous colleague and partner in crime, Arlene, and I were visiting this week) is, I would dare say, one of the biggest in the country. We spent a couple of hours there experiencing All Things Pawpaw.
First, the taste. Upon arrival, we sought out the free sample tent where we could set the mood. Volunteers sliced us a big hunk and explained that you just squeeze the soft, yellowish pulp out of the rind, and swirl the big dark pits around in your mouth to get all the good stuff off them. (Then throw them out because they are poisonous if chewed and consumed, apparently.)
Next we found the craft beer tent, where for a few bucks you could try a variety of pawpaw brews (and take the glass home to boot). We listened to a band that defied genre classification, and then made our way to the food court. We sampled an Indonesian satay with pawpaw peanut sauce, and later tried Thai mango sticky rice with pawpaw mousse.
There were also vendors selling pawpaw bread, official paw paw festival t-shirts with designs dating several years back, and pawpaw plants. (As well as a lot of non-paw paw-related stuff.) We were saddened to have missed the pawpaw cook-off.
A full harvest moon rose over the festival grounds, as we finally admitted paw paw overload. Still, I insisted on stopping by the free sample tent one more time to leave with the sweet custardy taste still lingering on my taste buds.
Kombucha in various pawpaw flavors (still tastes I assume like vinegar)
Pawpaw peanut sauce is a winner in my mind.
This is what a pawpaw tree looks like.
There were no pawpaws in the coffee thank goodness.
A visit to Gettysburg is certainly sobering. The main attraction of this small city in south central Pennsylvania (no matter what the tourist literature says about “fun activities for the whole family”) is following crawling traffic through a bucolic countryside to gawk at an endless series of soaring monuments commemorating men killing each other.
That is cynical, I realize. But realistic. The artwork and craftsmanship that went into these monuments is impressive. Standing among the tortured angels and stalwart fallen soldiers and officers on horseback, you are all too aware that thousands upon thousands of men (and some women too I suppose) died horrible deaths all around you.
War is hell, that is clear, and the Civil War battles fought in Gettysburg on July 1 – 3, 1863 were among the most hellish. Fifty thousand dead. Fifty thousand – dead.
It’s difficult to know what to feel. Proud of those who fought? In despair of so much loss of life? Glad that the Union was victorious in the end, and the States united once again? All – or none – of the above?
When we got to the towering Pennsylvania Monument, despite the number of people ambling around the fields and climbing the stairs to view the vista, it was relatively quiet. Until a thundering boom resounded through the staircase; a cannon fired by a park interpreter. Just one boom, but it shook the building, and the psyche of the assembled visitors. For one awful moment, pride, despair and victory seemed irrelevant. Survival seemed foremost.
Maybe, in the end, that is the lesson we take away from a visit to Gettysburg. The deep, basic struggle for survival, and empathy for those who didn’t.
My latest excuse for not posting for awhile is having been off in “undisclosable locations” within several Appalachian states learning more about the ever fascinating American ginseng. My trusty colleague Arlene has been my companion on these trips. We were sworn by our hosts to secrecy…we dutifully un-geo-located our photos. I will not speak of those adventures here.
I found that ginseng can be found closer to home, however, though the roots may have traveled a bit to get here. In Northern Virginia you can buy fresh ginseng in the local Korean grocery store, HMart. This is not be the same sort of ginseng which grows wild (or “wild simulated”) in the mountainous woods, but its pale, fat, cultivated cousin. Hmart’s ginseng is of unknown provenance, but it is probably from Wisconsin, Ontario, or… who knows, maybe it came all the way from Korea where they also cultivate ginseng. Then it would be Asian ginseng, another related species. But that is a whole other story.
I invited my summer interns over to dinner, and procured some of this $39.99/pound version. (This may sound expensive but the same weight in wild ginseng would cost several hundred dollars.) I threw a liberal amount of slices into a pot with some chicken breasts along with some onions, ginger, dried hot peppers, and salt. This concoction simmered for about an hour, and viola – my own version of a Korean staple, ginseng chicken soup.
We used slices of the chicken as the protein in some Vietnamese-inspired summer rolls. But not before I made the interns all slurp up some of the ginseng chicken broth and give their opinions on the taste. After all, they had just spent the better part of the summer researching and writing about ginseng, but they had not tasted any except in candies.
“Not bad,” was the verdict on the broth, and the chicken had a nice, slightly bitter, slightly sweet flavor that complemented the crunchy veggies and soft noodles in the rolls. (Not to take anything away from the ginseng experience, but the spicy peanut dipping sauce was the real star of the show.)
Everyone left that evening a little wiser, a little healthier, and having completed their ginseng education for the summer. As for Arlene and me, our ginseng adventures will continue. Stay tuned.
The 100+ heat index last week was good for at least one thing: hastening the ripening of the tomatoes in our “suburban vegetable farm.” The moment the backyard gardener waits all year for, that first juicy flavorful bite that banishes all memory of the sad waxy things passing for tomatoes the rest of the year.
Unfortunately, that first bite is sometimes taken by some other creature than yourself. Grab onto a big delicious looking specimen, and you may encounter a messy, gooey, open wound. Chipmunk, squirrel, bird, or something else that comes by night and chews…no matter, damage done and hopefully something left to salvage.
Most of our tomatoes were grown from seed. This year, I got several varieties from the Gurney seed company because they had a sweet introductory discount. I was intrigued by a variety called Mortgage Lifter, explained (at a farm museum I toured last spring) as being so prolific that it raised Depression era farmers out of debt. Makes a good story, and, if I have figured correctly, a good tomato too.
“Figuring correctly” is what one must do in our garden, since the varieties of tomatoes somehow always get mixed up between the seedlings and the planting, no matter how I try to keep them labeled. So you just have to wait for them to mature to find out what sort of tomato they will produce. Even then, I am not sure sometimes, especially since I purchased a “rainbow” package of heirloom seeds with a number of varieties mixed in. Is it a Cherokee Purple or a Black Krim? Is this one going to stay yellow or has it just not started turning red yet?
I call this “BT toast.”
Who cares, really. They are all yummy. If you don’t have your own, go find a farm stand or a farmer’s market and pay whatever it cost for a few pounds. It’s the essence of summer, and it’s gone all too soon.
For the first time since 1986, I had the 4th of July off, officially. Because I have worked on the Smithsonian Folklife Festival every year since then and it always incorporates the 4th of July. Only two times in all those years was I somewhere other than the National Mall on the 4th: sick, once and attending my great uncle’s 90th birthday party the other time.
This year, our shorter Festival did not encompass the holiday. Seemed, therefore, like a good time to experience Independence Day elsewhere. We picked the Brandywine Valley, and nearby Wilmington, Delaware. According to my research, Wilmington was reputed to have a good fireworks display, and there are plenty of DuPont mansions and other cultural wonders nearby.
With our destination about two hours from home and in no hurry to get an early start, our adventure commenced with lunch. Others might have enjoyed grilled hot dogs for the 4th; we dined on Mayalsian fare at Rasa Sayang, which is (aptly considering the date) located in a shopping center called Independence Mall a short distance north of Wilmington.
Next up, a trip to Europe via one of the lesser known DuPont estates: Nemours. At least I had never heard of it, as it seems to fly more under the radar than its sister estate, Winterthur. The 77-room mansion and extensive French gardens were the home of Alfred I. DuPont and his second, and then third, wife (until they bailed for Florida). It was built in the 1910s as a sort of Delawarian version of Versailles. Visitors are invited to wander by themselves around the grounds and house; friendly guide-staff let you explore at your own pace, but answer questions if you have any.
Next, a caffeine pick me up in the Trolley Square neighborhood, then finding a parking space near the waterfront in Wilmington to settle in for the 4th celebration. (Parking was delightfully available and free, the perks of a small city versus the nightmare of parking in DC.) We killed time riding up and down the Christina River on the water taxi, and then strolling nearly the entire length of the River Walk. Finally, it was time to find a place to watch the fireworks.
Our viewing space was directly across the river from the place they were shooting off the fireworks; any closer and, according to the security patrol, we would be in the zone where fireworks debris might fall on our heads. (The Christina is deep but not particularly wide, as you may have guessed.) Sure, the backdrop of the Washington Monument and the thrill of being in an excited hoard of half a million people was missing, but the show was just as impressive and the smaller crowd and immediacy of the display made up for not being in Our Nation’s Capital. Thanks, Wilmington, for making my first Fourth of July in over thirty years fine and DC-free.
Beaufort, South Carolina is a charmingly historic small city in “the Low Country” (aptly called this because it is just about at or below sea level, and when it rains as much as it did when we visited a couple of weeks ago, it almost recedes right into the various bodies of water surrounding it).
While on a family visit to Hilton Head, where our former Yankee relatives have retired, we took a side trip. My husband had seen a television feature about the National Reconstruction Era History Site(s) in and around Beaufort. Turns out the only one really open on a regular basis is the Visitor’s Center, but it was still worth the trip.
I for one learned many things I did not know about Beaufort and its surroundings. For one, that the city was taken over by the Union army early on in the Civil War, and consequently, after the war it had a sort of leg up on helping freedmen (and women) make the transition from enslavement to reach their educational and economic potential.
Sadly, along with these positive forces, there were the negative ones which led to what the National Park Service exhibition calls “unmet promises” which is shorthand for “legal (and also many illegal) ways to keep African American people from advancing.” The exhibit panel that most disturbed me was the Black Code laws which were voted into law in SC in December 1965. This included: “XXXV. All persons of color who make contracts for service or labor, shall be known as servants, and those with whom they contract, shall be known as masters.” Wait, I thought they abolished slavery. I guess not really.
We read all the very informative panels very thoroughly, because about five minutes into our visit, the sky opened up once more and poured more buckets of rain down on the already soaked earth. It subsided enough for us to go exploring around some historic neighborhoods, and to also have lunch at a nice Thai restaurant. We got back to our car just before the next torrential downpour, soaked in history and contemplation.
Inside the Visitor’s Center’s small but informative display.
A public art project of painted benches interprets Reconstruction.
We came upon the future site of a Harriet Tubman Memorial.
Robert Smalls was a Civil War hero and late a prominent citizen and politician.
Beaufort is chock full of historic sites, many of them churches.
Jeannette, Pennsylvania is a small city east of Pittsburgh, which I probably never would have even considered visiting before. But, then, at a meeting of Pennsylvania folklorists last year, a friend and colleague formerly from Arlington, Mary Briggs, reported on the community art space she was involved in downtown Jeannette called “You Are Here.” And, I wanted to be there.
Downtown Jeannette
It took about a year, but I finally achieved that goal this past week. I brought with me my husband (who said, more than once I think, “Why are we going to Jeannette again?”) and three boxes of used but serviceable art supplies for their resale shop.
Mary greeted us at the door of the narrow storefront on the main drag, and introduced us to her “partner in crime,” Jen Costello, and they gave us the tour. The first thing one notices in the entryway is a colorful display of carved and painted canes, part of the “Lean on Me” project that Jen initiated to provide canes to those in need, mostly the elderly. The canes are works of art and stories in themselves, and are often customized for their new owners.
Carved canes, each one unique.
Gallery space featuring work of local artist Larry Beaver.
Mary looks through my donation of used art supplies.
Jen shows off one of her favorite canes.
The second thing you notice is a big chalkboard with upcoming events: gallery openings, free movie showings, classes and workshops, and other fun stuff. (Mary joked about their taste in movies, reflected in the most recent offerings, “The Blob” and “Son of the Blob.”) Next up, the gallery, an open space that doubles for movie showing and other public events.
Tucked behind the gallery is the resale shop, whose name further illustrates the quirky humor of Mary and Jen – it is called “Oh, Scrap!” At the very end of the row is office space and a couple of small artist studios. The second floor, which is undeveloped so far, will eventually hold a couple of apartments for artists.
In short, there is a lot of “there” at You Are Here. If you find yourself in southwestern Pennsylvania, you should go there, too.
