e-Newsletter | December 9, 2022
Museum Bookstore Open Come in the museum's Fruit Street entrance Tuesday - Friday, 10am - 4pm for books on local history, the 2023 Calendar, gift memberships, and Museum of Old Newbury hats & totes. Or visit our online store - https://www.newburyhistory.org/shop
It's a Wrap! Another Magical Holiday Open House is in the History Books
A beautiful table and buffet in the Dining Room.

Thank you to all who made last weekend's Holiday Open House a great success. Here are some highlights of the rooms decorated by the Newbury Garden Club (Dining Room), Newburyport Garden Club (Margaret's Parlor), the West Newbury Garden Club (China Trade Room) and the Horticultural Society (Main & Garden Halls). In addition, Lillian Newbert designed wreaths for the doorways on High and Fruit Street. Museum docents welcomed over 440 visitors to see these installations. Photos courtesy of Bob Watts.
The China Trade Room had a Year of the Tiger theme.
This floral display was designed to look like a ship
The cake - and most everything in Margaret's Parlor - was made of dried flowers.
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Upcoming Events
3rd Annual William Lloyd Garrison Lecture
"I Will Be Heard: Antislavery Printing and Youth Activism at William Lloyd Garrison’s Liberator Office"
At Old South Church, 29 Federal St., Newburyport, MA
This Saturday, December 10, 2022, 7:00 PM  8:30 PM. Free.

The 3rd Annual William Lloyd Garrison Lecture, delivered this year by Prof. Kabria Baumgartner, will examine the lesser known role that Garrison and his radical antislavery newspaper played in teaching Black youth communication arts skills that they used to advance the antislavery movement and their own careers in diverse occupations.

Exploring this forgotten history is vital not only to spotlight the power of the press and the impact of a collective voice in Black communities, but it also reminds us of the importance of social movements in shaping youth activism.

Kabria Baumgartner, Ph.D., is the Dean’s Associate Professor of History and Africana Studies at Northeastern University where she also serves as Associate Director of Public History. She is a historian of the 19th-century United States, with a specialization in African American history.

Free to all thanks to a Bridge Street Grant from Mass Humanities.
Wednesday, December 21, 2022 - 6:30 pm. Starting at Brown Chapel, 4 Brown St., Newburyport. $10 members, $20 non-members.

Grab a flashlight and join us for a guided stroll around Oak Hill Cemetery on the longest night of the year!

To add to the intimacy and atmosphere of darkness, many epitaphs are easiest to read by flashlight. Join noted author and historian Ghlee Woodworth, a 12th generation Newburyport native, and Museum of Old Newbury executive director Bethany Groff Dorau for a nighttime stroll through the historic 1842 Oak Hill, final resting place of shipwrecked sailors, sea captains and merchants, architects and photographers, writers and poets, silversmiths and newspaper editors, and adventurers who travelled to the California gold rush. We will visit several Ebenezers, though none of them Scrooges, and toast the longest night with hot cider and good cheer.

Space is limited - reserve your tickets below.
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Woman on the MOON
...a blog by Bethany Groff Dorau, Executive Director
The Center of the Universe
Picture the scene - yours truly, perched on the edge of a comfortable leather sofa in a recreated pub below decks on the ship Queen Victoria, cruising through the Bay of Biscay between France and Spain. The occasion is the nightly pub quiz, a British tradition that, like other British traditions, forms the social calendar of our recent voyage. We are part of a team of 6, trying to identify songs by Fats Domino and Whitney Houston. I'm shouting over the throbbing strains of "I Wanna Dance with Somebody", recapping our plans for port excursions in Spain. One of the party declares that I must see the Alhambra. "The bus is full," I shout. "We’re going to Cordova."
The Spanish city of Cordova has been an important craft, trade, and religious center since the 2nd century BC.

And then it happens. My quiz buddy says something about cordovan leather, and we're off to the races. “You know what's funny” I say, “I was always seeing these early Newbury records that refer to cordwainers. Did you know a cordwainer is someone who works in new leather? It's a derivation of an old French word meaning someone who works in cordovan leather, originally the finest leather from Cordova! The term cordwainer was used to distinguish people who made shoes from new leather from cobblers, who repaired shoes, in the medieval guild system in England. Did you know that cordovan leather is made from the connective tissue under the skin of a horse’s rump? Cordovan leather was so expensive that the term became synonymous with the finest quality leather, and so it became sort of a high-end brand, and everyone started using it on all kinds of leather goods.” My friend’s eyes were glazing over.

“Anyway, you probably know all that already,” I said, making the natural assumption that British people are all fonts of historical knowledge. “I didn’t, actually” he shouted politely, “but I do know that this song is 'Hip to be Square' by Huey Lewis!” 
These tiles mark the shop of a leather merchant in Cordova in eight different languages.

I had so much more to say about arcane adventures in leather. I wanted to tell someone about my recent discovery in several account books that dog carcasses, DOGS, were sold en masse to the Coffin tannery on High Road in Newbury, and that far from being some sort of aberration, dog skin was widely harvested, considered the best for making strong but supple gloves, particularly for women. William Shakespeare himself mentions the article in his jointly written play, Two Noble Kinsmen, as a character notes that “the next gloves that I give her shall be dog skin.” Our own Louisa May Alcott mentions the offending article in Little Women. "Uncle rushed out and bought a pair of dogskin gloves, some ugly, thick shoes, and an umbrella, and got shaved _à la_ mutton chop, the first thing." 

Of course, how these dogs were acquired is a depressing thought, but in the days before spaying and neutering, packs of semi-feral dogs were routinely rounded up and…this is usually where the look of horror on my audience’s face reminds me that I have gone too far. And then I make it worse.

The last time I told this story, I finished it up with a full run-down of the dog-skin products available to Newburyport consumers. In 1849, the newspaper related a humorous story involving a dogskin saddle. Twenty years later, nearly every shop in town had several varieties of dogskin gloves for sale. As late as 1930, at Harrington’s Men’s Store at 19 Pleasant Street, one could pick up the finest “Genuine Arabian Mocha (sheepskin), Peccary, Pigskin, Dogskin, or Cape (South African goatskin)” gloves. Gross, right?
This advertisement for Easter accessories at Harrington's store appeared in the Newburyport Daily News on April 10, 1930.

But, but…everything is illuminated by its history, I want to plead. Even the unpleasant things – perhaps nothing teaches us so much about our own lives as an examination of the things that were once part of everyday life and are now repugnant. We wonder how people could wear dogskin gloves much like people in the future might wonder how we can eat cows and pigs on such an industrial scale. I’m not preaching – I am wearing leather shoes at this very moment, but doesn’t it make you think? And isn’t that the point of life – gathering enough context and detail to become insufferable at parties? 
As we piled into the bus and wound our way through arid mountains from the Spanish port of Malaga to Cordova, I thought about another reason I am insufferable at parties (there are many). Anywhere I go, anywhere in the world, I think of Newbury(port). But unlike the generalized affection many people feel for their home, my thoughts are very specific. I think of Thomas Jillings, cordwainer, who bought a house on Middle Street in April, 1725 from John Norton, also listed as a cordwainer. Later that same year he married my distant cousin Hannah Myrick, and they were both members of the Third Parish Meetinghouse, whose weathervane, a stunning gilded rooster, was brand new then, and is now the centerpiece of an exhibit upstairs from my office. I think of how newspapers from Cordova were passed from ship to ship in 1808, reaching Newburyport with the breathtaking news of the plunder of the city by French forces and the subsequent defeat of Napoleon’s army as the Spanish people took their revenge. I think of all the Newburyport adventurers who sailed into Malaga, and Lisbon, and Cadiz, all stops on my recent journey. The structure upon which I hang my experience of the wider world is built of the stone and earth of this community.

Cordwainer's apron from an unidentified Newbury shop, c. 1820-1840. Courtesy photo.

I have described Newburyport as the center of the universe – it certainly is the center of my life and work, but that’s not exactly what I mean. It is something about how this place, which over time has been Indigenous land, an early New England immigrant community, a thriving port, a factory town, an artist community, a seaside resort, has cast out and reeled in so many threads that connect us, over time, to the rest of the world.

A few nights later, another pub quiz. The question is something about Elvis Presley. We all whisper, confer, choose a likely answer. My friend from earlier leans in conspiratorially. “You know what’s funny,” he says, “Elvis only visited the UK once, and it was right down the road from my house in Prestwick”. His eyes sparkle. “And the British Open was first played there in 1860. Nobody’s ever heard of Prestwick, but it’s an amazing place. Robert the Bruce was supposedly cured of leprosy in a well behind the church…!” As it turns out, his hometown is the center of the universe too, another thread connecting us across this wild and wonderful world.    
Something Is Always Cooking...
MOON Board Member Paige Baumann brought gingerbread cookies to a recent event and they flew off the plate. Maybe it was the cookie cutter she used, but they also tasted great and took the cutter's imprint beautifully. When asked for her recipe, Paige said it was from an old Martha Stewart magazine. Even she was surprised to see that it was from December 1992 - thirty years ago! When magazine racks were plentiful and this issue cost only $3. The original recipe called for 50% more molasses, but the newer version (below) works best. Enjoy!
  • 6 cups sifted all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 1 cup dark-brown sugar, packed
  • 4 teaspoons ground ginger
  • 4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cloves
  • 1 teaspoon finely ground pepper
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 cup unsulfured molasses

In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, and baking powder. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in spices and salt. Add eggs and molasses; mix well. With the machine on low speed, gradually add flour mixture, and beat until combined. Divide the dough into thirds, and wrap each piece of dough in plastic. Chill at least 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with Silpat nonstick baking mats or parchment paper. Set aside. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out dough to 1/8 inch thick. Cut into gingerbread boys and girls. Transfer to prepared baking sheets.

To decorate cookies: Press currants into dough to create buttons. Bake cookies until crisp but not darkened, about 20 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack. Let cool completely. From marthastewart.com.
The Newbury Town Day community cookbook is now available - just in time for holiday cooking and gift-giving! It's a keepsake filled with more than 200 recipes gathered from local contributors, including many from the Museum of Old Newbury archives. Cookbooks are $15 with proceeds to benefit the Newbury Food Pantry. Pick up a few at:
* Main Street Mini-Mart, Byfield
* Colby Farm, Scotland Road
* Tendercrop Farm, High Road
* Jabberwocky Books, The Tannery, Newburyport
Puzzle Me This...
Click the image to do the puzzle
NO ANIMAL WAS HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS PUZZLE This cat lived at Saunder's Drug Store at Lime and Purchase Streets in "Joppy," where locals remember eating ice cream sundaes while they read the comics. Based on the cover of Jet Magazine, this photo is from March, 1956. Image courtesy of the Newburyport Public Library Archival Center.

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