This Week at the MHS - 14 December

Stay engaged with the MHS this year!

“Surely the noise of war does not drown the soft voice of friendship.- Yet, the importance of a dispute that will sharpen the swords of half the European World, and the dread of a decision against us, may so empress the mind, as to make it forgetful of those little attentions, which sweeten the path of life, and add variety to peace in the days of tranquillity.-

Though every social enjoyment is interrupted and our ideas dwell much upon scenes of devastation, cruelty, and blood, yet I will never forget to enquire with the warmest affection, after the welfare of my friends at Cambridge.”

– Letter from Mercy Otis Warren to Hannah Winthrop, 4 August 1777

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Featured Item from the MHS Collection

George III Peace Medal, 1764

Peace medals were typically given by heads of state to Native American leaders as a tokens of friendship. This medal bears the likeness of a young King George III on one side with the words and letters “Georgius III · D · C · M · BRI · FRA · ET · HIB · REX · F · D” and, on the reverse, the inscription “Happy While United” above an allegorical Native American figure and colonial Englishman seated together on a bench by a tree. They are shaking hands while overlooking the ocean with ships on it, and a house on an island, and holding a pipe. Below the scene is the date, 1764. At the top of the medal, which is made of silver and measures 77.4 millimeters, is a pipe and a wing, crossed.

View both sides of this medal up close.

Our Favorite Things Exhibition Now Open for In-Person Viewing!

With millions of letters, diaries, photographs, and objects in our holdings, we can tell countless stories at the MHS. Our Favorite Things connects a selection of compelling, captivating, and amusing items from our collection to the backgrounds, interests, and memories of the MHS staff.

General Public:

Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, from 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM

Tuesday and Thursday, from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

Members-only:

Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM

Tuesday and Thursday, from 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM

Want access to the exhibition during Members-only hours?

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Visiting the MHS during COVID-19

Please note that all guests are required to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination and wear a well-fitted mask covering the nose and mouth while in the building. Learn more about our COVID-19 protocols.

Chamberlain Legacy Lecture 2021

Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai, Director of Research at the MHS, recently presented a lecture titled, “‘Who shall tell what is past and what survives?’: Why Joshua Chamberlain Still Matters,” at the Pejepscot History Center in Brunswick, Maine.

Dr. Wongsrichanalai’s address touched on themes directly related to the mission of the Chamberlain Legacy Lecture: how the experiences, events, disciplines, and ideas of Joshua Chamberlain continue to resonate in the world.

Watch the lecture here, or click the video image.

Programs

MHS’s online programs are held on the video conference platform Zoom. Registrants will receive an e-mail with a link to join the program.

“The Kind of Death, Natural or Violent”: Fetal Death and the Male Midwife in Nineteenth-Century Boston

On Tuesday, 14 December, at 5:15 PM, Hannah Smith, University of Minnesota, with comment by Nora Doyle, Salem College, presents “The Kind of Death, Natural or Violent”: Fetal Death and the Male Midwife in Nineteenth-Century Boston, a History of Women, Gender & Sexuality Seminar.

This dissertation chapter examines a lecture by Boston man-midwife Walter Channing. The lecture was meant to offer his (male) midwifery students the skills to serve as expert witnesses in infanticide trials. However, Channing also used the lecture to promote his opinions on both infanticide and intentional abortion. This chapter focuses on the language Channing used to frame these acts, as well as the nature of the lecture itself as a form of communication, in order to establish how this lecture fit within the broader discussions around infanticide, abortion, and man-midwifery taking place in the Anglo-Atlantic world at this time.

Local Food Before Locavores: Growing Vegetables in the Boston Market Garden District, 1870–1930

On Thursday, 16 December, at 5:15 PM, Sally McMurray, Pennsylvania State University, with comment by Andrew Robichaud, Boston University, presents Local Food Before Locavores: Growing Vegetables in the Boston Market Garden District, 1870–1930, an Environmental History Seminar.

The Boston market garden district was a national leader in vegetable production from 1870 to 1930. Suburban market gardeners' practices both countered and anticipated broader trends in the US food system. For example, intercropping (though long-known) stood well outside the US agro-ecological mainstream. Boston growers also developed the modern forcing house, an engineered greenhouse environment dependent on fossil fuels, irrigation, and commodified insect pollinators. Year-round lettuce from these houses helped prepare the way for consumers to embrace a de-seasonalized, nationalized vegetable supply. This agro-environmental episode shows how the history of local food complicates our narratives about US food system modernization.

Upcoming Programs

On Tuesday, 11 January, at 5:15 PM, Peter Jakob Olsen-Harbich, The New American Antiquarian, presents Seceding from the Sachemship: Coercion, Ethnology, and Colonial Failure in Early Historic New England, with comment by Linford Fisher, Brown University.

On Wednesday, 12 January, at 5:30 PM, Reed Gochberg, Harvard University, presents Useful Objects: Museums, Science, and Literature in Nineteenth-Century America.

On Thursday, 13 January, at 6:00 PM, Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai and Kevin Levin present Film Club: Glory.

On Tuesday, 18 January, at 5:15 PM, Lindsay Keiter, Pennsylvania State University–Altoona, presents The Emergence of the Marriage Market, with comment by Ellen Hartigan-O’Connor, University of California–Davis, a History of Women, Gender & Sexuality Seminar.

On Wednesday, 19 January, at 5:30 PM, Tegan Kehoe, Russell Museum of Medical History and Innovation at MGH, presents Exploring American Healthcare through 50 Historic Treasures.

On Tuesday, 25 January, at 5:15 PM, Katrin Kleeman, German Maritime Museum–Leibniz Institute for Maritime History, presents Earthquakes in New England, 1600–1800: Extraordinary Natural Events and Timekeeping Practices in Early America, with comment by Lukas Rieppel, Brown University, an Environmental History Seminar.

On Wednesday, 26 January, at 5:30 PM, Seth Bruggeman, Temple University, presents Lost on the Freedom Trail: The National Park Service and Urban Renewal in Postwar Boston, with other experts, TBA.

On Thursday, 27 January, at 5:15 PM, Chad Williams, Brandeis University, presents In the Shadow of World War: Revisiting W. E. B. Du Bois’s Black Reconstruction, with comment by Adriane Letz-Smith, Duke University, an African American History Seminar.

Interested in Viewing Past Programs?

If you missed a program or would like to revisit the material presented, please visit www.masshist.org/video or our YouTube channel. A selection of past programs is just a click away.