History people always have their "go to" books for information.
I have many that fit into such a category. But there is a certain collection that really has America's past - from colonial through Victorian through early 20th century - in its heart & soul, more than most of the others. I mean, if you want to know what our ancestors knew and how they saw their world, well...what you are about to read will be a guide for you.
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So it was one day, as I flipped through the book selection in the Greenfield Village gift shop - in the old days one could find the most amazing history books there - I came upon a book with an interesting title: American Yesterday by author Eric Sloane.
Never heard of him.
But a quick glance through its pages convinced me to get it. I especially enjoyed the conversational manner in which he wrote and how he looked at life in the old days in such a manner that he tended to notice the differences between "then" and "now," and how the earth has changes, not only for people and technology or fashions, but how the earth itself has physically changed. Sloane also spoke of days gone by on a more personal level in that he relates the past to people of today.
Oh! Baby, that'sa what I like!
My next museum visit found me searching for more Eric Sloane books, which I snatched up as I came across other titles, such as Our Vanishing Landscape and The Seasons of America Past.
I soon learned the author had quite a catalogue, for a quick search on the computer brought his complete collection to my attention, and I continued to purchase each. Eventually I began purchasing Sloane's works off of Amazon.com and eBay.
Oh! But Sloane had authored something like 38 books, and each one was written in the folksy conversational manner that appeals greatly to me. So I continue to buy them to this day.
And he was an amazing artist:
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| An Eric Sloane painting |
Now, something cool began to happen as I hung around other history folk and listened to their words - people I knew and respected...people I know and respect: these living historians and historic presenters speak about Eric Sloane with reverence, referring to his works often, calling him America's greatest author of authentic Americana. And they speak with excitement! Ha! Funny thing is many so-called history majors know little about Sloane and his topics, which is not very surprising, for those modern academic professors who "teach history" in college have nothing on this man called Eric Sloane who actually got his hands dirty in his research and actually wrote about history, not just politics and wars, but the history people lived, and his only agenda was to teach and share his knowledge and visions---to get his readers to understand the past. From what I read, Sloane only went to school for art. As a historian, it seems he is self-taught.
Truly the best kind of historian.
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| Sloane sketches from the "Diary" book~ |
"While restoring a Connecticut farmhouse in the early 1950's he began to identify with the Early American settlers. He first moved to the Lake Candlewood area, then to Merryall, CT near New Milford and in 1956 he moved to Warren, where he kept a home until 1985. It was at a Warren Library book sale that he is said to have discovered Noah Blake's diary, an original account of New England farm life in 1805. With Sloane's unique illustrations and commentary the diary became the framework for Sloane's most successful book, Diary of an Early American Boy: Noah Blake 1805."
Now, in my Eric Sloane collection, I have the following titles (each includes Amazon links and reviews):
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| American Yesterday |
A compilation of engrossing facts and anecdotes vitalized by author Eric Sloane's own pen, this book captures the living legacy of America as seen in "the things that were." According to Sloane, American Yesterday explores "our national attic of vanishing ways and obsolete occupations." Impressed by the artistry and sturdy realism of pioneer builders, he takes genuine delight in exploring the unique careers of barber-surgeons, dowsers, tithingmen, sawyers, nailers, plumbum-men, and a great variety of artisans, illustrating the activities, customs, and things created by the people who made their living in "antique ways."
Sloane, a devoted student of early Americana, speaks lovingly of the people who spent much of their lives creating wardrobe closets, foot stoves, church pew armrests, grindstones, featherbed patter paddles, charcoal burners, English phaetons, giant hogsheads, drovers' sleighs, windowsill sundials, and other items of long ago.
Credited with "doing gallant service, preserving records of the ways and the means of the forefathers who got along well with the resources now long forgotten" (Springfield Republican), Eric Sloane has written an immensely enjoyable book that will enchant anyone who takes pleasure in reading about the past and views its artifacts as part of a rich national heritage.
"In analyzing great-grandfather scientifically, we would have to take into account such physical elements as heat and moisture, gases, dust, noise, and the various other environmental factors that make modern life different from that of the past. We would have to compare changes in manual labor, habits of sleep, and the character of food."
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| Our Vanishing Landscape |
Written with humor and affection, and enhanced with 81 of the author’s charming, historically accurate drawings, Our Vanishing Landscape takes readers on a leisurely sojourn through a bygone era. Leading us along rustic winding roads bordering fields and farmhouses, Eric Sloane captures our imaginations as he offers us a guided tour that evokes the America of pioneer times.
This fascinating narrative describes networks of canals, corduroy roads, and turnpikes; tollgates, waterwheels, and icehouses; country inns and churches; ingenious and colorful road signs; and massive snow-rollers that packed snow into hard surfaces for great sleds. Here also are engrossing accounts of toll-road owners, sign painters, circus folk, and other entertainers of the period.
Brimming with anecdotes about people and the times, this delightful, warmly written book remains a genuine and permanent contribution to the field of Americana.
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| The Seasons of America Past |
"The book has a real reference value, but it will also offer … hours of enjoyable reading." — Library Journal.
From flying kites in early spring to hunting and fishing during the glorious days of Indian summer, author Eric Sloane takes readers through a year's activities as he applies his reverent touch to yet another fascinating aspect of early American life. From "sugaring-time," spring plowing, and June weddings, to strawberry picking, weeding season, the fall harvest, and cider-making, his winning book recalls the rustic endeavors of not so long ago, when the time of year determined when a tree was to be chopped down, fences rebuilt, and tree stumps pulled out.
More than 70 of the author's own pen-and-ink drawings charmingly depict cider mills and presses, sleds, pumps and wells, axes, plows, and other elements of America's rural heritage. A section of old recipes and household hints adds additional color and practical value to this delightful book.
"Anyone with an eye for antiques and a yen to know America from the roots up will treasure this detailed record of seasonal life in new England." — Chicago Sunday Tribune~
As Mr. Sloane wrote in this book:
"Spring, summer, fall, and winter seem almost to vanish today; we ice-skate on artificial ice, eat strawberries or watermelon all year round, and go about our work regardless of the weather or time of year.
"Fruit is forced and tinted to appear tree-ripened, even hens are made to lay faster by illuminating chicken barns throughout the night.
"The average American buyer buys by appearance rather than by analysis..."
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| Diary of an Early American Boy |
For his fifteenth birthday in 1805, young Noah Blake's parents gave him a little leatherbound diary in which he recorded the various activities on his father's farm. This reprint of an actual early nineteenth-century book provides today's readers with a delightful rarity — a view of bygone days through the eyes of a young boy. Eric Sloane has taken the notebook with its brief comments and expanded the daily entries with explanatory narrative and 72 of his own remarkable drawings.
Verbal and graphic sketches detail the construction of an entire backwoods farm as well as such common tasks as making nails, building a bridge, splitting shingles, spring plowing, and maple-sugaring. The result is "an extraordinary glimpse into everyday Early American rural life . . . [that] will delight readers of all ages." — History in Review.
In December, 1805, Noah Blake wrote:
"December has arrived with another fall of snow---just enough to cover the ground. Father says it shall be my job to keep the bridge floor in snow. The bridge bears my name, he reminded me."
"December has arrived with another fall of snow---just enough to cover the ground. Father says it shall be my job to keep the bridge floor in snow. The bridge bears my name, he reminded me."
Eric Sloane followed that with: Very few people stop to think how important it was to keep snow shoveled into the old covered bridges. In fact, some believe they were built just to keep out the snow. Yet because most road traffic was during the winter (because of the impassability of muddy summer or spring roads, and the ease with which heavy loads could be sledded over snow), the covered bridge's busiest time was sled time.
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| American Barns & Covered Bridges |
When this book was first published in the mid-1950s, the author was concerned that such functional structures as the American barn and the covered bridge would soon give way to progress and be replaced by "modern" elements. Today, a number of these sturdy, beautifully proportioned barns and bridges are still standing — monuments to the skill and keen eye of their original builders. This lovingly written book, accompanied by more than 75 of the author's own sketches, provides a reliable record of those vanishing forms of architecture. Accurate line drawings depict a variety of barns, such as those in Maine, attached to houses; an "open" log barn in Virginia, and a "top hat" barn in North Carolina.
Covered bridges — like barns, built for soundness and endurance — are also illustrated, among them a saltbox structure in New England, a bridge with a pedestrian walkway in rural New York State, and a 10-span-long bridge at Clark's Ferry, Pennsylvania. Possessing a deep feeling for what might be called the Age of Wood, the author writes with "warmth and astonishing comprehension." — New York Herald Tribune Book Review. Americana enthusiasts and lovers of these traditional symbols of early American life will delight in this priceless tribute to a bygone era. Over 75 black-and-white illustrations.
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| Once Upon A Time: The Way America Was |
"This book is about once-upon-a-time in America." — Eric Sloane. Writer and artist Eric Sloane had an abiding love for America and worked throughout a long and productive life to capture the American spirit in word and picture.
The America Sloane loved was rooted in the simple virtues of our native soil: love of freedom, respect for the individual, sensible frugality, and determined self-reliance — all of which went to make up what Sloane perceived as our true American heritage.
Nowhere is this heritage more amply portrayed than in the work and ways of the early Americans in our pioneer days. In this book you will listen to Sloane's talk of home and hearth, farm and field, and see all manner of tools, utensils, buildings, and rural scenes rendered in his finely detailed and lively drawings.
A visit to America of "once-upon-a-time" brings us home to a land whose pioneer spirit endures, even amid the rapid and radical changes of our times.
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| A Reverence For Wood |
Refreshingly written, delightfully illustrated book remarks expansively on the resourcefulness of early Americans in their use of this valuable commodity - from the crafting of furniture, tools, and buildings to the use of such by-products as charcoal and medicine. "One of Sloane's best books." -Library Journal.
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| A Museum of Early American Tools |
This absorbing and profusely illustrated book describes in detail scores of early American tools and the wooden and metal artifacts made with them. Informally and expressively written, the text covers building tools and methods; farm and kitchen implements; and the tools of curriers, wheelwrights, coopers, blacksmiths, coachmakers, loggers, tanners, and many other craftsmen of the pre-industrial age. Scores of pen-and-ink sketches by the author accurately depict "special tools for every job," among them a hollowing gouge, hay fork, cornering chisel, apple butter paddle, boring auger, mortising chisel, a holding dog, hauling sledge, winnowing tray, reaping hooks, splitting wedge, felling axe, propping saw horse, and other traditional implements. Sure to be prized by cultural historians, this volume will delight woodcrafters interested in making their own tools and thrill general readers with its store of Americana.
My friend and historic presenter at the 18th century Daggett House, Roy, understands and uses the old tools in the same manner as the once owner (and builder) of the house, Samuel Daggett, used in his time 260 years ago, so it was fascinating to see some of the tools in the Eric Sloane book used as they were meant to be when I visited the historic Daggett House.
Roy was told by a tool historian friend of Greenfield Village management that the replicated 18th century saw he was using was not quite historically accurate to the Daggett period, so he corrected that mistake by removing the metal bar that held the separate pieces of wood on each side together and replaced it with twine. He placed a smaller piece of wood that the twine was tied to and twisted it around - spinning it and twisting the twine to be very taut (how’s that for an alliteration?) - thus securing the two sides together tightly enough, as the more modern metal holder once did, and can now proudly use the saw as would have been done during Samuel Daggett’s time,
It's these little things that make a difference, at least for me personally, for it helps me to understand the thought process and also to know that what I am witnessing history in its truest form.
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| Roy, working at the 18th century Daggett House, creating a historically accurate saw suitable for the house. |
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| A page from the Museum of Early American Tools book. |
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| Spirits of '76 |
Eric Sloane attempts to describe the spirits of America in 1776, including Respect, Hard Work, Frugality, Thankfulness, Pioneering, Godliness, Agronomy, Time, and Awareness. He does this with both words and line drawings.
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| Weather Almanac |
In addition to his roles as a celebrated artist and folklorist, Eric Sloane was TV's first weatherman and an author whose popular books offer fascinating combinations of history, lore, and practical information. The Weather Almanac combines Eric Sloane's Almanac and Weather Forecaster with Folklore of American Weather into a single-volume edition that's filled with fascinating forecasting tips based on wind, clouds, the moon, and other natural phenomena. Sloane relates each month of the year to typical weather conditions, highlighting his observations with 135 nostalgic drawings.
The books of Eric Sloane celebrate the time-honored traditions of early America and their enduring value. A prolific artist, Sloane created nearly 15,000 paintings and drawings over his lifetime, many of which enhance his delightful books of bygone days.
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| ABC Book of Early America |
From Almanack, Bathtub, and Conestoga Wagon to X-Brace, Yankee, and Zig-Zag Fence, this sketchbook of antiquities revisits delightful words and inventions of old-time America. Artist and historian Eric Sloane presents a wondrous collection of American innovations, including hex signs, ear trumpets, popcorn, and rocking chairs.
Readers of all ages will delight in these illustrated and hand-lettered pages, which feature brief captions explaining the items' origins and uses. Gadgets, gizmos, and contraptions include foot stoves, used in churches and under the blankets of sleighs and stagecoaches, oil lamps fed by whale oil and kerosene, water-wheels, weathervanes, and windmills (first built in Virginia in 1621 — a century later, there were nearly 1,000). The craftsmanship of the nation's early builders and inventors is reflected in this finely wrought compilation of historical curiosities.
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| Do's & Don'ts of Yesteryear |
A delightful mixture of early American know-how and good old-fashioned gentility, Eric Sloane's Do's and Don'ts captures the spirit of bygone America in words and pictures. Combining two of the beloved folk historian's nostalgic how-to guides, this collection offers vintage, homespun advice that recalls "the joy of doing things not just the old-fashioned way, but plainly the right way."
A shining historical gem, this little book of American lore recalls a more kindly, less hurried time. Lovingly gathered by "Mr. Americana" himself from colonial-era almanacs and diaries, hundreds of brief reflections spread time-honored wisdom on everything from curing hiccups, lighting a proper fire, and mending clothing and furniture, to predicting the weather, making soap, and getting rid of ants, bees, swallows — and boring houseguests. Sloane's evocative drawings add the perfect finishing touch.
Here is an example of a "Do" - Do hammer a squared peg into a round hole when you wish a wood joint to stay.
Here is an example of a Don't" - Don't, as an invited guest, be late for dinner. This is a wrong to your host, to other guests, and to the dinner.
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| I Remember America |
The name and art of Eric Sloane are synonymous with a vision – a rapturous recall – of America as it used to be: a simpler, quieter country of farms, villages, and crafts. Now in a majestic, outsized volume, Sloane presents an autobiography, a recollection, an album of stunning artwork, a passionate remembrance of the American landscape, and an outspoken defense of our threatened natural heritage. Half a century ago, Sloane, then an itinerant sign painter, set out to see America. The 37 oil paintings in this book depict the landscapes, the villages, the houses – indeed, the spirit of that time; they are vintage Sloane, classic Americana. But in addition to the powerful charm and nostalgia of his recollection, Sloane also presents “en passant” a report on the decaying American environment – both physical and cultural - and a lament for what we as a people have lost, wasted, or denied.
Yes, I own each book listed here. And will probably get more as time goes on.
I like to somewhat think of my own blog postings as sort of chapters of an American History book. Perhaps, now that I'm retired, I may put a few posts together in book form.
One never knows. All's I need is cash, right?
However:
"Eric Sloane is...credited with being the foremost authority on Early American rural architecture and Early American tools. His many books of paintings and drawings, and especially his "A Museum of Early American Tools", are considered the most important historical source works on the subjects. The Sloane Stanley Museum in Kent, Connecticut houses Sloane's own personal collection of Early American tools, as well as an exact replica of his painting studio. "A Reverence for Wood" is an invaluable resource to scholars of old growth timber in New England."
I have no idea how long I'll live; God only knows. But I pray when my time comes that I will be known as a Proud patriotic student of America and its history. That I'll be remembered as a man who loved his country: the United States of America.
Do I sound silly?
Foolish?
Old fashioned?
Ha! That's okay.
Hopefully I have a while to become someone's memory (lol).
Until next time, see you in time.
Here are links to my seasonal celebrations and actual experiences of time past (so far) - a sort of the coming to life of the Eric Sloane books:
To read about our 2020 autumn excursion at the cabin, click HERE
To read about our 2021 wintertime excursion at the cabin, click HERE
To read about our 2021 springtime excursion at the cabin, click HERETo read about our 2021 summertime excursion at the cabin, click HERE
To read about our 2021 summer harvesting of the flax at the cabin, click HERE
To read about our 2021 autumn excursion making candles at the cabin, click HERE
To read about our 2022 winter excursion at the cabin, please click HERE
To read about our 2022 spring excursion at the cabin, please click HERE
To read about our 2022 summer excursion at the cabin, please click HERE
To read about our 2022 autumn excursion at the cabin (Pioneer Day), please click HERE
To read about our 2023 winter excursion at the cabin - Candlemas, please click HERE
To read about our 2023 spring excursion at the cabin - Rogation Sunday, please click HERE
To read about our 2023 late spring - more planting at the cabin (& early farming history), click HERE
To read about the 2023 early summer weeding at the cabin (and a timeline event), please click HERE
To read about our 2023 summer excursion at the cabin (Lammas Day), please click HERE
To read about my celebration of a Victorian Autumn, please click HERE
To read about my visit to Greenfield Village in Autumn 2022, please click HERE
To read about celebrating fall harvest in the 21st century, please click HERETo read what life was like in an 18th century autumn, please click HERE
To read what life was like in an 18th century winter, please click HERE
To read what life was like in an 18th century spring, please click HERE
To read what life was like in an 18th century summer, please click HERE
To read about spending a year on a colonial farm, please click HERE
To read about 18th Century Homelife: Spinning, Dyeing, & Weaving as Told by Those Who Were There, please click HERE
To read of a Victorian summer, please click HERETo read about Victorian winters, please click HERE
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