Passion for the Past: Experiencing Our Research: Celebrating Harvest Time in Autumn 1773

And Fall Harvest Celebrations Past continue on...

As a living historian (and also historic reenactor), I am sometimes asked why do grown adults dress up and pretend that they're living in the past. My first response is, "Who's pretending?"

Seriously - - who is pretending here?

...some other place, somewhere, some other time...

>~>~>~>~>~>~>~>~>~>~>~

I practice living history with friends who are often like family, and we mostly portray ourselves in that manner - as family citizens during the era of the American Revolution and the period leading up to it - the 1760s and 1770s. Hence, the name of our reenacting group, Citizens of the American Colonies.

In doing this I try to keep the following two quotes close to my historical heart:

"If you could build up any muscle to be a historian, I'd say it's the empathy muscle. Go out and do empathy exercises; put yourself in their place."

David McCullough (1933 - 2022) historian and historical author~

"We are tellers of stories, we history folks. Our decorative and utilitarian objects are not merely things, but clues to tales of our past as a country. We don't just purchase a lantern; we investigate how it was used and the significance of the pattern of the piercing of the tin. All of the looking back is also a looking forward as friends and families grow closer just as they would have in early America. Make the right historical environment and let the situations and camaraderie unfold."

Tess Rosch - Publisher Early American Life Magazine

_____---...---____

It was a fine autumnal day; the sky was cloudy but serene, and nature wore that rich and golden livery which we always associate with the idea of abundance. The forests had put on their sober brown and yellow, while some trees of the tenderer kind had been nipped by the frosts into brilliant dyes of orange, purple, and scarlet.

Streaming files of wild ducks began to make their appearance high in the air; the bark of the squirrel might be heard from the groves of beech and hickory nuts, and the pensive whistle of the quail at intervals from the neighboring stubble field.

(From Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving - with one slight, barely noticeable change)

~~~

If we were actually living here in 1773, we would be in the midst of the busiest time of year, for we would need to continue harvesting crops, picking apples, and, as we are in November, the process of butchering some of the livestock will take place. Colonists did not waste any part of the animal. They cut steaks from beef. They made spare ribs and backbones. They smoked ham and used the fatty sections of the pig for bacon. The small and large intestines were used as casings for sausage, and they made sausage from the leftover scraps of meat, as well as from liver and lungs. Fat made good lard for baking. The meat from the heads and feet of pigs was chopped very fine to make head cheese. And then there was the tallow as well as the beeswax for candles.

All of this, along with the fruits & vegetables, would have helped to sustain us over the coming winter and spring seasons. The cellar would now have its "winter smell of apples and preserves," and the aroma in the living area would have the mixture of sweet beeswax and the more pungent tallow odors of the freshly dipped candles.

Colonial Larissa deep in thought...

In this photo we have the lady of the house staring out from the doorway on a warm autumn day, perhaps looking longingly into her kitchen garden. She could be thinking of the root vegetables still in the garden that are ready to be pulled for storage in the root cellar. She could be thinking about drying fruits or squash or gourds. She could be thinking of church this coming Sunday, and of the harvest frolic afterward.

But she dare not daydream for long, for there was work to be done: dinner must be prepared, for her husband will be hungry upon coming in from the field. And her sisters, who are working diligently in the next room cutting up their recent harvested vegetables and slaughtered chicken, will ensure a fine meal will be hot and on the table for their family.

Autumn in the early 1770s...

~~~

So, yes, we absolutely would have seen
barrels such as what we see here!!

I think my brain works a little differently than most historians. As if you haven't noticed by now, I am fascinated by things not of this time. And I try to question and research everything - to understand what was once commonplace but now no longer is. For instance, for quite a while I've questioned the use of spigots on barrels in the 18th century. For some odd reason I didn't know if such an invention was around at that time, that perhaps it was a "modern-ism" made to look old, like those two-piece low-sitting wooden chairs that slide together to create a seat with a slat back - "reenactor chairs" is what I've heard them called - which are actually from the 1920s but, for some reason, have found a place in the Civil War (and sometimes Revolutionary War) reenacting world.

When I've spoken to multiple people on the spigot subject, the answer was always, "Well, of course they were!" But I've learned to never take anything for granted.

So, after doing some digging, I've come to learn that, yes, spigots indeed were used in the 18th century - and even much earlier (they're from about 1700 BC!). You see, there is nothing wrong with questioning items, especially if it is considered normal and seen consistently at reenactments, for many times if it "looks right" or "old" or seen at many camp sites, some reenactors will assume it's correct without question...or perhaps some just may not care for what could be consider minor details. But the historian in me finds it better to check than just assume or take anyone's word as gospel.

And that is what we the cabin crew, try to do each and every time we utilize this historic structure as our 18th century home - where we pertain live, for a day at a time, in the early 1770s, and we do this for our own experience---few to no public or outsiders...just us living as if it is 250 years ago.

We are not perfect, but we're always looking to improve...and this is a splendid way to learn.

We also keep each other in check.

So let's get to how our day - November 4, 1773 - went:

In the fall of the year, 'twas a very busy time for all the family; besides harvesting the rest of the crops, there was canning and food to be stored away for the coming cold weather. Apples were picked and either dried, stored away, or made into cider, fritters, sauce, pies, or butter. The corn must be dried and the potatoes, carrots, and beets must be put down into the root cellar.

This is the time of year when hogs are slaughtered and the sides of meat are smoked, pickled, and made into sausages and head-cheese.

Candles - especially tallow candles - were to be made.

And this year, like two years ago, I decided my part in the day's activities would be back to candle-dipping. It is unfortunate that I have pretty nasty back pain and sciatica in my legs, which, sadly, limits much of my mobility - yes, physical therapy will be taking care of it right after we're done maintaining my rotor cuff issue----I am a pain-filled mess! - and candle making is something I can do that won't wrench me too bad. And just like in days of old, work had to be done no matter, and if this is what I can do, it's what I'll do.

This year, as we did two years ago, candle dipping took place.
See the pumpkin there?
More on that and why it's there shortly...

As explained by Cynthia Howerter, an author who also writes for the excellent Colonial Quills blog:

"Eighteenth-century colonists got up with the sun and worked until the sun went down in order to utilize the daylight. Once the sun slipped past the horizon, candles provided the only means of illumination (aside from the hearth-Ken) - but it was dim lighting, at best...

Townspeople could purchase candles from a local tradesman known as a "chandler" or a merchant, but people living in the rural areas needed to make their own tapers.

Candles were made by using metal molds or by the dipping method. Molds produced uniformly shaped candles, but could only be made in small quantities.

Dipped candles were less uniform in shape, but several hundred could be made in an afternoon. Multiple wicks were repeatedly dipped into hot tallow until candles reached their desired thickness, then hung on a candle tree to harden.

All candles require a wick to hold the flame. During the colonial period, wicks were made by twisting strings of flax and linen on a spinning wheel. Because twisted wicks do not burn away as the wax melts, they needed to be trimmed frequently with scissors."

Note the unprocessed flax upper right~
Our candles were very wobbly. We tried to keep the wicks as straight as possible but, well, our goal was quantity over how nice they look, for we have many dark nights ahead. The more the merrier.
The scissors you see are actually called "snuffers" - -
"Because of the scarcity of imported wicking, early settlers were known to spin the flimsy down of milkweed into loose threads for wicks. They also used loosely spun cotton, coarse linen, or tow. Early wicks sputtered and guttered and smoked so much that their charred ends, called "snuff," usually required snipping with a scissor-like device called a snuffer four or five times an hour."

Early American Life Magazine, February 2007

Most colonists made candles from tallow or beeswax.

Beeswax candles were preferred by colonists because they had a pleasant scent and produced little smoke. They also burned brighter than tallow candles.

But let's go back a bit - let's go back to when we planned out our autumnal harvest day and feast. I mean, it's fall, and being as such we would be enjoying the fruits of our labor; harvest time is here! It was time for feasting on the yield and to enjoy the little warmth before the bitter cold winter set in.

For the day's activities, I brought along about 60 lbs of pure raw beeswax.

But one also needs wicks.

Please allow me to digress for a moment here to explain how I got wicks for dipping:

you may or may not know that I enjoy processing flax to be spun on a spinning wheel, turning it into linen thread. But before spinning can occur, there is a whole 'nother process that must take place beforehand:

In mid-October I took part in Waterloo Farm Museum's Pioneer Day event,
and for my part I demonstrated the flax processing to many interested visitors.

It was great explaining how flax becomes a textile - linen. And it was with my tools that I was able to show how flax was processed in the 18th century: from planting to caring for to harvesting to de-seeding to retting to drying to the flax break to the scutching board to the hackle, and then have my wife or a hired girl spin it into linen thread. Once it was complete, the linen thread could then be sent off to the weaver who would then weave it on his loom into fabric, of which could be made into a towel or perhaps sewn into garments such as new breeches or a shirt. Or maybe even into a pillow case.

And leftover thread, perhaps spun a wee bit thicker, could be used for candle wicking.

"The scutching mallet was used to make the fibres more pliable, though a special flax breaker was much more effective. The fibres had to be combed, and for this a hatchel was used. When it was removed from the hatchel any bits of remaining fibre were known as tow, and were either made into candle wicks or burden-ropes. The flax was stored in bundles known as stricks until the spinner needed them."

(From the book Old Days, Old Ways: An Illustrated Folk History of Ireland by Olive Sharkey)

There is a story behind the making of this candle...

So in the photo above you see a candle on the table. No big deal until you learn that the wicking is actually from linen thread made from flax seeds that we planted, cared for, harvested, combed, retted, dried, broke on the flax break, scutched, hackled, and then spun by my living history friend, Rebecca. It was then dipped in pure raw beeswax I acquired from a beekeeper friend. By the way, each step of the process was done while wearing 18th century clothing. And to add to that, the candle holder it is in is an actual antique from 1757! Yes, I am quite proud of that! So I had a visitor who asked me about purchasing this candle. I told him "$50." He scoffed and replied, "Fifty buck for a candle?" And I said, "For what it took me to make this candle, even that price is too cheap!" Yeah...I probably wouldn't even sell it for that price!

I really like the authenticity of something as simple as this candle - as authentic as lighting can be for 1773!

With that all being said, as we in the Cabin Crew were planning our harvest day activities, I had decided that I wanted to make more of these period-authentic candles. So I grabbed the flax that I had not completed during Pioneer Day - I was presenting rather than doing - and I completed a good part of it. I also had more flax on hand and continued the processing. In my own decidedly un-historic backyard:

My flax tools, a bit of flax on the break, and the tow on the ground.
It wasn't nearly as much fun doing it while in period clothing with
other living history friends.
But I took advantage of the nice warm fall weather before the rains came.

Here is much of the flax I processed on the distaff of the
spinning wheel, a-waiting to be spun into wicking.

On the night before Hallowe'en, my wife spun the flax for me.
She did a wonderful job!
And, well, no...she did not dress period either.
Next time we both will!
But it was her first time spinning flax - she's very proud!
And so am I ~

Turned out pretty good, didn't it?

Here is a bit of more recent candle history and on this art of candle dipping:

Most 18th and 19th century homes were as self-sufficient as they could be, and those who lived in them did their best to produce as many things needful to life as they could, and this did include candles. As part of their domestic work, women usually were the ones who carried the candle making process from start to finish, though many times the children, and even the men (as opportunity arose), would help out as well.

Well, this male (meaning me!) has taken on the chandler job at our 18th century living history cabin excursions. As I portray a frontier farmer, I have also taken on this chore. While at the cabin, I am not allowed to go hunting, nor, due to health issues, am I able to do many of the other 18th century male chores. Also, we do not live there at the cabin; we are only experiencing colonial life one day at a time as best as we can. So, I suppose I am a sort of chandler - a chandler is a candle maker, typically a male in larger towns, however in smaller communities or rural farms it was mostly women who often made candles, though candle-making often could be a family affair.

Artificial light in the 18th and even in the early 19th century was truly a luxury. People were used to working by daylight while indoors, so lighting a candle when the sun was up was rare (sorry Outlander fans! Series characters, Claire & Jamie, way overdo the candles in their home - burning a dozen or more candles at once just wouldn't happen - day or night! lol). It was customary for folks to move from room to room to get the most out of the day's light. Generally, candles were lit only during the nighttime hours, and sparingly so, due to the lengthy candle-making process. According to one of the chandlers I spoke to at Colonial Williamsburg, a typical middle class home in the 1750's could go through nearly 500 to 700 candles a year. And that may even be a conservative amount for those who were a bit more well-to-do.

Though candles could be dipped any time of the year, the main season for dipping was usually in early-to-mid November. It must be remembered that candlemaking was not the fun hobby then as it is in our modern times; it was a backbreaking, smelly, greasy task. The making of the winter's stock of candles was the special autumnal household duty, and a hard one, too, for the large kettles were tiresome and heavy to handle, and the work was well under way at a very early hour, with the temperatures being just cold enough for a quicker hardening.

Wicks were made from linen, cotton, hemp, or, less often, from milkweed. If one lived near a general store, or maybe if a peddler happened by, thick string could be bought to use as wicks.

Though my candle chore began in the late morning, during the 18th century an early hour found the work well under way for our ancestors. Where mine is done outside over a firepit, in the 1700s a good fire was usually started in the kitchen fireplace under two vast kettles filled with boiling water and melted beeswax or tallow.

Here I am preparing to build a fire and set up the iron poles that will hold the
kettle filled with beeswax to dip candles.

At the far end of the kitchen or in an adjoining and cooler room, two long poles were laid from chair to chair or stool to stool. Across these poles were laid candle rods, which were about a foot and a half long, and to each rod was attached about six to eight carefully straightened candle-wicks. With the fat/tallow or wax in the pot melted, the wicking from the rods would be dipped into the pot and then returned to its place across the two poles. This process would occur repeatedly as each rod was dipped into the tub of tallow or wax, and with each dip the candles became larger and larger until the desired length and width was had.

Our rods - or long sticks, rather - were laid out in the same manner as was done in
the 18th century.
Better wobbly candles than none at all.
Actually, we tried keeping them straight but it proved to be difficult. It is much easier
with the heavy cotton wicks. Perhaps the next wicking made in this way
will have to be plied to thicken it up. It's all a learning process.

It's here that we can quote Susan Blunt, a woman who recalled her 18th century mother dipping candles:

"Mother used to dip candles in the fall, enough to last all winter. When a beef was killed in the fall, she would use all the tallow for candles. On the evening before, we would help her prepare the wicks. The boys would cut a lot of rods and she would cut the wicks the length of a candle and then string them on the rods.

In the morning she would commence with her day's work.”

My candle-making set up.
I use my reenacting cast iron cooking utensils to hold my larger kettle,
allowing me to slide the pot along the cross bar from the center heat to the cooler
sides to help maintain the correct temperature and prevent the pot filled with
melted beeswax from getting too hot.
Ah! Fall!

Of course, farms would also have bee hives on their property and, thus, be able to obtain the wax from the hive. Where tallow had a pungent odor, beeswax had more of a sweet smell.

Either way, both types were popular in the 18th century.

All of this, along with the fruits & vegetables in the cold room, would have helped to sustain the family over the coming winter and spring seasons. The cellar would now have its "winter smell of apples and preserves," and the aroma in the living area would have the mixture of sweet beeswax and the more pungent tallow odors of the freshly dipped candles.

The pot was not large enough for the twenty pound brick of pure beeswax, so I had to cut it in half. The saw was slow-going. However, an axe was found in the cabin and that worked out much quicker and easier.

Susan Blunt continues: "In the morning (mother) would commence her day's work. She would dip each one in the hot tallow and straighten out the wicks so the candles would be straight when they were finished. By raising the candles (out of the kettle) at just the right speed and working on a day with a moderate temperature, the fine quality of the candles would be assured. The candles would be cooled overnight and the bottom ends cut off neatly. The finished candles were packed away in a mouse-proof container for safe storage."

And the diary of Martha Ballard tells us:

November 5, 1787

"Clear & pleast. I Came from mr Fosters. we made 25 Dozn of Candles."

Twenty five dozen - that's 300 candles in one day!

Some of the candles weren't tied tight enough to the sticks/rods,
so for those that came off, I dipped individually.

I originally hoped to do tallow candles, as they were more common for folk like us back in 1773. However, with tallow candles I need a lot more beef fat to dip than what I had. Also, with tallow, the candles need to be burned not long after dipping and drying - it's animal fat, and it begins to rot and stink pretty fast. So I plan to tallow dip at my house sometime and have a separate pot for it. I may also try to mix the beeswax and the tallow together, as has been suggested to me. Again, I will experiment at home first to see how it turns out.

Wax on the fingers!

One lesson I learned about candle comparisons: the 12" long tapered candles I used to buy at the local party store will burn nearly three to four times as fast as one 6" to 7" homemade beeswax candle.

Tom Redd, a Materials Analyst for the Foundation in Colonial Williamsburg, noted: “Let us imagine we have four candles, and each one is about three-quarters of an inch in diameter and they are all about 10 inches long. They are in a room where the air is still. A candle well-made of the best tallow might burn two hours. A bayberry candle might last eight, while a beeswax candle may burn for 10 hours. The finest candle, imported from New England, would have been made of spermaceti wax. Spermaceti is taken from the head of the sperm whale. The spermaceti candle might last 12 hours or more, and burn with a brighter light.”

A key factor that many modern candle dippers either do not know, forget, or don't care if they're using pure beeswax is that you need to allow them to cure for at least four to six months - longer, if you can. I let my freshly dipped candles cure for a year.

Though Larissa & Jackie came out to help with the candles every-so-often,
much of their time was spent preparing and cooking our meal.

Larissa & Charlotte working on candles.

The hearth where the food was cooked during colonial times was the heart of the home, and the colonial women who spent their time at the kitchen hearth were nothing short of culinary geniuses.

Here is a diary entry from Mary Cooper, Long Island farm wife, who wrote on September 17, 1769: "Sabbath. A fair day but the wind north east still. O alas, I am more distrest than ever. I have dinner to get and nothing in the house to cook. My company will not go to meeten. Dirty and distresed. I set my self to make some thing out of littel on."

Unfortunately, she does not tell us what she made, but if anyone knew how to "make some thing out of littel on," a colonial woman would.

Speaking of which...

I brought along a couple pumpkins that my wife grew in
our home garden. That's when Charlotte got a grand idea...

If you recall my post a few weeks back about Pioneer Day, we saw Susan Dewey, a tribal member of the Sault Ste. Marie band of Chippewas, demonstrate as a native woman of the mid-18th century (1750-1770s) cooking native foods, such as a sweet pumpkin in the ground.

So, using the fire I built for the candles,
Charlotte set the pumpkin at the edge.

And it turned out so good!
Experiencing other's research~

Originally we planned to have a "pompkin" pie made in the traditional "Mount Vernon" manner, with a recipe given to us from a very special (and kind) lady. Unfortunately, 'twas not to be...this time. However, there are future-past plans to do so.

So my wife, Patty, baked a pumpkin pie made from pumpkins she grew in our tiny backyard. Charlotte said it tasted like "it came from the farm."

That is a high compliment, for everything was made from scratch.

The other home-grown pumpkin was just not quite ready yet -
still green but turning orange.
Then there's the pumpkin pie setting there on the table.
So good!.

I did bring my gun in hopes of doing some shooting,
but it didn't work out this time.

The chicken roasting in the reflector oven.

By the end of the 18th century, more and more households were equipped with tin kitchens/reflector ovens for roasting. The cook put the fowl or meat inside and would turn it so the open side would face the fire, using the small door in the back to baste and check on the food.

In my culinary historical research, one of the things that has noticeably changed in recent times is how much actual time is spent in the kitchen today by modern cooks. With "innovations" such as microwaves, frozen "tv" dinners, pre-packaged foods, and fast food restaurants, the time and energy spent in this oh-so-important room is nowhere near what our ancestors did for food preparation.

Pride in cooking seems to have gone out the window as well.

The seeded oat bread Jackie made was excellent.

But we are no longer an agricultural nation; the cycle of domestic life, which was closely tied to the land and seasons, had little changed from the beginning of time until very recently in the timeline, for it hasn't been that long in comparison that a new world of technology of refrigeration, gas stoves, electric lighting, and home furnaces transformed the old world into one where times of the seasons mean little.

Larissa has cooked on four different hearths, now. She is very well versed on hearth cooking, and it is interesting to hear her speak of the differences between them -
the good and the not-so-good.

Running a kitchen really did require a staggering range of skills, including chopping kindling, keeping a fire burning indefinitely, knowing which wood was best for baking or frying, plucking feathers from fowl, butchering animals large and small, cosseting (caring for) bread yeast, brewing beer, making cheese, adjusting 'burners' of coals on a hearth and gauging the temperature of a bake oven. In fact, the colonial cook would have to begin their work by "building a good-sized fire on the hearth, but once the logs had burned to coals, the embers were moved around, and carefully selected pieces of wood would be added to produce different kinds of heat, often having several small fires going at once. Piles of live embers on the hearth were like burners on a stove; a gridiron set over a pile of coals could be used for broiling; a pan set over coals on a trivet could be used for frying; and coals could be piled over and under a Dutch oven for baking."

(From the book America's Kitchens by Nancy Carlisle and Melinda Talbot Nasardinov).

Our home~

For our harvest feast:

Just look at the bird and the stuffing!

We ate a true harvest meal - and it was as good as I would have hoped it to be!

Enjoying our harvest 1773 celebration meal: chicken, stuffing, mashed potatoes, parsnips, bread (all cooked over an open hearth), and a pumpkin squash baked in the fire outside from a recipe shared by a native American...plus beets! - and cider to wash it down - plus a pumpkin pie - - -a true harvest feast created by these wonderful ladies!

The celebration of Thanksgiving over the course of the 18th century evolved into a holiday celebrated from fasting and prayer to gathering around the dinner table. But the root of our American Thanksgiving holiday was giving thanks to God for the bounty He gives - harvest time.

The harvest celebrations took place throughout the harvest season - August 1st (Lammas Day) through early December (depending on where one lived). And a harvest feast could occur whenever the crop was brought in by a community or even a family.

That's what we did on this day. And with us "living out on the frontier," we celebrated when our main crops were in.

Yes, I suppose it could be called a Thanksgiving, but it was more of our Harvest Celebration. The 1st Thanksgiving Proclamation occurred on November 1, 1777, but it was not a Federal Holiday - that would not come until 1863.

You see everything but the beets here.
Yes, we did eat as our colonial ancestors did, with the knife.
Happy Harvest!
(It was hinted that my plate does not pass "muster" so I have one coming that was
replicated from an original. You'll see it next cabin day - - stepping up our game)~

As head of the household, I read the following from the 1789 U. S. Book of Common Prayer for our before meal Grace:

O MOST merciful Father, who of thy gracious goodness hast heard the devout prayers of thy Church, and turned our dearth and scarcity into plenty; We give thee humble thanks for this thy special bounty; beseeching thee to continue thy loving-kindness unto us, that our land may yield us her fruits of increase, to thy glory and our comfort; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

About five o clock,

the warm November day

just stops...

...over ragged black woods

the orange sun

lingers~

We did not rise from the table until it was late in the day, and when the dishes had been cleared away we all got around the fire as close as we could. A couple candles were lit as well - hey! It's a harvest holiday! We're allowed! Someone hinted that this is what we would've done if we were actually in 1773 (no, we do not do/attempt 1st person at these cabin excursions, for the manner in which folks spoke in the 18th century was almost like a foreign language). But rather than Bible read, spin on a wheel, sing songs, or other evening activities of the day, we, instead, spoke on history; about the differing hearths Larissa has cooked upon and what makes them good or not as good as they should be, on our favorite open-air museum Greenfield Village, and a variety of other historical subjects, mostly pertaining to our own "past" adventures.

The fire gave off a pleasing glow.

"Possibly as a result of long dependence upon strong electric lighting, we seem to have much poorer night vision today than the average man had a century or two ago," wrote historian Eric Sloane in his Seasons of America Past book.

As the sun lowered, I took a walk around the cabin to snatch a few window pictures.

It was actually darker than the pictures show; my camera has a tendency to gather
every snippet of light to create a brighter photo.

I like window shots - take a look inside~
(of course, cabins oftentimes did not have windows,
and if they did, in many cases, there would have been greased (or oiled) paper
rather than breakable and expensive glass covering the panes)

With an electric light not even a thought, much less a reality in the colonial times, a dim visual world began where life centered around the flicker of a candle and, in cooler weather, the warming flames of a hearth. This low level of lighting created only pockets of brightness, leaving most of the room in darkness. Forget about the Hollywood movies showing people enjoying a pleasant eve after sundown reading or writing by candlelight, yet the room is bright.

That just was not the case.

A quote I repeat often (from Old Sturbridge Village) is "If the only light and heat comes from candles and fireplaces because of a power outage at your house, it is frustrating and annoying - but when it comes in the form of intimate tours of a (historical) village, it is charming and peaceful."

And it is never more true than during what we experienced here.

The day's temperature was tepid for early November - mid 50s - but as the sun began to set, the numbers lowered to where the heat coming from the fireplace gave us a, what I call, historical warmth, meaning exactly what the Old Sturbridge Village quote says. Again, it's this sort of experience that helps us to build up the empathy muscle by putting ourselves in their place.

This was as perfect as the image here shows.

However, just because the sun went down did not mean the people went to bed; this was their time for reading, writing letters, filling out a ledger, writing in a diary, sewing, mending, spinning, and other necessities, as well as also socializing and speaking of the day's events, storytelling, games, the bible recitations & family history lore, and other ways to pass the time.

One of the best pictures of the night, showing the four of us gathered in the dim light of three candles and a fireplace hearth. Now, back in the 1770s we would not have normally had three candles burning along with a fire in the fireplace. But this was a harvest celebration - a Thanksgiving of sorts - so we made an exception and splurged a little.

Our ancestors did live in darker times, as we in the modern day find out when a power outage strikes; we are so used to having bright electric lights, day or night, that sometimes even sunlight coming through a window isn't bright enough for some - they'll still turn on their electric light.

Larissa took this selfie of us - this could just be the picture of the day!
I grabbed the candle and antique candlestick to add to the ambience.

It seems that we turned the clocks back to standard time a day and about 250 years early - we spent this day in autumn 1773 celebrating harvest time by making candles and enjoying a splendid repast of a harvest meal - it was all was sooo good! And we stayed into the darkness of the evening - - 'twas an awesome day with awesome people living history...

One can never have too many candles.
The candles we made are now upon my table at my home.
It's not the 25 dozen that Martha Ballard made, I'll grant you that, but not too bad .

Opinion on Living History:

England's The Ragged Victorians - 'The great unwashed'

I've noticed how many reenactors / living historians fawn over the awesome English living history group, The Ragged Victorians. And rightfully so, for judging by their photos and commentary, they are excellent.

What gets my goat is when I hear so many - too many - in this hobby say dumb things such as, "I wish we could be that good!" or something along those lines.

Well, then, what's stopping you? Try harder! No excuse!

"But...well...no one else will...we're just not that good."

Bah! Get thee behind me!

The Ragged Victorians do research - deep research - and not just anyone can become a member of that top-notch group. They have a strict recruitment policy in place, "But that’s only to protect the high standards of what we’re trying to achieve and ensures the group’s harmonies are kept balanced," said one of the founders to me.

So why can't you do the same, either with your own group or solo, if you feel you are not up to their standards? Raise your own bar - it's as simple as that. And if anyone says, "Oh, you'll never be that good. We're just not that good - we don't have the people who care enough. We don't have it in us." Shrug them off, find people who have the same passion as you, research, and then set the bar...and raise it as you go along.

I just cannot express the importance of a willing to learn, a willing to change, a questioning mind and the ability to listen to the response, and a willingness to accept and attempt to correct your mistakes. And to share your own knowledge with others. Have discussions.

While this sounds simple, living history, filled with commitment and practice and study on the part of its practitioners, can be an amazing accomplishment. Also, remember: "Never say never, and never say always." Truer words have not been spoken in this hobby. History - all aspects - is not strictly black and white, but mostly gray.

'ave 'n apple!
Slogger Rose - this is who I interviewed.

This is the road we, the Colonial Cabin Crew, are trying to follow as best we can. We keep our participant numbers at the cabin to a minimum to keep it real. We call each other out if standards we have set for ourselves are not met. And we don't place any one of us above or below each other - we all learn different things from each other. And if we disagree, we will do our own research for confirmation.

Yes, we're tough on ourselves and each other, but we want to be as right as we can be. We are not perfect, and don't claim to be, but we're working onward and upward. We want the standards of groups like the Ragged Victorians to be our standards as well.

I would like to see all members of Citizens of the American Colonies go down this same road: to bring history to life by living it. Whether we take a quick jaunt "dressed" to Greenfield Village or a private event such as what we do here at the cabin or at a bonafide reenactment.

One more thing - if you see it in the movies - Hollywood History - it is probably not quite right.

These are just my own thoughts and opinions...

Until next time, see you in time.

. . .

Celebrating and participating in a 1770s fall and harvest:

2020 - Our first colonial harvest at the cabin experience

2021 - The Colonial Cabin Crew dipping candles

2022 - Pioneer Day

2023 - Pioneer Day

Celebrating and participating in an 1860s harvest:

2014 - Our first living history Harvest Home at Wolcott Mill!

2015 - A mighty large group of participants at Wolcott Mill!