By Cod, that's Good!!

Since we've moved to Massachusetts, cod has become a staple of our diet. Okay. Maybe not a "staple", but definitely something we eat a lot more of than say, spaghetti and meatballs (apologies to my Italian relatives).

Cod fishing's importance to American history is undeniable. Cape Cod was so named in 1602 by English explorer Bartholomew Gosnold, who took aboard his ship "a great store" of cod while visiting the surrounding waters, but cod fishing was inherent to the Bay State long before it was a British colony. The early pilgrims knew nothing about fishing, but were were determined to profit from it, according to Mark Kurlansky, in his book Cod: a Biography of the Fish That Changed the World, (p. 68). Unfortunately, while the Pilgrims were starving in 1621, British ships were filling their holds with fish off the New England coast. Eventually, the Pilgrims established fishing stations in Gloucester, Salem, Dorchester, and Marblehead, Massachusetts, and Penobscot Bay, in what is now Maine. I would venture a guess that early ancestors John Brock and his son, John, both fisherman, took part in Gloucester's cod industry.

Cod is worshipped – practically – in Massachusetts. A carved Sacred Cod has been resident in the State House since the early 1700's. The original, and the State House, were destroyed by fire in 1747. Both were replaced in 1773. The Thomas Crafts, Jr. iteration and the State House, again, were destroyed in the Revolutionary War during the British siege of Boston in 1775. Like the fish itself, the carving continues to perservere, and in 1784, Rep. John Rowe offered a third Sacred Cod carving to the House of Representatives. It hung there until 1798 when it was moved to the House of Representatives Chamber in the (third) new State House. The cod moved once more, in 1895, to the new House chambers where it remains today as an ancient symbol of prosperity.

I've baked, broiled and beer battered cod, but in an attempt to eat better (and get out of the kitchen in the summer), the grill is my new best friend. It's really Jason's best friend, but since he's my hubby, it's mine by association. From time to time I wing it with recipes, from the really good to The Monkfish Episode, now a euphemism in our house for total disaster, but this grilled cod definitely falls into the former not the later category.

All you need is a really great cod loin (nice thick pieces), some spices and a secret ingredient for an easy, simple and delicious dinner for two. Here goes:

Ingredients:
2 Cod Loin pieces
Butter
Onion
Garlic Salt
McCormick's Tuscan Spices (rosemary, garlic, paprika, black pepper)
Weber Kickin' Chicken Spices (optional)

• Place each cod loin on a piece of aluminum foil (large enough to wrap it up in).
• Sprinkle the loins with garlic salt, Tuscan spices* and a dash or two of Weber Kickin' Chicken spices.
• Slice one round from a medium onion (red or Vidalia), cut it in half, separate and top the cod loins with it.
• Add 1 pat of butter and, the secret ingredient, 1 capful of of sweet vermouth to each packet.
• Close the packet by folding down the top and folding in the sides. I usually double wrap – just so the packet doesn't fall apart when you take it off the grill.
• Cook on your grill for 15 minutes.

Serve it with a great green salad and an ear of buttery corn and you've got a meal that will have you hook, line and sinker.

Resources:
1. Celebrate Boston, The Sacred Cod; http://www.celebrateboston.com/strange/sacred-cod.htm
2. Photo courtesy of The Commonwealth of Massachusetts online photo tour

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The Whittemores of Wayland

Finally. Spring has sprung in Massachusetts. Whether it’s here for good or just another tease from that rogue, Mother Nature, is yet to be seen but I wasn’t going to let the opportunity to get outside and enjoy a few hours of sunshine slip by on Sunday.

So, I traded my needle and thimble for a Red Sox cap (when in Boston…) and my camera and headed to the cemetery.

Wait. What? Cemetery?

The ancient cemeteries in and around Middlesex County, Massachusetts are my haven; quiet reflective places full of history and silently spun stories about the families who built homes and lives in Weston, Wayland and the surrounding towns. I spent a great deal of time in Weston’s Farmers and Central Cemeteries last summer and the Wayland, Sudbury and Natick cemeteries are at the top of my list for this year.

Wayland was the first settlement of the Sudbury plantation, established in 1638, and incorporated in 1639. There are several cemeteries in Wayland, and the two oldest are the South and North cemeteries, located along Old Sudbury Road. The North Cemetery is on the site of Sudbury’s first meetinghouse, built in 1643. It is also the final resting place of 56 militia soldiers and minutemen who fought during the Revolutionary War.

The South Cemetery was my primary destination on Sunday; small, pastoral and quiet, its entrance fronted by a stacked stone wall which seems particularly typical to the homes in this area of New England. It is the final resting place to members of the Smith, Whittemore, Loker, Thompson and Draper families, among others. For me, it’s not only a place for quiet reflection, but also a great way to learn about the local genealogy.

As I wandered through the cemetery, the four headstones of Whittemore children, standing shoulder-to-shoulder near the entrance to the burial ground, struck me. It is not unusual for family members to be buried near each other, but as I took photos and notes it surprised me to realize they had all died within a span of 2 years. Infant mortality is also not unusual, but the Whittmore children were in their late teens and early twenties.

When I got home, I did some research on the family. William Whittemore was born in 1804, the son of Aaron Whittemore and his wife, Lucy Sanderson. On November 12, 1829 he married Mary Smith, the daughter of Josiah Smith and Elizabeth Jones. The Whittemores, like many early 19th century couples, began their family shortly after they were married. Daughter Elizabeth Alden was born in July 1831, followed by George in 1833. They had seven more children, a new Whittemore offspring nearly every two years – Lucy, Sarah, Abby, Ephriam, Isaac, Sophia and finally William in 1851. But the joy of their growing family was soon marred by heartbreak, evidenced by the succession of headstones.

Lucy Ann Whittemore died of consumption on February 3, 1852, two months after the birth of young William. She was 17. A year later, on February 23, Elizabeth, age 21, joined her sister in South Cemetery, also a victim of consumption. In April 1854, 17-year old Sarah Jane Whittemore became the third Whittemore child to lose her life to consumption, as did their brother, George, two months later and two weeks shy of his 22nd birthday. Four children lost in 2 years. I can’t imagine how that affected the family.

Consumption (known today as tuberculosis) was a common, infectious, and in most cases, fatal disease. Classic symptoms included fever, flushed cheeks, sweats, weight loss and most feared, the chronic cough. It was a death sentence for 19th century New Englanders, a slow and painful fading of the human body and spirit. Consumption was not discriminating about its victims, but statistics show it affected more females than males and the poor more often than the wealthy. It was especially prevalent among young adults, cruelly striking down scores of men and women with such promise left in their lives.

The disease was not well understood and was not believed to be contagious, so those suffering with the it were not quarantined or avoided. It is easy to understand how a large family like the Whittemores, living in small quarters, could be susceptible to multiple deaths. In the years between 1852 and 1854, Wayland Town Clerk Henry Wight noted 14 of the 56 registered deaths in town were the result of consumption.

In addition to losing 4 children, Mary Smith Whittemore also lost her widowed mother, Elizabeth, who was living with the family according to the 1850 Federal census, to the disease in 1856. Three years later, in 1859 the disease took Mary too.

William lived until 1889 and watched 4 of his remaining 5 children grow to adulthood, marry and raise families of their own. The only exception was Ephriam, who died in 1860 – of consumption – at the age of 16.

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Civil War Harley 2014

For the last few years – four to be exact, my hubby and I have spent a two week vacation doing what some may think unconventional. Two weeks on a Harley. Let me tell you, they are the best two weeks of the year.

I dubbed our inaugural ride the Civil War Harley tour because our route, through the scenic highways and byways of the south, was charted with specific Civil War sites and battlefields in mind. We hit the biggies, starting with a Gettysburg drive-by (that’s a blog for another day - my continued and relentless request for 4 days in that most hallowed ground), Manassas, Vicksburg, Shiloh, Franklin, and Antietem. It was an exhilarating and oftimes somber trip through history and Americana. Armed with my trusty Canon (this year I’m bucking for a GoPro to capture the whole trip), I have snapped thousands of photos of people, places, architecture, withered barns, beautiful landscapes and small Main Street towns over the years.

I wrote a blog each night well, almost (www.civilwarharley.blogspot.com) and an annual adventure was born.

This year, we’re taking the Root Beer Float (my name for the bike, not Jason’s) -  a beautiful root beer colored 2013 Anniversary edition ElectraGlide, which, when sitting in the back seat, truly feels like you’re floating. And we’re heading in a whole different direction.  North.  The ride will take us through Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Prince Edward Island, Niagara Falls and a visit to Buckfield, Maine, the tiny town where Jason’s great, great grandfather, Civil War Alvan (to note his military service and distinguish him from several other Alvans and Alvins in the family) was born and raised. While not a Civil War tour in our traditional sense, homage to an ancestral veteran of the War Between the States will keep the Civil War in our tour this year.

Of course, I’ll be blogging and capturing the ride on film – well, digital film – so get ready to ride along!

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1770's Stays - Complete!

I started my 1770’s stays in December, a novice historical costumer with a gleam in my eye and a spring in my step. Now, after hours and hours of handstitching, a lovely new callous on my middle finger from jabbing myself repeatedly with the needle and a cramp in my hand, my stays are complete!

My tale of woe is not intended to dissuade anyone from making their own stays. On the contrary. Now that I have a fully finished pair, I am thrilled at what I was able to accomplish. I’ve never taken on anything like this before so I didn’t have any idea how complicated or time consuming stitching nearly 200 channels then boning and joining the 10 sections together would be. But that was the easy part. Quarter inch linen tape covered the joining channels attached with minute stitches; it was a delicate task trying to roll the stays and attach the tape without hearing the unmistakable crack of a reed snapping within a channel. Adding the kid leather binding was the most abusive on my poor fingers and hands.  Sure, in theory, it’s like attaching seam binding to a hem, but it's definitely not as easy as attaching seam binding to a hem!  I bent and contorted 3 needles pushing my way through the layers of leather, linen and wool and lost count of the expletives.

The blue checked lining was added in pieces; the center covered stay sections one and two, flanked by two side pieces covering sections 3, 4 and 5. The tabs were covered separately, so they can easily splay over the hips.

Now I understand why men were stay makers!

Pamphleteer and founding father Thomas Paine was the son of a stay maker. Paine himself apprenticed at the trade for seven years, but his efforts as a stay maker failed. After he sailed for America in 1774 he never practiced the staymaking trade again, but his inability to bone up (no pun intended) were never forgotten. In London, Paine's revolutionary writings were dismissed and ridiculed as the works of "Tom, the Bodicemaker."

Francis Oldys (pseudonym), in the work 'The Life of Thomas Paine, the Author of Rights of Men' (1791) wrote about stay makers: ‘The art of staymaking require patience, skill and the Quakerly ability to sit for hours in busy silence, cutting, and shaping woolen cloth, boning between each row of stitching, and lining the patterned stay with linen. Women of the notable classes wore stays or corsets, stiffened with whale bone and laced at the rear, especially underneath their mantuas, a style of dress called the robe á l'Anglaise by foreigners.’

While I consider the callous a badge of honor for a job well done, I’ve invested in some serious hand cream and ordered another batch of coin leather thimbles. (The dog ate the others. I wish I was kidding.) They’ll be here in time for me to start my next pair of stays! (Okay. I am kidding. I’ve got other things to finish first.)

Many thanks to Steph and Hallie at The Sign of the Golden Scissors for the great stays workshop, their patience and for answering my too frequent emails. 

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Joel Lyman Raymond

There are so many branches in Jason’s family tree, it’s hard to keep track of who’s who, who’s related to who, who married who, and on and on and on.  While most of my genealogical research has focused on the Brock trunk lately, every now and again I’ll veer off and shake some of the other leaves to see what falls out.

With more and more information on line very day, it’s getting easier and easier to do genealogical research from the comfort of your kitchen table. And date is great – tax records, census records, vital records, they help to build the timeline of these relatives’ lives - but photographs are still the Holy Grail.

I’ve expounded before on the concept of instant ancestors. Wander into any antique store and you’ll find a box of them – discarded cdv and cabinet card photos, shiny black and white photographs from the 1920’s and 30’s – none marked or identified, save for a photographer’s mark or handwritten date.  Their story will never be told, these smiling, but nameless families and friends, waiting to be adopted, but more likely bound for some crafter’s or artisan’s table to become a piece of altered art.

While I can't imagine why people would discard family photos, I guess I can understand how the anonymity of an icy glazed, sepia tinted woman or somber child perfectly posed against a fringed armchair may not hold the same appeal for everyone. Sadly, the photographs most attributed to the people in my family trees are headstones. While the person may leave this Earth, the headstones remain in perpetuity, a record that they were here, but not of the life they lived, but that's exactly what they are meant to do.

A photograph is a gift, and the other day, I got one. I received a message on Ancestry.com with a link to a family photo. One of the great things about Ancestry is the sense of community, and the concept of paying genealogy forward while you're looking backward. Wayne, from Washington state, sent me a link to his tree and a picture of Joel Lyman Raymond, Jason's 3x great grandfather on his grandmother, Mabel's side. Seems Wayne's wife, Carol is a direct descendant of William Greenleaf Raymond, Jason's 4x great-grandfather, and while cleaning out the attic, she came across several old family photos, including the 1912 photo of Joel.

Joel Lyman Raymond was born on March 2, 1816 in Hinsdale, Massachusetts. Until now, he was data – the son of William Greenleaf Raymond and his wife, Elizabeth (Betsy) Freeland. The family lived in Tiogoa County, NY and in 1837, settled in Bingham Township, Potter County, Pennsylvania. Joel's first wife was Jane Searles, who died in 1838, shortly after they married. His second wife was Lydia Matilda Grover, the daughter of David and Lydia (Lyman) Grover. Joel and Lydia had 8 children – Jane (Jason's 2x great grandmother), Minerva, Harriet Louise, William G., Pauline, Ruth, John and Grace. By and large, the family remained in the Potter County area, and many of the Raymond ancestors, including Joel, Jane and Lydia, are buried in North Bingham Cemetery.

On one of our motorcycle jaunts, Jason and I ventured out to Potter County, visited the North Bingham Cemetery where I took dozens of photos of the aging headstones, inscriptions fading into oblivion, and with it, the memory of these ancestors. But now, thanks to Wayne and Carol, Joel Lyman Raymond has come to life; snow white hair, the straight jaw covered with a closely cropped beard, eyes alert and thoughtful, every inch the family patriarch at the age of 96 in his velvet jacket, buttoned vest and striped trousers.

A picture is definitely worth a thousand words.

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