Top 5 reasons I may go broke in Philly...

Philadelphia is a great walking city, and the area where I live is full of shops, restaurants, and bars. The only problem is that it's far too easy to reach destinations where I am almost certain to spend money. Here are my top 5 thus far:
1. Di Bruno Bros--fancy cheeses and pastries, prepared stuff, and cupcakes with towers of icing. A cheese obsession can be very dangerous when the stuff goes for around $20/lb.
2. Gap--not one, but two, nearby, plus an outlet. Especially bad.
3. Anthropologie--not that I can afford most of the stuff, but it has a very large sale selection with awesome tops. And it's in a cool historic building.
4. Capogiro--a gelato place with $4.50/bowl gelato in different flavors every single day
5. Italian Market--everything is cheap but it all adds up...lunch at a cafe, ravioli from the pasta factory, pastries from Isgro's, produce at the stands...and I haven't even tried the Mexican places in the neighborhood yet.

Boating into history

The Schuykill River may not be particularly scenic, but I had an enjoyable boat tour on it yesterday that started off from right near where I live. The Schuykill River Development Corporation has been working hard to create trails along the river and get people out on boat rides. For at least the past 100 years, the river's banks were inaccessible because factories blocked access. Today, though, this non-profit is buying up land to return to public use. Much of the trip south on the river was past wooded banks with the factories just behind, some awaiting conversion into condos.

The boat trip ended at Bartram's Garden, the estate of early American botanist John Bartram. He planted the nation's first botanic garden. He and his son, William Bartram, traveled around the country collecting and cataloging plants (William's book on his travels apparently inspired generations of naturalists and romantics, from Thoreau to John Muir). The elder Bartram built the house on this site himself; apparently he was a stonemason in addition to being a farmer and a botanist. The house is kind of quirky, with oddly-shaped staircases and rooms, cabinets built into corners, and the kitchen just off the front entrance (at this time, the kitchen was generally in a separate structure because of the fire hazard).


The gardens themselves are small, with just a couple of plots still being cultivated today. It would ordinarily be a very peaceful spot, but a wedding at the adjoining picnic pavilion was blasting rap music--hardly the right backdrop for this setting. It's hard to soak in the history of a place when the 21st century is drowning out the birdsongs. Check out a few more pics on my Flickr stream.

Remembering 9/11

I was surprised to go online this morning and realize that I'd forgotten that today was 9/11. In past years, I've anticipated the approach of the anniversary of the attacks with nervousness--I was always scared to be in downtown DC, worried that Something would happen. This year, living in a new city, I had to make myself stop and remember what happened that day.

It made me realize that, for all of the instances I'm always searching out to explain the relevance of history, this day is an achingly clear example of a case where remembering the past matters. I watched an interview this morning with twin girls born on 9/11/01, and the reporter asked if they knew what happened the day they were born. One of the girls sighed in exasperation and said, "Yes, some planes flew into buildings." Is this all that the next generation will remember of this day? How, then, will they make sense of what has happened since?

Admittedly, Pearl Harbor can never have the resonance for me that it did for my grandparents. But the difference with 9/11 is that rather than having to transfer collective memories to archives after the fact, reactions in the moment were preserved through online archives. It's an expansive multimedia repository--the official one for the Smithsonian, in fact--that historians long into the future will use to tell the story of that day. And, hopefully, it's a story we'll each retell every year, reminding us of the way history carries on into the present.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder...of the DC metro

Right before I moved up to Philly, the DC metro seemed like the last transit system I'd want to keep using, as a series of small fires closed down stations two days in a row. For that matter, I had come to dread my commute to and from work in DC, because at least once a week there would be some sort of mess. But then...I came to Philadelphia.

Philadelphia's public transit system, SEPTA, is the fifth largest in the country, but it's woefully inadequate and unreliable. There are blogs devoted to SEPTA's awfulness--riders can relate bad experiences at SEPTA Watch or print out signs from SeptaMadeBetter to post at transit stops because there are barely any official ones. It seems that the main problem is lack of funding, but I also get the sense that it's just poorly run. And don't get me started on PATCO, which I take to get out to New Jersey occasionally.

Granted, the bus I need to get to campus comes often enough, but then I have the joy of paying for my ten minute ride with a $1.30 token. Seriously, your choices are a monthly pass, paying $2 in exact change, or tokens. Finding a place to buy said tokens, then having to pay in cash and getting your change in dimes, is also lots of fun.

Oh, DC metro, how I miss you!

Ben Franklin was here

Well...it's not the most high-minded connection to history, but it's pretty funny that the National Park Service marked where Ben Franklin went to the bathroom. Privy pits are actually quite useful to archaeologists, because people threw away all sorts of trash into them--often pipes, broken pottery, or cooking leftovers. This privy is located right behind Franklin's grandson's print shop on Market Street in Old City. Behind the shop is a courtyard with two metal frames outlining where Franklin's house and shop would have been. How did archaeologists know this was the privy? Usually, by slight gradations in soil color that are revealed as they dig--and by all of the trash.

The remains of a 3-year dig at the site of the near-by National Constitution Center are being sorted around the corner from here at the Independence Living History Center. The large block where the museum is now located was once a busy neighborhood with a mix of socioeconomic classes and even races. The pottery that's being pieced together at the Center is indicative of this--some tables are full of plain, chunky bowls, while others have delicate blue and white (I assume delftware) tea cups.

My visit to Old City also included a stop at the Arch Street Meeting House, a walk through Elfreth's Alley and talks with some reenactors and storytellers. There's a surprisingly large area of 18th-century buildings that are still around, some of which are now private homes or offices. I also managed to make a stop for lunch at a Philly cheesesteak place called Campo's Deli (check out their website, there is actually a video of the making of their sandwiches). I got an enormous vegetarian wrap then headed toward home--all of this, without getting lost!