The Grand Tour of Random Cities

There is irony in the fact that a city founded by the most hard-core of the Puritans is now one of the least law-abiding places in the country. As the train enters the city, a decrepit brick building towering over the ruins of another building has a message in graffiti written across it: "Detox the Ghetto." And on the city's tourism website, the changing advertisements on the right of the page are for financial rewards for turning in guns or illegal dumpers, a crime hotline, and a neighborhood renewal group.

Newark, New Jersey, may have dropped from the most dangerous to the 20th most dangerous city in America, but it is far from feeling like an alive and healthy place. It was my latest stop in what could be called my "Grand Tour of Random Cities." In my travels in the past few years, I've gone to places that are largely off the tourist map--East Lansing, Michigan; St. Louis; Springfield, Illinois; Providence; Richmond; Columbus, Ohio; Baltimore; and now, Newark. Each of these cities has its merits, but they are all places that have struck me as still recovering from the near-death experience of white flight and urban decay in recent decades.

I only saw a small pocket of Newark during my visit to the New Jersey Historical Society, but what I found most creepy there--as in Richmond, St. Louis, and to some extent in Baltimore--was the lack of people out in the streets. Broad, congested city streets run through block after block of silent, cold buildings and the people are largely sealed inside their cars. The historical society is in one of the few remaining 19th century buildings in this part of Newark, and as I sat in the 5th floor library, the whole building occasionally shook as a trolley rattled past.

In a city like Newark, the past feels fragile. To walk through the empty streets of a half-dead city in order to read the papers of its earlier inhabitants, inhabitants who lived there when the city was growing and thriving, is in some ways a depressing endeavor. I feel like a voyeur who is peering into the city's past without contributing to its future. Unless, that is, cities like these can figure out--as Washington, Boston, or Charleston have--that their history is what could build their future.

SHEAR in the Land of Lincoln?

Perhaps it's one of the curiosities of being a historian that the study of the antebellum era (1830 to 1860) seems foreign to those who study the Early Republic (1780s-ish to 1830). Nonetheless, I and many of my colleagues felt out of place--or is it time?--attending the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic's conference in Springfield, Illinois, with an inevitable focus on Abraham Lincoln. I ventured to Springfield to present some of my early dissertation research and get feedback--which I did and felt went very nicely. But I also figured that I would enjoy the Lincoln theme a lot more by visiting the historic sites in town than by attending panels on topics that didn't interest me.

It was a good choice; the town's few historic sites are impressive. In two hours I was able to walk the whole town and see the Old State Capitol, the current Illinois Statehouse, and Lincoln's neighborhood. The latter two were both special surprises. In the case of the current state house, I was shocked to go inside and find the entire interior covered in marble. The slender dome soared above a round space decorated with scenes of Illinois history, reaching a height exceeding that of the U.S. Capitol building. The house and senate chambers had intricately painted ceilings and massive crystal chandeliers. It took two decades and $4.5 million to complete it--and so much trouble that some suggested abandoning the building and moving elsewhere.

From the statehouse it was a short walk to Lincoln's neighborhood. I thought I was only going to see his house; I didn't expect that four blocks of his neighborhood would be preserved as a National Park site. It is closed off to cars and unpaved, with tree-lined streets and a mix of freshly-painted wooden homes. There's a cell-phone tour, so you can hear about who lived in each house and what the Lincoln family's relation to each neighbor was. The house itself has been restored to its original appearance and, while large for Springfield in the 1850s, seems fairly small compared with the homes of the Washington, Jefferson, or Madison.


But what trip to Springfield, Illinois, would be complete without conservative, anti-health reform protesters? I was surprised to see a large group of people gathered outside one of the houses in Lincoln's neighborhood, milling around and half-heartedly holding up signs. It turned out that Senator Durbin's Springfield office is in the Shutt House, one block from Lincoln's. Mr. Shutt, it seems, supported Stephen Douglass instead of his neighbor in the 1860 election, so perhaps he would have approved of this scene of political disagreement.

You can see more pics from my trip on flickr. Next up: edutainment at the Lincoln museum.

Seeing Philly through fresh eyes

I've had many friends visit me on weekend trips since I've moved here, which we've packed with activities matched to the visitor. For one friend, it was a walk to the Italian Market and a drive out to the Morris Arboretum; for another, shopping and barhopping; for all, meetings my friends and going to my favorite gelato place. But my most recent visitor came during the week, in the thick of my teaching and reading schedule, and just wanted to get a feel for what my life here is like.

Which, of course, included gelato and meeting friends. But it also included hanging out in the grad student center, lugging my library books to campus, and wandering around Center City. I was going about my usual routine, but pointing out the little things along the way: the market where I buy produce, the spot in Rittenhouse Square where little kids always play, the prettiest block of Delancey Street, the cute house I love just off Fitler Square. It was a reminder to me of all of the things I like best in the city and in my daily routine.

I was often surprised at the places my friend stopped to take pictures. His pictures choices made me look twice at familiar places; why had I never noticed that beautiful building? Was that the cutest side street to take a picture of?--I knew an even better one. Through his eyes I saw the beauty I had often passed by in hurried walks to campus or to run errands, beauty in the small details we forget to notice. If in travel "one’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things,” I think the guide to the traveler reaps the same benefit.

Research Trip, Post #2: Cornish

My favorite American artist, Thomas Dewing, painted "Spring" on the left with Mt. Ascutney in the background. On the right, you can see the mountain from the loggia of Saint Gaudens's studio. It's possible that Dewing set up his models (who were usually friends in Cornish) in the field here.

On the first weekend of my research trip, I had a chance to do some sightseeing in New Hampshire. I've been wanting to visit Cornish, N.H. for years now. I first discovered that there had once been an artist colony there when I did a research paper in 2004 on Maxfield Parrish. Parrish was an illustrator and painter who studied here in Philadelphia and later spent his summers with a group of artists in Cornish. That group was led by a sculptor named Augustus Saint Gaudens and also included a group of artists whose work I got to know well when I worked at the Smithsonian--Thomas Dewing, Frank Benson, Kenyon Cox, Paul Manship, Willard Metcalf, and Daniel Chester French, to name just some of the artists. There work was part of the "American Renaissance" and incorporated classical influences.

The artists living in Cornish often gathered at Saint Gaudens' house and gardens. That's where a friend and I visited--it's the only one of the artists' houses open to the public--on the first weekend of my research trip to New England. These artists put on a masque, a performance similar to a play, in a field behind Saint Gaudens house in June 1905. I discovered that the classical structure that served as the setting for the masque is still there.




More pics are up at my Flickr stream.