Abby Epplett, Historian

On February 28, 2023 at 7:00 p.m., I attended a Zoom talk hosted by Rhode Island Historical Society and focused on the recently published book Black Greys and Colored Giants: A Comprehensive Guide to Black Baseball in Rhode Island, 1870-1949 by Robert Cvornyek , who is professor emeritus and former chair of the History Department at Rhode Island College , along with a professor at Florida State University Panama City . The talk took the form of a conversation moderated by Richard J. Ring , Deputy Executive Director for Collections and Interpretation at Rhode Island Historical Society since 2017 . Cvornyek explained that he wrote the book after researching Black baseball in Rhode Island for over twenty years, starting in the early 2000s. He interviewed men who played baseball in the late 1940s, along with their families, and learned that “Baseball is a critical lens to understand African American history.” He originally planned to donate all his research materials to RIHS...

Besides many great museums and historic houses in Newbury and Newburyport, some of which I will explore during my next trip to the Essex National Heritage Area , I visited several quick history stops along the Newburyport Harborwalk & Clipper City Rail Trail . The Custom House Maritime Museum is located along the route, along with sculptures from New England artists, lighthouses, and signage describing historical events and buildings in the area.

The fourth stop on my trip to the Newbury and Newburyport area was Spencer-Peirce-Little Farm , a Historic New England (HNE) property on the National Register of Historic Places with a late 17 th century house and a 230-acre farm, including a flock of animals supported by Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (MSPCA) , which has partnered with HNE since 2003. The property is adjacent to Bay Circuit Trail & Greenway , a “230+ mile, multi-use trail in Greater Boston” according to its website. The farmhouse itself has been a museum since 1992 after a six year, over $1 million restoration project. In the previous three hundred years, the property was owned by multiple distinct families, on a few of which lent their names to the house.

Rhode Island Historical Society hosted Valley Talk #4 from its 2023 series via Zoom on Sunday, February 19 at 1:30 p.m. The talk, titled “B’nai Israel: Woonsocket’s Gorgeous but Little-Known Synagogue” , featured historian George M. Goodwin as the main speaker. Goodwin was a former president of the Rhode Island Jewish Historical Association and has edited multiple publications. He spent most of the talk describing synagogues and other places of worship around Rhode Island, New England, and the world, accompanying his detailed descriptions with beautiful images. He finished with information about B’nai Israel in Woonsocket, RI. The entire talk with question and answer session took just under 90 minutes. Touro Synagogue of Newport, RI The oldest extant synagogue in North America is Touro Synagogue of Newport, RI , constructed in 1763 by British-American architect Peter Harrison . Harrison introduced the Palladian style of architecture to the Americas, with buildings ba...

My third stop on my trip to the Newbury and Newburyport area was Coffin House , a Historic New England (HNE) property just down the street from Swett-Ilsley House . For over three hundred years, this building was home to the Coffins, a Quaker family whose numerous descendants include abolitionist and women’s rights activist Lucretia Coffin Mott . The guide described the family as being so numerous that a descendent will be on a tour almost every day, travelling from as close by as Nantucket to as far away as Samoa.

On Wednesday, February 15, 2023, Yale Forest Forum (part of the Yale School of the Environment ) and Orion Magazine presented “A Tree’s View of History: A Conversation with Lacy M. Johnson” via Zoom webinar. Johnson is an experienced writer from the greater Houston area. In 2022, she published the book More City than Water: A Houston Flood Atlas with co-editor Cheryl Beckett of the University of Houston through University of Texas Press. More recently, she wrote the essay “The Brutal Legacy of the Longleaf Pine” for Orion , connecting longleaf pine farm to slavery in the United States. The notice of this talk, which I received via email from the Atlantic Black Box project , caught my attention immediately, since I know a lot about longleaf pines my time as a park ranger at Big Thicket National Preserve in Texas , where longleaf pines grow in abundance thanks to conservation efforts . The talk was moderated by Mary Evelyn Tucker , founder of the Yale Forum on Religion ...

Earlier today, I joined Historic New England’s Arnold House in celebrating the 214 th birthday of 16 th United States president Abraham Lincoln . I last visited Arnold House for a formal tour in July 2022 , where I learned all about its construction methods as a post-medieval, late 17 th century home. The house is located in the Great Road Historic District of Lincoln, RI , a town named in honor of Honest Abe, although he never visited this part of Rhode Island. The celebration, which was free and open to the public, included a more personalized version of the regular tour, an adorable cutout of the man himself holding festive party balloons, and a tasty birthday cake with Country Time lemonade.

As the second stop on my trip to Newbury and Newburyport, I visited Swett-Ilsley House , a property of Historic New England (HNE) . Constructed as a one-room house by Stephen Swett in 1670 and greatly expanded in its 350 years, this house was the first historic building purchased by William Sumner Appleton, Jr. , founder of what is now HNE. Conveniently located down the road from another HNE property, Coffin House , the Swett-Ilsley House served many purposes during its long existence and still serves as a rental property, along with a museum. Like other house museums in 17 th century buildings, the house is considered a study property, with additions from later periods stripped away and very little reproduction furniture in the space.

In mid September 2022, I took a day trip to the Newbury and Newburyport area in Massachusetts, part of the Essex National Heritage Area and North of Boston . My first stop was the Custom House Maritime Museum in Newburyport. The 1834 Neoclassical stone building was designed by architect Robert Mills , who also laid out the plans for the Custom House in New Bedford and multiple famous buildings in Washington, D.C. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1971 for its former use as a United States custom house, making it a crucial part of the transatlantic trade system in the mid 19 th and early 20 th century. The custom house ceased operation in 1911, and the building fell into disrepair until its restoration by the Newburyport Maritime Society from 1972 to 1975. In late 2018, the building was official sold to the Society by the now-dissolved Newburyport Redevelopment Authority .

During my trip to the Christian Science Plaza in Boston during late May of 2022, I learned that the Longyear Museum , established by Christian Scientist Mary Hawley Beecher Longyear in 1937, owns a collection of houses important to the life of Mary Baker Eddy . As described with greater detail in my previous blog, Mrs. Eddy (as she is called on the Longyear website) founded or “discovered” the religion of Christian Science . Docents at these houses chronicle her life and explain her contributions to their beliefs.

Founded in 1897 as a place to collect the history of the rapidly changing industrial city of Lynn, MA , the museum in the Downtown Cultural District houses the community art galleries of LynnArts on the first floor and the artifact-based exhibits of Lynn Historical Society on the second floor. Set in an area described as “one of Massachusetts’ best kept secrets” by Mass Cultural Council , this perfectly sized museum is a quick visit to give a comprehensive overview of life in the so-called city of sin since its settlement by European colonists in 1629.