Abby Epplett, Historian

On Christmas 2023, I was gifted the book Interesting Facts for Curious Minds by Jordan Moore along with similarly titled Interesting Stories for Curious People by Bill O’Neill, which I reviewed in March . As mentioned in past book reviews, my book pile is extensive, and I need to read through my books more quickly. Much like Interesting Stories , Interesting Facts is written at a middle school reading level, mixes humor with more serious topics, and cites none of its sources, although some sections match Wikipedia almost verbatim. As an added bonus, the name Dr. Seuss was frequently misspelled as Dr. Suess. This is a great place to get a taste of many different historical topics but not something to cite in a school project. As a result, this review will contain connections to my past blog articles and links to more reputable resources.

When creating prototypes and characters who might be classed as ‘rustic’ hobbits living during the late Third Age, or the time when The Hobbit and most of The Lord of the Rings took place, I considered how their physical appearance and occupation might affect their status within a complex, stratified society and accordingly influence their choice of clothing. Such stratification continues to occur in the Real World. In countries where people regard themselves as being democratic, like the United States, people attempt to appear egalitarian and middle class, even if this society currently faces the most extreme income gaps in its history. Meanwhile, in countries where people maintain remnants of feudalism or religious beliefs supporting hierarchy, like England and India, people take pride in their status and emphasize their identity through their clothing, especially if they are higher in the system, and even if their government has become democratic.

In October 2024, I checked off another Blackstone Bucket List item by taking the forty-passenger Explorer boat cruise on a fifty-minute guided river tour. Departing from Central Falls Landing in Central Falls, RI, the tour reviewed the ecology and history of the Blackstone River Valley, providing a great refresher to those familiar with the story at a relaxing pace. As an added bonus, the day was unseasonably warm and sunny.

In September 2024, I visited places and attended programs in Essex National Heritage Area as part of its annual event Trails & Sails . My final pair of stops on the trip were Patton Park and Patton Homestead in Hamilton, MA. Combining the story of a military family with New England architecture and beautiful nature walks, these sites were the perfect way to end a successful trip.

In September 2024, I visited places and attended programs in Essex National Heritage Area as part of its annual event Trails & Sails . During my trip, I hiked on several trails in the area, most of which were maintained either by Greenbelt, which is Essex County’s land trust, or by The Trustees of Reservations, a non-profit organization in Massachusetts.

A few months ago, I was gifted St. Eustatius Historical Walking Tour Guide , written by archaeologists Gay Soetekouw and Joanna K. Gilmore, and published by the St. Eustatius Historical Foundation in 2007. This tropical island is also known as Statia and located in the Caribbean Sea. While I have no plans to visit in-person in the near future, I did enjoy a rainy Saturday morning exploring on Google Maps while listening to cheerful island music and using the book to learn history.

For this week’s post, I decided to focus on the physical appearances and clothing styles of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins, the protagonists of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. As first mentioned in my character study of Elanor Gardner Fairbairn , the costume designs for my characters align to the timeline in the Real World. I used descriptions in the texts as my base and elaborated on these references with historical costumes. I also viewed the artwork created by other fans, including Tolkien himself, to understand how the characters are classically portrayed, and how my portrayal might differ.

On Thursday, April 10 from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m., I watched the fifth and final Parked at Home webinar of the 2025 season. This is the fourth year of the Parked at Home series of virtual talks hosted by Blackstone River Valley National Historical Park (BLRV) and other sites in the National Park Service, along with the third year of summaries appearing on my blog. The presentations this year are interpreted into American Sign Language (ASL) by Sherrolyn King. The hour-long webinars will be uploaded to the BlackstoneNPS YouTube channel and available to view at any time. The last installment to this year’s series was Saint Croix Island International Historic Site featuring park ranger Karin Magera.

In September 2024, I visited places and attended programs in Essex National Heritage Area as part of its annual event Trails & Sails . On my second day, I took quick history stops in Danvers and Beverly, MA between visits to Hospital Point Lighthouse ; Historic Beverly’s Cabot House , Balch House , and Hale Farm ; and Central Cemetery in Beverly . I visited the typical historic homes, parks, churches, and public buildings along with a stop at the oldest fruit tree in the United States.

In her MasterClass, U.S. Presidential History and Leadership , award-winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin discussed topics surrounding leadership, such as whether leaders are born or made, how emotional intelligence factors into leadership decisions, the ability to help rivals work together, and ways to relax from work. With each topic, she related stories from the lives of her four favorite presidents: Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt (TR), Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), and Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBR). The course is based on her book, Leadership in Turbulent Times , published by Simon & Schuster in 2018 , which followed the lives of these four presidents, while she won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1995 for her biography of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt . Additionally, the 2012 Steven Spielberg film Lincoln was based on her biography, and she conducted a popular “exit interview” of president Barak Obama for Vanity Fair in 2016 .

While putting the final touches on last week’s post, I realized I had yet to discuss The Lord of the Rings in the context of national epics and then concluded that this was an ideal time to do so. Tolkien himself was interested in national epics, both studying and creating them. During the talk “Lost Tales and Found Myths” at the Christopher Tolkien Centenary Conference , Sonali Chunodkar mentioned Tolkien’s early attempt to create a national epic using the characters of Aelwine and Ing as creators of England, but he seemed to have realized this flavor of nationalism trended towards supporting colonialism and white supremacy, so he quickly dropped the idea.

On Thursday, April 3 from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m., I watched the fourth Parked at Home webinar of the 2025 season. This is the fourth year of the Parked at Home series of virtual talks hosted by Blackstone River Valley National Historical Park (BLRV) and other sites in the National Park Service, along with the third year of summaries appearing on my blog. The presentations this year are interpreted into American Sign Language (ASL) by Sherrolyn King. The hour-long webinars will be uploaded to the BlackstoneNPS YouTube channel and available to view at any time. The fourth installment to this year’s series was Valley Forge National Historical Park featuring park ranger Sarah Reynolds.

In September 2024, I visited places and attended programs in Essex National Heritage Area as part of its annual event Trails & Sails . On my second day, I visited Central Cemetery in Beverly, just down the street from Hale Farm. This cemetery has been in operation since the 18 th century and is still active. Perhaps the most famous burial is Nathan Dane , last mentioned in my post on Cabot House as the Senator who added the amendment to bar slavery in the Northwest Territory into the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 .