Abby Epplett, Historian

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 .

As the name suggests, Bywater was a hobbit town in the Shire located by water, more specifically by the Water, the hobbit-name for a river that emptied into the Brandywine. Unlike Hobbiton, which appeared to be a late medieval village overseen by a landlord, Bywater was a commercial center occupied by working and middle-class hobbits who owned a shop or knew a trade. My design of Bywater considers many factors, including a map created by Tolkien, pre-historic town design, medieval markets towns, revivals of medieval architecture occurring around the time of the book’s publication, and design features specific to pubs and shops still used in modern England.

On Thursday, March 27 from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m., I watched the third 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 third installment to this year’s series was Carlsbad Caverns National Park featuring park ranger Tim Bone who formerly worked at Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area in Wyoming , Grand Portage National Monument in Northern Minnesota , Russell Cave National Monument in northern Alabama , and Blackstone River Valley and Roger Williams National Memorial in Rhode Island .

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 the John Hale Farm in Beverly, MA . This farm was completed by 1694 and owned by Reverend John Hale , a minister at First Parish Church in Beverly who is best known for first supporting and then decrying the Salem Witch Trials, which seemingly took place during the construction the farm in 1692. Hale’s book, titled in part A Modest Enquiry into the Nature of Witchcraft , was published in 1702, two years after his death, and served as an explanation of what happened in Salem. The house has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1974 .

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 the John Balch House in Beverly, MA . This 1679 post-medieval style home was the former residence of the colonial Balch family and purchased by the Balch Family Association with the help of William Sumner Appleton, Jr. in 1916. Appleton would later found the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities (SPNEA), now called Historic New England (HNE) . Meanwhile, the house was given to the Beverly Historical Society, now Historic Beverly, in 1932, and was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 .

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 the John Cabot House in Beverly, MA. This 1781 Georgian style red brick building was the former residence of the wealthy Cabot family, who earned their fortune as successful merchant mariners. The building is now the headquarters of Historic Beverly and has been since 1892 after Edward Burley bequeathed it to the historical society.

Since the late medieval period, pubs have been a culturally and historically significant aspect of English life. Accordingly, the largest historical organizations in the region put forth great effort to catalogue and preserve such establishments. Historic England lists England’s Historic Pubs to commemorate businesses and their buildings that have shaped local identity, Historic UK has identified the oldest pubs and inns in England , while Heritage Pubs and Historic Pub Interiors recorded by The Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) gives a glimpse of how pub-going has changed over hundreds of years, and how some aspects have remained the same.