The Canadas
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Summer 1996 News A Visit from Jerry
and Marge Henry Journal
Will Publish Mark’s Article Updated August 6,
2002 |
The Calm and the StormPassing my Ph.D. exams in the spring helped set up an enjoyable summer. For starters, it left me with more time to read for fun. Some of the most interesting books I read this summer were Margaret Christman's 1846: Portrait of the Nation, a book I took home from an exhibit by that name at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., and Daniel Schacter's Searching for Memory, a researcher's study of amnesia, the controversy of recovered memory, and other topics surrounding memory. While on vacation on Ocracoke, Lisa picked up a copy of Amy Tan’s novel The Kitchen God's Wife and liked it so much that she bought The Joy Luck Club and read it, as well. We found many other ways to entertain ourselves, as well. At home, Lisa served up homemade ravioli, herb breads, pies, and soufflés, and we often spent our evenings listening to Fresh Air on National Public Radio while relaxing on the porch, sewing, washing dishes, or catching up on mail. We also spent a lot of time in and around wonderful Chapel Hill, where we could take walks up and down Franklin Street, ride our bicycles around campus, and eat at a variety of restaurants, including Armadillo Grill, Caribou Coffee, and Red, Hot & Blue. One of our favorite spots was the Carolina Club. We especially like the monthly family nights, when club members can sit down for an exotic theme meal. For example, Mexican Fiesta Night, which we attended in August, featured Latin American music and decorations, along with a buffet of empanadas, quesadillas, tacos, fajitas, various salads, fettucine Alfredo with shrimp, and key lime pie, among other dishes. We also attended English Pub Night several months earlier. Alas, however, we were out of town during the Pasta Extravanza--a mild loss to Lisa, but a devastating disappointment to me. Lisa’s parents dropped in on us for a few days during the summer, and we
had the chance to share some of our wonderful life in Chapel Hill with
them. We also got a way a few
times, taking trips to Ocracoke Island off the coast of North Carolina and Williamsburg,
Staunton, and Lexington in Virginia. In September, we got our first taste of the less attractive
side of living in North Carolina when Hurricane Fran rolled through our area
and left us without power for several days. |
A Visit from Jerry and Marge Henry
I really love it when my parents come to visit Mark and me. They are such fun-loving people and are always up for whatever weird and wonderful activities we have drummed up. We took Mom and Dad out to a funky little picnic in downtown Carrboro where we had grilled Terriyaki chicken and a rice and seaweed salad. Both were excellent. The entertainment was a fun jazzy-bluesy-reggae band; and, in typical Carrboro fashion, the whole crowd -- from old people to toddlers -- was dancing, dancing, dancing. We also took our parents out for traditional Tandori, brunch at the Carolina Club, and a day in historic Hillsborough. Mark and Dad love the history that saturates this part of the country and Mom and I love the decor, architecture, cooking and lifestyle. And we spent lots of time around our little house, enjoying the Adirondacks and the hammock, the mooing cows and swooping birds.
Williamsburg, Virginia
June 6-9, 1996: Mark and I have found Colonial Williamsburg to be an ideal destination for vacation and education because it appeals to our occasionally diverse interests. Mark, as you probably have figured out by now, loves history; and Colonial Williamsburg is packed with that. I, on the other hand, love living history -- learning by witnessing how sheep are sheared, eggs are gathered, and colonial gardens are cultivated. And we both enjoy the dress, architecture, food and music of that time.
We
arrived in Williamsburg much like Mark's hero, Captain John Smith: across the
James river on a boat. We ferried across the James on a whim and found the experience
completely rewarding. While in Williamsburg, we lodged at an inexpensive but
very comfortable motor hotel within an easy bike ride of the colony. With a carbohydrate
laden breakfast of fruit and bagels, we started each day with lots of energy.
We'd need it. On Friday we toured the colonial governor's gardens with Thomas
Jefferson, who was an expert botanist, paid close attention to the crops and
irrigation used for growing food versus flowers, watched carpenters crafting a
harpsichord using colonial technology and tools, and peered into current
excavations underway on the grounds of the colony.
Saturday was another busy day and started off with a sixteen-mile round trip
bike ride to Carter's Grove, the colonial plantation home just outside
Williamsburg. The ride on the Country Road (a one-lane, one-way, ancient
highway connecting the two historic areas) was rigorous, but filled with
wildlife including those crazy lookin', side-way walkin' crabs, baby bunnies
and lots of extraordinary birds. Later that day we attended an educational and
entertaining talk on colonial poultry where we met a couple of the local
chickens. And then later, while I shopped -- another of my favorite things to
do -- Mark toured the capitol building there in the colony.
And in between our jaunts around Colonial Williamsburg and its environs, we
relaxed by the pool, ate out at the popular Colonial Williamsburg taverns and
inns, and shopped in both the colony and in the town of Williamsburg.
Regardless of where we are in Williamsburg, we always find the experience
enriching. Historians and restorationists at Colonial Williamsburg take their
work very seriously and have created a museum that is as close to time travel
as we have found anywhere.
Ocracoke, North Carolina
July
14-20, 1996: On the heels of Hurricane Bertha, Mark and I threw caution to
the dying wind and decided to keep our reservation on Ocracoke Island, on the
outer banks of North Carolina. Bertha blew in the day before we planned to
depart for the coast but delayed our vacation by only one day. Happily, ours
was the last car on the first public ferry to Ocracoke. On the island there was
no evidence that Bertha had passed through: everything appeared normal -- for
Ocracoke that is -- a place where roads have no names, folks go around
barefoot, kindergarteners attend the same school as 12th graders, the library
is located in a shed, and wild ponies were only recently corralled.
It's a wonderful place to vacation and Mark and I took advantage of every extraordinary opportunity there, including horseback riding, sea kayaking, shelling, sailing on a schooner, attending a live blues performance at a local coffee house, and meeting some of the local artisans. We also spent lots of time on the beach, in the water and on the deck of the little apartment we rented for the week; and of course we bicycled, walked, explored, and shopped like we always do. I added to my hand-thrown pottery collection with a beautiful piece crafted by a young artist who has made her home on that strange little island.
On the last day of our vacation we decided to forgo the two-hour ferry ride back to the mainland, and instead drive up the outer banks and back to the piedmont. Highway 12 which is the only road up the islands was pleasant enough, but under water in places and heavily travelled on that first post Bertha Saturday. We drove through Manteo, though, and got a taste of the city where we will surely return to see The Lost Colony. I don't know if we'll take Highway 12 again to Ocracoke, but I certainly hope we make it there at least once more -- one way or another.
Staunton, Virginia
July
27, 1996: Our main stop on this leg of the trip was Staunton, Virginia,
where we indulged our fascination with the American frontier at the Museum of
American Frontier Culture. To allow Americans to study the elements that went
into shaping the homes and lifestyles of American pioneers, the curators of
this museum have reconstructed a homestead from each of three places and time
periods where these pioneers originated: 17th-century Ireland, 17th-century
Germany, and 17th-century England.
At the Irish homestead, we visited a small home and outbuildings surrounded by
a sturdy stone wall. Because the Irish had many more stones than trees, they
used stones to build their homes, stacking two rows of large rocks and filling
the gap with rubble; they used mortar to hold the materials together and then
painted the entire wall with a whitewash. The roof consisted of strips of sod
covered with thatch.
The German house featured a different construction technique. In this method,
called wattle-and-daub, workers covered a wooden framework with thin strips of
wood and a plaster made of mud and straw. This house seemed rather large to us
until we learned that two families, each with perhaps five or six members, lived
here. In Germany in the 18th century, these families lived in a community and
farmed land outside of town. One of their chief crops was flax, which they used
to make their own linen and perhaps linen to sell. An interpreter demonstrated
the tedious process of removing the pods from the stalks and thrashing these
pods to remove the chaff. The seeds that they removed from this chaff could be
taken to a mill, where they could be pressed to create linseed oil, a
foodstuff.
The English home, also made of wattle and daub, was relatively large and
belonged to a yeoman family. These people were not as wealthy as nobles, but
they owned and cultivated their own land. An interpreter showed us some of the
foods this family might have prepared and eaten: an enormous loaf of bread, a
pudding of bacon and sage wrapped in a pastry and then boiled, and a meat pie.
Because the crust sealed and preserved the meat inside, the pie would last a
week without spoiling. Lisa noted that this crust was an early form of Tupperware,
but historians are not certain whether meat-pie parties were common among the
English homemakers.
After visiting all of these precursors, we finally arrived at the last stop
on the tour, an American homestead from 1858. An interpreter in the barn explained
an improvement the American pioneers introduced to flax processing:
19th-century American farmers thrashed the stalks on a wooden floor in the
middle of a breezeway in the barn. The solid floor made the pods easy to thrash
and retrieve, and the strong airflow facilitated the separation of seeds and
chaff. Raised sills on both sides of the breezeway--the
"thresholds"--kept seeds from being lost. Inside the house, we saw
many examples of foods these pioneers preserved by drying: tomatoes, applies,
green beans, herbs, even pumpkins. Rehydrated later, these items from their
harvests constituted a major part of their meals in the winter.
After we left the Museum of American Frontier Culture, we drove into downtown
Staunton, where we enjoyed a walk among several 19th-century buildings, Woodrow
Wilson's birthplace, a train station, a beautiful courthouse, and Mary Baldwin
College, a women's college and former seminary nestled among rolling hills. On
the recommendation of some people from the Visitors' Center, we had a wonderful
dinner of ribs and pork at the Millhouse Grill, located in an old flour mill.
Indiana
While we were in town visiting, my
parents took us to the Indiana State Museum, which neither Lisa nor I had
visited in a long time. Lisa spent a lot of time at an exhibit on wedding gowns
throughout history and at another exhibit called "American Mourning,"
which features quotations from Edgar Allan Poe and others. We also enjoyed
exhibits on wildlife in Indiana 200 years ago, Indiana during the Civil War,
and Indiana athletics, as well as a walk through reconstructed stores of the
19th century.
My favorite exhibit was a temporary one on baseball's Negro Leagues. Through
photographs of teams and stars such as Josh Gibson and Satchel Paige, this
excellent exhibit tells the story of black baseball players beginning in the
late 19th century, when a few of these players played alongside whites, but a
"Gentlemen's Agreement" barred them the major league of the time. In
1901, the great baseball manager John McGraw slipped one star onto his team,
claiming he was a Native American named "Tokohoma." Although I had
heard this story before, I paused to reflect the irony that white America could
accept a Native American, but not a black American, even though both races had
been the victims of racism and oppression throughout American history.
Tokohoma's guise didn't last long, however, and the Major Leagues became all white
again. Around 1920, Major League Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis forbade
blacks from playing alongside whites, and the great pitcher and organizer
"Rube" Foster helped to form the Negro League, which pulled together
many teams from all over the country, including the Homestead Grays, the
Pittsburgh Crawfords, and one of the great dynasties in all of baseball, the
Kansas City Monarchs. This league prospered, attracting thousands of fans,
until the middle of this century. In 1945, "Happy" Chandler replaced
Landis as baseball commissioner and announced that he would not block the
admission of black players in the Major Leagues. Jackie Robinson, of course,
was the first of these players to break the color barrier, signing with the
Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. As other Negro League players, including Willie Mays
and Roy Campanella, followed Robinson into the Major Leagues, the Negro League
suffered, eventually disappearing. They left an indelible mark on the majors,
however. In the decade after Robinson's admission, nearly every Rookie of the
Year and Most Valuable Player in the Major Leagues was a former Negro League
player. Dodger catcher Roy Campanella, for example, was named baseball's MVP
three times. Indianapolis has a rich tradition in the history of black
baseball, having been home city to both the Indianapolis ABCs and the
Indianapolis Clowns, a barnstorming club similar to today's Harlem
Globetrotters in basketball. Henry Aaron, who go on to break Babe Ruth's
all-time home run record, played with the Clowns before joining the Boston
Braves.
On our second full day in Indianapolis, we
joined Mom on a short trip to Greenfield, where we visited the childhood home
of James Whitcomb Riley. Born in the cabin that was the original house, Riley
lived in the cabin and the rooms his father added during his youth and found
inspiration in many of the objects and people he encountered here--from
knicknacks such as a yellow-eyed porcelain dog on his mother's mantle to
"Little Orphant Annie," a girl who came to live with the Rileys when
she was about 12. "Annie," whose real name was Mary Alice and who
went by "Allie," entranced Riley and his siblings with stories about
ghosts who lived in various nooks of the home. We saw these nooks, Allie's bedroom
and her toys, the yellow-eyed dog, a twisting stair and several beautiful
pieces of furniture made by Riley's father, and the front porch where Riley
watched wagons travel down the National Road, now U.S. 40, into and out of
Indianapolis. Lisa enjoyed the kitchen furnished with period utensils and
housewares and the parlor decorated with Riley's books and hair wreaths and
samplers made by Mary Riley, the poet's youngest and favorite sibing. After we
left the house, the three of us rode our bikes through Greenfield's charming
historic district and continued riding until we reached Riley Park, where we
visited the "Old Swimmin' Hole" Riley describes in one of his most
famous poems.
On
Wednesday, we drove up some side roads to Fort Wayne to visit Lisa's family. In
the first day and a half, we enjoyed a lot of time with Lisa's parents and even
managed to see a large portion of the Henry clan: Jessica Henry; Matt, Ann,
Adam, Emily, Kaitlan, Olivia, and Reid Henry; Andrea Chris, and Joe Navarro;
Paula, Bill, Sara, and Melissa Bentley; Jim Todoran; Cindy and Ben Henry; and
Tony Henry.
Friday,
our last full day in town, was our day for adventure. In the morning, Lisa and
I went for a long bike ride at St. Francis College and Fort Wayne's historic
Lindenwood Cemetery. Lisa then went home and spent some more time with her
parents while I visited the New Lincoln Museum, which has a wonderful
collection of exhibits and memorabilia telling the story of Abraham Lincoln's
political career. I especially enjoyed the information on Lincoln's trip down
the Mississippi River as a young man, the exhibit of company flags used during
the Civil War, and the section on America's mourning of Lincoln's death. In the
afternoon, Lisa, her parents, and I drove up to Rome City, where we visited
Gene Stratton Porter's home on Sylvan Lake and took a boat ride on the lake.
Porter's home, where she and her husband lived close to nature for seven years
near the end of her life, was a treat. We saw their collection of Native
American artifacts, several of her photographs, and her extensive library of
nature books, including Henry David Thoreau's Walden and A Week on
the Concord and Merrimac Rivers. My favorite feature was the living room
fireplace, made of stones arranged in the shape of a butterfly, George Washington's
profile, and other shapes.
Lexington, Virginia
August
31-September 1, 1996: One of Lisa's coworkers at the Department of
Nutrition invited us to come up to Lexington and see a play for which he was
the technical director. We jumped at the chance not only to travel, but to
return to the Virginia mountains and the historical area we had tasted about a
month earlier on our way to Indiana.
We arrived in Lexington in the early afternoon and hit the pavement right away.
In a matter of minutes, we walked across the small downtown area to the campus
of Washington and Lee University. Because the semester had yet to begin, we
weren't able to take in any of the student life, but we did enjoy the beautiful
green and rolling hills of the campus, as well as the impressive red-brick
buildings. The highlight was Lee Chapel, where Robert E. Lee attended services
and had his office while he was president of the college. Although the chapel
looks relatively small from the outside, its two tiers of white pews seat 600
people. Lee is buried inside the building, and the site is marked by a marble
statue sculpted by Edward Valentine. In the chapel's basement, we saw Lee's
office, featuring his desk and an enormous credenza, as well as a fine
collection of artifacts, such as portraits of the Lee family, items from Lee's
uniform, more sculptures, and Lee's books. Before leaving, we bought a compact
disk of Confederate songs. Outside the chapel, we visited the grave of Lee's
horse, Traveller, and smiled at the gift someone had left on the headstone: an
apple.
After wandering past and through a few other campus buildings, such as a recently renovated science hall and an impressively furnished alumni house, we walked to Virginia Military Institute, which is right next-door to Washington and Lee. At least as striking as its neighbor, VMI several imposing, castle-like structures and an enormous parade field, where cadets were training and playing. Exploring with no map or destination, we stumbled upon the VMI Museum, which turned out to be a delightful surprise. In the 20 minutes before it closed, we saw old uniforms, a life-size model of a typical cadet's room, a roomful of medals won by VMI graduates, and several fascinating exhibits on the school's history. The school has its origins in the early 19th century, when soldiers working at an armory in western Virginia had a lot of time on their hands. To give these men something to do with their time other than be rowdy, someone came up with the idea of providing them with educational opportunities; after their three-year stint, these men then could return to their towns with more to offer their fellow citizens. In 1839, this program became the Virginia Military Institute. Stonewall Jackson taught at the school, and its graduates include General George Marshall and General George S. Patton.
Take Us Out to the Bulls Game
I still remember the Saturday afternoons I spent in my parents' basement watching NBC's Game of the Week. It wasn't much, but it was heaven for a teen-age baseball fan with no ESPN or TBS. Then CBS spent a billion dollars for the right to broadcast about four games a year and leave us cableless souls channel-surfing over Julia Child and reruns of "The Wild, Wild West" the rest of the year. This year, however, the Fox network has returned Major League Baseball to my weekends, and I'm a kid again. Best of all, I somehow have gotten Lisa hooked on baseball, as well, and we watch the game together, sometimes grilling some burgers or cooking some hotdogs for the occasion.
When we lived in Student Family Housing, we were only a short walk or bicycle ride from the university's baseball stadium, and we often took in games there. We loved the cozy stadium, the opportunity to sit right behind home plate whenever we wanted, and a strong team to watch. This year, because of my exams and our distance from the stadium, we didn't see a single Tar Heel baseball game. We hope to change that next spring.
In the meantime, we had the chance this summer to see a more legendary local team in action. Our friends Beth McDonald and Austin Guiles took us out to the new Durham Athletic Park to watch the Durham Bulls, made famous by the movie Bull Durham. One of the most popular attractions in the area, the game was sold-out, and we had to sit on the grass overlooking right-centerfield. Although the view was not ideal there, we enjoyed being able to stretch out and walk around easily. We bought some scorecards, and I taught Lisa how to keep score. I honed up this valuable skill back when I was warming the bench on the high school baseball team. At this time, I didn’t realize its value as a courting device. Lisa enjoyed it so much that she insisted on keeping score for the Major League All-Star Game when we watched it on TV. The Bulls lost the game, but we saw some good baseball, Lisa shook the mascot's hoof, and we even saw the nostrils on the giant bull billboard smoke when a Bull hit a home run.
Journal Will Publish Mark's Article
August 20, 1996: On the day before my birthday, I learned that a journal of Southern literature wanted to publish one of my articles on Poe. "The Right Brain in Poe's Creative Process," which will be Chapter 5 in my dissertation, will appear in the Southern Quarterly, a journal based at Mississippi State University. In a field where "publish or perish" applies to job-seekers as well as professors, I was ecstatic to get the news. I have compiled an index for a published book and written two short articles for Oxford University Press's American National Biography, but this article will be the first full-length scholarly essay to make it into print.
Many of you, my friends and family, are familiar with some of my writing. I feel that I should warn all of you that this article differs somewhat in style and content from much of my output--less solemn than my obituaries in the Johnson County Daily Journal, more scholarly than Action News 10 or Star Trek: The Video Parody, longer than my headlines in the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel, and somewhat more substantive than my collaborative effort with Mark Murphy, Marks' Quote Book. Nonetheless, I think many of you will enjoy it, and I hope you will have a chance to read it when it appears in fall 1998.
Hurricane Fran
September 1996: When we heard that Chapel Hill residents were boarding up their windows in anticipation of Hurricane Fran, we laughed. We already had seen these North Carolinians rush to the supermarket at the sight of a snow flurry. Today, our fourth day without water or power, the laughter has died down considerably at the Canada household.
Prepared for nothing more than a little wind and rain, we had a normal evening on Thursday, September 5. Lisa got a permanent, we met for dinner at our favorite Chinese restaurant, and then I went to the library to show my students a short video on Poe. We arrived home around 8 p.m., watched a rerun of Friends and went to bed. A few hours later, we awoke to the loudest winds we had ever heard in our lives. Lisa looked outside to see what was going on, but the power already had gone out, and everything was pitch. We went back to bed.
Fran hit us the next morning, when we woke up to shredded leaves on our windows, debris on our porch, and the first day of our Amish lifestyle. After a few hours reading, we started to get stir-crazy and took a driving tour of post-Fran Chapel Hill. Our jaws dropped as we drove past telephone poles snapped in two, trees leaning on sagging power lines and crushed roofs, deserted parking lots, and dark stoplights. Our tidy little town now looked like a huge electric-train town that the family dog had trampled.
We had lunch at Red, Hot & Blue barbecue restaurant, which apparently had escaped a power outage, and then found one of the few open grocery stores. A few thousand other people had found it, too, and they were crawling over the parking lot and store like ants on a discarded watermelon. Inside, the lines stretched down the aisles, past the cereal and syrup, ludicrously hindering any attempts at smart shopping. Lisa grabbed a few pieces of fruit and parked her cart in line, and I went out and gathered up a few staples. Sociologists bemoaning the loss of community in modern America would have discovered new hope in this scene. We did our part, chewing the fat with four friends, including one we had just met in line. Conflicting reports of a water-sighting sent me and two of these friends scurrying around the store; with the help of one of these friends, I got the last jug.
For the rest of the day, we read some more, napped, listened to the battery-powered radio. Around sunset, we tried to get to a drug store and buy a radio with a TV band so we could hear the "X-Files," but the city was under curfew, and the police turned us back. Still, we made the best of the weekend and even had a little fun. During the day, we mowed the lawn, rested, read. Lisa cooked meals on the grill--eggs, bacon, and a banana dessert for breakfast, barbecue chicken for dinner. At night, we played Scrabble, and I read Poe stories aloud by candelight.
Ask us how we're doing when we're lying in a pool of sweat on a perfectly still, 85-degree night or when we're taking a sponge bath in a tub filled with cold water, and we'll likely be less than philosophical. The rest of the time, however, we realize that things are pretty good. Unlike many of our neighbors, we haven't had to cope with injuries to ourselves or damage to our house. Every day, our landlord hooks up his generator to our pump and provides us with some water from the well. Friends who have power have invited us to cool off or wash up at their homes. We're doing well, really. We've learned that we're survivors--but we're not Amish.