Happy Helen Keller Day!

Helen Keller Day is a commemorative holiday to celebrate the birth of the famous Helen Keller. However, most people probably don't know her connection to the Mount Washington Valley and the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room. 

The Henney History Room is named in memory of Nella Braddy Henney who was a great friend of Helen Keller. 

 

While we already had number of resources on Helen Keller including a bio of Keller by Nella (see link here). a recent donation from Peter and Joyce Blue has exponentially expanded our opportunity for additional insights.

Included in the donation are a number of photo albums that explore many aspects of the Henney and Keller relationship such as their shared love of dogs. nature and poetry. 

The photo above was taken October 6, 1946. Note that Nella is using hand signals to communicate with Helen.

The caption below the photo reads "NBH (Nella Braddy Henney), Helen Keller, and Polly Thompson in the back dooryard after breakfast shortly before their trip to Europe to study the needs of the post-war blind." For more on this trip see this link here. 

 

The caption goes on to read "In November, while they were in Greece their house in Westport Conn Burned."

 

Happy Dairy Month!

Do you recognize the company behind this image?

How about this one? 

Your answer can help date you as well as help you date cows. 

The answers can be found on pages 84 and 88 in the book The Illustrated Guide to Cows by Celia Lewis at the Conway Public Library. See this link here. 

So how do you date cows? It has to do with the changing tastes for dairy products over time. White Mountain paintings before the 1970s show small diverse herds of mostly brown cows. These types of cows were known for the high percentage of butterfat in their milk.  Elsie the Borden cow seen above is one of these. 

(You can click on images to enlarge them). For details on this painting from the Saco River with White Horse Ledge in the background see this link here. 

Today most dairy farms, such as the Sherman Farm, raise Holsteins which produce larger amounts of milk but with low butterfat. These are the cows shown above in the Ben and Jerry logo. 

The Conway Public Library's Henney History Room provides free outreach programs for schools and community groups to explore the history of many topics including dairy history. 

Earlier this week we did a dairy history program at the Mount Washington Valley Adult Day Center. 

We also cover dairy history in our "pizza box time machine" program in which the audience explores historical ways of food preservation and processing. 

After exploring the role of pepper, pickling, smoking and fermentation they examine maps of the area to determine the best places to raise cows vs logging, maple sugaring, and so on. 

This program in part of our larger overall Colony to Country series of how the area was settled and how we changed from a British Colony to an American state.  

We can then use Google maps and street view, photos, and other archival materials to map out and examine physical remnants of our local dairy history such as ...

... Abbot's Dairy and old wooden silos 

Over the years we have done a number of living history events in which we demonstrated how these structures worked. 

Even more rare than the wooden silos is the silage chopper that was used to chop and feed the corn into the silo. 

You can see the kids lined up to take their turn on the machine (under careful supervision). 

For more information or to schedule a program, contact us at the Conway Public Library. 

Intervale Scenic Vista

The Intervale Scenic Vista in Conway is a great place to enjoy art, history and nature. From here you can view a panoramic scene of Mount Washington, Cathedral Ledge and the Moat Mountains. For more on this 1865 painting by Benjamin Champney see this see link here. 

For directions to the view spot see the map here. 

The vistas are interesting in all their seasons and moods. 

Here is a winter scene showing the old building in a Dick Smith photograph from 1969 in the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room collection. See more into the link here. 

 

Here is another scene in our collection by William Fennell. see the link here. 

 

If you look towards the southwest from here you can see Cathedral Ledge, White Horse Ledge, and Mount Chocorua. 

 

For more on that view, including a video tour, see the Theclio here. 

 

This area was once the center of a number of large hotels. For more on that subject, see our previous blog here.

Gone now are the towering elms with their distinctive vase shape seen on the right of the painting.

For more information contact us at the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room.

Groundbreaking News!...

 

... from twenty years ago. Twenty years ago Gary MacDonald, Chair Library Trustees and Margaret Marschner ceremoniously broke ground on the expansion of the Conway Public Library. 

The event was free and open to the public. It was announced through the newspaper ...

... and mailed invitations. 

The year is enshrined in stone on the library addition. 

The libray staff and trustees had worked for several years to fundraise and get all of the approvals for the project which culminated on June 5, 2004 with a grand opening celebration. 

As part of our twentieth commemoration of that glorious undertaking we will be presenting a series of blogs, public events, and displays. 

As you enter the main doors of the library please take a moment to view an exhibit on a small number of items from the large collection we have documenting the expansion. 

Please help us remember and work together towards the future of your library!

The Farm's First Harvest

ICE!

Historically, ice was harvested in this area from frozen ponds and lakes using a specific set of tools. 

Thanks to a generous loan from the Freedom New Hampshire Historical Society the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room has been able to present a new program on ice harvesting which we offer free to local schools and community groups.

It starts with laying tools out on tables or the floor in no particular order...

... and inviting the students to then try to figure out the order in which they would have been used, which of course they can not do.

Then we watch the opening scene of the Disney film Frozen and they try again...

...and they are able to figure it out. 

We confirm and expand their understanding of the tools and the ice harvesting process by examining period photos and archival materials from the Henney History Room collection. 

Now they are able to put a name to the tools... such as this ice hook. 

Then the students closely examine the tools and with a little prompting and a few hints they discover that the tools “talk” and through study of details such as shape and wear marks the tools “tell” you how they are meant to be used - in this case, which part was used to push, and which to pull the ice blocks down the channel. 

Then it is back to the "Frozen" film clip to confirm the way that tool was used. 

It is amazing how well the students do with tools they have never touched before

Another student "listens" to the ice tongs and shows how they were used to pull the blocks up out of the water. 

We talk about how the ice harvesting tools fit into the categories of "simple machines" as defined by the ancient Greeks and use terms such as the screw, lever, and fulcrum. 

The film clip also allows for a discussion of the choreographed "ballet" of ice harvesting such as the role of singing while you work, how teams are set up and work together, and the hierarchy within and between the teams. 

We watch the young boy struggle with lifting his block of ice and talk about how he intuitively solved his problem by using the specific density of ice vs water. 

For info on harvesting and storing ice in ice houses see our previous blog on "pond water ice cream" here. 

This program is part of a larger set of programs we offer under the category of "Colony to Country" starting with the King's charter of the Town of Conway in 1765 to the Declaration of Independence in 1776. 

For more info on these programs contact us at the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room.

Carp in the bathtub and Hoppin' John for the Holidays

Are you familiar with these traditional culinary holiday delights? Let me tell you some holiday stories from our extended family. 

Carp in the Bathtub is a popular Slavic holiday experience that was carried over from our family ancestors in central Europe to Chicago and celebrated by our Jewish, Catholic and Baptist relatives there. 

The story is told in a wonderful children's book that harkins back to an earlier era, before refrigeration, in which live carp in the bathtub provided fresh fish for the holiday.  

In some cases served as a delightful twelve course meal. 

We also enjoy the more mainstream, mid-western traditions from our Ohio family members of turkey and ham and green bean casserole with Campbell's cream of mushroom soup.

The tradition of Hoppin' John on New Year's Eve comes from our southern kin. 

Hoppin' John goes great with collards and corn bread or hushpuppies, or both!

A newer family tradition, Iskender, comes from some of our travels.  

Others countries represented in our extended family holiday celebrations include dishes from Panama, the Netherlands, and now New England (although our New England roots go back many generations) such as red flannel hash and dried apple pie topped with a thick slab of sharp cheddar cheese. 

Each of these different tastes unlocks involuntary memories containing the "essence of the past" as described by Proust in Remembrance of Things Past. 

 

For recipes contact us at the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room. 

For more on your own family history and maybe some forgotten traditions you would like to revive contact us at the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room. We offer free guidance and workshops on researching, preserving and sharing your family history and traditions. 

Have a very merry holiday and a happy New Year!

What do hurricanes and pine cones have in common?

Happy Fibonacci Day!

Today, November 23 is Fibonacci Day, because the numbers are in the Fibonacci sequence of 1, 1, 2, 3. So when written in month and date format it forms the sequence that can be charted out into a pattern. 

The Fibonacci pattern appears frequently in like the branching in trees, leaves on a stem, family trees of honeybees, flower petals, spirals of a sunflower and so on.

The sequence is named for Leonardo Fibonacci, a Medieval mathematician who lived in Pisa from around 1170 -1250 ad. 

Starting with 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, the Fibonacci sequence is created by adding up the two previous numbers to get the next one.

The sequence is used in computing, stock trading, and architecture and design.

Once we discovered the sequence, it started showing up everywhere. Nature is full of Fibonacci patterns, from DNA to hurricanes, leading some to dub the Fibonacci sequence “nature’s secret code.”

 

Another major contribution he made was "nothing."

 

He helped introduce the zero to the western world. 

 

Born to an Italian merchant, the young Leonardo traveled to North Africa with his father, where he was exposed to the Hindu-Arabic numeral system. The system, which includes zero and limits itself to 10 symbols, is much more agile and flexible compared to the unwieldy Roman numeral system. 

 

In 1202, Fibonacci published “Liber Abaci”, introducing Europe to the Hindu-Arabic system and his now-famous sequence.

The website here suggests a number of ways to celebrate the day including

Plan a Fibonacci feast.
The Fibonacci sequence occurs very frequently in common fruits and vegetables and when prepared together, these foods make for a fun meal! Prepare things like artichokes, pineapple, Romanesco and pomegranate to see how the sequence occurs in nature.

Take a Fibonacci-inspired nature walk.
Depending on where you live, you may be able to easily discover Fibonacci sequence in flowers, trees, and much more. Take a nature walk and inspect things like pine cones, ferns, daisies, sunflowers, and snails, since all of these things are made up of Fibonacci numbers.

Seek out the Fibonacci sequence in famous works of art.
Many famous works of art employ the golden spiral or golden rectangles (based on the Fibonacci sequence). Art works like “The Great Wave” by Katsushika Hokusai or many of Mondrian’s square-filled paintings are great examples of the sequence in action!

To learn more about math and history contact us at the Conway Public Library's Henney History Room. We offer a number of free programs for schools and community groups related to the subject.