THE VICTORIAN SOCIETY IN AMERICA
205 S. Camac St, Philadelphia, PA  19107 ~ Phone: 215-545-8340 ~ Fax: 215-545-8379

EMAIL NEWSLETTER
 October, 2004

Welcome to the  October  issue of the VSA's email newsletter.
 

NEW BOOK FROM THE NE CHAPTER
Click image to purchase book.

Mary Petronella
Edward W. Gordon

This lavishly illustrated guidebook to the many distinctive attractions of Boston's Victorian heritage provides the walker and the armchair traveler alike with delightful and enlightening discoveries of the city's remarkable treasure trove of nineteenth-century landmarks and luminaries. Designed and written by a diverse group of specialists in history, architecture, literature, and culture, the narrators of these twelve unique tours offer rich historical detail and engaging anecdotes about this vibrant period in Boston's past.

VSA member Mary Petronella is Adjunct Assistant Professor of English at Bentley College and President of The Boston Browning Society.  Edward W. Gordon is the Site Administrator of The Old Schwamb Mill in Arlington, Massachusetts, and President of the New England Chapter of the VSA.

An October tradition

Univ. of Michigan base ball team, 1882

Most cultures have some sort of stick and ball game, cricket being the most well-known. While the exact origins of baseball are unknown, most historians agree that it is based on the English game of rounders. It began to become popular in this country in the early 19th century. Small towns formed teams, and baseball clubs were formed in larger cities.

In 1845, Alexander Cartwright wanted to formalize a list of rules by which all teams could play. Much of that original code is still in place today. Although popular legend says that the game was invented by Abner Doubleday, baseball's true father was Cartwright.

first game

The first recorded baseball contest took place a year later, in 1846. Cartwright's Knickerbockers lost to the New York Baseball Club in a game at the Elysian Fields, in Hoboken, New Jersey. These amateur games became more frequent and more popular. In 1857, a convention of amateur teams was called to discuss rules and other issues. Twenty five teams from the northeast sent delegates. The following year, they formed the National Association of Base Ball Players, the first organized baseball league. In its first year of operation, the league supported itself by occasionally charging fans for admission. The future looked very bright.

The early 1860s, however were a time of great turmoil in the United States. In those years of the Civil War, the number of baseball clubs dropped dramatically. But interest in baseball was carried to other parts of the country by Union soldiers, and when the war ended there were more people playing baseball than ever before. The league’s annual convention in 1868 drew delegates from over 100 clubs.

admission fees

As the league grew, so did the expenses of playing. Charging admission to games started to become more common, and teams often had to seek out donations or sponsors to make trips. In order for teams to get the financial support they needed, winning became very important. Although the league was supposed to be consist of amateurs, many players were paid. Some were given jobs by sponsors, and some were secretly paid a salary just for playing.

Some wanted baseball to remain an amateur endeavor, but in 1869, the Cincinnati Red Stockings decided to become a completely professional team. Brothers Harry and George Wright recruited the best players from around the country, and beat all comers. The Cincinnati team won sixty-five games and lost none.  As we know, the idea of paid players quickly caught on..

Sean Lahman, baseball1.com

WEBSITE OF THE MONTH

October  2004
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/victorians/
http://home.freeuk.net/elloughton13/vicintro.htm

With kids back in schools it's time for them to learn about the Victorians.  Here are two web sites devoted to just that.

The first is a BBC site called Children in Victorian Britain. This interesting and fun historical site gives an insight into the lives of Victorian children. This site is designed for children age 9-11 years and has been designed for children to be able to work through by themselves with minimal input.

The second is a school resource called The Victorians with information about Queen Victoria, Sounds of the Century, Change and Invention, and Florence Nightingale.

MUSEUM QUALITY TILE
made in the USA by Besheer Art Tile

Since ancient times Tile Art was an important expression of fine sense in design and decor.  Today, VSA members Kenneth and Jacqueline Besheer are dedicated to continuing this proud tradition.

 After years of patient experimentation, using variations of age-old techniques, the Besheers have developed and refined this art form, and create some of the most beautiful and decorative tiles to be found anywhere. Each tile is individually and completely hand-painted using vibrant enamel glazes.

In addition to making attractive and charming wall decor, these Art Tiles serve as excellent heat-resistant trivets or hot plates. Currently featured in many museums, fine shops and galleries.

Visit them at www.besheerarttile.com

AMERICAN ARTS AND CRAFTS NEWS

The New York Chapter has an active program of free lectures by experts in architecture, decorative arts, fine arts, landscape, literature, and cultural history, including December 7, 6 PM The Country Estate as Arts & Crafts Utopia: The Byrdcliffe Colony Experiment Cheryl Robertson, independent curator and museum consultant, Cambridge, MA, and author of an essay in the book, Byrdcliffe: An American Arts and Crafts Colony, to be published by Cornell University Press. For details www.metrovsa.org/calendar

 

Works from 75 U.S. and European institutions and private collections on loan for first-ever, in-depth presentation of movement in international context The Arts and Crafts Movement in Europe and America, 1880–1920: Design for the Modern World. On view at LACMA December 19, 2004, through April 3, 2005. For details www.lacma.org

 

April 12-20, 2005 -- Roycroft Foundation sponsored 2005 Tour of England -- showcasing the largest ever assembled Arts & Crafts Exhibition at London's Victoria & Albert Museum.  The trip will begin in the beautiful Lake District, visiting the home of John Ruskin and Blackwell.  Then the tour turns south with stops in the Cotswolds, before the final destination of London.  We will see the designs of Morris, Baillie-Scott, Pugin and Webb, as well as many others working in the period, with stops at pubs, gardens and shops along the way.  And all of these events guided by the foremost Roycroft scholar - Kitty Turgeon. For details www.ashton-drye.com. 

 

March 2005 -- Roycroft Foundation tour of the U.S. West Coast.  Plan on joining the  Roycrofters on an early spring  tour of Southern California attending the Los Angeles County Museum of Art's Arts & Crafts Exhibition "The Course of Invention: The Arts and Crafts Movement in Europe and America, 1890-1920". Also included will be visits to the Gamble House and other Greene & Greene masterworks, as well as works of Maybeck, Gill and Wright. For details www.ashton-drye.com.

 

CJ Hurley Century Arts has recently completed the beautiful WHITE ROSE residential dining room. The White Rose is a totally integrated environment done authentically in the Symbolist tradition of both the Art Nouveau and Arts & Crafts movements. To see THE WHITE ROSE, visit  www.cjhurley.com.

 

Frank Lloyd Wright’s Martin House Complex in Buffalo, New York is currently under restoration, but still open for guided tours. For opening times and details www.darwinmartinhouse.org

SHOP AT AMAZON.COM

Help the VSA when you do your holiday shopping by clicking our Amazon logo

VSA stalwarts Bill Ayres and Sally Kinsey were among those celebrating Oscar Wilde Fest 2004 in New York City on October 16th-- a celebration of the 150th birthday of Oscar Wilde staged by  the Oscar Wilde Society of America  (www.owsoa.org).

Also present was VSA member Mary Warner Blanchard whose book Oscar Wilde's America: Counterculture in the Gilded Age was described by  the Boston Globe, as an .. enlightening cultural history of the struggle between art and Victorian convention.

Click on the book to purchase at Amazon and help the VSA

Remembering founders


picture VSA archives by George Vaux

From the grainy archives comes this picture of Henry-Russell Hitchcock with Sir Nikolaus Pevsner.  In 1965 it was Sir Nikolaus, then Chairman of the UK Victorian Society  who suggested to several Americans who were attending the Summer School at Attingham Park (UK), that they should found an American society.  During the ensuing year informal meetings were held culminating in an application to the state of New York for the VSA to be recognized as a nonprofit, tax-exempt organization.  Although activities were well underway, the charter was officially granted on 30 December, 1966; it still hangs today framed at our head office in Philadelphia.

And finally, your staff of one at the email newsletter has been seeing white dots.  Perhaps you've seen them too but not given them much thought.

According to folk-tradition, if the newel-post at the bottom of the banister of the main staircase to a house has an inlaid button of ivory or mother-of-pearl on top, it is said that the house was paid for with no mortgage.

These can be seen in America as well as Britain.  Michael Sampson, of Nantucket explained, "There's a special ceremony that is an old, old Nantucket tradition.  When you went into a home in Nantucket and saw an ivory plug in the banister, it was a sign that there was no debt in the structure. They would burn the mortgage and put the ashes in the plug."

Carlton Cabot, who is a real estate agent in Boston,  MA, attests to a small ivory stone imbedded in the eye of the swirl at the bottom of the banister in his parents' house in old-moneyed Louisburg Square on Beacon Hill.  "It's a subtle sign," said Cabot. It means, to those who know, that your house is paid for." 

web site links

Let us know what you think of the e-newsletter and what you like to see in it.

UNTIL NEXT TIME
visit us on the web at www.victoriansociety.org

The Victorian Society in America
205 S. Camac Street
Philadelphia, PA 19107
info@victoriansociety.org

Copyright 2004. Victorian Society in America. All rights reserved.