Phantoms — Field Notes— the bone lines

We visited Old Sturbridge Village for the Phantoms By Firelight event. It was a gorgeous night outdoors as we gathered with many others to walk throughout the Village. Old Sturbridge Village is a recreated 1830’s rural New England town. I have been coming to this museum since I was a child. It has been here for 75 years now. As it is not far from my home, I have visited here many times during all seasons over all these years. I often took my young daughter her to museum classes where we would spend the day living as people in the 1830’s did. Learning about daily life and participating a bit in the experience of OSV is such fun if you are interested in history. More recently there has been an effort to create a more inclusive picture of history in the US that includes Black and Indigenous People’s history and exhibits.

The daily home life of people of this time period is a draw for me as it portrays the simple lifeways of people living in a rural village at this time. The pursuits of gardening, home keeping, farming, weaving, basketry, hand sewing, herbalism, crafts are all shared and discussed here. Often there are workshops to attend to learn and study more.

Tonight our visit was a bit different. OSV has a Phantoms by Firelight event throughout October that includes an entertaining version of spooky.

Cyrkus Vampyr was the troupe that came to entertain us. It was a magical experience with little ones and adults tromping about in costumes to celebrate the night.

Inside this house was a woman weaving and creating mourning pieces out of hair.

Here we talked to the shop keeper about the goods available during the time. The gorgeous baskets above are all handmade. People back then would do side projects to try to earn money or trade goods with others to fill in with things that they needed. The shop keeper said - try not to think of things as - something costs this much money. Often things were traded to acquire what was needed. It is different than today where we just spend our money on what it is needed. You might have a couple of baskets - not many. Somehow it seems if we as a culture could embrace slowly made, handmade - we might begin to appreciate having beautiful, long lasting items - just fewer - in our home. Instead of the desire to want more. When I visit Sturbridge Village - this living picture always stays with me in the days afterward.

Story by firelight. This is something that people just naturally gravitate to. Still - we draw up to the fire. The warmth of a fire and good company seems to be something we naturally seek together. We as humans have been telling stories for as long as we have been on earth.

Coffin making by a resident woodworker. This man is 6 foot four! He said that perhaps this would be his coffin that he was making. They make a couple of coffins each year in the village. Long ago coffins were made individually for a person when they died. A simple coffin shown here that is completely handmade would have cost about 1 dollar. That would have been a couple of full days wages. The How Many Nails jar was a traveling game that people could participate in the village for the event. Oh, the scent of wood is one of my all time favorites!

It was a lovely night. Meteor showers were up above in the clear night - just after nightfall which isn’t commonplace for meteor viewing. The village isn’t typically open in the night time so it was special to be able to walk around in a quiet place in the dark - only lit mostly by candlelight in hand made tin lanterns. The shadows and squeals were a moving wonderland of color and dream like pictures. A home diary of perhaps a bit of what the world looked like in one corner of the world in rural New England for white settlers in the 1800’s.

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