Birthplace of Memorial Day offers festival and small town charm

by Jamie Rhein on

Back in 1865, Henry C. Wells, a druggist in Waterloo, New York thought that honoring all American soldiers who died in a war was a fitting gesture. The following year, Waterloo threw the first Memorial Day celebration on May 5. The holiday caught on, and in 1966 Lyndon Johnson signed a Presidential Proclamation declaring Waterloo the “Birthplace of Memorial Day,” something the town takes quite seriously.

Instead of focusing only on Monday, the town includes the entire weekend for festivities. Located in between Cayuga and Seneca Lakes in the Finger Lakes region of New York, this would be a place to head to for a mix of the outdoors and history. Unlike Ithaca that wants you to stay away for Memorial Day festivities because of Cornell’s graduation that adds plenty of people to Ithaca’s streets, Waterloo wants you.

As a person who is a festival hound, Waterloo looks like the perfect way to kick-off the summer season of festival hopping. All the trimmings are there and most activities are free, or budget friendly. Events start this weekend and finish up on May 30, the official date of Memorial Day.

Activities are family friendly and include a breakfast buffet, 5-K run, car show, bike rally, a concert stage with multiple concerts and acts, an arts and crafts show, plus a Memorial Day Commemoration by Waterloo veterans. Of course there’s the parade that anyone can join in and fireworks. For the schedule, click here.

There are also special events for the younger crowd. At the Kids’ Korner there are games, crafts, goodie bags, animals, a clown and a juggler, depending upon the time you’re there.

One item in particular caught my eye. Bubblemania, a one-person performance by Casey Carle will be on the Layfette Stage. According to the info on the festival Website, Carle has been performing in India on a 16-day tour. I’m always curious to find out how performers from various countries end up performing where they do, whether they are from the U.S. and end up overseas or groups from other countries that end up here, particularly on a small town stage. If you see him, ask him.

If you head to Waterloo, also check out the National Memorial Day Museum, and the American Civil War Memorial and take a ride on the Finger Lakes Scenic Railway.

Lincoln’s boyhood home is well worth the trip

by Jamie Rhein on

Because Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial in Indiana near the Kentucky border is not on a main highway, it’s not crowded. At least it wasn’t crowded the sunny Sunday afternoon in August when we swung into the parking lot after winding our way along the shady road that led there from Indiana Highway 162.

I was surprised by the size of the park’s visitor’s center. It’s scope is impressive–massive amounts of limestone and lumber. Inside, the interpretive displays and the short film about Lincoln’s life offered background information to frame our visit–one I recommend.

Our son was most impressed by the size of Lincoln’s shoes. Replicas, available for trying on in front of a life-size cardboard figure of grown-up Abe, offer the chance for a boy (or a girl) to see how he or she physically measures up. But, it’s through the woods where one sees what helped make the 16th president, who was born today 200 years ago, so unique.

Across the parking lot in the midst of the woods on a hilly spot is a cemetery with a simple grave marker. It belongs to Nancy Hanks Lincoln, Lincoln’s mother. Although the actual burial site is not known, the marker is an estimation of the grave’s location. Nancy died of milk sickness when Lincoln was nine years-old.

Caused by drinking milk from a cow that ate white snake root, milk sickness was more common during dry spells in certain sections of Indiana, Illinois and Ohio when there was not much else for cows to eat. As the story goes, Nancy knew she was dying, and afterward, Lincoln helped his dad bury her.

Down the hill from the cemetery is the site of the original house’s location. The size of the foundation’s outline attests to Lincoln’s humble beginnings. A short distance away, the Living History Farm shows what life was like for Lincoln as he headed towards his teen years. The one-room house, out buildings, barn, animals. and people dressed in period clothing tell about the days when Lincoln sat reading by firelight after a day of chores.

In a clever form of story-telling, a walk through the oldest stand of oak and hickory trees in the forest goes along the Trail of Twelve Stones— stone markers from various sites that were significant in Lincoln’s life. The first stone is from his birthplace in Kentucky, for example. One stone is from the battleground at Gettysburg. Another, my favorite, has four bricks from his wife Mary Todd Lincoln’s house. When you follow the trail, you get a sense of the scope of Lincoln’s experinces.

As majestic an awe-inspiring as the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. may be, I was inspired by walking through the woods where Lincoln once walked. Because this is an off-the-beaten-trail location, largely untouched by development, a lot of it looks, smells and sounds the same it did almost two centuries ago.

Ford’s Theater where Lincoln was shot has reopened

by Jamie Rhein on

The Ford’s Theater reopened this week after 18 months of renovation. The first play being performed in the gussied up gem, “The Heavens Hung in Black” by playwright James Still has a run through March 8. The play is about the period between the death of his son Willie and the delivery of the Emancipation Proclamation.

If you do go to the theater, know that the chair Lincoln was sitting in is at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, but there is a reproduction in its place. You can still see the nicked picture frame of the portrait of Washington above where Lincoln sat the night John Wilkes Booth shot him in the back of the head. One of Booth’s spurs caught the frame’s edge when he jumped over the railing onto the stage. American flags are draped just like they were the night Lincoln and his wife Mary were enjoying their evening out before it came to an end.

Also on view is the original couch where Major Henry Rathbone was sitting nearby. Rathbone attempted to foil Booth’s escape and was cut by Booth’s knife for his efforts.

Later this spring, an exhibit about Lincoln’s presidency will open in the basement of the theater. In his New York Times article “When a Comedy Turned to Tragedy” Edward Rothstein ponders why the Ford’s Theater has such a hold on our consciousness. It begs the question, I think, about why we are drawn to places where history happened, although our emotional attachment may not be there. Or what makes a place one where we feel a stirring of something bigger than ourselves?

Here is a link to a virtual tour of the theater.

Civil War driving tour in North Carolina: A trip on the Blue-Gray Scenic Byway

by Jamie Rhein on

A month ago, I wrote about a Civil War driving tour in Tennessee. Here’s another one I found out about in an engaging article by Jodi Helmer in the November/December issue of AAA’s Home and Away magazine.

Helmer followed North Carolina’s Blue-Gray Scenic Byway on a quest to find historic sites connected to the Civil War. The journey was a hunt and ask venture that wound through small towns and tobacco fields. As she found out, even a nondescript field where a battle took place has significance. Such was the case when she went into the Harper House, the now museum, but once farmhouse that was turned into a hospital during the war in order to treat soldiers who were wounded.

Other points of interest along the way were the Cliffs of Neuse State Park, the remnants of CSS Neuse–a ship used by the Confederate Navy, and small towns like Dudley, Seven Springs and Deep Run.

People in these towns pointed Helmer in the direction of terrific barbecue. She suggests Wilber’s Barbecue in Goldsboro.

Reading Helmer’s article reminded me of the importance of pulling off the road once in awhile to read those brown historic markers and asking the locals, “Where would you eat and what’s worth seeing here?”

For more information about the Blue-Gray Scenic Byway, click here. One thing to keep in mind, many places are closed on Sundays. Here is a down-loadable brochure of the Civil War Trail another tour option.

The Gettysburg Museum of the American Civil War and Heritage Days

by Jamie Rhein on

Even though I’m disappointed that the Electric Map is gone, the new National Park Service’s ‘s visitor center in Gettysburg where the map used to be does sound wonderful.

Called Gettysburg Museum of the American Civil War, it is filled with artifacts, interactive displays, a gift shop and a place to buy Civil War era food like hardtack, a type of biscuit that keeps forever.

As mentioned in a previous post, the Electric Map has been traded for a movie, A New Birth of Freedom. Narrated by Morgan Freeman, it outlines the importance of the Battle at Gettysburg and pertinent details about the Civil War. The rest of the museum is made up of galleries with different themes.

The Voices of the Campaign Theater in Gallery 5 seems like a section not to miss. This is where you can hear audio versions of letters, diaries and newspaper articles from the time period. Artifacts of note in this gallery are Robert E. Lee’s stove and other items of an officer’s field camp. The display is made to look like what a field camp would actually look like. The field desk that Lee might have used at Gettysburg is also here.

The 11 other galleries are as detailed, and each have a theme inspired by Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. For those of you watching your dollars this summer, a stop here has a price that’s right. The museum is free. The movie costs $8 for adults and $6.50 for children. If you can swing it, spring for the movie because I imagine it will help highlight the sites that you’ll see when you tour the actual battleground. Plus, Morgan Freeman has such a lovely voice.

From June 29 until July 6 is Heritage Days which commemorates Gettysburg’s history. This year the museum is playing host. Here’s a link to the schedule of events.