Send an Obama Hug for Valentine’s Day AND Black History Month!
The Seacoast African American Cultural Center is teaming up with the Historical Society to offer these funny and heartwarming cards, featuring the friendly grin of our huggiest-ever president!
This unique and oversized card (those hands are nearly life-sized!) is sure to brighten someone’s day. We can add a message and mail this collectible card directly to your valentine!
Rocking chair, America, ca. 1900-1920. Retailed by Margeson Brothers, Portsmouth. Oak, replaced leather seat; H. 42 1/4 in., W. 27 1/4 in., D. 33 in. Portsmouth Historical Society; Gift of Bob Shouse, 2014
This chair was used at Rock Rest in Kittery Point, Maine, in operation from 1946 to 1977 as a summer retreat by Hazel and Clayton Sinclair for an African American clientele, providing a safe and congenial haven for Black travelers. Through the efforts of historian Valerie Cunningham and the Portsmouth Black Heritage Trail, the Rock Rest archives are now at UNH, and the site is featured in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Writing While Black: The Afrofuturistic Writer
This Sunday, the Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire is hosting another online edition of the Elinor Williams Hooker Tea Talks. Featuring some big names in contemporary fiction, “Writing While Black: The Afrofuturistic Writer” will explore Black writers and characters in a genre where they have not been expected to excel.
Did you think those caterer’s urns with spigots were a 20th-century invention? Not so! Urns with spigots to dispense hot water (because the proper way to do it is to put the tea leaves in the tea pot) have been around since the 18th century.
This monumental tea urn, seen here on display in the John Paul Jones House, is a good example of English Sheffield plate, which was very popular in America in the early nineteenth century as an alternative to objects fashioned from more expensive sterling silver. It serves as a reminder of the importance of the tea ceremony in early America. The unmarked urn has an early history in the Fowle family of Portsmouth, and is a recent gift of Esther Pappas of Yarmouth, Maine, a family descendant who presented it to the Society in memory of her mother.
Hot-water urn, probably Sheffield, England, 1810-20. Fused plate (Sheffield plate), ivory; H. 19 in., W. 9 ½ in., D. 10 in. Gift of Edith Pappas in memory of Esther J. Marshall, 2020.
The Teapot’s Tale by Portsmouth author Joanna Brode
with illustrations by Claudia Hopf
The little teapot in this story is real. It was made in New York City by one of the Crolius family of potters, and centuries later was purchased at the Brimfield, Massachusetts Flea Market by a New Hampshire couple.
The story of what happened between the teapot’s creation in New York City and its purchase at the Brimfield Market is fictional but plausible. Readers are invited to imagine their own story of what might of befallen the little teapot in those mysterious lost years.
2021 Elinor Williams Hooker Tea Talks at the Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire
The Black Heritage Trail is once again hosting a phenomenal series of talks to celebrate Black History Month. It’s a “virtual” series this year, so you don’t even have to brave the 15° weather to participate. But you do need to register in advance!
