Transcripts For CSPAN3 American Artifacts Ralph Waldo Emerson The Old Manse 20171015

We visit the old mans in concord, massachusetts, to learn about Ralph Waldo Emersons home. Is really aans house of two revolutions. The American Revolution, and secondhe section revolution of intellectualism and thought. It is such a charming house. Newy year i find some graffiti in the corner. I pull visitors and say hey, come look at this thing we just found. Its a house that keeps on giving like i have never seen in my career. It is a house full of places to be discovered and for inspiration as well. It was built in 1760 by William Everson and his family, one of the first occupants of the house and a minister. William emerson is the grandfather of the emerson, the writer we know and love. He and his wife phoebe had several children, the last of which was 10 years before he left to be part of the revolution, for a short time period. While he was here, he was one of the town leaders and like many reverends of the time, he not only led in church, they but he would have gatherings here as they talked about the American Revolution. He was a philosopher. He started this amazing book collection, the collection contains 3000 volumes that started with the first ministers who lived at this house and continued to the early 20th century. Later residents were collecting the books of the writers who wrote here in their lifetime. When you think about the books of old manse that is really the heart and soul of the old house. So many people have touched these books, used these books, and so many have inscriptions. On the second floor we have them in bookshelves with handles on the sides so they can be easily removed in case of a fire. We have many of them here and we finished a conservation project to look at the books, and the 250 books predate 1750. We rehouse to them. Many of the books are inscribed emersons friend sarah ripley. From the same family line. Sarah ripley was this amazing woman who lived here. She was a scholar, a mother. Some wonderful anecdotes talk about her, where she would be walking rocking a cradle with one foot and reading a book in sanskrit with the other. For emerson, their friendship was an important thing. They shared the interest in the outdoors, writing and reading and learning. A book like this inscribed by emerson is one of many we have in the collection. Many have little notes. People who have lived here have taken notes as they have gone through and given books back and forth to individuals. Its a collection that tells us the people who touched these throughout history. When we are standing in the study, you have to look at the view. This is really about the landscape as well. It is really from these windows that back during the revolutionary period, the emerson family first looked out and saw the commotion over the shotrth bridge, heard round of the world. They talked about in their journals how they are standing here, looking out the window at the world. Think about that process. Standing in your home and witnessing the start of what would be a major event for our nation in its earliest roots. William emerson stayed at this house for about five years. Again, it was built around 1770, 1769. He and his wife moved in and lived here for a few years. He eventually went to for toonderoga, got ill trying come back in 1776, and died. His legacy of the house was instrumental in laying the work of intellectualism, the house, the philosophy of the house. He only lived here for a short time period. William emersons wife found herself with small children living at the old manse as a young widow and when she looked to what was next in her life she encountered ezra ripley. He was also a reverend in this area, and they soon married. What began as the second reverends who lived here at the house, phoebe and ezra. When ezra came to the town, they wanted him to become the minister. Almost everyone said yes. One person voted no, saying he looked a little frail. A were not sure he would survive too long. Lived at the house for 50 years. He outlived everyone and was one of the longest residents. He was a prolific writer, when talking over the trustees in 1939 and everything that stayed the whole time for generations back, a standing desk that was his when open, hundreds of revealed hundreds of sermon see it written, just stacked in there. He was known to write sermons for several hours. A true intellectual scholar, philosopher if you will, and led this town for quite a while. Of his life, after his wife died, the room we are in now, which we call the large parlor, became his bedroom. Going up and down stairs became too difficult for him, so this was a place where he would write, live, and except gueststo his accept to his house as well. He really had an impression on the house. Many of the books in the 3000 Volume Library are inscribed by him. And you can see that influence that he had as a minister and as well. Ralph Waldo Emerson was born in 1803 in boston, massachusetts. A local boy, he spent his life in the city, but for a brief time when he came over when he was around 12. He continued to visit the property throughout his life. And when he wrote nature in 1834, his mother came for a visit. Becoming as wrote ripley ezra ripley was here as well and he was becoming elderly. They cared for him for a brief time as well. Emerson, even though he was born a city boy, it was a home for him. In 1834, he comes here and puts himself in the upstairs study, and that is where he wrote the first draft of nature. He came briefly for nine months when he was here in the house and overlapped with ezra. Ofs is an early vision continuing what the people who lived and worked in this room including emerson, who sat in a chair just like this one. The original of the emerson chair is over at the Concorde Museum and wonderful collaboration last year, the museum, the trustees of the reservation, and the north bennet Street School came together to reproduce the emerson chair that so so that visitors could sit in the chair where emerson wrote nature and look out over the landscape. One thing people always notice if they have seen the original and they look at this one that is reproduced, this one is green and the original chair is black. In fact the green chair, when green chair is what it would have been when emerson first sat in it at mary windsors writing desk, in this period, but later victorians loved to keep things black so the chair was changed. So what people notice is when they stood in it, it envelopes you. You feel very held when you are writing there. This wonderful wood piece come of this writing surface is actually a natural color. This is a furniture piece of adaptive use. It started out as a green chair. Ezra ripley, the tall gentleman, he wanted the writing surface a little higher. So he made this homemade mockup to create a writing surface. This is an important place for visitors to come and look out over the landscape. Right where the American Revolution started, where the second revolution in literature and american writing started. Thatis the same view emerson had when he wrote nature. Work, nature, is emersons bestknown. Many look to it for american transcendentalism. Transcendentalism at that time was a growing idea of looking inward to the person. It was a philosophical and religious thought that was grounded in social and political thought as well, an individual could look at themselves, look at nature, looked up at for look to that for inspiration, spiritual response. Transcendentalists really believed in the quality of the individual and looking at everyone equally. The idea of abolitionism, trying to fight for the rights of all and a womans rights and education were really important. Social parts of transcendentalism. That is different from the other writing at the time, looking at romanticism, and some other philosophical thoughts, very in this very inward. It didnt have that social and political twist to it, too. Many of the people involved in the american Transcendentalism Movement looked to try to better their community and the equality of everyone was really touted as something cord to that. Core to that. And so when emerson took pen to write this philosophy down in the book nature, it set off a series of conversations and devotees that really wanted to subscribe to what emerson was saying. When he writes here, others start to trickle into concord at the same time. You have Margaret Fuller coming alcott family. E emerson is loosely at the core of that. He didnt take the flag and run with it, he was a quiet leader of this idea, the transcendentalism idea and really, concorde, is so well placed for that. It was beautiful and continues to be so today. It was a Perfect Place for inspiration to happen, and transcendentalism is very hard to distill down to one particular thought. There were volumes and volumes. Even today, written about what was at the core of it, emerson believed the individual spirit had the capacity to think about the world, anything as small as a leaf or a water droplet, or a you couldy was see the world in that thing, that element, that person. It was a very optimistic view. Certainly, there was a social awareness component to it that wanted to make the world a better place at a time there was so much change industrially in the city. For emerson to write that, i often wonder how aware he was that he was about to change things. Nathaniel hawthorne is one of our great figures in this house too. One of the things i love about the old manse is it is so layered in history. There are these intellectual greats from the early ministers to emerson and thoreau and fuller and Nathaniel Hawthorne, visiting and staying here. It is amazing we have not only one but several Great American writers central to the story. Around 1842 Nathaniel Hawthorne and his new wife, sophia, came here to live. They rented the house from the family, they are newlyweds, the outdoor vegetable garden was planted by thoreau for them as a wedding present and we have continued to maintain a garden in that spirit outside. In fact, even the windows tell a little history. There is in a chain here from Nathaniel Hawthorne and his wife etching here from Nathaniel Hawthorne and his wife sophia when they used this room. We have several in this house, sophia and nathaniel took her wedding ring that had a little this inin it and etched his study. Nathaniel hawthorne 1843 and by my wife and written with her diamond, inscribed by my husband at sunset on the gold light. You get this wonderful graffiti on a windowpane. I want to point out the idea of golden light in this room, so important to the history, we just installed and are so excited, this wonderful golden wallpaper. Nathaniel and sophia loved gold, they used it at all their houses. They write in their letters there was a golden light here, shedging astral lamp that beautiful light in the room and put on a gold paper. We didnt really know what that looks like. Short of getting a ouija board and asking them, we had to use our best educated guess. We went with the color scheme in the period, they didnt have a lot of money so they didnt pick a wallpaper that had many colors, they went with something less expensive. We went with a fine pattern to ine pattern to bring the outside in. This is historic wallpaper to 1840 that has been reproduced for us and we had it put in this room recently and when Nathaniel Hawthorne lived here, this was a study his wife, sophia, really loved. They talk about repeatedly coming to the study, they would read together, write together, had a kid that sometimes played with a pin or sophias sewing that she was doing. This was actually the desk Nathaniel Hawthorne used. Its a ratchet desk. You can bring it up or down depending on the angle. It is a form he really liked. Pretty standard size for the time. There he simple construction. Very simple construction. It allowed him to face the wall. Not too many distractions. Close to the fire. And a little breeze would come into the room as well. But this was his desk as well. Hawthorne talks about the dingy old antique furniture when he was here in the 1840s. This idea that so many of the objects that we have from when the minister first lived here. The 1760s and later. This is the environment hes writing in. He is actually very respectful of that. He loves the authenticity and the intellectualism of the ministers and what they did here at the house. He talks about the very fondly and he looks back at his time as being one of the favorite moments of his life when he and his wife started out their life together here. Nathaniel hawthorne was a very althoughnd of emerson, he did not fully agree with transcendentalism. O optimistict was to and did not agree with all of the tenants, although as an intellectual, he respected it. Even though hawthorne was not a transcendentalist, he was socializing, writing and being part of that group. Its a really interesting relationship they had in this house. We had both gentlemen in the study at two different tasks, writing end doing work that would become their capstone projects of their careers. Now we are going to go to the thirdfloor attic. It can get a little hot in the summertime. At different times it was used for a room for people who boarding here, for studying, for overflow for people who work here. We are going to take a great look at those graffiti upstairs. So when visitors come they will notice the downstairs area. Only some of get a special look at the attic. There is so much to discover and so much graffiti on the walls from the early residence. If you follow me carefully i will show you some of my favorites. So, this room has some beautiful artwork with all of those scholars, intellectuals, and writers who lived here, we also had some wonderful artists that made it to their residence, edward simmons, who was known for doing early 20th century work. He actually stayed here and wrote his autobiography. As a young child, he drew on the wall in pencil. We can see these great mechanicals in the area. My favorite is in this corner. Its a bee. You think about kids today you take writedowns and draw on the walls, to think that a artist thating auditor would one day make some of the murals that would be a largest and most of buildings in our country, started here as a youngster. He also wrote above the doorframe, good luck to all who come in and go out at the top. I will show you one more area that i love down the hall. The house was built in the late 1760s. This was one of the areas when ministers would come and they would stay here, they could come up and practice their sermons, including a little room in the corner that we believe they used for this purpose. Around the fireplace are wonderful graffiti from hawthorne, emerson, the ripley family, all throughout the room, graffiti of those who came here before. We are still trying to solve the mystery of all of them, but there must be at least two dozen signatures around this particular fireplace in the attic. These are very wonderful bits of history. This was one of the areas where se shines. N i have never seen so much graffiti in one house. It really is the fingerprint of the people who lived here and wanted to leave their initials. This is really about people who lived here and all of those things that they go through. We have newlyweds like hawthorne the hawthornes who moved here struggling to make ends live lifete a family, as newlyweds. We have emerson trying to figure out who he was in the bigger picture. The objects of this house have a have been here for generations. It is a very authentic site. You can see of it from the 1700s that have been recycled and , objects that have been recycled and breezed over the years. I think the very house is very approachable. People can come and see this history and feel the connection that they can be inspired by the people that lived here and thought here, at times struggled here. Emersons influence has been lasting. He lived here, people loved him. He was known to be an amazing writer and a local celebrity. The town embraced him throughout , even when there was a fire in his home and he needed money after that. He was a central town figure. Is ans day, concord amazing place that has always really understood the importance of the outdoors, of preserving the past, and of looking ahead to the future. It is great to see that their spirit has continued from the time he have been talking about with these american writers and this idea of social justice, preserving our landscapes. It has continued to this day. To concordto come today really can be transported back in time. The town has been wonderful at preserving the history, the buildings, the landscapes, the artifacts. So many people come to concord to find that inspiration as well. You are watching American History tv all weekend, every weekend, on cspan three. Up next on reel america, its everybodys business, a 20minute animated film from 1954. It is funded by the u. S. Chamber of commerce. Presenting a brief history of the u. S. Economic system. Beginning with the colonial period. It argues that Free Enterprise is embedded in the bill of rights. Its everybodys business is part of the library of Congress Collection and made available by the National Film Preservation Foundation and the internet archive