Category: History
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A Solitary Child in the Woods
You won’t find it in the guidebooks. You probably won’t find it at all without sitting in a dusty room of a Historical Society and doing your homework. Not many people know it exists. I found it because I had a decades-old topographic map in my possession. And still, I found it by accident. The…
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To Betty: An Alpha and Omega Life
On a Tuesday Betty sat in the passenger’s seat of her car in our driveway. Her husband, Bob, was behind the wheel. They took our Netflix DVD (we share an account) and drove home. On Wednesday, she became unresponsive at her kitchen table. She suffered a stroke. On Friday, she was in the ICU for…
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Forever Janis
If you’re busted flat in Baton Rouge…then pull out your harp from your dirty red bandanna…and play the blues, softly. Pull out your file cabinet and check that your Elvis and Marilyn stamps are safe. Make room for another lost soul. Today, the Janis Joplin Forever Stamp is on sale at the Post Office. Why…
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Coney Island With Princess Pat and Eddie
I was on the stage of the Sideshow at Coney Island and I was standing on the thighs of a woman who was lying on a bed of real nails. Her name was Princess Pat. I’ll get back to her. I’m in New York City. We came for a few doctor appointments. It was Tuesday…
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At The Hound Tor
This is the place of legends. Arthur Conan Doyle saw these rocks and promptly went home to write The Hound of the Baskervilles. Our walk was five miles, beginning in the car park on the north side of Hound Tor. We were to end our day climbing up and over and between the rock outcrops,…
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Passports 14: The Sad Life & Lonely Death of Kitty Gray
The Tors and heathland of Dartmoor is a landscape that breeds legends. Legends, myths, mysteries and ghosts. The guidebooks tell you not to go out onto the moors when the weather is foul. When the fog descends, as it often does, and when the misty rain falls on the gorse, and on the matted shag…
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Passports 12: The Legendary Hedges of Devonshire
Hedges. In most standard dictionaries, “hedge” will be defined as a row of shrubs to separate lawns, fields or pastures. In Devon, they can also separate your sense of self-confidence and driving skill from your very soul. If you drive seven miles along a “two-lane” road with these hedges, the fear you will feel is…
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Passports 11: Morris Dancing: Another Way for the English to be Silly or an Ancient Cultural Tradition?
I had my hand on the door handle of the Antiquarian Book Store in Moretonhampstead village. In a moment, I would be lost among my dear friends, the arcane tomes and dusty volumes of local history and regional literature. My thumb was on the latch. I pressed down. It gave way under my pressure. The…
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Passports 9: Guests and Ghosts in an English Hotel
We chose to be guests at the George & Pilgrim Hotel in Glastonbury, England. What we did not choose was that a few other guests were quite dead. Yes, there were a fair number of living travelers that night but occupying the same space and the same time, were the resident ghosts. What else would…
patrickjegan 