Category: culture and history

The Sunday porch: rooftop retreat

Cindy at enclos*ureLeave a comment

As the summer heat comes to an end,* I thought you might enjoy this repeat porch from July 2012.

This sleeping porch for hot summer nights was added to the roof of the White House during the Taft Administration (1909 – 1913). Photo by National Photo Company, via Library of Congress.

It’s a little funny to think of the country’s first family climbing up to the roof to bed down in what is basically a shed with screened sides.

Click here to read more about sleeping porches.

*Fall officially begins on Tuesday in the northern hemisphere.

Life in gardens: more chickens

Cindy at enclos*ure1 Comment

Hugh Magnum chickens, via Duke on flickrChild with white chickens, taken between 1890 and 1922, by Hugh Mangum, via David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University (on flickr).

Mangum was a traveling photographer who worked along a rail circuit in North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia. You can see his portraits here.

Life in gardens: feeding the chickens

Cindy at enclos*ureLeave a comment

Feeding chickens, ca. 1899 Georgia, Library of CongressA fenced-in backyard in Georgia, ca. 1899, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

These photos were included in one of several albums depicting African American life, which were compiled by W. E. B. Du Bois for the 1900 Paris Exposition.

Feeding chickens in ca. 1899 Georgia backyard, Library of Congress

There’s a brief history of the American backyard here.  Until the 20th century, it was a space for work, not recreation.

The Sunday porch: Mobile, Alabama

Cindy at enclos*ure2 Comments

The Sunday porch:enclos*ure- Tom Riley Hse., 1936, Mobile, Ala., HABS“Tom Riley House,” 256 North Jackson Street, Mobile, Alabama, September 1936, by E. W. Russell for an Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

Decaying. . . but still elegant.

A Google street view for this address shows an empty lot, but the house next door is still standing.

Life in gardens: fall flower show

Cindy at enclos*ure3 Comments

Fall flower show, via Library of Congress. . . at P.S. 15, Manhattan, New York City, ca. 1921, by Paul & Co., via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

This hand-colored glass lantern slide was used by Frances Benjamin Johnston in her garden lecture series.

The original black and white photo may have been taken for the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.  Its online photo collection has several 1921 pictures of P.S. 15 and P.S. 62 children working in their “nature rooms.”