The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts: An Ideal and a Symbol

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts: An Ideal and a Symbol By 1805, the year the Pennsylvania Acad­emy of the Fine Arts was founded, Phila­delphia had achieved a large measure of political, social and economic stability. It had been the nation’s capital and contin­ued to thrive as a center of banking and commerce. The largest city in the United States at the opening of the nineteenth century, it was arguably the center of culture, with Boston its...
read more

Bookshelf

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bookshelf Amish Houses and Barns by Stephen Scott Good Books, 1992 (158 pages, paper, $5.95) Home is the center of Amish life, and most – if not all – major life events occur within its walls: birth, mar­riage, visiting, worship, recreation, and death. Amish Houses and Barns is a carefully researched “behind-the­-scenes” look at these events on three farms in particular, as well as...
read more

Shorts

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Shorts The descendants of natural­ist John Bartram and members of the John Bartram Associa­tion will celebrate the centennials of the association and the family reunion during the weekend of June 25-27 [1993]. The event will feature tours of Historic Bartram’s Garden, speakers, bus tours, and a gala picnic on the grounds to commemorate the family’s first reunion in 1893. To obtain...
read more

A Walk on the Wild Side: Philadelphia’s Wissahickon Creek

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Walk on the Wild Side: Philadelphia’s Wissahickon Creek At one time deli­cately depicted on dainty lamp shades, the Wissahickon Creek has offered generations of Philadelphians a verdant retreat from the stress of urban life. It is a place to meet old friends, engage in spirited recreational activities, or simply seek solitude. Each person’s reason for seeking respite along the Wissahickon is as unique as the individual, but all share a common...
read more

An Address for the Afterlife at Laurel Hill Cemetery

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on An Address for the Afterlife at Laurel Hill Cemetery It all began in 1836, when architect John Notman (1810–1865) laid out a series of meandering walkways and terraces on the east bank of the Schuylkill River above Fairmount Park. With his design for Laurel Hill Cemetery, the twenty-six-year-old native of Scotland created the first architecturally designed cemetery in the country. He also established the nation’s second garden-type cemetery,...
read more

A Trio of Philadelphia Maritime Painters

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Trio of Philadelphia Maritime Painters Oceans and seas have long challenged civilization’s adventurous spirit. Sailors and their ships have struggled against billowing winds and sweeping tides, as well as fires, piracy, collisions, and warfare. All of this has been celebrated in story and song — and in works of art. Artists of the day captured both the beauty and the rigors of those wonderful ships in their coveted canvases. Three of...
read more