Springtime Interpretation at Clarke House

Come see Clarke House Museum change over for springtime interpretation! Mrs. Clarke and her children would have taken the months of April and May to clean the house top to bottom in anticipation of warmer weather and the visitors it was sure to bring. Join us this spring to learn about spring cleaning and gardening. Participate in hands-on activities families like the Clarkes would have done in 1850s Chicago! We hope you'll plan a visit this season.

Considering Our Collections: How CHM Objects are Catagorized

When you come for a visit to Clarke House, you will see several objects placed together to give an impression of an 1850s middle-class Chicago home. But are all of these items really from the mid-nineteenth century? Not everything. Currently, the museum's collection is divided into three categories: 

1. NSCDA-IL Artifacts: Items owned exclusively by The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Illinois. These objects are authentic to the Clarke House period and are the core of the museum's exhibits. Most of what you see out on display is from the NSCDA-IL collection. The bulk of these artifacts were gathered by the Dames when Clarke House was being restored in the early 1980s. Since then, the Dames have added several pieces to their collection and continue to seek out high quality period furnishings and household artifacts to enhance the authenticity of Clarke House Museum's interiors. 

The Real Deal: NSCDA-IL Artifact

2. Props: These are objects that have age, but may or may not date to the Clarke period. Props are secondary to the Dames collection, providing filler or backdrop to our principal artifacts. These objects are selected to help tell the story of our period of interpretation. Prop items would be considered "antiques" but are commonplace and easily replaceable. Guests and docents may be invited to interact with some of our prop items.

Prop Object: Fills in Our Exhibit

3. Reproductions: Objects that are modern-day copies of items that would have been available to the Clarke family. The museum uses reproductions in the same way as props, to flesh out our exhibits and make them more realistic. Reproductions are produced in the same manner, using the same materials that would have been available during the Clarke period. Guests are encouraged to touch, handle, and use reproduction items. Docents will point out reproductions for your use while on tour.

Reproduction Items: Try them out!

Mother-Daughter Tea at Glessner House, April 30

Clarke House Museum is pleased to announce the following event for our sister intitution Glessner House Museum:

Time is running out to make reservations for the Mother-Daughter Tea to be held at Glessner House Museum located directly north of Clarke House Museum at 1800 S. Prairie Avenue. Don't miss out on this very special opportunity to take high tea in the museum's historic dining room, not regularly open for public events.

Historic photograph of the Glessner House Dining Room.

Mother-Daughter Tea
Saturday April 30, 2011
Seatings at 11:30am and 2:00pm
$35 per person/ $30 for museum members
Pre-paid reservations required; group size limited
R.S.V.P. to 312-326-1480

Experience high Victorian tea in the historic dining room of Glessner House!
Glessner House Museum offers a rare opportunity to dine in the historic dining room. Surrounded by beautiful oak paneling, a gilt ceiling, and a fireplace clad in exotic Persian tiles, attendees will be treated to a traditional high tea with fine china, linens, and an assortment of delicious treats. In addition, selected vintage textiles from the collection, worn by Frances Glessner and her daughter, will be on display. This is a very special event not to be missed. Invite your mother, grandmother, daughter, sister, or good friend for what promises to be a most memorable experience!

Happy Birthday, Charlie Clarke!

Today, April 6, marks the 176th birthday of Charles Clarke. Little Charlie was born right before the Clarkes left Waterville, New York for Chicago in 1835. He accompanied his parents and big brother Henry on the long journey up to Utica, along the Erie Canal to Buffalo, New York. He then boarded a boat that ferried his family to Detroit where they bought a wagon and traveled overland to Chicago, arriving in October 1835. A big trip for such a little guy!

His mother, Caroline Palmer Clarke, wrote to her sister-in-law Mary Walker in a letter dated November 1, 1835:

The other children are very well,(daughter Mary was left in the care of her aunt in New York) little Charlie has been considerably sick a few days from a severe cold,   but is now well as ever. He has grown very much, sits alone on the floor now. He was the best child on the journey you ever saw, scarcely cried at all. He would sit for hours sometimes on board the boat, looking first at one and then another, and seeming as much amused as though their whole conversation was acceptable to him. He was not afraid of strangers at all.

Charlie stayed with his family at the Tremont House, a hotel and boarding house in the town's center. He lived in the log home on the property the Clarkes purchased from Dr. Elijah Dewey Harmon and may have even taken his first steps there. Little Charlie also witnessed the construction of Clarke House and moved in with his family sometime during 1836. Sadly, on September 24, 1836, at just fifteen month old, Charlie Clarke died.

We don't have any images of Charles Clarke, but he may have looked something like this child. Little boys wore dresses before they were potty-trained to make diapering easier on the mother.

Dames to Docents March 26, 2011

   

Docents mingle during breakfast before the program begins.

This past Saturday, March 26, four representatives from The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Illinois (NSCDA-IL)  visited to speak to our docents about their organization and its relationaship to Clarke House Museum. The program was held in the Beidler Room of Glessner House Museum, located just north of Clarke House at 1800 S. Prairie Avenue.  Refreshments were served at 9:30 a.m. with the program running from 10 until 11:30 a.m.

The ladies on the panel all currently serve on the NSCDA-IL Museum Properties Committee, which oversees the collections housed at Clarke House Museum and greatly contributes to exhibits, public programming and educational initiatives. The Illinois Society was invited by the City of Chicago to furnish the recently relocated Clarke House in 1978. Since then, NSCDA-IL has been an intregal part of the restoration, preservation, and interpretation of Chicago's oldest structure.

 

Glessner House Museum Executive Director & Curator,
Bill Tyre, welcomes everyone to the Beidler Room.

Patriotic Service Chair Jean Perkins opened the morning's discussion with a history of The National Society of The Colonial Dames which was founded in 1891. At the core of NSCDA's mission is the preservation of historic propeties.  Jean informed the group that NSCDA owns and maintains more historic buildings than the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Jean continued to talk about the foundation of the Illinois Society in 1896, Fortnightly Club in Chicago, and the decision to take on Clarke House as the Illinois Society's museum property.

Jean Perkins (left) and Cami Burgess (right)

Cami Burgess, First Vice-President Membership, spoke about membership requirements to become a Dame. Membership is handled at the state level, depending on where one's ancestor lived. A Dame might be a member of the Illinois Society, but if her ancestor was from Virginia, for example, the approval of her paperwork would go through that Society. Ladies eligible for membership with NSCDA-IL are proposed by a current member and must prove lineage to an ancestor that contributed siginificantly to the original thirteen colonies.

 Mary Glerum, Docents & Education, talked about the Society's decision to contract museum consultants Jane and Richard Nylander for an assesment of Clarke House back in 2009. Their findings resulted in the Nylander Report, a thirty-two page document which outlines recommendations for improving interpretation at Clarke House. Mary Glerum is also a certified docent at Glessner House Musem who understands the impact the Nylander Report has had and will continue to have on tours, programming, and general interpretation. Mary also discussed plans for the 175th Anniversary Celebration taking place at Clarke House in September. The Dames are planning an evening gala event and symposium featuring the Nylanders as keynote speakers.

Marilyn Helmholz, Budget Chair, also sat on the Dames panel during the event and contributed much to the question and answer session held during the latter half of the program. The Dames answered questions posed by the Glessner House Museum Docents on the effects of the new furnishings plan to be implemented at Clarke House, period of interpretation, and plans for new acquisitions.



Assistant Curator, Becky Young, welcomes the Dames panel (left to right) Jean Perkins,
Cami Burgess, Mary Glerum, and Marilyn Helmholz.

 The Glessner House Museum staff and docents wish to extend a hearty thanks to the ladies of the Museum Properties Committee for their participation in Dames to Docents. We all eagerly look forward to working with them as the anniversary celebration approaches.

If you're interested in learning more about other properties maintained by The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America and their State Societies, check out these links:

NSCDA Museum Properties Map

Illinois Dames

A Friendly Game of Chess

The North West Sitting Room at Clarke House Museum is similar to the modern-day family room. As the most casual space in the home, the Clarkes would have used this sitting room for informal conversation and evening diversions. Mrs. Clarke and her daughters, Mary and Caroline, would have settled down in the evenings to do needlework or read. Her four boys may have also read or pulled up a couple of chairs to engage one another in a game.

The North West Sitting Room has been recently staged for a chess game between Robert (age 19) and his brother Edward (age 13) in 1857. The board is home-made, painted black and red, with delicately carved ivory pieces belonging to a finer game board, long ago lost. In addition to playing games, the Clarke boys might have used their leisure time in the evening to catch up on the current issues of the day. They may have talked about the present recession or about the slave issue and murmurings of secession.




A reproduction of a June 1857 issue of Frank Leslie's Illustrated Magazine is casually laid over the chess board in the sitting room as if Robert has just set it aside. Engravings of Dred Scott, his wife, and two daughters grace the front page.


Scott became famous after a long-fought court battle to gain freedom for himself and his family. In March of 1857, the Supreme Court ruled that because Scott was black, he was not a citizen and therefore had no right to sue for his freedom. The court's decision also declared the Missouri Compromise of 1820, legislation which restricted slavery in certain territories, unconstitutional. While the decision was well-received by slaveholders in the South, many northerners were outraged. The decision greatly influenced the nomination of Abraham Lincoln to the Republican Party and his subsequent election, which in turn led to the South's secession from the Union.
(Courtesy of pbs.org)





The Clarkes would have been very aware of the Dred Scott case and its implications. Where exactly they stood on the issue of slavery and full freedom for blacks is unknown, but it is certain that it was a topic of conversation in their social circle. The family Sitting Room was a space where polite, inoffensive conversation could be set aside in favor of speaking candidly about social and political issue within the confines of the home, perhaps over a friendly game of chess.

Object Found in Collection, Now On Exhibit

A painted c. 1840 rocking chair, documented as once being on exhibit in the North East Sitting Room, was rediscovered today stored behind the false wall in the Second Floor Gallery (North Central Room). The chair was purchased by The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Illinois (NSCDA-IL) in June of 1987 from Taylor B. Williams Antiques in Chicago.

Simple, with slender spindles at the back and turned rungs, the chair is beautifully decorated. Typical for the 1840s period, it mimics Japanese lacquer with a coat of red paint applied as a base and covered with black over top. The seat has faux graining meant to resemble flame mahogany, edged in gold paint. The back rest features a stenciled design of a sailor, sailboats, and houses.

A mysterious "B" is painted in black under the seat. Could it be a clue to the original owner?

This piece is now on exhibit in the South East Bed Chamber (Girls' Room).