Category: Americana

Posts related to US history, geography, traditions, etc.

A family memory

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date April 30, 2014

Family memories are often attached to old vehicles

This antique Packard belongs to Steve, a neighbor of mine. It reminds me of a story my Mom used to tell. When she was a girl, probably a young teen, she was taught to drive a car in order to help on the farm. He father instructed her how to pull hay up into the mow with it. I think it was a Maxwell. Cars in the 1920’s, the era this car is from, were often put to work on the farm. I’ve heard stories (I can’t remember where) of a rear tire being removed from an old car and a belt somehow put on to drive a saw. Steve found an original engine for this car in another old Packard that had been used as a tractor. Much of the interior work on this car is leather. Steve pointed out that many parts were hand-made, not mass-produced in that era.

Tags American history, antiques, memories

Americana Joy Notes Who Am I

Our manger scene has a history

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date December 25, 2013

"A Savior has been born to you." — “A Savior has been born to you.”

Our outdoor manger scene is an integral part of our family Christmas celebration. JoAnne and I originally made it while pastoring at our first church in Bentley Creek PA. Our church was having a live nativity that year. The animals were staying in the little shed/stable we had constructed on the lawn in front of the church and parsonage for a couple days as there were two live performances separated by a few days. I was the caretaker. JoAnne and I thought it would be a shame to have the animals there with no representation of the Christmas story, the reason for the celebration. So we made the manger scene to place in the stable with the animals when the actors were not present. One corner of one of the figures still shows the marks where I set it a little too close to the donkey and he reached around and chewed on it.

JoAnne found the figures she used for models in a coloring book we had purchased for Keely. She used projection to transfer the forms to the 4 by 8 exterior plywood sheets that I had purchased. Then I cut them out with a jigsaw and we painted them. I then devised a simple stand system that holds them upright securely but can be dismantled easily with a screwdriver, hopefully an electric one. The current manger is not the original one.

Since then, every year that they were not being used for their original purpose, we have put them up in our front lawn for our Christmas display. In Kirkville, we almost never actually put the baby in the manger as there was so often much snow you wouldn’t have been able to tell if the baby was under it all anyway. Now they are with us at our third parish and still helping us to spread the news of Jesus’ coming; God’s greatest gift to us all.

Tags Christmas, live nativity, manger scene

Americana Journal Joy Notes

Washington Hill UMC Thanksgiving Eve service

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date November 29, 2013

Washington Hill United Methodist Church

Did I mention that I love old churches? If you have driven by the corner of routes 219 and 179 you have probably seen the old brick sanctuary of Washington Hill UMC on the corner. The sanctuary is a gem of early colonial Methodist church architecture. It has never been “modernized” with things like electric lights, bathrooms, sound amplification, or hidden heating systems. The building dates from 1834 and has a wrap-around balcony on three sides, all the better to seat more people within easy earshot of the preacher. Heat is from a great ancient wood stove in the rear center with a stove pipe running the length of the sanctuary to extract more heat. Lighting is by oil lamps along the sides. Music was originally by pump organ, which still is there. The church has two rear doors and the pews have a divider in the center. It makes me wonder if it was built for the very early colonial church seating arrangement of men on one side and women on the other.

Annual Thanksgiving Eve service

It is tradition in this area to hold a Thanksgiving Eve service there. My wife and I were privileged to attend this year. Luminaries had been placed in the lawn and the stove had been lit ahead to make it warm inside even though snow was falling outside as the elevation is higher there than here in West Granby. The antique oil lamps cast a warm glow over everything, but the lighting was dim enough that one needed a flashlight to read fine print easily away from a lamp. The service is sponsored by the North Canton UMC church which is linked with this parish and considers it its mother church. The pre-service tradition is a time of hymn-singing. The ground floor was full of people gathered to give thanks to God in this unique setting and there were some people in the balconies as well. Pastor Sandra Wanamaker led the service. Tonight a concession has been made to convenience and the organist plays a pump organ patch from a modern keyboard. I was invited to share the platform and participate in leading the service which I did, reading Scriptures and receiving the offering for an area food pantry. One other visible piece of time warp were the little LED flashlights in evidence as folks read from their hymnbooks.

Thinking back

I could not help but think about the nearly two centuries of people who have given thanks to God in this spot. As I looked out into the dimly lit faces, I thought of preachers in by-gone eras in our country and others who preached by lantern lights. Yet the message of God’s love displayed in Christ has not changed. The Good News of salvation by faith in Jesus has not changed. And certainly, the need of humankind to give thanks for the great gifts of the heavenly Father is, if anything, even greater today, when we enjoy so many blessings of extended life, material wealth, and technology that our forefathers never dreamed of. As the Bible says,

“Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; Give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.” Ps 100:4-5 NIV

Tags American church, Thanksgiving, Washington Hill UMC

Americana Journal Joy Notes

Reflections on car shopping today

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date November 23, 2013

Thanksgiving for my Buick

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, today I am thankful first for the 7 years of good service that I have had from my 2005 Buick LeSabre. If memory serves, I purchased it late in the year in 2006 when it was a year old and had thirty-some thousand miles on it. Now it has 146,000 on it. I am thankful too for the safety we have enjoyed over all those miles. I have put very little money in it either beyond routine maintenance. It still purrs and eats up road well. It had been a rental car. But now it needs some work and its value has fallen far below the value of the work that needs to be done.

Late twentieth century car shopping

So, I have been car shopping. What a difference between car shopping today and car shopping even just fifteen years ago. Before, I would have first checked newspaper ads, especially those big auto sections in the weekly Sunday papers. Then I would have driven through the lots of dealers that I knew to see what I could find that I liked. Third, I would have called a couple trusted dealers I knew to see what they had and suggest models I had been thinking about. To check on values, I would have visited the bank and asked at the counter to see a copy of their little Kelley Blue book so I could look up the value of my trade-in and of the car I was considering. Interest rates might have been six or seven percent.

Internet car shopping is so different

But this time around, having recently moved, I did not even know where the dealers were. I just started searching on the internet. I just picked a price range and set a couple search engines going. Soon I was looking at details on cars and trucks for sale in that price range within 75 miles of my house. In the process, I learned where some of the major car and truck dealers are too. I emailed for more info right from my chair or desk. Once, I was called back within minutes. Other times I was contacted by email. I could then schedule a time to test drive the vehicle if I wanted to. What a difference over how I would have done it just a decade ago. And what is more, I’m so used to the new ways already that it just seemed like the intuitive way to do it. That’s the really scary part. Back in May when I found a new car for my wife, I had found the car on the internet also. I reflected that my feeling of naturalness about this new internet way of car shopping was an even greater measure of how truly our culture has thoroughly changed in how it does business.

I’m thankful to be getting an Equinox very soon

Now on to the news. I am also thankful to have found a car that I believe will serve us well in the future. We have chosen a 2012 Equinox LTZ AWD which I found on the internet. It is also a vehicle coming out of the rental fleets with thirty-some thousand miles. The LTZ trim will be especially helpful to me as it supplies a higher grade front seat that is six-way adjustable, a helpful feature for my chronic lower back issues. The crossover style, with its fold down rear seats will also give me room to put stuff into the car that I need to carry for projects. (I told the salesman that I can’t remember all the times I’ve had eight foot lumber inside my Buick.) I test drove the Equinox twice, once by myself and once with JoAnne along. It impressed. It is white, one of my favorite car colors. I hope to pick it up next week.

Tags cars, our move, shopping, Thanksgiving

Americana Journal Who Am I

Dating at the Fair

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date September 30, 2013

Keeping a tradition

One of the first dates I asked JoAnne to go on was to the Steuben County Fair. We remember eating spaghetti at an Italian stand where I learned how to twirl spaghetti on my fork against a spoon rather than cut it up. After that, one of our annual dates was a trip to the New York State Fair. While we lived in Syracuse, we kept this tradition going by visiting the fair annually. We love ogling all the exhibits. JoAnne seeks out the needlework shows since that is one of her hobbies. I love the farm animal and farm equipment exhibits because of my farm upbringing. Both of us enjoy historical and travel exhibits and some vendors exhibits, though there are always more of these latter type than anyone can handle. We admit, we missed our traditional trip to the NYS Fair this year. But when we heard about the Big E, an exposition for all six New England states, we jumped at the chance to go. Maybe this would be much like the Fair.

The Big E

JoAnne and I arrived through gate 10 in the late morning on Friday, Sept. 27. It was about the only day we were free to go. But the weather was perfect and it was the day the big horses were showing –perfect for me. We start with the nearest farm building which today houses an eclectic collection of alpacas, goats, and sheep. We ask a question or two of an alpaca keeper and go through the wool exhibit too. Outside is the butter sculpture. Now there is a memory—

Tags big E, family traditions, memories, state fair

Americana Journal Joy Notes Who Am I

A little inside winter fun

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date February 5, 2013

Puzzle fun

What do you do in winter when the snow is flying and the temperature is dropping? Well, among my wife’s and my favorite pastimes for winter evenings after Christmas are jigsaw puzzles. We have a collection of them and we put several together every year. Once one is together we look at it for a short time—the harder it was—the longer we look at it—then we tear it apart again and box it up again, storing all the pieces carefully in a plastic bag tied securely with a twisty so no pieces are lost. The season must always begin with JoAnne’s old favorites from childhood. They are thick Tuco ones with a piece or two missing, but what they don’t have in looks, they have in memories. Then we progress to the harder and bigger ones. We just boxed back up this one; it was 1000 pieces. The black sections were fairly tough. Now we are starting one that focuses on America’s National Parks.

Tags jigsaw puzzles, winter pastime

Americana Journal Who Am I

The Syracuse Train Show

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date November 12, 2012

A couple weeks ago on the first Saturday in November I snuck out to the annual Syracuse Train Show. It is a massive display of working train sets of all gauges and vendors of all railroad hobby items from whistles and T-shirts to new engines and cars to antique parts and postcards. The last two years it has been in the Toyota building at the State Fair grounds. It is the third largest train show in the Northeast.

I love to go for several reasons. One, I guess it is the little boy in me. My brothers and I shared an O‑gauge Lionel train set when we were children. It had one oval of track on a 4 by 8 sheet of plywood with a road painted across it in black crayon. We had a great deal of fun with it. About ten years ago Bill Quick gifted me a set very much like it, which reignited my interest in the hobby. Ever since then at our house, we have had trains around the Christmas tree.

Special features of the show that I especially look for are two. One is the Lego train display. It is amazing to see their huge colorful set-up with its speedy trains made of Lego. The other display is that of our local historical group chapter. You can see more pictures on their website. http://www.hirailers.org/modular_layouts.htm. The detail model that they are building from pictures of the old station on Erie Blvd. with the elevated tracks behind it is awesome. Their display had multiple sections. Another section included a repainted two story station that I loved. I have one like it but have not painted it yet.

This year I went to the train show with a new perspective. I’m starting to think about sharing the train hobby with my little grandson. I’ve already bought him some Thomas the Train books and this year at the fair, I went looking for a good deal on what I learned was the second most popular train set ever sold, Thomas the Train. (Number one is the Polar Express.) Thomas has just recently been reproduced with a new remote control feature that will eventually allow operators to run more than one train on the same track. This is especially nice since most Thomas stories feature more than one engine. The story has a happy ending too as I found one at a good discount and bought the vendor’s last one.

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Tags Christmas trains, model railroad, train fair

Americana Journal

Railroad golden era reminders

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date November 4, 2012

It is interesting to me how you find reminders of the Golden Age of Railroad transportation in the oddest places. Perhaps they only seem odd to me because 100 years ago railroad tracks meandered into many corners of our nation that are far from any railroad today.

A couple weeks ago, my wife and I attended the CNY-NE district pastors’ retreat at Camp of the Woods near Speculator in the Adirondacks. To my surprise and joy, sitting in a lawn was an old Erie Railroad caboose #04947. On the other side it was labeled Napierville Junction 38. The Napierville Junction Railroad went from Rouse’s Pt. NY to Montreal. This caboose was from the area when cabooses were made of wood and had rounded dome roofs. Beside it was a station freight cart. I looked the caboose up on a hobby website by its Erie number. This one was built in 1929 by Magor Car Company of New Jersey.

Why was it there? From their website, Camp of the Woods offers lodging at a cabin built onto another newer caboose—part of a strategy of offering some unique accommodations. I found a picture on their website. I missed seeing that one but will look for it if I have a chance to visit there again. I suppose the idea of staying in a caboose may have originated back in the days when tourists came to the Adirondacks by railroad rather than by motorcar since Camp of the Woods traces its history back to 1900. Was the now unused caboose on the front lawn an earlier accommodation? Maybe a reader knows.

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Tags caboose, Camp of the Woods, railfan

Americana Journal Joy Notes

Horses at the NY State Fair

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date August 31, 2012
1 Comment on Horses at the NY State Fair

Watching the horses

I don’t remember JoAnne and I ever stopping to watch the big hitches in the coliseum before. Yesterday was the day. We watched four different classes during the afternoon horse show. In the third class, the six horse hitches came roaring in.

Six horse hitches

These are the big Percheron draft horses. According to Wikipedia, “the Percheron is a breed of draft horse that originated in the Huisne river valley in northern France, part of the former Perche province from which the breed takes its name. Usually gray or black in color, Percherons are well-muscled, and known for their intelligence and willingness to work.” There was thunder in the air as each horse weighs about a ton. Three hitches came in at one time and then the ringmaster invited all nine in. It was quite a sight and sound.

Unicorn hitches

Next in were the Belgian draft horses hitched together in the unicorn formation. This consisted of a team of horses and one single horse hitched in front of the team in the center—a lead horse. Belgians are a heavy draft horse and the largest horse on record was a Belgian. I love their colors—chestnut body and contrasting ivory mane and tail. As with the six horse hitches, every hitch had a second person on board who hopped off the finely finished wagon and served as the handler of the lead horse when the team stopped. This person also was in charge of what we used to call in dairy cattle exhibiting, the showmanship aspect—helping the horses position themselves, making sure they were presentable for the judge.

JoAnne and I both enjoyed our time in the coliseum very much. If I had a little less to do, I would like to go back tomorrow when the six horse hitches will return along with eight horse hitches.

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Tags horses, state fair, summer fun

Americana Journal Joy Notes

State fair fun at the butterfly house

Post author By pastorkelvin
Post date August 30, 2012

Since our dating days, JoAnne and I have loved going to the fair. In fact, I took her to the Bath fair on one of our first dates and later to the NY State Fair. Since we have been going for many years, we look for the unique things. Usually there is something that just happens to be there that year or is happening only on the day or at the time you go that you have not seen before. This year, we found a butterfly house in the horticulture building. It was filled with monarch butterflies and was a popular attraction. For a dollar, you could attempt to feed them using a Q-tip and a nectar the keepers had prepared. We didn’t try to feed them but they loved our big sun hats as resting places. It made for some light and delightful moments as the pics show.

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Tags butterflies, state fair, sun hats

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