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Celia Thaxter’s Garden Announces Summer 2018 Tour Dates

I have always wanted to go out to Appledore Island and see Celia Thaxter’s garden, perhaps this will be my year! I had hoped to fit it in last summer but by the time I’d nailed down a date I could go all the tickets were sold out. I’ve been out to Star Island before (one of Appledore’s neighboring islands) but Appledore is special, because of Celia Thaxter and her garden.

Don’t know the story of Celia Thaxter? Let me fill you in:
Celia Laighton Thaxter was born in Portsmouth, NH in 1835. When she was a young child her family moved to Appledore Island, one of the 10 or so islands that make up the Isles of Shoals, located approximately 6 miles off the coasts of New Hampshire and Maine. (Some of the islands are part of the state of Maine, some are part of New Hampshire. Appledore happens to be located in Maine.) Her father initially held the job of lighthouse keeper on White Island (also part of the Isles of Shoals), but after several years he left that position to build and open the Appledore Hotel on Appledore Island.

Celia grew up on Appledore, and married her father’s business partner Levi Thaxter when she was just 16. The Thaxters initally lived on the mainland, in Watertown and Newburyport, Massachusetts. Celia and Levi Thaxter separated after 10 years of marriage and Celia returned to Appledore Island to both care for her mother and help with the running of her father’s hotel.

While on Appledore she met many literary and artistic luminaries of her day, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Whittier, Childe Hassam and William Morris Hunt. There are several well known paintings by Hassam of Celia Thaxter and her gardens.

Celia Thaxter had been writing prose and poetry her entire adult life, but she is most well-known for her book An Island Garden which was published a year before she died at age 58 in 1894.  In the book, Thaxter lovingly describes her beautiful gardens, which she had arranged by height, as opposed to any specific color scheme. Flowers from her garden were made into arrangements that decorated both the Appledore Hotel and her island cottage home.You can see the entire text of Thaxter’s book, An Island Garden, here: 

http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/thaxter/garden/garden.html

Celia Thaxter’s garden was reconstructed by Dr. John Kingsbury in 1977. Kingsbury was the founder and first director of the Shoals Marine Laboratory. He located the garden in the exact spot where Celia Thaxter’s garden had been, and some of her original plants still grown in the garden, including snowdrops, day lilies and the hops vine.

Now that you know a little more about Celia Thaxter, wouldn’t you love to visit Appledore and see her island garden? The Shoals Marine Laboratory runs a day trip tour limited to 34 participants per tour. It includes transportation to and from Appledore Island. The trip costs $100 per person; in addition to transportation, this fee covers a guided garden tour as well as a gourmet catered lunch. For more details, as well as the link to register, go to:

www.shoalsmarinelaboratory.org/event/celia-thaxters-garden-tours

These dates are limited and do sell out! There are only 10 tour dates, which means 340 spots. Don’t just dream of warm summer sea breezes and garden beds exploding with color, book your trip soon, or you’ll lose out like I did last summer!

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Erica Armstrong Dunbar to Speak at Saint Anselm College

Erica Armstrong Dunbar, author of the book Never Caught: The Washington’s Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge, will be speaking on Tuesday, January 23 at 7:00pm at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, NH.

This is a New Hampshire Humanities Program, officially titled, Rethinking Resistance: Ona Judge, the Washington’s Runaway Slave and the Meaning of Escape. The lecture will take place at the Dana Center For the Humanities on the Saint Anselm campus, and will be followed by a facilitated discussion led by Dr. Dr. Jennifer Thorn and Dr. Beth Salerno. It is open to the public and free to attend.

Never Caught was nominated for a 2017 National Book Award. It chronicles the story of Ona Judge and her quest for freedom. Judge was a 22 year old slave who left her position in the household of George Washington, and was then doggedly pursued by Washington, who hoped to recapture his property.

Representatives of Gibson’s Bookstore of Concord, NH will be on hand that evening to sell copies of Never Caught, and there will be a book signing opportunity.

https://www.nhhumanities.org/events/rethinking-resistance-ona-judge-washingtons-runaway-slave-and-meaning-escape

http://www.gibsonsbookstore.com/event/dunbar-at-saint-anselm

Erica Armstrong Dunbar is the Charles and Mary Beard Professor of History at Rutgers University. She also serves as Director of the Program in African American History at the Library Company of Philadelphia. Her first book, A Fragile Freedom: African American Women and Emancipation in the Antebellum City was published by Yale University Press in 2008. She is also the author of Never Caught: The Washingtons’ Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave Ona Judge.

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Ticket Alert: Mary and the Witch’s Flower – Premiere Screening January 18th

Mary and the Witch’s Flower is the first film from Studio Ponoc, under the direction of Hiromasa Yonebayashi. If the style of animation looks familiar, you’ve likely seen some of Studio Ghibli’s films! Yonebayashi worked as an animator on both Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle (Classic Ghibli movies!) and he was also the director of The Secret World of Arietty. Mary and the Witch’s Flower promises more of the same gorgeous animation that made Studio Ghibli world renowned.

The story of Mary and the Witch’s Flower is adapted from the novel The Little Broomstick by Mary Stewart. (Fans of Arthurian legend may recognize Mary Stewart’s name from her beloved Merlin Trilogy: The Hollow Hills, The Last Enchantment, and The Crystal Cave.) The story follows Mary on an action packed adventure, described as “a heartfelt story of a young girl trying to find her place in the world.” Check out the trailer below:

Mary and the Witch’s Flower’s premiere screening is next Thursday, January 18th. Go to https://www.fathomevents.com/events/mary-and-the-witchs-flower to see where the movie is playing in your area. This is a one night only event! Some theaters have the dubbed version (playing at 7:00pm), others have a subtitled version (playing at 8:00pm), so be sure to check the details carefully when purchasing your tickets. This is a national event, with over 500 theaters participating in screening the film. Tickets can be purchased through the Fathom Events website.