The Annual Garden Party on May 20 honors the many wonderful volunteers that have put in so many years of service for the Dames and Stenton. Some have served more than forty years.  Their efforts have made Stenton what it is today. Stenton would like to acknowledge their contributions. We hope we got all of you!

Anne Bates, Viola Bement, Daphne Bettle, Mary Blake, Patty Billings, Marion Bruce, Jane Burtis, Bobbie Cauffman, Dodie Cauffman, Hughes Cauffman, Lil Chance, Shirley Daniels, Eddie Dixon, Marjorie Fletcher, Betsy Halberstadt, Joan Havens, Bizann Herd, Joe Hoeffel, Nadine Hoffman, Emily Jackson, Ann Johnson, Robin Keisman, Joyce Lewis, Marty Lewis, Christine Linde, Betty Lippincot, Tenny Marshall, Louise McCabe, Bev Montgomery, Helen Nemir, Margaret Richardson, Eleanor Sayre, Charlie Schaefer, Margie Schiffer, Pat Schwab, Nancy Siedlarz, Betsy Slattery, Nancy Spaeth, Sis Stuart, Liz Theime, Bonnie Tubbs, Nancy Wessells, Gigi Westbrook, Nora Wetherill, Jane Ziegler

History Hunters Bus Trip A Success

On April 1, a group of close to twenty enthusiastic participants boarded a Tropiano minibus in Bryn Mawr, bound for Germantown as the Friends of Stenton's History Hunters Bus Tour of Germantown sites began. The bus tour was designed to familiarize members and non-members alike with the collaborative History Hunters Youth Reporter Program and the four sites that participating schools visit during the year-long education program: Stenton, Cliveden of the National Trust, Wyck and the Johnson House. 

 April showers held off as we arrived at our first stop of the day, Cliveden, for a look at the site where the Battle of Germantown occurred more than 225 years ago. A highlight of the tour was a visit from Sergeant William O'Chester, a member of the Fourth Continental Light Dragoons (real life interpreter and reenactor Bill O'Chester) who explained to us his uniform, equipment and weaponry. We also had an interesting guided "walk through" of the Chew house and looked at some of the hands-on activities that students take part in during the History Hunters program.

After Cliveden, it was on to Wyck for an overview of the school tour and activities that comprise the History Hunters tour at this fascinating historic house museum, followed by a delicious box lunch in Wyck's award-winning new education building.  Following lunch, our bus headed back up Germantown Avenue to the Johnson House, where we learned about the long and rich history of this house and its involvement and associations with the Underground Railroad and the Abolition Movement. The day's program concluded with a short "History Hunters" tour and tea at Stenton, and a bus ride back to Bryn Mawr.  Participants thoroughly enjoyed this opportunity to learn more about our exciting education program and to visit a few of the many wonderful treasures in historic Germantown.  Interest has already been expressed in repeating the tour, for those who were unable to attend as well as in scheduling future bus tours to visit some of Germantown's historic sites and museums. Watch for more information in future editions of the newsletter.

A Tribute to the Garden Chair

In the language of Stenton, Lil means garden.  "How is Lil?" means, "How is the garden?"  "What has Lil been up to?" means, "What is going on in the Garden."  And, any proposal for the garden or landscape is always prefaced with the question, "Have we asked Lil?" That of course assumes that questions about the garden are asked by anyone other than Lil.

Lilian Chance, one of the most steadfast, intelligent and creative members of the Stenton Committee, is the long-time Gardens and Grounds Chair, and her accumulated wisdom about the Stenton landscape is one of the great repositories of Stenton knowledge.  In earlier days she also served as Stenton Chair, with a dedication to Stenton's history and preservation equaled by few.  In the 1980s she was the driving force behind the Historic Structures Report for Stenton, and she has continued to encourage this rigorous scholarship through the more recent Cultural Resource Inventory of the Colonial Revival Garden as well as service on the team to develop Stenton’s Interpretive Plan.

Tough, strong-minded but tremendously fair and warmly engaging, Lil is seen at all times of year, often on hands and knees, weeding the garden, planting flowers, giving direction to arborists, removing small trees with a weed wrench, chasing dogs and doing anything else needed by this property that she loves so well.  She is a joy to work with, makes terrific soup, and is exactly the sort of Stenton Dame that has made James Logan's country estate the great success it is today.

Focus on Women's History: Women Advancing

This spring heralds the beginning of a year long celebration of women's history in the Delaware Valley.  Created by the Valley Forge Convention & Visitors Bureau, Women Advancing marks the 85th anniversary of women's voting rights in America. Organized as a series of events, performances and exhibits throughout the five-county region of Philadelphia, Montgomery, Chester, Bucks and Delaware Counties, Women Advancing will celebrate women of all races and creeds in every realm of the arts, politics, abolition, and preservation.

The celebration, which kicks off in June 2004 and runs through September 2005, is a natural match for Stenton.  Women have played important roles in saving and making history at Stenton. According to family legend, Dinah, a freed slave, spared the mansion from being burned by the British during the American Revolution and went to great lengths to keep her family intact despite the conditions of slavery. Deborah Logan became a well-known literary figure and historian, especially in her circle of women writers in and around Philadelphia in the late 18th century.  The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania has been actively involved for over a century in the restoration of Colonial buildings and the preservation of colonial history. 

We hope you'll join us on Saturday June 26 from 12 – 4 pm, The Women of Stenton: Deborah, Dinah and the Dame, will explore the lives of these remarkable women, as well as introduce visitors to many of the crafts and domestic duties of the colonial period.  There will be house tours throughout the afternoon, visitors can "meet" Dinah, the enslaved African housekeeper at Stenton, shell work, weaving, spinning, dairying and other related domestic activities. We will once again have animals on site, providing some sense of the active farm that Stenton was in the late 18th and early 19th-centuries, and tea will be served.

A highlight of the day will be a lecture and booksigning by Susan Stabile, Associate Professor of English at Texas A&M, at 4:00 pm.  Her recently published book, Memory's Daughters: The Material Culture of Remembrance in Eighteenth-Century America, has much to say about Deborah Logan, as well as the literary women with whom she exchanged thousands of poems and maintained elaborate handwritten commonplace books of memorabilia. Memory's Daughters shows that these female writers sought to memorialize their lives and aesthetic experience—a purpose that stands in marked contrast to the civic concerns of male authors in the republican era.

This special event at Stenton is part of the Women’s Weekend in Philadelphia's Historic Northwest, a joint effort sponsored by Historic Germantown Preserved.  Other Germantown houses - Deshler-Morris House, Wyck, and Cliveden - will be open with special programs, and then on Sunday June 27th Grumblethorpe, Ebenezer Maxwell Mansion and the Johnson House will have additional women's history programs. Please join us for what promises to be an exciting series of events to kick-off Women Advancing.

Preservation Plan

Over the course of the last year, Curator Laura Stutman has been working with the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts to create a Preservation Plan for the Stenton collection.  This is through the Advanced Stewardship Program, administered by CCAHA with a grant from the William Penn Foundation.  This project, which has gone hand in hand with our strategic planning, will guide our collections care and preservation practices over the next several years.

DamesLines: The lastest news from The Colonial Dames of America in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

Featured Article: "Ahead of Their Time: The Colonial Dames and Their Vision for Stenton as Expressed in the Furnishings of the House, 1899-1939 (Part I)"

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