FAQs about the
intersection between "Business"
and "History" as we
explain it at
History Smiths.
Please let us know if
we left out your question!
(Just click on the image.)
| 
|
|
|
|
Greetings!
Please consider this the mid-holidays edition of Connections, because I hope you will allow me to share some thoughts (below) on telling and capturing the stories from your family history. As we approach the winter holidays, we have another opportunity to do just that now that Thanksgiving/harvest time has passed. It's so important to do!
Naturally, some of those family stories will involve business history because they are intertwined. If it is appropriate, can you share the information you gather with your historical society or public library?
And on the subject of business and history, we've just added a FAQ (frequently asked questions) section to the Web site because, as Desi would say to Lucy, I am often asked to "'splain myself." I thought it might be helpful to offer our FAQs and answers here!
Those of us in the Boston area are now officially bracing for winter. More on that later, because complaining about the weather is an old New England tradition....
Be well, and keep in touch!
Bonnie
P.S. I know that many of you are interested in the subject of girls' and women's financial literacy, as am I, and I am pleased to share my new article, below, that draws on works from 1792 and 1793 by Judith Sargent Murray (my long-time, personal historical subject). I had great fun connecting the dots from her to today. Easily done!
 Bonnie Hurd Smith |
Telling and Saving Family Stories
During the Holidays
by Bonnie Hurd Smith
 | | What will our kids know about their grandparents? |
The holidays are a time for nostalgia -- stories are told, memories shared, new audiences enthralled. Please don't let these moments go by without capturing them for future generations of your family -- and even for your community!
We have just passed through the Thanksgiving or harvest holidays and coming up are winter celebrations. Think about planning how to document the stories told by your older relatives, and ways you can get them to
talk.
Many of you have probably been involved in formal oral history projects, or in more informal "let's get grandma to talk for the camera" projects at home. It's tricky, because you really need to ferret out the information in a way that makes your subject comfortable. Plenty of older people love to reminisce, but others feel very awkward about "being recorded before they die."
Some of my friends hail from an oral history tradition and the stories
survive through the generations. But many of us do not, and the stories
are lost if they are not somehow documented. (continued)
|
Judith Sargent Murray on Women, Money,
and "Reverencing" Ourselves
 | | Essayist Judith Sargent Murray |
by Bonnie Hurd Smith
In 1793, Judith Sargent Murray of Gloucester, Massachusetts, wrote in an essay, "Was I the father of a family ... I would give my daughters every
accomplishment which I thought proper, and to crown all, I would early accustom them to habits of industry, and order; they should be taught with precision the art economical, they should be enabled to procure for themselves the necessaries of life, independence should be placed within their grasp, and I would teach them 'to reverence themselves.'"
Her essay, written under the male pen name "Mr. Gleaner," appeared in the Massachusetts Magazine, which circulated throughout the young American nation and "across the pond" to Great Britain. At the time, women could not vote or own property, with some minor exceptions. Very few methods of earning money were available to them, and they certainly could not control it. Simply put, girls were expected to marry, have children, and be taken care of by men -- period. (continued)
|
|
|
|
|
