North Shore of Boston, Cape Ann, Ipswich, Essex

Monday, after a good breakfast at the hotel, we drove up the North Shore of Boston through Cape Ann, Glouchester, Rockport, Ipswich (see the Clam Box - the sweetest clams I've ever eaten - truly YUMMY!), and Essex before returning to Manchester, NH to fly home. It was cloudy, but quite pleasant, and we loved taking the quiet, back roads past perfect villages and the ocean.

We particulary sought out properties owned by the SPNEA (Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities) - Cogswell's Grant (the peach colored house), Spence-Peirce-Little Farm, and the Coffin House. At the farm we saw the sheep and the goat peeking around the barn, and we passed an alpaca farm on the lane coming into the farm. That was lots of fun. Nothing was open on a Monday, but we'll hope to come back on a weekend to go inside.

Wish you could've been with us, Mom, but hope these photos bring back some happy memories for you.

Cambridge Sunday, September 9, 2007

Sunday, we went to the Cambridge farmer's market outside the Charles Hotel, followed by a cooking class and lunch with Chef Jody Adams of Rialto. She's a longtime favorite of ours, so we try to eat with her everytime we come to Boston. Antipasto, fresh cheese ravioli, stripped bass with corn & tomato sauce, spice cake. It was terrific. After that we bought a Boston Globe, clam chowder from Legal Seafood, and chocolates for dinner at our hotel. A relaxing day.

Bleu performance, Boston, 9-8-07

We had a easy flight to Manchester, NH, on Southwest Airlines, where we picked up a rental car for the easy one-hour drive to Cambridge. We checked into the hotel, changed, then took the T (subway) over to the concert venue, the Bank of America Pavillion. Will asked Louis to bring along his tuxedo, in case one of the band or choir members forgot theirs, so we dropped that off before dinner at Salvatore's across the street. It was very hot, so I think he regretted his big idea to wear the tuxes, but they DID look nice. The young lady in the black baseball cap is Kiku, our friend from Tokyo who comes to Will's concerts several times each year. She's a trooper. There were about 5,000 people at the concert by the time Will's set ended. It was fun and exciting. So glad we could come east for this one.

Welcome students back, Evan's book, Westcott House

A busy, gratifying week..........classes started Monday, Aug. 27th, and we hosted a Library welcome-back with lemonade and cookies Wednesday from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. The big hit this year is plastice ice cubes with a changing, colored light! Activated by two metal tabs on the bottom, it lasts up to 60 hours. I'd seen them at a conference, and Peggy was able to order them with "Denison Library" printed on top. Wayyyy cool.

Friday Louis and I drove to Springfield/Yellow Springs, Ohio for a celebratory dinner with our dear friend and mentor, Evan Ira Farber, College Librarian Emeritus at Earlham College and the modern father of library instruction. The book is a compilation of his writings over a 45 year career, including some important unpublished works. The project started in 2003 when I conducted an oral history with Evan about his life, ideas, and achievements. Pulling together the publication from so many excellent possibilities was a huge task, and fortunately, David Gansz, then Director of Wilmington College's library, took that on. The final piece of the puzzle was getting it published, which Earlham's current library director and premier Evan protoge, Tom Kirk, achieved through the Earlham Press. It's an important contribution to the professional literature, and we're all just thrilled with it. The celebration in Yellow Spring, OH (home of Antioch College and half-way between Granville and Richmond, Indiana where Earlham is) included Evan, Tom and Betsey Kirk, David and Regan Gansz, Louis and I. A highlight of the decade.

We took time in the afternoon to visit a newly restored Frank Lloyd Wright home in Springfield, OH. Ohio's only FLW prairie-style house, Westcott House was built on Springfield's millionaires' row, High St., in the first decade of the 20th century for an industrialist and early auto manufacturer and his wife. The street and the house eventually fell on hard times. Westcott house was broken up into apartments for decades and suffered terrible structural damage, until the FLW Conversancy bought it in 2000 and subsequently sold it to a local foundation. The foundation spent $5.8 million and 4 years to restore it. There was also LOTS of volunteer time, expertise, and in-kind donations, explaining the relatively low cost of such a massive project. The street is also coming back now, thanks to a wildly successful Cincinnati financier who remembered his home town in his substantial will.

With hesitation I say that "things will settle down a bit" this week, because with the second week of classes there's a semblance of routine. Probably won't be too calm, though, if life goes on with its usual pace......Fine by me.