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New Hampshire

How the Presidential Range Got Its Names and Started a Bunch of Arguments

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In the 19th century, New Hampshire went into a frenzy of naming the White Mountains, from Attitash (the Indian name for blueberries) to Zealand (no one knows why). That changed in 1890, when the federal government began tightening control over the haphazard naming of geographic features—much to the displeasure of those with their own ideas about naming the Presidential Range.

Controversies over the names of New Hampshire’s tallest mountains began in the 19th century, continued into the 21st century. They may well go on into the 22nd.

The White Mountains

Though Maine and Vermont have their share of mountain peaks, the Whites are the most intensely mapped and hiked in New England. They have the highest concentration of named summits, including 48 4,000-foot peaks. Maine only has 14 4,000-footers, Vermont five.

Massachusetts and Connecticut don’t have any 4,000-footers, and you can forget about Rhode Island. Its highest peak is the 812-footer, Jerimoth Hill, in Foster. (Though some joke its highest peak is the 550-foot landfill in Johnston.)

The New Hampshire Presidential Range, located mostly in northernmost Coos County, has the tallest of the tall peaks. The 13  Presidentials include eight 14,000-footers. They also boast the highest mountain in the Northeast, Mount Washington. The 6,288.2-footer got its name during the earliest days of white White Mountain exploration. In 1784, two prominent intellectuals, Jeremy Belknap and Manasseh Cutler,  climbed Mount Washington. Cutler was the first to publish the name Mount Washington, in his report on the expedition. Belknap used it in 1792 in the third volume of his “History of New Hampshire.”

Mount Washington from Intervale, N.H.

Even then the naming of the mountain stirred up controversy. Thirty-two years later, Dr. Jacob Bigelow led another expedition to the mountaintop. The party left behind a note in a bottle inscribed with the Abenaki name for the mountain. “Mount Agiochook Conquered, We leave this behind,” the note said.

The name “Washington,” however, pretty much inoculates a geographic feature against a challenge. And so Mount Washington kept its name.

O-be-joyful

By 1820, the civic leaders of Lancaster, N.H., decided to have a party naming the rest of the mountains in the Presidential Range.

Tourists had begun to travel to the White Mountains by then. The Crawford family, after whom the notch is named, began it all in 1790 when they moved to the Whites and started building inns.

On July 31, 1820, the Lancaster men began their journey. They hired Ethan Allen Crawford, the son of the Crawford family patriarch, as their guide. Then they loaded their baggage on Crawford like a pack mule and added their coats as they started to climb the mountains.

When they reached the summit of Mount Washington, they began to name the surrounding mountains. They named the second highest mountain after the second president, John Adams, the third highest after Thomas Jefferson. Then they named the fifth highest peak after James Madison and the fourth highest—by 5 feet–after James Monroe, the current president.

But they’d run out of presidents. So they named the sixth highest peak after someone of presidential stature–Mount Franklin, after Ben.

They still had another mountain to name, so they called it Mount Pleasant.

The Lancaster men included among their provisions an adult beverage called “o-be-joyful.” They eponymously toasted the mountains and the statesmen they’d named them after.

The Mountains in Words and Pictures

By the mid-19th century, painters and writers took to the mountains to ply their trades. In the process, they promoted tourism to the Whites.

Nathaniel Hawthorne visited, wrote a short story, “The Great Stone Face,” and got a brook and a waterfall named after himself.

Mount Washington by Benjamin Champney

Benjamin Champney often painted the White Mountains and founded an artist colony in North Conway, N.H. He got a brook and a trail named after him on Mount Chocorua. Artists Brook and Artists Falls took their names from artists who painted their splendor. However, the falls became a favorite subject not because of their splendor but because they were easy to get to.

Throughout the mid-19th century, the Whites hosted geologists like Charles Hitchcock, cartographers like Philip Carrigain and botanists like Edward Tuckerman. They gave their own names and others to the mountains’ geographic features. One almost-president who actually climbed the White Mountains got one named after him: Daniel Webster.

More Names for the Presidential Range

Thomas Starr King in 1859 wrote a White Mountain guidebook packed with bombast.  “The White Hills: Their Legends, Landscapes and Poetry,” served up such grandiloquence as “the richest feasts of loveliness and grandeur … are spread by the Summer around the valleys.”

King paid a visit to the Presidential Range, and he noticed Mount Adams had three peaks. In his book, he named the second peak after the seventh president, John Quincy Adams. The name stuck.

In 1876, MIT professor Edward Charles Pickering and entomologist Samuel Hubbard Scudder sent invitations to their academic friends to join their new organization, the Appalachian Mountain Club. The goal: to map the White Mountains, create trails and build campsites and shelters. They also established a Committee on Nomenclature to study mountain names.

AMC members got started right away by jokingly referring to the third peak on Mount Adams as “Sam Adams.” That name stuck, too.

It seemed anyone could name any of the White Mountains. If a name spread by word of mouth in nearby towns, it would stick. The U.S. government had no formal organization or protocol for naming peaks.

Naming Gets Formal, Finally

Finally, the willy-nilly naming of geographical features ended. In 1890, President Benjamin Harrison issued an executive order creating the Board on Geographic Names (USBGN) as the standard authority on all unsettled questions about geographic names.

Harrison did not get a peak named after him for his troubles. Others who did, but not in the Presidential Range, include Abraham Lincoln, James A. Garfield, Calvin Coolidge and Grover Cleveland. The Presidential Range does have a Mount Jackson—but named in 1848  after New Hampshire state geologist Charles T. Jackson, not President Andrew Jackson.

The town formerly known as Adams

But a town that lies in the shadow of the Presidential Range does bear the seventh president’s name. Adams was originally named after John Adams in 1800. But his son, John Quincy, fought two bitter battles for the presidency with Andrew Jackson. John Quincy won the first election but lost the second in 1828. The town of Adams, presumably a hotbed of Jacksonian democracy, voted  in 1829 to change its name to Jackson.

More Presidents

The USBGN may have thought it had the last word on geographic names, but it has had to think again. In 1913, the New Hampshire state Legislature renamed one of the Presidential mountains. It named Mount Clinton (after New York Gov. DeWitt Clinton) after Franklin Pierce, the only U.S. president born in New Hampshire.

The USBGN went along with Mount Pierce, but the AMC did not. Perhaps because of its contempt for Pierce’s dismal presidency, the AMC continued to publish maps calling the mountain “Mount Clinton.”

In 1969, former President Dwight D. Eisenhower died. His assistant and former New Hampshire governor, Sherman Adams, lobbied for a Mount Eisenhower in the Presidential Range. The Legislature tossed out Mount Pleasant and brought in Mount Eisenhower. In 1970, the USBGN put its stamp of approval on the change.

The USBGN Giveth and Taketh Away

The Legislature then in 2003 passed a law that said Mount Clay, named after presidential candidate Henry Clay, “shall hereafter be called and known as Mount Reagan.” The USBGN refused to make the change. New Hampshire state documents continue to refer to the mountain formerly known as “Clay” as Mount Reagan.

Mount Jefferson and Mount Clay

As late as 2000, two minor subpeaks of Mount Adams still didn’t have names. With one subpeak named Quincy and the other Sam, the USBGN in 2010 agreed to name one Mount Abigail Adams. The other remains Adams 5. Perhaps fans of Clover, Henry, Brooks, Mitch or the two Charles Francis Adams would like to lobby the USBGN for one of their names just to keep it in the family.

The USBGN eventually moved to the Department of the Interior, and in the ’60s and ’70s it began to eliminate the use of derogatory terms for Japanese, Black and Indigenous people.

President Donald Trump gave it a new task in his 2025 executive order, Restoring Names That Honor American Greatness.

 

Images: Mount Washington By Kyle Corry – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=50406610. Mount Adams By Fredlyfish4 – Own workhttps://web.archive.org/web/20161015012058/http://www.panoramio.com/photo/39614533, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54220238.Mount Jefferson By AlexiusHoratius – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=26757996.Northeast Appalachians graphic By File:NortheastAppalachiansMap.jpg: PflyAI upscaling, conversion to gif: Hike395 – This file was derived from: NortheastAppalachiansMap.jpg:, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=139285383. Mount Clay By Fredlyfish4 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=35487536. Featured image illustration created by ChatGPT. Mount Washington from Intervale By Harvey Barrison – originally posted to Flickr as White Mountains_12 30 09_81, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10396490. Mount Jefferson and Mount Clay By EgorovaSvetlana – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=148392603.

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Ken Burns’ The American Revolution: Your Guide to Visiting the Historic Sites

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You’ve seen the American Revolution unfold on screen in Ken Burns’s The American Revolution—through paintings, documents, narration, reenactments and footage of the landscapes where history happened. What Burns did on PBS, you can do for yourself on foot.

Across New England, the places where ordinary people and famous leaders pushed the colonies toward rebellion still stand—often right beside modern life.

Ken Burns’ The American Revolution Episode I

The series opens before war, in a world of mounting tension.

Benjamin Franklin’s 1754 “Join, or Die” cartoon foreshadowed the need for unity. Though Franklin left Boston at 17, a bust still marks his birthplace on Milk Street.

John and Abigail Adams, whose words frame Ken Burns’s narrative, lived with the fear that Revolution could unleash chaos as easily as liberty. Adams National Historical Park in Quincy preserves their story in three buildings where the Adams family lived and worked for generations.

The trouble started with the British victory in the French and Indian War, which brought crushing debt—and new taxes. Then Parliament passed the Stamp Act of 1765, which taxed printed paper. It enraged printers and readers alike because they didn’t want to be taxed without representation. On Boston’s Freedom Trail, you can now visit the Printing Office of Edes and Gill, publishers of revolutionary newspapers. You can also see their presses at the Museum of Printing in Haverhill Mass.

Peacefield, a house Abigail Adams bought while John was away in Europe. Ken Burns quotes extensively from both Adams in his documentary.

Samuel Adams, a brilliant propagandist, rallied resistance. His likeness hangs today at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Stamp Act riots followed across the colonies, including Newport, R.I., where protests at The Old Colony House forced stamp distributors to resign. The Newport Historical Society now runs the little-changed Old Colony House as a museum.

The Townshend Duties

Parliament repealed the Stamp Act, but tensions escalated when it passed the Townshend Duties. In order to police unruly Boston, British troops arrived in the town in 1768, landing at Long Wharf, which still exists. Nearby stands the Gardiner Building, once John Hancock’s counting house and now the Chart House restaurant serving seafood and steak. (Hancock’s beanpot hangs from the ceiling.)

On March 5, 1770, a confrontation outside the Old State House ended with British soldiers firing into a crowd—the Boston Massacre. A pavement marker shows where it happened; the victims lie buried in the Granary Burying Ground. Paul Revere’s famous engraving ensured the event would never be forgotten. You can visit his house, in Boston’s North End, year-round.

The Old Statehouse, another spot on Boston’s Freedom Trail mentioned in Ken Burns’ documentary..

Resistance then spread outward. In New Hampshire, the Pine Tree Riot erupted in 1772; a marker in Weare commemorates it. In Rhode Island, colonists burned the grounded customs ship Gaspee, an act still celebrated each summer during Gaspee Days.

The Tea Party

The crisis peaked in Boston. At the Old South Meeting House, citizens debated what to do with taxed tea. On Dec, 16, 1773, they dumped it into the harbor. Today, you can visit Old South, Griffin’s Wharf and the Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum to see where it all happened.

Boston Tea Party Ship & Museum, Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Parliament’s response—the Intolerable Acts—closed Boston’s port, revoked Massachusetts’ charter and replaced elected officials with those appointed by the Crown. Protesters forced all the King’s men to resign. Local historical societies reenact the protests that shut down local government at the original courthouses in Barnstable, Mass., and Westminster, Vt.

Sympathy poured in from other colonies; church bells rang in Lebanon, Conn., whose Green remains rich with Revolutionary history.

By 1774, armed resistance had become organized. Militia companies created special units that drilled as minutemen. When Gen. Thomas Gage sent troops to seize gunpowder in Charlestown, Mass., alarm bells rang across the countryside. The powder house still stands in the middle of a rotary in what is now Powder House Square in Somerville.

The violence escalated. A boy rammed his sled by mistake into a minor customs official, John Malcolm. George Hewes, a veteran of the Boston tea party remonstrated with Malcolm, who beat him senseless. Malcolm was tarred and feathered. Hewes’ portrait hangs in the Old Statehouse, now a museum.

George Robert Twelves Hewes

Patriots formed committees of safety and prepared for war. In 1774, 12 colonies sent delegates to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. John Adams commented that every delegate was a “great man” who must on every question show his oratory, his criticism, and his political abilities. Gage told King George they were a motley crew. You can see John Singleton Copley’s painting of Thomas Gage at the Yale Center for British Art.

A Crackdown Backfires

Gage received orders to crack down on the colonists. John Hancock and Sam Adams left Boston for their safety, staying at a friend’s house in Lexington, on the way to Concord. The  Lexington Historical Society operates the Hancock Clarke House as a museum.

Early one morning in April 1775, British troops stealthily marched out of Boston toward Concord. Patriot Joseph Warren got wind of their plan and told Paul Revere. Portraits of both Revere and Warren hang at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.

Two lanterns were ordered hung from Old North to warn people the British would row across the Charles River. You can visit Old North, and you can also visit the grave of the sexton who hung the lanterns. Robert Newman, in Boston.

Paul Revere and William Dawes rode to Lexington to alert Hancock and Adams and the local militia. Markers along the route commemorate their historic rides. Dawes and Revere are both buried in Boston.

A Shot Heard ‘Round the World

Lexington’s militia assembled on the Green to face the British. A shot rang out, and the firing began, mostly by the British. Lexington has preserved its historic Green, which has monuments, markers and a visitors center.  Every Patriots Day in Massachusetts, living history units reenact the battle.

Old North Bridge

The British marched on to Concord and began ransacking the town. The American militia skirmished with them at the Old North Bridge. A replica of the Old North Bridge is part of the 1,038-acre Minute Man National Historic Park.

The British then retreated along the Battle Road as colonial militiamen fired at them from behind trees and fences. The British suffered heavy casualties as they marched through Menotomy (now Arlington). Now on Patriots Day, reenactors perform tactical demonstrations of the shooting, accompanied with lectures, workshops and living history events.

The Battle Road looks much as it did in 1775.

Part II of the Ken Burns Documentary Series

After Lexington and Concord, New England became the war’s engine.

By nightfall on April 19, 1775,, thousands of militiamen had surrounded Boston, beginning the Siege of Boston.

Over the next 11 months, British troops trashed the town, turning Faneuil Hall into a theater and Old South into a riding ring.

A month after Lexington and Concord, Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold captured Fort Ticonderoga. A few days later, Seth Warner subsequently took Fort Crown Point, also in northern New York. By seizing the lightly defended forst, they secured the artillery that Henry Knox would later haul to Boston. The Knox Cannon Trail marks his legendary winter journey, and Fort Ticonderoga, now a museum, offers a robust program of living history events.

fort-ticonderoga-today

Fort Ticonderoga today.

On June 17, 1775, the bloody fight at Bunker Hill proved the colonists could stand against British regulars.  A 221-foot-tall granite monument and a museum commemorate the battle on Breeds Hill, where the fight took place.

As the Siege of Boston dragged on, George Washington arrived in Cambridge in July 1775 to take command of the Continental Army. His headquarters, later home to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, is now a National Park Service site.

THE LONGFELLOW-WASHINGTON HOUSE

Washington’s Headquarters during the Siege of Boston

The war widened quickly. Benedict Arnold led a brutal expedition through Maine toward Quebec, hoping to capture the British fortress there. You can retrace his route today by driving along the Arnold Expedition Route. (Look for markers.)

Meanwhile the British vowed to lay waste to the ports that provided safe harbor for American privateers wreaking havoc on British shipping. Lt. Henry Mowatt began by bombarding Falmouth (now Portland) in Maine. He burned the entire town in October. A plaque marks Fort Allen, earthworks at the time of British bombardment of Falmouth.

1776

On New Year’s Day, 1776, George Washington ordered a new “Continental Union” flag raised atop Prospect Hill overlooking Boston. A tower marks the spot today in what is now Somerville, Mass. Every New Year’s Day, the City of Somerville reenacts the raising of the first flag of the United States.

The first American flag flying over Prospect Hill in Somerville, Mass.

On March 17, 1776, British commander William Howe evacuated Boston for Halifax, taking 10,000 soldiers and more than 1,100 Loyalist civilians. Washington had driven them out by mounting the artillery from Ticonderoga on Dorchester Heights. Dorchester Heights is now a National Historic Site and public park.

Expecting the British to strike New York next, Washington moved his army south.

Far to the north, Benedict Arnold’s assault on Quebec collapsed as smallpox ravaged his troops, forcing a retreat to Crown Point. Britain escalated by hiring thousands of German mercenaries. New Hampshire delegate Josiah Bartlett, commemorated on the Kingston town green, warned the war would grow harder.

To secure French aid, the colonies declared independence. Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration; Rhode Island’s Stephen Hopkins, signing despite palsy, declared, “My hand trembles, but my heart does not.” You can visit Stephen Hopkins’ home in Providence, R.I., now a historic house museum.

In Boston, the Declaration was read aloud and the king’s arms torn down at the Old State House. It’s now a museum on the Freedom Trail.

Episode III of Ken Burns’ The American Revolution

By June 29, 1776, the British landed 10,000 troops in New York. The war had become both a fight for independence and a civil war. Patriots imprisoned Loyalists in places like Newgate Prison in Simsbury, Conn. You can visit the prison, an old copper mine, now run by the State of Connecticut as an archaeological preserve.

Washington spread his forces thin; Nathanael Greene fortified Brooklyn but fell ill. Israel Putnam, a brave but not very bright general, replaced him and left a key road unguarded. Connecticut Landmarks owns and operates the Putnam Farm in Brooklyn, Conn.

The British routed the Americans at the Battle of Long Island, capturing Gen. John Sullivan. A plaque and memorial in Sullivan’s hometown of Durham, N.H., honor his service.

constitution-fort-sewall

Fort Sewall today

Trapped on Brooklyn Heights, Washington narrowly saved his army when John Glover’s Marblehead mariners miraculously ferried 9,000 men across the East River under cover of darkness. Glover’s Regiment still exists as a living history unit. Every Fourth of July, they fire off cannon at Fort Sewall, where they garrisoned for a time, in Marblehead, Mass.

Manhattan soon fell, Loyalists flooded the city, and on Sept. 21, 1776, New York burned. The British hanged captured spy Nathan Hale. Hale’s homestead, now a house museum. stands in Coventry, Conn.

The Northern Theater

Meanwhile, the Americans feared a British invasion from Canada, while disease weakened their forces at Ticonderoga and Crown Point.

You can visit the site of Fort Crown Point, which features the ruins of the stone barracks and stunning views of Lake Champlain.

The soldiers from different colonies fought among themselves, so the New Englanders were sent to the opposite shore to build Mount Independence. Mount Independence State Historic Site, opposite Ticonderoga, stands as one of America’s largest and most preserved Revolutionary sites. A museum showcases exhibits and artifacts.

On Lake Champlain, Arnold hastily built a small fleet and fought the British at Valcour Island in October 1776. Though defeated, the battle convinced the British  it would be harder to capture Fort Ticonderoga than they had thought, and it started to snow. They decided to invade in the spring.

The Lake Champlain Maritime Museum in Vergennes, Vt., has artifacts and a replica gunboat from the Battle of Valcour Island.

Episode IV of The American Revolution

The fourth episode begins with a quote from Mercy Otis Warren: “No suffering which Britain can inflict will reduce America to submission.”

Mercy Otis Warren lived in Barnstable, Mass., on Cape Cod. Drive by the Barnstable County Courthouse and you’ll see a bronze statue of her.

The Continental Army abandoned Manhattan. As Washington retreated across New Jersey, British and Hessian troops occupied Newport, R.I.  You can visit several sites in Newport to learn about the British occupation of the town.

Mercy Otis Warren is quoted often in Ken Burns documentary on the American Revolution. A bronze statue of her stands in front of Barnstable County Courthouse.

Washington struck back at Trenton on Christmas night, crossing the Delaware with Glover’s regiment and artillery under Henry Knox. The Hessians surrendered, reviving American morale.

Learn more about Henry Knox at Montpelier, a museum/replica of his home in Thomaston, Maine, and John Glover at his house in Marblehead, now a museum that offers guided tours.

Cornwallis chased Washington across New Jersey, only to lose the Battle of Princeton on Jan. 3, 1777.

John Trumbull, an aide-de-camp to Washington, later painted a scene from the Battle of Princeton. You can see it at the Yale University Art Gallery.

The Death of General Mercer at the Battle of Princeton

The Turning Point: Saratoga

In 1777, Gen. John Burgoyne invaded from Canada, forcing the Continentals to abandon Forts Ticonderoga and Crown Point. Burgoyne then beat the retreating Americans at the Battle of Hubbardton. But then he lost 15 percent of his army at the Battle of Bennington because John Stark defeated and captured hundreds of Hessians on a foraging expedition.

Vermont celebrates Bennington Battle Day as a state holiday, and the Battle of Bennington Monument commemorates the victory. Owned by Vermont since 1937, Hubbardton Battlefield hosts annual Revolutionary War reenactments and features a visitor center with a permanent exhibit on the battle. John Stark, New Hampshire’s great hero, returned to his farm in Derryfield, N.H. (now Manchester). It’s now on the National Register of Historic Places. You can also see his words on New Hampshire license plates: Live Free or Die.

Burgoyne pushed on but was stopped at Saratoga, where fierce fighting at Freeman’s Farm and Bemis Heights ended in surrender. The victory would bring France openly into the war.

Take a driving tour of the battlefield at Saratoga National Historic Park, which includes the Surrender Field in Schuylerville. The visitor center in Stillwater explains the whole battle.  

Episode V

In the Mid-Atlantic, the British captured Philadelphia. Washington camped nearby in the winter of 1777-78 at Valley Forge, while Benjamin Franklin secured French alliance in Paris. Pvt. Joseph Plumb Martin described the suffering at Valley Force in his memoirs, from which Ken Burns quotes liberally. You can buy a copy of Martin’s memoirs on Amazon and visit his grave in stockton Springs, Maine..

In 1778, John Paul Jones raided Britain’s coast from the ship Ranger, built in Portsmouth, N.H. You can visit the John Paul Jones House in Portsmouth, N.H., where Jones lived while the local shipyard built and outfitted Ranger in 1777 and built and outfit another vessel, America, from 1781-82.

John Paul Jones House in Portsmouth, N.H.

The French Arrive

Finally, the French fleet under Admiral d’Estaing arrived to help dislodge the British from Newport, R.I. The plan called for a joint assault—French by sea, Americans under Gen. John Sullivan by land. But Sullivan advanced early, and then a storm drove the French fleet to Boston for repairs. Left alone, the Americans were then attacked; the battle was inconclusive, and the British retained Newport.

Today the Battle of Rhode Island Association is restoring the fort on the battlefield, which has been partially preserved. The battlefield also includes memorials, including to the 1st Rhode Island Regiment, a Black regiment that fought gallantly.

The British landed near here in New Haven.

Then in July, British commander Gen. Henry Clinton ordered an expedition in order to destroy Connecticut port towns that harbored privateers: Norwalk, Fairfield and New Haven.

Several sites commemorate the militia men who fought the raiding British: In Norwalk, Mill Hill Historic Park; in Fairfield, the Fairfield Museum and History Center and Experience Fairfield; and in New Haven, Black Rock Park.

The war then shifted south. British forces captured Savannah and Charleston, defeating Gen. Benjamin Lincoln. Lincoln was born in Hingham, Mass., and his grave can be found in the Old Ship Churchyard in Hingham.

The Final Episode of Ken Burns’ The American Revolution

Nathanael Greene then took command of the southern army, wearing down Cornwallis. He usually lost; however, his forces remained intact and he inflicted costly losses on the British, including Guilford Courthouse. Today, the General Nathanael Greene Homestead Association now operates Greene’s home in Coventry, R.I., as a house museum.

The home of Nathanael Greene, called the most underrated revoltuionary general in the Ken Burns’ documentary.

The tide finally turned when French troops landed in Newport in 1780 under le comte de Rochambeau. King Park, the site where the French landed, has a monument honoring Rochambeau and the French.

Rochambeau and Washington then met to discuss strategy in Hartford. In May 1781, Washington and Rochambeau subsequently met again in Wethersfield, Conn., and agreed to join forces north of New York City. They spent several days at what is now the Webb-Deane-Stevens Museum.

Rochambeau monument in King Park, Newport

They then marched south along what is now the Washington–Rochambeau National Historic Route. Washington from New York and Rochambeau from Newport. Once they met up, they agreed to head south to Yorktown, where d’Estaing and his fleet were also headed. The Washington Rochambeau National Historic Route commemorates the 680-mile march to Yorktown. The spectacular French march through Connecticut has many markers along the way.

Cornwallis had made a mistake by choosing Yorktown to entrench his forces because it was a strategically vulnerably position. French ships then sealed the Chesapeake, and American and French artillery closed in. Then, after a three-week siege, Cornwallis surrendered in October 1781. For all practical purposes, the war had ended.

End Notes

 

Images: Nathanael Greene Homestead By Camanda at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18112163. Longfellow Washington House By Daderot at en.wikipedia – Originally from en.wikipedia; description page is/was here. Original uploader was Daderot at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2929917. Peacefield By Daderot, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3162095. Battle Road By NewtonCourt – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=106953815. Boston Tea Party Ship By Robert Linsdell from St. Andrews, Canada – Boston Tea Party Ship & Museum, Boston (493624), CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=46943593. Fort Ticonderoga By Mwanner – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6967864. Mercy Otis Warren by By Kenneth C. Zirkel – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32733257. First American flag By Mmangan333 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=132392902. Fort Sewall By Fletcher6 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10266490. Rochambeau Monument By Kenneth C. Zirkel – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=58488582.

 

 

 

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The Christmas Tree Ships: When Schooners Brought the Holiday to American Cities

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After the Civil War, the great wooden schooners—the Christmas tree ships—began to carry cut evergreen trees from the Maine woods to the bustling winter markets near the big city docks. These vessels were more than shippers; they were the lifelines of a holiday tradition.

Four schooners arrived from Maine carrying that first modest shipment—fewer than 6,000 trees. Yet, as demand exploded, the fleet struggled to keep pace. By 1905, there simply weren’t enough Christmas tree ships to satisfy the hunger for hundreds of thousands of cut trees destined for the festive hubs of Portland, Boston, New York, and Baltimore.

Newspaper illustration of a Maine woodchopper

The Christmas tree ships allowed Maine farmers and woodsmen to turn a nearly worthless but plentiful resource into a lucrative commodity. It sustained them through the lean winter season when they would otherwise go hunting. Then the expanding railroad network would allow New Hampshire and Vermont to ship their own cut trees from the interior.

The Christmas Tree Ships

A combination of post-war prosperity, massive immigration and the growing popularity of the Christmas celebration kept the fleet busy hauling trees from late November. It reigned until the inevitable rise of trucks and trains. By then, the old wooden schooners were becoming too costly to maintain, and the era of the Christmas tree ships gradually faded away.

But their legacy endures. It lives on in the majestic windjammers that now carry tourists along the rugged Maine coast each summer. And it is remembered solemnly on Lake Michigan, where an annual ceremony honors a beloved Christmas tree ship skipper who perished with his vessel in a storm.

The Emergence of the Christmas Tree

The changing American celebration of Christmas gave rise to the Christmas tree ships. In the 17th century, New England puritans banned Christmas.  They viewed it as a rowdy, Papist celebration far removed from the family-centered holiday we know today. By the Civil War, Christmas was making a comeback. Charles Dickens’ 1843 story, “A Christmas Carol,” popularized a holiday that celebrated Christian values of kindness, charity and family. As the Civil War erupted, the “influencers” of the day—ladies’ magazines—promoted the Christmas tree as a cherished family ritual.

Immigration also reshaped American Christmas customs. German immigrants, in particular, brought with them traditions like the decorated Tannenbaum. At the same time, people were migrating to cities in droves. Between 1890 and 1910, Boston’s population alone grew by 25 percent. This urban concentration created a centralized demand for Christmas trees that grew every year.

Northern farmers and woodsmen welcomed this development. So did schooner captains and their crews. Their versatile vessels worked the coast year-round, hauling cargoes of fish, granite, lime, lumber, coal or canning supplies. As winter approached, they readily converted into Christmas tree ships.

The Lewis R. French once carried Christmas trees. Now it carries tourists.

The Lewis R. French, launched in 1871 from Christmas Cove in South Bristol, Maine, was one such maritime workhorse. With her sturdy oaken hull and two towering masts, she carried freight for a century. She hauled Christmas trees to evergreen markets and cans to Maine’s sardine factories.Today, her legacy continues, reborn as a passenger windjammer that still sails the Maine coast.

For Yew I Pine…

Early American Christmas trees were often spruce, pine or cedar. Their widely spaced branches were considered ideal for hanging candles and small gifts. Then, in 1892, the humble balsam fir made its celebrated debut at Boston’s Quincy Market.

Here’s how it happened: A party of Bostonians was returning via steam yacht from a caribou hunt in Newfoundland. They stopped in Sedgwick, Maine, on the Blue Hill Peninsula and journeyed inland. From a high vantage point, they beheld thousands of vigorous young balsam firs blanketing the hills and valleys.

A young balsam fir

The yacht’s owner  concluded they would make ideal Christmas trees.—far superior to the scrubby, pines then common. He hired men to cut 500 trees, loaded his deck and took them to Boston to sell in the market district.

The market sellers around Faneuil Hall clamored for the fragrant, bushy trees. The yachtsman sold his entire stock at a tremendous profit and immediately sent for more. The next year, 40,000 balsams were sent to Boston. From then on, the balsam fir was the premier tree in New York and Boston.

Christmas trees at Quincy Market. Colorized by ChatGPT>

That Woodsy Odor

Buying a Christmas tree at the bustling outdoor dockside markets became an annual ritual in the big cities.

“How picturesque the sight, and how wholesome the woodsy odor, when thousands of these trees are displayed in the marketplace of a great city the week before Christmas,” exulted The Youth’s Companion in 1913.

In New York, enormous quantities of trees were sold at “the Farm,” a vast wholesale market on West Street near the Hudson River docks. A 1905 newspaper writer waxed nostalgic about the scene: “At one time West Street, with all its wide expanse of space in front of the great warehouses, was packed full of piles of evergreens… each day as evening came, showed great gaps purchasers had made in carrying out their selections, until on Saturday the huge piles had dwindled to a few remnants of the great store that had almost denuded the Maine forests.”

A Forest Weed

Not everyone celebrated the trade. In 1905, a conservation-minded newspaper editor argued for a ban on the Christmas tree ships, condemning the clearcutting of Maine’s forests.

The Bangor Daily News scoffed at such concerns. It editorialized that the balsam fir, which comprised 95 percent of a typical shipload, amounted to nothing more than a forest weed. “The balsam fir of North America is not a valuable or a useful wood,” the paper declared. It argued the tree crowded out more valuable species, and its only real merit was as a fleeting landscape ornament. Once mature, the News claimed, the trunk became brittle powder, insects reduced it to sawdust, the greens browned and fell and the tree toppled to decay into forest mold.

Furthermore, the paper opined, the Christmas tree business was a drop in the bucket, making no meaningful dent in Maine’s vast timberlands.

As World War I approached, the tradition evolved again. Churches, schools, and towns began erecting large communal trees in public squares—Augusta, Maine, installed its first municipal tree in 1913. By this time, trains and trucks were rapidly supplanting the schooners. Profit margins on the big trees shrunk, and the industry began shifting from family farmers and foragers to managed tree farms.

Large outdoor trees didn’t become a thing until after the turn of the 20th century. Here, Calvin Coolidge lights the first National Tree in 1923.

Unforgotten

The Christmas tree ships of the Atlantic might have faded quietly into history if not for a parallel—and tragic—story on the Great Lakes. There, schooners hauled evergreens from the forests of Northern Michigan and Wisconsin across Lake Michigan to Chicago. For three decades, Capt. Herman Schuenemann, known affectionately as “Captain Santa,” sold trees directly to families at the Clark Street Bridge at low cost, even giving them away to the poor.

On Nov. 23, 1912, the Rouse Simmons, overloaded with Christmas trees, set sail for Chicago into a brewing gale. The violent storm overwhelmed the schooner. The crew raised a distress flag, but the tempest snapped the mast, and the ship foundered and sank. All 17 souls aboard were lost, but not forgotten. For years afterward, sightings of a ghostly evergreen-laden schooner were reported, and divers searched for the wreck.

The wreck site of the Rouse Simmons has been found and is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The English rock band iLiKETRAiNS recorded an album titled The Christmas Tree Ship, and a musical, The Christmas Tree Schooner, has seen numerous performances.

The Coast Guard Cutter Mackinaw arrives at Chicago’s Navy Pier with a cargo of Christmas trees.

Most poignantly, the tradition is reborn each year in Chicago. The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Mackinaw now plays the part of the Christmas Tree Ship, delivering a load of trees to Navy Pier. From there, young volunteers distribute to needy families, ensuring the holiday spirt once carried on the sails of the old Christmas tree schooners continues to reach shore.

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Now available in paperback and as an ebook from the New England Historical Society! A collection of stories about the French people who came to America. Click here to order your copy today!

 

 

 

 

End Notes

mages: Lewis R. French By Raphodon – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7424995. Calvin Coolidge lighting the Christmas tree: Harris & Ewing, photographer. Calvin Coolidge and group at Christmas tree, Washington, D.C. [or 1924] Photograph. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/2016892956/>. Mackinaw by Defense Visual Information Distribution Service. Balsam fir by By Famartin – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=44027501. Featured image illustration by Google Gen=mini. 

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First U.S. Credit Union Opens in Manchester, N.H.

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On Nov. 24, 1908 the first credit union in the United States opened for business in Manchester, N.H.  Founded on a belief that people with limited financial means should form a cooperative alternative to the commercial banking system, the success of the Manchester venture spawned further development of these entities throughout New England and elsewhere.

The origins of the modern credit union in North America can be traced to Germany.  In 1853 Hermannn Schulze founded a society to raise funds (capital) for loans to its membership. Members were employed mainly in industry and commerce in urban areas.  Nine years later, Friedrich Raiffeisen established a similar society at Anhousen to help poor rural workers.   Credit cooperative societies then quickly began to spread across other European countries.

A caisse populaire credit union in Lévis, Quebec, c. 1920

North America’s First Credit Union

Credit unions first appeared in North America in Quebec, Canada.  On Jan. 23, 1901 Alphonse Desjardins opened his La Caisse Populaire de Levis (The People’s Bank of Levis) in Levis, Quebec.  As in Germany in the mid-19 century, farmers and industrial employees struggled to earn a living. They also faced difficulties in dealing with commercial banks, and they had to pay high interest rates for borrowing from unscrupulous lenders.  Desjardins wanted only “honest and laborious” members in his cooperative association who would make their deposits and could obtain loans. Men and women who wanted to join had to pay an entrance fee and buy a minimum of one $5 share.

Alphonse Desjardins

Meanwhile, Monsignor Pierre Hevey, pastor of Sainte-Marie parish in Manchester, became aware of the success of the Quebec credit union. He then invited Desjardins to meet with him in May 1908 to form a similar financial institution.  Desjardins agreed to meet. Hevey told him that his relatively poor French-Canadian parishioners lacked access to needed funds, given their low-wage employment in the Amoskeog Textile Mill and elsewhere.  Desjardins then gave advice about how to create such an entity to Hevey and others.

Monsignor Pierre Hevey

St. Mary’s

Based on the successful organizational model created by Desjardins, the St. Mary’s Cooperative Credit Association began its operations on Nov. 24, 1908. Thus it became the first credit union in the United States.  The initial location was in the parlor of the home of Joseph Boivin, who became the president and manager.  The New Hampshire General Court subsequently granted the credit union a charter by a special act on April 9, 1909.  By 1913 it had its own building.

The not-for-profit financial entity was member-owned and operated. Each member had to buy at least one $5 share in the corporation and pay an entrance fee.  Membership was initially restricted to the men, women and children of Manchester.  The pooled savings deposits (credits) became the source for loans to the members at an interest rate capped at 6 percent.

Workers at the Amoskeag Mill Yard

The organizational structure of the credit union had three groups: at least five directors; a three-member supervision committee; and a three-member credit committee.  The directors oversaw financial affairs; could declare a dividend payment from net earnings, subject to a 20 percent contribution to a guaranty fund for unforeseen expenses or incurred losses; and initially had to select a president, treasurer and clerk.

Moreover, the state exercised control over the credit union through supervision by bank commissioners. It also required payment of the same types of taxes that were imposed on savings banks.

A New Name

On April 3, 1917, the New Hampshire Legislature allowed the credit union to change its name to La Caisse Populaire Ste. Marie (Bank of the People, St. Mary’s).  A further change came on April 28, 1925, that allowed the credit union to use its 1917 designation or be known as St. Mary’s Bank.

Ste. Marie Church in Manchester

Meanwhile, Edward Filene, a Boston department store owner, and Pierce Jay, the Massachusetts banking commissioner, saw a need to encourage the formation of credit unions (coined by them) through a state general incorporation law, rather than through special acts pertaining to a specific entity (i.e., St. Mary’s).  Thus, they helped secure passage of the Massachusetts Credit Union Act on April 15, 1909 (six days after the granting of St. Mary’s charter). That became the first general law for the creation of credit unions.

The Industrial Credit Union opened in Boston in 1910, becoming the first credit union in Massachusetts.  Within New England, other credit unions emerged. Rhode Island started its first in 1915 (La Credit Union de Notre Dame de Central Falls, Maine in 1921 (Telephone Workers Credit Union of Maine), Vermont in 1925 (Montpelier Credit Union) and Connecticut in 1938 (Manchester Teachers Federal Credit Union).

Edward Filene

Legacy of the First Credit Union

Since its founding in 1908, St. Mary’s Bank has been durable and popular.  It has survived both world wars, the Great Depression (especially after the bankruptcy of the Amoskeag Manufacturing Company in 1935) and various financial turmoils over succeeding decades.  Its popularity had depended on higher savings rates on deposits, lower interest rates on borrowings and customized personal services offered in a local setting.  Nevertheless, challenges have included questions about its management, computer software usage and external threats. Those criticisms, however, are common to other financial institutions.

Edward T. Howe, Ph.D. is Professor of Economics, Emeritus, at Siena University near Albany, N.Y.

Images: Illustration of Desjardins and Hevey created by ChatGPT. Ste. Marie Church by By John Phelan – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=30614758

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Six Fun Facts About the Doughnut

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What’s not to love about the doughnut? Well, except what it does to your waistline. But there’s a lot more to the tasty snack than you might think. Here are six fun facts about the doughnut and its many, many variations.

1. You say “doughnut,” I say “donut.”

The word “dough nut” first appeared in print in 1803 in a cookbook, “The frugal housewife,” by Susannah Carter. English cookbooks had previously included recipes for fried “nuts,” because that’s how the dough was shaped. Then in 1809, Washington Irving explained the origin of the dough-nut in his “A History of New York, from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty.”

Sometimes the table was graced with immense apple-pies, or saucers full of preserved peaches and pears; but it was always sure to boast of an enormous dish of balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog’s fat, and called dough-nuts, or oly koeks: a delicious kind of cake, at present scarce known in this city, excepting in genuine Dutch families.

But in 20th-century United States, the ubiquity of fast food coffee-and-doughnut chains—Mister Donut and Dunkin’ Donuts—transformed “doughnut” to “donut.”

However, “doughnut” is considered the more highbrow spelling, and both the New York Times and Associated Press insist on it. The Oxford English Dictionary also likes “doughnut,” while the American Heritage Dictionary prefers “donut.”

2. It didn’t have a hole until a Maine ship captain put one in it.

Capt. Hansen Gregory in 1916 told a Washington Post reporter he discovered the doughnut hole when he worked as a 16-year-old crewman on a lime-trading schooner.

“Now in them days we used to cut the doughnuts into diamond shapes, and also into long strips, bent in half, and then twisted,” he said. “I don’t think we called them doughnuts then–they was just ‘fried cakes’ and ‘twisters.’ Well, sir, they used to fry all right around the edges, but when you had the edges done the insides was all raw dough. And the twisters used to sop up all the grease just where they bent, and they were tough on the digestion.”

He decided a space inside the dough would solve the problem. So, he took the cover off the ship’s pepper box and cut a hole into the middle of the doughnut.

He shared his trick with his mother, who lived in Camden, Maine. She began making doughnuts with holes. Soon, claimed Gregory, everyone was doing it.

At least that’s the story, and no one seems to have disproved it.

3. The Dutch weren’t the only ones who brought doughnuts to New England.

Many immigrant groups brought their own version of the doughnut across the Atlantic.

For example, Italian-Americans throughout New England celebrate St. Joseph’s Day (March 19) by binging on the luscious pastry known as zeppole. The saintly snack is a baked or fried doughnut with fillings such as cream, custard or jelly and topped with sugar or fruit. You can find them in many Italian bakeries, especially in Rhode Island, Connecticut and Massachusetts.

Zeppole

Pączki (pronounced “poonch-kee”) are filled Polish pastries either glazed or dusted with sugar. Poles in Poland eat them on Fat Thursday, the Thursday before Ash Wednesday. But in the United States, Polish Americans tend to indulge in them on Fat Tuesday. Look for them in bakeries in heavily Polish communities like Chicopee, Mass., or Bridgeport, Conn.

In the southeastern Massachusetts cities of Fall River and New Bedford, Portuguese-Americans celebrate Fat Tuesday with—you guessed it—sugar-coated doughnuts. They call them malassadas.

The association of doughnuts with religious holidays has led some to refer to the “Christian Doughnut Season.” But Jews do it, too, on Hanukkah, with sufganiyot, fried dough rolled in sugar and injected with jelly.

Polish pączki

Loukoumades, the Greek version of the doughnut, consists of deep-fried dough balls soaked in honey, dusted with cinnamon and sprinkled with chopped nuts. You can buy them at LoukoMadness at the Mall of New Hampshire in Manchester, N.H., which has a sizeable Greek population.

In Hartford’s Jamaican bakeries, you’re likely to find Jamaican doughnuts, called festivals. And you used to be able to get berliners, a German favorite, at Karl’s Sausage Kitchen, a German grocery store in Peabody since 1958. It closed, regrettably, in 2025.

Sufganiyot

4. The Boston Cream Doughnut is the official doughnut of Massachusetts.

Somerville Middle School Student Emma Krane began her campaign for the doughnut’s officialdom as a grade-school student in 1997. She continued to lobby the Great and General Court  with her classmates until Acting Gov. Jane Swift made the Boston Cream Doughnut official with her signature on Jan. 1, 2003. Such campaigns–to name official state cookies and fruits and the like–generally aim to teach schoolchildren about civics. It usually teaches them how long it takes to get a law passed.

A month after the Boston Cream Doughnut achieved its elevated status, Dunkin’ Donuts came out with a press release celebrating the news. The company also took the opportunity to promote its “Boston Kreme,” which it then sold in about 800 shops in Massachusetts.

Boston Cream Doughnut

The Boston Cream Doughnut is actually a berliner filled with custard or crème pâtissière and topped with chocolate icing. (And no, JFK never said, “I am a jelly doughnut.”)

Only one other state, Louisiana, has an official state doughnut—the beignet.

5. The potato doughnut lives on in Maine.

In the 1940s, a chain of doughnut shops called Spudnuts created a craze for potato doughnuts. It died out, however, and most Spudnuts have closed. But in Portland, Maine, the Holy Donut shops keep the flame alive. Started by a single mom in 2012, Holy Donut has expanded to four shops in Greater Portland. They have a cult-like following and tourists seek them out. Lines for the light, cakey doughnut are often out the door.

Maine has a tradition of potato-infused sweets. The state’s signature candy, the needham, is also made with potato.

6. Two brothers-in-law founded Mister Donuts and Dunkin’ Donuts.

They partnered to sell doughnuts, and then they broke up in 1955. Harry Winokur founded Mister Donut in Boston and Bill Rosenberg founded Dunkin’ Donuts in Quincy, Mass.

Both companies expanded to hundreds of franchises, and eventually the company that bought Dunkin’ Donuts bought Mister Donut. Mister Donut shops had the option of converting to Dunkin’ Donuts.

Today, Mister Donut has all but disappeared from the United States. Only one domestic Mister Donut survives, in Godfrey, Ill.  But the franchise has a large footprint in Asia. Japan has adopted Mister Donut as its own. There’s even a Mister Donut Museum in Osaka, called the Dusken Museum after the company’s mascot, a cute white dog. The museum features busts of the founders, retro memorabilia, short films and two workshops: “The Donut-Making Experience” and  “The Donut Topping Experience.”

The original Dunkin’ Donuts in Quincy.

Quincy, Mass., has a Dunkin’ Donuts Museum. At least that’s what Quincy locals call it. Though not an actual museum, it’s the first Dunkin’ Donuts eatery, started by Bill Rosenberg. Inside, a plaque reads, “This is the site of the Original Dunkin’ Donuts.” It has pink and orange chairs and doughnut-shaped tables.  Call it a “living history museum.”

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Now available in paperback and as an ebook from the New England Historical Society! A collection of stories about the French people who came to America. Click here to order your copy today!

 

 

 

 

Images: Boston Cream Doughnut By Evan-Amos – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18949241. Image: Zeppola by By News21 – National – Zeppole, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=34876662. Mister Donut By Kuha455405 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4666574. Paczki By fir0002flagstaffotos [at] gmail.comCanon 20D + Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8 – Own work, GFDL 1.2, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=260421. Sufganiyot CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=816880. Doughnuts on display By WestportWiki – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=24823025.

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The “Indian Othering” of Dr. Charles Eastman, Ohíye S’a, in New England Newspapers

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It started for Charles Eastman before he graduated from college.

“A Dartmouth Sioux Indian sophomore’s native name is Wiychpeyatamicasta, but he passes as Charles A. Eastman” read an 1885 short notice in the Boston Evening Transcript. In fact, his Lakota name was Ohíye S’a, but since 1873 he had been called Charles Alexander Eastman.

The Boston Evening Transcript wasn’t alone in trying to set the Dartmouth student off as different, even exotic. This notice appeared in dozens of newspapers around New England and across the United States. And it was only the first of many times that Charles’ Native heritage would be singled out in the press. Often his Lakota background was highlighted more than his many accomplishments.

Throughout his life, he never escaped his public image as an Indian curiosity despite his accomplishments as a social reformer, cofounder of the Boy Scouts, author, historian, lecturer and Native rights advocate.

Portrait of Charles Eastman

Charles Eastman

Charles Eastman was born in 1858 near Redwood Falls, Minn. His early life was marked by tragedy and displacement. His mother died shortly after he was born. That led his relatives to name him “Hakadah,” or “pitiful last.” When the Dakota War of 1862 broke out, the boy escaped with his grandmother and uncle and fled to Manitoba. They feared his father and brothers were killed.

Until his teen years, Hakadah learned the ways of his Santee Lakota people. While still young, his athletic prowess earned him a new name: Ohíye S’a, or “the winner.”

One day when he was about 15, Ohíye S’a returned from hunting to find an unfamiliar person waiting for him, a Lakota wearing Euro-American clothing. It turned out to be his own father, who had been imprisoned, not killed. Jacob Eastman, as he now called himself, firmly believed that Indians in 19th century America had one path forward: become Christians, take Euro-American names and get a westernized education. And so Ohíye S’a became Charles Alexander Eastman, began attending church and studied at a series of boarding schools and preparatory programs. Eventually that led him to Dartmouth College, and then to Boston University Medical School. He was the only Native American in his class at both institutions.

Early Fame

The combination of his good looks, articulate speech and educational pedigrees meant that newspapers often published stories about Charles. Reflecting on this in his second autobiographical book, Charles recalled his surprise when a journalist encountering him on the beach at Nantasket published a gossip column about him. In it, he referred to Charles as “the hero of the Boston society girls…a Sioux brave.”

Screenshot of a photo and caption from the Bridgeport, Conn., Times and Evening Farmer, Jan. 4, 1919. Caption reads “Full Blood Sioux Indian.” Colorized version by ChatGPT.

After graduating from BU in 1890, Charles took a job working as agency physician at the Pine Ridge Reservation in the newly declared state of South Dakota. There that he met a young woman named Elaine Goodale.

Elaine Goodale

Elaine grew up in the tiny Berkshires town of Mount Washington. As a girl she earned early acclaim as a poet; by the time she was 20, she had published five books of poetry and essays. As a young woman with few career options Elaine turned to teaching. Rather than teach in the local one-room schoolhouse, she began her career at the Hampton Institute in Virginia, teaching Native American students. After becoming fascinated with her young charges Elaine decided to travel to the Dakota Territory in 1885. Two years later she opened a day school on a reservation, believing that education would be more impactful if her pupils were not torn from their families and communities and sent to boarding schools like Hampton. She also learned the Lakota language with the idea that bilingual education could be more powerful.

Elaine Goodale

Elaine’s innovative teaching methods and her ability to parlay them to audiences back East through the many articles she wrote and published in the leading newspapers and magazines of the day led to her appointment as the first Superintendent of Education for Indian schools in the Dakotas in 1890. It was in this capacity that she traveled to Pine Ridge.

Mrs. Charles Eastman

Surprisingly, these two young people who came from such different worlds met. Even more surprising, they fell in love. They announced their engagement at Christmas. Several days later their happiness was shattered by the Wounded Knee Massacre, in which at least 250 Lakota men, women and children were killed. Charles tended to the victims as best he could; Elaine acted as a nurse. But the medical training he had received in Boston did not prepare Charles for the situation of mass causalities he faced. This tragic experience seared into their respective memories, affecting them for rest of their lives.

The battlefield at Wounded Knee

Wounded Knee also heightened their desire to work on behalf of Native Americans, and to do this work together. They married in 1891 in New York, despite the considerable opposition of Elaine’s family.

Not surprisingly, their unusual interracial marriage proved good fodder for newspapers. Their union was gleefully -– and often, inaccurately –- covered in hundreds of articles.

Wedding Notices

Sometimes just the headlines told the main story. For example, the Augusta (Maine) Kennebec Journal ran a long article on page 1 under the headline, “She Will Marry Dr. Eastman, A Full-Blooded Sioux.”

Other articles sought to differentiate the newlyweds by focusing on racialized stereotypes. An article in The Day from New London, Conn., proclaimed “Romance of a Poetess: Elaine Goodale’s Marriage to a Full Blooded Sioux – But he is no common Red Man.” “He is of medium height, straight and slender, with all the racial peculiarities of his people in his features” this article read. Another article in the Boston Daily Globe mentioned Charles was “a splendid specimen of manhood” with looks that “…characterize his race, but notwithstanding this fact, is a handsome man.” Though sometimes these articles would mention Charles’ educational background (where he was frequently described incorrectly as “a graduate of Harvard Medical School” or “an alumnus of Yale College”), almost always they focused on distinguishing him as the “Indian Other.”

This kind of newspaper coverage followed Charles his entire life.

After Wounded Knee, the Eastmans began an odyssey crisscrossing the country as Charles took on new jobs in medicine in Minnesota and South Dakota. He traveled throughout many states with the YMCA. He worked as a lobbyist in Washington, D.C., at the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania and with the Boy Scouts of America. Money was always a problem, and the Eastmans needed a steady income to support their growing family of six children. To supplement their finances, Charles began writing stories from his “Indian boyhood” and publishing them. This led to a new career as an author, and another as a public speaker.

Debating class, Carlisle Indian School, Carlisle, Pa.

Amherst, Mass.

By 1903, Elaine had enough of moving from one state to another. She insisted that the family return to her native Massachusetts and remain in one place. They lived in Amherst for three decades.

The Amherst years were certainly Charles’ most productive in terms of his writing. He published eight books, and two more co-written with Elaine. She also published several books during this period and took a prominent role in editing Charles’ work.

His public speaking career also took off during this time. He spent more time on the road than he did in Amherst, leading to additional pressure on his marriage.

Charles Eastman’s writing and speaking careers also meant that there were hundreds of additional articles published about him. Often, the articles were accompanied by photographs. Though some of the photos showed Charles dressed in the fashionable Victorian suits and cravats of the day, many more of these photographs depicted Charles in feathered headdress and fringed buckskin.

And the way he chose to present himself often dominated the coverage he received. For instance, an article in the Lewiston (Maine) Sun ran under the headline, “Ohiyesa Came in Real Sioux Costume and told Story of Genuine Heart Interest.” “His headdress was a genuine war bonnet,” the reporter stated, “made of spotted eagle feathers…His costume was of tan colored skins, with wonderful bead trimmings, light blue forming the background for the bead work. Woven into this, were all sorts of symbols. The tomahawk which he carried was once owned and used by Crazy Horse.” Whether or not this was true was beside the point. The content of Charles’ talk was not recorded, at all.

An Indian at Heart

Sometimes when his lecture was discussed, it focused around separating Charles from those reading the newspaper. An article in The Brattleboro VT Reformer from 1911 related that an audience listened to “Dr. Charles A. Eastman, a Sioux Indian…He told his story of an Indian boyhood in a marvelously interesting manner. Dr. Eastman is fitted to tell this story, because notwithstanding his training in white men’s ways he remains an Indian at heart [and] depicts the primitive life of an Indian from childhood to manhood.”

Because money was always tight, the Eastmans decided to tap into the growing American camping movement and rented a property along Granite Lake in New Hampshire. Indian–themed camps were becoming more popular all the time. Having a camp run by a “bona fide Indian” made it much easier to publicize the endeavor.

Granite Lake

In one of the many articles published about Camp Oáhe, the Boston Sunday Post suggested that “the best educated Indian in America, author of a dozen widely read books on Indian life and history, a practicing physician, lawyer, businessman and educator, is going to show wealthy white girls the little conveniences of life which native Americans seem to know by instinct. And here are some of the things the back to nature school is going to teach the pretty palefaces, most of them daughters of wealthy New Yorkers.” These skills include “how to make a fire when the grocery man forgets to bring matches; how to cook a porterhouse steak without a skillet; how to make a baby stop crying at night so that the landlord will not receive complaints from adjacent flat dwellers” as well as other “Indian skills” encapsulated with strangely citified applications.

Even Their Daughters…

The photo spread accompanying this article depicted the Eastman girls with bows and arrows, and captions such as the one under the picture of daughter Florence that inexplicably read, “Miss Mabel ‘Great Cloud’ Eastman, youngest daughter of the famous Ohiyesa. She is adept with the bow and arrow.”

The Eastmans shrewdly realized that Charles’ Lakota background was a great marketing device at a time that many Americans were seeking a return to simpler times and thought that Native Americans embodied this. But Charles also believed that Oáhe could serve as a way of educating Euro-American girls about important Native concepts.

But the Oáhe period wasn’t all the Eastmans might have hoped. Tragically, they lost their cherished second daughter, Irene Taluta in the influenza pandemic of 1918. After that, other events continued to unravel their marriage.

“Yellow Star,” published by Elaine Eastman in 1911

Charles Eastman, Indian Other to the Grave

The ways that Charles was portrayed in the press proved to be another stressor because they continued to emphasize his otherness. Even late in his life, the images of Charles Eastman in New England newspapers focused more on his Lakota heritage than on his accomplishments. His work on behalf of the Society of American Indians (SAI) advocating for citizenship in 1919, for example, got this mention in the Holyoke (MA) Transcript-Telegram: “Three hundred American Indians swept down on Minneapolis a few days ago. They didn’t come in their war paint and bells. They came as serious men, dressed in citizens clothes…Among the delegates …was Dr. Charles A. Eastman, president of the American Society of Indians.”

The Eastmans separated in 1921 but never divorced. Charles moved back to the Midwest, eventually building a cabin on Lake Huron. He continued trying to eke out a living through a series of different jobs, but money was always tight. His health declined precipitously.

Even his obituaries in 1939 continued the earlier patterns of presenting Charles Eastman as an “Indian other,” replete with incorrect information. In just one example from the dozens of obituaries that appeared around the world, the Keene (NH) Sentinel incorrectly listed Charles’ age and erroneously suggested “Ohiyesa” meant “the Unconquered One” while noting he was “the most learned member of his race” and Dartmouth’s “most picturesque figure.”

As had been happening his entire life, the man melded into the legend and the legend melded into the man.

 Julie Dobrow is a biographer and a professor at Tufts University. Her new book on Charles and Elaine Eastman, Love and Loss After Wounded Knee: A Biography of an Extraordinary Interracial Marriage, comes out November 4 from NYU Press.

Images: U.S. troops at Wounded Knee U.S. troops surrounding the Indians on Wounded Knee battle field. Photograph. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/2024693319/>. Granite Lake By John Phelan – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59336762. Carlisle Indian School Johnston, Frances Benjamin, photographer. Debating class, Carlisle Indian School, Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Photograph. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/98503015/>. Featured image colorized by ChatGPT.

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