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A couple weeks ago I was talking to a friend who lives out of state, and he asked me what seems like it should be a fairly simple question: "What does "Hundred" mean, in "Mill Creek Hundred"? For those of us who have lived for an extended time in Delaware (especially New Castle County), we're probably used to hearing "Mill Creek Hundred", or "Brandywine Hundred", but we may not think much about where the term comes from. I've actually sidestepped this post for this long because there really isn't a good, simple answer to the question. Or, there is a simple answer, but it's not good enough. Or, there's several good answers, but none of them are exactly right ... but none of them are completely wrong. Sometimes, thinking too hard about a word only serves to confuse things. But, I've come this far, and never let it be said that I'm not willing to try to confuse things even more. We'll start with what should be t

Lauren recently had a very fun contest at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books . Readers got to vote on a sexy cover for the inimitable Turnip Fitzhugh, and now Lauren has posted a love scene between Turnip Fitzhugh and Arabella which did not appear in the wonderful The Mischief of the Mistletoe . It’s a great idea, born about because two different reviewers regretted the lack of a love scene between Turnip and Arabella. It got me to think about “missing scenes” – scenes which don’t take place between the pages of a book which I’ve always wanted to read. For instance: Darcy and Elizabeth’s engagement conversation. Some authors fade to black for love scenes. Jane Austen does it for the final romantic resolution between her heroes and heroines. In many ways it’s a wonderful literary technique, leaving so much tantalizingly to the imagination. And yet I would so like to know what they actually said and did… Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane after “Placetne, magistra? / Placet. ” and the

Readers, are you a bit like me? Did you ever long to attend the premiere of a Shakespeare play? You know, the REAL premiere at the original Globe Theatre when the words were still wet from Shakespeare’s pen and nobody knew what would happen next? How would Macbeth and his wife end up – dead or alive? Would Prospero ever escape that island? Or how about the premiere of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, with the composer himself conducting it even though he was deaf? Or maybe the premiere of Stravinsky’s The Rites of Spring when an upper-crust 1910 Parisian audience rioted inside the theater over such a scandalous ballet? Or how about coming to London for The Season and visiting Vauxhaull Gardens in person? Oh, to actually see the mixture of high and low society, hear the popular dance tunes – and see the formal gardens with their dark corners for illicit assignations? Or perhaps you dream that a great author entrusted you to premiere his work – Shakespeare or Chekhov. I admit th

Last Saturday I attended a “launch” gathering of historical fiction writers, part of the Historical Novel Society’s effort to establish small sub-chapters in various parts of the country (HNS is based in England). This first meeting, held at the Hotel Rex in San Francisco, proved exciting. The 25 gathered members did decide to establish an HNS chapter in northern California; they also decided to meet four times a year with various agendas, including workshops, readings, critique sessions, and speakers; and they decided to establish a Facebook page. But the best part for me personally was the people who attended! I met authors I admire, including Cecelia Holland ( The King’s Witch; Great Maria; The Secret Eleanor ); C.W. Gortner ( Confessions of Catherine de Medici, The Tudor Secret; The Last Queen ); and long-revered writer Persia Woolley ( Child of the Northern Spring and 2 other works in her Guinevere trilogy). Following the meeting, a roster was sent to all attendees listing wri

Samuel A. Bailey Sometimes the most enjoyable research is the stuff that comes out of the blue, and ends up somewhere you never thought it would go. A few days ago, commenter M.S. left a few stories and a few questions over on the Forum , so I decided to take what I thought would be a quick look and give a quick answer. The innocent question that sent me off involved an old woman named "Miz Bailey", who the commenter's brother remembered as living in an old house in the woods near Hercules Road and Newport Gap Pike. I figured that if I was lucky, I might be able to find her in a census and uncover her full name. I didn't expect, however, to be digging back over 200 years, and clearing up a few questions about some old maps along the way. To get right to the answer to the question first, "Miz Bailey" was in fact Margaret Mabel Bailey, who died unmarried in 1953. The house in which she lived her entire life, and which never had electricity, was located a f

For those who haven't seen it yet, our very own Hoyden, Isobel Carr, was interviewed last week by the Wall Street Journal -- in order to mention unmentionables. (Yay, Isobel!) In short, historical undergarments. It may sound like a laughable topic, but it's no joke to historical novelists, in the attempt to recreate the minutiae of every day life. I remember laughing over the scene in Elizabeth Peter's The Love Talker in which two characters come up with a mock bibliography of historical undergarments, including Edward Hightower-Smythe's Clasps, Buttons, Buckles and Other Methods of Joining Together Garments During the Period Between 1415 and 1418 and that respected, learned journal, the Zeitschrift fur Studien der Untergarmenten . It was incredibly amusing-- until I found myself searching for the equivalent, and not in jest. It's not just about accuracy for accuracy's sake. I had a drama teacher back in the day who used to have us wear long skirts to rehe

I can’t believe that RIPE FOR SCANDAL is almost here! As I gear up for its releas e, I thought I’d talk about the non-dog animal that features in this book: a pig. I can hear my friends laughing from here. In general, I am not a great fan of pigs (I most commonly refer to them as “bacon waiting to happen”). There was a sow near where I stabled my horse as a teen that would regularly escape and go viciously marauding across the countryside. Anyone who’s had to use a buggy whip to deter a charging 600lb animal with teeth that go through bone like butter has good to distrust the creatures. But I knew that my elegant, city-beau hero was going to end up on an estate that was, essentially, a large working farm. Nearly all great estates had home farms, and my hero needed something to get him invested in the idea of owning such a place (especially as the one in question is all the way down by the channel in Kent, a long ways away from friends and family for both characters). My heroine is smar

I feel I need to apologize in advance for the possibility that this post will read as being a bit disjointed and rushed. Frankly, I need to just write it before I get too frustrated and give up. When I write a post, I generally like to answer more questions than I raise, but sometimes it doesn't work out that way. This is one of those times. Two previous posts ( here and here ) have looked at the Mendenhall family and their holdings along Mill Creek, but since the writing of the recent post, new information has been presented to me regarding the house overlooking the Mendenhall Mill/Mill Creek Road intersection. There are tantalizing clues as to the early history of the house, but unfortunately few concrete answers. What I'll do here is present what we know, what we believe to be true, and the questions that have yet to be answered. My hope is that someone else out there may have the key to unlocking this mystery. The information sent to me came from Stephen Ruszkowski, a loca

Carhartt is known throughout the world as a manufacturer of high-quality workers' clothing. The company was founded over 120 years ago to supply railroad workers and other laborers with reinforced overalls made with high-grade materials. For many of those years, a great deal of those garments were manufactured right here in Corktown. Hamilton B. Carhartt (1855-1937) ( Google Books ) Hamilton Brakeman Carhartt was born in Macedon Locks, New York, on August 27, 1855. He grew up in Jackson, Michigan, where he married Annette Welling on December 21, 1881. They had three children: Hamilton Jr., Wylie, and Margaret. After moving to Grand Rapids, Hamilton Carhartt went into business with his father-in-law, Stephen Alling Welling, in 1882. Two years later the family moved to Detroit, where Welling & Carhartt operated as a gentlemen's furnishing wholesaler. They later changed their name to Hamilton Carhartt & Co. Finally, in 1889, the business converted to manufacturing

 James Mendenhall's 1826 Mill  A while back, I did a post about the Mendenhall House and Mill located around the intersection of Mill Creek Road and Mendenhall Mill Road. While I still think that most of what is in the post is correct, and it was all written with the best information I had at the time, I have come across new information that sheds new light on the early history of the area, and a little on the later history. One of the reasons I started writing this blog originally was to document my own journey of exploration through the history of the Mill Creek Hundred area. And like many journeys, this one sometimes heads the wrong way. I want to use this post to clear up some of the things that I now know I got wrong, and to add some more information to the story. The first place to start, I guess, is at the beginning of the Mendenhall story, and to state that I now know that it wasn't really the beginning. In the previous post, I had written that Aaron Mendenhall, Jr.

This will have to be a short post as I am scrambling to finish the first draft of the second novel in the Marie Antoinette trilogy; and I have promised myself that I would write the last word today. To have my characters experience the events of Bastille Day tomorrow, on the 222nd anniversary of, well, Bastille Day, would be too painful for me and it's not a career milestone I'd like to remember. The events of the second book, DAYS OF SPLENDOR, DAYS OF SORROW span the years 1774 - 1789, from the ascenion to the throne of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette to the fall of the Bastille. On Sunday I wrote the death of the dauphin (while in Marie Antoinette's head) and found myself sobbing hysterically at one point, as though someone close to me had passed away. Does that ever happen to you as you work? I also find my stomach knotting at tense moments for the characters, or getting headaches when they might have one, for example. And yet for me this is nothing new. Many years ago, w

 Postcard showing the Paper Mill Covered Bridge  I don't think it would shock anyone if I said that Mill Creek Hundred is chock full of creeks, streams, runs, and all manner of moving water (c'mon, "Creek" is right there in the name). And while these were certainly a blessing for millers and manufacturers, they sometimes got in the way when you were trying to get from one place to another. Very early in our history, there were no bridges on what passed for roads in the area -- you just forded the streams at a shallow spot. Later, bridges did begin to be built, but they were usually small, wooden, and in need of frequent maintenance and repair. In the early part of the 19th Century, a new type of bridge began to appear, one that would last longer and require less maintenance than earlier ones -- the covered bridge. At one time, MCH was dotted with at least a dozen or more covered bridges. Here, we'll look at two of them -- one of the longest, and probably the sho

I admit I go through writing lulls. There are times, like lately, where I just can't put a story down on paper. And I really didn't want to go to the national RWA meeting in New York this year---but my DH somehow got me two tickets to The Book of Mormon, and I'd paid for the hotel, conference registration and booked my ticket months ago (when it seemed like a good idea), so what the heck, I'd go and at least see my first ever Broadway show. I am sooooo glad I went. I drifted through the conference, picking up inspirational nuggets and many books, met with editors and my agent and came right home to write proposals (3 in a weekend!), motivated for the first time in a long time to write. I sat through sessions on epubbing, and heard a great historical author, Madeline Hunter, tell 3000 women authors that for the first time, thanks to the internet, the author has power over what she publishes. I'd read on another loop that the historical book business was not good this

Isaac Eastburn (1806-1890) In this blog, we've looked at a variety of different sites from life in Mill Creek Hundred in the 18th, 19th, and early 20th Centuries. We've seen houses, mills, hotels, churches, and even a resort and amusement park. There's one important community building of the time that we've yet to focus on, though, mostly because precious little survives of these outposts. I don't know if it comes from watching too many Little House on the Prairie episodes with my daughter and wondering how Mr. Oleson gets all his supplies and who he sells them to, but I've been interested recently in the small general stores that once served rural residents like those in MCH. Now, thanks to prompting from a question from a reader and local resident (thanks, Robin S), we'll take a quick look at one of those stores, owned by a member of a very prominent local family -- the Eastburns. As with most things, it seems, we don't have a complete picture of what

I turned in revisions yesterday on my Waterloo-set book, Imperial Scandal (which will be out in April 2012). I love the revision process, a chance to hone and shape and refine the story and characters (though I get very nervous letting the book go, afraid I've missed something). Thinking back through the revisions, I didn't actually make that many major changes (though it certainly felt as though I was working on them long enough!). But I did make one significant change at my editor's suggestion. It involved reworking a scene which originally involved infidelity on the part of the one of the major characters. This was a scene I'd had in my own mind for a long time before I wrote I mperial Scandal , and I was sure that this was how this would play out for these two characters (two people who are devastated and cast adrift in the wake of the battle of Waterloo). But my editor was afraid it would destroy reader sympathy for the character committing infidelity and on refle