My wife recently handed me an article from a magazine and asked me if I had ever heard about it before. It seems that a man who had been a chaplain in the Civil War moved west and started a town in California around 1908. He died in 1914 and the town quickly declined and died out. It is now a state park with the buildings restored.
Why go to all this trouble? It was just another ghost town, right? Wrong. The one detail I left out was that the chaplain was black. That made it a chapter in Black history.
As I was trying to explain why anyone would care about a town that failed I came up with the term, “Boutique History.” I like that. History is all around us. I have a book on the history of the Martin Guitar. I have a book on the history of Burma Shave signs. You see these kind of things all over. They are boutique history. They are valid areas of interest and research but they are only of interest to special groups of people. Beyond that circle they have no significance.
So read your book about the history of coffee. Collect early American cook books. Research the Nash Rambler auto line. Go for it. Just don’t get too disappointed when I don’t share your enthusiasm.
homo unius libri
I keep hoping that rednecks will be declared a minority, so I can get free stuff from the government and have my story told on PBS.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with red-neck history is that too many of us have lived it. Unfortunately, we would be the kind of minority that it would be acceptable to persecute.
DeleteI guess that isn't "would be" but "are."
Grace and peace
Nash Rambler? Now there is a flash from history; my Dad's first car was a Nash Rambler (circa 1955).
ReplyDeleteI loved our Nash when I was a kid. I should have caught on though that just about everything I think is great goes out of production. The bakery where I eat breakfast used to have three choices of bagget. They eliminated my first choice. Now I hear that my second choice will disappear.
DeleteMaybe if I could start liking Progressive politicians they would also go away.
Grace and peace.