Well, according to some records, I was born in 1720. Others have it in 1748.
Needless to say, I’m quite old by now. In fact, I no longer technically exist in material form, but in the quantum reality I am eternal. In the hearts and minds of many Princetonians, past and present, I live on in memory. And they live in mine.
Princeton had been barely named when I came into being, and was only a stop on the way between Trenton and New Brunswick on the King’s Highway. There was a tavern on that road that made it a place. Greenland’s Tavern.
I was a two story farmhouse in the beginning. Two rooms, one above, and a large fireplace. A young family grew old there. And over generations, so did I. The Reverend John Witherspoon, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, moved in down the road around the time of The Revolution. There were only a few of us back then. Cherry Hill Road was country. Merchants referred to us as the big white farmhouse on the hill. I didn’t have a number then.
But my mind keeps returning to the 1960s and on to the present day. Those are my most heart-felt memories. The last family. Fifty-two years we had together. After the vacancy. After the Second World War, the previous family dispersed, leaving me without human companionship for two decades. The last living son on the land was Harry. He had moved into a cottage on the property near the woods. No plumbing or electricity, but a phone line. He heated cans of food on the old iron wood burning stove, and that’s the way he wanted it even after the new owners took over. Actually, I prefer the word custodians to owners; over time, that’s the truer word. I mean, death seems to dictate that, don’t you think? Did I own the residents? No, I sheltered them.
Harry was never altogether all together after the Great War. The mustard gas had its effect. For some reason, he was in Boston for a time. There he was married to a young lady — a surprise to all, ” Dear Mother Married to day I supose the boys will be shocked when They see this . . .” She was as ordinary as he was. Both wore eyeglasses. They were happy. Punctuation was not a thing with them. Or spelling. Sister Martha wrote letters home from the State Village for Epileptics at Skillman. Dear Mama I am getting along allright…How is Frank Harry Alonzo and Arthur Tell Mary and Ruth to come see me again they are welcome…Ma I am out of stamps…1918.
Twice during my first 200 years, rooms were added. And as I grew, so did my awareness. In the beginning, I heard mostly the Bible, the only book they had. And news of the day came via tradesmen and foot travelers, and much later, the radio. We did hear of the big events; the battles nearby for independence from England, the comings and goings of governors and statesmen, and the laying down of the Canal, and the Straight Turnpike, later called U.S.1, which, in time, brought more and more people to settle up here on the hill, and so a small stone schoolhouse was built on the big curve halfway into town. With a house next door for the teacher. Masses of orange Daylillies grew alongside the road in Summer. Harry was the reason for the 20 year absence of people, and also the reason I was finally purchased. Every prospective buyer needed for him to be removed from his cottage. Every buyer until 1966, when Mr. Joe and Ms. Maggie said, “Why?” Why should the old man have to go from the only home he knew? And he was old by then.
Sold. Me, in a state of dishabille, as you might imagine; being broken into and vandalized and neglected, nesting on seven acres at the top of Cherry Hill Road. Dinah, the middle daughter, cried when she first saw me. Tears not for me, but for the prospect of living in a place so different from her elegant dreams. Bekka, the eldest, was intrigued by the artifacts left behind, and the energy remains of the ones who lived here before. I wish I could have regaled her with stories of the music and dancing and wistful moments around the wind-up Victrola record player. Mary and Ruth, especially. It was stolen. Sad. Bekka had her mom’s old record collection from the 1930’s. I would have loved to hear that music again on the old machine. Can you hear it?
There were bibles and bedpans, disintegrating leather suitcases full of letters and needlework; an ancient shotgun, and Harry’s WW1 army kit and uniform. In the kitchen was the iron wood stove, and the large, ornately carved oak dining table, and on it, a box of Kellog’s corn flakes with the rooster … hmmm, I wonder who left that out? So quiet for so long! The matching china hutch, and linen chest were still there, untouched by thieves. All locally made, for they were ordinary people; educated to the eighth grade or better, and doing well as skilled workers.
So much to be done! I was uninhabitable. For two and a half years, during my make-over, the three girls appeared every school morning on my doorstep, the construction site, to wait for the school bus. Miss Burke, a vice principal at the high school, and girl’s disciplinarian, knew what was up, but looked the other way. That was just the beginning of the drama! All the noise and ruckus and laughter and plenty of heartache — I held them all through the years. You’ve heard tell of the fly on the wall; I was the wall. All the walls. Inescapably one with all of life inside and out.
It felt so — literally, restorative, to be restored. Recalled to life, to use Dickens’s words; they read a lot, and the youngest daughter, Jessie, spoke French. But, to have years of debris scraped away, and sagging, arthritic joints put back in place, to be lifted from the fate of all matter, to the purpose I once had, and actually raised in stature, given more responsibility by additions, doubling my size — I felt elevated and humbled at the same time.
Move-in day was the end of November in 1968. All my doors were gloriously open, and my rooms were filled again with the energy and purpose of human habitation. I would say, it was one of the best days of my life, because until I knew emptiness, I didn’t really understand the joy of fullness. Boxes were set on the polished wood floors. Furniture was there to stay. The lights were on! I really loved the crystal chandelier that hung in the two story high entryway. Probably Mr. Joe and I were the ones most in awe of its brilliance.
It would have been just before Thanksgiving. I would learn that holidays were a time of trouble for this family; perhaps an inauspicious time to launch, as it were.
The eldest daughter was nowhere to be seen. As I gleaned, she had left the home in Trenton at the beginning of the school year, with only the clothes on her back, a toothbrush, and a job in Professor Bruce Albert’s biochemistry lab on campus.
Eventually, she did turn up, and took up residence again with the family. Bringing in the sounds of Bob Dylan, The Beatles, and all of Motown, the girls would be dancing, spiraling, spinning on the polished parquet floor of the partially furnished living room. I was shaken to my core on the mighty ocean of sound from the speakers of the RCA console stereo and television. Television! Literally an eye opener for me.
The girls took an interest in Mr. Harry, a couple of times inviting him into the house for a cup of coffee. Instant Taster’s Choice was what they knew how to make. Ahh, the aroma of coffee again! I missed that. He was a reluctant guest in his old home. In fact, at 87, and of dwindling faculties, he was more probably a clueless guest. I, of course, remembered him as a boy and a young man, a bit prankish. But, sadly, he was beyond sharing recollections. It would have been nice, and I think that’s also what the girls were hoping for; stories of his life and mine. He brought the scent of wood fire inside. Indeed, the oldest part of me, at the end of the cool marble hall, was forever infused with the ancient, ashy breath of the remaining stone fireplace.
On Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter, he put on a cleaner shirt and a suit jacket, and walked into town for an early dinner. It might have been Renwick’s that was serving on holidays. He walked straight and tall, as I watched him walk down the long driveway. Proud. Once in a while, he had a friend named Mitzi staying overnight. That is what the telephone line was all about — to call a cab for her. I never met her, but once caught a glimpse of fuschia shoes, and a fur coat.
I enjoyed the everyday hub-bub of life ; all of it, including the fights and arguments, except when I was threatened with bodily harm, as I could not duck. The old dining room furniture had also been restored; the large round table was back in its place as though it had never left; and this room that was the kitchen, was now called the dining room. The piano stood where the old stove used to be. Almost all of them played, livening up many a gathering. The ancient wood floors of my original rooms were cleaned and shined. I so much looked forward to family mealtimes, where events of the day would be thrown about, where everyone would tell their adventures, and the news of the moment. That is really how I ever knew anything about the world down the hill and beyond.
Alas, everyone was on a different timetable. Different feeding patterns. It wasn’t often I was able to relax and enjoy an everyday family dinner conversation, but the dinner parties were definitely worthwhile occasions, as the family circle of friends, acquaintances, associates and strays was global. People they met on their travels were invited to stay, or at least come over when visiting the U.S. George from Estonia they met in Sweden. In 1973, they went to China with a group from the NY Academy of Sciences. So, of course, during the next few years, came several Chinese travelers. “Ni hao?” I picked up a few words.
The warmest parties were with family and friends. A lively evening of food and drink, politics and good fellowship would frequently be ignited by the merest excuse — a knock on the door on a Saturday evening. Mr. Joe’s closest friend, Mr. Walt, and Ms. Rosemarie: We just came from a lecture on campus, or a play at McCarter. A bottle of wine would be opened. A tray of pastries might appear. Mr. Joe would find some delicacy in the fridge he’d been saving for just such an event. Well, this went on for the next 50 years. The girls popped in with boyfriends, and sometimes friends were already there, hidden away in the secret places only they and I knew about. Then. The teenagers here in my last decade, of course, found them all; their parties tended to revolve around hide-and-seek, dancing, and rollicking fun that spread out into the woods; on a midsummer night or in a snowy starlit wonderland, or around a bonfire in the driveway.
Back to the 1960s. What was called the generation gap caused all kinds of turmoil in daily life, especially affecting the females – the curfews, and the howit-looks, and girls-can’t-do-that, and so on. The dress code at the high school was especially concerned with skirt length for girls, often landing ours in Miss Burke’s office for enlightenment. Decades later, when Bekka’s kids were here, some of the boys did wear skirts to school. Usually midi length. It was a patriarchal family, and yet, the girls and all the younger ones were encouraged to speak up at those parties. Express their views. Was it entertainment, to let the teenagers reveal their minds? And did they? Yes, of course they did, because they knew things, and knew that they knew things. The adults asked probing questions that they never did when one-on-one, but all of them together — it seemed more like curious inquiry than inquisition. They seemed earnest. It would have been a time to bridge the gap. Was there a lot of drug taking among their friends? Was there dating with University students? Was there a political underground at the high school? Was the gap bridged? Eventually, it always is.
Throughout my time, generation after generation, I have had to adjust my thinking about right and wrong. It does come down to that on issues. Not so much on individuals — so many bands of nuance with humans. You might think an old house like me would be alarmed at change, and set in my ways. Maybe other houses in town held up established views long past their time. But, you see, I was in on it all; the arguments and discussions, from 1776 when we were wondering about the benefit of living under a distant monarchy, until, ultimately the will of the people decided the matter, and formed a republic. Truthfully, because of the human influences around me at the time, I, myself was unsure. After the fact of the actual violent birthing, the Revolution, I saw clearly why it had to be. Ever since then, I have paid attention more critically to the events and sentiments of the day, listening ever more closely to the many voices heard inside my walls, and out.
Enough for now. This was but a sketch, which, of course leaves out almost everything. And yet, I will continue to tell the stories, one way or another.
Rebecca Pack Burr grew up in Trenton and Princeton and is keeping up treasured friendships, old and new. Her three kids attended Princeton schools. She is a writer and award-winning filmmaker.
