New Hampshire General Stores

I am going to focus almost entirely on general stores in this month’s blog post.  They are fixtures in small towns in New Hampshire.

In our last road trip we learned of two village stores that had been saved by the local inhabitants.  Here in Freedom, NH is the Freedom Village Store. It is built of wood, and of Victorian design.  It was built about a century ago, thrived for a long time, then went empty and forlorn.  In 2009 it was reopened as a non-profit space.  I didn’t have much time to spend there, but it looks worth a return visit.  It is a true community center, with food, and art. And coffee, gazpacho, and blueberry soup. Sounds good, and colorful too.

The town of Freedom, with almost 1500 residents, took its name in 1831 when it broke away from the town to the south, Effingham.

Here we are in Campton, NH, a town of 3400 people or so.  It lies in the foothills of the White Mountain National Forest.

First of all, I drew this building because I was taken by the color.  Pale aqua is one of my very favorite colors, and in a clothing store it draws me like a magnet.  But it is an unusual color for a building, here painted wood.

This is a general store with groceries and more.  But notice the lack of any large signs.  Nothing that tells you what is on sale this week.  Or even a hint of all that might be inside.  I drew the tiny sign that is above the door, on the very far right.

The sign says Crawford Notch General Store, but it is in the town of Hart’s Location, population 41 as of the 2010 census.  It is a ribbon shaped town 11 miles long and 1.5 miles wide (18 km by 2.4 km), running along a valley in the White Mountains. It’s the smallest town in the state.

New Hampshire state law allows a town of fewer than 100 residents (not just registered voters) to open its polls at midnight and close when all have cast their votes.  Therefore this small community, along with the neighboring Dixville Notch, gets a lot of attention during New Hampshire’s first in the nation presidential primaries for their early results.

The building is a log cabin, with rugged decor....antlers, snowshoes, and wagon wheels.  New Hampshire’s mountain passes are called notches, some say to echo the shapes cut into the logs for cabins.  The mountain notches are Franconia, Dixville, Crawford, and Pinkham.  The rock outcropping I drew is called the Frankenstein Cliff.

In the middle of the drawing is the wire shed filled with firewood for campfires. There is a ban on importing out of state firewood, due to invasive nonnative insects.

Atkinson, a town with a population of about 7,000, is on the border with the state of Massachusetts.  We got lost and were in Massachusetts for an hour or so trying to make our way north again back into New Hampshire.

As I have mentioned before, we travel with four maps and our GPS and still have our troubles finding our way around.  This little store, under new ownership, was filled to bursting with beautiful flowers and plants. Mother’s Day was just around the corner, so the owners were in preparation for holiday purchases. The owners looked worried that I was outside for a long while, seemingly taking notes about their business.  I went inside and explained that I was an artist, and harmless.  This led to my husband creating a ‘Get Out of Jail’ card for me, explaining my quest to draw all the towns in the state, which I now hand out to those who show a close interest in my activities.

It is quite a busy road, and very narrow too.  I drew from across the road, next to a granite post.  The nickname for New Hampshire is the Granite State.  It refers to the ubiquitous hard stone, and the toughness and resiliency of its inhabitants.  Some stone posts have metal rings on them, leftovers from the days of tying one’s horse up at curbside.

I was very careful where I stood to draw this image, as there seemed to be some very healthy poison ivy plants trailing over the stone wall.  Poison Ivy is horrible stuff. It causes an itchy rash. Be thankful if you have never heard of it where you live.

The building in the distance is the fire and rescue department.

You can see the railroad tracks to the right, in this drawing of Newton Junction,  a part of Newton, NH.  I read that the Amtrak train goes by but doesn’t stop here anymore.  The oval sign says “Trackside Professional Building”.  And the sign over the door says ACI Family Takeout. This business is not quite a general store.  But I think the shape of the building indicates to me that it once was.

There’s that beautiful teal color again, on the old sheds to the right.

Kingston, with a population of 6,000, was originally a part of Hampton, NH.  And in 1694 it was granted status as a new town called Kingstown.  The king involved was King William of England.  The town green is rectangular and unusually long.  Early industries included shoe making in one-room shops and homes, silversmithing, and a rather extensive charcoal manufacturing industry that supplied many of the growing industrial cities of northeast Massachusetts. 

We stopped in here for some coffee at about 4 PM, when I need a pick me up.  Then I stood out on the town common and drew this very vertical building.  As is almost every structure in NH, it is painted wood clapboards.  (In our family we pronounced this word as ‘clairboards’.)  The signs say Kingston Country Store and Groceries and Lottery and Subs and Beer. And Power Ball, a multi-state lottery.

Subs, or submarine sandwiches, are sandwiches made on long rolls as the word suggests.  In the US there are over 20 regional names for this kind of sandwich.  Where I grew up in Massachusetts, they were called grinders. I salivate as I type the word.

This view is in the town of Jefferson, NH.  And this section of town is called Jefferson Meadows.  The mountains are the White Mountains of New Hampshire.  This range is called the Presidential Range.  The names are Mt. Washington, Mt. Adams, Mt. Jefferson, Mt Madison, Mt. Monroe, Mt Eisenhower, and some others named for notables of American history.  The native people had their own names of course.  When the mountains were first formed they got along well with no names at all.

I put this drawing in as a little break from all the architecture.

Milan, with the stress on the first syllable, is a small town. It is near the much larger town of Berlin, also with stress on the first syllable.  I was struck by the unusual color combination in this storefront.  The name sign is very new and modern, possibly plastic.  I forgot to include the word ‘Inc.’ in the sign.

Like almost every building in NH, it is constructed of painted wood, probably about 1900.  There is a lot of granite quarries in NH, but most of the stone is shipped away and used in major metropolitan areas.  Like Washington, DC.  Or the capital city of Concord, NH. 

General stores are the traditional meeting places for the townspeople and those running for elected public office.  The sign above the door says ‘Geo. A. Robie and Son’. The business was in this family for 110 years. It sits along the railroad tracks in the town of Hooksett, NH.  It has been a stop for presidential candidates since the 1950s. The walls inside are lined with political buttons, photos, bumper stickers and the like.

At one time the business received merchandise by barge from the Merrimack River, and also served as the town’s post office.  We ate lunch here, and tried to remember past presidential campaigns and running mates.  The names of the Vice Presidential candidates really fade into oblivion fast.

To the left of the wooden structure are the railroad crossing lights and gate.  Road level crossings are dangerous places when drivers try to beat the oncoming train.  It was fun to draw however.

Errol is a small town north of the White Mountains, with a population of perhaps 300.  Like many, many towns in New Hampshire, the name goes back to some British gentry who never ever visited.  In this case, the town was named for Scotland’s James Hay, 15th Earl of Errol.

The soil was considered poor, but suitable for hay, oats and potatoes.  And the forests were full of lumber.  Today the area is known for fishing, hunting, and sno-mobiling.  There is an enormous outdoor goods store there.  We wandered through it a bit.  And I wondered at their sign which states that ‘All footwear must be paid for at the fudge counter.’

The drawing has a bit of twisted perspective.  It was unintentional.  I guess I moved my feet somewhere in the sketching process.  It can be a hazard of on the spot drawing.  I find the long addition colorful but oddly shaped.  I liked the orange kayak on the red car. 

The flowers, flag, and round wreath (backwards to the viewer) are a small war memorial across the street. I was standing in the memorial park while drawing.

Eaton is a small town, with a population of about 400.  But it has a lot of heart.  The residents saved their village store. And painted it ‘barn red’ again. It houses the post office, a grocery store, and a restaurant.  We ate lunch there and visited with our friend.

As soon as I started to draw, a gorgeous antique car pulled up.  I had to sketch the car first, as I had no idea how long it was going to be posing for me. It stayed the whole time.

Danbury NH is a town within a few miles of our home base of New London.  It was not so easy deciding what to draw.  When unsure, I tend to look towards a general store.  It is a gathering place and meeting point.  There is another general store across the street from this one, and I just heard today that this one has now closed.  It was an unusual situation.  Nonetheless, here it is, the (former) Danbury General Store.

On the orange bench is a sign advertising Ragged Mountain, a ski resort in the town.  It is 2,225 ft above sea level, or 678 meters. The Sunapee-Ragged-Kearsarge Greenway hiking trail runs through a corner of the town. 

I love to draw large ice cream cone signs.  It probably drew me to this view point.

This is the general store in Lyndeborough, NH.  It was dark by the time I stopped here as you can see.  I liked the effect, and I don’t mind drawing in the dark.  General stores often have a lot of additions to them.  Probably this building started out as the far left section.  Or maybe the far left and the far right were joined with the middle part. 

At this time, I was drawing in autumn, and it gets dark so early.  Things are easier in the summer.

We spent a fair amount of time in Tamworth last week.  I popped into the library (the long white building on the right half of the page), and had a nice chat with some employees.  And I showed them my Draw-NH sketches at their beginning stages. Which I don’t usually do. They were very encouraging people, and I hope they will log on and see this post.

Then I checked out some books, knowing I can drop them off at my local library and they will be returned to this library by the state of NH book van. You can apparently do that anywhere in the state.

Bruce took a nap. While I took a walk.  We had a lovely dinner of local foods on the back deck of the Lyceum. 

New Hampshire has 21 playhouses, small professional repertory theatrical companies. Our town, New London, has one called  the Barn Playhouse, in a refurbished cow barn on Main Street. Tamworth’s playhouse is called the Barnstormers.  They all appear to enjoy marvelous support from the townsfolk.

One cannot see this view from a single location on the street.  I drew it as I walked down the street to the right.  Which is how you see things in your daily life, right?

 As I stood in front of the town offices drawing, a man asked me what I was doing.  He was curious.  I jokingly told him I was the town’s new meter maid, ready to write a ticket.  And that I was prepared to stand there until the new parking meters were installed.  A little joke...this town is so small that it has no need for meters or parking regulations (other than to control parking during Barnstormers’ performances).  But I did give him a start for a second or two, and then a laugh.

Ok, I admit it.  I imagined the fall foliage behind all the white buildings. When we were there it was lush green.  I know in my heart it will be these glorious colors.

Today was Hospital Day in our town of New London, NH.  Various activities raise money for our local hospital.  This year some inflatable games for the children were sited on the town green.  I just couldn’t resist drawing this large colorful dragon.  There are several children playing inside it.  To the right is a slide, with parents waiting at the bottom. 

New Hampshire and Wisconsin!

On Friday nights in the summer, people gather on town commons in New England to listen to band concerts.  There’s a different band here in New London every week. They vary in size, and they vary from good to great.

Besides the music, there is the entertainment of watching the hordes of kids—running, chasing each other, doing somersaults, and climbing trees.  Usually we get little ones who want to pet our dog.  He goes along with it.  The band stand is the far right of the drawing, then in the middle the town offices, and at the extreme left is the New London Inn. 

These very long brick buildings are the Cocheco Mills in Dover, NH, as seen from the corner of Orchard and Central Streets.  I wanted to include the spire of the church in the background, St. John’s Methodist Episcopal.  It is hard to see well, but it is topped by a weather vane. The vane is shaped like a three masted sailing ship.  Dover is not very far from the Atlantic Ocean.

The Cocheco Mills were built in 1815 for the purpose of printing designs on cotton fabric.  They were in business until 1937.  Today the solidly built structures are used as housing and small businesses.  In 1828, the workers in the mills, who were mostly young single females, went on strike.  I think that this strike is well known and remembered in the history of unions in textile mills.

The opposite side of the street is lined with small shops and businesses, almost all in the pleasingly warm tones of red brick.  I drew this in the spring time.  I see that my red bush blends in with the brick.  And a red car too.  It’s a study in red and green.

One day we felt like leaving the woods where we live and driving to Nashua.  It was cold and snowy in our little town, and warm and not snowy here in Nashua, only about a 70 mile drive away.  Of course it was south and downhill and well farther along into spring.  I do enjoy drawing towers and turrets, and Nashua abounds with them.

  When I was a child, in the 1950s, Nashua was a major shopping destination for our family. It had department stores, a true sign of urban life,  One of the department stores had a system of pneumatic tubes.  You handed your cash to an employee, who fed it along with the bill of sale into a tubular canister.  This went into a pipe and woosh, disappeared.  Except it didn’t really disappear.  You could watch it whiz around and up until it reached the cashiers on the top floor.  They made change and sent it all back again.  I feel like a fossil telling this tale.

I drew my peach and blueberry pie at Schubert’s Bakery in Mount Horeb, Wisconsin.  I travel to this town in southwestern Wisconsin twice a year to visit my mother and my sister and her family.

In the 1800s, many settlers here came from Norway.  You can still see signs in Norwegian, and Norwegian clubs put on ethnic festivals.  I have eaten herring many ways in Mount Horeb!  ‘Mange Takk’ on the sign above the door means bon appetit. Funny we don’t have such a saying in English.  Most people say enjoy, or sometimes cheers.

This is my sister’s favorite vista  She has painted it in the past, and she took me there so I could sketch and paint it too.  The corn is just starting to grow.  They look like lines of tiny v shapes. The long rows of hay have just been cut, and it’s drying out before baling.  It is a lovely grey-green color in the foreground. 

The peak is called Blue Mound, and it is in the tiny town of Blue Mounds.  It is always blue.  This part of Wisconsin is called driftless, which means the glaciers never got here during the last ice age.  Which means it is more hilly than the surrounding parts of the state.

A neighbor once suggested that we go to the lupine festival in Sugar Hill, NH. It took us a few years to make up our minds during the correct time, but we got there. Beautiful. (Thanks, Carolyn.)  We learned from a festival brochure that a lupine plant is the same as a Texas bluebonnet. And that they grow around the world.  But we had never seen large masses of them.

 This view is across the street from the famed Polly’s Pancake Parlor.  The yellow field is buttercups.  The peak is Mount Lafayette.  You’ll notice a white horse grazing in the field too. The blue is caused by a haze in the air caused by moisture.  I thought it went well with the blue of the blossoms. Some stalks are pink or even white.

After this drawing was done, we drove a couple of miles to another gorgeous field of lupines  This place had a winding path mown through it with white signs here and there.  On the signs were short quotes from poems about nature.  We were able to enjoy this private land because the owner wished to share it with the public.

These gliders are at the Franconia Soaring Center in Franconia, NH.  I really enjoy drawing things that I have never drawn before, like here.  I was amazed to notice that the design of each glider is so different from the other.  Different tail, wings, nose shape, body shape. I have no interest in actually doing any gliding.

I drew the mountain profiles carefully.  I would like them to be recognizable.  Kinsman Mountain is on the far left.

 

Usually I draw sights that I find along the main street of a town or near the town center.  I broke my own guideline when I got to Moultonboro, NH, because we decided to visit an historic home called Lucknow, with the nickname of ‘Castle In The Clouds’.  First you drive a long ways through the woods on a very steep narrow road,  stopping along the way to hike to a waterfall. Then you get to the visitors center in the former carriage house and stables—quite an elegant structure in its own right.  Then you transfer to a trolley which winds up an even more narrow and more steep road.  You try not to think how far down the drop is on your right.

After 5 minutes or so, you have arrived at the back door of Lucknow.  It is a home built in the American Craftsman style in 1914.  The owner was Thomas Plant, who made a ton of money owning and running a shoe factory in Massachusetts.  This was to be his retirement home.  He did a lot of philanthropic good deeds with his spare cash as well.  He was a world traveler, and Lucknow is the name of a beautiful city in India.  Most people think it was also a pun referring to his good fortune. He employed a thousand people all at once to work on this home in order to finish it as quickly as reasonable.  It was wonderful.  I LOVED every room and every detail.  Every thing was so thoughtful and skillfully done.  For example, in every window were individually painted glass roundels of local vistas, flora, and fauna through the seasons.  And the home had the latest in inventions too—in the kitchen, multi-headed, full body showers in the baths, brine cooled refrigerators, central vacuum cleaners, etc. They entertained a lot of people well.  A local golf course was established by him that continues today.

Mr. Plant did lose his fortune through poor and unwise investments, such as the purchase of Imperial Russian bonds in 1916.  Many of these were advised by his friend Theodore Roosevelt.  But he was allowed to live out his life here by a subsequent owner. The house gradually fell into disrepair, but it has now been purchased by a non-profit foundation that has done a loving and wonderful job bringing it back.  They’re still working at it and hope to have the basement area containing the wine cellar and the various mechanical systems open within a year or so.

The view I chose to draw is from the front garden of the house, showing the panorama overlooking all of Lake Winnipesaukee and the mountains beyond. The overhanging roof is suggested by the open rafters and supports.  There is a ring of stone planters and rose bushes.  In the foreground is a very small wishing pool with a bronze statue.  The little winged creature is raising its face to the sun.  There is a frog at the feet.  It is challenging to pull off a composition which includes very small and closeup retails as well as the full horizon.  And the feeling of shelter as well as expansiveness. Phew.  But I felt it was worth the effort.

Waterville Valley is just south of the White Mountain range in NH.  We drove in circles for a while as I had trouble finding a vista that said ‘draw me!’.  I chose this one when I saw the red barn with the nice door.  I liked the shape of the mountains with their summer view of the skis slopes.  I also just loved the shape of this paved driveway. 

Wolfeboro is on the eastern side of Lake Winnipesaukee, and also borders Lake Wentworth. It is a small, charming, resort town, with lots of scenes begging to be drawn.  But I was getting antsy about not being close enough to the water. And then we found this park, named Town Park, established 1967.  It was a set of semi-circular terraces leading from the street to the lake’s edge.  Some parts were in full sun, some in shade.  All very carefully designed and maintained.  So lovely. 

 

I was wandering up and down the main shopping street in North Woodstock,NH,  not quite settling down on a subject to draw.  I was mumbling ‘hmm’ a lot.

Then I saw a hotel named Cascade Hotel.  I thought, perhaps that implies that there is a cascade, or waterfall, nearby.  I turned 180 degrees and read the sign Cascade Park. It is a newly made small urban park leading from the shopping street to the Pemigewasset River (generally called ‘The Pemi’ by locals).  I thought the place was quite enchanting.  I loved the way the stones had been shaped by the water, over eons of time.  And the trees echoed the wavy shapes too. The water must flow up over the trees in spring runoff to shape them like that. There were tiny patches of sand here and there.  And a few people lounging with their feet in the cool water.

Alton Bay, NH is at the very southern most end of the large Lake Winnipesaukee.  The road makes a sharp turn here to follow the western side of the lake. In the bend of the road is this Victorian era building.  It was long known as the Busy Corner Store and owned and run by my husband’s aunt and uncle.

It has a new owner and is now called Amilyne’s Corner.  You see the sign for haddock sandwiches which caught my eye.  We had them and they were delicious!  So delicately battered, and fried just right. Hundreds of motorcyclists were passing in front of me as I drew this.  It was Bike Week in NH.  It was a real exercise in concentration.  I considered drawing them, but it’s hard to draw a blur.  The building on the left houses the town post office.

This is my latest attempt to draw New London’s Community Garden behind our town library.  It is such a charming spot.  Many volunteers in town maintain it.  It was originally designed in 1923 by the famed Olmsted Brothers, pioneers of landscape architecture.  This firm over the course of many years designed parks such as Central Park in New York City and the Emerald Necklace in Boston, along with many college campuses and private estates. 

New Hampshire!

Litchfield is a small town along the Merrimack River, nestled between Manchester and Nashua.  We saw lots of rich brown soil, ready for this year’s crops to be planted.  The land next to rivers is always very fertile, and it was good to see it used for its best purposes.  Meaning, no housing there, just farmers’ fields.

The white wooden clapboard building states that it is the home of the Litchfield Historical Society.  The red, white, and blue bunting was up in time for Memorial Day, at the end of May, and will likely stay there until Independence Day, July 4. I don’t know what the original use of the building was.  The fire station is next door.  One of their vehicles is parked in the shade.  I sat in the grass to draw this, and that perspective explains the very tall purple irises in bloom.

Historical Societies are a wonderful New England thing.  They range in size and scope from one-room adjuncts to other buildings, run by very dedicated volunteers and open one day a week or perhaps just by appointment, to large activities with professional staff such as the one located in the Amoskeag Mills complex in Manchester.  The thing that’s common to all is a love of their locality and a deep appreciation of its rich history.  You can find links to over 40 such organizations on this page at DirectoryNH.com.  And there are surely others that haven’t yet gotten quite up to speed with the Information Age, but you can find them if you look hard enough once you get to town.

We arrived in Londonderry at midday, and as I have mentioned before, I just don’t draw on an empty stomach.  So we had a very nice lunch at a corner restaurant, The Coach Stop. We ate on a terrace, overlooking the front lawn.  On this lawn sat a buggy.  It was in lovely condition, actually looked new.  The old vehicle seemed to gaze out towards the busy highway crossroads.

A friend once remarked to me that there is nothing I won’t draw.  I replied that there is little that I won’t consider drawing.  And I drew this locomotive engine at an incredible pace because the black flies were swarming around my face. I wasn’t prepared for the onslaught of the pesky flies that aim for your eyes, since our region 2 hours south was already pretty much through with them for the year.

After a few minutes I started to speed up the drawing process even more by just drawing where the train was NOT.  In other words, I penciled in the shapes where I could see light through the complex undercarriage of the train.  And I finished it at home from my notations.  Artists often focus on negative spaces for design anyway, so it worked well.  It is all pencil with watercolor for the red, blue, and green shapes.

  And the vehicle is a lumber train engine in Lincoln in the White Mountains area.  It is no longer used, and is now perched near the entrance to the Loon Mountain Ski Resort.  The railroad opened up the White Mountains to logging, as the rivers weren’t suitable for floating the logs down to the mills as was done elsewhere.  Logging practices of the day were horrendous, leading to the creation of the White Mountain National Forest and the attendant restrictions on the industry.

 The sign said that three trains a day went through town loaded with felled trees.  And there was a photo of the engine pulling railroad cars piled with pre-built lumber towns into place for the summer logging season.  The lumber industry in this area is pretty much over.  Tourists are the money makers now.

Plymouth is a small city at the southern edge of the White Mountains. My sister Aimée was born here while our father was a graduate student at Plymouth State University.  When we lived here it was called Plymouth State Teacher’s College.  He was getting a Master’s degree in preparation for becoming a science teacher.  In one class, he was learning to give IQ tests.  I think I was the only person in the family who agreed to take it.  I was five years old, and I remember the pretty red and white blocks I had to rearrange in a certain time. 

Plymouth has a shaded sort of oval shaped common or town park.  I found this bronze statue there and liked it.  It represents a Boy Scout and was sculpted in 1932 by G. H. Borst.  The boulder is from the nearby Franconia Notch and the natural pothole basin, at the foot of the boulder, is from the Baker River. I love the details on sculpture, in this case the boy has patches on his sleeve from a local troop, Troop 56. 

The university buildings are up on the hill behind the white post office.

Here is my husband resting on a bench at the Audubon Center in Auburn, NH.  The wooden boxes on posts are most likely for nesting bluebirds.  I think they have at least 85 of them.

The building is named the Broad Barn, for the donors named Mr. and Mrs. Broad.  The orange sign says bat box.  The center wasn’t yet open for spring and the ground was all soggy, so we didn’t walk around. 

The sign on the red building says “Torrent Hose Co. No 1 RFD”.  It is the fire station in Raymond, NH.  Clearly it is an old house, repurposed and expanded horizontally and perhaps raised up one story as well.  I was sitting on a bench in the town green to draw this.

 It is good to have highways to bypass the little towns, in this case Route 101.  But then you never see the small towns and have no sense of where you really are.  This is one of the many reasons that I am enjoying my Draw-NH project.  The only cure for wanderlust is wandering.

I don’t post my drawings exactly when I draw them.  I put them in a box to accumulate until I see at least two subjects that look like they want to tell a story.  I can tell from the orange colors of the leaves that I drew this last autumn.  

The square boxy white building is the former fire station in Hollis, NH, now the home of the local Historical Society.  The letters on the sign spell out the charming name of the “Always Ready Engine House”.  It was home of a horse drawn carriage and hose.  

The tower in the background belongs to the town offices.  The little tree appears to be atop the fire station roof, but it is merely centered behind it.  I could have moved it, or left it out, but I chose to keep it there like a topknot.  Drawing makes you feel powerful.

And here we have the railroad station in East Kingston, NH.  Yellow and brown are the colors of the Boston and Maine Railroad, I’m told.  Commonly referred to as the B&M. I think it is possible that a few trains still use these tracks.

I do have to be careful when counting toward my goal of drawing all 234 towns in the state.  East Kingston is indeed a separate town, though many places whose names feature compass points are just informally designated local areas of the actual town.  Acton, Massachusetts, where I lived during most of my high school and college years, is the only place I’ve ever encountered that has a locally recognized (though unofficial) North, East, South, West, and Center. 

And another yellow painted wooden building.  New England is all about clapboard construction from local timber.  This is called the Ladd-Gilman house in Exeter, NH.  It is the side view, from a viewpoint on a street way below the house.

There is in fact a cannon on the green grass pointing out towards the passersby.  It was hard to draw from a point of perspective, and hard to draw a weapon aimed at me.  So sorry to those who are missing the cannon and saying “where is it?”.

Exeter, it seems to me, has a larger number of yellow houses than the typical New Hampshire town.  Some day I would like to understand why.  Right now, I just enjoy the cheery phenomenon.

This is the steeple of the Pilgrim United Church of Christ in the town of Brentwood, NH.  I liked the use of red paint instead of the standard green, and of course, I was taken by the gold colored fish weather vane. The churches of New Hampshire almost always seem to have a weather vane on the top rather than a cross.  It is important to know which way the wind is blowing. 

An historical marker to the side of this church told of a peace rally there in 1812.  Two thousand people gathered to hear Daniel Webster speak against Americans entering into the War of 1812 against the British.  Many historians regard the War of 1812 as the Revolutionary War, part II. 

We have been friends with the British ever since we settled that conflict.  We call each other cousins.  When we lived there for three years as a family, the daily struggle with language and cultural differences nearly did us in.  At times.

I sat on the grass directly underneath this tall steeple of the Parkhill Meeting House in Westmoreland, NH.  The current appearance of the meeting house dates from 1824.  And it was moved to this spot from a nearby location as the population shifted.  I am so impressed with the skill to move buildings.  I included this drawing and the next in honor of June brides.

Walpole is an attractive village in the western part of the state along the Vermont border.  I just knew that I would have some trouble deciding what to draw.  So I went into the town’s Old Academy Historical Society. And I happily wandered through the exhibits.

  I was struck by a beautiful wedding gown from the 1870’s.  The dress fabric was champagne colored satin, with multitudes of chiffon roses.  The bodice was a delicate sheer lace with hand appliqued flower clusters.  I liked it so much I decided to draw it on the spot.  And then I got the idea to envision the wedding bouquet.  And then I extended the paper to draw the bride’s face, hair and veil, again through my imagination.

I used to work for an old large country estate in Maryland.  For four and a half years, I went to a wedding a week.  My job was to ensure that all was going smoothly. Or if not, to assist where needed.  It was a real behind-the-scenes job. I liked my job as I ate well, heard wonderful music, and witnessed much happiness and joy.

I drew the Barrington Community Playground in Barrington, NH while sitting in the car.  There were several parents there supervising and having a Saturday afternoon chat.  But I chose to just draw the children.  It was quite a fun adventure style playground that the kids were enjoying a lot.

New Hampshire and British Columbia!

While I was outside drawing this beautiful brick library in Kensington NH, my husband was inside getting a deluxe tour from the librarian, who clearly loved the building and the history it represented.  The sign above the door says in white letters The Kensington Social Library.  The building was a gift of Joseph C. Hilliard in 1895.  It has a modern wing out back (nicely concealed so as not to detract from the original architecture), and it is next door to the elementary school.  That must be handy for the students.  I just love the conflicting architectural devices of this era, e.g. the symmetrical and the asymmetrical windows and columns.

 The term ‘social library’ is a holdover from the early 1800’s when libraries in New Hampshire were private book collections.  If you joined as a member and paid a fee, you were allowed to borrow.  Ironically, libraries are now evolving into more social centers with meeting rooms, and clubs such as knitting.  My sister and her husband have recently posted photos of themselves at their library in Wisconsin...one while enjoying a Death by Chocolate cooking competition and another at a costume party.

My drawings and watercolor paintings always indicate the weather and the season as well as the architecture.  The trees in spring are yellow-green and pink.

When I am driving around in my project of drawing every town in New Hampshire, two thoughts are usually floating around in my head: “Oh, I have never seen that before”  and “Oh, that building really looks like the one in such and such a place”.  If the towns are close together, I sometimes feel I am following around a local architect/builder.  And I know that pattern books and mail order trimmings were readily available, so that could explain many of the similarities. 

This is Bedford Center, NH.  The town hall is in the center, which includes the Narragansett Grange No. 16.  The yellow building is a private home, and just to the left of that are small views of the end of the town library. And the white building on the far left is a home.

Granges were established a in the mid 1800’s as a social movement.  This was an era when half the population left to move to better farmland in the midwest states of the US.  Those who stayed behind suffered from the lack of man power to keep the land in agriculture.  Most fields quickly reverted to woodland, and New Hampshire slid into a severe economic decline.  For decades.

 The yellow shrub is called forsythia, which cheerfully blooms early.  It blooms before its leaves pop out so the color effect is dramatic.  Since this has been a cool spring, they are still in bloom a month later.  The odd brown shape to the far right is a vine on an arbor.

If you should go to Bedford Center, you will not see this exact view.  I drew it as I was walking up the road, adding new details and sightlines as I went around a corner.  That is the fun of drawing on location.

These are the main cross roads in Gilmanton, NH.  The tallest building in the center is the home of the town offices.  On the left stands the Gilmanton Community Church, and on the right is a small scale public library.  I didn’t check to see how many copies of the novel Peyton Place (Grace Metalious, 1956) may be inside.  It was always said that she based the plot and characters in her scandalous novel on this town, where she was living when she penned it.

The town office, grand in scale but built of wooden clapboards, has an unusual window. It is circular and resembles a globe in an atlas. Tricky to draw.

Notice the granite pillars along the roadway.  There were too many to count, but they seemed such a part of the place that I had to fit in three.  They were once part of a fence.  I wouldn’t want to meet one with a car fender.  New Hampshire is the Granite State.

My historical advisor tells me that the ‘traditional’ white New England buildings date only to the 1930’s.  A conference was held and sponsored by Yankee Magazine.  The attendees discussed how to get more tourists to come to New England, stay longer, and spend more money.  It was agreed that painting all the buildings white would have a unifying effect and successfully convey quaintness.  The paint companies were most happy to assist and encourage this thought.  (Up to this point, the buildings were left unpainted or painted with whatever was the least expensive color available.)  No harmony at all in other words.  Litchfield, Connecticut was selected as a trial town. White paint was slapped on all the buildings in the town center.  Then the owners were required to attach black or dark green shutters.  Voilà, instant charm.  (The plague of shutters with no function continues to this day.  Don’t get me started on shutters that don’t shut.)  It worked. Tourism picked up, and paint brushes and buckets emerged all over the six New England states: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island.

Fremont is a small town in the southeast part of New Hampshire.  I decided to draw their town pound viewed from the inside.  In earlier days, wandering livestock would be corralled into this enclosed space until the owner could come claim them.  It is made of small granite boulders and upright granite posts.  It is kept as a relic, and somebody must be restacking the stones from time to time because these kinds of walls do tumble down.  It is not easy to draw rocks.  I try to draw the idea of rocks, if you see what I mean. In behind is the Poplin Meeting House, 1800, in white clapboard, and a graveyard across the road.  

My paternal grandfather and his parents and brothers came south from Quebec, Canada to work in the granite quarries of Concord, NH.  I think they may have been stonemasons in Quebec as well.

Fremont has an historical marker about the town’s Mast Tree Riot in 1734.  This was a little altercation between local tree owners and the English Crown.  It seems the Crown reserved the tallest and straightest pine trees as masts for the king’s ships.  And some folks objected.

And here we have another stone town pound in the tiny town of Windsor, just west of Hillsborough.  It has a population of about 200 in about 8 square miles  It was known as Campbell’s Gore originally.  A gore is a wedge shaped piece of land, sort of a leftover. The sign in the center notes that the fee for claiming an impounded animal was 50 cents per day—quite a large sum by the standards of the time.  Little volunteer evergreens are sprouting in the center. I like how I could see through the woods to a lake and a mountain.

I decided to gather a few of my drawings of schools, in honor of the winding down of the school year. Schools in North American close for the summer, in early to mid June.  The summer camp industry has grown to fill in the gap of time in the summer.  I am a volunteer at our local elementary school, where I talk about art history once a month.

To make this drawing, I peered in through very dusty windows.  It is the Bow Center Schoolhouse, 1894, in Bow NH, and is no longer in use.  Of note, the black slate writing board. The lettering above this chalkboard is called the Palmer Penmanship script.  I think it is still taught in North America. It is a distinctive style that does not resemble that of England, Europe, or anywhere.  Most people evolve a simpler form as soon as they leave elementary school, age 10. Most of my letters look like printing, although some are still loopy.

To continue with the school theme, here is the former high school in Ashland, NH.  It sits high on a hill and is a Victorian era gem.  My father had his first teaching job here, in the late 1940’s and early 1950’s.  He taught all the mathematics and science classes for ages 14–17.  As a first teaching job, it sounds very challenging.  I was about 4 or 5 years old. 

My memories include my pet hamster, and the five and dime store down the street.  It was not a Woolworth chain store, but similar in concept.  The counters and shelves were so low I could see all the assortments of lipsticks, frilly handkerchiefs, and fake pearl clip-on earrings.

The next year we moved to Massachusetts, where the starting salary for teachers was greater.  We lived in Westford, moving into three different houses, until I was fourteen. 

Brookline, NH borders the state of Massachusetts in the south.  I seem to be drawn like a moth to yellow buildings.  This is the large square building of the town offices.  It is the former home of the Daniels Academy, founded in 1905 for girls and boys.  It looks dignified and solid, and well worth repurposing.

New Ipswich is a small town along the Massachusetts border. I bought a coffee and a cookie at a small store, for a break.  The coffee shop was next door to this elementary school, the New Ipswich Center School.  I really liked that green awning that shelters the students from the weather.

My father-in-law was not a very hard working student in high school.  He was sent off to the New Hampton School in New Hampton, NH for a year after he graduated, for the purpose of bringing up his grades so that he would be accepted to a university.  This was accomplished through enforced study halls.  And the lack of female students in his classes helped too, I’m very sure.  My father-in-law had a facetiously pompous way of speech. Right now I can hear his voice, from the hereafter, urging me to use the word ‘pulchritude’.  Which is a very awkward sounding word meaning beauty of females.

Anyway, this is Lane Hall on the campus of the New Hampton School, built in 1919.  The planter has a date of 1890 on it.

This building has what I call cowboy style architecture.  It is the Deadwood Junction in Greenwood, British Columbia, Canada.  It has wonderful coffee, pastries, and rooms of arts and crafts.  And very friendly owners and staff.    

I read that Greenwood, Canada’s smallest city (a form of government distinct from that of a town), with about 700 people as it says on the sign, just won the top award at Berkeley Springs, West Virginia—the international competition for the best tasting municipal tap water in the world.  This is one reason why their coffee is so good, no doubt.

We happen to pass through Greenwood when we drive from Spokane, Washington to Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada to visit our family, including our three grandchildren. We got a recommendation from some people walking down the street in Grand Forks, a mere 40 miles or so east.  Even though it is spring time, the climate is very dry here as indicated by the yellow hills in the background.

Sometimes we do a bit of exploring on our own while we are visiting family in British Columbia.  One sunny day we decided to explore the Father Pandosy Mission.  In 1859 a group of Oblate priests made a home in the Kelowna valley, the first group of white settlers.  My quick online research tells me that Father Pandosy was born in Marseilles. France. And that the word ‘oblate’ means sacrifice.  I believe the fathers started farming and planting orchards.

So I decided to draw this barn, as I had never drawn a saddlenotch log construction before.  And I drew, or attempted to draw, the complex farming mower or reaper on the right.  It was just one of many highly mechanical farm implements on display there.  In the background is Black Mountain. I moved it slightly to the right. (Yes, I move mountains.)

And now there is an upscale shopping district in Kelowna called Pandosy. The building on the left is not old at all.  Just a funky, contemporary nod to the old, which houses the Marmalade Cat Café.  I can’t resist yellow buildings.  And yellow, blue and rust colored buildings really hold my attention.  I can’t explain this and that doesn’t bother me. There is still snow on the high hills.  

We sat in a lovely coffee shop while I drew this.  And knowing that the new building will block the view.

And one more last one, including our grandson playing in a toy train. It is a stationary train.  Only imagination makes it move. We go to the park often when we visit. It’s a grandparent thing.

 The climate here in eastern British Columbia, the Okanagan, is semi-arid.  It is the northern end of the Sonoma desert which starts in Mexico. So the ground is dry with desert type plants and animals.  But it has lots of lakes and beaches too. We get ourselves there as often as we can.  Which is often.