A great find!

I’m sorry to be so long between blogs. There are two reasons I don’t blog more often. One is that I have a lot going on right now—both at work and with my own writing. Time is short. The other reason is that I’m often at a loss as to what to blog about. I want my entries to be helpful and interesting. Otherwise, why bother? I think perhaps a good interview is about due. I’ll have to think about that.

But today, I do have something I hope novelists will find of interest—particularly historical novelists. However, I think even contemporary novelists will benefit. We’ll see. It’s a long one, so refill your coffee cup and sit back and read.

As some of you know, I sell used books on Amazon as a hobby. Plus I have a good-sized library of my own. To feed both of these habits, every weekend finds me scouring thrift stores and an occasional garage sale for books.

This past Saturday I found a wonderful old book that prompts this blog entry. The book is Early Days in Greenbush. The subtitle is With Biographical Sketches of the Old Settlers. It was first printed in 1905, but the book I bought is a later reprint. The Greenbush of the title is in Illinois. The original compiler of the book, William Snapp, says in the introduction:

These early settlers braved the dangers of frontier life, endured hardships, toil, deprivations, and the loneliness of the country at that time. Many of them lived in simple log cabins affording poor shelter from the storms of winter. But they planted civilization here, which has made possible the comfortable and luxurious homes of today.

Wow. That was written in 1905. I wonder what the author would say about homes today!

The book is an extremely interesting (to me anyway) accounting of the lives of some of the early settlers in Greenbush. There are lots of dry statistics (who married who, when and how so-and-so died, etc.), but even those hold a fascination for the fertile imagination of a writer.

One section lists the occupations of the townspeople. There is a list of those in the mercantile business, the blacksmiths, the wagon-makers, the doctors, the shoemakers, the coopers, the harness-makers, and so on.

Interspersed are the interesting anecdotes—the gossip, to be honest. For instance, at the mention of a man named James Crawford, Snapp says:

This man Crawford was a good workman and was considered honest and reliable, only he would take spells of drinking liquor. At one time he went to Burlington, got on a spree and was arrested, convicted, and sent to the penitentiary at Ft. Madison, Iowa, for passing counterfeit money. It was believed by many that this counterfeit money was given him in change and that he did not know it was counterfeit. A petition for pardon with many signers was presented to the authorities in Iowa by William May of Greenbush. Crawford was finally pardoned and came back to the residence of Isaac Hanks where in a short time he died. This was in 1862. He was buried in the Bond graveyard on the north side.

I don’t know about you, but I find that story fascinating.

Next the several weavers in town are listed with a note that “in the township there were many looms and many families did their own weaving.”

A few paragraphs later the cabins and their furnishings are described in detail. I’d never heard of a sop lamp. The author says:

The sop lamp was a very useful article. It was filled with lard or grease of some kind. The wick was made by twisting up a small piece of cotton cloth and placing it in the grease. It was then ready to light and stick in the wall. Those who had candles, used japanned tin candlesticks and candle snuffers….Sometimes candles were made by dipping wicks in melted tallow, but these candles did not give good satisfaction. They were likely to go out and leave you in the dark; hence the saying, “Go out like an old-fashioned dip-candle.”

Well, I could go on and on. It’s utterly fascinating. From the details of who cheated who to the town’s cholera epidemic in 1851. Sad to read:

It was in June 1851 that the cholera made its appearances in Greenbush and vicinity. There were about twelve deaths from this disease at that time. Lawson Walker was the first one. He died June 15, 1851. Abner Walker and his daughter Abigail died on the same day, June 24, 1851, making three deaths in the same family. Abner Walker lived on the north side of the square in the village and was engaged in keeping hotel.

The other nine victims are then listed and the section on cholera ends with:

Porter J. Jack and John C. McCall took an active part in doing everything they could for the sick and dying. Philip Karns was also very helpful in removing the dead to the cemeteries and burying them.

In a later chapter, we learn that Mr. Karns’ “last years were spent on his farm north of Greenbush, where he was engaged in farming and stock raising. He died March 10, 1898.”

In addition to the stories and statistics, you’ll often catch a nice turn of phrase or an evocative paragraph. Apparently the local “academy” had no bell in the belfry, so the women arranged to raise money for a bell. The author notes:

Different religious denominations used this bell to call the people together, where the minister exhorted them to a better life. Often as the years went by, it tolled the years of departed ones in tones that were received in sadness and sorrow.

Very evocative.

The book tells of murder, hangings, and the means of death of several leading citizens (boiler explosion, death by hot steam, accidental shooting, etc.).

The latter half of the book is comprised of short bios of the leading townspeople. Almost each one concludes with the person’s politics and religious persuasion. An example is John Webb Nance:

In politics he was a Whig up to 1856, afterwards a Democrat. In religion, he was a member of the Missionary Baptist Church.

My point in all this is that having spent just an hour with the book (engrossed!), I felt THERE in Greenbush. Had I been starting a historical novel, I could have easily used the objective information from the book AND, more importantly, the subjective feel I was getting from the book to properly set my own novel. Research is more than just learning about your locale and historical era. Research’s most important benefit, in my opinion, is to so transport the novelist to his or her setting, that the story unfolds naturally, just as if the writer is there witnessing, for example, the public hanging of Thomas Brown and George Williams for the murder of Harvey J. Hewitt. It went like this according to the compiler, William Snapp:

The hanging occurred in the south part of Peoria, then an open prairie. Under the bluff the platform was suspended by a rope. Brown was very anxious that the rope used in hanging him should be so adjusted that the fall would be sure to break his neck. After the arrangements were all made, Brown, from some cause, turned his head around, the drop fell, and Brown struggled for a long time, the rope having turned under his chin. Williams seemed to die easy.

Wow. I’m so there!

Folks, do your research, not just to find useful information by which to prop up your story. Do your research with the notion that it will take you to your setting and will even dictate a good portion of your story. Find the books like this one that will allow your imagination to run wild with the possibilities. Become a sponge of, not just the facts you’re reading about in your research, but of the emotions that can be generated by those facts. Be there with the Walker family as they lose three loved ones to cholera. Be there at the hanging of Brown and Williams as if you were a relative or friend of their victim, Mr. Hewitt. Be there with Philip Karns as he removes the dead bodies of his neighbors to the cemetery. Allow your research to highly inform your story itself.

Another way to put it is to say that research isn’t just to take your reader to the setting and era, it’s to take YOU there.

I will, by the way, not be selling this book. It’s a keeper. 🙂