piano

September 25, 1852

Music stool

 

Sat Sept 25th Louisa has a swelling on the back of

her hand which troubles her & she left this

morning and I have got Catharine Middleton

to stay untill next Wednesday when I expect

a new girl  Catharine made some squash

pies and finished the ironing. It has been about

most all the week  Helen & I have been to N Bridgewater

She had a tooth extracted  I got a Piano stool

Evelina was still spending money. In North Bridgewater (today’s Brockton) she bought a music stool to go with the new piano that was coming soon to her parlor. With her was niece Helen Angier Ames; the fifteen-year-old had a less enjoyable errand to accomplish: getting a tooth pulled. It’s interesting that Helen’s aunt, Evelina, and not her mother, Sarah Lothrop Ames, accompanied the girl to the dentist.

In the servant department, the new girl, Louisa McAvoy, departed today, having not even worked a full week. Evelina was really struggling to keep a household staff together. Catherine Middleton agreed to stay on and was helpful with the baking and ironing, the latter of which had taken “most all the week” to complete. We might wonder if Evelina ever missed Jane McHanna, the one servant who had been steady, if occasionally ill – the one whom Evelina had fired in June. Evelina had yet to really settle on a dependable replacement.

 

September 22, 1852

Piano

Wednesday Sept 22d Have been to Boston with Mrs

Witherell to get a Pianno  Have got to have

them made  Mrs Kinsley called to see them with

us  Met Mrs Wilson at Lintons to go to select

them. Dined at Mr Orrs while Mrs Witherelll

called on Mrs Dorr  Bought a Piano cloth

and gold thimble for Mrs Ames & C Hobart

and a ring for Helen  Oliver came from Providence

 

A piano! And not one piano, but two, one for each side of the house. Both Susan Ames and Emily Witherell would be learning to play the instrument. Each girl would have her own piano to practice on. What luxury. What gentility. What fun.

With advice from friends such as Louisa Kinsley, Evelina and Sarah Ames Witherell selected and ordered the instruments in a Boston store. Spending money liberally, Evelina went on to purchase gifts. For her other sister-in-law, Sarah Lothrop Ames, she bought a cloth to go on top of the piano that those Ameses already owned. For Catharine Hobart, a young family friend who had caught the eye of her son Oakes Angier Ames, she bought a gold thimble. And for her niece Helen Angier Ames – Catharine’s classmate – she bought a ring.

Did her husband Oakes know that Evelina was spending so much money? Did her father-in-law? While her husband must have given his approval, it’s unlikely that Old Oliver would have approved of such a spree. Yet both those men were often generous within the family; in that respect, Evelina was just following suit.

We note today, too, that Oliver (3) returned from a few days at a fair in Providence, where he no doubt saw friends and former classmates from his two semesters at Brown University. We might imagine that he was missing school.

 

 

August 4, 1852

Thread

1852

Wedns Aug 4th  Sewing circle met at the other part

of the house  Had an unusually large number

About 30 beside the gentlemen that came

to the second table.  My family all had tea

there  After tea all went into the gardens

and into Olivers to hear Helen play

Horatio and another man came from Salisbury

Sarah Witherell hosted the monthly Sewing Circle, to which people turned out in “an unusually large number.” Everyone would have known about the death of Sarah’s son back in May, and by showing up on this occasion, they likely were paying respect to a woman they probably admired. In her quiet, dignified way, Sarah had done so much for others that others now wanted to do something for her.  They may also have been demonstrating respect for her father, Old Oliver. Sarah was probably grateful for the outpouring and for the hostessing assistance she would have gotten from her visiting cousin, Almira Ames.

Old Oliver may or may not have been on the premises for tea. According to his daily record, on “the 4th Horatio + Mr Morse his traveling agent came here + went away the next day.”* Evelina doesn’t mention Horatio (Sr., probably) but as we know, they weren’t close.

After the busy gathering at Sarah Witherell’s, family and guests toured the gardens – of both houses, presumably – and then moved into the house next door to hear Helen Angier Ames, only daughter of Sarah Lothrop Ames and Oliver Ames Jr., play piano. Perhaps even Old Oliver, Horatio and Mr. Morse were part of the appreciative crowd.

This is the first entry that tells us that Helen Angier Ames played the piano, and it’s significant. Owning a piano or, more likely, a pianoforte was “the ultimate ‘badge of gentility’.”** Because “less than one in a hundred” households in the country owned such an instrument, those that did could be reckoned to be high up on the social scale. Owning a piano distinguished “‘decent people’ from the lower and less distinguished”, according to the standards of the time.

 

*Oliver Ames, Journal, Stonehill College Archives, Arnold Tofias Collection

**Jack Larkin, The Reshaping of Everyday LIfe: 1790-1840, New York, 1988, p. 143