Tag Archives: librarians

Midwifery – and Witchcraft?

Posted on by

As Lydia, one of the principle characters (married to my detective Will Rees) prepares to deliver their first baby, my thoughts turned to births. In that time both maternal and infant mortality was high. It was not uncommon for a man to be buried in a church yard with several wives.

Most women, especially those in the country, had their babies delivered by a midwife. For one thing, it was considered indecent for a man to witness the birth. Male physicians were just beginning to make inroads in delivering babies in the cities. Thousands of women who were burned in Europe as witches were midwives and healers . Why? Well. everyone knew women, who were ill-educated to begin with,  were too stupid to learn something like this so the knowledge had to have a supernatural origin, i.e. the Devil. This in spite of the fact that midwives have been part of human history for millennia and there were less deaths when midwives delivered the babies. They washed their hands. Male doctors, according to the history I’ve read, did not and they passed bacteria from one woman to another, with maternal death following.

What did midwives do? Think about this: there were no pain killers other than alcohol and opium and anyway it was thought women should suffer. After all, they were guilty of listening to the serpent in the Garden of Eden and persuading Adam to eat the forbidden apple. Queen Victoria popularized pain killers during birth. (Smart woman).

There were no stethoscopes. They were not invented until 1816 and then looked like a long tube. Forceps were invented centuries earlier but were risky. Obstetric tools discovered in 1813 included forceps used by a male physician so they were known and used by then.

But midwives helped with the breathing, cut the cord, and some experienced midwives could turn a baby who was in a breech position. After the birth, they cleaned the baby, removing the mucous from nose and mouth, and made sure the cry was robust. Usually the midwife had an apprentice or two.

Now, with an interest in ‘natural birth’, we have come full circle back to midwives.

 

Salem tunnels late eighteenth century

Posted on by

So there were already some tunnels in Salem linking the fine houses, the docks, the brothels and the counting houses. Many of the men who had made their fortunes running privateers became Senators, a Secretary of State, and other wealthy and influential men. As Salem shipping  imported cargo from Russia, India, the East Indies, and finally China, Salem became not only the sixth largest city in the U.S. but the wealthiest.  Custom duties to a large degree supported the Federal Government.

To collect these duties during the time Rees visited Salem, the merchant ships were required to tie up about three miles out. The customs inspector would row out to inspect the cargo and assess the duties. Do I believe that this prevented smuggling? Not a chance. I’m sure a number of shippers found ways to circumvent these efforts and used the already existing tunnels to transport goods to the counting houses out of sight of the prying eyes.

In 1801 Thomas Jefferson became the third president of the United States and began, not only enforcing the already existing laws on the books but put in new strict laws on the collection of duties. The harbor was silting up and New Bedford, Boston, and other ports would soon become more prominent. Elias Haskell Derby Jr. found it difficult to maintain his lifestyle.  He embarked on a building program in the Commons, and put in tunnels to the wharves, the counting houses and the banks. But isn’t 1801 is several years after Death in Salem? Yes, that is so but a number of the houses listed as having tunnels connected to them were built before 1797.

I made a leap and decided to claim there were many tunnels prior to the Derby scion in 1801. The tunnels would have been helpful during the Revolutionary War and the British incursion, especially when it would have been important to move goods without British knowledge.

Finally, my excuse for this bit of slippery history is: Well, the story is fiction and I think the tunnels could have been there and been used as I described.

The Librarians

Posted on by

I watched the two hour debut episode knowing I would love it. After all, I loved the three movies and Warehouse 13, to which this bears a huge resemblance. And I am a librarian so when one of the ads says: “Reading is fundamental. Zombies are slow so go for the head. Think like a librarian; it may save your life,” I knew this was the show for me.

OK, maybe the real librarian job isn’t so Indiana Jonesish. But we do look up tons of things; searching for information is a core task of any librarian. But what about the Internet I can hear you say. Well, a lot of people cannot manage even a copier, let alone a computer. Even phone numbers can be hard to find. And  for those patrons who are Internet savvy and find the easy stuff, there are still questions – super hard questions – that come to us at the reference desk. Plus, although we don’t have a massive hardback copy of the Reader’s Guide anymore, we have databases that do the same thing, and that we pay for and that our patrons have just as much trouble using them as they did the Reader’s Guide. In addition to things like ancestry and consumer’s reports and so on.

Finally, although one of the prongs of a librarian’s job is information, the other is community, at least in a public library. Programs from how to dye to how to use your Kindle, how to set up email and where to find a good doctor. We are legally not allowed to offer medical, legal or tax advice, but man we sure get a lot of questions in those fields. Because my library is located near a court, we help a lot of people with family issue kind of things – referrals to lawyers and/or books and databases. And this doesn’t even include all the popular stuff like the latest bestseller or movie.

Clearly I love my job. Partly this is because being a librarian is such a clean job. We help people. And this is one of the last bastions, probably the last, where we do not expect the users to come in with a credit card. Sure, you’ll pay modest fines for overdues, generally in the area of .10 cents a day. and you’ll pay for photocopies. But you don’t have to be a member to sit and read the paper. Or to check your email on a computer. Or to ask a question.

So, although we don’t save the world by searching for magical artifacts, I feel we do our bit in saving the world a little bit at a time.

Cucumbers and Las vegas

Posted on by

cukes

Four of these beauties were waiting for me when I returned home from ALA. I mention that to show the difference in the climates. Las Vegas is in a desert and is unbelievably hot and dry.

I do not like Las vegas, and not just the climate. (as a gardener, the whole desert thing doesn’t work for me). But I also don’t drink, smoke or gamble. the casinos have no windows or clocks since they are trying to encourage people to gamble. Women in skimpy costumes walk around pushing cocktails. And the place smells of smoke. I admit, though, that I am a little more tolerant of the smoking. at least that doesn’t put someone’s family’s financial future in jeopardy.

More than anything, I got the feeling that I had stepped back in time, to the glory days of Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack.