On the Wednesday, January 30 broadcast of Greenwich, A Town For All Seasons we featured an encore presentation of our November broadcast with Missy Wolfe, author of Hidden History of Colonial Greenwich.
I sure hope that on these cold, dark wintry days and nights you are catching up on your published histories of the Town of Greenwich. Missy Wolfe's tome on Greenwich's earliest years is a must-read for all.
Missy Wolfe discovered the lost world of Greenwich, Connecticut in the 1600s by transcribing hundreds of handwritten documents owned by the town. Digitally ordering these centuries old papers opened an ancient portal that showed how the town was first created, managed, and developed from a wilderness. Lost places names are recovered, along with the functioning of the Greenwich Plantation, operated for over a century. This first town was a mandatory and communal endeavor that employed watchers and warners, sheepmasters, cowkeepers, fenceviewers, haywards, pounders and planters.
Faced with an ever-changing new world, the first citizens her created many new-world strategies. Quite experimentally, they balanced religious and civic authority, private and common interests and financial inequities across communities. As a consequence of their heroic efforts, these first comers often found it more challenging to please their own than it was to please their God. The first here were compelled to depart from the past and fashion an idealized, yet still imperfect, new society. Missy Wolfe details the strategies and setbacks of creating community in colonial America's First Period. This work includes many new maps and illustrations.
Historian Missy Wolfe has always loved histories and biographies that allow her to time travel to meet unusual people and experience dramatic events. Growing up, she loved the works of Lady Antonia Fraser, Alison Weir, and Barbara Tuchman. Impressed by their research and writing, Wolfe began investigating the earliest history of her home town, Greenwich, Connecticut. For this she was also inspired by Nathaniel Philbrick's Mayflower and Russell Shorto's Island at the Center of the World.
After receiving an MBA from Columbia University and an early career in advertising, Wolfe pursued her interests in history, design and fine and decorative arts with an Associates degree from the New York School of Interior Design and a certificate of Appraisal Studies for Fine and Decorative Arts from New York University. She remains fascinated by the past and its appreciation by the modern world.
Tune in to the broadcast of Greenwich, A Town For All Seasons on Radio 1490 WGCH and WGCH.com anywhere. It starts at 9:00 a.m., Eastern Time every other Wednesday morning after the top-of-the-hour news.
The host and producer of the show is Jeffrey Bingham Mead, a descendant of the founders of the Town of Greenwich, Connecticut (Founded July 18, 1640).
Also, please CLICK THIS LINK to the current crowdfunding campaign to support and underwrite the costs of producing and bringing you Greenwich, A Town For All Seasons on 1490 WGCH and WGCH.com anywhere.
