396 Thanksgiving Feast in Chicago (1883)

“Chicago, Ill., West Side - Though it is a little late, perhaps it will be interesting to your readers to know how we celebrated Thanksgiving Day here. The Pastor thinking that it would be useful to have a fall festival, concluded that we could not do better than adopt Thanksgiving Day. So it was decided to have a general Thanksgiving dinner at the church, to which all were invited. Accordingly when Thanksgiving Day arrived, about sixty members of the congregation assembled at the church, and set down to a dinner of cold turkey, hot vegetables, coffee, pie, etc., which was provided by the ladies. The tables were arranged so that they formed three sides of a square, and we were assigned our seats by slips of paper on which our names were written. When all were seated the Pastor asked the blessing of the Lord upon our feast, and then we began the discussion of the good things. After the first ardor had a little worn off, our Pastor, the Rev. Mr. [W.F.] Pendleton, made a few remarks about the day and the use of being thankful, i.e., of acknowledging that all that we have comes from the Lord. . . . Continue reading » » » »

389 The Bryn Athyn Glass Factory (1922-1942)

“One of the things that I remember is going over to the glass factory and watching the operation going on there, particularly watching David Smith, the glassblower, sit on that bench and actually be blowing glass. And I remember one occasion where I thought that I could do it myself, and so he handed me the blowpipe with some glass on the end, and I puffed as hard as I could—nothing happened. I didn’t make any bubble at all at the end of the pipe” (Carl R. Gunther, son of Ariel Gunther. Interview. March 30, 2006).

During the early 1920s, when much of the construction for Bryn Athyn Cathedral had been completed, the builders began to turn their attention to the production of stained glass windows. Continue reading » » » »