Field Trip to the Longfellow House and the Maine Historical Society

Today we went on a field trip to the Longfellow House and the Maine Historical Society's Civil War exhibit in Portland. Here are some interesting things we learned:

• There were 10 people living in the Longfellow House. (Cole)
• When Fannie (Henry's second wife) was sealing up an envelope, her dress caught on fire and Henry rolled her up in a rug to try to get the fire out. He got the fire out but she died the next morning. Henry burned his face and he couldn't shave because it hurt so he grew a beard. (Eliza)
• On the memorial wall which had all the people who died from Maine in the Civil War, there was someone with the last name of Cox. (Ed)
• I saw in the Longfellow House on all the doors there were locks. (Olivia)
• A Confederate prisoner went to prison because he was going to rob a bank but someone caught him. He left the flag in the prison cell when he left 36 days later. (Trinity)
• Ann (Henry's sister) lived for 90 years and lived in the house for 87 years of her life. (Lexi)
• In the olden days instead of a microwave they used heated plates. (Teresa)
• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was the most famous poet in Portland in the 1800s. (Sawyer)
• Many people died in the Longfellow House. (Kaiyla)
• In the party room, there were cords in the corner of the room and if you pulled one of the cords it would ring a bell. There were three bells in the kitchen and in other rooms. If you rang the bell it meant you needed help. (Jasper)
• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow had seven siblings. (Mason)
• The women grew their hair out super long so they could put it up in a bun and used clips out of turtle shells and cattle horns. They put it in their hair. (Maddie)
• The soldiers who did the drums were men and when the war started the men went to war and the boys had to be the drummers. (Matt)
• I found out that I might have a missing in action family member and his name was George P. Moore and he was from Yarmouth. (Hannah)
• I found out that many soldiers died from deadly fevers, diarrhea, and other maladies and once they hurt their arms or legs they had to amputate them or they would get infected. (Ari)
• They had a tradition that they put an orange in their stocking. (Gavin)
• Henry liked pictures of himself. (Piper)
• They had a coffee grinder on their wall that they would have to go up stairs to get up to. (Laney)
• When the boys went off to go to war, the women would have to knit mittens and make first aid kits for them. (Mark)
• The parlor in the Longfellow House was the biggest room in Portland at that time. (Jake)
• With the kitchen you could slide the tray through a passageway so it could be received by the people who were in the dining room to eat. (Elena)
• At that time, the girls worked in the kitchen and the boys in the barn. (Laney)
• They had really steep stairs (for the kids). (Ed)
• Dorothea Dix, the superintendent of nurses for the Union, helped the soldiers a lot. You had to be 40 to be a nurse. All nurses were women. (Lexi)
• Three people died in one year in the Longfellow family. (Elena)
• When Henry's mom had Sam, she got ill and stayed in her room a lot. (Ed)
• The kids had their own special rooms where they would have their own special things. (Kaiyla)
• I didn't know that so many gave their lives to say that slavery isn't good. (Owen)
• Henry died in 1882 from stomach cancer. (Lexi)
• People a long time ago are so cool! (Jack)

Special thanks to our chaperones, Mrs. Flowerdew, Mrs. Small, Mr. Damboise, and Mrs. Waeldner!