Excerpt from Satirical History of NEW HAMPSHIRE
NEW “ALL-TOO-TRUE-BLUE” (ALTERNATIVE) STATE HISTORIES
TIME IMMEMORIAL – What’s In a Name?
Just like the Iron Butterfly song “In a Gadda da Vida,” the reason New Hampshire is named as it is was due to an incident of involuntarily poor enunciation brought on by voluntary inebriation.
The first governor told his daughter – who he was trying to appease in a rather Neville Chamberlain-esque way (she was a spoiled brat (rich kid)) – that she could name the State. Little Nellie Olsen, drunk as a Lord on spiked castor oil, tried to name the State after her new hamster, but all her father could make out of her gibberish sounded like “New Hampshire” to him. And so it goes...
But many things happened besides that prior to Statehood. Yet, there was nobody to write it down, because nobody could convince the Indians to put their popcorn down and write a history, and the only other souls were the Karner Blue (albeit not iron) Butterflys, Lynx, Bald Eagles, Short-Nose Sturgeons, Sunapee Trouts, Atlantic Salmon, and Dwarf Wedge Mussels.
It is surmised that the Piping Plovers and Roseate Terns have passed stories down via the oral tradition, but Dr. Doolittle is no longer available for the purposes of translation, interpretation, or really – sadly! - anything else, either, so these tales have been lost to the world.
1719 – First Spud
The first spud planted in the Ewe-Knighted States was interred at Londonderry Common Field in 1719.
Nobody took a picture of it, so you’ll have to use your imagination.
Jack Frost, Robert’s grandfather, appreciating the enormity of the event, attempted to write a poem about it:
Oh, spud!
Watch out for the four-footers who chew cud!
Oh, potato!
Use your time in the ground to read up on Plato!
Sometimes poetic talent skips a generation or two.
1776 – First to Declare Independence
After years of abuse at the hands of their foreign overlords, New Hampshire became the first to declare its independence from England, in January of 1776. Six months later, the other colonies began to follow suit. They said, “Hmm...not a bad idea. #MeToo”
1787 – Alarm Clock Invented
Levi Hutchins of Concord (New Hampshire, not Massachusetts) invented the alarm clock in 1787.
I just got home from a trip back to 1787 in my time machine, when I told Levi off, like so: “Confound it, man! You should have called it good after inventing blue jeans! We don’t need no stinkin’ alarm clocks!”
He simply grinned at me, and said, “...Strawberry...Incense...Peppermint...” over and over again. That’s when I left.
1788 — Statehood
When New Hampshire became a State in 1788, they adopted the motto, “Live Free or at Least Inexpensively”
Somebody got the motto wrong when they put it on a license plate. You can’t get good help nowadays
1828 – First Women’s Strike
The first strike by women in the Ewe-Knighted States took place in 1828 when about four hundred female mill workers walked out of the Dover Cotton Factory.
They came back to work after the mill owners immediately began advertising for replacement workers.
It’s hard to imagine what these women (or girls, in many cases, as some of then were as young as twelve) were complaining about, anyway. They got a whole 47 cents a day! And they only had to work a measly eleven hours per day, six days a week. They were making more than four cents per hour – and getting overtime on Saturdays! That is to say, they worked on Saturdays, receiving their normal generous wages. What a bunch of wimps!
Besides that, they were allowed to arrive at work whenever they wanted (but if they came after their shift started, they had to find another way to get in, as the doors were then locked).
At least they could talk to each other – if they could make themselves heard over the loud machinery.
And the work was as safe as could be! Only occasionally did a woman mangle her hand in the machinery or get scalped after getting her hair stuck in the looms there.
So, obviously, they really had nothing to get “up in arms” about, and it served them right that when they found out that their pay had been cut once they returned to work.
1830 -- “Mary Had a Miniscule Lamb”
Newport’s Sarah Josepha Hale, granddaughter of Nathan (who is famous for inventing tasty hot dogs), wrote the poem “Mary Had a Miniscule Lamb” in 1830.
Tragically, she lost her copyright to her work when the editor who published it, a minimalist, changed the world “miniscule” to “little.” All to save one measly syllable!
As you can see below, some of Sarah’s barnyard friends discussed the metaphysical impact of this change, as recorded by an eavesdropping farm hand:
“Little Lamb, who made thee? It could be argued that, in a sense, Sarah Josepha Hale did, because who would otherwise even give you a single, solitary, miniscule thought?”
1905 – Treaty of Portsmouth
The Treaty of Portsmouth was signed in Portsmouth (were you expecting Nashua?) in 1905. This officially ended the Russo-Japanese War.
The Russo-Japanese War was a violent conflict between author Richard Russo (who wrote Empire Falls about a century later, in his geezerhood) and Japan.
Japan declared a war on Mr. Russo after he wrote that he didn’t care for Sushi.
The two sides finally got things straightened out after meeting together and hashing things out. In the image below, you can see the point in the proceedings where Russo was out for a lunch break (at a nearby hamburger joint):
1924 -- “New Hampshire: A Poem with Notes and Grace Notes”
Robert Frost won the Pulitzer Prize in 1924 for New Hampshire: A Poem with Notes and Grace Notes.
Frost went on to garner three more (Pulitzer Prizes, that is). He is understandably famous for such poems as “The Road Not Taken,” “Two Tramps in Mud Time,” “Nothing Gold Can Stay,” “Fire and Ice,” “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening,” “Acquainted with the Night,” “Mending Wall,” “Birches,” and its sequel, “Sons of Birches.”
1934 — World Record Winds
In 1934, world record winds of 231 mph were measured on Mount Washington. This record stood until 253 MPH were recorded on Barrow Island, Australia in 1996. The Aussies probably cheated, though. It doesn’t really get that windy in Australia.
Besides, Mount Washington is more scenic, as you can see below:
This mountain was named for Washington Irving and the two NFL wide receivers named Gene Washington (both the one who played for the 49ers, and the other one who played for the Vikings)
1936 – Daniel Webster Remembered
Salisbury’s own Daniel Webster (1782 to 1852), known for his oratory (in other words: he talked a lot), was the subject of a short story by Stephen Vincent Benét in 1936 entitled The Devil and Daniel Webster.
Benet’s mindstorm as set down on the page concerns a New Hampshire farmer who sells the soles of his shoes to the devil (who was getting a bad case of corns).
The farmer who had been “slumming it” is defended in court by the old windbag Daniel Webster, who filibusters the jury to the point of their getting so annoyed that they give up and acquit the farmer.
1938 – First Aerial Passenger Tramway
The first aerial passenger tramway (known as a ski-lift in common parlance nowadays) in North America was installed at Cannon Mountain in 1938:
1938 -- “Our Town”
Thornton Wilder (great-grandfather of Laura Ingalls Wilder, and grandfather of Gene) dashed off a play which he called Our Town in 1938.
Although Wilder was from Madison, Wisconsin, the play is set in the fictional New Hampshire town of Grover’s Corners.
Our Town has been made into a movie (at least twice) and been performed on the stage (as a play, that is to say) upwards of forty-two million times.
Once, even Mark Twain trod the boards to play a role in it, as you can clearly discern by the photo below:
1945 – German U-Boats Surrender at Portsmouth
At the end of World War 2, in 1945, some German “U-Boats” (German: Unterseeboots, literally “Under sea boats”) surrendered at Portsmouth.
Well, the boats didn’t surrender, the sailors on them did.
“Are we in Bremerhaven?”
1953 – Forrester Moves In
In 1953, the famous author who called himself J.D. Forrester (his real name was J.D. Souther), who had written the novel Ham on Rye, moved to Cornish. Since he had been in New York prior to this, you certainly can’t blame him for wanting to get out of there. Especially when you see Cornish:
1981 -- “On Golden Pond”
Squam Lake in Holderness saw a whole “boatload” of Hollywood people take over the place in 1981. A movie dubbed (and overdubbed) On Golden Pond was filmed there.
The movie was about a dentist whose girlfriend worked 9 to 5 every day. They went to New Hampshire for a little R & R (Rockfish and Rye bread). There in “the wilderness,” they are attacked by all sorts of wildlife, get poison oak, poison ivy, and generally hate the boondocks. Then they leave. So there you have it.
The rather disappointing tale starred Audrey Hepburn as Holly Golightly, Peter Fonda as Winston Churchill, and Jane Goodall as monkeyshines specialist Carole Bayer Sager Wayne. Billy Ray Cyrus plays a guy named Doug, and “Little Dabney” Coleman portrays the dentist.
Well, at least you can look at the lake if you find the story boring and the acting absurd.
These locals were hoping that they would get “discovered” as they nonchalantly paddled by the shack where the shooting was taking place (the shooting of the film, that is):
1981 -- “The Hotel New Hampshire” Novel & Movie
John Irving (grandson of Washington) wrote the novel The Hotel New Hampshire in 1981. It relates the tale of the Chuck Berry family in the small town of Dairy.
The Berry family milks cows every day, and thus have no time for fooling around or getting into mischief. This is why the kids talked the parents into moving there. The parents would have gotten into no end of trouble otherwise.
To be specific, their father just couldn’t keep himself from duckwalking, no matter where he went or what the occasion was.
He duckwalked at the super market. He duckwalked when they visited neighbors. He duckwalked in church. He duckwalked at funerals. Always with the duckwalking.
They were embarrassed to be seen with him. Hence, the cow milking business.
Three years later (1984, but who’s calculating?), some people were naive and gullible enough to make a movie out of this bland and lifeless story.
At least the film had an interesting cast: Joe D. Foster, Burned Bridges, Curtis Lowe, Walrus Brimley, and Jethro Bodine.
2003 – Old Man Collapses
In 2003, the old man finally collapsed. The rocky icon of New Hampshire was no more. But we still have proof he existed – photographic evidence!
Do you want to see it?
Okay, then, here it is:
This shot was taken by Ansel Adams with a Leica at an fstop of 64, for three whole minutes. It was hard for those people in the middle distance to keep still for that long, but Adams threatened them with banishment if they didn’t “freeze,” and it worked (they did freeze)
. . .
Each Saturday and Tuesday an excerpt of one State’s (satirized) history will be posted here, in alphabetical order (from Alabama to Wyoming).
For “the rest of the story,” the (32-page) complete book “The New All-too-True-Blue History of New Hampshire” is available here.
The regions of the U.S. have been combined into volumes, too; New Hampshire is included in the volume The New All-too-True-Blue History of the American Northeast
You can listen to this excerpt here.
Blackbird Crow Raven is also the author of the book “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle”