Colonial Williamsburg

As some of our blog followers know, our kids have a special unit that we study every month in our homeschool, and this month's unit was the American colonies. Where else can you better study American colonies than Colonial Williamsburg???  We took the two and a half hour trip up to Williamsburg to step back in time...

Williamsburg is AMAZING!!!  Everywhere you look, you feel like you are in Colonial Virginia circa 1770.  Workers are all dressed-up in period costumes and welcome talking to you about the era.

At the Governor's Palace (above and below), our family had the opportunity to do our very first hedge maze.  Quite cool.

The Colonial Williamsburg folks have gone to great lengths to remind you where you are...even when you need to use the "necessaries" (below)!

By far, the kids' favorite part of Colonial Williamsburg was trying out the stocks and the pillory.  (The pillory tied you at your arms, while the stocks tied you at your feet).  

Stuff that might sentence one to do time in the stocks or the pillory in Colonial Williamsburg: slander, perjury, drunkeness, missing church, etc.  These stocks were traditional of others of the time in that they were placed in the center of town where traffic was busiest.  Passersby could throw vegetables at or spit on the criminal, but most of the punishment came from the humiliation of being seen by everyone in town, as well as the discomfort of being held in that position for hours.  Our kids found no humiliation or discomfort in these, and like all the other parents we had to drag our giggling kids away while they cried, "I want to do it again!"

With every man who walked down the street, Anna would cry-out, "It's George Washington!"  Until we finally had the ability to take her to a Q&A session with the man himself (below):  George answered everyone's questions for over an hour, and Anna even got to ask him a question herself.

Her question: "Who do you trust the most?" 

 George's answer:  "My wife."

Good answer, Mr. President.  Good answer.

Our greatest surprise in Colonial Williamsburg was the stores.  We knew that there were little shops all along the streets that you could stroll in and out of, but we did not realize that many of the stores were ORIGINAL.  As we were browsing in this one (above and below), the shop owner began explaining to us that the building was built in 1739, and was a store then, too.  George Washington, he explained, was 7 years old when this shop was built, and Thomas Jefferson had not been born yet.  What's coolest of all was to think that they both probably shopped in that store themselves for the same types of wares that were on display and for sale today.  WOW!!!! 

 Although Williamsburg is happy to make a profit off its visitors, I was quite impressed that they keep absolutely everything historically accurate.  Those pieces of blue chinaware behind the storekeeper in the above picture are imported from the exact factory in Germany that the colonists imported that exact same chinaware.  The toys that are for sale on the back table are the exact kinds of toys that colonial children played with.

 In addition to the stores, there were open-air markets that you could browse.  As a homeschool mom, I had to practice tremendous restraint not to activity ourselves to death when we got home with so much cool stuff to make and do!

 The dresses below were hand-made of silk in the same way colonial women sewed.  The red striped one to the left was $1000 to buy.  They were incredible works of art.

Although we had to mostly have a "look but don't touch" policy with the kids in Williamsburg's incredible colonial shops...well...we couldn't help ourselves sometimes.  John had fun trying-on a colonial hat and striking his best "Crossing the Delaware" pose (below).

Some of the shops had nothing for the public to buy, however.  You just mozied into them and talked to the workers.  Above, we watched seamstresses sew with the tiniest little stitches I had ever seen.  I can't imagine that a sewing machine could stitch any smaller or neater than they were.  

Below was the leather-maker.  He showed-us saddles and belts and all kinds of leather goods.  And he used a real anvil, which the kids learned had more of a purpose than just trying to squash a road runner if you're a coyote.  :)

But enough with shopping.  We had to take a stroll down to John's favorite spot in Williamsburg:  jail.  

This jail's most famous prisoners were 15 henchmen of  Blackbeard the Pirate.  If you ever think boys aren't interested in history, take them to an actual prison cell where Blackbeard's pirates were imprisoned and watch them stand in awe.

Williamsburg court only conveined once every 3 months.  You were held in the Williamsburg jail until the next court date, and then interestingly enough, you would never see the jail again.  A judge and jury would either set you free or execute you.  So things would end very well for you...or very poorly.

 The lady giving the tour explained that for entertainment, the colonists would come to the courthouse and watch cases be tried.  Kind of like Court TV!  She explained that founding fathers like Thomas Jefferson and John Adaams would have sat in this courtroom and watched cases be tried while they were studying law.

The oil paintings in the Williamsburg courthouse were phenomenal (above and below).  My favorite was of George III.  (And yes, we had permission to photograph the paintings.)

Once while we were walking through a field, a conflict broke-out!  The British had broken into the magazine the night before and stolen all of Williamsburg's gunpowder.  Several of Williamsburg's colonists were attempting to get us to join their militia to storm the governor's house and demand the gunpowder back.  But costumed characters among our crowd warned, "Don't do it!  You'll be hanged!"

Anna looked at us very pesimistically and said, "I don't want to be hanged."

Apparently, Anna's not much for throwing a coup.

  

 And at the end of the day when everything was about to close, a group of boys playing fifes marched through the field, where Revolutionary canons were fired.  Those canons were LOUD!  But as one of the solidiers explained, these were just blanks.  If actual canonballs were being shot out of the canons, the noise would be 3 times as loud.  I now have an understanding of what it would have sounded like to listen to a Revolutionary battle.

But as awesome as my day in Williamsburg was, it could not compare to my evening in Williamsburg.  After all the sites had been closed, my sweet husband took us to dinner at a colonial restaurant called The King's Arms.  It was unquestionably the greatest meal I've ever eaten.

The restaurant was built in the early 1700's and served as a restaurant to the colonists.  There were no electric lights in the dining area: you eat completely by candlelight.  The food was divine, and the waiter even brings you a tasting of colonial delicasies such as pickled watermelon rhine, pickled corn, and pickled ham, and he explains to us that without refrigeration, colonists had to pickle much of their food to keep it from spoiling.  And in addition to what you order, he also brought each table a hefty portion of creamed spinach that is from a recipe that the governor's wife introduced to the colonies that she learned as a girl in England in the 1700's.  How cool is that?

Then comes the music.  Wow.  As we were eating, two men sauntered through the restaurant playing colonial songs on colonial instruments, and took special care to show the kids how each instrument worked.  One of the men was named John Turner, and he's the best violinist (fiddler) I've ever heard.  At one point he told a story about how his people (the Scots) were blamed for the loss of a Revolutionary battle, so a law was made that no more bagpipes could be played again, upon penalty of death.  So the Scots got together and figured-out how to play their songs on a violin and make the violin sound just like the bagpipes.  And as Mr. Turner began playing that song on his violin, it sounded EXACTLY like bagpipes...amazing!  Perhaps my Appalachian upbringing and my Scotch-Irish ancestry led me to love that music and that story so much.  I could have listened to John Turner's music all night.  He has a website where you can hear/order his music:  http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/turnerjohn3

My wonderful time in Williamsburg makes me think that maybe I was born in the wrong century.

-Kara