Appreciating and Elevating the Everyday

Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • December 15, 2012

As the curator of a historic house museum that dates to 1790, I have a deep appreciation, enthusiasm, and affection for historic architecture and objects from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and earlier. I grew up surrounded by antiques and old houses. I was brought up to appreciate their simplicity, beauty, and utilitarianism. And this in turn, became a part of my occupation and what I surround myself with not just at work but in my personal life as well.


But, I also have a deep appreciation for everything from Philip Johnson’s Glass House and Le Corbusier’s work to Mies van der Rohe, Frank Loyd Wright and McKim, Mead and White designs. I appreciate the Art Deco style, pieces from the early twentieth century, and items designed in the 1950s and 1960s. I find the everyday item, whether it be a mixing bowl, hammer, a simple nail, a door knob, or even a pottery shard beautiful. There is beauty in each of these pieces – they were made for a purpose, designed by an individual, used by many. Many people have touched that door knob as they have gained access to the interior of a house, the bowl has been used to make breads or cakes, the hammer has been owned by and used by my great grandfather and now I use it. The nail I uncovered in the Mitchell House yard or the pottery shard are items once used by the family. It may no longer be useful but it is beautiful in its simplicity, for what it was once used for, and for what it tells us about the past.


We need to look at items from the past − even if their original intended use is outdated and they are not useful for that purpose now − such as the items pictured here. I came across several of these when visiting an antiques show with my parents and it took me a minute to realize what they were. Now, what a beautiful way to appreciate the craftsmanship and design that went into these. Yes, they may still be utilized if one is restoring an old car, but displayed like this in a wrought iron stand allows a person to better appreciate what today is typically a piece of plastic and which (in my opinion) very little imagination has gone into designing. Some of the same companies that designed these lens covers for headlights also made glassware – as in dishes, glasses, and vases. Yes, that is what these are: headlight lens covers.

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Mallow!

By Jascin Leonardo Finger • August 31, 2026
I’m sure you’ve seen it as you trek about the island – near the beaches and ponds. This image is of the swamp or marsh mallow that we have on Vestal Street in our garden out front of the Observatory. It can grow in drier places – though it’s not as lush as at Capaum Pond or out in Quaise. It’s in the Hibiscus family – and is fairly tropical looking and always a delight to see.  “When in bloom, one of the most showy plants of the Island, for a mass of the magnificent, large flowers on the edge of a blue pond causes one’s heart to thrill at the wealth of deep pink colour . . .” from Nantucket Wild Flowers, Alice O. Albertson (cousin of Maria Mitchell), 1921. JNLF

A Piece of a Clay Pipe

By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • August 24, 2026
I have always wanted to find a piece of a clay pipe. I know – weird – but if you have ever read any of my blogs here for the MMA then you know I have a thing for pottery shards. I sort of figured I would not find a piece of a clay pipe – not even a piece of a stem. But the other day, walking in a place where I have found quite a few shards, I found a piece of clay pipe! Now, I’m not talking about water pipes – I am talking about tobacco pipes. And I know very little about clay pipes. Yes, I am a curator of a historic house museum, but this family did not smoke. They were Quaker and among the many things they abstained from, tobacco was one of them. Therefore, I am not up on clay pipes so I am doing a bit more research.  For one, age can be determined by the width of the hole inside the pipe. So based on this one, I would say it’s fairly late. Since they were so fragile, and those holes pretty small, if it got filled with tobacco, the person just broke off the stem creating a shorter pipe and one that was not clogged with tobacco. Apparently, stems could be recycled – in fact, 15,000 broken stem pieces were uncovered at a historic walkway at Colonial Williamsburg – they were used as fill! And pipes were made into the early twentieth century – falling out of favor around World War One. It makes sense – they were cheap, easy to make, and affordable. Typically, one could last a few years – unless you dropped it of course. An,d pipes were used by men, women, and (eh, em) yes, children. I can see that Nantucket may not have had a lot of tobacco smoking residents – not just that some were Quaker – but because of the Quaker influence. I t does not mean people here do not smoke – I just think there may have been fewer smokers on the island in the nineteenth century and earlier. JNLF

Maria Mitchell In Her Own Words

By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • August 17, 2026
August 19 {1857}. There are four great men whose haunts I mean to seek, and on whose footsteps I mean to stand: Newton, Shakespeare, Milton, and Johnson. To-day I told the driver to take me to St. Martin’s, where the guide-book says that Newton lived. He put me down at the Newton Hotel, but I looked in vain to its top to see anything like an observatory. I went into a wine-shop near, and asked a girl, who was pouring out a dram, in which house Newton lived. She pointed, not to the hotel, but to the house next to a church, and said, “that’s it – don’t you see a place on the top? That’s where he used to study nights.” It is a little, oblong-shaped observatory, built apparently of wood, and blackened by age . . . .” Blackened no doubt by the wood ash and soot found in the air throughout over-crowded nineteenth century London. We always think about London being very foggy in the nineteenth century but frankly a lot of it was wood and coal ash as the nineteenth century grew older, particularly as factories developed and belched all of that into the air – think Sherlock Holmes in the 1880s. But Maria Mitchell, while starting in Europe as a young woman’s chaperone, also knew that this tour of Europe was a great learning experience – the equivalent of a college education she could not have. Doors were thrown open to her around Europe – in particular at all of the observatories that dotted the continent. She was not just well-known – she was famous. JNLF
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