Good Neighbors

Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • February 18, 2025

Good neighbors seem hard to come by these days. And, by these days, I mean the last thirty or more years. There are still good neighbors out there but many neighborhoods are not what they once were. People tend to be more insular, inside more often on devices, not outside tending to their yards or just sitting on the front porch. Children do not run rampant over yards and fences, multiple ages playing outside until the last gasp of daylight. Grown-ups are not inviting one another over for dinner or giving each other a hand as they once did. In elementary school, my best friend’s family moved in across the street (how lucky was I?!). Our bedrooms were directly opposite one another and we developed a flashlight signal to share from our windows. After Hurricane Gloria, without power for days, our two families gathered to clean out the refrigerators and freezers before things spoiled. Our father’s grilled it all on charcoal grills so we could have a hot feast – and save the food. Does that happen anymore? We are all more focused on ourselves than one another.


The MMA recently lost a good neighbor. Nancy lived on Vestal Street for twenty-five or more years with her husband in a house that was once occupied by another good neighbor. I think a little osmosis might have been at work but also, simply, Nancy was a good neighbor.  I would liken her to the “Mayor of Vestal Street.” She looked out for people, paid attention, invited her neighbors for dinner, and helped them out. She certainly helped the MMA out. She offered to garden – and re-did our Astronomer’s Cottage garden and side yard. She painted window boxes. She donated an old door she had so we could replace a rotting door we had. She donated a refrigerator – still humming along nicely in one of our dorms. She welcomed a Mitchell House intern into her home to look at the grain painting in her home from the nineteenth century as the intern worked to study the grain painting in the Mitchell House’s 1825 Kitchen. She attended our events. She was a member. She helped out in other areas of the MMA with advice and support. She swept at least weekly – if not more – the stones from our driveway that constantly tumbled into the street. She gave us plants, kept her eye on things, and looked out for our staff and interns, too. She even gave me a few dresses she could not wear and a baby gift when we brought our son home.  She was a mensch.


Finding out about her death knocked me down. I keep expecting her to be outside sweeping or walking her beloved dog or putting a new flower arrangement in her front window. She loved her historic home and she and her husband worked very hard to preserve it and also restore details that were lost over the last 100 or more years. She was an incredibly talented and smart person and had a whole other life in Boston where she worked for many years in human resources. I could not think of a better person to have such an occupation. She always had a smile on her face and was ready with support.


Good neighbors are hard to come by. I hope that Nancy and her memory inspire a few more people to be good neighbors in this world. 


The step, however small, which is in advance of the world, shows the greatness of the person, whether that step be taken with brain, with heart, or with hands. – Maria Mitchell


JNLF

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Maria Mitchell In Her Own Words

By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • December 15, 2025
[1855] On the 12 th [December] at 8 o’clock, I found a comet in Cetus. It is probably that seen by Bruhns in Berlin on Nov. 12. It is round and bright and moved so rapidly that in an hour I was certain of its change of place. From 8 to 10 ½ it had moved about half the diameter of my field of view. I tho’t it varied in its light but of this I am not quite certain, as I at times changed from one instrument to another, and I cannot be certain that my eye was not somewhat affected by the size of different powers, so as to affect my judgement. I would give a good deal for it to be my own possession, because it would convince me that I was not declining in vigor.  This comet, unlike her won comet of October 1, 1847, is fairly fast moving – it would take many calculations and much time for her comet to illustrate its movement – beyond just the appearance of its “tail.” Maria had made earlier comments in the month about if being a hard year – the hardest of her life. The loss of friends, her mother’s illness. But this, with other matters, buoyed her spirit and she talked about her “blessings.” This comet was one seen by Maria only eight years after her comet discovery so it seems interesting that she feels she is slipping and not as “vigorous” – she is only thirty-seven years old at this date. JNLF

A Swatch of Fabric

By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • December 9, 2025
Another re-blog. I came across this recently while looking through my computer files. I want to re-blog it in memory of Jean Hughes, an incredibly gifted islander, who was directly influential in the lives of so many island children and those in need. She was the Coffin School Trustee’s President for many years and I had the honor to serve as a trustee under her. She passed away in the summer of 2025. Jeanie loaned me this from her family collections as she thought I would enjoy it. She knew me better than I thought she did. With love. 1830s Chinese silk to be exact. It literally floated into my lap as I sat reading a letter.  A letter from a young Nantucket girl to her grandparents. A young girl who just several years before had moved from tiny Nantucket Island to San Francisco with her mother to join her father. He had moved for better work and a better life. Nantucket was in an economic decline. Reading this treasure trove of letters – loaned to me by a friend who is a descendant of these people I mention – was like spying on them. Now, when I read Mitchell family letters and writing it is slightly different for me. Having worked in the Mitchell House for so long, I feel like they are a part of my family. This batch of letters was different however. I felt like they know I read their letters – as if they were looking over my shoulder or sitting on the other side of the room aghast. I felt like they thought no one ever would – or at the very least an outsider – read this correspondence. The worse letter one was the son writing to his mother upon receipt of her letter telling him of his father’s death. That was hard. Made harder because he thought his father was fine – he was as of the last letter a month or two before. Made harder as I lost my own Father a little over a year ago. I knew how he felt – but cannot imagine receiving a letter that is about a month old telling one of such horrible news. He had not seen his father in several years. I could speak to my Father, visited him monthly, and was there with him. That was not an easy letter to read. The silk fabric piece is quite beautiful – and still pristine – as if it was just folded into the letter yesterday. She wanted to share with her grandparents the dress that her cousin had brought to her directly from Hong Kong. A cousin, who was likely pregnant – or “sick” as was written but it was obvious what “sick” meant (yes, pregnancy was looked at as an illness in a way – and there were high rates of infant and mother mortality during and immediately following birth). The cousin had travelled back and forth to Hong Kong on the China Trade with her husband it seems but due to the pregnancy had to be put off with family or others until the baby was born. This was a common practice for the wives of whale captains who might go to sea with their husbands. They were put off with other whaling families or missionaries in far off ports so that they could have their baby where others could help. Sometimes they were put off months in advance. And, did you know that Nantucket whale wives were the FIRST to go to sea with their captains husbands? They set the trend – after all, we were the whaling capital of the world. At least, until we lost that title for multiple reasons. I digress. The other piece that leads one to realize that money was to be had – at least for the cousin – is that she didn’t bring fabric – she brought the dress already made in Hong Kong. Yes, it would have been less costly there than in the United States but it shows there was extra money for spending. And, there was enough excess fabric inside the dress for this young girl to cut off a piece of it and send it to her grandparents. Making them feel as if they were a part of her daily life – and making her feel that way too. So far from home. On the other side of the continent with Nantucket Sound in the midst, to boot. JNLF

Keep Calm and Bird On: December 2025

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