Wyomissing is a town along Route 422 just west of Reading and east of the towns where my historical research is centered. Some of the place names there have a lovely musical quality: Cacoosing, Ontelaunee, Lorah. These names were given by the original inhabitants, a group called the Tulpehocken Indians. The early English, French, and German settlers provided place names from their own languages, so we have also Alsace Manor, Gibraltar, and Moselem Springs.

I was in the area today for my first SERIOUS work on the quilt project. My proposal has been approved by the leadership of the Heidelberg Heritage
Society. I met with members of the museum committee this morning. There is a series of public events at the site over the next six weeks or so -- a county-wide museum open house, two more monthly meetings, a hoagie sale, and the popular flag retirement ceremony held on Flag Day (June 14). By June 15 we can appropriate an area with a table and some good light where the quilt can be spread out and studied.

I’ve learned several things about the quilt. I was wrong about the date -- it was created in 1887, not 1899. (The date is still significant to my story -- the children’s deaths occurred in 1885, so it’s their names I hope to find.) The quilt is not owned by the Society. Rather, it is on a permanent or long-term loan from the woman who does own it. Now in her nineties, she resides in an assisted living facility just down the road. It is said that her awareness of the present and her ability to recall a specific event in the past when asked are both unreliable. It’s quite possible that the story of how she came to possess the quilt is unretrievable.

I was able to look at it briefly. As I remembered, it is hanging folded over a padded rod and on top of a woven coverlet also provided by the same donor. It, too, has a connection to Hain’s Church. A plain white bedsheet covers the whole thing -- an attempt to reduce fading and dust accumulation.

The names are not embroidered, but written by hand in ink which is remarkably legible. It appears the same hand did what sections are visible from a quick peek under the sheet. The names are on large white blocks separated by red ones. The material is undoubtedly cotton, and the color of the fabric is good, although there are some stains near the border.

I spent nearly two hours in the library of the facility -- a little room beside the quilt room. Like many local historical societies, the Heidelberg Heritage Society is operated by volunteers, a group small in number but fiercely dedicated to the preservation of local history. And like many such groups, the pace at which they collect items exceeds the pace at which they are able to order and arrange things. This is especially true of paper items -- school record books, minutes of township boards, pastors’ diaries, published histories. Thus finding a document or an object that might be useful to one’s research is often a matter of serendipity. This is particularly true for me, because I’m not really a genealogist trying to assemble the “begats” of a specific family. I’m a fiction writer trying to evoke “local color,” and I can’t name what I’m looking for. I just know it when I see it.

One thing that caught my attention today was a farmer’s account book from the 1870s. Written in a beautiful Spencerian hand, it lists expenses and income for an operation that raised cows and pigs primarily, grew their feed, and maintained horses to pull the sowing and harvesting equipment. There are work records for hired men as well as monies paid for services -- blacksmith, wheelwright, butcher. There is also a receipt for quantities of various textiles, sold to the household per one of the hired men. I imagine Ellen, my central character, making her list (verbally to her husband or the hired man, since she herself cannot write English) and sending him to town for the goods, as she is too busy to leave the homestead.

I copied down a lot of the pages verbatim (the copier wasn’t on, and photocopying such old documents is damaging to them anyway), aware anew of how angular my Catholic schoolgirl script has become. Then I had lunch in a very modern pizzeria installed in a very 19th century railroad guard house, and made my usual visit to the cemetery.

As I’ve said, I’m not a genealogist. But my interest in Katherine Whitmoyer (the real Ellen) and her story has as its byproduct the amassing of her “begats.” One of her daughters married a son of a prominent family, and I recently found the grandchildren generated by that daughter listed in a Hain’s Church history produced early in the 20th century.

Walking among the graves, I found one I’ve been looking for for almost five years. I knew that Franklin Hassler, who perished in the train accident of August 1899, was buried in the large Hain’s East section, where Katherine and her family are. I’ve looked for his stone on every visit, but never found it.

Nor was I looking for it today. I was walking toward a trash container to dispose of my water bottle, and suddenly, there it was, a pink granite double stone with a branch of cherry blossoms carved along the top. It is less than fifty feet from Katherine’s plot. 

It’s been there for more than a hundred years. I’ve walked past it a hundred times. Today I saw it. I’m seeing this whole project with new eyes and new energy.

Onward.