Love is Building a House Together: A Tribute to My Parents, Part I

 Chasing History: Exploring My Ancestral Roots - Blog Post #54 By Tonya Graham McQuade

"LOVE IS BUILDING A HOUSE TOGETHER" 

In this photo, my mom stands and dad sits beside this slogan,

painted on the side of the old house on Minta Lane before it was torn down.

For most kids, building a house involves blocks, legos, Lincoln logs, or possibly cardboard boxes. Perhaps, if they’re lucky, they might get to help build a fort or a playhouse in their backyard. In my family, though, building a house meant working together to build an actual house – one that we would eventually live in – and which my parents, Doug and Dotty Graham, continued to live in until earlier this year when they sold the house on Minta Lane in Antioch and moved to a senior living facility.

My dad’s birthday is this weekend, so it seems like a good time to feature him in one of my blog posts. I previously wrote about some of his building projects and his sailing adventures. In this post, though, I’ll discuss how he pushed forward to make a dream of his come true – and how he eventually brought the rest of the family along with him, teaching us a lot about determination, persistence, and what goes into building a house in the process. Of course, this is how I – then ages 13-14 – remember it. The rest of the family each has their own memories — but some of those memories come from my mom’s own pen in 1979, as you’ll soon see.

Photos of the old house at 2752 Minta Lane in Antioch

I still recall the day my dad purchased an old house sitting on a third of an acre on Minta Lane. We were living on Kendree Street at the time, where I had lived since I was four years old, and none of us were especially anxious to move. As a then-seventh grader, I was not privy to the conversations my parents had about this decision – but I’m pretty sure my mom was not a driving force in this move. She was a resigned participant at best.

We did not, however, immediately move to this new property. There was a lot that had to be done before they could start building, so for a while, my parents rented out the old house to another family. My dad, in the meantime, started researching different styles of houses, reading books about construction, drawing up and submitting plans, building cardboard models (I remember arguing for a bigger bedroom), and getting permits and ordering supplies so that he could start construction.

My dad's cardboard model of the house he designed

A picture of what the house would look like

My parents ultimately decided to build a passive solar house, using some of the design features they learned about from a similar community they visited up in Davis. That decision paid off in many ways over the years, helping not only the environment but their pocketbook – they were even audited twice because their PG&E bills were so low. 

My dad did a lot of research into passive solar design.

Around this same time, President Jimmy Carter added solar panels to the White House in 1979 to set an example for a national campaign to conserve energy and reduce the nation's dependence on foreign oil, especially during the energy crisis caused by the Arab oil embargo. He said the U.S. could harness “the power of the sun to enrich our lives as we move away from our crippling dependence on foreign oil.” [1] He tried to get the country to buy in to his way of thinking.

That year in his State of the Union address, Carter “presented an ambitious plan to put America on a clean energy path: 20% of energy from renewable sources by 2000. Part of his idea was to go far beyond simple hot water solar collectors and direct government research funds toward the development of photovoltaic cells, the kind that could put energy into the grid.” Ah, if only we as a country had continued down that path. [2]

Seven years later, under President Ronald Reagan, those solar panels were removed from the White House and never reinstalled. The Reagan administration also “allowed Carter’s financial incentives promoting renewables to expire…. Tax credits established in 1977 for homeowners installing solar water heaters ended Dec. 31, 1985.” [3]

My parents, though, were able to benefit from those incentives under Carter. And while I was not always a fan of our solar water heater, which sometimes was not as “hot” as I would have liked, I appreciate (probably more now than I did then) that my parents were so forward-thinking when it came to clean energy. Our front door featured a decorative piece of stained glass depicting the sun, and another sign in our house (made by my brother Cam) proclaimed, “The answer to the world’s energy crisis comes up every morning.” 

But I’m getting ahead of myself …

The old Minta house was very close to the street,

leaving plenty of room to build behind it.

The old house on Minta Lane was close to the street, toward the front of the property, which meant there was a lot of space behind it to start building the new house. Of course, that also meant clearing and leveling the property before construction could begin. This involved lots of pickaxing and shoveling and hauling. All of us were drafted to be workers in this process - especially as part of the “clean up crew.”

Working to clear and level the construction site

One of the more memorable moments happened when my dad was using a pickaxe to break up the soil to level the ground for a shed. Our job after he did this was to shovel the dirt into a wheelbarrow to haul to another section of the yard. This was certainly not a fun task to my teenage mind – but it got a lot more exciting when we heard glass break and discovered a now-broken canning jar with a roll of old paper money totaling $575 wrapped in an old popcorn bag inside of it. Years ago I wrote a poem about that memory, which you can read HERE if you are interested.

The summer before my eighth grade year, my parents started building the foundation of the house. That involved a LOT of digging – which my dad did by hand – as well as lots of lumber deliveries and precise structural framing. The solar design also required pouring a cement foundation, which meant all the plumbing and electrical had to be carefully laid out before the cement could be poured. I remember my dad was very concerned about getting everything right since it could not be easily corrected after the cement had dried, so he had someone help with some of this to ensure accuracy. He also recruited lots of friends – as well as family members – to help with the cement pouring, as these pages from their photo album show.

That's my brother Cam (age 10) in the top left and two bottom right photos;

Andy (age 5 1/2) appears in two of the photos as well.

Here you can see my mom, then 39, hard at work "cleaning up,"

as well as my dad's captions: "Dotty, we're going to have to stop meeting this way." - Marty; 

34 1/2 yards [of cement] later; and "Waiting for Spring" to continue the building process.

A neighbor captured this photo of my mom nailing down the shed roof.

This page shows the shed, the foundation, 

and the view from the backyard of the Antioch hills.

While going through old boxes of cards and photos earlier this year to help my parents prepare for their move, I found this written description from my mom that included some details I had forgotten. I think her journal entries are worth including here:

6-25-79

Fence posts all in – Tonya and I put up three sections of fence Friday. Doug working on foundation. When we came to work on fence this morning, we were surprised to find it almost finished. I worked on front sections until I ran out of wood – got one section out of plumb [not aligned]. Hope it’s okay.

6-26-79

Took out four boards on fence to correct my error. Rest of fence was finished last night by McKains [our Minta Lane neighbors]. Tonya and I were disappointed as we wanted to work on it, plus her dad was giving her $1 a section! We helped Doug dig. What a miserable way to dig a foundation – by hand. Tonya and I picked on Doug – sometimes I don’t know how he can work so very hard! We only stayed until lunch. I took kids home then.

6-27-79

I left early with Doug. Kids stayed home. We worked on foundation. Digging is hard work. I have blisters. I can’t believe it will ever really be a foundation. Doug continues to plod onward.

6-28-79

Today more of the same – work. Dragged some heavy boards delivered by lumber company. Cam and Andy played space ships while we worked. Doug worked on putting forms up for concrete. It begins to take on a shape – be it ever so humble. Doug worked late – 5:30. I came home at noon again.

6-29-79

I don’t feel like helping today. Doug needs me to help do measuring. He left early to go to dump and get more pipe. Read a book until it opened at 8:00 – what determination! I only worked 1 ½ hours today. Andy’s last swimming lesson today. He’s doing so well.

Measuring, leveling, taking out trees, and building fences

6-30-79

It’s Saturday – everyone wants to play and not go to Minta to work. I’m behind in my work here at home. We put off going until 2:00. Doug, Cam, and I went over. Cam had fun watering trees and getting all muddy. Doug and I spent two hours measuring the levels of foundation! I like to think about the landscaping every now and then – what it would look like someday.

7-1-79

Sunday – Roller skating at Golden Gate Park. What a blast it was.

I remember how much fun we had roller skating at Golden Gate Park. What a nice respite that must have been for everyone! I also like to think of my mom picturing what the landscaping might look like one day, knowing how beautiful their yard eventually was with its garden, trees, and flowers (more on that later).

Over the next week’s journal entries, my mom writes about preparing for Cam’s 10th birthday party, going to Contra Loma Reservoir with friends for a picnic and to celebrate the Fourth of July, staying home to clean the house to get ready for a visit from my grandparents (my dad’s father and his wife Donna), hearing about their recent trip to Canada, and taking my grandparents to see the Oakland Symphony at the Concord Pavilion. In other words, she lived a normal life and took a break from work on the Minta house. She then describes something about which I have no memory. I can't imagine how emotionally difficult those few days must have been:

7-8-79

Sunday after church we went to see some energy efficient homes in West Pittsburg. Doug is now very discouraged because our house seems so much bigger than the ones we saw. We are ending up with 1925 sq. ft., more than we wanted. We might decide to start all over!

7-9-79

No work done on house today. It is very depressing. Talked to Steve Ortega for advice. He’s a carpenter.

7-10-79

Went to Benicia today to look at energy efficient models. They were lovely – wonder if ours will ever look like that. Now Doug thinks we will stick with original plan in spite of its size and difficultness (?) to build.

7-12-79

Worked at house at 8:00. Came home at 10:00 to take kids to swimming lessons. Then we all went back and worked on house. Tonya and I stacked bricks with sand to help fill in foundation so we will not need so much cement. It is HOT today. Boys played in the big pile of sand we had delivered. After we had lunch Doug took Tonya and Cam to school and library with him in afternoon. They helped him work on new drafting room. I got some cleaning at home done. 

7-13-79

Went early to work at house. Doug and Tippy [our dog] went early again to get more brick so I could continue brick wall. Kids stayed home – except Andy came to play on sand pile. Only worked until lunch as it is HOT again!

That’s where my mom’s journal ends … at least, those are the only pages I found. That means I’ll have to rely on my own memories (and photos from their house building scrapbook) to tell the rest of the story. Once the foundation was completed, my dad had to focus once again on his regular job: teaching Industrial Arts at Antioch High School.

In the spring of 1980, though, he started framing the house. Then, in April of my eighth grade year, we moved into the old house on Minta Lane while we continued building the new house behind it.

A picture my brother Cam drew for my parents

If you want to hear more of this house-building saga, check out Part II ...

Endnotes:

1. Wihbey, John. “The forgotten story of Jimmy Carter's White House solar panels » Yale Climate Connections.” Yale Climate Connections, 21 February 2023, https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2023/02/the-forgotten-story-of-jimmy-carters-white-house-solar-panels/.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.

A Historic Trek: The Amazing Honeymoon of W.F. Traughber and Nora Petree Traughber in 1905, Part VII

Chasing History: Exploring My Ancestral Roots - Blog Post #53

By Tonya Graham McQuade

American explorer, military leader, and politician John Charles

Frémont in front of the Fremont Tree, 1888.

Back in September of last year, I started a series of blog posts about the “historic honeymoon” my great grandparents, Frank and Nora Traughber, took back in 1905. My father had recently given me their old photo album, and I had decided to “dig in” to the story of their lives. After getting married in San Jose on August 17, 1905 (see this post about their wedding), they set off on a four-week honeymoon that took them throughout California, Oregon, Washington, Montana, and Utah before heading back to Missouri, where Frank (aka. Dr. William Francis Traughber) had his medical practice. Mike and I had been to many of those same places, so I wanted to see how their experiences might have compared to ours.

The first post in the honeymoon series talked about the time Frank and Nora spent in Del Monte (aka. Monterey), Pacific Grove, and Santa Cruz (see this link for more details and photos), but I barely touched on the Santa Cruz aspect of their trip. The photos in their scrapbook that were labeled “the big trees in Santa Cruz” were quite faded and discolored, and at the time they didn’t really capture my attention. These past few days, though, I started researching more about their time in Santa Cruz because I am working on expanding that blog series into a travelogue-style book that tells about their adventures. And guess what? Their story and photos got more interesting the more I learned.

Nora standing beside a giant Coastal Redwood  in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

Frank playfully climbing up into a giant redwood – the two trunks 

have fused together through a process called inosculation. 

There are several photos of Frank and Nora in the album showing them among the big trees. So, the first question I had to ask was, where exactly did they go? Which big trees did they see? And how did they get there? Big Basin State Park had opened in 1902 as the first California State Park, so I knew that was a possibility, but it seemed like getting there from Monterey for an afternoon visit would have presented quite a challenge. Back in 1905, the main route to Big Basin was a rough, rutted wagon road that connected it to the nearby town of Boulder Creek, and with no railway option, visitors had to arrive by horse-drawn vehicles. The journey was a major undertaking, even for those living nearby.

The Santa Cruz & Felton Railroad crosses a trestle on the way to Big Tree Grove. 

Photo courtesy of the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. [1]

I quickly figured out with a bit of online research that Frank and Nora would have had easy access to a very popular tourist attraction of their day: Welch Big Tree Grove in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Popularly called “Santa Cruz Big Trees,” thousands of visitors had toured the grove since it opened in 1867, with access made much easier by the opening of the first railway in 1875 (Big Basin never gained railway access). Visitors at Monterey’s Hotel Del Monte, where Frank and Nora were staying, could board the Southern Pacific Railroad at Del Monte station bound for Santa Cruz, then transfer to a local line, the Santa Cruz Big Trees & Pacific Railway, for the ride to Big Tree Station. Welch Big Tree Grove, later known as Santa Cruz County Big Trees Park after becoming a county park in 1930, operated until 1942, when it closed down due to World War II. It is now part of Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park. 

Entrance sign to Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park near Felton.

Photo by Tonya McQuade.

Those who know me know I am a big fan of both state and national parks. My car, as well as my computer, bear stickers for each. I’m also extremely grateful to people like John Muir, Theodore Roosevelt, Stephen Mather, Charles Young, Minerva Hamilton Hoyt, Marjorie Stoneman, Thomas Moran, and so many more for the work they did to help preserve the trees, wildlife, and beauty of our national parks for posterity. 

The cover of my laptop clearly “advertises” my love of state and national parks.

I have also always loved walking among the towering Coastal Redwoods in places like Redwood National Park and Big Basin State Park, as well as the Giant Sequoias found further inland in places like Yosemite’s Mariposa Grove and Calaveras Big Trees State Park, so I wanted to know more about how the privately-owned Welch Big Tree Grove became Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park. I also could not remember if I had actually walked through the specific Redwood Grove that Frank and Nora would have seen.

So yesterday, I suggested to Mike that we drive to Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park, which is just thirty miles from our house, and go for a hike through the Redwood Grove. What follows includes some information from the research I did these past couple days, as well as additional information from the Visitors Center, the park map and brochure, the Redwood Grove Loop Trail Guide, and the book I purchased at the gift store: Historic Tales of Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park - Big Tree Grove, by Deborah Osterberg.

The book I bought at the gift shop yesterday — it’s full  of interesting photos and information.

When Joseph Warren Welch, Sr. purchased this amazing grove in 1867, he fortunately saved it from the logging that would have likely been its fate. Many of the other big trees around it had already been cut down – either for their wood or to fuel the lime kilns that were big business in the Santa Cruz Mountains in those days (that was actually how the Cowell family earned much of their money). Only about 5 percent of all the old-growth redwoods that stood before 1949 are still standing.

Welch, instead, turned his grove into a tourist attraction, with a hotel, dining hall, cabins, and a dance pavilion. His wife Anna was a big motivation for this. In the photo below, Nora is standing in front of one of the Welch resort buildings, though I am not sure which one. The buildings, which stood near the Fremont Tree, have all since been removed.

Nora standing in front of one of the old resort buildings,

which have now been removed.

The Fremont Tree was one of the park’s biggest attractions. According to reports, Second Lieutenant John Charles Frémont of the U.S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers had visited this grove in the San Lorenzo Valley in 1846 with his scout, the legendary mountain man Kit Carson, on his third scientific expedition to the West. “The accounts of the great trees in the forest on the west slope of the mountain,” according to his memoirs, “had roused [his] curiosity,” so he wanted to see them for himself [2]. Frontiersman and early Santa Cruz Mountain pioneer Isaac Graham, who knew Kit Carson from his fur-trapping days and lived in a small logging settlement in the area, served as Frémont’s host.

Frémont had earned the nickname “the Pathfinder” due to his celebrated explorations, and his exciting descriptions of those travels (aided by his wife Jessie’s pen) had caused his accounts to become national bestsellers. His descriptions of the giant Coastal Redwoods first sparked skepticism and disbelief, then fascination and excitement, among his fans, and many wanted to see the big trees for themselves. California at the time was still under Mexican control, but that didn’t stop adventurous settlers from moving in.

Here I am, sort of copying Frank’s pose from above; these two trunks have fused together through a process called inosculation.

Graham had arrived in the Santa Cruz Mountains in 1841, where he established a distillery at Rancho Zayante (near present-day Felton), one of the Mexican land grants in the area. He also built one of the first water-powered saw mills, along with Danish immigrant Peter Lassen. Graham built the road now known as Graham Hill Road, on which Mike and I drove yesterday when we visited Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park, to transport his timber to the coast for shipment. Later, the railroad helped with that challenging task.

At Graham’s request, Frémont spent several days measuring the largest tree in the grove, and he found that it measured 275 feet in height and 15 feet in diameter, three feet above the base. [3] That tree later became known as “The Giant” and is still called that today. You can see a few views of it below in the photos I took yesterday.

This tree, known as "The Giant," is the one that Fremont measured. It stands 282 feet tall, over 17 feet wide, and weighs over 400 tons. It used to be even taller until part of the top of the tree broke off. Photo by Tonya McQuade.

Mike and I standing in front of “The Giant” on our recent excursion.

This large burl hangs off the side of The Giant; burls are natural,

knobby growths filled with dormant buds and can be a result of past damage,

like a fire, from which the tree has recovered. Photo by Tonya McQuade. 

When Welch and his family later owned the grove, it became a common practice for visitors to tack their notes and calling cards on “The Giant,” as well as on other neighboring trees, as seen below. This practice was eventually called out by a well-known conservationist, as you’ll soon discover.

This photo from Deborah Osterberg’s book describes the Giant

as wearing "a great corset of cards." [4]

Another nearby tree called the “Fremont Tree” was reputed to be where Frémont slept during his 1846 visit, for it had been hollowed out by fire, providing a cavity measuring approximately twelve by fifteen feet with a ceiling about twenty-six feet high. [5] An 1862 article in the Santa Cruz Weekly Sentinel claimed that thirty people could stand inside of it. [6] When Frémont visited the grove again in 1888, he posed in front of the tree with his wife and daughter. Asked by a reporter whether that account was true, he reportedly said, “It’s a good story; let it stand,” according to the park brochure.

To see the rest of this post, head over to my website at this link ...

Endnotes:
1. Osterberg, Deborah. Historic Tales of Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park: Big Trees Grove. History Press, 2020. Pg. 48.
2. Fremont, John Charles. Memoirs of My Life by John Charles Fremont. Vol. 1. Chicago: Belford, Clarke & Company, 1887. Hathi Trust Digital Library, babel.hathitrust.org. Pg. 457.
3. Osterberg, pg. 26.
4. Ibid, pg. 53.
5. Ibid, pg. 55.
6. Ibid, pg. 56.

Standing on a Quaker Burial Ground in Philadelphia that Contains my 8th Great-Grandmother's Bones

Chasing History: Exploring My Ancestral Roots - Blog Post #52

By Tonya Graham McQuade

Arch Street Quaker Meeting House in Philadelphia

Back in October 2023, I wrote a blog post titled “Exploring my Irish Quaker Roots: From England to Ireland to Pennsylvania.” That post was inspired by my trip that summer to Ireland. This follow up post was inspired by my much more recent trip to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in early August 2025.

In that 2023 post, I wrote about how, when my husband Mike and I visited the EPIC Immigration Museum in Dublin, I chose among my various ancestors from Ireland to plug in Katherine Lightfoot’s name in the immigration database, as seen in the photo below:

 

Without repeating too much here (I encourage you to read the previous post), I explained that Katherine Lightfoot was my 8th great grandmother, born on September 12, 1682 in County Antrim in Northern Ireland to Rev. Thomas Lightfoot (b. 1645 in Cambridge, England) and his wife Mary. In 1700 Katherine married James Robert Miller, who was born in Timahoe, Kildare, Leinster, Ireland. They had one son and six daughters (I descend through their daughter Mary, b. 1713). 

Katherine at some point became a Quaker minister, with her family being members of the Timahoe Meeting in County Kildare, then later the Quaker Meeting in Dublin. In September of 1729, after various other family members had already done so, she and her husband James immigrated to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with five of their children on the Sizargh of Whitehaven, captained by Jeremiah Cowman. There, sadly, just a few weeks after their arrival, she died on October 17. She is buried at the Friends Arch Street Meeting House Burial Grounds in Philadelphia. 

Now, back to the present. Imagine my surprise when I realized the hotel I had booked for my husband and me on our recent trip was directly across the street from the Arch Street Meeting House! Of course I was anxious to learn more, so on our first full day in Philadelphia, we headed across the street to check things out.

A sign welcoming visitors to the Arch Street Meeting House,

located on the corner of Arch & 4th Streets (right across from our hotel)

A large brick wall surrounds the meeting house grounds, but we noticed several possible entrances. We entered from the side, where we saw a large plot of grass with several tall trees but no graves markers. Then I saw a sign that posed the question: “What Happened to the Headstones?” As the sign explained: “In the 1700s, Philadelphia Quakers declared grave markers were ‘Marks of Superfluity and excess.’ Grave markers and stones were deemed ‘inconsistent with the plainness of [Quaker] Principles and Practice,’ and many were removed or buried in a pit on the property.”

My 8th great grandmother, Katherine Lightfoot,

is buried here somewhere.

It was in 1701 that William Penn, the Quaker founder of Pennsylvania, formally deeded this land to the Quakers, also known as the Religious Society of Friends, to be used as a burial ground. Some burials had already taken place on the site before this, with the earliest recorded in 1697. As explained on another sign, “Arch Street’s burial grounds were initially organized by family and community. As the grounds grew fuller, the Quakers began burying the deceased in chronological rows. The final recorded burial was in 1872."

This sign includes a photo of William Penn's Deed

The exact number of people buried on the site is unknown, but estimates range from 13,000 to 20,000. While the burial grounds were primarily reserved for Quakers, exceptions were sometimes made. During the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793, approximately 5,000 Philadelphians – 10 percent of the city’s population – died over a four month period. Records show that, during that period, “Arch Street’s burial grounds were opened to everyone … and that people of diverse races, religions, and nationalities were buried here.”

Approximately 10 percent of Philadelphia's population

died during the Yellow Fever Epidemic

Construction of the Arch Street Meeting House – the largest Quaker meetinghouse in the United States at 28,000 square feet – did not begin until 1801 and was not completed until 1811, so neither Katherine nor her husband ever set foot inside the building. Her husband James actually moved with their children to New Garden, a township about 40 miles southwest of Philadelphia, where Katherine’s father, Thomas, and brother, Michael, both also Quaker ministers, had already moved. Thomas Lightfoot, my 9th great grandfather, is buried near there in the Darby Friends Cemetery in Darby, PA.

A timeline showing key details related to the construction of the Meeting House,

which was designed and built by Quaker drafter and carpenter Owen Biddle

An early photo depicting the Arch Street Meeting House

The building is still used as a Quaker meeting house, but it also houses a museum with exhibits about Quaker history and beliefs and some of the “heroes”  of the faith. We spoke with a docent whom we found in the West Room, who talked a bit about her own experience as a Quaker. There are currently about 76,000 Quakers in the United States; 377,000 worldwide. The West Room also contains various signs explaining some of the Quakers’ core beliefs. The following descriptions are taken from those signs:

• Simplicity - Quakers believe in living simply so they can focus on their spiritual life and helping others; as a result, their meeting house is very plain, with no distractions from worship like adornments, statues, stained glass windows, or icons.

• Equality & Racism - Many "Friends," as Quakers are often called, were among the first abolitionists, speaking out strongly against slavery and aiding in the Underground Railroad. Others, however, participated in and benefited from enslavement, and first-hand accounts also report that seating was sometimes racially segregated into the 1800s, so they were not consistent in this belief. Many of the suffragists who fought hard for women’s right to vote were Quakers, and others helped pioneer school and prison reform.

• The Light Within - Quakers believe everyone has a direct relationship with God. They call it the “Light Within” or the “Inner Light.” While some Friends view the “Light Within” as the Christian God, others view it as spiritual energy or the truth.

• Community - Quakers do not typically have one minister who heads the congregation. However, historically, they did have leaders and elders who were more likely to share their reflections during meeting, who sat on what they called “facing benches” that faced the congregation. Others sat in the general seating area.

• Activism - Quakers are activists. They are guided by their faith's core beliefs - "testimonies" - of peace, equality, integrity, and simplicity. They agitate for social, political, economic, and environmental change both locally and around the world.

There are also displays at the Meeting House, as I mentioned, about some of the "heroes" of the faith. Several were highlighted in a series of dioramas; others, in large exhibits. The first photo below shows a diorama depicting William Penn's meeting in Philadelphia in 1682 with Lenape chiefs. Under an elm tree, they signed a treaty focused on establishing peaceful coexistence and fair trade between the settlers and the native inhabitants. Penn aimed to build a colony based on principles of religious freedom and mutual respect. He wanted to avoid the conflicts common in other settlements - and, as the sign states, "colonists and Native people did peacefully coexist - until the mid-1700s, when the European push to seize Native lands erupted into decades of racial violence." 

Diorama depicting William Penn's meeting with Lenape chiefs 

Other Quaker heroes depicted or mentioned in the dioramas included abolitionists Benjamin Lay and Anthony Benezet; suffragists Lucretia Mott and Alice Paul; Native American rights advocate William Sawry; educators Sarah Mapps Douglass Cyrus Bustill, who both helped start schools for black children; and doctor Ann Preston, the first woman dean of the Woman's College of Pennsylvania (founded by Quakers).

This larger display talked about the work of Quakers Lucretia Mott,

Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Alice Paul

Quaker influence can be seen and felt throughout Philadelphia. It was Quaker Isaac Norris, speaker of the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly, who chose the inscription for the State House Bell, now known as the Liberty Bell, back when the bell was cast in 1751. That inscription reads: "Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land Unto All the Inhabitants Thereof," as can be seen (at least partially) in the photo below:

Mike and I standing in front of the Liberty Bell

William Penn also stands prominently atop Philadelphia's City Hall - a landmark visible from throughout the city. The statue, completed in 1892 by Alexander Milne Calder, stands 37 feet tall and weighs over 53,000 pounds. It was installed on the tower in 1894 - which must have been quite an undertaking!

Philadelphia City Hall, with William Penn statue on top

The Arch Street Meeting House, however, is not the only famous meeting house in Philadelphia. Just one block away, on the corner of 5th and Arch Streets, one can find the "Free Quaker" Meeting House, which is part of Independence National Historic Park. Unfortunately, due to its limited hours of being open, we were not able to go inside during our recent visit. However, in my next post, I will explain a bit more about how Quakers, who in general believe in peace and do not support war, were impacted - and for a time divided - by the American Revolution. I'll also talk a bit about how the TV series Outlander has addressed some of these issues in its most recent season through the Quaker characters of Denzell and Rachel Hunter.

There is also a question I posed in my previous October 2023 post but never addressed, and which I hope to get to soon: Why did Quaker laws and practices sometimes clash with the Ulster Presbyterians who also settled in Pennsylvania, especially along the western frontier? You can read this previous post I wrote for more details on my Ulster Presbyterian connections. I plan to continue to explore the varied paths both my Quaker and Presbyterian ancestors took that eventually led them out of Pennsylvania.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you'll check back for future posts. You can easily find all of my blog posts listed on my website (tonyagrahammcquade.com), where you can also sign up to subscribe to my newsletter and/or to receive notifications about future blog posts.