Quoits, Anyone? The History of an American Pastime  

Next week, the country will commemorate the adoption of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. 241 years ago, the original thirteen American colonies declared themselves a new nation – the United States of America. Whether it be political ceremonies or barbecues and parades, there are many ways we honor the history and traditions of our nation.

As many of us pull out cornhole, horseshoes or the croquette set this weekend, let’s dive into the history of the game of quoits, an extremely popular game during the founding of our nation. In our opinion, we’d like to see it overtake cornhole to once again be a favorite BBQ pastime!

Quoits has origins in ancient Greece and was picked up by the Roman conquerors and spread throughout Europe. According to the United States Quoiting Association, quoits originally came to America in the 1700s with the early settlers from England. The game consists of throwing a metal ring towards a spike to either land on or near it. It was considered a more sophisticated lawn game in comparison to horseshoes, which was played by commoners.

John Marshall, fourth Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, was a renowned quoits player in Richmond. Playing quoits during Court Days was a popular pastime in Virginia, which may be how he became such an excellent player¹. The John Marshall House has a set of quoits that are a reproduction of the original set Marshall would have possessed. 

Marshall was a member of the Buchanan Spring Quoits Club (also known as the Richmond or Fairfield Sociable Club), which consisted of 30 elected members, including the city’s leading merchants, politicians and professional men². The group met every Saturday afternoon from May to November at Reverend John Buchanan’s farm and the men were no strangers to having a good time. They feasted on barbecued pig and drank punch and juleps. Talking about politics was strictly prohibited at these gatherings. Rule breakers were punished by Marshall with a hefty fine – alcohol.

Historic Richmond Foundation has revived this historic pastime, with the Quoit Club. Membership includes social gatherings and an all-access pass to Richmond’s history through members-only tours inside of the city’s most interesting buildings and locations. 

At the John Marshall House, you can play a game of quoits in the garden when you come for a visit! There is a pit set up outside and the house has a modern quoits set for you to throw. The John Marshall House is open Friday, Saturday and Sunday, March through December.

Preservation Virginia wishes you a happy and healthy Independence Day weekend!

1. https://bjws.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-game-of-quoits-travels-from-gardens.html
2. http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/marshall/

Richmond Justice Exhibit Opens in Newly Restored John Marshall House Justice Gallery

The Richmond Justice exhibit is officially open for public viewing in the newly restored John Marshall House Justice Gallery. The exhibit will run through the month of September.

Richmond Justice started in 2016 as a year-long project produced by Field Studio to share portraits and stories of Richmonders whose lives have been shaped in some way by the justice system.

The project grew from years of co-directors, Hannah Ayers and Lance Warren making media about incarceration. The duo’s experience led them to discover that the number of people touched by the justice system is greater than what people tend to imagine and the stories of those affected by the justice system are profound and must be told.

Check out our Q&A with Hannah and Lance:  

Can you discuss the importance of providing a platform for those affected by the justice system to tell their stories?

Lance: The justice system is hard to see. If you're not inside of it—and often, even if you are—the reasons why people are jailed or freed, prosecuted or merely warned, tend to be shrouded in legal jargon and bureaucracy. Not only that, the very nature of arrest and incarceration separates those charged, and those doing the charging, from the rest of the community. And yet, this hard-to-see system makes decisions that transform our community, one life at a time, and often not for the better. 

We believe that a sensible, fair justice system could serve Richmond as it should. But first, we need to understand the people in our justice system in their own words. We couldn't find a platform that enabled Richmonders whose lives are shaped by the justice system to share their wildly varying experiences and perspectives, and so, we decided to create one.

What were some common experiences that you all discovered that Richmonders face when it comes to interacting with the justice system?

Hannah: One thing that’s easy to forget is that in many cases, families interacting with the justice system are doing so for the first time. And unless you’re a lawyer or an advocate, you’re thrust into a system that’s immensely complicated and requires a steep learning curve. So it’s not uncommon for Richmonders to feel completely lost, or worse, neglected as they navigate hearings and trials.

We also discovered that a lot of community members are interacting with the justice system because they struggle with a substance use disorder. They need treatment, but due to the way that our laws and institutions are set up, many of them end up in jail. Some get treatment there, but treatment through jail is a counterintuitive way to address treatment for a disease.

Which organizations are spearheading reform efforts within Richmond’s justice system and where has progress been made?

Hannah: This was the most heartening thing we found as part of this project: Richmond is fortunate to have progressive people who are deeply committed to broadening access to justice and seeking reform. The Legal Aid Justice Center has done tremendous work on a number of fronts, especially when it comes to juvenile justice and the school-to-prison pipeline.

There is good work being done as part of the REAL Program at the Richmond City Justice Center. The REAL Program works to address addictive behavior through classes and workshops, and we’ve met graduates whose lives were transformed because they finally learned about their addiction and what to do about it. Some of the change is coming from the state policy level; Governor McAuliffe signed a bill last month to reform the Virginia Board of Corrections, strengthening their oversight of jails and tasking them with investigating the deaths that occur with frightening frequency.

There are also promising partnerships among foundations, nonprofits, arts groups, and legal organizations working to address problems from multiple angles. All of these changes are positive, but it’s hard to feel hopeful when some of the problems are so vast: the poverty that drives people to desperate situations and desperate decisions; the opioids and guns that are too readily available; the laws that criminalize drug use, homelessness, and mental illness; the corrections facilities that do little to rehabilitate.  There’s an overwhelming amount to do, but we’re grateful for the folks who are committing their time and expertise to move Richmond in a positive direction.

Can you all describe the significance of featuring the exhibit at the John Marshall House?

Lance: John Marshall was a child of the American Revolution, schooled and shaped by the struggle's many strategies to secure self-government rooted in the will of a united people. This very unity, this common sense pursuit of common purpose—this is one key force we found often missing in the way justice is measured in Richmond. "We're arresting the wrong people," the Sheriff told us. "You could do 12 months in jail on a littering charge," noted a public defender, explaining that homelessness itself has been criminalized and locks those without shelter into a destructive cycle of incarceration and vulnerability.

The Commonwealth's Attorney for Richmond told us that he wouldn't want his post in "any other jurisdiction in the state," because voters here "are at least willing to entertain non-traditional approaches to criminal justice." But too often, he told us, his office and other reformers haven't been enabled to bring good ideas to scale. The result is injustice done to those convicted as well as to the welfare and public safety of the city: "Most of the people we’ve convicted for felonies, we will see again—not because they’re inherently bad, as we've told ourselves, but because of the consequences of the felony in terms of difficulties in securing stable housing, employment, and recovery. Forgotten felons come back again and again."

John Marshall understood the need for fairness and logic in the prosecution of law. It's impossible to know what he would've thought of today's challenges to justice in Richmond. But his example makes clear to us that the place where we can begin to study his legacy today is exactly the place to consider how to do justice to those in Richmond in a way that treats them as they are—our neighbors, our fellow Americans, sometimes our family members, and hopefully our friends.

What’s next for the Richmond Justice project?

Lance: Through exhibits like the one we're fortunate for the chance to launch at the John Marshall House, we hope to give more Richmonders the chance to hear the voices that so captured us over the last year.  We started with a family-and-friends mailing list of 129 people and grew the project to an audience of more than 20,000 by the end of 2016. We were active in-person, too, hosting in October the only mayoral debate focused squarely on the justice system, and then convening hundreds more at UR Downtown during the inaugural First Fridays gallery opening this year. We pledge to keep the site accessible indefinitely, so that an unlimited number of people may read and learn from these stories. And we look forward to welcoming attorneys, visitors, and supporters of all sorts to the John Marshall House in the coming months.

Visit www.richmondjustice.org to learn more about the project and like the Richmond Justice Facebook page to keep up with their latest updates.

Gutters

On a rainy day in Spring, a young man's thoughts turn to ...GUTTERS! I had occasion to be at the John Marshall House this afternoon in the midst of a downpour. I was meeting with the contractor who is preparing to begin the roof replacement there, hopefully within a week or ten days. As part of the job, they will be adding half round copper gutters to the roof edges in an effort to control the disposition of rain water.



Some twenty years ago, we added the brick ground guttering shown in the photograph above. This was best practice at the time, as gutters were considered not historically accurate. The gutters that had been on the building for some time were removed and not replaced during the 1974-76 major restoration of the house. You can still trace the staining left from the many years they had been in place against the bricks on the edges of the house. In the 80's moisture infiltration into the basement walls was very evident and growing worse. The gravel that was meant to absorb the rain falling off the roof and disperse it to the storm drain was dug out down to foundation level and a French drain system installed. The shallow V-shaped brick ground guttering was meant to channel the majority of the rain water into drains piped directly into the storm sewer. The water that escaped this first system would then be captured by the French drain.



This greatly improved the moisture problem in the basement, but resulted in another unintended consequence. Raindrops falling two full stories onto a brick surface tended to explode upwards and create a constant moisture on the bricks above the ground gutter. These got moist, and because of the showing caused by the surrounding buildings, never were directly exposed to drying sunlight. As a result, moss grew and held the moisture there even longer. So back to the simplest system of controlling rainwater - roof edge gutters. When these are in place, the brick ground gutter will be removed and the grading corrected to slope away from the building. We likely will go back along the surface perimeter with some pea gravel for both decorative and moisture issues. The French drain system will be left in place, as there is no evidence that it is failing.



Rain is a good thing and we certainly need it in good season, but it can be a threat to an insufficiently protected historic house!

The Year of the Roof

2008 is indeed the year when many of our properties are receiving much needed new roofs (rooves?) An earlier post celebrated the completion of the one on Historic Smithfield and the John Marshall House is waiting the start of that replacement process. Yesterday, I stopped by The Old Stone House here in Richmond to view progress on that project. This is of course not directly operated by APVA Preservation Virginia, but is an owned property. The Edgar Allan Poe Foundation raised the money and is overseeing the project. We did have approval on the type of material used. As you can see from the photos of the completed rear face, they are using a good quality cedar shingle. This is encouraging in that the same company doing this job (Paul Saunders Roofing) is under contract for the Marshall House roof. I suspect the Marshall House may have to wait until this one is completed before they move there for that job. The staff member at the Stone House says that Saunders is expected to undertake the front face next week.

Note the deteriorated shingles on the front face in the shot taken yesterday afternoon. Wooden shingles are the most authentic and historically appropriate roof covering for this and for the Marshall House. The urban environment will certainly shorten the life of a wood shingled roof. However, with the accessibility of this roof to view, using a synthetic product is more problematic. We have chosen to go with a cement based Hendricks Tile on the Marshall roof in the hope it will last longer. Being a two story house with even more elevation from the street, the roof of the Marshall House is less visible to the average viewer. We expect that the trade off in life versus strict authenticity will work in the Marshall situation where it may not have worked as well at the Old Stone House.

Butler's Pantry Up and Running at JMH

After two years of planning, the newly installed butler's pantry at the John Marshall House is officially open to the public!

Here's a sneak preview tour, but be sure to stop by the house and see the finished project.

This room is interpreted as a Butler's Pantry. We don't know exactly how it was used in Marshall's day, but we do know that it was probably a service space, based on the very simple wallfinishing (white wash and simple trim, compared to the papers, paints, and grained trim in the rest of the first floor) and location within the house. It certainly would have been a convenient place for Robin Spurlock, the Marshall family's enslaved butler, to have performed some of his daily work, right in the heart of the house and near the outbuildings and cellar.

The room is set up right now as if Spurlock is polishing brass candlesticks and preparing them for use throughout the house. The shelves store frequently needed household items, such as extra canton for use at daily meals and extra wine glasses. Less frequently used items are on the top shelves. A coal scuttle is on the floor, ready to refill the grates throughout the house.

The items in the room are a mixture of period pieces from our collection and new reproductions. I'll provide a full list later, but the short version is that the glassware, redware, and tin are all reproductions; the other ceramics, brass, and copper scuttle are all original.