Inaugurated in 2003, The Maurice Sendak Gallery of the Rosenbach Museum and Library is “dedicated to showcasing the works and personal collections of Maurice Sendak." Currently on exhibition is There’s a Mystery There: Sendak on Sendak, “the largest Sendak exhibition in the history of the Rosenbach, occupying 4 rooms over 2 floors and two different buildings.”
The Rosenbach Museum and Library is open Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.; Wednesday,
10 a.m. – 8 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. For additional information on the current and past exhibitions, visit the Maurice Sendak Gallery webpage.
Pittsburgh -- city, seat (1788) of Allegheny county, southwestern Pennsylvania, U.S. The city is located at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers, which unite at the point of the 'Golden Triangle' (the business district) to form the Ohio River…. From Encyclopedia Britannica OnlineAn American Childhood, by Annie Dillard (New York: Harper Perennial, 1988; first published 1987)
In An American Childhood, the incomparable Annie Dillard recalls her privileged Pittsburgh childhood, beginning her “story” at age five and continuing to high school’s end. Although Dillard follows a linear path, her story doesn’t move from fact to fact, but instead touches down on memories that capture childhood’s inner and outer lives, memories that enfold family, friends, and place.
“I grew up in Pittsburgh in the 1950s, in a house full of comedians, reading books. Possibly because Father had loaded his boat one day and gone down the Ohio River, I confused leaving with living, and vowed that when I got my freedom, I would be the one to do both.” – from An American Childhood, by Annie Dillard
Related Websites
Annie Dillard – Official Website
Baker Towers, by Jennifer Haigh (New York: William Morrow, 2005)
Set in fictional Bakerton, a composite of Barnesboro, where the author was born and raised, and other Pennsylvania towns, Baker Towers tells the story of a coal company town during the postwar years. Revolving primarily around the Novak family, readers watch the five children of Stanley, from “Polish Hill,” and Rose, from “Little Italy,” grow into adulthood from coal mining’s heyday through its gradual decline. Sympathies to town and characters grow as lives unfold, as choices are made – to escape Bakerton, to remain out of duty, or to choose to return. Jennifer Haigh’s “family saga” pulls readers into a “time and place long gone,” allowing readers to better understand the present through connection with the past.
The valley is deep and sharply featured. Church steeples and mine tipples grow inside it like crystals. At bottom is the town’s most famous landmark, known locally as the Towers, two looming piles of mine waste. They are forty feet high and growing, graceful slopes of loose coal and sulfurous dirt. The Towers give off an odor like struck matches. On windy days they glow soft orange, like the embers of a campfire. Scrap coal, spontaneously combusting; a million bits of coal bursting into flame.Bakertown is Saxon County’s boomtown. Like the Towers, it is alive with coal…. – from Baker Towers, by Jennifer Haigh
A museum and gallery dedicated to the life and work of John James Audubon is located at Mill Grove, the “first home of John James Audubon in America.” In 1803, Audubon’s father sent his 18-year-old son to Mill Grove to “supervise the estate." Today, visitors can see how “the wooded hills along the Perkiomen Creek and the Schuylkill River” inspired Audubon’s interest in wildlife and his craft. Complete editions “of every major work published by Audubon” are on display in the museum, while outside five miles of trails lead through the surrounding woodland, home to over “175 species of birds and over 400 species of plants.” Owned since 2004 by the National Audubon Society, the museum is open Tuesday thru Saturday 10 a.m. – 4 p.m and Sunday 1 – 4 p.m. The sanctuary grounds are open Tuesday thru Sunday 7 a.m. – Dusk. For additional information, including directions, visit the John James Audubon Center at Mill Grove website.
Zane Grey (1872-1939) lived in Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania, from 1905 until 1918. Between 1914-1918 he lived with his wife, Dolly, in the home, “along the banks of the Upper Delaware River,” that now serves as the Zane Grey Museum. Operated by the National Park Service as part of the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River, the museum offers a “glimpse into the diverse life and character of one of the early twentieth century’s most popular and widely read western writers.” Tours are offered “seasonally, usually between Memorial Day Weekend through Labor Day.” For additional information visit the Zane Grey Museum website.
The Appalachians, Pennsylvania
Appalachian Summer, by Marcia Bonta (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania : University of Pittsburgh Press, 1999)
Marcia Bonta shares a day-to-day account of summer in the Appalachians. Walking the trails near her home, Bonta follows the season, from May’s briefest hint to September’s turn toward autumn. Through journal entries, readers meet the “natural life of one place…on the westernmost ridge of the ridge-and-valley province of south central Pennsylvania.”
Related Websites
University of Pittsburgh Press
From Appalachian Summer, by Marcia Bonta:
“September 21. Summer is going out in a blaze of glory. The eastern phoebe regained his voice this morning after becoming silent in late June. The phoebe was followed by an eastern bluebird song.”
“September 22. Fifty-eight degrees and raining at dawn. With less than twelve hours to go before fall officially arrives, it began raining at 3: A.M…. It was fitting that this wet summer rained itself out and that the cool green woods of summer were giving way to the bright warm colors of early autumn.”