Fraunces Tavern

Fraunces Tavern is one of the many small random New York museums I'd never been too, but my friend Jane is visiting for a long weekend, and wanted to see it. So we met there, after she'd gone to Liberty Island (where the statue is closed) and Ellis Island (another place I've yet to visit) on the day's first ferry. It's touristy and pricy, but she wanted to eat there, is on holiday, and said she'd treat. Okay, I'm easy. There were actors outside in colonial garb, and a bagpiper, working mostly on "Yankee Doodle Dandy."

We had lunch before looking at the museum, since neither of us had had much breakfast. The clam chowder was only fair: too much cream (and, I suspect, cornstarch or similar thickener), not enough clams. My lobster roll was good, though, and Jane was happy with her salad and macaroni and cheese (like many such places, they don't have many vegetarian choices).

Partway through the meal, a birthday cake was wheeled out. Complete with an American flag made of berries. Then the staff realized that they didn't know where George was. This gave a camera crew plenty of time to take pictures of the cake, with candles. A minute or two later, an actor dressed as George Washington came in, the cake was wheeled to the middle of the room, and we were all asked to sing happy birthday, on three. With bagpipe accompaniment. I doubt either Jane or I will ever hear "Happy Birthday" on bagpipe again. It was loud enough that I could barely hear the singing--the bagpipe is not intended as an indoor instrument.

Then "George" blew out the candles, everyone cheered, and we finished our lunch. The waiter offered "coffee or dessert," I asked for tea, and Jane decided she'd also like tea. The waiter asked if we'd like "some of George Washington's birthday cake," and of course I said yes. It was basic yellow sheet cake, but the tea was quite good: they brought proper pots of tea, cups, sugar, and a jug of milk. So we drank tea, ate birthday cake, and conversed.

We didn't plan it this way--we were there today because Jane figured Friday would be better than the weekend for Liberty and Ellis Islands--but there's a lot to be said for going to Fraunces Tavern on Washington's birthday.

We had fun being editors in the museum upstairs: we started by criticizing the almost-unreadable decorative font on the exhibit labels, moved on to "that's not a sentence," and then realized that a wallpaper designer had been credited with basing his work on "heresy" instead of "hearsay." I'm not sure if the family next to us knew what we were laughing at, but we decided it was time to go up another flight of stairs and see the rest of the museum.

A room on the Sons of the Revolution (who run the museum), okay. There was a bell to ring, with a note that it's from Whitechapel Bell Foundry (hi, Rob). A room on Washington and Freemasonry, a bit odd. They had early-nineteenth-century mason's aprons, lodge record-books, and other things that I was a little surprised to see in public. Also a portrait of one of the first women admitted to a masonic lodge, sworn in to keep her to secrecy after she overheard one of their ceremonies through a wall. (The exhibit said there are some lodges that practice what they call co-masonry, meaning they don't discriminate on the basis of sex.)

The last room was the prize--copies of eighteenth-century and earlier American flags, including the red ensign that became the flag of the U.K. under Queen Anne; the plain flag of England, planted by John Cabot in Newfoundland in 1493, first British flag in North America; and an assortment of Revolutionary War flags, including the famous "Don't Tread on Me" and 13-stars-in-a-circle early Stars and Stripes, New Hampshire's pine tree, and a regimental crescent moon flag from South Carolina.

(After that, much walking, talking, tea, and pastries.)

Fraunces Tavern

Fraunces Tavern is one of the many small random New York museums I'd never been too, but my friend Jane is visiting for a long weekend, and wanted to see it. So we met there, after she'd gone to Liberty Island (where the statue is closed) and Ellis Island (another place I've yet to visit) on the day's first ferry. It's touristy and pricy, but she wanted to eat there, is on holiday, and said she'd treat. Okay, I'm easy. There were actors outside in colonial garb, and a bagpiper, working mostly on "Yankee Doodle Dandy."

We had lunch before looking at the museum, since neither of us had had much breakfast. The clam chowder was only fair: too much cream (and, I suspect, cornstarch or similar thickener), not enough clams. My lobster roll was good, though, and Jane was happy with her salad and macaroni and cheese (like many such places, they don't have many vegetarian choices).

Partway through the meal, a birthday cake was wheeled out. Complete with an American flag made of berries. Then the staff realized that they didn't know where George was. This gave a camera crew plenty of time to take pictures of the cake, with candles. A minute or two later, an actor dressed as George Washington came in, the cake was wheeled to the middle of the room, and we were all asked to sing happy birthday, on three. With bagpipe accompaniment. I doubt either Jane or I will ever hear "Happy Birthday" on bagpipe again. It was loud enough that I could barely hear the singing--the bagpipe is not intended as an indoor instrument.

Then "George" blew out the candles, everyone cheered, and we finished our lunch. The waiter offered "coffee or dessert," I asked for tea, and Jane decided she'd also like tea. The waiter asked if we'd like "some of George Washington's birthday cake," and of course I said yes. It was basic yellow sheet cake, but the tea was quite good: they brought proper pots of tea, cups, sugar, and a jug of milk. So we drank tea, ate birthday cake, and conversed.

We didn't plan it this way--we were there today because Jane figured Friday would be better than the weekend for Liberty and Ellis Islands--but there's a lot to be said for going to Fraunces Tavern on Washington's birthday.

We had fun being editors in the museum upstairs: we started by criticizing the almost-unreadable decorative font on the exhibit labels, moved on to "that's not a sentence," and then realized that a wallpaper designer had been credited with basing his work on "heresy" instead of "hearsay." I'm not sure if the family next to us knew what we were laughing at, but we decided it was time to go up another flight of stairs and see the rest of the museum.

A room on the Sons of the Revolution (who run the museum), okay. There was a bell to ring, with a note that it's from Whitechapel Bell Foundry (hi, Rob). A room on Washington and Freemasonry, a bit odd. They had early-nineteenth-century mason's aprons, lodge record-books, and other things that I was a little surprised to see in public. Also a portrait of one of the first women admitted to a masonic lodge, sworn in to keep her to secrecy after she overheard one of their ceremonies through a wall. (The exhibit said there are some lodges that practice what they call co-masonry, meaning they don't discriminate on the basis of sex.)

The last room was the prize--copies of eighteenth-century and earlier American flags, including the red ensign that became the flag of the U.K. under Queen Anne; the plain flag of England, planted by John Cabot in Newfoundland in 1493, first British flag in North America; and an assortment of Revolutionary War flags, including the famous "Don't Tread on Me" and 13-stars-in-a-circle early Stars and Stripes, New Hampshire's pine tree, and a regimental crescent moon flag from South Carolina.

(After that, much walking, talking, tea, and pastries.)