Notes & Notions from the Salem Witch Museum

We’ll be OPEN Tuesday, Oct. 30th 10am to 5pm

Thanks to everyone for safety wishes, we seem to have fared Sandy with minimal damage.  However, there are other places in town who lost power, so if you’re planning to visit Salem today, it’s recommended that you call to find out if your destinations are open.

Questions about visiting the Salem Witch Museum?  Call 978-744-1692.

Travel Safely

We’ll be CLOSED Monday, October 29, 2012

For the safety of our staff and visitors the Salem Witch Museum will be CLOSED today,

Monday, October 29, 2012.

Tips for Visiting in October

The reason so many people come to Salem in October is the festive atmosphere created by…so many people. It’s part of the excitement, chatting with fellow revelers and soaking up the atmosphere.   A few people who aren’t in the right frame of mind might grumble about the lines, crowds and traffic.  Prepare yourself with information, and embrace it all as part of the fun.

Tips for an enjoyable visit to Salem in October

1.  Check out Destination Salem’s online visitors’ brochure to help plan your trip.  You’ll find a helpful walking map of the downtown and waterfront area listing major attractions, shopping, restaurants and activities.  It also lists parking options and road closures (for parades) where applicable.  You can pick up the print version of the Destination Salem Guide & Map once you’re here at the Salem Witch Museum, at the National Park Visitor Center, or many other places throughout the city.

2.  Arrive as early as possible.  The Salem Witch Museum opens every day at 10:00am.  The earlier you arrive to purchase tickets, the more likely your preferred tour time will be available.

3.  Be flexible.  It is possible – and especially as we near Halloween very likely – for certain presentation times to be sold out.  Be prepared to opt for a different tour time.  Our presentations begin promptly at  :00 and :30 of each hour.  Presentations last approximately one hour.

4.  Anticipate lines or wait-times just about everywhere in downtown Salem the nearer we get to Halloween.  And, if there isn’t a line or wait, just be pleasantly surprised!

5.  Expect there to be some traffic the closer we get to Halloween.  Directions can be downloaded here, and it’s always possible to map out alternate routes into Salem, ie. Route 1A, Route 107 , Route 127.

Salem Witch Museum Hours for October, 2012

Day        Date      Open                Close

Mon      1-Oct     10:00am               5:00pm

Tue        2-Oct     10:00am              5:00pm

Wed      3-Oct     10:00am               5:00pm

Thu        4-Oct     10:00am               8:00pm

Fri           5-Oct     10:00am               10:00pm

Sat          6-Oct     10:00am               10:00pm

Sun        7-Oct     10:00am               8:00pm

Mon      8-Oct     10:00am               7:00pm

Tue        9-Oct     10:00am               5:00pm

Wed      10-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Thu        11-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Fri           12-Oct   10:00am               10:00pm

Sat          13-Oct   10:00am               10:00pm

Sun        14-Oct   10:00am               7:00pm

Mon      15-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Tue        16-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Wed      17-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Thu        18-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Fri           19-Oct   10:00am               10:00pm

Sat          20-Oct   10:00am               10:00pm

Sun        21-Oct   10:00am               7:00pm

Mon      22-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Tue        23-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Wed      24-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Thu        25-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Fri           26-Oct   10:00am               12:00am

Sat          27-Oct   10:00am               12:00am

Sun        28-Oct   10:00am               7:00pm

Mon      29-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Tue        30-Oct   10:00am               5:00pm

Wed      31-Oct   10:00am               12:00am

Martha Carrier, Traitor’s Wife ?

Hanged as a witch in Salem on August 19^th, 1692 Martha Allen Carrier was initially accused along with her children and sister, Mary Toothaker.  I recently listened to the audiobook version of The Wolves of Andover (retitled The Traitor’s Wife) and am now finishing The Heretic’s Daughter by Kathleen Kent.   These fictional accounts are soundly researched immersing readers into the seventeenth century frontier life of these colonists, eerily capturing the seemingly mundane events that lead to their deadly outcome.

Not every victim of the Salem witch trials has much information about their lives before the tragic events, but in the case of Martha Carrier – her family being a prominent one in the founding of Andover – there are many resources for researching her fascinating case.  If you’re reading either of these accounts of her life, you may find the following augmentations thought-provoking.

From the Salem Witch Museum Blog:  http://www.salemwitchmuseum.com/blog/index.php/2011/08/martha-carrier/

Kathleen Kent:  http://kathleenkent.com/

For descendants:  http://marthacarrier.org/

Billerica Library:  http://www.billericalibrary.org/localhistory/genealogy/WitchcraftinBillerica.htm

Andover Historical Society:  http://www.andoverhistorical.org/witchcraft.htm

Biographical sketch at University of Virginia’s Documentary Archive and Transcription Project:

http://www2.iath.virginia.edu/salem/people/carrier.html

Guests From Sister City, Ota Japan Visit Salem Today

For many years the Salem Witch Museum has welcomed an annual tour group from Ota, JapanThrough a sister-city relationship beginning in 1991, hundreds of teachers and students as well as business, cultural and government officials have visited Salem from Ota.

The family of our own Will Parr is extending their hospitality on a very personal level by hosting a “Homestay” student in coordination with the Salem-Ota Club.

For more information about our sister city check out the City of Salem website:

http://www.salem.com/Pages/SalemMA_Council/ota

The Salem Witch Museum offers our main presentation translated into Japanese as well as 7 other languages.

Gordon Hirabayashi, Japanese Internment Opponent, Honored with Medal of Freedom

Gordon Hirabayashi was a student in the 1940s when he challenged the internment orders for Japanese Americans during World War II.  Opposing the wartime removal of more than 100,000 Japanese-Americans and Japanese immigrants from the West Coast to detention centers, Mr. Hirabayashi involved himself in a debate that echoed throughout the remainder of the century.

In February 1942, two months after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, approved the establishment of ‘military areas’ to ‘exclude therefrom any or all persons.’ In March a curfew was instituted along the West Coast for people of Japanese ancestry, and in May 1942, the West Coast military command ordered their removal to austere camps in isolated locations.

Hirabayashi was imprisoned from March to October, 1942 after refusing to obey curfew and internment orders.  In the 1980s a professor of political science at the University of California, San Diego, Peter Irons, found documents revealing that in presenting to the Supreme Court the federal government had held back its own assessment that Japanese-Americans on the West Coast were not dangers to national security. In September 1987the federal appeals court in San Francisco overturned Mr. Hirabayashi’s conviction. He died in January at age 93.

Presidential Medal of Freedom: Obama honors Bob Dylan, Madeleine Albright and others

Gordon Hirabayashi, World War II Internment Opponent, Dies at 93

Japanese American Internment Timeline

Galileo Galilei

“We cannot teach people anything; we can only help them discover it within themselves.”

What Happened to Abigail Williams?

On Friday during a Skype in the Classroom “virtual museum tour,” a student at Oliver Street School in Newark, New Jersey – whose class is studying Arthur Miller’s The Crucible – asked what happened to the real Abigail Williams after the trials.

While Wikipedia can offer information on a wide array of subjects, there is no reason to accept the undocumented assertion that Abigail fled after the trials, becoming a prostitute.  Reliable Salem witch trials scholars are unable to give detail about her last years with any certainty, but Marilynne Roach says in The Salem Witch Trials:  A Day-By-Day Chronicle of a Community Under Siege, “…Abigail Williams, haunted to the end, apparently died before the end of 1697, if not sooner, no older than seventeen.” (page 518)

According to a biographical essay published on the University of Virginia Salem Witch Trials Documentary Archive and Transcription Project:

Even though Abigail played a major role as an accuser at the beginning of the trials, especially in March, April, and May, she gave her last testimony on June 3rd 1692. There is no historical documentation suggesting why Abigail virtually disappeared from the court hearings. In addition, there are no records indicating what happened to Abigail after the events of 1692. It is suggested that she never married and died a single woman, but without any evidence we will never be quite certain.

Word of the Day: Friggatriskaidekaphobia

Definition: A morbid, irrational fear of Friday the 13th.

From Wikipedia: The fear of Friday the 13th is called friggatriskaidekaphobia (Frigga being the name of the Norse goddess for whom “Friday” is named and triskaidekaphobia meaning fear of the number thirteen.

January Spruce Up 2012 Hours

Every year in January we close for business for a few days to scrub, paint and refresh.  Here is our schedule, but feel free to call us with questions at (978)744-1692.

1/3/12 Tuesday     CLOSED

1/4/12 Wednesday     CLOSED

1/5/12 Thursday     CLOSED

1/6/12  Friday     CLOSED

1/7/12 Saturday     Open 10am – 5pm

1/8/12 Sunday    Open 10am – 5pm