Creative History

Pliny the Younger, or Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus, as he would have been known in Latin to his Roman contemporaries began what is quite possibly Western Civilization’s first ever account of a haunted house with these ominous words:  “There was in Athens, a large and spacious, but ill-reputed and pestilential house.” (from Letters VII: 27 Pliny the Younger) After the famed orator and statesman Cicero, Pliny the Younger is the Roman world’s best known letter writer and politician of the first and second centuries A.D.  Today there are ten surviving volumes of letters, over 350 missives in total, that survive and bear the name of Pliny the Younger. (Beard pp. 424-425) He lived between the years 60 A.D. and circa 115 A.D, reaching heights of great fame for his learning and erudition throughout the Roman Empire, before dying suddenly at around the age of fifty-five while traveling away from Rome in Asia Minor in what is present day Turkey.  At least, this is how historian...

  The home of the American Philosophical Society, known as Philosophical Hall, is located in Center City Philadelphia mere yards from Independence Hall. It has stood as an integral part of Old City Philadelphia for well over 200 years.   Philosophical Hall is now a part of Independence National Historic Park and in addition to still being home to the offices of the American Philosophical Society it is also visited by thousands of tourists and researchers with an interest in American history each year. Founded in 1743 the American Philosophical Society was, and continues to be, an organization dedicated to promoting learning in the sciences and humanities through research, discussion, community outreach and most importantly reading.  The father and founding member, some would even say the creator of the American Philosophical Society itself, was none other than the inventor of bifocals, and the man whose portrait graces our one-hundred dollar bill, Benjamin Franklin...

  As the horse-drawn carriage rumbles over the rutted road in the London suburb of Highgate, renowned Enlightenment scientist and philosopher Francis Bacon is insistent. “It is most definitely possible,” Bacon turns and asserts to his carriage companion. Dr. Winterbourne, Royal Physician to King James I, is nonplussed.  He shakes his head and mutters, “Anything is possible.” Bacon, who is considered one of the most intelligent and learned men on the planet at the time, isn’t used to having any of his ideas questioned and he is rarely ever proven wrong. “Definitely possible,” Bacon repeats as he motions for the coachman to stop the carriage at the side of the road.  He then hastily jumps out of the coach and tells Winterbourne, “And now I’m going to prove it to you!” It is early April 1626 and a surprise springtime snow is falling.  It is bitterly, unexpectedly, cold for that time of year.  What Francis Bacon and Dr. Winterbourne are arguing over is t...