THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 16, 1994 TAG: 9410140196
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Mary Reid Barrow
LENGTH: Medium: 99 lines
See a 17th-century clay pipe and imagine its smoke wreathing the head of an early Virginia Beach settler. Could Adam Thoroughgood have smoked that very pipe?
Notice the comb made of bone with its fine toothed and wide toothed sides. Can you picture Adam's wife, Sarah, pulling that comb through snarls of hair?
Look at a small brass lantern blackened with age and paint a picture in your mind of the lantern lighting up the dark for a member of the Thoroughgood family. Which Thoroughgood carried that lantern and where was he or she going?
Pieces such as these dug from the earth by the late archaeologist Floyd Painter will whet your imagination at a new exhibit opening Tuesday at the Francis Land House. Entitled ``An Old World in a New Land,'' the exhibit will be up through February.
The pipes, comb and lantern are three of the oldest English colonial artifacts ever found in Virginia Beach. They were among numerous early 17th century pieces uncovered by Painter in the 1950s at Lake Joyce. His excavation took place when the Baylake Pines neighborhood was being developed.
At the time, Painter also discovered remains of a wooden post-hole foundation and a brick chimney, typical of early 17th-century construction. He speculated the site may have been the original dwelling of Adam Thoroughgood, considered to be Virginia Beach's first English settler. Thoroughgood arrived in the area in the 1630s.
``Based upon the context of the site, it is an extremely valuable collection to historians and archaeologists,'' said Mark Reed, Francis Land House administrator.
The artifacts, which belong to the Virginia Department of Historic Resources in Richmond, have not been on display in Virginia Beach in decades. Yet they are extremely important to our local history.
Whether or not they belonged to Adam Thoroughgood, they tell us about our first English settlers. They were certainly the kinds of things that Thoroughgood and other early residents, such as Francis Land I, would have had or wish to have had, Reed noted.
``Most of these date from 1625 to 1640,'' Reed said. ``They are certainly consistent with the time frame of the earliest settlers here.''
The ceramic artifacts also are interesting because some were reconstructed by Painter to show what the original bowl or pot may have looked like. For example a large soup bowl with a red and white marbleized glaze has been repaired. The marbleized shards have been glued together and the gaps filled in with unadorned clay by Painter.
Other ceramic artifacts, both reconstructions and shards, include Delftware in yellow, blues and white and earthenware crocks. Pieces of glass liquor bottles, glass and shell beads, a 1640s coin, a copper alloy thimble that looks as good as new, hoe blades, a brick, fireplace poker and a long iron pan handle also are part of the exhibit.
``This is just a drop in the bucket of what was found on the site,'' Reed said.
Perhaps the most interesting artifact of all is the brass lantern. It's so complete that you can see where the wick would have been lit and the little ``tunnel'' in the center where the wick went down and drew up the oil. In the early 17th century, folks would have used candles inside for light, Reed said. So the lantern was probably not a household light.
``Maybe a ship's lantern?'' he queried. ``We like to leave some mysteries. We'll put it on display and maybe someone will know the answers.''
So visit ``An Old World in A New Land'' and put your imagination to work.
P.S. THE VIRGINIA BEACH AGRICULTURAL RESERVE PROGRAM will be explained by environmental consultant Mary Heinricht at the Virginia Beach Audubon Society meeting at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at Westminster-Canterbury, 3100 Shore Drive. The meeting is open to the public.
THE ORIGINAL HERRMANN'S ROYAL LIPIZZAN STALLIONS of Austria will perform to benefit the Virginia Beach SPCA at 7 p.m. Thursday and Friday and 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 20-23, in the indoor arena at Holly Ridge Manor, 2993 Seaboard Road. Advance tickets are $12 for adults and $7 for children and are available at the Virginia Beach SPCA, Norfolk SPCA and Holly Ridge Manor. At the gate, tickets are $15 for adults and $8 for children. Call 427-0070.
YOUR TRICK-OR-TREATERS can decorate their own tote bag to use on Halloween night at 10 a.m. Saturday at the Virginia Marine Science Museum. The fee is $6 for museum members and $8 for non-members. Call 437-4949. MEMO: What unusual nature have you seen this week? And what do you know about
Tidewater traditions and lore? Call me on INFOLINE, 640-5555. Enter
category 2290. Or, send a computer message to my Internet address:
mbarrow(AT)infi.net.
ILLUSTRATION: Photo by MARY REID BARROW
Among the ceramic artifacts displayed by Mark Reed, Francis Land
House administrator, are a large soup bowl with a red and white
marbleized glaze. The marbleized shards have been glued together and
the gaps filled in with unadorned clay by the late archaeologist
Floyd Painter.
by CNB