Random Blog Stuff

Various Odds, Ends, News & Such

Finding what you want: a few tips for readers

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins. / Leave a comment

Sometimes a blog is like a labyrinth…

JCH Bonniwell family Bible, MS inscription “John” and drawing of a Labyrinth, First […] Concordance, sig. A1 verso (detail)

I’m looking forward to blogging more regularly, and I hope you enjoy the upcoming posts. But I’ve been publishing Clark House Historian for almost ten years (!), and I know it can be hard to navigate the blog and find the particular historical information, photos, maps and other images that you might be looking for. Today’s post has a few tips to help you make your way through the twists and turns of the Clark House Historian information labyrinth.

Tip No. 1: Click the links!

If you’d like to view a larger, clearer version of almost any image on the blog: click the image (or, sometimes, the link in the caption), and a new full-size image will open in a new window. Other links (highlighted in the blog’s signature minty-green color) will connect you with related blog posts and online sources for further information.

And by the way, you can read the blog on your phone and open and zoom in on the photos, drawings, maps and other images. But I create the CHH posts on a device with a good-sized screen, and I recommend viewing on the largest screen that you can.

Finally, and most importantly, be sure to click the Continue reading—> link, typically found after the first image and paragraph or two. There is a lot more to be found “below the fold.”

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Hot off the press…

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins. / Leave a comment

The new JCH Newsletter is here!

Hot off the (virtual) presses, the latest issue of the Jonathan Clark House Newsletter is here! Seven pages of JCH news, announcements, and photographs, recalling some of our summer 2025 activities and looking ahead to Fall at the Clark House. And fortunately for us—living in the 21st-century—no hand-typesetting, manual printing, or acid baths for copperplate engravings were required.

For all the details, and your own pdf copy of the new newsletter, click “Continue reading”…

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Random Bits o’ Holiday News…

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins. / 2 Comments

Well, whaddya know? Christmas is just around the corner…

JCH Parlour with Christmas tree and decor. Photo credit Reed Perkins

Holiday Lights 2024

December 2 & 3, 2024, brought us the latest edition of our Holiday Lights gathering of Clark house friends old and new. There was good food, tasty beverages, lively conversation, and fine seasonal music, all dished up in the unique ambience of our historic Jonathan Clark House Museum.

As we do every year, the house was decorated with appropriate 1840s-style decorations, including the table-top Christmas tree and ornaments, and the evergreen bough decorations on the window sills, shown above.

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November! already?

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins.

The Clark House Historian at his desk, wondering where October went…1

It’s been over a month since our last Clark House Historian post! Sorry about that. It’s not that I haven’t been busy with JCH writing and organizing. I have been. But most of my work for the last month has been done behind the scenes as the Jonathan Clark House graphic designer and webmaster.

For a good roundup of what’s been going on, please head over to our JCH official website and click on the News & Events page for details.

And that’s not all…

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Clark House News – June, 2024

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins. / 2 Comments

There’s a lot going on at the Jonathan Clark House this summer! Here’s a quick look at two upcoming June celebrations, as well as information about our other 2024 summer events. Be sure to click Continue reading (below) to see all the details.

Pie on the Patio 2024

As a reminder, Pie on the Patio, our annual salute to donors and Friends of the Jonathan Clark House will be held at the museum this Wednesday, June 12, from 5:00-7:00 p.m. There is limited space for the event and RSVPs were due June 5. But if you have questions or last-minute changes in plans, please contact executive director Nina Look via email at jchmuseum@gmail.com or call 262-618-2051.

And if you don’t want to miss next year’s Pie on the Patio, become a Clark House donor, today! Just click this link to our JCH donor page, or scan the QR code, below, and scroll down to the Donate Online info. And thank you for your support!

This Saturday! – Heritage Day 2024

Put away the electronics and experience life in Mequon-Thiensville as it was in the 1850s. On Saturday, June 15, from Noon to 3:00 p.m., the Jonathan Clark House Museum hosts its annual Heritage Day, where everyone steps back in time to learn more about early settler life. Each event features hands-on activities and fun for all ages. Admission is free and open to the public. Come see us at the corner of Cedarburg and Bonniwell Roads in Mequon!

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Trouble with the wireless

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins.

Sorry for the “radio silence” lately. I’ve been occupied with a number of tasks on- and off-line and then, early last morning, we had a big thunderstorm, and it seems that one or more of the storm’s lightning strikes managed to fry our family’s wi-fi modem-router. Imagine that. No internet! How does a blogger cope?

The cold realization of an off-line Monday was followed by the prospect of what lay ahead: going to my day job (meh), and then, after work, needing to choose and purchase a new modem-router (not too bad, perhaps) and then having to spend hours trying to follow the inevitable—and laughably & misleadingly-labeled—”few easy steps” to set up the new Wi-Fi hub and connect it to our existing internet service and other devices (I’ve done this before and, frankly, I’d rather visit the dentist).

What to do?

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Clark House News – May, 2024

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins.

The JCHM Newsletter is here!

The Spring edition of the Jonathan Clark House Museum newsletter is here! It’s filled with Clark House news and updates, notices of upcoming events, and recaps and photos of a variety of JCH happenings since last November. There’s also a “Meet the Historian” article on page 7, in which I discuss how I got involved with the museum and what I do as Clark House historian. I hope you find it interesting.

Click the image (below) to view and/or download your own PDF copy of the complete Spring | May 2024 newsletter.

You can also view the May newsletter at the Jonathan Clark House Museum website. Just click this link.

Adventures in Graphic Design…

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I recently signed on as the part-time graphic designer for the Jonathan Clark House Museum newsletter, posters, and other visual products. I will continue my independent, volunteer, Clark House Historian research and blog posting, but I’ll also help prepare various JCH publications, using the design and layout skills that I’ve developed over the decades, including more than 400 illustrated blog posts here at CHH. And speaking of graphic design…

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News…

/ Clark House Historian Reed Perkins. / 2 Comments

Hello again! Sorry for the long blog silence. I hope all is well with you. I’ve been busy offline, in part answering some interesting questions from CHH readers.

I’ve also been doing a lot of reading, as I try to get a clearer understanding of several ongoing Clark House Historian research topics. It’s going well, but I haven’t got much written up yet. More coming soon. Watch this space.

Under repair

By the way, if you’ve been to the official Jonathan Clark House website in the past few days, you may have seen this 404 error message, in place of our usual colorful and informative pages:

I contacted Clark House director Nina Look, and she assures me that they are aware of the problem, working on a solution, and expect the Jonathan Clark House museum website to be back up shortly. (It’s even possible that the problems may be fixed by the time this blog post goes live on Friday morning.)

Meanwhile…

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