Letters to the Editor

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Highlights from our virtual mailbag. Please email your letters to us, making them as short as possible. We reserve the right to edit them for length and clarity. For safety's sake, they may be published anonymously, but you must send us your name in your email. We're sorry, but we cannot answer all questions we receive.

Kimball's Was a Disappointment
We just celebrated our 37th wedding anniversary. When we were dating, one of our favorite "dates" was to go to Kimball's on a Sunday afternoon. For many years after we were married we made our annual pilgrimage to Kimball's and introduced each of our three children to the scrumptious flavors available there, and nowhere else. Now that the kids are grown and married, and cholesterol is letter, please

catching up with us both, we haven't been for a few years. On a beautiful "Indian Summer" this past October day, we made a spur of the moment decision to get off the highway and stop at Kimball's, "for old time's sake."

I must be getting really old, since it's been a while since I've had such a disappointment (over ice cream, of all things.) While the portions are still overly generous, the quality and flavor of the ice cream has gone abysmally downhill. I guess that's the way of today. Cut costs at every corner. While my husband still felt he could tackle a "Kimball's Special" (which always used to be the order of the day), I only opted for a Sundae. His "special" had vanilla, chocolate and strawberry ice cream. I ordered a butterscotch sundae with coffee ice cream. I distinctly remember the Kimball's chocolate ice cream being so deep and dark in color, and ohhhhh ssoooooooo chocolatey in taste. The coffee taste used to be so distinctive. The strawberry used to have big chunks of fruit. All of the flavors were very bland and artificial tasting. I guess they've gone the more "economical" route on their flavorings. He threw out more than half of his special and while I did eat my sundae, it tasted like "store brand" ice cream. It really was terrible.

If I want really good ice cream, I guess I'll go to the grocery store and buy Brighams (when I can find it.) (Coffee Fudge is the best!!!)

With all that's going on in the world, I guess its pretty trivial to be disappointed over the downfall of an "ice cream legend", but it did get my mind off current events for a few minutes. Please tell Kimball's to straighten up their act.
John & Roberta Gray, Marlborough, MA

Transcendentalism and the Afterlife
brass box

Hi, I'm Mel and me and a group of friends have been reading through your site and others on Transcendentalism. So far I am amazed as I agree with all that is said but we have become stuck as we cannot seem to find anything on after life. Yes, I have read Transcendentalists believe we carry on and on and come back but I am wanting to know what their views are on spirits , guides and if any about planes that spiritualist talk of. I would be very grateful if you could get back to me on this as I am very interested.

Thanks for your wonderful work on your site and hope to here from you soon.
Mel

Leslie Perrin Wilson, Curator, Concord Free Public Library Special Collections and author of Thoreau, Emerson and Transcendentalism answers:

Mel: In a broad sense, the Transcendentalists were spiritualists inasmuch as they accepted the reality of a spiritual (i.e. nonmaterial) world and believed that everything in the real world was symbolic of something in the spiritual world. But in the narrower sense of spiritualism as direct communication between the living and the spirits of the deceased, the Transcendentalists were skeptical, even contemptuous. Both Emerson and Thoreau wrote strongly and negatively about the practices of mediums and others, despite the popularity of spiritualism in their time (and even among people they knew and respected--Mrs. Emerson included).

I suggest you consult the article by Ron Bosco entitled "Spiritualism" in the Encyclopedia of Transcendentalism. It is lengthy and substantive, and includes bibliographical references.

Learning More About The American Revolution
letter, please Hi, my name is Tess. I am in the 5th grade in Ohio. My friend and I are doing an extra-credit project on the Revolutionary War. We were wondering if you could give us any facts, important or not, about the North Bridge, and the battle-fields in the Concord area. (Especially the "Battle of Lexington and Concord!") I have visited Concord one time, when attending a wedding, but did not get the chance to visit any battlefields. Also, I was wondering who the statue downtown is. Thank you for your time.
Tess

Our editor replies:

Tess, if it's a statue downtown, you are thinking of Lexington, not Concord. We have an obelisk in our Monument Square. Lexington has a Militiaman statue (often called a Minuteman, though this is actually incorrect -- see here for more information). Our Minuteman Statue is at the Old North Bridge.

For info about the Concord Fight, go to our Virtual Booklet on this topic: here for links to many articles in our back issues of the Concord Magazine. Also, you can search our entire site for additional information.

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