Historical Trail

One of my "cloistered brothers" was telling me about a possible ancestor of his.  I was curious.  So I googled.  My "cloistered brother" is black and I was searching for a black woman who started a school for black children around 1800.

Actually, she was easy to find because she was on television news a few days ago.  Evidentally, there is a proposal to put up a monument to her.  I am talking about Dinah Whipple.  She married Prince Whipple at age 21 in 1781.  Dinah was an avid reader and evidently loved learning.  She held classes in her home, which is credited to be the first school for black children in New Hampshire. 

Laudable as this is, what interested me more, was her husband, Prince.  He was a slave and his owner was named William Whipple.  As Mr. Whipple's property, he also was called Whipple.  For his first name, he was given the name Prince.  It seems that slaves were given names like King, Ceasar, etc.  The times are the beginning of our country and William Whipple was in the thick of it.  When the Revolutionary War broke out, William Whipple was a colonel in the First New Hampshire Regiment.  Prince accompanied him.  Tradition even has Prince Whipple rowing the boat that took Washington across the Delaware. This is doubtful because Colonel Whipple was attending Congress in Philadelphia and Prince Whipple would have been with him.  But there is a black man rowing Washington's boat.  Is that because the artist wanted to represent all men who were fighting?

There's a Pub at the Top

"There's a pub at the top." is a common refrain as hikers pass you, going down the mountain.  It's a joke.  There's no pub; they're just saying that to encourage you to keep on walking.  We didn't meet any hikers coming down, today.  It was raining.  We were the only fools hiking.  It's rather dangerous to hike in the rain because the ground can be slippery.  So we had the entire mountain to ourselves.

We hiked up to see Arethusa Falls in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.  We took our time and were very careful.  The trees were an excellent canopy over head, so the rocks, logs, leaves, and ground weren't slippery at all.

As we were climbing, everyone was teasing me by saying, "Look, God must have put these here.  How thoughtful!"  I'm always giving Aquinas' argument of a priori arrangement of the universe, hence the teasing.  There were obviously man made steps and climbing aids, along the trail.

It was a three mile round trip climb.  It's approx. 200' high.  The trail climb was moderately steady at a nice grade.  The view was sweeping.  I want to say awesome because to me it is positive proof that there is a God.  Nature itself is awesome.

Arethusa was  named from the Percy Bysshe Shelley poem about the Greek nymph Arethusa who was turned into a fountain to avoid the love of the river god, Alpheus.  See even earlier civilizations acknowledge the divine, even if their theology was different than ours.