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Description

Clarke Garrett, Ph,D., Cumberland County Historical Society 1997

ISBN 0-9638923-4-7 $10.00 152 pages Hard Cover

This book explores the ways in which the natural environment and the historical development of the Cumberland Valley shaped leisure activities in the nineteenth century. Their evolution in the course of the century was shaped by important national developments such as industrialization and a revolution in physical environment of the valley and its dozens of towns and villages.

Sometimes leisure was enjoyed in such simple activities as dancing singing around a piano, or roller skating. Sometimes it was sought at special events like parades, the annual visit of the circus or the U.S. Centennial.

During the first decades of the century, popular entertainment consisted of plays and exhibitions presented in taverns. It later evolved into traveling minstrel shows, vaudeville entertainment and movies, presented in public halls or the town’s opera house.

Those in the valley also enjoyed music, singing in choral groups or playing in brass bands. Yet the most satisfying leisure activity of all might have been a picnic somewhere in “the loveliest spot on earth” -the Cumberland Valley.