THE PORTER-PHELPS-HUNTINGTON MUSEUM CONTINUES ITS 2019 SEASON OF “A PERFECT SPOT OF TEA” WITH A PERFORMANCE BY BOX SHOP BLUES ON SATURDAY, AUGUST 17TH
The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Museum continues its 2019 series of “A PERFECT SPOT OF TEA” on Saturday, August 17th with a performance by Box Shop Blues, playing original folk, blues, ragtime, and rock. The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Museum invites guests to partake in its 250 year old tradition of afternoon tea with good company, interesting conversation, and lively music. Admission is $12 per person. There are seatings at 2:30 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. For an additional fee, guests may also tour the Porter-Phelps-Huntington House Museum. Tours will be every hour on the half hour; at 1:30, 2:30, and 3:30.
Box Shop Blues will perform original folk, blues, and ragtime. The duo is comprised of Pioneer Valley residents Walter Burnham, a prolific singer-songwriter and pianist, and Mitch Mulholland, the lead-guitarist, and University of Massachusetts professor emeritus in anthropology. Both men work with Leverett Crafts & Arts, a non-profit studio, gallery, and education space in a historic building in Leverett, MA.
Elizabeth Porter Phelps, a resident of the house from its construction in 1752, regularly hosted teas until her death in 1817, and noted the teas often attracted ten to fifteen couples weekly. Elizabeth’s daughter met her future husband, Dan Huntington, at one of these events. Visitors would “tarry” a while over a beverage that “cheers but not inebriates.” The series is made possible through generous donations from area musicians, volunteer servers, restaurants, grocers, florists, and other businesses who provide the music, engagement, tea, pastries, and flowers for this program.
The “A Perfect Spot of Tea” series concludes on Saturday, August 24th, with a performance by Celtic Calamity, a group of amateur musicians consisting of two fiddles, three mandolins and two Irish bouzoukis.
The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Museum is located at 130 River Drive (Route 47) in Hadley, two miles north of the junction of Routes 9 and 47. The Museum is open for guided tours Saturday through Wednesday from 1:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. The house, which remains unchanged since the family’s occupancy, tells the story of six generations of prominent Hadley residents. The family, prosperous traders turned farmers, fought in both the French and Indian and Revolutionary Wars, rose to prominence in local government, and embodied a consistently progressive social consciousness. Tours highlight both local and regional narratives, from architecture, material culture, and labor, to early-American theology, economics, women’s history and social movements. For further information about tours or other programs, please call the Museum at (413) 584-4699 or visit our website at http://www.pphmuseum.org .