Marcia, Marcia, Marcia

We have a ghost at our offices and her name is Marcia. It’s actually Marcia Crocker Noyes. Marcia was the librarian at MedChi, The Maryland State Medical Society where I work, and when our current offices were built in 1909, an apartment was built for her on the top floor. In essence, a penthouse!

Marcia started her library career at the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore and then took a position at MedChi in 1896, when MedChi was located in a building several blocks from our current location. She was in her mid-20’s when she started and the library had about 7,000 outdated volumes.

In 1889, Sir William Osler, one of the founding physicians at the newly opened Johns Hopkins Medical School, arrived in Baltimore and set to work with Marcia to revive MedChi’s library. He was a noted bibliophile and had a large personal collection of books on various topics. Sir William and Marcia worked to create a library, and when our building was erected in 1909, a large four-story stacks library was created that was renown in the world’s medical community.

Her apartment, on the top of our building, was a lovely four room flat, with lots of light, big windows, a working fireplace and a view out over the city. She kept a vegetable garden in what is now our parking lot. Her apartment was considered the first penthouse in Baltimore!

Marcia worked diligently to create a state of the art library and at her death, 50 years after she arrived, the number of volumes totaled more than 65,000! She was well-known in the emerging field of medical library sciences, and in fact, the highest award for a medical librarian is named for her. She became become the first woman and first non-physician President of the of Medical Librarians Association in 1933.

In her 50th year of service to MedChi, a large party was given in her honour. The doctors knew she was dying and pushed to have it earlier in the year, although her anniversary was in November. She was still living in the apartment on the top floor, and working in the library, although an elevator and a dumbwaiter had been added to make things easier for her.

She died in her apartment in November of 1946, 50 years after she arrived. Her funeral was held in Osler Hall, named for her dear friend, Sir William Osler, and 60 doctors were honoured to act as pallbearers.She’s still here in spirit, if not more. There are documented cases of her being seen in Osler Hall, and odd things happen in our buildilng. In her old offices, you can hear someone typing on the keyboard, even when no one’s there. If she doesn’t like the song on the iPod, she changes it to a new tune. As I approached our old elevator the other week, the door magically opened – no one was around and I hadn’t heard it arrive. When we did our tour of our building on October 30th, I was talking about Marcia and all that she did, when suddenly, the lights dimmed, flickered and went out. There was no one near the switch, and you couldn’t dim the light-bank even if you tried. We think that it was Marcia letting us know that she was there. Wheels squeak in the stacks, and you can hear muffled footsteps. Things turn up, even though they were NOT there before… like the painting I found a few weeks ago!

There is much to be admired about this woman who worked so hard for us, who was beloved by all – her employees stayed with her for years – and who did much to advance library science. She was the Google of her day, being available to doctors 24/7 for 50 years. She’s a benign presence here and still a revered figure in her chosen field.

And So It Begins…

The search for the perfect present for each person on your list. I am attending my first holiday fair this weekend at my friends’ shop, Halcyon House Antiques where I hope to find a few presents.The owners told me that they have four holiday fairs in the next two weeks, including one today!

Several years ago, my family, including my siblings and their spouses, and nine nieces and nephews, decided to choose names, which makes things a little easier. But to put a twist on that, we choose a letter of the alphabet and everyone has to buy a present beginning with that letter. I think that last year’s letter was P.

Once again this year, I am going to be an advocate for Small Business Saturday, November 30th. A number of my friends own small businesses and shops, and I do my best to patronize them, and I encourage others to do so as well.

My friends at With Gratitude are great about supporting local artists in their shop. A local artist makes these fun necklaces from old watch faces. The price point on them is really reasonable and each piece is unique.

At Halcyon House, I am always drawn in by their great selection of jewelry and accessories!It’s so hard to choose which piece I want when I am there, and I am usually racked with indecision (I am a Libra) and end up not getting anything at all… some of the time!

Pal Andrea who owns Bosom Buddy Bags has such a sense of style. I am carrying one of her bags these days and I constantly get stopped to ask where it came from!Her artisans live and work here in Baltimore, so that’s doubly good!

Stephanie from The House Downtown always has the best accessories for the house and such a discerning eye.She even has an on-site design studio for consultations and bigger design jobs.

So this holiday season, do what I do… support small businesses, especially ones where you know the owners. You’re never going to get personal service at a big box store like you will at a store where you know the people who own and run the business.

Ring It In

For at least 2/3 of my life, I’ve worn a small gold signet ring on my right hand. At this point, I am not exactly sure where it came from, but I’ve worn it so long that my finger’s indented where the ring sits.My house was robbed a few months after I returned to the States, and every single piece of jewelry that I had, with the exception of the pieces I was wearing, was stolen. So I have very few pieces of “good” jewelry, and I wear what I have.

A while ago, I heard something hit my tile floor, and looked down and saw my little gold ring. The gold in the back had worn through and had just broken. Luckily, I heard it fall, otherwise the ring would have been lost. After faffing around for months, I finally took it to a goldsmith friend, Lauren Schott, who repaired it for me, courtesy of my mother who did this for my birthday. Lauren, who is so talented, did a beautiful job of repairing and strengthening the ring, which has more sentimental value than actual value.

Here are some of my favourite pieces of her work.

18k yellow gold handmade chain with uncut diamond crystal bracelet

Kallatis - Therace Moesia Infarior 3rd century BC - Black Sea Ob. Apollo 18k yellow gold and .09 ct diamonds handmade chain bracelet

18k yellow gold and aquamarine ring

14k yellow, rose and white gold Mokame' wedding bands for our friends Mike & Chick

Constantine I and II with tourmaline and pearl earrings

14k white gold with amethyst and seed pearls

18k yellow gold pendent with peridot, tanzanite and diamonds

I am so pleased to have my ring back on my finger and delighted that Lauren helped me accomplish that!

Mackerel Sky

One of the college courses I took was the fabulously named, “wind & weather for the serious yachtsman” and it was a meteorology course. If you’re in the ocean with no radio, you need to be able to read the sky. I loved it and have been a big sky-watcher ever since. As I left the office at lunch today, I happened to glance up and see the most amazing mackerel sky. I remembered from my class that this is unusual in that it was a very high sky and that it indicated rain in the forecast. In fact, there’s an old mariner’s rhyme that says, “Mackerel sky, mackerel sky. Never long wet and never long dry”.

The occurrence of these clouds is an indicator of moisture and instability at intermediate levels of 8,000-20,000 feet. As soon as I posted a picture of these clouds on my FB page, I noticed that others were posting them, too.

Our local investigative paper, Baltimore Brew had these two images.

An old sailing team mate, Pete Carrico, posted this from the Naval Academy in Annapolis.

Washington Cube, the pseudonym of a Washingtonian friend, posted this from the late afternoon.

My friend Mary, who writes Barn Bug Studio Blog, weighed in with this stunner,which then lead to this amazing shot.

To see some pictures of another unusual cloud formation from a few summers ago, click here.

Haunted Tour

As you may know, I work for an organization which is 214 years old, and our offices are in buildings which were built in 1900 and 1909. For about 30 years, our librarian, Marcia Crocker Noyes, both lived and worked in the 1909 building. Some say she’s still here.

On October 30, the Baltimore Architecture Foundation will be joining with MedChi, The Maryland State Medical Society, to tour these historic buildings.

For more information on the tours, e-mail me, or the Baltimore Architecture Foundation, here.

I’m Puttin’ On My Top Hat…

On Saturday night, I was a guest at the Homewood Museum’s Harvest Frolick, an elegant dinner at a historic house museum on the campus of the Johns Hopkins University. The invitation said “black tie or period costume” and since I wasn’t about to get dressed in period costume, I decided to do a twist on black tie. My starting point was an old grosgrain top hat that my CEO had found stuck in the back of a cupboard at our offices. I whipped up a skirt of deep burgundy taffeta and a similar tulle strewn with sparkly bits and added a black cashmere sweater. I had some extra tulle, so I wrapped it around the hat to make it a little more festive!

I thought it was going to be chilly, so was going to add some motorcycle boots and jacket, but it was actually rather pleasant, so I just wore flats and took a burgundy cashmere shawl. We’d had nearly five inches of rain in the three previous days, and the event was being held in a tent, so heels were out of the question.

My partner-in-crime, David picked me up, and to my delight, he also had a hat on!

What you can barely see on my Bosom Buddy bag is the great skull and crossbones!It couldn’t have been more perfect for the evening and the event! And the grosgrain on the bag went perfectly with my topper!

When we arrived at Homewood, the last half mile via golf-cart, we were met by others, some sporting period costumes,

and others in black tie.

The museum had hired actors from the local Shakespearean company to meet and greet the guests, and in each of the rooms, there was either a docent or a musician.

In the parlour, we could see where the museum staff was conducting tests on the paint to determine the original finishes.

As we wandered through Homewood, we saw that many of the guests had dressed in period costume.

The back lawn was tented for the dinner and the dancing, and people took advantage of the break in the weather to stand outside for a bit.

David’s and my hats attracted a lot of attention and people loved trying them on.

One of the highlights of the evening was the presentation given to Museum Trustee, Aurelia Garland Bolton who has worked tirelessly on the boards of both the Museum and the University for many years. I’ve admired her grace and charm since I first met her when best friends, my brother and her son, were about 12 years old. She’s got such a terrific sense of style and she always looks effortlessly elegant and chic!She was shocked by this honour, and by the time they finished announcing it, we all had tears in our eyes and and an incredible sense of pride in what she’s done for these two institutions.

But she’s not the only stylish one in the family! Her husband, Perry, pulled together an ensemble in which all the pieces dated from 1909 – they were his uncle’s and he found them in a trunk in the attic of the house where they’d both lived. The most beautiful silk-satin breeches with buckles, black stockings, opera shoes, white tie and tails! He was moving so fast that I only caught one shoe standing still! Very elegant!

After the dinner, there was a demonstration of early 1800’s dancing, including an Irish jig that was far more sedate than any I’ve seen.

The finale of the evening was the cutting of the cake!

Yes, this is a cake! It was a rendering of Homewood House and it was very detailed. The curator of Homewood was the one to make the first cut into it, after a bit of a hesitation!

And it was delicious!

There was also dancing to music more contemporary than the Irish jigs, and I was delighted to see old friends Chick and Mike, in period costume, taking a spin around the dance floor!

Thanks to my friend Stiles for inviting me as his guest! It was a great party and raised some much-needed funds for projects at Homewood!