Deck the halls, ho ho ho and Jingle Bells. While awaiting Chunky’s bag of toys to clog my chimney, I did the only intelligent thing. I went to Virginia.
Colonial Williamsburg.
Being very intelligent, I took two elves along. Judge Judy from Florida on her own plane. Joan Rivers from hawking her own jewelry on QVC in Pennsylvania. Just your average travelers to “America’s premier living history museum,” where a usual mode of entry is by bus.
Our nation was born here. Founded 1607, it’s where Thomas Jefferson, the soul of our Declaration of Independence, went to school. His father was this new land’s first law enforcer. Here lived the Commonwealth’s first governor, twice married Patrick Henry.
With 17 kids and 77 grandchildren, no wonder he said: “Give me liberty or give me death.”
We saw The Booth, America’s first theater. We saw where Martha Washington’s children lie buried. We saw where Washington spent the night.
Virginia’s territory then encompassed Michigan so to schlep from New York — where he also slept every place — took so long that he had to stay over. George Washington was America’s first house-guest.
Amid this historic area, maintained by gents in knee breeches and powdered wigs, ladies in frill bonnets, white aprons, low-cut necklines, ankle skirts, stands a magnificent Williamsburg Inn. “America’s Guest House,” built by John Rockefeller in 1937, has housed Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, kings, emperors, chiefs of state, Churchill, Shirley Temple, Salvador Dali.
Now Joan Rivers, who had hair done in her room every morning, and Judge Judy, who worked her iPad alongside period antiques and a 1773 portrait of whoever Thomas Bolling might’ve been.
Outside, Judge Judy sat on the high judge’s chair in this colony’s then only courtroom. Sessions commenced with “God Save the King.”
A 1682 court officer’s remuneration was in tobacco. The “Marshall,” in silk stockings, tri-cornered hat, shoe buckles, silver buttons festooning his coat, pocket watch, explained judges, appointed by His Majesty, were learned gentlemen not legal practitioners. They received no pay. (Hizzoners today mumble that still applies.)
The clerk, ascribing decisions with his quill pen, was a lawyerly pro. Pilloried for skipping church. Placed in the stocks for civil disobedience. Hanging or a hot poker branding your forehead with the letter “M” for manslaughter. Jails featured thick giant iron manacles. Unlike justice in The Bronx, they didn’t kid around those days.
But they sure kidded around those nights. This infant land instantly opened inns. Gentlemen partook of cool libation downstairs and warm ladies upstairs.
Josiah Chowning’s, which advertised in the Virginia Gazette in 1752, had a corner bar — at which patrons could not sit — for dispensing drinks. The name “bar” came from its lockable slatted gate which kept the liquor secure.
Waiters, laundresses, stable hands and cooks were slaves. Food or “dyet” price was set by law.
The menu — which I consumed yesterday — included “Josiah’s Cook’s Soupe,” some fowl and veggie “Brunswick Stew” and a “sallet” of tomatoes, greens, cucumbers and carrots. Waitstaff sang, played violins and produced gambling with dice and peanuts instead of cash. Upstairs rooms with beds promised even more exciting games.
Our guide Mary removed us from our driver Cecil’s nice car to seat us in an open stagecoach. Trotting about we saw fifes, drums, muskets, blacksmiths, silver smiths, flags from the Mother Country and Brit street names like Norfolk and Gloucester — enough to make future Queen Kate Middleton whimper: “This place could’ve been ours.”
Wooden floors were unpolished. Why? Sand scrubbed them clean and abrasion removed the gloss.
Huge black Dutch ovens stood mid-room and drapes around the bed retained warmth. Family instruments were harpsichords. Chamber pots were in sleeping rooms. For the wealthy, large carved chairs hid big-time potties. To avoid fragrant unrefrigerated pig innards kitchens were often small cabins off to a side of the main house.
Men’s hairpieces with the braided ponytail, bow in the back, tight curls on the side were not because the 18th-century Nicolas Cages had thinning coifs, but because that was considered “in.”
Fie on powdered wigs because males were as bald as billiard balls. It was because they were stylish. Fashion was to shave one’s head. The richer the dude the jazzier his toupee. Maidens in ye days of yore were attracted by the size of a guy’s ringlet.
Patrick Henry (two wives; 17 children), always showing off his extra large curl, was the beginning of the phrase “bigwig.”
Americans of the 21st-century know Disney, A-Rod, video games — not the baby steps of the United States of America.
They should bathe in patriotism, see Colonial Williamsburg, learn our forefathers struggle, understand it was Thomas Jefferson who said: “The glow of one warm thought is to me worth more than money.”
And be it known that with Judge Judy, Joan Rivers, me, plus crowned heads, the Willamsburg Inn management desperately wants a visit from Regis Philbin.