February is for Hiking

Soup Hike Saturday – February 11

Saturday is the next Soup Hike . A beautiful hike of about two miles, rated "moderate" with one climb through the woods. Meet at the Harrow Road Café at 10 a.m. Eastern. Soup afterward at the Café. The trail to be hiked begins at the Beacon Hill home of Tom and Benita Howell, leads downhill to White Oak Creek, then over a rise to rejoin the White Oak, past the former "Letner property" (Riverside) and arriving at Rita Myers' gate. From there we follow the White Oak upstream to the Hwy. 52 bridge where cars will be available to shuttle us back to Rugby.

Carrie Thornthwaite

Carrie's Weekend Wanderings – Beginning February 18

As many of you know, Carrie Thornthwaite is a regular hiker in the woods around Rugby.  She would like to extend an invitation to anyone who would like to join her. On Saturdays, she leaves from the Cafe around 10 a.m for a 11/2 to 2 hour hike in the area. Similarly, on Sundays she'll leave, again from the Cafe, around 2 p.m. If you'd like to join her, please e-mail her at thornthwch@lipscomb.edu.  She will leave no later than 5 minutes after the hour, so please be on time. This may be adjusted due to weather or other obligations... also she'll need to miss two weeks in March. Finally, for the weekends when there are regular hikes scheduled,  like the Soup Hike, she will be joining those.  She hopes to have several join her on the February 18.

History Club Meeting Friday

By Linda Konig

The February History Club will meet on Friday night, Feb. 10, 7:30 p.m.at the Friendly House.  If you have an interesting artifact from Rugby's history, please bring it for show-and-tell. Though we already have some interesting ideas for programs this year such as Civil War stories from the area, Charles Wilson's family and what they meant to Emily Hughes, a Cumberland Mountain frontiersman presentation, etc., you  may have thought of some other fascinating topics.  So bring your thinking caps and join us for refreshments and brainstorming.  Remember: we call ourselves a club, but there are no dues and no formal memberships.  Just come as you are.

Thomas Hughes portrait

Rugby Founder’s Portrait Donated

   
A surprise donation from Scotland that arrived this week brought Historic Rugby an 1890 oil portrait of Rugby’s founder, British author, statesman and social activist Thomas Hughes (1822-1896).

          

The donor, Rod Salusbury-Hughes, descends from Thomas Hughes’ older brother, George. He contacted the organization on Nov. 21 with the offer. Salusbury-Hughes and his brother were clearing out their late parents’ home and faced with making a decision of what to do with the artwork.
        
“We (the family) would be delighted if you would like to accept it as a donation to your community museum, bearing in mind that it will need a little care before it can be displayed,” he wrote.

A Tennessee donor is financing the creation of a high-resolution digital copy of the portrait that can be digitally restored and printed on canvas, in anticipation of eventual professional conservation, cleaning and remounting of the original canvas itself.

Lowes Dickinson

The portrait is by artist Lowes Cato Dickinson (1819-1908), who painted a strikingly similar portrait of Hughes purchased by Historic Rugby a few years ago. The previous one (a copy hangs in the Historic Rugby Visitor Centre) was dated 1896, the year of Hughes’ death. However, an initial examination shows it may have been created at the same time as the newly received 1890 one and later repainted in 1896 to make Hughes look slightly younger.

Expert research may be needed to establish the most likely relationship between the two paintings. 

The artist, like Thomas Hughes, was among the founders of the Working Men’s College in London, still in operation today. Yet a third Dickinson portrait of Hughes shows him seated full-length in a chair and is included in Hughes’ most definitive biography, published in 1954.

Other Dickinson works are held by the National Portrait Gallery in London, including one of Gladstone’s 1868 cabinet depicted in the cabinet room of No. 10 Downing Street, the London residence for British prime ministers. Queen Victoria herself and the author George Eliot were among his many other portrait subjects.

Barbara Stagg, Historic Rugby’s former executive director, said she saw the newly donated portrait hanging in the Hughes family cottage in Scotland on her visit there about 30 years ago and had long dreamed that it might eventually come to Historic Rugby.

Salusbury-Hughes’ late father, David Hughes, represented the family in Rugby, Tennessee, for the 1980 observance marking the centenary of its founding. The donor and his wife may someday pay a visit themselves, Salusbury-Hughes wrote.

 Copies of the 1896 portrait are available for purchase at Rugby’s Commissary.

Little Creek Bridge Jan. 2012

Truck Bypass Hits Snag

Environmental issues are expected to cause a major delay in completion of the Highway 52 Truck Bypass near Rugby. Representatives of the road construction company have told a number of hikers and others from Rugby that due to the expense of removing soil which contains pyrite near the newly constructed bridge across Little Creek, the bridge will need to be removed and rebuilt to a higher level.  Construction of the bypass was originally scheduled to be completed by the end of 2012, but this is reportedly expected to delay the completion for at least six months. Pyrite, used in the manufacture of sulfuric acid, can acidify area streams when disturbed.

BIRTHDAYS February 12 - Barbara Stagg

CALENDAR

Rugby is in the Eastern time zone, just barely.

Tuesday, Feb. 7 – Afternoon Tea at Grey Gables - 1 p.m. Eastern, $10 per person, plus tax and gratuity. For Reservations: 423-628-5252

Friday, Feb. 10 - Music at the Café - Dusty Basye of Allardt playing the Oldies

Saturday, Feb. 11 – Soup Hike –Meet at the Harrow Road Café at 10 a.m. Eastern. Soup afterward at the Café.

Saturday, Feb.11 – Craft Demonstration at the Rugby Commissary Store - Mary Curren – Spinning

Saturday, Feb.11 – Valentine Dinner at the Harrow Road Café. – Four-course dinner options and special gift. Wine and champagne available. Call 888-214-3400 for required reservations.

Saturday Feb. 11 – Valentine Dinner at Grey Gables with entertainment. Reservations Required: 423-628-5252

Sunday, Feb.12– Craft Demonstration at the Rugby Commissary Store - Mara Trumbo, Artist

Friday, Feb. 17 - Music at the Harrow Road Café – Our very own Donna Heffner on keyboard playing the oldies

Saturday, Feb. 18 – Hike with Carrie – Join Carrie Thornthwaite for 1½ to 2 hour hike meeting at 10 a.m. at the Cafe.  Email her at thornthwch@lipscomb.edu to confirm.

Saturday, Feb.18– Craft Demonstration at the Rugby Commissary Store - Sue Duncan-Spinning with Angora rabbits

 Sunday, Feb.19– Craft Demonstration at the Rugby Commissary Store - Mara Trumbo, Artist

Saturday, Feb. 18 – Hike with Carrie – Join Carrie Thornthwaite for 1½ to 2 hour hike meeting at 2 p.m. at the Cafe.  Email her at thornthwch@lipscomb.edu to confirm.

Friday, Feb. 24 - Music at the Harrow Road Café - Victory Bluegrass with Wayne Rogers and Friends

Saturday, Feb.25 – Craft Demonstration at the Rugby Commissary Store - Bill Henry-Carving

Saturday, Feb. 25 – Book Club at 7 p.m. Eastern/6 Central at the home of Kit and Candy Howes. The book the group will be reading is The Tiger, a true story of vengeance and survival, by John Vaillant
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Quilters’ Group - Wednesdays and Saturdays, 2–4 p.m. Eastern, at the Friendly House behind Christ Church

Rugby Yoga – Wednesdays, 8:30 a.m. Eastern, at the Friendly House.

Christ Church Episcopal -- Sunday morning services, 11 a.m. Eastern year round; all are welcomed.

Historic Rugby Winter Hours

Harrow Road Café open every day except Wednesdays. Sundays through Thursdays - 8:30 a.m. until 3 p.m. EST. Friday and Saturday hours, including dinner seatings, 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. EST (7:30 to 7:30 Central).

Visitor Centre and Commissary General Store - Fridays and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. EST and Sundays from noon to 5 p.m. Closed Mondays through Thursdays. Weekday and weekend group tours can be arranged with advance reservation. Post Office in the Commissary is closed until March

Lodging Facilities are available year-round.


NATURE NOTES

Love Among the Sexton Beetles

By Linda Konig

I found some intriguing information this past week about some of our local sexton beetles.  Sextons in English church history were men who did the gravedigging chores in the churchyards.  One kind of nocturnal sexton beetle we have here is named Nicrophorus orbicollis, the most common kind in the eastern U.S.  These sexton beetles do us all a great service by burying and recycling dead birds, mice, and other small animals in the woods and nearby areas.  I read that the adult beetles from last year start coming out again in February, especially if the weather is mild. 

So what does a young male Nicrophorus orbicollis's fancy lightly turn to in spring?  The females, of course, and he usually chooses an ideal spot to lure a female: a carcass heap.  It's a good spot partly because, if he's timed it right, there are lots of fly larvae for the courting couple to feed on.  During the night, he climbs up to the topmost point of the dead animal and rotates the tip of his abdomen in the air, thus emitting his pheromones for several hours or however long it takes to entice a female.  If another male shows up, they will fight to the death.  If two females show up, they fight each other to see which one gets to stay with the male. However, if the animal is large enough, the beetles may share it.

Afterwards a pair will equally share the workload of burying a small carcass.  Why do they bother with this?  Since there's sometimes a lot of competition for fresh carcasses, they want to hide it and also keep it moist.  Sometimes they even move the carcass to a better spot for digging.  How do they do this?  They lie on their backs and move their legs like a conveyor belt.  Would I make this up?  They can heft carcasses up to 200 pounds their weight.  

They delay the natural process of decay and molding by secreting a substance over the carcass.  (This secretion is something scientists are interested in because it has antiobiotic properties which might prove useful to humans in the future.  The study of these beetles has also proved useful in the field of forensics.)  After the carcass is in a depression, they remove the hair or feathers and shape the carcass into a ball as much as possible.  Next comes the covering, the tunnel digging and the egg laying, egg laying being the only part of the Nicrophorus orbicollis couple's life together in which he doesn't share the duties.  They both feed the hatched larvae with regurgitated food from the carcass.  If something happens to the female, the male will take over feeding duties!  Studies have shown that the immature Nicrophorus orbicollis cannot reach the pupal stage without parental care.  Both male and female share guard duties, keeping other burrowing insects from getting into their food ball and preventing enemies from attacking their young.

Well, there you have a greatly simplified version of a Nicrophorus orbicollis's life.  For lots more detail in all the variations of the story, you'll have to look them up in books or get on the WEB.  Here's a good site with photos: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicrophorus_orbicollis

 This Week’s Editors: Rick Murphy and George Zepp