INCREASE

by Susan Edwards Richmond

In 2007, I spent a year exploring Fruitlands in Harvard, Massachusetts, as the museum's first poet-in-residence. Of the many captivating exhibits, I became most absorbed by the Shaker collection, which was largely drawn from the neighboring Shaker community. Harvard was the second Shaker settlement in the United States and the first in Massachusetts. For many years, it was considered the spiritual center of the Shaker world.

The Shaker population in Harvard reached a peak of around 200 members in the 1850s, but membership dropped precipitously following the Civil War. In 1920, when the community closed, the Harvard Shakers sold their first office, built in 1794, to Fruitlands Museum founder Clara Endicott Sears. Ms. Sears had it moved to its present site on the museum grounds. In addition to an extensive collection of Shaker objects, Fruitlands has volumes of writings by and about Shakers, including the original journals written by members of the Harvard community from which the voices in this collection are drawn.

36 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Susan Edwards Richmond explored the history of the Harvard Shaker Community while poet-in-residence at the Fruitlands Museum. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies. She has taught writing at the Shirley Medium Correctional Facility, located on the site of another former Shaker community, and is currently on the faculty at Clark University. Her interest in the intersection of art and nature is reflected in her work with Wild Apples: a journal of nature, art, and inquiry. She lives with her husband and two daughters in Massachusetts, where she enjoys hiking and birdwatching.