Tahsin Tawhid
Ama started with an exercise where we explained the story of our name. We then wrote some words we found interesting in a book near us, and we also described a soft object and a rough object. We read Letter Home by Natasha Trethewey and Letter to Denise by Hayden Carruth. We then had to write a W.O.W. piece, a letter in the perspective of someone who lived in Seneca Village. W.O.W. is an acronym for “Who,” our imaginary person, “Object,” our Seneca Village object, and “Word Bank,” which includes the words we picked out earlier.
Lucia Fishel
(I’ve chosen to share my writing with some historical context as a supplement)
Dear Charlotte,
I’ve bought us a bottle
A New York bottle
Smooth grooves
Cutting through
Softer silky reflections
I can hold in my hand
From my hand to yours
Promising health
Promising control
And industry and middle-class prestige
We’ll keep in our household
And drink its contents
And taste its rectangular shape
Made endearing by a greener-than-aqua
And a New York embossment
For a New York bottle
With love,
William Godfrey Wilson
Context: Medical sarsaparilla in the nineteenth century was aimed at the middle class, those who had money to spare but couldn’t always afford doctor’s visits. For collectors, the appeal of these bottles increased depending on whether the bottles had unusual colors, sizes, shapes, or labels. Although rectangular bottles–like the one excavated from the Wilson household–were more common and thus had less value, their buying potential could be increased if they had a more unusual color than the typically manufactured aqua color (for which the Wilson bottle almost classifies as, but not quite). Additionally, the fact that the bottle was embossed (a rarity at the time) and had the name of a city engraved on it would have increased its viability on the collector’s market.