Explore Americas best-loved no work days through 380 beautiful and fun postcard images from the early 20th century. They portray specific animals, children, flowers, and symbols that have come to identify each holiday, and some pretty weird events as well. Fascinating histories of each holiday are included, and what diverse backgrounds they have! For an appreciation of the weirdness of holiday recognitions, think of the images of a kid in a diaper kicking out an old bearded man, turkeys dancing, chickens nodding to rabbits, and strange men dropping down chimneys to make children happy. The weird is integral to American holidays. All who celebrate them as well as artists, decorators, and postcard collectors will enjoy this book for the graphic styles it contains. Historians will marvel at the reasons these holidays are celebrated today.

Hundreds of old farm tools and equipment are shown to be echoes of America's past, as farming remains vital to the economy today. Major chapters cover old haying, grains, tobacco, orchards, poultry, dairy, horses and mules in farm practices. Over 600 vintage and modern photos display the amazing variety of gadgets once necessary for farming. These objects are preserved in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, at the Landis Valley Museum, where they help to interpret American farm life of the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. This book extends the reach of the museum's collections to interested people worldwide.

Artwork created to sell flower and vegetable seeds to the public is bright, eye-catching, and tempting. It reflects the fantasy that any novice gardener can grow beautiful plants just by buying the seeds. This is not a new phenomenon. Over 475 boldly colorful flower and vegetable seed artwork, catalog, packet, and publication illustrations are arranged here chronologically (l1869 to 1997) and alphabetically (acroclinium to zinnia) for easy reference in this fun visual delight. Many images are from the vast and superb collection of the Landis Valley Museum in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where the author was Director of the Heirloom Seed Project. See unusual plant varieties from both small independent and large seed producers, like the W. Atlee Burpee Company. A mid-20th century watercolor illustrator's work is featured as an impressive record of plants grown from seeds; see how many you can recognize.\nThe stunning images will stimulate artists, gardeners, naturalists, and interior decorators to find these and additional seed art examples to add beauty to their lives.

The history of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, is visually presented through the words of a venerable historian and striking images compiled from old photographs, advertising pieces, and postcards that relate the cultural diversity apparent today in this favorite tourist destination. From all over the world, visitors marvel at the beautiful farms on limestone-based soil that is among the most productive land anywhere. Early settlers found it a Garden of Eden, and to this day the land attracts people concerned with diverse community life and productive industries that support the growing population. Learn about the area's history and traditions, and see everyday life conducted by everyday people of a thriving locale. Religious independence still thrives in the communities of Amish, Mennonite, Quaker, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish settlers from Swiss, Scottish, Irish, French Huguenot, German, and Hispanic origins, and the rural setting complements progressive towns where the future is part of the past.

"The greatest influences of German architecture on America are bipolar: Folk Architecture and Modern Academic Architecture. In between are the lower keyed stories of less dramatic contributions." From log houses, corner beer halls and restaurants, and modern theme parks to the Brooklyn bridge and the Seagram Building in New York, German-inspired architecture covers America and defines a cultural heritage. In this book, a fascinating text is peppered with over 300 historical and contemporary photographs that illustrate powerful as well as quaint German-style buildings throughout America. From the Hill Country of Texas to the skylines of the great American cities and famous bridges, everyday places and American icons alike are described in detail with charming anecdotes about people and uses that combine to create a culture that is all-American. This book features so many highly recognized places that you will wonder why the subject hasn't been presented before. It is fresh, stimulating, and entertaining; a delight to architects and all who have never before thought about the great legacy of German influence in America.

Heritage, or traditional, gardens and heirloom seeds are joined at the hip, but previous books have separated them. This is the first holistic look at several of the most vibrant trends in contemporary horticulture, both in vegetables and flowers. Lavishly illustrated, it is a how-to manual, a history, and a guide to gardens and historic landscapes. The basics of heritage garden design from California to the East Coast are here, with special attention to the Pennsylvania four-square garden. Plans and suggestions for your garden are included, and seed-saving techniques are clearly enumerated. A gallery of heirloom plants and lists of suppliers are featured. There are travel suggestions for visiting gardens ranging from Bethabara Park in North Carolina, to The Landis Valley Village and Farm Museum in Pennsylvania, to the Frontier Culture Museum in Staunton, Virginia. This book is sure to delight historians, traditionalists, green thumbs, and horticulturists alike.

There has never been a book like this intertwining the arts and artifacts of both the traditional and the evolving worlds. The Pennsylvania Germans are a remarkable people; some are among the most conservative of Americans, retaining a strong cultural identity to this day, while others have largely assimilated into the larger English world. Folk art and quilts are here, but so is the work of Precisionist painter Charles Demuth and Abstract Expressionist painter Franz Kline. Objects range from needlework, pottery, furniture, and glass to paper, paintings, and metals--including gold and silver! Here is a very personal and extensive historical text illustrated with the works of traditionalists, revivalists, and the avant garde displayed in over 350 color photographs. Pennsylvania German Arts has been written to be both informative and fun to read and is designed to showcase distinctive works of great beauty.

These 580+ juicy images capture the fact that throughout history, artists and artisans have depicted vegetables in remarkable ways. Still lifes, photographs, amusing antique postcards, seed packet art-all sorts of vegetable illustrations have been created to arouse physical and aesthetic appetites, and they are displayed here together with interesting botanical and historical insights. This wealth of vegetable art includes paintings by American artists like Lily Martin Spencer, Ernest Lawson, and Charles Demuth; engravings and lithographs by major printmaking companies like Louis Prang and Company; botanical illustrations; and commercial images drawn from vintage catalogs and seed packets. Vegetables are represented in colorful glory, from the hundreds we appreciate daily-like tomatoes, potatoes, peas, and carrots-to less-familiar vegetables like sea kale, cardoon, and walking onions.

America's favorite flora are the homey ray flowers, a tribe featuring daisies, sunflowers, chrysanthemums, dahlias, coneflowers, and black-eyed Susans, combined with the elegant, multifaceted rose. Children pick ray flowers for their prepubescent crush or for their mom; when they get older, they graduate to the rose, a more sophisticated choice. Both high culture and pop culture embrace floral imagery; think of Annie Liebovitz's famous nude photograph of Bette Midler blanketed in long-stemmed American Beauties on the cover of Rolling Stone, or zombies featured in a Wars of the Roses comic book. Thousands of postcards and greeting cards are covered in a sea of roses and ray flowers. Meet Daisy Mae, see Daisy the dog, and view the presidential Rose Garden, as well as influential American and European works of art. These images are combined with the history and romance of our favorite flowers. A nonallergenic floral extravaganza!