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Contact: Chris Beagan
The National Park Service announces the 2024 public season at Longfellow House-Washington’s Headquarters National Historic Site, a free destination for groundbreaking history, contemporary poetry and music, and family activities.
“There are so many ways to experience the Longfellow House,” said Site Manager Chris Beagan. “From guided tours to garden walks to picnics on the lawn, there’s a story and experience for everyone. I expect visitors will be particularly captivated by this summer’s exhibit of rarely seen children’s objects from the museum collection.”
The 2024 season will include the Longfellow Summer Arts Festival, historic house tours, family activities, community events, and a special museum exhibit, “The Patter of Little Feet: The Longfellow Children.” The National Historic Site is free and open to all, Friday through Monday from May 24 through October 28, 2024.
The Longfellow Summer Arts Festival, a celebration of poetry, music, and community, runs Sunday afternoons, June 2 through August 25. Highlights include the third annual Juneteenth Gathering, Longfellow Pride Picnic, performances by students from the Berklee College of Music, and the presentation of the New England Poetry Club's Golden Rose Award to Gail Mazur.
The annual Juneteenth Gathering on June 16 honors the lives and living legacies of those who endured slavery and seized freedom on Brattle Street. This year’s all-ages community gathering features speeches by descendants of Cuba and Tony Vassall, # Pop-Up Poetry: A Denise Plays Hard Event, music, refreshments, community tables, a hands-on history area, and family activities.
TheLongfellow Pride Picnic on June 30, hosted in partnership with the Cambridge LGBTQ+ Commission, is an all-ages celebration of LGBTQ+ history. This year’s event features queer history tours, lawn games, food, activities, and music.
The complete Longfellow House Summer Arts Festival schedule includes:
- June 1, 8:30 PM | Outdoor Film Screening: Giving Voice (2020)
- June 2, 3:00 PM | Longfellow Student Poetry Awards
- June 9, 3:00 PM | Poetry Reading: 2023 Golden Rose Award with Gail Mazur
- June 16, 12:30-3:00 PM | Juneteenth Gathering
- June 23, 3:00 PM | Concert: Juventas New Music Ensemble
- June 30, 12:00-3:00 PM | Pride Picnic
- July 7, 3:00 PM | Concert: Mia Zeta (Berklee Summer in the City Series)
- July 14, 3:00 PM | Poetry Reading: Sarah Audsley and George Kalogeris
- July 21, 3:00 PM | Concert: Concert: (Berklee Summer in the City Series)
- July 27, 2:00-4:00 PM | Poets in the Garden
- July 28, 3:00 PM | Concert: Sarah Mesibov (Berklee Summer in the City Series)
- August 4, 3:00 PM | Concert: Concert: André Bois (Berklee Summer in the City Series)
- August 11, 3:00 PM | Poetry Reading: Sam Cornish Award with Gloria Mindock
- August 18, 3:00 PM | Poetry Reading: Elizabeth Bradfield and Kevin Goodan
- August 25, 3:00 PM | Poetry Reading: Kymm Coveney and J. Kates
Guided Tours of the historic Longfellow House are offered Friday through Monday, 10:00 AM-4:30 PM. For two hundred years, residents of this remarkable Georgian house shaped our nation. It was a site of colonial enslavement and community activism, George Washington’s first long-term headquarters of the American Revolution, and the place where Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote his canon of 19th-century American literature. Daily “Deep Dive” tours invite visitors to examine Longfellow’s poetry, the history of enslavement and freedom, queer history, or George Washington’s complex time in Cambridge.
The special exhibit "The Patter of Little Feet: A Longfellow Childhood" will be on view Friday through Monday. Henry and Fanny Longfellow had six children, all born in the 1840s and 1850s: Charley, Erny, baby Fan, Alice, Edie, and Annie. This temporary exhibit features toys, clothing, drawings, and more from the collection relating to the children's early years and growth in this house.
Family Fun Saturdays at Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters take place every summer Saturday from 10:00 AM-12:00 PM. Enjoy family-friendly crafts, games, stories and activities designed for families with kids ages 2-8!
Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site preserves the house that served as headquarters for General George Washington during the Siege of Boston and later home to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, one of the world’s foremost 19th century poets.
The 2024 Longfellow Summer Arts Festival is generously supported by the Friends of Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters. Key partners include the New England Poetry Club, an association of poets founded in 1915 by Amy Lowell, Robert Frost, and Conrad Aiken to foster the art of poetic expression, and the Berklee Summer in the City Series, free concerts throughout the greater Boston area by students, faculty, and alumni from Berklee College of Music and Boston Conservatory at Berklee.
Tags:
literature historic house
Last updated: May 30, 2024