J.W.W. Loose sees history as a now thing
John W. W. Loose
For many of us history
may be a dry, almost dead,
and useless subject. We
think it is about great men
of the past and their
forgotten deeds in faraway
places like London, Paris,
and Rome.
You may ask - ‘Of what
practical value is history
here and now?
Jack McDonald is a man of many parts
A man of many parts is
Jack McDonald, Marietta,
R. D. 1. His skills and
accomplishments are so
many and varied, it is
difficult to decide which to
describe first.
John W. W. Loose,
President of the Lancaster
County Historical Society
and head of the department
of social sciences at Donegal
High School, has an answer
to the question about the
timely, practical value of
studying history. He be-
lieves that if we want to _
understand what is hap-
He is a geologist, gradu-
ated from Franklin and
Marshall, and teaches earth
sciences at York Suburban
Junior High School.
He is qualified as a school
administrator with an M.A.
pening today, and what will
happen tomorrow, we have
to understand what hap-
pened yesterday.
Why?
Because the present and
future are being determined
by people. And people are
their pasts. Our ancestors
have made us what we are
today.
“You have to understand
human beings to understand
history, and you have to
understand history to under-
stand human beings,” says
Loose.
Human nature is nothing
more or less than the past
accumulated experiences of
people.
‘‘History is people,’’ says
Loose, ‘‘not just great
people, but all people.
History is terribly human...
History is not made in the
world capitals but in places
like Maytown, Marietta, and
Mount Joy.”
In other words, history is
us, you and me. What could
be more practical, or more
interesting, than under-
standing ourselves?
As President of the
Lancaster County Historical
Society, Loose has devoted
himself to assembling not
the extraordinary, but the
ordinary kinds of data.
Recently, he added to the
archives of the Society the
business records of a local
industrial firm. ‘Of what
value are they?’ asked
some historians.
from Millersville.
He is a chef, having
served in that position at
The Lemon Tree. He has
also managed The Frog
French restaurant in Lan-
caster, and went to Montreal
to recruit Parisian Ange
Parodi as its chef. Presently,
he is head waiter and
assistant to the manager at
Accomac Inn across the
Susquehanna from Mari-
etta.
He is a restaurateur in
both meanings of that
French word, because he is
not only an expert keeper of
restaurants, but also a
skilled restorer of old
houses.
He and his wife Judy, who
teaches at Seiler Elementary
School in Mount Joy, have
been restoring their early
19th century house, Shag-
bark Hill, between Marietta
and Rowennafor the past six
years. The rooms are
decorated and furnished in
period style appropriate for
the house with many pieces
the McDonalds have been
collecting at auctions.
For a while the McDon-
alds contemplated going
into the antique business,
but they valued their col-
lection too much to sell any
But it wasn’t long before a
graduate student in history
found these data to be just
what he needed for his
research.
Loose’s main interest has
been in economic history.
The ways we make our
livings are certainly very
important parts of our lives,
the most vitally important.
(His master’s thesis was
on the subject of the iron
furnaces that once flou-
rished along the Susque-
hanna, especially at Mari-
etta.)
He has tried to collect for
the Society the most exten-
sive possible records of how
all people have led their
lives. The library and ar-
chives of the Society are
replete not just with politi-
cal, financial, and legal
records of all sorts — but
with the most common and
ordinary artifacts of daily
living. Here are the names
of just a few items in the
Society’s wide collection of
artifacts: ‘‘one yellow and
black bridle from the Civil
War,” ““a 1780 fire hat,”’ “‘a
pair of child's stocking
stretchers,’’ etc., etc.
Not that the modern
and beautiful colonial-style
building at Marietta and
President Avenues in Lan-
caster does not contain its
grand objects. The walls of
the lecture room are lined
with paintings by Jacob
Eichholtz, Lancaster’s re-
nowned protraitist of the
local gentry around 1800.
And a small room con-
part of it. They and their
four year old son Scott live
in and enjoy the early
American environment they
have recreated.
The grounds of Shagbark
Hill are beautifully land-
scaped by Jack, who, among
his many other trades, used
to run his own tree nursery
in Washington Boro.
Jack grew up in Wash-
ington Boro where “he
learned from his father how
to raise tomatoes. Jack and
his brother Larry paid for
their own educations at
Franklin and Marshall by
growing tomatoes — 10,000
or so every summer.
Jack got interested in
cooking while living as a
bachelor in Pittsburgh,
where he taught school right
after leaving F. and M.
When he first went to
Pittsburgh to look for a job
he was interviewed by Dr.
Robert Cresswell, who was
then principal of a high
school in Pittsburgh. Ten
years later Jack recognized
Dr. Cresswell, who had also
coincidentally moved to
Marietta. Jack did not at
first remember Dr. Cress-
well’s face, but a large
green jade ring on Cress-
well’s finger.
tains the Jaspar Yeates Law
Library, which helped to
establish the link between
British common law and
Americam law under the
Constitution. Most of the
Yeates volumes were pub-
lished in England, many in
the 1600’s.
There are seven working
grandfather clocks in the
Society’s building. When all
seven strike on the hour,
Loose says it sounds like
bedlam, but the serious
scholars go on intently with
their researches.
In addition to heading the
County Historical Society
and teaching at Donegal,
Loose is a member of the
Circus comes to town
August 20, 1975
Pennsylvania Historical As-
sociation, the Pennsylvania
Federation of Historical
Societies (vice-president),
American Association for
State and Local History,
Eleutherian Mills Historical
Conference on Economic
History, Lancaster County
Bicentennial Committee
(secretary), Heritage Center
of Lancaster (secretary),
Marietta restoration Associ-
ates, and Southern Lancas-
ter County Historical Society
(former president).
John Ward Willson Loose
keeps himself very busy,
helping us to understand
ourselves — whence we
came, and whither we are
going.
Mademoiselle Antoinette swings tonight at 6 and 8 p.m.
with Lewis Brothers Circus in Mount Joy Borough Park,
sponsored by Mount Joy Jaycees.
Jack McDonald’s skills
are endless. This past
summer he added another
vocation to his repertoire —
travel agent. He organized a
windjammer (2-masted
schooner) cruise. A total of
40 local people including
Linda Smeltz and Diane
Rice, teachers with Judy at
Seiler, went with the Mec-
Donalds in two windjam-
mers from island to island
off the coast of Maine. One
among many beautiful me-
mories of that cruise was
having all the lobster they
could eat.
One of McDonald’s windjammers off coast of Maine