I now live in the South West of England in Devon, which is probably more known for its rolling hills, beautiful brown cattle and scones with clotted cream than its cultural diversity. However Plymouth is my nearest largish town, which has a rich sea faring history which ensured some ebb and flow of different cultures, but never in significant numbers. Last weekend I discovered that, as in New York of 1909, when Harry Edmonds met the lonely Chinese Student who inspired the founding of I-House, it is places of study in Plymouth that are drawing in young people from across the world. Global Plymouth is an organisation, which through its monthly international bring and share suppers, attracts a diverse group of locals, academics and students together to eat and forge new friendships.
The supper I attended was celebrating a range of spring festivals, including Nowruz Persian New Year and Easter. There were 22 nationalities represented both in people and the food they had bought to share. As I sat there taking in the atmosphere and watching the interaction, I was thinking about the Sunday Suppers that Florence and Harry Edmonds hosted on and off at a variety of locations including Earl Hall on the Colombia University campus from 1910 until the opening of I-House in 1924. An extract below gives a vivid description of the process and energy required to put them on. In Plymouth a team of about 10 cheery volunteers was helping serve the many dishes from behind a counter, washing up and ensuring everyone was well fed. Creating opportunities for sharing takes energy and commitment. Then as now holding these gatherings it is also an act of faith that people will show up and interact. Back in Harry and Florence’s day there was no social media to spread the word of the event, but they also did not have to compete for attention with ever pinging devices once the supper was underway!
This year I-House New York celebrates 100 years since its doors opened in September 1924. Keeping those doors open and the House relevant has required huge faith and energy from every member of staff, donor, resident and volunteers. How institutions stand the test of time is something I thought about a lot on my 2019 trip recreating my great grandfather’s last world tour, it really is down to the strength of their founding ‘idea’ and all those many individuals who embody, are custodians of, and evolve it. I am very much looking forward to celebrating every one of them in September at the I-House Centennial gathering.
Extract from Harry Edmonds Memoirs recorded by Berkeley University – “Our home was not large enough (for the Sunday Suppers). We must do something downtown. This was at that time when through Mr Dodge and Mr Morgan, I was able to get Earl Hall for this purpose. We started our first series of Sunday Suppers in the fall of 1910 in one of the small rooms that wouldn’t hold more than thirty-five. Our whole idea was to create an atmosphere that would be home-like and not in any way different from the little gatherings we had at our home in the country, except of course, there would be a little more formality with all those students gathered around a table.”“There would have to be a program of introductions, and somebody speaking, and the food had to be abbreviated because there were no food facilities in Earl Hall to draw on. I found after on or two experiences that getting together the ingredients of food from a near by delicatessen was a very expensive operation. What did I do? I took two suitecases of good size and took the L down to Washington Market. There I procured for a fraction of what I would have had to pay on the hill, the best butter, eggs, oranges and apples and so forth. I lugged them with my two strong arms through the “L” and up to Earl Hall.” (had no car)“That was the sort of stuff we put into it. It was physical, mental and spiritual sharing with these young people. Our supper would consist of hot chocolate, maybe some rolls and butter and an apple.”
100,000 Grains of Sand 