James Whitcomb Riley Museum Home

With the arrival of October, the coolness and fall smell coming on the breeze tells us that the beginning of the harvest season is upon us! For Riley, this would have been a time of fond memories from his childhood in rural Greenfield, best memorialized in one of his most famous poems, “When The Frost is on the Punkin’.”

However, fall also marked the beginning of the lecturing season for Riley, which was his primary way of making money for his works. For eight months out of the year he would travel from coast to coast reciting his poetry before packed audiences at venues big and small, all through the winter and into the beginning of the planting season. Given the season in which he would be giving these recitations, it makes sense why When the Frost is on the Punkin’ was such a crowd favorite.

Included in the photos this week are an illustration of a lyceum hall, giving you an idea of the type of venue Riley would preform in, a copy of Riley and Nye's "Railway Guide" chronicling their travels on the circuit in 1888, and an old postcard featuring a stanza from When the Frost is on the Punkin'.

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock,
And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin’s turkeycock,
And the clackin’ of the guineys, and the cluckin of the hens,
And the rooster’s hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence;
O, it’s then the times a feller is a-feelin’ at his best,
With the risin’ sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest,
As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock,
When the frost is on the punkin’ and the fodder’s in the shock.

They’s something kindo’ harty-like about the atmusfere
When the heat of summer’s over and the coolin’ fall is here—
Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossums on the trees,
And the mumble of the hummin’-bird and buzzin’ of the bees;
But the air’s so appetizin’; and the landscape through the haze
Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days
Is a pictur’ that no painter has the colorin’ to mock—
When the frost is on the punkin’ and the fodder’s in the shock.

The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn,
And the raspin of the tangled leaves, as golden as the morn;
The stubble in the furries—kindo’ lonesome-like, but still
A-preachin’ sermons to us of the barns they growed to fill;
The hosses in theyr stalls below—the clover overhead!—
O, it set s my hart a-clickin’ like the tickin’ of a clock,
When the frost is on the punkin’ and the fodder’s in the shock!

Then your apples all is gathered, and the ones a feller keeps
Is poured around the celler-floor in red and yeller heaps;
And your cider-makin’ ’s over, and your wimmern-folks is through
With their mince and apple-butter, and theyr s***e and sausage, too! . . .
I don’t know how to tell it—but ef sich a thing could be
As the Angels wantin’ boardin’, and they’d call around on me—
I’d want to ‘commadate ‘em—all the whole-indurin’ flock—
When the frost is on the punkin’ and the fodder’s in the shock!

📣 Vendor Call-Out 📣

We have a few spots left for vendors at our Holiday Open House on December 5, 2026 ⛄

Please email Amanda at [email protected] for more information ✨

🎁 Completely free admission event
🎁 Family and kid friendly
🎁 Tour the Museum Home decorated for the holiday season
🎁 Visit with Santa in the Visitor Center
🎁 Shop an indoor local vendor market
🎁 Enjoy winter beverages
🎁 Enjoy kid friendly activities

Happy Birthday to John Nickum, who was born on this day 205 years ago now. John was the man who commissioned the house at 528 Lockerbie to be built by his friend, the architect Robert Platt Daggett, in 1872. He was born in Maryland originally, relocating to Dayton with his parents when he was still a child.
John made his fortune in Indianapolis during the Civil War by owning a baking company that produced hardtack for the Union Army. Hardtack, also known as ship’s biscuits or worm castles, due to their penchant for becoming infested with pests, was effectively a type of thick dense cracker that could be stored for long periods of time without going bad—because of this, it was favored as a foodstuff for soldiers and sailors alike for centuries. However, hardtack was greatly disliked by those who were made to eat it. Living up to its namesake, hardtack was so hard that biting into it without proper preparation could damage one’s teeth—especially in a time when dental healthcare was sparse at the best of times. To eat hardtack soldiers would often have to bust it apart with the butts of their muskets, and then soak the chunks in water to soften them—often soaking the chunks in their coffee. Hardtack is also noted for being incredibly dry and bland, hence why soldiers often opted to soak them in coffee, so that they would have some sort of flavor. Often they would mix the crushed hardtack with bacon grease and fry it into a sort of hash known as hellfire stew, included among the pictures this week.

Today we have one of James Whitcomb Riley’s most famous poems, “The Old Swimmin’-Hole.” This appeared along with eleven other beloved Riley poems in Riley’s first published book of poetry, “The Old Swimmin’-Hole and ‘Leven Other Poems,” in 1882 and were published under his pseudonym Benjamin F. Johnson. The poems all have a rustic theme, and would go on to be staples of Riley’s repertoire.

The era in which Riley’s poems gained massively in popularity, the 1890s to the 1910s, was a period in which the United States was undergoing a period of “national nostalgia.” At that time, the frontier was closing up, cities were growing, and industrialism was expanding—as a result many people began to feel nostalgic for this earlier period. Since many of Riley’s poems, especially those in his first book, were based upon his childhood growing up in Greenfield, Indiana in the 1850s and 1860s, it scratched the itch of nostalgia that many in the nation were experiencing. You definitely can see hints of this feeling of loss in the closing stanza of the poem.

Oh! the old swimmin’-hole! whare the crick so still and deep
Looked like a baby-river that was laying half asleep,
And the gurgle of the worter round the drift jest below
Sounded like the laugh of something we onc’t ust to know
Before we could remember anything but the eyes
Of the angels lookin’ out as we left Paradise;
But the merry days of youth is beyond our controle,
And it’s hard to part ferever with the old swimmin’-hole.

Oh! the old swimmin’-hole! in the happy days of yore,
When I ust to lean above it on the old sickamore,
Oh! it showed me a face in its warm sunny tide
That gazed back at me so gay and glorified,
It made me love myself, as I leaped to caress
My shadder smilin’ up at me with sich tenderness.
But them days is past and gone, and old Time’s tuck his toll
From the old man come back to the old swimmin’-hole

Oh! the old swimming-hole! In the long, lazy days
When the humdrum of school made so many run-a-ways,
How pleasant was the journey down the old dusty lane,
Whare the tracks of our bare feet was all printed so plane
You could tell by the dent of the heel and sole
They was lots o’ fun on hands at the old swimmin’-hole.
But the lost joys is past! Let your tears in sorrow roll
Like the rain that ust to dapple up the old swimmin’-hole.

That the bullrushes growed, and the cattails sotall,
And the sunshine and shadder fell over it all;
And it mottled the worter with amber and gold
Tel the glad lilies rocked in the ripples that rolled;
And the snake-feeder’s four gauzy wings fluttered by
Like the ghost of a daisy dropped out of the sky,
Or a wownded apple-blossom in the breeze’s console
As it cut acrost some orchard to’ards the old swimmin’-hole.

Oh! the old swimmin’-hole! When I last saw the place,
The scenes was all changed, like the change in my face;
The bridge of the railroad now crosses the spot
What the old divin’-log lay sunk and fergot.
And I stray down the banks whare the trees ust to be—
But never again will theyr shade shelter me!
And I wish in my sorrow I could strip to the soul,
And dive off in my grave like the old swimmin’-hole.

Today is the 160th Birthday of Hebert George Wells, better known as H.G. Wells. He was an early pioneer of science fiction literature in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. Wells was an enormous influence on later sci-fi tropes and concepts, with later sci-fi writer Brian Aldiss referring to Wells as the “Shakespeare of Science Fiction.” His best-known works are The Time Machine (1895) and The War of the Worlds (1898).

Riley and Wells never met, as far as we know, but Riley was certainly aware of Wells. In the museum home we have four books by Wells. First up is The Wheels of Chance (1896), a comedic story about bicycling—this one comes from Riley’s personal collection in his room. Two others were collected stories Thirty Strange Stories (1898) and Tales of Space and Time (1899), which had anthologies of his popular novels at the times. The last (and in my opinion, most interesting) is a speculative fiction novel titled The World Set Free (1914), detailing a future nuclear conflict between the powers of Europe—keep in mind this is 24 years before the first documented nuclear fission reaction, and more than 30 years before the Trinity test.

When Riley was a boy he was a big fan of cheap dime-novels detailing exciting and outlandish adventures, and while his teachers pushed him toward more serious literary works, it seems that he always held on to an interest in otherworldly stories.

Aside from his talent as a writer and performer, James Whitcomb Riley was also a talented musician! Despite never learning to read music, he was able to play the piano, violin, and the Guitar. In fact, here at the Lockerbie Street home we have one of Riley’s guitars produced by the Regal Music Instrument Company of Indianapolis. Riley quickly picked up how to play the guitar after his brother John brought one home with him when they were young. He would play classic American folk tunes, like “Swanee River” or “The Arkansas Traveler,” the latter of which you can hear a recording of played by The Blue Ridge Duo Gene Austin and George Reneau, from 1924: https://archive.org/details/78_arkansas-traveler-breakdown_the-blue-ridge-duo-gene-austin-and-george-reneau_gbia0189597a
In 1876, Riley had decided to give up his days of travelling and playing music, and pushed himself into working toward becoming a famous poet. That year he wrote the poem “The Old Guitar,” perhaps reflecting this feeling of leaving this part of his life behind. It goes as follows:

Neglected now is the old guitar
And moldering into decay;
Fretted with many a rift and scar
That the dull dust hides away,
While the spider spins a silver star
In its silent lips to-day.

The keys hold only nerveless strings—
The sinews of brave old airs
Are pulseless now; and the scarf that clings
So closely here declares
A sad regret in its ravelings
And the faded hue it wears.

But the old guitar, with a lenient grace,
Has cherished a smile for me;
And its features hint of a fairer face
That comes with a memory
Of a flower-and-perfume-haunted place
And a moonlit balcony

Music sweeter than words confess,
Or the minstrel’s power invent,
Thrilled here once at the light caress
Of the fairly hands that lent
This excuse for the kiss I press
On the dear old instrument.

The rose of pearl with the jeweled stem
Still blooms; and the tiny sets
In the circle all are here; the gem
In the keys, and the sliver frets;
But the dainty fingers that danced o’er them—
Alas for the heart’s regrets!—

Alas for the loosened strings to-day,
And the wounds of rifts and scar
On a worn old heart, with its roundelay
Enthralled with a stronger bar
That fate weaves on, through a dull decay
Like that of the old guitar!

It is said that on September 14th in the year 1321, the famous medieval Italian poet Dante Aligheri met his end in the city of Venice, due to a bout of malaria. Most of James Whitcomb Riley’s literary influences were of more contemporary English literature: Dafoe, Dickens, Longfellow; however, it is certain that he was familiar with the Florentine bard.
Born in 1265, a tumultuous time in medieval Italy, Dante was exiled from the city of his birth, Florence, by his enemies in 1301. He would remain exiled for the rest of his life, during which time he would composed his most famous work: Comedìa, better known today as The Divine Comedy, chronicling his fictional journey through Hell, Purgatory and Paradise.
An interesting artifact we have here, a reminder of the close-knittedness of the old Lockerbie Square neighborhood, is a book on the study of Dante that was a Christmas gift to a neighbor named Sadie Kinder. In it, Riley wrote: “O, Mr. Dante! would it might have been [rousafed?] to you to know some of [our?] people on Lockerbie Street!”
Featured in this week's photographs, we have a near contemporary fresco of Dante which appears in the Bargello, along with a depiction of Dante on a door in the Uffizi, as well as Dante's house, all three in the city of Florence. There are also the two books we have at the home on Dante, as well as the little message to Sadie Kinder written inside. Can you make out what this "rousafed" word is supposed to mean, because we are a bit stumped.