A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 3 May 2022 - T for Trumpeter and turtle

 Hello lovely ladies,

How are you all? We are OK. Still staying in Granada for hubby's treatment. We will go back to our village next week, but we will still have to go to Granada for a few days as through Easter and the May holiday, hubby has missed a few sessions, which we need to recuperate next week. 

I have another nice postcard for you today. It comes from the USA:

It's a historical portrait window showing 'Antony van Corlear, Trumpeter of New Amsterdam'. On the card it has the following information: Designed by Howard Pyle.  The Colonial Club, Broadway and 72nd street, New York. (1896).

Wikipedia writes:

Anthony Van Corlaer is a fictional trumpeter of New Amsterdam, appearing in Washington Irving's 1809 A History of New York and subsequent lore, most famously for supposedly heroically drowning in (and giving its name to) Spuyten Duyvil Creek in 1664. He is portrayed as a loyal follower to the real historical Peter Stuyvesant, with a contrasting boisterous temperament to the stern colonial governor.

The character and incident were sometimes later described as fact or "legend", but Washington seems to have only drawn from an account by David Pietersz. de Vries of an unnamed boisterous and pugilistic trumpeter in the colony.

This is a painting by Charles Loring Elliott, (1858, The Walters Art Museum).

In 1893 Howard Pyle painted a picture of Anthony Van Corlaer to serve as the basis for a stained glass window commissioned by the Colonial Club of New York from Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company. The window was removed at some point and on March 30, 1984, was auctioned by Christie's in New York and purchased by the Delaware Art Museum.

In Irving's story, Peter Stuyvesant, having learned of an English expedition on its way to seize the colony, ordered Van Corlaer to rouse the villages along the Hudson River with a trumpet call to war. "It was a dark and stormy night" when Van Corlaer arrived at the upper end of the island, and as no ferryman was available Van Corlaer vowed to swim across the Harlem River "in spite of the devil", but drowned in the attempt. Some sources state that Spuyten Duyvil, an inlet between Manhattan and the Bronx, is named after this incident.

Van Corlaer was famous for his enormous, shiny red nose. One story tells of a sturgeon killed by a ray of sunlight reflected off its surface. Anthony's Nose Mountain along the Hudson is said by Irving to be named for this event.

Van Corlaer's prior endeavors on behalf of Stuyvesant are mentioned several times in Washington Irving's book A History of New York. Irving also wrote the most popular account of the trumpeter's last deed, including the witness statement (which he claims to disbelieve) of Van Corlaer being seized by "the duyvel, in the shape of a huge mossbonker". This has led some modern readers, unaware that Irving's work was a parody of history, to suggest that Van Corlaer was killed by a bull shark.

Antony Van Corlear Brought Into the Presence of Peter Stuyvesant, 1839, John Quidor.

I really enjoyed this story, of which I knew nothing.

The stamps are gorgeous. The lady that sent it (called Ellen) has even included a turtle. She writes that she lives 'in rural NY state in a big old (1880) house surrounded by vineyards on the shores of a long Y-shaped lake'.

 She knew from my profile that i like turtles and has found a turtle stamp! Wonderful!

This past weekend has been a long weekend here in Spain. (Yes, another one). The first of May is a fiesta, and because it fell on a Sunday, they declared Monday a fiesta too. Sunday was also the fiesta of the cross. Every neighborhood decorates a cross and individuals do too. We don't see them as they are usually in their patios, inside the house. 

This is the cross in the village.

Because it was a long weekend, we decided to travel home after hubby's treatment on Friday. We got on the bus and a dear friend picked us up from the bus station. The weather is lovely and we are enjoying being home. 

Saturday we had Intercambio (Spanish/English practice conversation= chatting), usually held in the little building behing the cross in the above photo. But because they were assembling the display, we couldn't use the classroom there. So we went to the bar:

Hubby stayed in bed. I am the second from the right. The lady in the middle is the friend who collected us from the bus station. These people are all English speakers. The only Spanish person this evening was taking the picture!

Lastly I want to share this with you:

Elizabeth shared a song by the Eurythmics not long ago (Here comes the rain again) and it reminded me of this song: Sweet dreams are made of these. Of course I sang it with the 'cheesy' words! Didn't you?

That's it from me this week,

Have a lovely week, Take care,

Hugs,

Lisca