SALISBURY — At a talk Jan. 19, Charles Lyle, director of the Webb-Deane-Stevens Museum in Wethersfield, spoke about the challenges of “continuous history” and running a museum consisting of three historically significant houses, all next door to each other on Main Street in Wethersfield. (Also included: a Colonial Revival garden and a barn, plus a fourth house a short walk away.) The talk was sponsored by the Salisbury Association’s Historical Society and the Scoville Memorial Library. The Joseph Webb house, built in 1752, was the site of a May 1781 conference between Gen. George Washington and respresentatives from the French force under Rochambeau, who had been sent to Newport, R.I., a year earlier to assist the revolutionaries — but hadn’t done much since landing.Lyle said the front parlor of the Webb house was referred to as the “Yorktown parlor,” referring to the subsequent battle of Yorktown, which marked the end of the Revolutionary War.But that isn’t quite right, because what Washington and the French were discussing was how and where to rendezvous with Rochambeau’s men. The ultimate result in Yorktown did not occur until October.But it was a significant meeting, Lyle said. “I believe if it hadn’t been for the French we’d all have mild British accents.”While he was at it, Lyle debunked the enduring myth inspired by the famous painting of the British Lord Cornwallis presenting his sword to a victorious Washington at Yorktown, a deepwater port on the James River in Virginia.Lyle said Cornwallis had underestimated the American/French artillery capacity, supposing the rebels to have only light guns.He did not realize that the French had brought siege cannons, and when the British navy failed to materialize he had no choice but to surrender.Lyle said Cornwallis was so embarassed he didn’t show up for the ceremony, sending instead a man named Charles O’Hara.An insulted Washington in turn sent an aide, Gen. Benjamin Lincoln.Lyle said the bedroom Washington used at the Webb house is one of five rooms in America with a particular wallpaper, the date of which was determined by a tax stamp on the back.Lyle said the tax act that included wallpaper was enacted in 1765 and repealed a year later, which makes it possible to date the wallpaper.For exhibition purposes the museum reproduced Washington’s jacket. Draped over the back of a chair, visiting schoolchildren “feel like George Washington just left the room.”Lyle said the Webb house underwent a major restoration in 2010, which included completely stripping the exterior of its lead paint — a costly and cumbersome process.The building had been painted red in 1976, and when the subject of the original color came up, Lyle said experts could not determine what it might have been.“The only color they could document was from the 1820s.”And so the Webb house today is a grayish-tan color that looks off-white on photographs, with dark green shutters.Lyle said the Webb-Deane-Stevens Museum is a “teaching museum,” hosting between 2,500 and 3,000 schoolchildren per year. “We hired six people with master’s degrees for minimum wage” to don period costumes and do reenactments.And the museum treads into unusual territory, showing what slave quarters were like.The museum gets significant revenue from hosting weddings in the Webb barn. Lyle said one recent wedding coincided with a Revolutionary War reenactment, and the bangs and yells were making the bride nervous.So by way of easing the situation, the happy couple was allotted an honor guard of Revolutionary soldiers.Lyle showed a slide of a laconic groom and a rather fidgety-looking bride walking beneath the raised rifles of the reenactors.For more information on the museum visit www.webb-deane-stevens.org.
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Greg Fricke and James Boehmer, co-owners of Peggy Mercury in Kent, recently launched their first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts.”
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Fricke and Boehmer are not there to stock their shelves with the same products customers find at standard makeup retailers. They’re there to help customers find what works for them. That usually means asking customers about themselves and learning about their beauty habits, skin, style and the way they like to present themselves. Fricke and Boehmer believe it’s their job to help customers bring out the qualities that suit them and determine what works best for their look.
So much of the Peggy Mercury world is about emboldening people to become more creative, and possibly bolder, versions of themselves. Some of this comes through the store’s creative collaborations with artists, designers and stylists.
It’s part of an ethos that encourages them and their friends to use the shop as a kind of laboratory, trying out new creative experiments without knowing how they might turn out. Whether in fashion, painting, fiber arts or photography, the projects almost always turn out marvelously.
A line of sterling silver charms they sell started as a small project by their friend Nolan Percival. In the beginning, the pieces were for close friends and loved ones. But Boehmer and Fricke encouraged Percival to get a little more serious about the project and create a whole line for the store. Today, it’s one of their top-selling collections.
Classic styles, bold colors, and creative concerts make up the “Imaginary Concerts” line at Peggy Mercury.Provided
“Imaginary Concerts” has the duo taking their own advice.
The project started as a way for Boehmer to connect with his mother, who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Taking old concert shirts from his own collection, Boehmer and his mother began cutting out the graphics with the idea that they would make a quilt together. Unfortunately, she died before they could complete the project in 2025. The pieces, which were ready for production, were put on the back burner as Boehmer and Fricke dealt with their loss and the whirlwind of projects that never seemed to cease at Peggy Mercury.
But the harsh winter of 2026 presented an opportunity to take some time and focus on themselves. Part of that meant revisiting and redefining the concert T-shirt project. This time, instead of looking to the warmth and comfort of a quilt, they turned to another passion — fashion.
Taking a page from their own book, they wanted to create something that felt comfortable to them. They took two disparate loves — one rooted in simple preppy style, with clean lines and classic silhouettes, and the other in the nitty gritty worlds of punk rock and pop — and blended them together to create something entirely new. Pulling from the staples of vintage Brooks Brothers and Charvet collections, they applied the graphic elements with bold stitching reminiscent of punk jackets of the ‘70s and ‘80s, but with a much more sophisticated air.
But the remixing isn’t just the pairing of prep and punk. The pieces are not canon. They take liberties with the realities of concert tours, combining one band’s dates with another band’s logos, mixing them all up until the reality is lost and imagination is the only truth.
Shirts from Peggy Mercury’s first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts,” hang on display.Provided
Adding to the mix is an element of perpetual creativity. Art can be messy, both figuratively and literally, and many of Fricke and Boehmer’s artist friends carry evidence of their work on them at all times. As a nod to these tireless creatives, the duo added haphazard splashes of bright color, giving the line an even more distinctive feel.
For them, “Imaginary Concerts” passes the “Peggy Test.” The mythical Peggy Mercury is a fictional figurehead for the company, a character who thrives on creativity and change. The name, much like the clothing line, is a mixture of interests: Mercury is a planet, a deity and an elusive, transformative element, while Peggy is the wonderfully stylish and boundary-pushing Peggy Guggenheim.
Everything Fricke and Boehmer put in their store has to pass this test: Would Peggy Mercury approve? For their first collection, the answer is a resounding yes.
Peggy Mercury is at 9 Maple St., Unit 2, Kent.
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