Inqlings: Ben Franklin, Betsy Ross engaged
Ben Franklin and Betsy Ross are getting married. That would be Ralph Archbold, Philly's best-known Franklin interpreter, and lady friend Linda Wilde, who's been at his side lately, portraying the flag-stitcher.
Ben Franklin
and
Betsy Ross
are getting married.
That would be
Ralph Archbold
, Philly's best-known Franklin interpreter, and lady friend
Linda Wilde
, who's been at his side lately, portraying the flag-stitcher.
They met Sept. 1. Wilde, a pharmacist whose husband died of cancer, called Archbold to hire him to do a wedding toast for a friend who was remarrying. "I don't do weddings," Archbold says he told her. "It's the bride's day to shine."
"I begged," Wilde says. He relented. During the appearance at the College of Physicians, Wilde told Archbold about her interest in history and her desire to dress up.
Archbold called her in search of a last-minute Ross. "Think you can put together a costume?" he asked.
Sew, she did, joining Archbold on a few outings, including the Thanksgiving parade.
That turned into dating, said Archbold, 66, whose first wife died and who's been divorced from No. 2 for more than 20 years.
The real Franklin said that one should "never take a wife till thou hast a house (and a fire) to put her in." Archbold has the house, but he and Wilde plan to wait till summer's tourist season passes.
Sept. 1 looks propitious. It's not only the anniversary of their first meeting, but also the date in 1730 that Franklin and
Deborah Read
were married.
Classy move
Deborah M. Fretz
, CEO of Sunoco Logistics Partners, yesterday picked up a $25,000 check as winner of the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce's Paradigm Award, given annually to a successful woman in business. Fretz donated it to Big Brothers Big Sisters Southeastern Pennsylvania to help BBBS SEPA, the group's one-to-one youth mentoring organization.
Into the fire
Recession? Yet another steakhouse will join the fray: William Douglas, attached to the McCormick & Schmick's seafood eatery opening Saturday at the old Garden State Park in Cherry Hill. William Douglas, named after M&S founders
Bill McCormick
and
Doug Schmick
and counting on an average tab of about $60 per, is due to open April 4.
Briefly noted
Wynnefield documentarian
Tigre Hill
(
The Shame of a City
) says he's about to wrap his film about
Mumia Abu-Jamal
. Hill hopes to unloose
The Barrel of a Gun
- which he started filming in November 2006 under the working title
13th & Locust
- at the end of the year.
Irish balladeers
The High Kings
, coming to the Merriam Theater on May 19, will get exposure Sunday on
Weekend Today
and Monday on
The View
.
The Fairmount Park Commission yesterday signed off on The Centennia, a festival of Victorian-era antiques to benefit the Fairmount Park Historic Preservation Trust, set for May 16-18 in the park's Georges Hill area. Backer is
David Groverman
, who owns the Centennial Cafe at the Ohio House, around since the 1876 Centennial.
Fresh from Tuesday's screening of the HBO mini-series
John Adams
, in which he plays the second president,
Paul Giamatti
and two associates visited Tinto near Rittenhouse Square for dinner. Unlike his pinot-loving Miles character in
Sideways
, Giamatti's vino of choice was a 2004 Vierlas, a syrah-cabernet blend from Spain.