Locations in North America Of Greatest Significance To Epicurean Philosophy

I just Googled larping; I'd never heard of that lol

1 - My main LARP is my avatar -- that is from the movie "The Last Legion" One day I am going to have to buy a Roman helmet like that! My real life is excruciatingly boring in comparison. Anyone like to read some insurance policies with me? But it pays the bills and allows me the time to pursue Epicurean philosophy.

2 - YES I have been to the Parthenon in Nashville and it is great! I highly recommend it. I've actually been twice, once about 20+ years ago, and once about three years ago. It is impressive from the outside, and even more impressive inside. That statue of Athena(?) inside is really impressive! If the building is a full scale model of the real thing, the real thing must have been hugely impressive up on top of that hill in Athens.

On the second trip three years ago there was a lot of construction going on around it, which I presume is now complete. It no doubt looks best without those chain link fences around it.

I wonder if there is any site in the USA that is more directly tied to ancient Greece, and yet is so relatively unknown, as the Parthenon in Nashville. In fact, I wonder if there's any site in the world, even in Greece, that can match this! I doubt the reiigious nuts in most of the world would allow something like this, even in replica. Quite impressive in person:

There's also the Getty Villa copied from the Villa of the Papyri in Herculaneum. Walk (virtually) in the footsteps of Philodemus?

There's an idea! We can have a competition: What locations in North America have greatest connection to / significance for Epicurean Philosophy? I have now split this out as a separate thread.

Let's call for nominations! Here are three:

1. The Getty Museum in California - http://www.getty.edu/visit/villa/

2. The Parthenon in Nashville - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenon_(Nashville)

3. Monticello (Where Jefferson wrote about Epicurus and met with Frances Wright and presumably talked about "A Few Days in Athens") https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monticello

Others? (if there are museums like Gottingen or Leipzig that have copies of statues of Epicurus or Epicurean figures that would be good, but I am not sure there are any.)

What locations in North America have greatest connection to or significance for Epicurean Philosophy?

Elli's recent post of herself at an Epicurean shrine spurs me to ask whether we could assemble a list of locations relevant to Epicurus for those of us in North American. Here are three possibilities for a list:

1. The Getty Museum in California - http://www.getty.edu/visit/villa/ (Obvious connection to Philodemus and his library, leaping pig, statues of the founders, etc.)

2. The Parthenon in Nashville - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenon_(Nashville) (A replica of a building that would have had great significance to Epicurus himself)

3. Monticello in Virginia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monticello (Where Jefferson wrote about Epicurus and met with Frances Wright and presumably talked about "A Few Days in Athens")

Others? If there are North American museums like those in Gottingen or Leipzig that have copies of statues of Epicurus or other Epicurean founders that would be good, but I am not sure there are any.

If this turns out to be an interesting topic we can do a separate list for other parts of the world.

Consider that Epicurus himself more than likely walked across the grounds of the Acropolis in Athens and around the (real) Parthenon. He said that Epicureans could enjoy public spectacles more than other people (I believe he said that) and so more than likely participated in things like the Panathenaic Festivals and other ceremonies on the Acropolis. And I can imagine him appreciating the view from the summit at least. Think about that if you travel to Nashville and circumambulate the "Parthenon" there.

Quote from JJElbert

Frances Wright's grave is in Cincinnati.

Oh my! I didn't realize that! Thanks, Joshua ! In addition to my other duties at the library, I'm also the coordinator of the Ohio Center for the Book. I'll be adding Frances Wright to our Ohio author mini-biographies now! She was not in our list!

Here's her record from Find-A-Grave with a photo of her stone.

Yes it seems to me that Frances Wright's gravesite and/or other places associated with her would definitely be a good addition to this list. "A Few Days In Athens" is not only an excellent book, it probably qualifies as the most unabashedly pro-Epicurean and consistently-Epicurean piece of writing since the ancient world. So many others are sort or / kind of / approximately Epicurean, but I would put AFDIA is in a class of its own.

WAIT -- I don't think I noticed this before:

So this James Milne who brought up Frances Wright was JOHN STUART MILLS' FATHER?

A Few Days In Athens was published in 1822 in London.

Frances Wright was born September 6, 1795, so in 1822 she was 27 years old.

At that time James Mill was 49 years old.

These are Mills' works and dates of publication:

Major works

• An essay of the impolicy of a bounty on the exportation of grain, 1804.

• "Lord Lauderdale on Public Wealth", 1804, Literary Journal Vol. IV, No. 1^[15]
• Commerce Defended, 1808.
• "Thomas Smith on Money and Exchange", 1808, Edinburgh Review no. XXV, pp. 35–68^[16]
• The History of British India, 3 vols., 1817 (and many later editions)
• "Government", 1820, Encyclopædia Britannica
• Elements of Political Economy, 1821
• "Liberty of the Press", 1825, Encyclopædia Britannica
• Essays on Government, Jurisprudence, Liberty of the Press, Education, and Prisons and Prison Discipline, 1823.
• An Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind, 2 vols., 1829.^[17]
• Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind. 1869.^[18]
• Essay on the Ballot ^[19] and Fragment on Mackintosh ^[20], 1830.
• "Whether Political Economy is Useful", 1836, London Review, vol. II, pp. 553–572.
• The Principles of Toleration, 1837.

MANY things to consider here but so as not to derail the thread I am going to take the rest of this post elsewhere....

Please take the rest of the discussion on Mill and this aspect of Frances Wright here: JAMES MILNE / MILL, Mentor of Frances Wright

This classic photo showed up in a blog post the other day.

Ha that's a good one - seems like several of us now have been there!

This was by Baldwin Lee, shot in c1983.

Quote from Godfrey

This was by Baldwin Lee, shot in c1983.

How Baldwin Lee Saw Ageless Beauty in ’80s-Era Black America

When Lee found himself teaching in Tennessee, he began creating a group of photographs still teeming with life and humanity four decades later.

www.thedailybeast.com

Baldwin Lee - Wikipedia