Caitlin R. Kiernan - The Red Tree

See the relevant entry, “legend trip,” in Jan Brunvand’s American Folklore: An Encyclopedia (Garland Reference Library of the Humanities, Vol. 1551), pp. 439-440.

Michael E. Bell, Food for the Dead: On the Trail of New England’s Vampires (2001, Carroll & Graf Publishers).

It should here be noted that while I have been successful in acquiring the necessary releases allowing me to speak of Hopkins and her part in this strange affair, and to publish everything Sarah wrote about her, Ms. Hopkins has repeatedly refused my requests to be interviewed. The only published work concerning Hopkins, aside from what follows and her website, was a brief profile and review in Culver City Artscape (September 2009) following her installation at a gallery on La Cienega Boulevard last summer, a show which apparently included several of the canvases mentioned herein.

Quercus rubra (= Q. borealis ), known as the Northern Red Oak and Champion Oak; also see Donald Cultoss Peattie’s A Natural History of Trees of Eastern and Central North America (Houghton Mifflin Co., 1950, with a 2nd ed. in 1966).

These measurements were given me by Mr. Samson Blanchard, a few weeks after my visit.

Manufactured by George Wade Pottery in Burslem, Staffordshire, England, Red Rose Tea has included these “whimsies” since 1967, beginning as a short term pro motion in Quebec. The first American figures were offered in 1983. To quote the company’s website, “To date, it is estimated that more than 300 million Wade figurines have been given away in packages of tea in America.” See also The World of Wade by Ian Warner and Mike Posgay (Schiffer Publishing, 2003).

Sarah chose this pseudonym for her former lover, and I have chosen to respect her decision to do so by never using “Amanda’s” true name. However, it is not difficult to learn, if one is so disposed.

Atlanta Journal-Constitution, December 14, 2001.

Publishers Weekly, March 3, 1999.

HarperCollins, 1998