In partnership with one of our favorite designers and brands @1924.us,
We just added a little collaboration: A prayer candle in honor of Camp’s patron saint:
THE MADAME ANNA PECK
1880s, Sweden- young Anna is orphaned.
1905 as a teen, she emigrates to America and is adopted by a Chicago architect.
She takes work as a maid in a well-to-do home and marries the chauffeur.
She’s widowed at 32 when he dies in WWI.
At 39, her father builds “Wandawega Hotel.”
Anna runs gin & a brothel here.
She marries a local, the “ne’er do well” son of a prominent family.
Gordon Peck was a vet, a drunkard & 13 years her junior who's mother filed for an annulment, claiming he was too taken with consumption to know what he was doing.
Anna & Gordon continued to operate Wandawega’s brothel & speakeasy “Orphan Annie’s.”
At 56, Anna is convicted for running a 'bawdy house of ill fame' & goes to prison for 7 years.
Upon release, she moves right into town off the square, taking up residence where everyone knew her business & she knew more about everyone else’s.
At 80, Anna becomes a widow for the 2nd time.
At 94, she dies alone, taking the town's secrets to her grave.
When her house was in demo, her things & life story were thrown into a dumpster.
A local man happened by & salvaged portraits of the orphan immigrant & her 2nd wedding.
25yrs later he saw our post asking for leads & remembered he still had them in storage.
Anna was abandoned from the beginning.
Ostracized by a community.
Rejected by the family she married into.
Anybody who can live through that & still have the audacity to plant herself in the middle of town has no shortage of chutzpah.
Which is why she is Camp's namesake & her rathskellar bar is ORPHAN ANNIE’S.
DETAILS
➕ Handmade in Texas, USA
➕ Saint candle is made with unscented clean burning paraffin wax & measures 8.5" x 2"
➕ Candle will be packaged in a linen bag with 2 saint stickers & Anna's prayer card (printed in Italy, an unchanged original)
The Wandawega Camp Store Shipping Details