SBHS September 2012 Newsletter

September 2012

A New Roof for the Abijah Rowe House

By Ken Kuhl At the Salmon Brook Historical Society

we endeavor to teach and preserve the history of Granby, including the buildings we are so fortunate to own.

Over the past 15 years we installed new roofs on all the buildings except the Abijah Rowe House. We have had limited success with cedar shake roofs on our buildings including the Weed-Enders saltbox. The Board of Directors considered a variety of alternative roof coverings; however, with advances that have been made in ventilation and pressure treatment of the wood shingle, a new cedar shake roof is now installed on the Rowe House that promises a much (All images by Peter Dinella) longer life and a more satisfying experience.

The cost of a wood shingle roof is not inexpensive, so our board agreed to investigate the availability of a grant for a worthwhile project like this. We were encouraged to contact the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation and when we did, we found they work with the 1772 Foundation, which is known for providing funding for “bricks and mortar” projects like ours.

Its name was in honor of the very first project they funded; Liberty Hall in Union New Jersey which was built in 1772.

The total estimate of a new roof, cornice work and repairs along with painting the entire building came to a little over $30,000. We were very excited when the 1772 Foundation agreed that our project met their criteria and awarded the Society $13,500.

The roof work is completed and we hope to see the exterior painting begin soon.

A Peddler’s Wagon for SBHS? (see page 6 for more details)

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Get Ready For TheFall Flea Market!

The Salmon Brook Historical Society’s annual Fall Flea Market is on Saturday, October 20, this year. The show begins at 9 a.m. on the historical society’s grounds and ends at 4 p.m.

Those interested in having a 20 x 20 ft. space to sell goods to the public may reserve a space for $25 before Oct. 13th by contacting Dave Laun at 860-653-3965. Those reserving a space after Oct. 13th will pay $35.00.

Members who wish to donate items to the Society to be sold by the Society at the Flea Market may drop off the items at the Society on Salmon Brook Street on Tuesdays and Thursdays between 9 a.m. and noon. If you have questions about items to be donated, you may call Ruth Robinson at 860-653-3918.

We are always looking for volunteers to help with the flea market. Society members who would like to help with parking, cooking at the concessions tent, pricing and selling items or leading vendors to their spaces, should contact Todd Vibert at 860-653-9506. If you are an early bird, the first shift starts at 6 a.m. and the last shift starts at 2 p.m.

The more volunteers we have, the smoother the Flea Market will run. Most shifts for each area of work are two hours and those two hours usually go by quickly. Please tell your friends to come. The Flea Market – spring or fall – is a wonderful show and a great Granby tradition.

SBHS Thursday Volunteers

By Dave Laun

The men’s group consisting of Jim Allen, Jim Glenney, Jim Rosano, and John Horr have been busy assembling storage racks for the textile room, building map storage shelves in the archive storage room, doing miscellaneous maintenance jobs, cleaning up after an animal, maybe a raccoon, that tried to take up residence in the Tobacco Barn, moving boxes from and cleaning the Enders attic, and helping move and organize flea market donations for Ruth Robinson.

On the women’s side, Melba Griffin, Sally Markey, and Roxanne Rosano are continuing the huge job of updating the society’s accession files and marking the accessioned items. Roxanne has successfully integrated the old Past Perfect files with the new Past Perfect program on the new 2 computer.

Sat. October 6, 2012 (Weather Permitting) 9:30 am – 3:00 pm Contact: D. Laun (860) 653-3965 This is the 12th year that the Historical Society has organized and held a show of hit & miss engines, tractors and antique cars on our grounds at 208 Salmon Brook St. The show has grown to almost 30 exhibits and will be held this fall on Saturday, Oct. 6 weather permitting.

The food booth will be selling coffee and Mrs. Murphy’s Donuts in the morning starting at 7:00 a.m. and will have hotdogs and soda at 10:00 a.m. for lunch time.

Parking and admission are free, so come see and hear yesteryears’ mechanical technology in action.

SBHS Building and Grounds Committee Report The tarp on the Rowe house roof is finally gone and the roof is weather proof for the first time in many years!

It is difficult to put an authentic roof on an old house without having the problems that accompany the old style wood roof, but I think we have accomplished that by hiring BLD Construction, LLC from Suffield. Brian Doyon is the owner of the company and did all the work by himself. The work site never looked messy and the damage to the garden around the house was minimal. He did leave the cleanup of the Rowe attic to the Thursday volunteers.

We have another volunteer who has offered to repair all the window sashes in the Rowe house in exchange for a chance to perfect his restoration technique and showcase his work for a future business venture. His name is Robert Burke and he has completed about half of the 25 windows so far. He removes all the glass from the window, repairs any rot or damage, lets the window dry out, reglazes and repaints the wood. On the last 6 windows he has also been installing a film on the glass that blocks UV. He spends about 20 hours on each window and the cost to the society is only the cost of the materials.

We also have Foster Newton, who is rebuilding the walkway to the Ender’s house as a community service project to earn a high school parking permit for his senior year at Granby Memorial High School. He is being challenged by our requirement that only native field stone be used in order to blend in with our 1790 farm house.

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What’s Happening In Textiles

by Jean Potetz

The summer flew by with time spent in the Textile rooms organizing and boxing pieces of the collection.

We are now concentrating mainly on women’s dresses.

The book Homefront & Battlefield, Quilts & Context in the Civil War by Lynne Z. Bassett and Madelyn Shaw was released recently. The book uses quilts, textiles, personal artifacts and stories to present the Civil War in a personal manner while covering the historic events that changed the course of our country.

Among the many inspirational textiles within its pages, the book includes a full-page photograph of Estelle Holcomb’s Stars and Stripes Quilt taken by SBHS member Peter Dinella. This historic quilt is part of the quilt collection at the Society and has been on display this summer in the Preservation Barn. The book also includes a little information about Estelle Holcomb and Granby during the Civil War. It promises to be an important publication for any historian interested in how the Civil War affected life in America. It is an honor to have one of our quilts included in it.

The planned four-museum exhibit associated with the book was restructured late last year. Our quilt was not a part of this restructuring and is not included in the ongoing exhibit, but because it was not away on tour, we were able to display this historic quilt in its hometown 150 years after Estelle Holcomb first picked up her needle to create it. It seems it was meant to be here to mark such an important anniversary.

The Homefront & Battlefield exhibit at the American Textile History Museum in Lowell, MA will be open through November 25, 2012. The exhibit will travel to the New York Historical Society, NY, NY; the Shelburne Museum in Shelburne, VT and the Nebraska Historical Society, Lincoln, NE respectively. More information can be found at www.athm.org.

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Archivist Report The library has had several people from out of state doing genealogical research, buying our books and making generous donations. A brother and sister from MA wanted to find their grandparent’s home. They used to visit over 70 years ago. With the help of Fred Griffin and our files we found the house. They remembered that their grandparents still drove to the Loomis Store using a horse and buggy in the 1940s.

The Tuesday volunteers have been working on our jewelry collection, matching items to file cards, updating the cards and storing everything in acid free boxes.

Our next project is the items men used in the past, straight razors, clay pipes, pocket knives and more. We are working on moving fragile items from the Enders attic to acid free boxes in the Preservation Barn store room.

The wonderful publicity that Heather Tomasetti has been doing is showing results in increased visitors on Sunday afternoons. On a recent Sunday, 16 people toured our buildings! Thank you, Heather, for a fantastic job.

Ginny Wutka and I have been working with Catherine Saunders, an English professor at George Mason University. We are helping to research Emily Clemons Pearson, a writer of anti-slavery books, who lived in the Wutka house.

Catherine came across an ad in the old CT Courant which she sent to me. It advertised an Iron Foundry for sale in Granby in 1837. This was news to me, so I started looking in land records and found that it was located on Rt. 10-202 on the shore of Manitook Lake, in the area across from Mechanicsville Road. Not only the Iron Foundry, but a blacksmith shop and a small dwelling house was also there.

The Foundry got me interested in early Granby industry, so I have been looking at old newspapers online. Besides finding clothier’s shops, carding machines and Granby farms for sale, I also stumbled across some fascinating items about escapes from Newgate Prison, ads to sell Opium (direct from Turkey) and a surprising number of divorces for the time period. A future Drummer article is planned.

Carol Laun

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A Nice Piece of History.

But What To Do With It?

(Story continued from page 1)

By Bob Schrepf

Pictured is a 19 or early 20 century peddler’s wagon of uncertain provenance.

Nonetheless it’s now the proud possession of the Salmon Brook Historical Society and billeted in Bob Schrepf’s garage.

It had been at rest in the barn behind Cossitt Library in North Granby, property of the town. When the town tore down the barn recently, we rescued the wagon.

We thank the town for delivering the wagon to its present location.

The wagon’s body is painted a sporty red with white stenciling. It has a gray roof. The wagon box is about eight feet long and six feet tall.

The large wheels have yellow spokes and as you can see, they need a lot of work.

We need volunteers to restore the wagon to its former … well, if not glory, at least utility. It might make a fine advertising vehicle for the society or possibly a parade participant.

Anyone interested in helping with restoration work can contact Ken Kuhl or Bob Schrepf. th

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Have You Renewed Your Membership?

This is a reminder to renew your membership in the Salmon Brook Historical Society for the calendar year 2012 if you haven’t already done so.

To jog your memory, please look at the address label on this copy of the newsletter. We have printed the last date each member paid dues (or the status of membership, such as Life Member) on the upper right corner of the address label.

If you haven’t renewed for this year or owe back dues, please send us a check. We have attempted to keep dues at a reasonable level, but we need the income to help support our programs. Your continued support is welcome and appreciated. If you have already paid your dues, many thanks.

Remember to check the dues information on this newsletter’s address label!

Student: $3 Individual: $15 Family/Group $20 Sustaining $30 Life Membership $300

(Story continued on page

Include your name and address with a check payable to: Salmon Brook Historical Society. Send to the society at 208 Salmon Brook Street, P.O. Box 840, Granby, CT, 06035.

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Recent Donations to the Society

by Carol Laun, Archivist and Acting Curator

Generous donors continue to add to our archives and collections.

The archive received a 1962 raised topographic map of CT from Bill Hart. Doris Ahrens donated the 1916 graduation certificate from Granby District Schools for Rita Case (her mother) and also several c.1890 hand written invitations to the weddings of three Griffin sisters.

Melba Griffin shared a copy of a fascinating “Address to Farmers” written in 1796. Marge Goslee added these books to our library - two Glastonbury History books, “Putnam Phalanx” published 1859 and a book of New England Museum houses.

The American Textile History Museum sent us a copy of “Homefront and Battlefield” which includes our Civil War quilt by Estelle Holcomb, now on exhibit in the Preservation Barn.

Lucy McMahon added to the Domin Collection with photos of her father, Charles Domin, and documents and memorabilia from WWII, including a letter from Pearl Harbor written in early 1941. The Domin family lived in the Floydville Road area. We also added important Masonic history items from the estate of the late Robert Hahn. His widow, Shirley Hahn, also donated a sign from the Odd Fellows organization, a fraternal group who originally owned the Masonic Hall on East Granby Road.

A heavy package in the mail revealed a brick from the old Loomis Store that once stood where the present Rt. 189 enters Rt. 10-202. Craig Fowler sent it in memory of his mother Maliss, who saved a brick for each of her sons. A beautiful watercolor painting of Cooley School by Evelyn Hildreth is now on display in the school. It was donated by George Tuffin.

Dick Martindale added several items from an old medicine cabinet – tooth powder, straight razor, styptic pencil, shaving brush, a medicine bottle, scissors and two pocket rulers. Our most recent donation came from Lucy Holcombe, an elegant silver soup tureen with elephant head handles and beautiful engraving. It was polished to gleaming brilliance by Bill Hart.

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The Salmon Brook Historical Society PO Box 840 Granby, Connecticut 06035

Salmon Brook Historical Society 208 Salmon Brook Street Granby, Connecticut 06035 860-653-9713 Or go to: www.salmonbrookhistorical.org Hours:Tuesday 9:00 to Noon Genealogical & Archival Research Thursday 9:00 to Noon Thursday Morning Group

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Calendar of Events

Gas Engine & Tractor Show Oct. 6 Fall Flea Market Oct. 20 House Tour Dec. 1 Wassail Party Dec. 2

September 2012 Edition •SBHS Newsletter Publishing Committee: Leila Hawken, Bob Schrepf •Layout: Ken Kuhl •Photography: Peter Dinella, Ken Kuhl