April 2010 Newsletter

Henry Knox

April Meeting Notice

The Ellington Historical Society will meet on Thursday, April 22, 2010 at 7:00 p.m. at Hall Memorial Library at 93 Main Street. After a business meeting, society member Jim Long will present a lecture and PowerPoint presentation titled, “Who was Henry Knox?” Jim will share his research into the life and military career of this interesting Revolutionary War hero. Follow Knox from his humble beginnings in Boston, through his participation in the most important action in the Revolutionary War, and on to his career in the military and public life after the war.

The public is invited and new members are welcome to join. Refreshments will follow the program. The bakers for our April 22, 2010 meeting are Tina Fiore and Mary Temple.

News from the Curator-Nancy Long

Spring is here and so the busy season begins!  The Nellie McKnight Museum will be open for the season on Thursday, May 13, 2010 from 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. We will be open on Thursday through the end of September.  Our Daniel Halladay exhibit, currently at Hall Memorial Library, will return to the front parlor of the museum and the windmill to the backyard.

A new exhibit has been installed at Hall Memorial Library and features several stereoscopes from the museum collection. Stereoscopes were a popular form of home entertainment in the late 1800s right through today in the form of the popular Viewmaster. Stereoscope slides consisted of a pair of photographs side by side and were viewed through a pair of lenses. The photographs were taken from a slightly different view corresponding to the spacing of the eyes. The special viewer merged these two-dimensional photographs into a single three-dimensional photograph. The history of the stereoscope and the artists who produced the photographs are featured in this exhibit.

Fair on the Green/EHS Flea Market and Bake Sale

On May 8, 2010 the popular Fair on the Green will return to the center of Ellington. In keeping with tradition, the historical society will hold a flea market on the Nellie McKnight Museum grounds from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.  The rain date is May 15. Spaces are 10’ x 20’ for a donation of $20 for non-members and $15 for members. Exhibitors of typical flea market/tag sale items are welcome. Craft and food exhibitors cannot be accepted. Application available on the website.

The historical society bake sale will also be held on May 8 at the Nellie McKnight Museum from 9:00-2:00. Members will be contacted to bake and help staff this bake sale. In keeping with the guidelines given by North Central District Health, we are asking our bakers to package their baked goods so they are ready for sale. We do not want to handle or repackage the baked items and it really speeds up the bake sale set up if all we only have to price the item. We thank you for your observance of these guidelines-the rules protect us all!

Let’s hope for a splendidly sunny and warm day on May 8 for all the activities that are planned for the center of town!

Donations

Thompson Letters -- The society has been given a copy of Letters Written to the Joseph Abbot Thompson Family (Melrose and Ellington CT) from Friends and Relatives 1784-1868 transcribed by Sally Thompson Bissell. This volume includes genealogy information on the Thompson family, obituaries and “bits and pieces” of information discovered while transcribing the letters. Sally Bissell has included several scanned copies of the original letters thus making the reader grateful for her transcription in spite of the beautiful handwriting of the Thompson relatives. This book will be stored at Hall Memorial Library and be available to the public on future history day events.

Edward Hall Family School schedule – Former Ellington resident Sue Kuendig, whose Main Street home had housed the classrooms of Edward Hall’s school, donated the original copy of the order of exercises on examination day, Thursday, April 19^th, 1853.  Sue found the paper in the walls of the house.  Subjects on the schedule were: Spelling, Bible, Reading, Colburn, and Declamation.

News from the Archivist-Lynn Kloter Fahy

In August 2005, the historian of the Mitsubishi Corporation in Tokyo, Seiichi Narita, visited Ellington to verify that Yanosuke Iwasaki, Mitsubishi’s second president, had attended the Edward Hall Family School in the early 1870s. I discovered, while doing research for Images of America: Ellington, that Mitsubishi was unaware of the Ellington connection. The Hall Memorial Library houses gifts from Yanosuke, who visited Ellington while the library was under construction in 1901. He donated money which was used to pay for the leaded glass windows that portray his former teacher and his family. Narita is now lecturing in Japan, and in his lectures he often refers to Yanosuke's study abroad. His book on Mitsubishi history was published in March (in Japanese only).