Tag: history

Sharon Historical Society

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~Sue Sellew, Secretary of the Sharon Historical Society

In this blog post, the author shares current activities the Sharon Historical Society are undertaking to make their collections accessible to the public.

Vermont Views – July 4, 1878, Sharon Common; Sharon Historical Society.

Active Collections

In 2025, the Sharon Historical Society (SHS) was very fortunate to be selected by the Vermont Historical Society (VHS) to receive training as part of a “Cohort” of five historical societies: Bixby, Brookfield, Sharon, Thetford and Waterbury. VHS recognized the need and importance of small, volunteer run historical societies whose collections are often stored in historic structures, many without heat, and is providing us with training. This training is known as “Active Collections”.

The Sharon Historical Society’s mission has always been to collect the history of Sharon. Our collection has grown over the years, and one of the things we have learned is to deaccession items that do not support our mission. (A Deaccession Policy is part of the original SHS Bylaw and we have written a procedure to do it.) Another goal is to “Tier” the preservation of items in our collection so we spend our time and money on items that best tell the story of Sharon’s history. As a member of the Cohort group, we meet regularly to discuss common problems and help find solutions. We plan to keep our Cohort group active when this VHS grant ends.

Vermont Historical Society staff Eileen Corcoran and Hannah Kirkpatrick, who run the Activating 21st Century Local History project, wrote the article below about the 2025 Cohort project, of which Sharon Historical Society is a participant. The article ran in the September/October 2025 issue of Museum magazine.

https://mcusercontent.com/e69cba1e8aa4ba62c6f7175df/files/1454c1af-43c9-4c37-f405-034f2ce4bcdf/AC_Feature_Corcoran_and_Kirkpatrick.pdf

Other Opportunities

Vermont Views from Tyler Mountain 1870s; Sharon Historical Society.

We are looking for ways to engage the Sharon community. We have a collection of antique stereoscope cards with images of Sharon and are scanning them using equipment borrowed from the Vermont Historical Records Program (Mobile Digitization Unit). We plan to share these scans with the Sharon Elementary School and will discuss the images with their history classes.

The Town of Sharon has the distinction of having the oldest, continuously held Old Home Day celebration in the country, and our collection includes many photographs taken over the decades. As they are scanned, we will add these images to a website that we hope to build this winter.

Hardwick Gazette Picture Project

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Hardwick Historical Society resides in the old Hardwick Train Depot along the Lamoille Rail Trail

~Elizabeth Dow, Hardwick Historical Society

A few years ago, the new owners of the Hardwick Gazette, our local newspaper, offered the Hardwick Historical Society the collection of 40 years of photographs, negatives, and contact sheets left in the office by the previous two owners. We immediately said yes, and it was a couple years before we did the math. Probably just as well. For 40 years, the paper had published 51 issues. Each issue contained at least 20 pictures–some many more. We could reasonably estimate that we had more than 41,000 images to process. Fortunately, the newspaper staff had filed each month’s pictures in a manilla envelop with the negatives and contact sheets.

            Step 1: Identify the pictures and write the metadata on the back including: Hardwick Gazette, publication date, page, people, place, and/or event as described in the caption or story that accompanied the photo in the newspaper.  For each pack of pictures we pulled the published newspaper, and turned pages, matching pictures, and writing the metadata on the back. We quickly made some decisions. For instance: no baby pictures from the “I’m One” column that ran for years; no glossy publicity shots for theatrical acts. Neither contains a lot of local historical information.

            We identified pictures related to other towns, and then we put them in a container that we eventually sent to that town’s historical society. While we put the names of graduates or team members on the back of Hardwick pictures, we did not do that for the classes or teams from other towns. It simply took too much time.

            This part of the project included as many as a half dozen volunteers working around a large table together, and it created a trip down memory lane that just never ended. A good time was had by all, until our hands began to cramp.

            Step 2: File the pictures. Each picture went into a folder with others like it, and the folder  went into a lateral file drawer. We developed a facetted index to organize the files. We could categorize a picture of a couple kids on a playground 1) by the kids’ names, 2) by the game they were playing, 3) by the playground 4) by the season of the year, etc. So we chose to file pictures by reason the photographer took the picture. If the photographer wanted to highlight the new playground equipment at the school, we filed the picture under “Schools–Hardwick Elementary–Playground, 1990-1999.” If the photographer meant to feature kids enjoying themselves during a summer activity, we filed the picture under that activity, e.g. “Recreation—Hardwick Summer Recreation Programs” or “Schools—Hazen Union—Sports—Basketball—Summer Program.”

            We had some hitches. At first each newly engaged or married couple got its own folder. Then we saw how much drawer space that would take, and redid the folders by years and listed the couples in the index with the date of their engagement or wedding. And it took a while to sort out the difference between a sport and a recreation. Answer: “Sport” usually involves organized competition — e.g. basketball; “Recreation” usually does not — e.g. bicycling.

            The project took a total of about six years to complete, but it has provided us an invaluable resource. Take a look: https://hardwickvthistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Pictures20250919.pdf

Shelburne Vermont Preservation of Collections

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~ David Boucher, Shelburne Historical Society

Shelburne Vermont has had at least two groups of citizens interested enough in the towns history to gather collections and create a museum space and hold events. These individuals  however either passed away or were unable to continue. Large amounts of time and effort resulted in wonderful collections but with no centralized, permanent access, all their work was being dispersed and lost. The public does not know the importance of what they have in their possession.

In 2013, the 250th anniversary of the chartering of Shelburne saw the creation and focus of a large group of volunteers gathering written, oral and pictorial collections and presenting them during town celebrations. The resulting collections however were being moving around, with no centralized home due to renovations and new construction of the town offices and library. So at the end of the celebration, the initiative was taken to establish The Shelburne Historical Society, a legal non-profit.

At the completion of construction, the newly formed Society moved into the ‘old’ town clerk’s office complete with fireproof vault. The roving collections were moved in, think hoarders house, and every item was reviewed and put into topical folders. Collections management software systems were researched and a CatalogIt subscription purchased because it was very simple to understand and use, cloud based, and priced right for the budget.

Using money from a grant provided by the Lake Champlain Basin Program, archival shelving and storage materials were purchased, collection management education taken, procedures written for consistency, and then the topic folders one by one reviewed again, and recorded into the pictorial focused CatalogIt system.

The unique identifier assigned to each object during cataloging, provided a digital folder/file numbering system that allowed any data collected about that entry to be stored in a digital archive which is backed up weekly, monthly and annually in three different drives.

Having a collection is of little use unless there is easy public access and the CatalogIt HUB provides public access. However, it required access through a website platform, so a Google Space Website, free for qualifying non-profits, was created.

A monthly E-newsletter, utilizing the digital images and metadata being recorded, cutting/pasting was started to drive interest and build some ‘buzz’ about the new access to the town’s history.

Some of the gems we discovered during this process:

Color image of seven journals with a leather wrap and some with gold embossed labels. Diaries of Lucia E. Comstock 1865, 1870, 1874, 1876, 1877, 1879, 1891.
Diaries of Shelburne residents.
Black and white image of a two-story building with chimney and water tower behind on the left. An old-style gas pump is in front of the building and cars are parked to the left. A man walks out of the frame on the left. Shelburne cooperative Creamery Company - Parke Kent Collection.
10 years of Shelburne Cooperative Creamery Company business artifacts.
Color image of the front page of an old volume. "Shelburne Vt. July 1st 1917 Presented to the Shelburne Free Library by Felix A. Chauvin. In Memory of his Father Leander Joseph Chauvin born in Varennes P.I. Canada, Feb 19th 1826. Died at Shelburne Vt. April 4th 1914.
Leander Chavin, town cobbler, accounting ledger with records from 1850-1854 including customers, work done, charges, and payments made including barters.
Color image of an old volume open to a page that says, "Washington Band Book Shelburn [sic] Vt"
A hand inscribed music book circa 1812.
Image of a typed record that says, "Interview with Kitty Noonan 11/22/81 On the history of Shelburne Falls. Miss Quinlan Picked out photographs from an old photograph album we found in our attic. Following are the people she knew: Frederick A. Basford and Family had a wagon shop at the Falls i 1869. A.K. Moore who ran the Grist Mill at Shelburne Falls. He died around 1989 from an accident at the Grist Mill. The mill was down behind Barbara Kent's house. John Papineau lived in the Oak's House. Another family lived across the street (Henry Papineau. John was the father. Mrs. Papineau was a Sorrell. Her father lived to be 100 years old. View of the 1927 Flood. Back view of the Grist Mill at Shelburne Falls when both dams on the river were washed out. The people in the picture are Evert Laroque, Clayton Shortsleeves, Jr. and his wife Hazel. This is a view of the front of the Grist Mill. The stones from the Grist Mill were used to build the Vermont House at Shelburne Museum. Map of Shelburne Falls in 1900 drawn from an inset of the 1869 Shelburne map by Tom Tompkins, Cub Scout in the 1960's as a project on town history. He visited the neighbors in the Shelburne Falls from Mt. Philo Road to just over the Falls bridge. He also drew another map of the people living on the street in the 1960's. For 1900: Begining [sic] at the bridge and going East, the first house on the left is where Mrs. Sorrell lived. Then the..."
Oral and handwritten histories from town residents covering 1800’s to 1900’s.
Black and white image of a building on wheels being pulled by a rope down the middle of a street. People are stopped by the buildings on the left watching the site.
Images of building being relocated to the Shelburne Museum.

Best of all is the appreciation of Shelburne residents when they discover that someone is preserving the town’s history and providing a place for their donated collections. Gratitude that provides the incentive to continue the work.

Archives Discovered

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~By Brian Lindner of Waterbury, VT

Can a 1969 Cold Case be solved by materials found in an archive?  Can a mysterious fatal fire from 1935, with diametrically opposed witness testimonies, finally be solved through old photographs found in an archive?  Can today’s archival collections solve a lingering piece of a 1929 mysterious death?  The answer in each case is “yes” or at least “maybe.”  Amazing answers to old questions can often be solved when materials held in various public archives are studied by members of the general public. 

Cold Case

Newspaper article titled, "Couple Dies Violently Near Calais." Calais - Vermont State Police found the badly mutilated bodies of a vacationing Florida couple in a travel trailer here Friday night. State Police identified the couple as James A. Hip, 67, and his wife, Iola, 62, of Lutz, FLA. Police said the couple had last been seen alive Sept. 12. The couple's car, a 1959 Pontiac, was found abandoned about midweek on the East Montpelier-Montpelier Road. State Police Lt. Richard W. Curtis said the trailer was found in a remote section of Calais on the Adamant-North Calais Road. He said the police were alerted to the trailer earlier this evening when two area residents reported finding the 24-foot-unit parked off the road in a wooded area. Curtis said the inside of the trailer was "a real mess," and said that the State Pathologist Lawrence Harris was unable to determine the cause of death without performing an autopsy. The police official said it looked like the couple had been dead about a week. The two had reportedly been vacationing in Vermont about two weeks. The bodies of the couple were brought to Burlington for autopsies late Friday night. Shortly before midnight Dr. Harris said his tentative ruling was that "the couple had been killed by a series of blows from blunt and sharp instruments to the head and upper body." Harris said he was being assisted by Dr. Richard S. Woodruff, the assistant state pathologist.
Burlington Free Press

In 1969, James and Iola Hipp of Florida were murdered while vacationing in central Vermont and their case has never been solved.  However, in the nearly six decades since that crime, a scrapbook of newspaper clippings maintained by an alleged loner was donated to the Vermont Historical Society after he passed away in 1987.  At the very time of the killings, the scrapbook owner had begun saving newspaper clippings of homicides in central Vermont (there were several) that year.  At the scene where the Hipp bodies were found, a slaughtered fawn was discovered.  In his scrapbook, along with the stories of the homicides, the owner was also chillingly saving newspaper clippings of dead deer.  He stopped collecting clippings when the cluster of homicides suddenly ceased.  Coincidence?

Image of newspaper with pictures of deer walking across a landscape, and an up-close image of a deer standing. In the background, the title reads, "Pet Deer Slain."
The Times Argus

Civilian Conservation Corps Disaster

Black and white image of the Officer's Quarter at Camp Charles Smith in Waterbury. It is a single-story u-shaped building with cars parked in the center and along the open edge.
Photograph taken days (maybe hours) before the fire.  Waterbury Historical Society

On Christmas Night 1935 at 2:30 AM the Officer’s Quarters at Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Camp Charles Smith in Waterbury erupted in flames.  Four Army officers perished in the roaring inferno that left the motel-sized building level to the ground in less than 15 minutes.  The entire Board of Inquiry file is available from the U.S. National Archives in College Park, MD.  A read of the file shows several witnesses claimed to see the fire start but none agreed on where; the point of origin was never determined.  The board concluded there was no evidence of arson, but they were unable to officially determine how and why the deadly fire started.

Unofficially, CCC veterans, the newspapers, and locals suspected methane gas could have been both the cause and the reason the building burned so quickly.  The Army was using poorly built and leaky stoves burning cheap soft coal…a recipe for generating methane gas.

Black and white, three-quarters image of a man in military uniform looking at the viewer. His coat has a thick collar, and his hat has an eagle emblem.
Lt. Henry Howard.  Waterbury Historical Society

In 1996 the family of CCC Lt. Henry Howard donated his scrapbook of letters, clippings, and photographs to the Waterbury Historical Society for their archives.  Lt. Howard barely survived the fire, and his scrapbook contained the only known photograph of the Officer’s Quarters from before the fire.  AND…there were two astonishing photos that had clearly never been seen by the Board of Inquiry.  These two photos showed the early stages of the fire thereby solving the decades old mystery.  The fire clearly began at opposite ends of the building at the same time: methane gas.  Case closed.  We’ll never know why Lt. Henry hadn’t shared such critical photos with the board despite the fact he was one of the key witnesses at the Inquiry.

Black and white image of a building on fire. On the left side, the building is lit up by fire shooting out of the top and sides. The wood framing is exposed, and the siding is almost completely burnt. In the background on the right, another fire is seen at the other end of the building.
Fire erupts at both ends of the barracks but not in the middle.  Waterbury Historical Society
Color image of a building on fire. On the left side, the building is lit up by fire shooting out of the top and sides. The wood framing is exposed, and the siding is almost completely burnt. In the background on the right, another fire is seen at the other end of the building.
Modern colorized version courtesy of Moriah Keat

Body Never Identified

Newspaper article title only, "Find Woman's Body on Farm in Chicester - Suspecting Murder, State's Attorney L.F. Edgerton Orders Autopsy. IDENTITY UNKNOWN"
Rutland Daily Herald

In August of 1929 an unidentified female body was found in a farm field in Chester.  Her identity remains unknown to this day.  Although officially ruled as a suicide, there were very serious doubts within the small group of investigators. 

Among several other females, the body was once suspected of being that of Matilda Anderson, a native of Sweden, who had been anonymously reported as missing from Boston.  There was extensive news coverage about the attempts to find Anderson and the trail seemed to lead to Vermont.  Using today’s newspaper archives at the Vermont State Archives and Records Administration in Middlesex, coupled with the ability to use hindsight, we can easily see Anderson was never missing and she wasn’t from Boston.  She was a resident of Burlington and appeared frequently in the social section of the Burlington Free Press from 1929 all the way to her obituary in 1935.

Newspaper Article titled, "Mrs. Thuren Dies" Mrs. Matilda (Anderson) Thuren, 68, died at her home at 8 Summit Street yesterday morning and the funeral services will be held at the residence, probably on Friday afternoon. Her husband, Alex Thuren, died in 1932. She was born in Sweden January 6, 1868, and has lived in this city for the past 35 years. She is survived by two sons. George Thuren of this city and Arthur Thuren of New London, Conn., by a grandson and by two sisters, Mrs. Peter Hundland of Cromwell, Conn., and Mrs. Selma Leth of East Braintree, Mass.
Burlington Free Press

If you have an interest in researching an old crime, old disappearance, old tragedy, births, marriages, your street name, or any of an endless list of topics – visit any public archive.  You will be welcomed, and you may find the answer that eluded everyone before you.