History, Natural History & the Arts
Wednesday, October 13th is #AskAnArchivist Day, an annual event during which archivists take to Twitter to answer all kinds of questions — from the silly to the practical — and raise awareness of the importance of archives.
Archivists will answer inquiries via Twitter. You can submit questions by posting them on Twitter on October 13th using the hashtag #AskAnArchivist.
Vermont Aviation Historian Brian Lindner will present a talk about Vermont’s most infamous air disaster , the B-24 Liberator Bomber that crashed on Camel Hump Mountain and killed nine Air Force crewmen while on a training mission in 1944.
Lindner has researched this particular crash extensively, as well as other aviation related crashes in Vermont. [Read more…] about B-24 Bomber Crash on Camel Hump Mt, VT Presentation
You could see Charles F. Dumbleton coming for blocks. Although he wasn’t exactly well-dressed, he held his head high and had a swagger that said “I’m coming to YOU.” This despite his uncertain gait, a limp supported by his ever present crutches, which confirmed from a distance it was Taffy – the name given to one of the most notorious men in the city of Troy in the mid-nineteenth century.
He wasn’t always notorious. He had built that reputation over years of street fights, petty thievery and bullying his betters. He was a frequenter of bawdy houses, a bartender, a saloon operator, a gambler and political operative. He was one of the leaders of a band of men. Newspapers and night watchmen called them a gang – “a terror of the town,” but loyal friends on the make is a more accurate description. [Read more…] about Taffy Dumbleton: Troy’s ‘Terror of the Town’
The Morris-Jumel Mansion has announced the opening of a new exhibit “Portraits From My Community” by New Yorker cartoonist Felipe Galindo Feggo, featuring a selection of thirty mixed-media artworks portraying the people of Harlem, Washington Heights, and Inwood, on display through January 2nd. [Read more…] about Felipe Galindo Feggo’s Community Portraits on Exhibit in NYC
Shadd Cary, the first black woman in North America to edit and publish a newspaper, one of the first black female lawyers in the U.S. and an advocate for voting rights for women. She was also both a friend and foe of Frederick Douglass.
Jane Rhodes, the author of Mary Ann Shadd Cary: The Black Press and Protest in the 19th Century (Indiana Univ. Press, 1999) and professor and chair of the African American Studies Department at the University of Illinois in Chicago, will present “Mary Ann Shadd Cary: Black Women and the Early Suffrage Movement,”on October 23rd.
[Read more…] about Mary Ann Shadd Cary: Black Women and the Early Suffrage Movement
The Oneida County History Center will host “Edelweiss Schuplattlers: Folk Dancing at the History Center,” a program set for Saturday, October 16th. [Read more…] about Edelweiss Schuhplattlers German, Austrian Folk Dance in Utica
One morning in early autumn, I was running errands in downtown Keene, New Hampshire, when I was stopped in my tracks by a flash of yellow. Crouching down, I found a gorgeous, palm-sized bird, olive above, with a belly as gold as sunshine. It was a species I’d never seen before, and it was lying dead on the ground beneath a store window.
After consulting several field guides and two friends who know the intricacies of warbler identification far better than I ever will, I deduced that it was a mourning warbler – a secretive songbird of boreal and high-elevation forest clearings, with a migration route that tracks to Central and South America. Imagine flying all that way – a wonder of beauty and color – only to be felled by a run-in with a pane of glass. [Read more…] about The Perils of Bird Migration
In early October, 1859 John Brown and his small militia were making their final preparations for a raid on the slaveholders of Virginia.
The time and place for a raid seem right even now. It was the harvest season in the south and the fields would be filled with disgruntled and overworked slaves bringing in the crops, a perfect opportunity to turn them to revolt.
Harpers Ferry was lightly guarded and the arsenal there contained about 100,000 muskets and rifles – enough to carry on a lengthy guerrilla war against southern slaveholders. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: Final Harpers Ferry Preparations
Advances improve people’s lives, however many of these have come at the cost of invasive diagnostic technologies, the medicalization of human conditions, and endless quests for cures. Doctors have performed experiments on the poor and disempowered; especially enslaved Black and institutionalized people who had limited public voice.
Writing medical history must include people with disabilities and use their experiences as analytical lenses for understanding historical events.
[Read more…] about Disability and the History of Medicine (Free Virtual Event)
The 2021 Adirondack Film Festival will be held from October 14th through 17th, in a hybrid in-person and virtual format.
This year’s festival will feature 70+ films including features, documentaries, experimental shorts, music videos, plus popcorn, panels and parties. Films will be shown on multiple screens in downtown Glens Falls, or from the comfort of your own home. [Read more…] about Adirondack Film Festival Returns October 14-17th