This week’s guest on The Historians Podcast is Leigh Eckmair, village of Gilbertsville and town of Butternuts historian in Otsego County, New York. She explains why the village of Gilbertsville has been named an historic district. [Read more…] about Historic Buildings in Gilbertsville, NY (Podcast)
Otsego County
A Cannon Explodes: 19th Century Electioneering In Otsego County
On the morning of August 28, 1888 residents of Dimmock Hollow (Ostego County) woke up knowing that it was going to be a memorable day. They couldn’t have known how right they were.
A political rally had been planned by local Republicans to support Benjamin Harrison in his presidential campaign against Grover Cleveland. They knew that the race would be close, nowhere more so than here in Cleveland’s home state of New York and wanted to whip up all the support they could get.
The Republican gathering was planned shortly after Democrats raised a liberty pole near the schoolhouse in Dimmock Hollow, a tiny crossroads between South New Berlin and Morris. [Read more…] about A Cannon Explodes: 19th Century Electioneering In Otsego County
Otsego Lake Life Focus Of Fenimore Museum Event
Hear experiences and memories of Otsego Lake from oral histories of local residents during “Food for Thought” Wednesday, October 22 at the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown.
William Walker, Associate Professor of History at SUNY Oneonta, will play excerpts and lead a discussion on the importance of the lake, how it has changed. [Read more…] about Otsego Lake Life Focus Of Fenimore Museum Event
The Sullivan-Clinton Campaign, Then and Now
On October 11 at 6:00 pm at the Unadilla Historical Association Robert Spiegelman will present the lecture “The Sullivan-Clinton Campaign, Then and Now”.
During America’s Revolution, George Washington ordered Generals Sullivan and Clinton to launch the biggest operation to date against sovereign peoples in North American history. Most Iroquois are uprooted from their homelands, making way for the Erie Canal and Westward Expansion. Strikingly, though Sullivan/Clinton has the most historical markers in New York, it has been nearly forgotten. Spiegelman’s lecture combines fresh research, visuals, and animated maps to attempt to answer why. [Read more…] about The Sullivan-Clinton Campaign, Then and Now
Hanford Mills Museum Events Feature History at Work
Hanford Mills Museum will offer two themed-weekends as part of the statewide Path Through History initiative, which seeks to connect people with New York’s rich cultural heritage. Hanford Mills operates a historic sawmill, gristmill and woodworking factory that grew in many stages between 1846 and 1902.
On June 1-2, Hanford Mills Museum will hold a History at Work Weekend, giving visitors a firsthand view of the work it took to run a mill. A century ago, mills were a mainstay of rural communities. They provided lumber for homes and farms, animal feed, and other needed supplies. On June 8-9, in addition to the 1926 Fitz Overshot Waterwheel and a water turbine, the Museum will be running its steam boiler and steam engine as well as its gas-powered dynamo, which provided the village of East Meredith with its first electricity. [Read more…] about Hanford Mills Museum Events Feature History at Work
NYS History Journal Ends Print Publication, Goes Digital
The New York State Historical Association’s (NYSHA) quarterly journal New York History, published since 1919, is no longer available as a print publication and will henceforth be published as a digital pdf file. A statement published on the NYSHA webpage reported the change: [Read more…] about NYS History Journal Ends Print Publication, Goes Digital
The Leadership Role of Municipal Historians
As the new year gets underway, it is appropriate to pause and reflect on open issues from years gone by. I am referring now to the role in 2013 of the county historian as a custodian for New York State history as we forge ahead with our Path through History Project.
The starting point for this investigation is an article which appeared on September 12, 2012 just after the summer launch in August entitled “New York State’s Curious, Century-Old Law Requiring Every City and Town to Have a Historian” by Amanda Erickson in The Atlantic Cities. [Read more…] about The Leadership Role of Municipal Historians
First Exhibit Devoted Solely to William Matthew Prior
Artist and Visionary: William Matthew Prior Revealed, the first exhibition devoted solely to this American folk artist, has opened at the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York. The exhibition includes over 40 oil paintings spanning his lifelong career from 1824 to 1856 and will be on view through December 31.
“Of the many 19th century folk portrait painters, William Matthew Prior is one of the most accomplished and interesting,” said Fenimore Art Museum President and CEO, Dr. Paul S. D’Ambrosio. “The exhibition, expertly curated by Jacquelyn Oak, explores the blurry line between folk art and academic art in the early 19th century, and the intersection of folk art and the myriad reform and religious movements of the era.”
[Read more…] about First Exhibit Devoted Solely to William Matthew Prior
Native Artisans at the Fenimore Art Museum
The Fenimore Art Museum welcomes five Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) artists this summer to spend three days in the museum galleries and outdoors at our Native American interpretive site, Otsego: A Meeting Place. Engaging conversations with these artists offer a delightful, insightful way to learn about traditional Native American art skills that have been handed down for generations.
June 18-20: In addition to traditional pottery, Natasha Smoke Santiago, a self-taught artist, casts the bellies of pregnant women and then forms the casts into sculptural objects incorporating Haudenosaunee craft techniques. She will be creating pottery on site and sharing its relationship to Haudenosaunee tradition and stories.
July 17-19: Penelope S. Minner is a fourth-generation traditional artist making black ash splint baskets and cornhusk dolls. Working in the customary Seneca way, Penny uses no forms for basket shapes and sizes.
August 5-7: Karen Ann Hoffman creates beautiful decorative pieces following the traditions of Iroquois raised beadwork and embodying Iroquoisworldviews.
August 21-23: Ken Maracle creates beads from quahog shells and has been making reproduction wampum belts for more than 25 years. He also makes condolence canes, horn rattles, water drums, and traditional headdresses. He speaks the Cayuga language and is knowledgable about the history of wampum and his people.
August 30-September 1: Iroquois sculptor Vincent Bomberry carves images of Iroquois life in stone.
Artisans will be in the museum galleries and at Otsego: AMeeting Place from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. During the Artisan Series, visitors can explore the extraordinary Eugene and Clare Thaw Collection of American Indian Art, a collection of over 800 objects representative of a broad geographic range of North American Indian cultures. Tours of Otsego: A Meeting Place and its Seneca Log House and Mohawk Bark House are also available.
Admission: adults and juniors (13-64) is $12.00; seniors (65+): $10.50; and free for children (12 and under). Admission is always free for NYSHA members, active military, and retired career military personnel. Members enjoy free admission all year.
For more information, visit FenimoreArtMuseum.org.
Major Exhibit of American Impressionsist Masters
A rare grouping of paintings and sketches from American Impressionist masters will highlight the summer season at the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York. American Impressionism: Paintings of Light and Life, on view May 26 – September 16, will showcase groundbreaking artists including Childe Hassam,William Merritt Chase, Mary Cassatt, Theodore Robinson, John Henry Twachtman, and others. These adaptors of the French Impressionist style revolutionized the American art scene in the late 19th century and ultimately paved the way to a uniquely American style of painting.
American Impressionism: Paintings of Light and Life features 26 paintings, dating from 1881 to 1942, representing nearly every noted American Impressionist from the period. “The paint, the color, and the light in these works separated them from anything that had been done in this country before,” said Museum President and CEO, Dr. Paul S. D’Ambrosio. “They can truly be called some of the first, modern American paintings.”
Impressionism was a painting style imported to America after the 1880s. The major catalyst was Paris-based art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel’s 1886 exhibition of French Impressionist paintings in New York. Comprising nearly 300 paintings by Edgar Degas, Edouard Manet, Claude Monet, and others, the exhibition marked the beginning of serious interest in Impressionist art on behalf not only of American collectors, but also American painters.
The artists represented in American Impressionism: Paintings of Light and Life were among the first generation of American painters to utilize the techniques of their French counterparts, such as a brighter palette and the use of broken brushwork. While using innovative techniques, they were traditional in their selection of subject matter, seeking out and painting colorful landscapes, beach scenes, urban views, and perspectives of small town life. The artists had a particular interest in the way light could be captured on canvas.
“The Impressionists believed there was a lot more going on with the play of light on various surfaces than people realized, and that’s what they wanted to express in their painting,” D’Ambrosio added.
These works are on loan from several sources, including The Arkell Museum (Canajoharie, NY), The Florence Griswold Museum (Old Lyme, CT), The Parrish Museum (Southampton, NY), and The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY). The exhibition will also feature Bridge at Dolceacqua (1884) by Claude Monet (Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA), an excellent example of French Impressionism that inspired and influenced these American artists.
Illustration: Provincetown, 1900, by Childe Hassam (1859-1935), oil on canvas. Owned by the Arkell Museum Collection, Gift of Bartlett Arkell.