Website Widens Web

"We started off by saying, we need a simple site, nothing too complex, but something which is both user-friendly and useful to our patrons." said director Liz Shapiro. During its initial debut at the March, 2000, annual meeting of the Society, the site was largely formatted for information but unfinished. In the past month, both Liz and Marel have been hard at work filling in the information gaps.

A visitor to the website will have access to a fairly large source of information. Current headings feature information on upcoming lectures, family and school programs, membership information, Sharon and the iron industry, basic facts about Sharon history, selections from the collection — focusing particularly on the George Marckres collection of photographic images of Sharon, genealogy information and sources, a list of gift shop inventory and prices, as well as links to other Connecticut history-oriented web sites.

"Not only does the web site offer information about the Historical Society, we’ve tried to include bits and pieces of the most current information on Sharon history," says Marel Rogers, webmaster for the museum, whose specialty is "simple country pages." "We really hope that once the word gets out, the site will be used by local schools as well as researchers from around the country." The Society has already averaged three to five requests for information via the web site per month, and is answering many phone and written requests for information via e-mail.

Elyse Harney Real Estate has linked its site to ours, and features information about historical society happenings. In the next month, the Connecticut League of History Organizations will be debuting their new web site which will also be linked to SHS.

A $1000 seed grant from SNET helped to make these technological dreams a reality. "I feel very fortunate to have been able to move so far, so fast," says Liz Shapiro regarding the development and implementation of the web site, "I have to thank Marel Rogers for her talent and volunteerism, and SNET for their financial support."

Although the site is still a work in progress, there’s plenty of information to keep even the life-long Sharon resident interested. Let us know what you think!

In response to our fastest growing visitor population — families with small children, we now stock some of the highest quality reproduction or historically-inspired toys available. Whether you’re in the market for a game of marbles in a leather pouch, wooden pick-up sticks, or the challenge of the ever-popular ball & cup toy (watch the grown-ups fight the kids to try this one!), there is sure to be something in the selection just right for your holiday gift-giving needs.

Along with games, you can also find kits to make a Dancing Lady Doll or a Hat & Bandbox. For the littlest seamstresses you can find the "Sew N Sew" which teaches youngsters to sew using a wooden block and colored shoelaces. You can even find a quill pen, a Jacob’s Ladder toy, and a Historic map of Connecticut! For the genealogists in the crowd, there is a lovely family tree poster featuring a floral motif all ready to be filled in with the important people in your life.

Take the time to stop by the museum and visit the gift shop, you’ll be surprised at the treasures you’ll find!

Join author/lecturer and iron expert Ed Kirby in the field as he guides participants around some of the most important and interesting of Sharon’s 19th century industrial sites. Meet at the Historical Society between 9:30 and 10 a.m. to register and receive your map. After a brief overview, caravan to the Sharon Lime Kiln and the Sharon Valley Furnace (a site on private property.) Get your historical bearings at the Valley’s four corners, then on to Skinner’s Forge, Benedict’s Mill and the site of the Sharon Electric Company. Call Liz to pre-register!

Join Karen Dignacco for a two-hour, hands-on workshop on the hottest craft hobby around the country - scrapbooking! Americans spend a small fortune on photos each year, and most of us keep them in boxes, envelopes and drawers. If you’ve been wondering how to tackle your personal albatross of neglected photos, wonder no more! Following a presentation with instruction on theory and design, participants will receive scissors, a 12 x 12 scrapbook page, photomounting paper samples, and stickers to create a page of memories to last a lifetime. All materials used are archivally safe for photographs. There will be some discussion of appropriate ways to preserve old photographs. Bring some of your latest family pictures and enjoy an evening devoted to creating lasting memories!

This year’s museum exhibit, Sharon Voices 2000, an historical record of our town told through the words and personal stories of its people, will continue on display through May, 2001.

Museum hours are Friday through Sunday, noon-5 p.m. through October 8th. Please note that museum hours will change as of Monday, October 9th when winter hours take effect. Hours as of the ninth will be Tuesdays, 2-5 p.m. and Wednesday-Friday, 9 a.m. to noon. Special tours of the museum and exhibit may be arranged by calling Liz at (860) 364-5688.

Water Wonders Raises $14,000

Great Sharon Water Wonders, which took place under beautiful July skies, netted over $14,000 in this year’s annual summer fund raiser.

The opening party held on the eve of the tour of water gardens drew 180 people. Besides great food, music, a wonderful bar featuring the classic martini, hand-mixed by Lionel Goldfrank, the evening featured fishing for raffle prizes. Prizes taken home by the lucky winners included dinner at the West Main Restaurant; lunch at the Woodlands; a needle-point pillow from April 56; rose bushes from Beardsley Gardens; two garden urns from Old Farms Nursery; a Kate Spade handbag donated by board member Susan Ginkel; tickets to the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival and concert tickets to Music Mountain.

The success of the weekend event was thanks to the planning and efforts of a host of volunteers, committee members, garden owners and the generous support of local businesses. This year’s patron sponsor was the Salisbury Bank and Trust Company, with other sponsors including Elyse Harney Real Estate, New Milford Savings Bank, Scott Swimming Pools, Prindle Insurance, Monroe Tree Company, Sharon Autobody and Rick’s Wine & Spirits. Thank you to all for your wonderful showing of community support!

Kirby’s "Echoes of Iron" Wins Two Awards

Ed Kirby and the Society have been recognized by two prestigious awards for Echoes of Iron in Connecticut’s Northwest Corner, the story of two centuries of the tri-state area’s iron industry. The Connecticut League of History Organizations, at its annual meeting in June, presented its Award of Merit, recognizing the book’s exceptional contribution in furthering knowledge of state and local history.

Last month, the book received further honors when the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH) awarded a Certificate of Commendation for excellence in a history publication. Thrilled by the dual recognition of all the hard work and dedication that went into the book, Sharon Historical Society director Liz Shapiro said, "Echoes of Iron is the culmination of a life-long interest in the industrial, economic and social history of the northwest corner’s iron heritage. Both Ed Kirby and the Society’s Trustees truly deserve this honor for their hard work and support of this historically significant project."

Copies of the book are available in limited quantities at the museum for $15.

Architectural Survey Looks at Sharon’s Past

A copy of the recently completed Historic and Architectural Resource Survey of Sharon is now available for research use at the Historical Society. Field work and photography of some 160 historic Sharon buildings were carried out between last fall and April of this year. Compiled and published by the Connecticut Historical Commission, selection criteria for inclusion in this publication was weighted toward the oldest buildings, with virtually all verifiable eighteenth century buildings included, as well as a majority of nineteenth century structures and representative examples from the first half of the twentieth century. Severely altered buildings were not included.

The report acknowledges the contributing efforts of the Sharon Town Clerk, Linda Wasley, Sharon Assessors Helen Humeston, Deborah Reyelt, and Christine Snyder and Sharon Historical Society Director, Liz Shapiro.

The Historic and Architectural Resource Survey of Sharon was conducted in accordance with guidelines set out by the National Park Service. The book, researched by Salisbury resident Dr. Geoffrey Rossano, includes a nice introduction to Sharon history which will soon be available in condensed form on the Historical Society’s web site.

Oral History Program in Full Swing

As part of our Sharon Voices 2000 program, Liz Shapiro and Historical Society president Ed Kirby have spent their Thursday mornings this summer chatting with life-long Sharon residents. In the informal setting of Ed’s living room, armed with tape recorder, pen and paper, Liz and Ed have listened to some wonderful stories of Sharon’s past. People who have been interveiwed include Tom Loughlin, Stuart Prindle, Dr. G.S. Gudernatch, Reidar Holst-Grubbe, William Wilbur, John Humeston, and most recently, Morris and Emma Paley. Topics have ranged from baseball in Sharon, to life in a one-room schoolhouse, to farming in Sharon. If you are interested in being interviewed, please call Liz at the Society at (860) 364-5688 or Ed Kirby at (860) 364-5147. If you’re interested in hearing some great stories about Sharon, we are looking for people to transcribe the interviews! Call Liz for information.

Pre-Order Sedgwick’s History of Sharon in Time for the Holidays!

The fourth edition of a General History of The Town of Sharon, Litchfield County, Conn, From Its First Settlement, originally published in 1842 and authored by Charles F. Sedgwick, is entering its final pre-publication phase. This 200-page, soft-covered publication is available for the pre-publication price of $25 (regularly $30) plus $3 shipping & handling from the Society. The book includes chapters on the Indians in Sharon, Ecclesiastical Affairs, Events of the Revolutionary War and much more. Included are fifteen appendices, including the Census of 1790, and an index of family names. To order, call SHS, watch the mail for the upcoming flyer, or send a check for $25 (if you would like to pick the book up) or $28 (to have the book sent) to the Sharon Historical Society, P.O. Box 511, Sharon, CT 06069, attention "Sedgwick Book". Checks may be made payable to the Sharon Historical Society. The book is expected to be available in early-mid December. Pre-publication price is good through December 1, 2000.

PictUresqe and Historic Sharon

In 1904, Reverend Ulysses Grant Warren, then the pastor at Sharon’s "Methodist Episcopal Church", wrote a wonderful book entitled, Picturesque and Historic Sharon. The book, bound in leather, features photographs of many of Sharon’s most spectacular homes and text which attempts to illuminate topics ranging from Sharon’s origins, early years and wartime experience to Sharon’s religious life. The following passage is an exerpt from the book regarding Sharon’s involvement in the Civil War, including the story behind Sharon’s Civil War memorial. As enjoyable is the historic content, perhaps even more interesting is the tremendous insight on the part of the reader into the mind of the author. The preface to the book is quoted in its entirety to illustrate the author’s deep emotional attachment to Sharon. Original copies of the book may be viewed at the Historical Society. Call Liz at (860) 364-5688 or visit our website at www.sharonhist.org

That a book of this nature has not been written previous to this time is a surprise to the author. There are many publications on Sharon and the surrounding country. But for the most part they are fragmentary and without continuity of thought. It is to correct this error that I publish this book. Again, so many people say Sharon is beautiful. But Sharon is not only beautiful. I have striven to portray her in the whole reach of her picturesque, historic, ethic and economic life. I do not claim to have treated each of these phases exhaustively, nor to have presented all the attractions of the good old town. From the very nature of the work it is evident that it can scarcely be more than a suggestion of what Sharon has been, is and will be. Yet I have endeavored to present these suggestions logically, and lend continuity and purpose to them. The book merely explains why the people of Sharon can with real pride invite the outside world to look in upon them, and see how nature has blessed them and what has been done with the blessings. Perhaps my effort may suggest to someone the possibility of a larger work along this line, or it may be the means of bringing an author of national fame to study and write upon picturesque and historic Sharon. If so I shall feel well paid for my labors in giving this book to the public.

U.G. Warren

Sharon, Conn., September 1, 1904

From the moment when the peace and silence of that beautiful April’s morning were broken by the roar of cannon until on that other April’s day when Lee, beneath the outspreading branches of the apple-tree of Appomatax, handed his sword to General Grant, who promptly returned it, Sharon gave her men, her money, her time, her thought, yea, her life, in order that the Government of the United States might not be broken in twain. From almost every home up and down this lovely valley the sons of Sharon went forth at the call of Abraham Lincoln for 200,000 strong; went forth, in order that the precious blessings of free government and constitutional liberty might be eternally secured by every man of every race, color or previous condition of servitude; went forth, in order that there might be no North, no South, no East, no West, but union henceforth and forever, one and inseparable; went forth, in order, as the poet puts it,

In this brotherhood of the blue, Sharon had two hundred noble sons. They fought in nearly all the great battles of that war. They were with McClellan at Antietam. They fought on the field at Gettysburg. With Sherman, they marched to the sea. With Sheridan, they turned and went back. With Grant, they hunted the enemy through the wilderness of Virginia and died before Petersburg. They also were present when Lee surrendered and the Confederacy fell.

On July 25, 1862, a meeting was held in the Town Hall, Samuel Roberts, Esq., presiding. The people for miles around attended. It was impossible for more than twenty-five per cent of the gathered number to get inside. The feeling ran high. The whole town was in a state of wild excitement. At that time fathers, sons and brothers of Sharon were dying on the Southern battlefields. The writer has heard many people of this quiet town decry the method of burning at the stake, but it is safe to say that if a Johnny, or one who had a Johnny’s blood in his veins or a Johnny’s thoughts in his head, had appeared in that meeting and made himself known, the conscience of Sharon’s citizens, which is somewhat elastic, would not have stood between that creature and the flames leaping about a post on the village green. After some resolutions had been passed relative to bounty for volunteers, the method of raising money, and recruiting officers appointed, these further resolutions were adopted as expressive of the sense of the meeting:

The fathers and grandfathers of those noble boys who went out from Sharon to fight in the great civil strife had in other days and on other fields fought and bled and died for their country’s freedom and the founding of a government, and it was the duty of the nineteenth century sons to fight and to die, if needs be, to preserve that freedom and maintain that government. So they said goodbye to mother, sister and wife, and went to Southern battlefields, some never to return, some to be sent back wrapped in the Stars and Stripes, but others still were to come back to their families in Sharon, having escaped the shot and shell of Southern cannon. Most of these now have fallen beneath the sickle of Time, and their comrades have laid them to rest on the sunny slopes and beneath trees green in Hillside Cemetery, and on the 30th of May, when eighty million people are paying tribute to the honored dead of that great struggle the few remaining members of the John M. Gregory Post, No. 59, G.A.R., rally beneath the tattered flag, and with bodies not only beaten by the storms of battle but burdened by the weight of years and by the many cares and sorrows of life, yet still with brave and courageous hearts, they march to the graves of Sharon’s honored dead and plant tiny flags o’er those sleeping ones who died for right, for country and for God. Old Father Time, more accurate in his sight, more deadly in his aim than the Southern gunner, is thinning out these ranks as the years go by, and soon of that splendid army that Abraham Lincoln marshaled on the battlefield there will remain not one, no not one. Still memory will live, and we thank God that it will be a memory of duty done, and done well.

####

A few years after the war had closed, and the great struggle became history and soldiers became citizens, a movement was set on foot to erect a monument that should proclaim the noble deeds of Sharon’s sons who had fought in the great Civil War and had laid down their lives for their colored brother and their country. The John M. Gregory Post, No. 59, G.A.R., co-operating with some other prominent citizens of Sharon, called a town meeting, which proved to be very large and enthusiastic. The following resolution was introduced and adopted:

Work was immediately begun. On the 6th day of August, 1885, the dedicatory services were held and the monument unveiled. These services were enthusiastic and impressive. Three posts of the G.A.R. from different parts of the State joined in the procession of the day, several bands furnished the music, and speakers of prominence delivered the different addresses. Rev. C.B. Landon, former pastor of the M.E. Church, offered prayer. Col. H.H. Fenn, of Winsted, made the dedicatory address. Mrs. John C. Terrett was the poet of the occasion, and the Rev. Hiram Eddy, of Canaan, delivered the oration of the day. The benediction was pronounced, the services ended, and the monument was unveiled to the town of Sharon. As the sun went down that evening, looking up from over the tops of the clouds that hung low about the horizon, he saw another monument erected to the fallen heroes of the war of 1861-5. When the western skies were paling, the afterglow fading, and the day dying, standing in the presence of the beautiful monument, newly unveiled, I recalled these words: