Vol. 1, No. 2                                                                           November 2006

Fall Meeting Recap

The Friends of Pisgah hosted our fall Roundtable meeting at the Pisgah State Park Visitor Center in Winchester on Thursday October 19th. Twenty-two people attended the meeting representing fourteen organizations.

We held our Roundtable meeting in the morning, and after our brown bag lunch toured the newly and beautifully restored barn that is being used as museum space for old equipment, tools, and historical displays by the Park. With our tour complete, long time Park volunteer Cliff Struthers guided us by vehicle to a former home site that he has researched, surveyed, and mapped. We explored the site with Cliff bringing to life its history and use. Cliff has been researching, surveying, and mapping the many old home sites to gain a better understanding of the settlement history in the Park.

We wish to thank the Friends of Pisgah for hosting and supplying wonderful refreshments, Pisgah State Park manager Norma Reppucci for welcoming us to the Park and in sharing some of its history, and Cliff Struthers for his guided tour of the barn and former home site.

Our next meeting will be on Thursday February 15, 2007 at the Historical Society of Cheshire County beginning at 9:30 a.m. The January newsletter will have further details on the meeting.

Meetinghouse Exhibit is on View

On the evening of Monday November 27, 2006, the Monadnock Historical Societies Forum collaborative exhibit Sacred and Secular: Historic Meetinghouses and Churches of the Monadnock Region, 1750 to 1850 opened. More than one hundred people attended the opening to view the exhibit and to hear a program on the history of meetinghouses in New England by architectural historian Will Morgan from Providence, Rhode Island.

The evening was also the official announcement of the companion publication by the same name. More than twenty communities and over forty historic meetinghouses and churches are represented in the 88-page publication. The collaborative publication includes an overview of the architecture, role, and importance of 18th and early 19th century meetinghouses and how this changed in response to the Toleration Act of 1819 that created a separation of church and state over issues of taxation and the support the town's settled minister; individual town meetinghouse histories; a chronology of when meetinghouses were built; and a list of surviving meetinghouses and their current use. The entire publication is richly illustrated with photographs and a Monadnock region map.

The meetinghouse sub-committee wishes to thank all the participating historical organizations who compiled their meetinghouse history, donated photographs, or loaned artifacts for the exhibit. The exhibit will be on view through March 31, 2007 at the Historical Society, 246 Main Street, Keene, from Tuesday to Friday 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., Wednesday evening until 9:00 p.m., and Saturday 9:00 a.m. to noon. It is free and open to the public and generously supported by Ocean National Bank, SVE Associates, Cox Woodworking, Daniel V. Scully, Architect, Weller & Michal Architects, and the Keene Sentinel.

The Sacred and Secular publication is available at the Historical Society of Cheshire County's museum book store for $10.00.

Sacred and Secular Available for Sale

Do you sell local publications at your facilities? Sacred and Secular is available at wholesale costs for your organization to sell and benefit. If you would like to add Sacred and Secular to your sale items, please contact HSCC at 352-1895 or dired@hsccnh.org.

Exhibit Donation

We are still accepting $25 donations from Roundtable members to help support the costs of the exhibit and accompanying publication. For your donation you will receive two free copies of the publication. If you would like to contribute or order Sacred and Secular, please use the enclosed order form.

Newsletter Ideas & Logo

There will be six Roundtable Forum newsletter issues each year, January, March, May, July, September, and November. Comments, suggests, or ideas for our new newsletter format are welcome. Our Roundtable meeting schedule will remain the same, meeting on the 3rd Thursday of February, June, and October.

It might also be fun to have a simple Monadnock Historical Societies Forum logo to add to our newsletter and other documents we might prepare. If you have a logo idea or would like to try your hand at designing a logo, please contact Tom Haynes or 352-1895.

Contact Information

For all questions or concerns regarding any aspect of the Monadnock Historical Societies Forum, please contact Historical Society of Cheshire County's Tom Haynes at 603-352-1895 or dired@hsccnh.org. Please remember to post or share this newsletter with your members. Also, please submit your events to have them posted on the Roundtable Events page of the HSCC web site.