. .

UPCOMING EVENTS

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Regular Meetings, 6 PM, First Monday of every

month. In the conference room of the Bethel Town

Hall. If the first Monday falls on a holiday the meeting will be held on the second Mon-

day of the month.

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Spring Art Show

Bethel Town Hall

Saturday, May 6

Sunday, May 14

Sunday, May 21

Saturday, May 27

11am-2pm

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Bethel Historical Society

Museum will be open during

the Spring Art Show

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Watch The Herald & BHS

Facebook page for other special events.

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We review the past not in order that we may return to it

But that we find in what

direction straight and clear,

it points to the future.

Bethel Historical Society And Museum at Town Hall Newsletter

May 2017

Three ladies...Ann Noble (center), Irene Cushing (right) in the fancy fluffy hat...third gal (left) unknown.

The Bethel Historical Society was organized in 1970. Miss Irene Cushing was

elected president.

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Irene Cushing was one of the founding members of the Bethel Historical Society. In the 1970’s she wrote a column under the heading Building Bethel by The Bethel Historical Society for The Herald. The following excerpts are almost entirely from some of her pieces.

1780- September 6th is a date to be noted for its historical significance. On that date in 1780, Asa Smith was born, the first child to be born in the town of Bethel. Asa Smith died in 1859 on the same farm where he was born and was buried in Old Christ Church cemetery.

1794 – Rochester Mountain Road is not the present Camp Brook Road, but an earlier one that roughly paralleled it. The “old road” took off from the present Route 12 just north of the Norm Case residence.

1815 – Mount Tambora (in what is now Indonesia) erupted. It was the most devastating volcanic explo-sion in recorded history and would affect weather all around the world. In Vermont it would be called 1800 and Froze To Death.

1816 –The United Church of Bethel was built by five different Protestant religions.

1837 – Excerpts from a letter written by James Noble to his brother John. Both related to the Noble fami-ly of Bethel. “Nearly two months have elapsed since I left you, in which time I have traveled nearly 3,000 miles. Three days we traveled from Baltimore to Washington in the stage without sleep or stop but to eat and change horses. I remained in Washington a week, much to my benefit, as I think, as I was enabled to see men as they really are. And the result has been that I find little integrity in Congress and little honesty – all things are settled on party grounds, which I consider despicable.”

(On to New Orleans) “It contains from 50,000 to 80,000 in habitants, a motley crew of all nations and tongues and the gibbering would quite equal a flock of blackbirds. I was at an auction of slaves. The first I saw was a girl standing on a bench before the auctioneer. She was dressed well enough – clean with a ker-chief tied about her head and she was described to be 18 years old, healthy and sound, could wash and iron and something of a cook, addicted to no bad viscous habits. Who bids $900, $1000, $1100,$1110, Gone. And she follows her new master.”

1893 – January – Henry Burrelle “our Henry” was signed as pitcher for San Francisco team for the com-ing baseball season at 200 a month.

1893 – April – C.D. Cushing’s stock of new buggies is taking off like hot cakes. Call to see them if you want to purchase.

1893 – A Great Appetizer. Ask for B-L Tobacco. Helps digest your food. Delicate delicious Chew.

1893 – A large band of gypsies passed through town Thursday and camped at the mouth of Cleveland Brook. There were three big covered carriages, seven horses and many babies. Bert Rogers, hearing of their presence, speedily hastened to their rendezvous and traded horses with them.

1893 – The Selectmen have sold the town poor farm on Camp Brook to Elwin Flint for $40.

1893 – The pusillanimous minded and pachydermatous conscience-ed individual who stole fifteen chick-ens from W. H. Gilmore last Saturday evening is known to some and if restitution is not made to the old man from whom they were stolen, that name will become public property.

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1895 – There is considerable complaint in regard to bears on Rochester Mountain and some of the farm-ers are taking in their sheep in consequence. 1895 – As Melville Chamberlain was coming down the hill from his house the morning of the 6th, 2 large panthers gambled by him. He described them as being as big as the famous Barnard panther and of a yel-lowish tinge. 1895 – The Latin salutatory was delivered by Miss Ann Kimball in a graceful and easy manner, the long jointed phrases of the ancient and venerable language falling from her lips as if her mother tongue. 1895 – Last week a telephone call was received here that two desperate criminals have crossed the moun-tains and were headed for Bethel. Within a few minutes after receiving the message Officer Guy Wilson saw the two coming through the street. Making a dash he seized them. Before they had time to realize what had happened they were secured. Officers arrived soon after and they were started for their old quarters. 1895 – C.V.R.R. Timetable shows: 4 trains going north daily. 4 trains going south daily. 1895 – A syndicate of local capitalists is behind the scheme for furnishing electric lights to Bethel. The company has the use of the immense water power at Gaysville, best in this part of the state, and it is pro-posed to go ahead when the patronage of 1200 lights is secured. With almost no work at all, over 800 are already assured. The extremely low price at which the lights will be furnished makes it but a question of a year when kerosene will be almost an unknown article in Bethel village. The company engages to furnish light at a cost not exceeding a dollar and a half per year, which is far below the cost of kerosene. Lighting facilities will also be provided at Gaysville and probably the shoe shop and tannery will run by the same power, and it is within the realm of possibilities, that a heating apparatus will soon be perfected that will make it economical to use the same energy for heating houses and stores of Bethel. Who can tell the end? 1895 – Contractor Moor’s gang of concreters have begun concreting the sidewalks. 1895 – Where shall I hitch my horse when I drive into the village from my farm? The streets of Bethel Vil-lage, narrow enough before, have been made still narrower by a concrete walk this year on each side of the business section, and now it is being agitated that all hitching posts in the business section should be removed. Some mornings it is like playing a game of pigs in the clover to attempt to run the gauntlet of moving and fastened teams in the village. 1900 –August – The canary of Mrs. Nellie Cushing escaped last Sunday forenoon from its cage and there has been considerable excitement in trying to capture it. F.B. Ryan, C. I Chadwich, Dab Sulie, Fred Marsh and C. B. Soper all tried their hands but with no success. It was seen in the trees in the vicinity for several days. Wednesday morning, the aged, toothless cat of E. M. Weston brought in birdie all un-harmed. 1924 – August 21 – KKK burn cross in Barnard 1924 – October 16 – Bethel’s first big KKK meeting. Held in Shaw’s pasture. 600 attendance. 1925 – October 15 – Blizzard 1933 – January – The first twenty days of January have set a record for summery winter weather. During the whole time, on only two days has there been snow on the ground. The through roads are generally free of all ice and this includes the roads over the Green Mountains to Rutland. The Bethel streets have aver-aged as dry as in summer. Back roads are quite passable though icy and rutty in spots. The greater num-ber of the days have been clear and not unlike Indian summer. In some warmer sections the trees have begun to bud out. Fish worms crawl about with the full belief that it is the proper time to be eaten by fish.

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Pictures from our Fall Art Show 2016

Puzzle created by Susie Fedak

Come visit our Spring Art Show! From 11 am to 2 pm on Saturday, May 6th, Sunday, May 14th, Saturday, May 21st, and Sunday, May 27th at the Bethel Town Hall.

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Excerpts from a letter written in 1878 by Martin Kellogg, Jr. to his daughter Lucy:

Bronson, Ohio September 21, 1878

KELLOGG

As seen in Picturesque Huron, 1896

Dear Daughter Lucy,

You have often asked me to write you a letter, I will begin by saying that the date above given counts my age namely ninety two years, and what can you expect in the way of writing from one at that age?

I hardly know upon what subject to write as there are so many that might be presented. Perhaps some family records might be as acceptable as any-thing I can present. You grandfather Martin Kellogg was born in Springfield, Massachusetts November 2, 1759; died March 4, 1850.

Your grandmother Lucy Dunham was born in Wilbraham, Mass., time of birth is not known; died in 1811.

I have no record of time of their marriage. There were born eleven children: Sally, Martin (myself), Thomas, Lucy, Ruth, Polly, Philena, Silas, Asenath, Parry and Truda.

Perhaps some items of my early history might be acceptable. My advantages for education were very limited; schools were few and far between. My first recollection of attending school was in the upper part of an old Malthouse. After this, school was held in old forsaken dwelling houses. Also, Amanda Sally Chaplin was my first teacher; after this Miss Polly Smith was teacher.

Mr. Ezra Benjamin, a good teacher in read-

ing, writing and arithmetic, taught two winters in a

dwelling house of two rooms; the first winter Mr.

Zachary Deans family occupied one room, the school

the other. The second winter Mr. Daniel Ainsworth

and family occupied one room, the school the other. This was in the village of Bethel.

Martin Kellogg was born September 21, 1786, in Bethel, Windsor Co VT

He married in 1809 to Lucy Fay, also of Windsor county. In June 1815,

Mr. And Mrs. Kellogg located in Huron county, where they remained the

Balance of their livers. At the age of 105 years, ten months and twenty-seven

Days, Mr. Kellogg died August 17, 1892.

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WHITE RIVER ON RAMPAGE Copied from a newspaper dated March 10, 1910

Twenty Bethel Families Driven from Their Homes Some Rescued by Boats Bethel, March 1, 1910. The ice went out of the White River at this place at 4:00 o'clock yesterday afternoon. For four hours before this the dwellers on River street and on the other lower streets of the village were in a state of anxiety not easily imagined. A jam from up the river came down at 12:00 o'clock and covered half the length of the solid mass of thick ice in the mill pond of the Bethel Electric Light and Power company, part of this was ice which piled up six weeks ago at the time of the January thaw. The water was never so high in the White river as for an hour or more yesterday afternoon, and the fate of River street was known to depend on an early breaking away of the thick ice. Fortunately the large deposit of ice in the Gaysville Electric Light and Power company's pond six miles above here did not come down, although usually the ice at Gaysville goes out first. As many as twenty families vacated their houses, and will find them very damp on their return as the cellars in most cases were full of water. Three members of the family of Antonio Fum-agalli were rescued in a boat by Howard Gray and Fred Hayes after the water had suddenly sur-rounded their home. Work at the Woodbury stone shed ceased at 12:00 o'clock, the power station having been dis-abled by the rising water. The Bethel Electric Light & Power company had intended to blast out the ice in the pond this week, not anticipating the ice to break this early. The oldest residents of River street say that the river never before crossed the street at George W. Berry’s so deep as today.

Bethel Years Ago!

Men talking at intersection of Church Street & Main Street

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I rather believe there is someone in the picture you have seen before. This was taken on the school grounds, It doesn’t show the school building.

Bethel around 1910

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Bethel History Word Search

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Bethel Historical Society Website:

http://bethelvt.com

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MAIL TO:

Bethel Historical Society

PO Box 25

Bethel, VT 05032

Help Us To Preserve Bethel’s History

CONTACT US:

Pres. Greg Fedak,

E-mail: nick@nikolaidis.com

Vice Pres. Janet Hayward Burnham

E-mail: JHaywardBurnham@aol.com

Treasurer: Susie Fedak

Secretary: JoAnn Marshall

E-mail joann_marshall@comcast.net

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Created by Susie Fedak