Historical societies gear up to celebrate America’s 250th

Just in time for the upcoming commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, 19 Dutchess County historical societies have been awarded $100,000 in grant money by the Dutchess County Legislature.

Announced by Dutchess County Historian Will Tatum at a December 2024 meeting, all twenty historical societies in the county would have the opportunity to apply for the grant in tandem with the anniversary, known as Rev250. The funds have been allocated to support a wide variety of programs, events and exhibits across the 19 historical societies.

Dyan Wapnick, president of Pine Plains’ Little Nine Partners Historical Society, said the pool of funds was originally $75,000, but was increased to the final amount of $100,000 due to impressive applications and detailed plans.

“Of the 20 historical societies, 19 applied, and out of 27 project proposals, 23 were funded,” Wapnick said.

Robert McHugh, president of the Millbrook Historical Society, described the application process as competitive. “We had to lay out our plans for publicity, for what audience we hoped to attract and what we wanted them to take away from the programs,” he said.

Although there were a wide variety of possible programs, Wapnick said, “the minute the grant was announced I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to write a play about the experience of Pine Planes Revolutionary War widow Mary Ingalls applying for her husband’s pension in 1842.” The story had inspired Wapnick ever since she came across the Ingalls’ records in the National Archives.

Following the themes set by the grant, “The monologue theme chosen is ‘Power of Place’ and the play theme is ‘We the People,’” Wapnick said.

Wapnick took to writing the play herself, “the development and writing of the play has taken the most hours,” she said. “Even though I had much of the research material on hand or available through online websites like Ancestry.com, I still had to tie it all together with a storyline.”

Along with Wapnick’s play, “Widow’s Weeds,” which will take place at 4 to 6 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 6, at the Stissing Center, there will be a full day of activities from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Graham-Brush House. Events include blacksmith and cooking demonstrations, tours of the house and talks and reenactments of Revolutionary soldiers, all of which are free.

Similarly, the Millbrook Historical Society has added additional programming with the allocated funds from the two grants it received. The first allows for the society to bring in two speakers to the Nine Partners Meeting house for lectures on Quaker history. Professor Sara Gronningsater from the University of Pennsylvania spoke on Quakers, Manumission and Abolition on Sunday, June 29, and Professor Carl Lounsbury from the College of William and Mary will speak on Sunday, July 27, from 2 to 3 p.m. on the architecture of the Nine Partners Meeting House.

The other grant, which includes four different Quaker meeting houses, will allow for tours open to the public on the first Sunday of each month from noon to 4 p.m. until November.

For McHugh and the Millbrook Historical Society, events that centered on Quaker history were “an obvious solution, because the Quaker meeting house that we have in Millbrook is probably the most historically important building. It is from 1780.”

McHugh also noted that Quaker history in Dutchess County is intertwined with the American Revolution, and therefore, a valuable outlet for the funds they received.

Although unrelated to the Rev250 grant, the North East Historical Society plans to explore and discuss the effects of the American Revolution through an exhibit at the NorthEast-Millerton Library during the month of November. They will also host a presentation by historian Anthony Musso on effects of the Revolution in the Hudson Valley on Saturday, Nov. 15, at 2 p.m. in the Library Annex.

Along with Millbrook and Pine Plains, historical societies in Amenia and Stanford also have big plans for events made possible by grant money.

The Amenia Historical Society will host a lecture about the journal of Cadwallader Colden, a Loyalist imprisoned in Amenia during the American Revolution. The event will be presented by researcher Jay Campbell on Saturday, Sept. 27, at 2 p.m. at the Amenia Town Hall Auditorium.

The Stanford Historical Society plans to host two free lectures by Professor Dillon Streifeneder at the Stanford Free Library on Friday, July 18, regarding post-Revolution changes in government, and Friday, Sept. 19, about the town of Stanford as it became an independent town in 1793.

The grant allows smaller towns and historical societies to acknowledge and teach about their rich history and role in the American Revolution. “We are immensely grateful to the county for its generosity and interest in promoting local history programming into its towns,” Wapnick stated. “We are hopeful this continues our efforts to bring local history programming to the community and make the public aware of the events that have shaped small rural towns like Pine Plains.”

McHugh put it simply, the programs “wouldn’t be happening without the funding,” he said.

McHugh noted that this is a way to draw people to Dutchess County and spread its history. “It’s an endorsement,” he said. “This is actually important and the people in power who allocate funds support this kind of effort. I think it’s a good sign.”