Colrain Archives

 New Items as of April 29 - binders &  2 Gems  Several Colrain historical items were found in the hall chest upstairs in the Pitt House during our work bee on Friday the 26th. Mixed in with some Bill Pitt theatre scrapbooks and some old dolls, we found two gems - an pre-revolutionary account ledger, and the 1939 manuscript for the History of the Griswoldville mills. This "new items" batch has those two and several other things we have cataloged this past week. See also the airtable link to all the New items. # 3583    Richard Ellis Account Book   1765 This may be the most historically valuable item in the CHS collections, a 6" x 16" ledger of sales and payments starting in 1765.   On several dozen double pages in this book Mr. Ellis kept track of each of his regular customers buying and selling. Below we see that James Clark was paying for his purchases (on the left page) with loads of ashes (right page). This may mean that storekeeper Ellis had a "potash w

 Here is a link to 18 "new" items which we have cataloged and scanned since the last post. This April 24 batch is a pretty "dry"  collection, mostly old CHS and Pitt House papers which were found loose in the office and in the Pitt Bedroom this month. Rather than just put them into a filing cabinet, we thought it best to catalog and store them just like the "real" historical items. That way they can be easily found in the future. *** Many of the CHS documents are available as PDF files for download*** #2564-1  Bill Pitt's "Sherwood Forest" typed sheets for house guests in the 1950s.   Note:   "the bathroom is off the kitchen" -that's our office today. -- # 2567  the Old CHS Website from 2000 +- #2575 is Prentice Crosier's "Tour and Guide to the Collection" from 2018, Revised 2023. Although the house is being rearranged now,  this narrative is a nice (limited)  summary of the Pitt House Collection . The whole docum

43  "New" items cataloged since early April at the Colrain Historical Society. Most of these are items which were not cataloged prior to now, including several things found in the Pitt bedroom.  Click here for the databas e # 200-217  many old deeds The "43" included about 400 old deeds (cataloged as "17" items) , dating from the late 1700s to about 1930.  These are original land deeds which came from the Registry of Deeds, then to Town of Colrain, then to CHS. They were removed from two oversized boxes, sorted into 17 small batches by decade, and stored in small storage boxes. Most of the deeds are mid-to late 1800s. There are a handful of very early deeds, one of them by Jesse Lyon(s), the noted Colrain furniture builder.  In 1801 Jesse sold 1/4 of an acre to a Judah Pierce and recorded the deed with his signature and a waxed seal of paper.  (Item 202-1). There is also one 1776 deed for 100 acres to Abraham Pennell, also with a waxed seal #2531  Levi Lin

  New Items added to database as of April 8 2024. "New" includes items we found floating about, not cataloged until now, and old items whose pictures were added. There are 22 additions to the online Airtable database since March xx. https://airtable.com/appZT73u0VhiS67ZX/shrigyvqQPbwfFAPe You will see a list.  Click on the leftmost field (diagonal lines) to enlarge . Then , using small arrows in upper left corner you can scroll through the 22 records. It's not the most user friendy...but it works. Highlights: #2507     2 small forestry maps of the Pitt House Property. This one below has boundaries. #2511   a 1997 news story about artist Hale Johnson. He had roots in Colrain for many generations (his Mom's side) and was a major benefactor of the CHS. (He died in 2022). #2514    A nicely done family history "A History of Coombs Hill..." by the late Russell Coombs. #2519     3-ring binder of earliest CHS records  1956-1975. Including a June 1956 letter suggesti

 On Thursday April 4 Sarah and I worked at the Pitt house. Just us as a snowstorm kept others away.  We cataloged about 10 loose items in the office such as news clippings, and an envelope of WW1 photos of a young soldier and his family.  We labelled with numbers the backs of a dozen or so hanging pictures in the Booth Room, and photographed the backs of each. Interesting info.... On Friday Dave and Prentice started cleaning up the Pitt Bedroom. We numbered and photographed about 50 small framed photos for which Prentice added notes for those he could identify. Most of these appear to be Mr. Pitt's clients when he was a booking agent for entertainers in the 1950s.  We sorted about 40 file folders with papers into Pitt or CHS categories and boxed the Pitt folders into a box for future review.  CHS material was moved to office for cataloging. ------ That's It --------------------------