HISTORIAN S REPORT to the TOWN BOARD s1

HISTORIAN’S REPORT to the TOWN BOARD

APRIL 19, 2011

Sharon Allen has returned from Florida & we are glad to have her back.

Val DeLeo donated an old recipe book . It is not your usual recipe book because in addition to food recipes your can make indelible ink, Somersets healing linement, mend china etc. The last recipe in the book is dated 1927 making the rest of them much earlier.

Looking at old pictures of homes in the Hall area has all of us racking our brains. “ Fairview Farm” caused the most confusion until Lisa finally found “Fairview Farm” written sideways on the 1904 map. It is on the Gorham-Hall Rd. near the Wilson St. end of the road.

And so it goes, as we try to put together the pieces of our history.

Your Historian attended a 3 day conference April 4-6 in Elmira. This one was presented by APHNYS (Association of Public Historians of NYS). There was much focus on the Civil War since this year is the 150th year since it started.

One of the presentations was about women in the Civil War. 130 women posed as men to be a soldier. In that time they bathed in streams and dressed & toileted behind bushes making their disguise possible. One woman soldier from the Binghamton area took on the name Edwin. She died of dysentery in Louisiana & was buried there. Her family never knew what happened to her. The letters she had written home were found in an attic in the 1940’s.

History has many interesting stories to tell.

I think that it is noteworthy to pass on that New York is the only state that has a mandated system of Historians at each level of government. Making it much easier to find information in our state compared to others.

Jane Wolfe

Town of Seneca Historian