Steve Wakefield, a Living Historian

May 4, 2011Posted inDanville Green, Historical events, Historical people, Uncategorized

A Vermont Civil War Hemlock explains why he takes part

Steve Wake­field, liv­ing his­to­ri­an with the Ver­mont Civ­il War Hemlocks

By Sharon Lakey

At the 125th anniver­sary of the sur­ren­der of Lee’s army at Appo­mat­tox, Steve Wake­field, liv­ing his­to­ri­an, had one of those crys­talline moments. “I was with the 5th of New Hamp­shire at the head of the col­umn. When I turned around, I saw 3,000 fed­er­al troops stand­ing behind me, all per­fect­ly aligned. “The moment didn’t last long, maybe three sec­onds, but in those few sec­onds, I was there.” To be trans­port­ed through time—those are the sec­onds a liv­ing his­to­ri­an cherishes.

In 1963, Andy Fish­er, a his­to­ry teacher in Con­cord, VT, attend­ed the 100th obser­vance of the Bat­tle of Get­tys­burg, a reen­act­ment of the bat­tle that turned the tide in the Civ­il War. The event was so inspir­ing to him, he returned home to cre­ate the Ver­mont Civ­il War Hem­locks, a non-prof­it group whose goal is edu­ca­tion. Three years lat­er, 16-year-old Steve Wake­field went to one of the group’s meet­ings and joined. He was uni­formed and equipped in 1971 and took part in his first reen­act­ment that year.

“I don’t like the term reen­act­ment,” said Wake­field. “I am a liv­ing his­to­ri­an.” He goes on to explain that to reen­act implies an indi­vid­ual is act­ing. “We don’t act; dur­ing an event, we actu­al­ly live the expe­ri­ence 24-hours a day. At night, we don’t retire to the tent with a beer cool­er.” And any­one who has wit­nessed the Hem­locks in action, per­haps in some­thing as sim­ple as a parade, rec­og­nizes imme­di­ate­ly that they are liv­ing in the moment, and it is not tak­en lightly.

Preparation for War and Watchful Waiting

May 4, 2011Posted inHistorical events, Uncategorized

Going to see the Ele­phant, Part 2

The 1st Ver­mont went to Fort Mon­roe at the begin­ning of the Civ­il War

By Paul Chouinard, Pres­i­dent of the Danville His­tor­i­cal Society

From the out­set, both as it assumed sta­tus as an inde­pen­dent repub­lic in 1777 and as it entered state­hood in1791, Ver­mont out­lawed slav­ery.  Ver­mont set an exam­ple through its pro­gres­sive posi­tion of treat­ing blacks as equals long before the Civ­il War.  There were some instances of Slave-hold­ing in the state, but these were few.

Alexan­der Twilight

Alexan­der Twi­light, born in 1795 in Corinth was the first black man in Amer­i­ca to earn a col­lege degree.  He grad­u­at­ed from Mid­dle­bury Col­lege in 1823.  He went on to become a promi­nent edu­ca­tor in Brown­ing­ton, VT and to be elect­ed to the VT leg­is­la­ture in 1836.

Ned, You Ought To Take Me in Your Auto

April 4, 2011Posted inDanville Green, From the archives

The story of the first automobile in Danville

Ned Pet­tengill’s lit­tle red car, the first in Danville, sits in front of the Bad­ger black­smith shop on what is now Route 2.

By Mark R. Moore

Ancient Roads. When I first heard of their exis­tence, I had visions of a myth­i­cal high­way hid­den under the soil and stones in some cor­ners of the Repub­lic of Ver­mont. Soon I learned it was a mat­ter of old, fad­ed charts and the rec­ol­lec­tions of long-time res­i­dents. But even the maps and mem­o­ries get fuzzy with the pas­sage of time. The roads become ruts, the ruts get filled in, and the road becomes not an obscure ram­ble through the forest.

Yet the doc­u­ments at the Danville His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety set me on a clear path where I met the image of the first car and first car own­er in Danville–the recent­ly mar­ried 24-year-old own­er of a red tour­ing auto­mo­bile, Ned Pet­tengill. But first, let’s review a bit of his­to­ry of the auto­mo­bile in Vermont.

School on a Mission

March 30, 2011Posted inDanville Green

Danville School receives high national recognition

Meg Pow­den, Co-Prin­ci­pal of Danville School

By Sharon Lakey

8:00 on a Mon­day morn­ing, and the Danville School front desk was hop­ping. Three ele­men­tary school­girls, obvi­ous­ly excit­ed about some­thing, were wait­ing their turn to speak to one of the sec­re­taries. Tow­er­ing above them was a lanky high school boy, ask­ing about tick­ets to the boys’ bas­ket­ball semi-final game at the Aud. “All sold out,” the sec­re­tary said apolo­get­i­cal­ly, “but you can get them over there before the game.” It was pleas­ant, orga­nized-chaos that I remem­bered well from my own children’s school days in Danville. I was on a mis­sion, too, need­ing to sign in with the sec­re­tary before meet­ing with co-prin­ci­pal, Meg Powden.

 

The mis­sion: get the sto­ry behind Danville School’s nation­al recog­ni­tion as a best school. Sur­pris­ing­ly, it was an hon­or I had not read about in our own local media; instead, it was men­tioned in con­ver­sa­tions with peo­ple I had out­side of our area, both in and out of state. Hav­ing worked in a pub­lic school in Ver­mont dur­ing the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) high-stakes test­ing years, I knew this des­ig­na­tion was no small feat.

Meg arrived through the maze of stu­dents before a bell sound­ed and all moved off in the direc­tion of their assigned rooms. She escort­ed me up the ramp, past the lunch­room, and into her office in the upper hall. It was not an impos­ing office, look­ing like a small con­vert­ed class­room space. After explain­ing my mis­sion, she brought out her lap­top and locat­ed the sites where Danville is listed.