Waterford Historical Society (CT)
For the second year, in 2024, the Waterford Historical Society welcomed students, teachers and chaperones on two sunny May mornings to tour 9 locations on Jordan Green to experience what life was like “way back when.” Society members and the living historians, the Dirty Blue Shirts, demonstrated rope making, hearth cooking, blacksmithing, food preserving, and herb gardening. Students were quizzed in the one-room schoolhouse by “Miss Etter” dressed in full period attire, and shown farming implements in Stacy Barn harkening back to when Waterford boasted 100 dairy farms.The “hot spot” was the blacksmith shop that held students’ attention, as did the heirloom apple orchards and discovering the outhouse behind Beebe-Phillips House! A wonderful time was had by all!
As a follow-up, teachers were asked to have 3rd graders draw a picture of what impressed them most that day, and 5th graders to write a short essay on their experience. Society board members’ difficult deliberations yielded the winners! President Kristen Widham and Assistant Superintendent Craig Powers surprised 3rd-grade Oswegatchie student Honesty Castro and 5th-grade Great Neck Elementary School student Sophie Anglim in their classrooms with a special award: a citation and a hand-crafted horseshoe hanging hook made by the blacksmiths!