The Muse
Newsletter of the Slater Memorial Museum Summer 2008
Norwich Celebrates Part II The Second in a Series By Vivian F. Zoë
Not to be outdone by the extravaganzas of the Bicentennial and the 250th, and despite the depths of the depression, Norwich townsfolk found many ways to celebrate the 150th of incorporation and the 275th of founding. For July 1934, another four-day celebration was planned. It drew a great deal from the earlier events, with exhibitions, a parade, the notation of important sites and homes, a huge pageant and medals and ribbons for attendees and committee members. The Norwich Sunday Record announced that “10,000” were expected and that there would be “over 60 floats by business firms, societies, individuals, etc., over 10 bands and a number of drum corps”. A news article traced the parade route and enumerated the dignitaries whose attendance was anticipated. To be included were floats by the Daughters of United Civil War Vets;
Image Parade for Front Page
Catholic Ladies of Columbus; United German Societies; Ukrainian Society; and the United Textile Workers. Music that day came from, among others, the U. S. Coast Guard Academy and Polish Society Bands. Marching were members of the Sedwick Women’s Relief Corps; the Columbian Commandery De Molay; the Degree of Pocahontas; the Grand United order of Odd Fellows; Buckingham Council of American Mechanics and Children of the Playground Association. In addition to the Coast Guard, submariners from Groton and New London were expected. William R. Denison, captain of the 192nd field artillery, C.N.G. was named Marshal and expected to do a fine job lining up the disparate groups for their march. Both judges and doctors were enlisted for the event. Slater Museum director Mrs. Ozias Dodge pledged the “art Gallery” with student guides to assist visitors; Charlotte Fuller Eastman pledged the Converse Art Gallery and building to exhibit artwork by Norwich Art School students. An early plan to have the art students create plaster figures representing the great events in Norwich history must have fallen by the wayside. But manufacturers were enlisted to place their wares in empty storefronts to “enliven the streets” and citizens were asked to decorate their homes. A city-wide clean-up, touch-up campaign was implemented. (Continued on page 3)
A Message from the Director
As a late-spring rain finally hydrates our thirsty trees and new tomato plants, I envision the summer ahead and the planned restoration work on our cast collection. A recent trip abroad brought me to the University at Göttingen, about 150 kilometres north of Frankfurt. There, I met with Dr. Daniel Graepler, professor of archaeology. In addition, Dr. Graepler is overseer of the university’s immense collection of plaster casts, its Sammlung Gipsabgusse. The archaeology department sees these as primarily study casts, although, the University’s art history department also has a small collection of cast “reductions” with their original patinas. Interestingly, the archaeology department has had, on staff since 2002, a professional conservator, Stefanie Bauer, who has steadily improved the condition of their collection. She now estimates that she is about a year away from finishing the treatment of every piece in their collection of several hundred. Luckily, with Germany’s socialist work environment, when she has finished the work, her job will still be guaranteed! The conservator of the Göttingen collection has been cleaning the casts through a variety of methods and then painting them with a white, semi-gloss latex paint. And do they sparkle! I’m not sure the treatment is right for us, but as we progress through our restoration, we will turn our backs to no potential improvements.
Upcoming Exhibitions, Programs and Events •
The Slater Museum regrets to announce that the Exhibition of the Connecticut Plein Aire Painters Society, originally scheduled for Summer 2008 has been cancelled to accommodate planned construction. It is hoped that the Slater will be able to re-schedule the exhibition.
The Muse is published up to four times yearly for the members of The Friends of the Slater Memorial Museum. The museum is located at 108 Crescent Street, Norwich, CT 06360. It is part of The Norwich Free Academy, 305 Broadway, Norwich, CT 06360. Museum main telephone number: (860) 887-2506. Visit us on the web at www.slatermuseum.org. Museum Director – Vivian F. Zoë Newsletter editor – Geoff Serra Contributing authors: Vivian Zoë, Leigh Smead and Patricia Flahive Photographers: Leigh Smead, Heather Brine, Vivian Zoë The president of the Friends of the Slater Memorial Museum: Patricia Flahive The Norwich Free Academy Board of Trustees: Steven L. Bokoff ’72, Chair Jeremy D. Booty ‘74 Richard DesRoches * Abby I. Dolliver ‘71 Lee-Ann Gomes ‘82, Treasurer Thomas M. Griffin ‘70, Secretary Joseph A. Perry ’60 Dr. Mark E. Tramontozzi ’76 Theodore N. Phillips ’74 Robert A, Staley ‘68* David A. Whitehead ’78, Vice Chair *Museum sub-committee The Norwich Free Academy does not discriminate in its educational programs, services or employment on the basis of race, religion, gender, national origin, color, handicapping condition, age, marital status or sexual orientation. This is in accordance with Title VI, Title VII, Title IX and other civil rights or discrimination issues; Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 as amended and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1991.
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Captain Louis Sable, Naval Attaché of the French Embassy and official representative of France, arrived on July 3 to place a bronze “tablet” on the graves of unknown French soldiers of the American Revolution.
Chelsea parade, then speak at the Elks recreation field later in the day. A number of churches and the Norwich Hebrew Institute held open houses during the day. The Norwich Bulletin reported that “Arriving visitors found a welcome extended in banners suspended over the highway on all the roads leading into the city. … Buildings on streets in the business section of the city were in festal array in decorations of bunting in the national colors and sidewalk flags will add to the gala effect. Many homes in residence section have also been attractively decorated for anniversary”. During the 1934 celebration, the Norwich Fire Department presented an exhibition of early fire fighting equipment. Included were a horse drawn pumper, its “Big Six”, and a hand-drawn hose carriage. Twenty red-shirted firemen pulled the
Boy Scout Troupe, 1934
Boy Scout Troupe #12 paid tribute to First Norwich Mayor, Benjamin Huntington by performing a ceremony culminating in the laying of a wreath upon his grave. The Clara Barton Tent #1, Daughters of Union Veterans made a pilgrimage to Governor William Buckingham’s grave and laid a wreath. Buckingham had been both mayor of Norwich and Governor of Connecticut during the Civil War. The Girl Scouts created a nature trail starting at the bottom of McKinley Avenue behind NFA and named it “Sacojewa”, or Sacajawea,-known as the Indian woman who led Lewis and Clark on their expedition to find the Pacific Ocean. Born about 1790 in what is now the state of Idaho, she had no known connections to Connecticut.
Early Hartford Fire Truck
latter in the parade, according to The Bulletin. Reporting the next day, The Bulletin stated that “The principal event of the Anniversary program was the community meeting at the Broadway Theatre in the evening (Sunday, July 1). Despite the oppressive heat there was a large attendance at the gathering, which opened at 8 o’clock with Mayor Edward G. Moran presiding”. The community meeting had religious overtones, with scripture being read, and opened with the Norwich Choral Society accompanied by Miss Annie L. Taft on the piano singing America the Beautiful. Miss H. Louise Fuller, sister of the Norwich Art School director, Charlotte Fuller Eastman, had composed Ode to Norwich especially for the occasion to words written by W. Tyler Olcott.
The reviewing stand was, appropriately, at Chelsea Parade. Planners had invited Governor Wilbur L. Cross who would review f r o m Governor Wilbur Cross
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Comdr., Sen. Hiram Bingham, Mayor Edward Moran, Capt. Sable
Rabbi Joseph N. Rosenberg.
attended the Republican National Convention as Connecticut’s alternate and was chosen as an elector on the Hughes-Fairbanks ticket. Hiram served as an officer in various military roles, eventually being promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and serving as Commanding Officer at the Aviation International Center in France. In the summer of 1920, he was again an alternate for the Republican National Convention and two years later was elected Lieutenant Governor. Bingham was a U.S. Senator for eight years but lost his seat to Democrat Augustine Lonergan which ended his political career. Today, most in the World would not recognize the name Wilbur Cross, but because of its inevitable connection to the controversy surrounding Machu Picchu, millions know the name of Hiram Bingham.
Following the featured speaker, she played the piece on the piano while leading the Norwich Choral Society in singing it. After violin soloists and more choral music, the evening was brought to a close with a benediction by
The Sporting Committee produced a sort of Rodeo with horse races and trick riding at the fairgrounds, where an evening dance was held in the “Dance Hall.” In addition, a concert of 150 accordions, five vaudeville acts and a “grand and spectacular display of Fire works such as has rarely been seen in these parts”. The Bulletin reported that Milo Light was given special permission by the committee to add, free of charge, his own fire works to the show. This was the spirit of the 1934 celebration … the community came forward, most as volunteers to make the event spectacular in spite of financial woes.
Also attending was U. S. Senator for Connecticut, Hiram Bingham a descendant of Deacon Thomas Bingham, who had come to the American colonies in 1650 and settled in Salem. He received his B.A. degree from Yale in 1898 and later studied history and political science at the University of California and Harvard, attaining a Ph.D. He spent years of travel, study and writing in South America and in 1911, Bingham became Director of the Peruvian Expedition when he located the site of the last Inca capital Vitcos. He was the first to ascend the 21,763 ft. Mt. Coropuma. The following year Bingham made another discovery, perhaps his most important, the discovery of Machu Picchu, the “lost city.”
Spectacles, tableaux and historical dramas were not new to Norwich, nor had they been exclusively reserved for
As World War I began, Bingham turned to politics and the military as a way of life. He Hiram Bingham at Macchu Picchu
Millicent in the Rose
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Slater Gates Examined Conservator and Iron Consultant Barbara Mangum from Cambridge, Massachusetts visited the Museum and NFA’s storage facility at 90 Sachem Street, where the Slater building’s elegant wrought iron gates have been stored since Spring 2007, when masonry restoration began. Her job was to examine every inch of the five medieval-style gates to make drawings and photographs and take samples of coatings and rusted metal. Ms. Mangum’s fee will be paid through a generous Technical Assistance Grant from the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation. She was identified through a recommendation from stone expert Ivan Myjer who, since winter 2007, has been advising the academy on brownstone restoration of the Slater building. During the past five years, the Slater has pursued a rigorous plan of facilities improvement, ultimately to result in the installation of the building’s first elevator and climate control system. To date, approximately $3 million have been expended on project planning, engineering and design, and on window, roof, and brick, mortar, and masonry restoration and repair to ensure the integrity of the exterior building envelope before major internal work is undertaken. Throughout the entire process, meticulous attention has been afforded to preserving the historical accuracy and detail of the Romanesque Revival ornament of the brick, brownstone, and granite structure designed in 1884 by Stephen C. Earle of Worcester, MA. Ms. Mangum’s report will propose treatment to restore and preserve the iron gates and recommend a craftsman. She described the gates as “very beautiful, well made and exhibiting expert craftsmanship”. Her preliminary findings were that restoration would not be difficult nor need be particularly expensive and that re-installation, with some cautions, would be more than possible.
Restoration Begins on Slater’s Casts Sculptor, conservator and plaster cast expert Robert Shure of Giust Caproni Studios in Woburn, Massachusetts was at work in midJune restoring “Funerary Stele of a Warrior” and the “Hermes of Praxiteles”. The “Model of the West Pediment of the Parthenon” and “Standing Youth” will be the focus of his attention when he returns in July. The Slater’s 120-year-old collection of plaster statuary created from molds taken directly from the originals show the signs of their age and fragility. A generous grant from the David T. Langrock Foundation as well as funding from the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS), a federal program, are making the work possible. 5
Friends of Slater Activities Notes from the President by Patricia Reardon Flahive I am happy to announce that the Friends of Slater will be organizing another bus trip for members and friends this October. This excursion will take us to Springfield, MA, where we will spend the day touring the Springfield Museums - a group of four specialized institutions that offer something for every taste. Our last bus trip to the Clark Institute in Williamstown, MA was hugely successful, due in part to the inclusion of Friends of Otis Library. I am very pleased that we again invite Otis members on the upcoming trip, and extend the invitation to Cragin Library patrons. Please join us for this exciting trip and spend the day with Friends, both old and new. Hope to see you in Springfield!
The Springfield Museums, located in the heart of downtown Springfield, Massachusetts, comprise four world-class museums; the Museum of Fine Arts, the Springfield Science Museum, the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum and the George Walter Vincent Smith Art Museum, where a collection of plaster casts was assembled in 1899 by the Slater Museum’s first curator and NFA alumnus, Henry Watson Kent. The Museums Association is proud to be home to the Dr. Seuss Sculpture Garden honoring the birthplace of Theodor Geisel, a.k.a. Dr. Seuss.
Trip Details
The Springfield Museums Saturday, October 4, 2008
The bus will have TWO departure locations: 8:15 am - Norwich: Commuter Parking Lot at Exit 80 off I-395 8:50 am - Colchester: Commuter Parking Lot at Exit 16 off Route 2
We plan to arrive in Sprinfield at 10:00 am and will depart promptly at 3:00 pm. The bus will deliver passengers to Colchester and Norwich by 4:00 pm and 4:30 pm, respectively. RESERVATIONS MUST BE MADE NO LATER THAN SEPTEMBER 2, 2008
Yes! Please reserve my seat: Number of Museum & Library Members: ________ x $40 per person = $_______________ Number of Non-Museum & Library Members: ________ x $50 per person = $_______________ Total Enclosed = $_______________ Fee includes transportation, admission to museums, and a box lunch. I will meet the bus in: ___ Norwich ___ Colchester Please indicate lunch preferences for each participant:
___ Turkey
___ Tuna
___ Vegetarian
NAME(s)________________________________________________________________________ ADDRESS_______________________________________________________________________ *For our records and to confirm the reservation, please list one address and contact phone number. CITY___________________________________________________________________________ STATE/ZIP_________________________TELEPHONE: (DAY)_________________________ Detach completed form and mail to: Friends of Slater • 108 Crescent Street • Norwich, CT 06360 Please make checks payable to “Friends of Slater Museum” 6
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anniversaries. On September 5, 1927, the John B. Rogers Production Company staged An Historical Pageant, Battle of the Great Plain, at the New London County Agricultural Fair Grounds in East Great Plain, Norwich. The Pageant included a cast of literally hundreds, from the community and an even greater number of “Reception Committee” members from virtually every town in Southeastern Connecticut. Arthur L. Peale, author of Uncas and the Mohegan Pequot
She graduated from NFA in 1924, Emerson College in 1928, and received her MA from Columbia University. She returned to NFA to teach English and was the founding faculty member for Playshop from 1935 - 1942. Millicent was also director of children’s radio programs, which her daughter Kira Van Deusen characterizes as “a big bust because they didn’t pay her and she had to solicit advertising to pay herself. Then the depression hit”. She worked for General Electric Broadcasting in NYC; and was an instructor of speech at University of Connecticut and State Teacher’s College, Geneseo, NY. According to Ms. Van Deusen, Millicent worked for a company that provided a show script and music, costumes, etc. She would arrive in a town with a big trunk of that stuff and direct the musical with a cast of locals. Three weeks in each place, start to finish. She did that for about a year and a half and it sounds like fun but she wound up completely exhausted. Came home to rest. And that’s when the shows in Norwich began and then teaching at NFA”.
A “Pageant” orchestrated and directed by Millicent Disco, attracted an audience of 6,000 to the fields behind Norton Gym at NFA. The Norwich Bulletin of June 28, tantalized the public with “The unique staging arrangement of the pageant is on a grandiose style. The Central scene depicts a huge rose characterizing the ‘Rose of New England’. The rose is so constructed that as the episode in the pageant develops, the petals will open and out of it will arise the Spirit of Norwich (impersonated by Miss Millicent Disco) and give a dramatic interpretation of time and events of the progress and achievement of Norwich since 1784”. The pageant was to have three “episodes” with Mayor Moran “portraying Benjamin Huntington, first mayor of Norwich and the directors of NFA acting out the dedication of NFA in 1856”.
Nancy Dutton wrote her memories of Millicent as her Playshop director for the NFA alumni association. “Millicent Disco was the Faculty Advisor and Director of the Playshop. Her office was located in the vestibule of the Commercial Building (Cranston).
The Bulletin of June 11 projected that “Millicent Disco was to announce the parts of the pageant during the evolution of Racial Groups, coming to the U.S. and availing themselves of the liberty and opportunities afforded by the country to all people, irrespective of race, color or denomination”. Miss Disco also brought in descendants of Mohegans, 300 French children, Irish “Lilt” dancers, “The Negro Group” to sing spirituals, Costumes from Poland, Swedish folk dance, Hebrew religious music, a Greek ceremony and an Italian Orchestra. In 1934, Buzby Berkeley’s career had reached its zenith in 1934 and may have rubbed off on Miss Disco.
She was very talented, dedicated and theatrical. Her contagious enthusiasm and expertise motivated her many students to succeed on the stage. Being a member of the Playshop was very important to so many of us at NFA. Friendships were formed and our love of drama and the theatre has
Millicent Disco was a member of the Disco Brothers Dry Goods Store Family. They had commissioned and sold a plate 50 years earlier in 1909, commemorating the Quarter Millennium.
Millicent as a young woman
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Ms. Chase also loaned her highboy and documented the historical exhibition. In her images, one sees objects now in collections of museums and historic sites in Norwich, including the Slater Museum. Also evident is the simplicity with which the Converse Art Gallery had been built, with exposed pipes serving as heat radiators. An open house program included historic houses and organizations like NFA and Backus Hospital. As at the Quarter-Millennium, new signs and accompanying text to denote historic sites were issued. Included in this group was a sign on the Troy Laundry at 282 Franklin Street, indicating that it had been the former home of Christopher Crandall Brand’s Whaling Gun Factory. After the event, Allyn Morgan Brand, grandson of the founder, noticed the sign deteriorating and acquiring unsightly graffiti. He removed it to safe storage in his barn from which it disappeared. By 1983, the sign reappeared in the collection of Mystic Seaport, where it is safely archived today. How the sign made its way from the barn to the museum remains a mystery!
Pageant
continued through the years due to the inspiration of Millicent Disco.” She died March 25, 2002 … the anniversary of which is almost exactly today. She had staged a musical at the new Masonic Temple in January, 1934, just six months before the 275th . William Berkeley Enos (1895–1976) was known as one of the American cinema’s most innovative choreographers, noted for his mobile camerawork, dazzling kaleidoscopic routines and seeming casts of thousand, including spectacular multitudes of chorus girls. His work was seen in Forty Second Street (1933), Gold Diggers of 1933 (1934), and Dames (1934). Had Miss Disco envisioned herself in the center of such a production? The Bulletin projected that “Miss Helena Crandall and Mrs. Florence Olson will interpret a dance evocation, symbolizing the wood nymphs, calling the spirits of Norwich”, recalling the work of Isadora Duncan (18771927) earlier in the century who had established a dance school and the primitivist style. Inspired by the classics, especially Greek Mythology, she rejected traditional ballet steps to stress improvisation, emotion, and the natural human form. She is known for her use of scarves and diaphanous costumes that floated through the air as she moved.
The performances in 1934 preceded and followed a long address delivered by guest Justice Philip J. McCook, a member of the family that gave name to the Butler-McCook Homestead, McCook Library at Trinity College and McCook Hospital, all in Hartford. The men of the family were known as the “Fighting McCooks” because they served in every armed conflict in which the U.S. had engaged.
Ada Chase, Chairman of the History Committee, wrote a series of articles for The Norwich Bulletin, and spoke at the Society of the Founders of Norwich on Captain Robert Niles, a Norwich native who carried the treaty from Stonington to France that secured France’s support of the 13 Colonies’ quest for independence.
His speech was transcribed in its entirety in Historical Exhibition in Converse
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oldsters like to browse among the dusty papers and furniture, or pause a moment beside a gravestone, hoping it has not been too much neglected since they last went by. The youngsters will follow the band and the pageantry. All alike will feel some (if also they simulate some) joy at the recreation of old scenes and the return of the prodigal from New York, Chicago, New Orleans, or San Francisco. And as the heart swells to the music, and the eyes dance with the flags, we can perhaps spare a moment for the virtues of our forefathers, loving them but the more for their limitations. We know, or think we know, more about light waves and sound waves and air currents, but are we happier? We move faster than they, or think we do, but where has our progress taken us? It was but yesterday we thought , as the saying is, we had the world by the tail, but were they not richer in their quiet corner?? All of this before the Second World War, Atomic Bombs, Nuclear Power, computers and cell phones.
Brand sign Courtesy of Mystic Seaport
The Norwich Bulletin the next day. In it, McCook hits the highlights of “Norwich Worthies” along with other men of .significance to Connecticut history. In addition, however, he recounts his discovery of the intertwined histories of the European settlers with the indigenous people, and especially, his familiarity with “Worthy” members of the local tribes, most notably, Mercy Ann Nonesuch (Nehantic) and “Matthews” (Mohegan), whose children were later depicted in the anthropological work of Frank G. Speck and archived in the collections of the Smithsonian Institution’s Museum of the American Indian. He goes on to describe the relationship of “whites” to the native peoples. “Now it is written that the founders of Norwich paid real money to the Indian owners for the land on which the settlement was to rise. This, no doubt, surprised the redskins considerably”.
Daughter of Mercy Nonesuch
Partial list of sources cited:
Hobsbawm, Eric, The Age of Revolution: Europe 1789—1848 and The Age of Empire: Europe 1875—1914, Praeger Publishers, New York, 1962 and 1975 respectively Peale, Arthur L., An Historical Pageant, Battle of the Great Plain, Norwich, 1927 Peale, Arthur L., Uncas and the Mohegan Pequot, Meador Publishing Company, Boston, 1939 Pencak, William, Riot and revelry in Early America, Pennsylvania University press, University Park, 2002 Norwich Bulletin, January – July, 1934 Norwich Sunday Record, May, June, July, 1934 _________, Connecticut Circle, the Magazine of the Constitution State, Vol. XXII, No. 5, New London, 1959
As if out of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, The Bulletin reported McCook’s final words to the gathering: “Well, fortunately, one can find something for every taste in an anniversary celebration. The
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Numerous additional sources were consulted in researching this work. Printed programs and advertisements were consulted and interviews with the descendants of participants were carried out. A list will be made available to inquirers. It may be more critical here to list those individuals who assisted with this research, making it possible to paint the most accurate and interesting picture. Alphabetically, they are Carol Connor, Nancy Dutton, Beryl Fishbone of the Founders of Norwich, Leffingwell Inn; Dorothy Gravel, Ralph Lathrop, Mary-Anne Hall, George Lee, Diane Norman, Edward Rogalski, Elisha Sherman, Leigh Smead, Kira VanDeusen, Linda Ververis, Glenn M. Watts. Finally: A note about 1984: Research on this, the most recent past anniversary celebration (225th and 200th), is now being researched. If you have photographs, artifacts (such as memorabilia) or stories to tell, please contact Vivian ZoÍ at 860-425-5560. Slater Memorial Museum Hours: Tuesday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Closed to the public on Mondays and holidays Visitors may park in designated visitor parking spaces or any empty parking place on campus. Parking is difficult between 1:30 and 2:15 p.m. during school days due to the school buses. The museum’s main telephone number is (860) 887-2506. A recording will provide information on current exhibitions, days of operation, directions, admission fees and access to staff voice mailboxes. Our Webpage is linked to the NFA Website. www.norwichfreeacademy.com.