Upcoming Events
4/19: If you read in this week's Salem Area Community Calendar that there is an Artillery Reenactment at 834 Chamberlin Mills Road in Hebron on April 26 from 2-4 p.m. it was printed in error. That event took place on Saturday, April 26, 2025 . There is no event on April 26, 2026.
Hope you are not too disappointed!!
A Look Ahead: Spring Programming with Saratoga 250 As momentum builds toward America's 250th anniversary of its Declaration of Independence, Saratoga 250 is excited to share what's ahead this spring-and how these programs continue to deepen understanding of Saratoga's central role as America's Turning Point.
The years surrounding the 250th are not simply commemorative; they are about connecting people to history through programs that are meaningful, educational, and rooted in place. While America's founders may have declared its independence this July 250 years ago, it was the struggles across a revolutionary period, including an eight-year American war for Independence, that proved liberty protected by a new form of self-government was possible.
Much of that struggle played out among the peoples and across the places of our region. This spring, Saratoga 250 will feature public programming and content that brings Saratoga Revolutionary Experiences to life, highlighting the individuals whose resolve forged a nation and the landscapes that shaped it.
Mark your calendars for these upcoming opportunities to make America's 250th a Saratoga Revolutionary Experience!
5th Annual Turning Point Symposium Saturday, May 2, 2026
The 1780 Raid on Ballston Guided Coach Bus Tour Sunday, May 3, 2026 Following the symposium, we invite participants to join our popular guided bus tour tracing the route of the 1780 Ballston Raid. This immersive experience places history directly on the landscape, offering deeper insight into the region's revolutionary past and the communities affected by the war.
Meeting of WCHS Local History Book Club Wednesday, May 13, 2026, 12:30 to 1:30 Membership in the historical society is not required.
The topic is George S. Brown, builder of stone walls. George was born a free Black in Newport, RI in 1801. After years of being a traveling musician and drunkard, he was converted, first to the Baptist faith and then to the Methodist religion. In 1825 he built the Beach schoolhouse on Vaughn Road in Kingsbury. While living on the Gould Sanford farm in Kingsbury, he began to preach at the nearby Methodist Church. He supported himself by building stone walls using the dry-stacking method. Some of these walls remain standing today.
He sailed to Liberia as a missionary in 1836, returning in 1844. He continued preaching and building walls in this area. He died after falling on ice in 1886 and his gravestone is in the Sanford lot, Quaker Cemetery, on Ridge Road, Queensbury.
Articles on Rev. Brown are available online here . The meeting will be held in one of the churches where Rev. Brown preached, having been built in 1832 and subsequently enlarged.
Future sessions of the club will feature topics related to the larger Adirondack area as well as works by local authors. Upcoming discussions include: Le Loup's Bloody Trail from Salem to Argyle (1859), flax and linen in Washington County, and Floyd Bennett's flight over the North Pole. For additional information, email Connie Harris Farrington .
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My Odyssey with Solomon Northup Thursday, May 14, 2026 at 7:00 p.m. please note that the starting time is 30 minutes later than our other WCHS programs )
Paul first discovered the story about Solomon Northup the year he became Historian of Fort Edward. Doris McEachron at that time was the Argyle Historian. She helped to show Paul the ropes as a new historian. Doris gave him enough information to go looking for the book Twelve Years a Slave which he found at the Village Book Smith in Hudson Falls (for under $20 each!). He found the reference to the Old Fort House which Solomon occupied with his wife upon their marriage in 1828. Overtime, he has worked with historians, scholars, and interested parties studying the Northup story. Attendees will have the opportunity to tour the Old Fort House and especially the Solomon Northup room after the program.
R. Paul McCarty was appointed Historian of the Town and Village of Fort Edward in 1975. In his 51 years as historian, Paul has been dedicated to telling the history and preserving the past of Fort Edward and its surrounding areas. In 1981, Paul was appointed as the first Executive Director of the Old Fort House Museum, a position he still holds today. In that time, the museum has acquired and restored several area historic buildings including a Greek Revival Law Office, Fort Edward Water Works Barn, the one-room Riverside Schoolhouse, the Cronkhite Pavilion which is the oldest surviving Washington County Fairgrounds building (c. 1875), Moreau Station Toll House, a colonial Dutch-style home from 1790 and the infamous 3-seater outhouse from the Lakeville Church in Cossayuna.
He is a member of the Fort Edward Historical Association, Washington County Historical Society, Sandy Hill and Fort Edward Union Cemetery, and Roger's Island Visitor's enter. He is also the historian of the William H. Hill Historical Collection at SUNY Adirondack.
Paul was one of the first certified public historians by the Association of Public Historians of New York State. In 2015, he was given the Franklin D. Roosevelt Historian Professional Achievement award from APHNYS.
Paul is also a certified History and Industrial Education teacher and began teaching in 1974. He retired from the Saratoga Springs City School District as Technology Department head in 2007. He was also Director of Adult and Continuing Education for SSCSD for six years.
The program is free and open to the public. Donations are gladly accepted. We hope to see you there!
Major General Israel Putnam: Hero of the American Revolution Thursday, May 28, 2026 at 6:30 p.m. The Hebron Preservation Society and the Washington County Historical Society will co-host "Major General Israel Putnam: Hero of the American Revolution" (and for whom the Town of Putnam in northern Washington County is named). A colorful figure of 18th century America, Israel Putnam (1718-1790) played key roles in both the French and Indian War and the American Revolutionary War. During the former, he barely escaped from being burned alive by Mohawk warriors and was held by the French as a prisoner of war in Canada. He later commanded a force of 500 men that was shipwrecked off the coast of Cuba. During the Revolutionary War, it was Putnam who reportedly gave the command "Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes" at the Battle of Bunker Hill. The late U.S. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan who was also a historian, once stated it "could be argued that we owe our national existence to the fortifications which General Israel Putnam threw up in April 1776 on the Buttermilk Channel side (of New York's Governors Island), which is just a baseball's throw from Brooklyn Heights.
IsraelPutnam.com
There is no charge for the program. It is open to the public. Donations are gladly accepted.
We hope you can join us for this interesting and informative program.
