Putney Historical Society

As a special event to celebrate Putney’s 250th charter anniversary, the Putney Historical Society Board decided to update the town history, first prepared in 1953 by the Fortnightly Club. Planning for town wide participation began in 1999. Interviewing was conducted for two years. Well over 200 people contributed by interviewing, being interviewed, taking notes, donating photos, writing, editing, and reviewing many versions of the manuscript. Read the entire post: The New Putney History Book, Published in 2003

In 2002, through a grant from the Strolling of the Heifers Foundation, a project coordinated by the Putney Historical Society combined efforts of Putney Central students and teachers, Putney farmers and residents, and Putney artists.  PHS volunteers walked students to various sites  around town. Read the entire post: Reliefs of Historic Putney Houses Restored at PCS

The Putney Town Hall was constructed in 1871 as a proud example of Victorian architecture in post-Civil War Putney.  Sporting many attractive architectural features in the entry, it provided a locus for innumerable town events including dances, plays, dinners, veterans’ gatherings, and the annual town meeting.  Sometime before 1950, the beautiful foyer received a light blue coat of paint, over a previous, dark green coat.  No attempt was made to highlight architectural features of the building at that time; the trim and the walls were given the same thick coat of semi-gloss. Read the entire post: Town Hall Entry Newly Painted

This album is currently on display in the entry of the Putney Town Hall.  At the time of the dedication of the Putney Veteran’s Memorial in 2003,Laurel Ellis and Marilyn Loomis collected as many pictures as possible of men and women whose names are carved on the memorial. It was not possible to get pictures of all.

In 2006 Thera and Bob Hindmarsh proposed assembling these into an album and to add pictures of other men and women of Putney who have served in the military. Thera brought this idea to the Putney Fortnightly Club who agreed to take this on as a project

Laurel Ellis gave us the use of the cd that had most of the images on there.  Darrel Daley enhanced as best as possible some of the older pictures and had copies made.

This album is not complete.  The Putney Fortnightly Club and the Putney Historical Society have lots of space in this album for pictures of residents of Putney who have served in the military.  One does not have to have been born here.  If you have a picture please contact Marion Daley 387-5822, or:

Marion Daley
Putney Fortnightly Club
PO Box 445
Putney Vermont 05346

In case you haven’t heard, the board of PHS determined that the historical society could not coexist with the monthly contra dances held at Pierce’s Hall.  The East Putney Community Club was very generous to offer to share the space of the Hall, especially considering the historical society’s recent difficulty in finding a place to settle down after moving out of the downstairs of the Town Hall to make space for the town offices.  However, after a lengthy study of the space, which included input from multiple sources, the board determined that moving out of the town center to create an office and display area which would need to be packed up every month would not be a good choice.  We will continue to serve the town from the Town Hall for the time being—the geneology files and important reference texts are still located in the accessible downstairs, and our main collection of documents, books, photos and artifacts is currently housed upstairs.  We are endeavoring to organize and clear the space in the large upstairs room so that it can be freely used by various organizations.