Last school year, our Searching for Slavery class was encouraged to explore ways to authentically share our work with the community. The idea of a public event appealed to us.
Fast forward to this year, nine community schools – public and independent, middle, and high school – gathered on April 28 and 29 at Troutbeck in […]
It’s February, Black History Month, and we’ve revisited and updated our 2021 post about slavery in the Hudson Valley. New sources helped us to better understand not just how widespread and tenacious the institution of slavery was in the Hudson Valley, but also to appreciate the magnitude of the struggle for freedom fought by those […]
Sometimes a topic for a blog post comes to us through sheer luck. This happened recently, when we received an inquiry from Lance Fromm, an Andover, MA antiques dealer.
“Hello … I have come across a walking-stick with a silver engraved cap on top that reads ‘J. B. Collin Hillsdale NY.’ A Google search […]
The Roe Jan Brewing Co., one of Hillsdale’s newer businesses, located in one of the older commercial buildings in the town, has been awarded a 2021 New York State Preservation Award by New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. Roe Jan Brewing is one of nine projects in the state recognized for […]
We recently discovered that Hillsdale shopkeeper Matthew White has assembled one of the most complete collections of late 19th and early 20th century Hillsdale postcards. It gave us the idea for this blog post. And, as often happens, researching the topic led us to explore the history of a humble item that turns out to […]
The hamlet of Green River in the northeast corner of Hillsdale has intrigued and puzzled the Hillsdale Historians for some time. Franklin Ellis’s History of Columbia County (1878) identifies it as “…a hamlet in the valley of the Green river … formerly known as Green River Hollow.” But immediately to the north, in the town […]
The Columbia County Historical Society (CCHS) has announced a new permanent outdoor exhibit, the Early Heritage of Columbia County Outdoor Narrative Panel Exhibit, featuring eight narrative panels set along the treeline of its rural properties along Route 9-H including the c.1850 Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse and the 1737 Luykas Van Alen House located in the Town […]
Our friend and fellow history buff Sally Laing recently gave us a copy of a news clipping from the April 17, 1889 edition of the Hillsdale Harbinger. The clipping is of an article listing half of the questions on the arithmetic exam that was given to the students, presumably eighth graders, at the Hillsdale School. […]
by the hillsdale historians
Every now and then, we set out to research something, and while we may uncover some interesting facts and anecdotes, there isn’t enough to warrant an entire blog post. So, we chuck what we have found into a folder and stash it, like a jar of old screws and bolts, on a […]
by the hillsdale historians
Now that secondary education in the Roe Jan region by Zoom is becoming the exception instead of the rule, it’s worth remembering that for the first 114 years of its existence, Hillsdale had no high school at all. Until 1903, an eighth-grade education had been deemed adequate — the “Three Rs” equipped […]