People – Page 2 – Local History Collections

2014-07-10

Fishing

This is Emily Fuller Drew’s copy negative of a panel card probably taken by someone else sometime earlier. There’s not a lot more information about it: just two boys fishing in the pond that provided water power to C. Drew & Co., the long-lived Kingston tool manufacturer. (There’s a great deal of information about C. Drew and their tools here).

Who were the boys? Who knows? That’s not captured on any of the three versions of this image in the Local History Room. Yet, for all the identifying detail lost to history, there’s something painterly about the composition of the two figures and the texture of the image that abstracts it just enough to capture the hazy, nostalgic air of a hot summer afternoon spent fishing.

Sources: Negative from the Emily Fuller Drew Collection MC16 (scan federally funded with LSTA funds through the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners and digitized at the Boston Public Library in conjunction with the Digital Commonwealth)

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog at piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2014-05-29

Beach day!

Sooner or later, summer will come. We’ll all be hot and sticky and we’ll welcome a cooling breeze near the waterfront. Just like this crew.

Five in a boat on the Rocky Nook shoreline, no date

Source: LHR General Image Collection IC7

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog at piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2014-05-23

Memorial Day parade

Another Memorial Day is upon us. Here are a few photos from the Local History Room collections which provide a glimpse of one of Kingston’s Memorial Day parades sometime before 1961.*

Sailors from the U.S.S. Des Moines march on Main Street

*This date is based on a flag carried by the color guard, which reads “U.S.S. Des Moines.” This heavy cruiser was launched in 1946 and decommissioned in 1961.

Source: LHR General Image Collection IC7

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog at piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2014-05-14

Fruit delivery

"Peanut Jack" Costa, around 1908 — “Peanut Jack” Costa, around 1908

Who was Peanut Jack? There’s nothing in the Local History Room to help identify him, but the 1890 Plymouth and Kingston Directory gives us this.

Mrs. D. Costa, Wholesale and Retail Dealer in...Fruits and Confectionery, Cigars and Tobacco, 1890 — Mrs. D. Costa, Wholesale and Retail Dealer in…Fruits and Confectionery, Cigars and Tobacco, 1890

The 1909 Plymouth Directory has almost the same ad, but the proprietress in that version is a Mrs. M. D. Costa, exactly what we see printed on the tarp or wagon cover right next to Peanut Jack in the photo. So it seems likely that Peanut Jack was one of the “teams making regular trips to all places in the vicinity.”

Sources: Delano Photograph Collection IC11; Books OC7

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog at piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2014-04-04

Asa Hammond and his house

"Asa Hammond house - Wapping Road. Asa in foreground," no date — “Asa Hammond house – Wapping Road. Asa in foreground,” no date

Asa Cook Hammond (1826-1913) was a carpenter or housewright, who was born Pembroke, but lived in Kingston from around 1850 until his death. He married Amanda Clark, a dressmaker from Plympton in 1849; they had several children. Both are buried in the Evergreen Cemetery.

Asa is identified as the figure in the foreground of the photograph but the woman and two boys are not, though it seems likely they are Asa’s wife and children.

The Hammond’s house, built in the Queen Anne style with an unusual center hall plan and set perpendicular to the road, still stands at 40 Wapping Road.

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog at piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2013-11-26

Happy Thanksgiving dance!

Emily Fuller Drews models a Pilgrim costume, circa 1920

As a descendant of First Comers and an indefatigable researcher of their occupations, genealogies, land swaps and lawsuits, Emily Fuller Drew was perhaps more entitled than most to dress up like a Pilgrim. It certainly seems to have suited her.

More Thanksgiving posts here and here and here and here!

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog at piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2013-11-13

New Exhibit: Are you ready for some football…history?

This month, the Local History exhibit case at the Kingston Public Library features a few football artifacts loaned to us by the Silver Lake Regional High School Library. Recently Coach John Montosi, who led the Lakers football team from 1960 to 1980, donated six scrapbooks to the school. These volumes, created by Montosi’s mother Dorothy, document the coach’s career and the team’s development over two decades which ended with a Division Championship and a Super Bowl win.

The artifacts will be on display through early December. The scrapbooks will be available in the Kingston Public Library through December 31; please contact the Archivist for an appointment. In 2014, the scrapbooks will return to the Silver Lake Library.

Thanks to Linda Redding, SLRHS Librarian, for making this exhibit possible!

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog at piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2013-09-07

New Exhibit – School Days

Ring ring goes the bell
The cook in the lunchroom ready to sell

Chuck Berry — “School Days”

For September’s lobby case exhibit, the Local History Room presents highlights from a great collection of photographs of Kingston Elementary School dating from 1952 to 1966. These class portraits and candid shots were collected by Florence Esther DiMarzio, who taught at KES from 1920 to 1958 and served as principal for 34 of those 38 years. In addition to 180 prints, the Local History Room has digital copies of another 20 photographs held in a private collection.

We haven’t identified everyone in the photos, so if you know who some of them are, ask for a photocopy, label the people you know and return it to the Local History Room. We’ll put in their Permanent Records!

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2013-07-03

Go Fourth and Parade!

In 1910, the first of many Fourth of July parades rolled in Kingston.

In honor of this most American holiday, here are a few views of one of our favorite floats from the inaugural year: the “Guardians of the Clam Flats.”

"Guardians of the Clam Flats" float, Fourth of July parade, 1910 — “Guardians of the Clam Flats” float, Fourth of July parade, 1910

Source: LHR General Images IC7 (top two); Hathaway Collection MC21

And now, a word from our sponsors…

If you can spare a moment, please help the Library Needs Assessment Committee plan for the Library’s future by sharing your thoughts and ideas in this short survey. Even if you don’t currently use the Library, we want your input.

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com.

2013-04-16

New Exhibit: The Boys of Summer Start in the Springtime

Stop by the Library this month to see photographs of baseball players in and around Kingston from 1897 to 1961.

Source: The Albion Holmes Collection, MC 25

For more, visit the Kingston Public Library, and the Local History Room, and the full blog piqueoftheweek.wordpress.com