Mary Bucknam
New Ipswich Historical Society
Residents of Center Village
Mary & Kate Bucknam with the bike gang
On this day - July 11, 1908
James Roger diary entry
11th (Saturday)
Warm and sunny. David went to Greenville and brought four and grain and went to Club in afternoon for opening day. A good number turned out and waited for supper. I hoed some in garden.
On this day - July 11, 1897
William Jurian Kaula diary - no entry
The Birth of the Fair (Continued pages 8 - 10)
The conception of the Children's Fair of New Ipswich was in this wise:
One afternoon in September 1862 (date not recalled), the Pastor of the Congregational Church and Prof. E. T. Quimby, preceptor of our Academy, were driving home from a Sunday School Convention held at East Wilton, and the Rev. Mr. Cutler and Prof. Quimby fell into a talk in regard to the possibility of so training children that they, in the early be ginning of their lives, would feel it a pleasure and a duty to share with others the good gifts of life bestowed so freely on themselves.
It may be that the readiness of the children of our Sabbath School to take part in the efforts we were making to send help to our soldiers, and to the freedmen, prompted the thought. Neither of the men, when inquired of afterwards, could tell which first suggested holding a Harvest Festival annually, at which might be sold for benevolent objects, any product of their skill or industry during the year. The suggestion approved itself to both. They were both men of action, and both keenly alive to the needs of the world and the training of the rising generation to supply those needs.
The following Sunday, notice was given for a meeting to consider the topic, and the young pastor's calm, quiet, feeling, convincing representation of the object of the meeting immediately enlisted the sympathy of every hearer In those days, attending the worship of Almighty God in the sanctuaries provided for the purpose, was considered an obligation by the majority of respectable people.
The old church building on the Common, built in 1812-13, had been remodeled a few years before and the audience room removed from the ground floor. The reunited Second Congregational Church, and the First Church, and the Baptist and Methodist Churches being closed for reasons connected with the war, a large congregation filled, almost to repletion, the pews, where sat Mr. Calvin Cutler's hearers.
His appointment of a meeting during the week to consider. the advisability of holding a fair the present autumn, met with cordial reception. William D. Locke, then, with his family occupying the Academy Boarding House, on the site of the Ames House, proposed his dining-hall as a good place for the proposed meeting. He was among the first who then, and as long as he lived, took active interest in this annual fair, and so also did his family.
One cannot fail to mark the difference in social life between the women of fifty years ago and now. The lives of women and men were more apart from each other. The ability of woman was not disputed but was exercised in Auxiliaries, Daughters of Temperance, Female Cent Societies, Sewing Circles by themselves, etc.
No woman in all that crowd who listened to the notice. given by Mr. Cutler dreamed anything else was asked of her but to wait and see what part of the work which was to be done would be assigned to her, by husbands, sons and brothers, who should devise all the details of the proposed Harvest Feast.
We were practically just beginning to know that difference in the qualities of the two sexes did not mean the superiority of one above the other.
But I have diverged. There was hearty, cordial, unanimous acceptance of such plans in this General Committee of the Children's Fair, such as has ever continued, as would promise the most complete success, and it is remarkable that but few changes have, in fifty years, been found necessary to per perpetuate it so long and successfully.
As I read about the history of the Children's Fair, I realize I am wearing a t shirt that I bought at the Children's Fair with an image of the Barrett House many years ago. I never knew why it was called the Children's Fair until now. The bike gang picture is interesting. The Buckham sisters must have been more tolerant of high risks than their male counterparts. When I lived in NJ I made 4000 plus trips into Manhattan by bile across the George Washington bridge and on more than one occasion my pant cuff would catch in the sprocket. I can't imagine biking in a long dress!