New Sullivan history room is born

By CHARLIE BUTERBAUGH

Volunteers are busy building a new history room at the Sullivan County Museum that will present a visual chronology and written timeline of life, industry and recreation in the county.

The Sullivan County Historical Society will host a ribbon cutting and opening of the history room for the public on Saturday, July 10 at 3:30 p.m. at the museum in Hurleyville.

Model displays will represent moments in time dating back to the Lenni Lenape, the pioneer life, timber hauling and building rafts for voyages on the Delaware River, traveling between the Hudson and Delaware Valleys on the Newburgh-Cochecton Turnpike, the bluestone mines, the sawmills, the acid factories of Willowemoc, the tanneries, the Loomis Sanitarium, the hotel business, the 1969 Woodstock Festival and Sullivan County at the beginning of the 21st century.

Early in the week, as volunteers Bob Decker and John Masten were busily cutting trim for the timeline, Museum Chairperson Pat Burns remarked on the history represented by the displays, pointing out that Sullivan County’s past is largely a story of its inhabitants depleting natural resources in the name of industry.

Four DVD kiosks in the new room will provide audio/visual narrative of relevant historical content.

An exhibit of 200 years of women’s fashion in Sullivan County, curated by Burns, will also open in the museum’s auditorium on July 10.

“We have over 160 women’s hats in our collection,” Burns said.

The idea for the history room was born during the Wednesday lunch group, a weekly gathering among volunteers who work in the collections and archive rooms, board members and students.

The volunteers who are creating the model displays have gone to great lengths in the name of historical accuracy.

Bill Grunwold found a steering device at a local garage sale that may have been used on an early raft, floating timber southward to sell at ports along the Delaware River.

Museum genealogist Bernice Masten, who is building the Lenni Lenape display, took pains to collect birch bark to build a miniature long house, an upside-down arc-like structure that could provide shelter for 25 families. Some of her ancestors were descendants of Tuscarora Indians.

Long houses were either built with birch or elm trees, she said.

Jack Yelle has painted the watercolor backdrop for Masten’s display.

Bob Decker is building an acid factory based on the one that used to exist in the Village of Willowemoc, where he now lives.

Rachel Keebler and Joan Newhouse, scenic artists and teachers in the Scenic Artist Training Program at Cobalt Studios in Bethel, NY, recently began work on the Woodstock room. They will paint each of the four walls in the 10 by 10-foot room, rendering the main stage and the story of the festival with details of Yasgur Farm scenery, the changing weather and the aftermath of the historic weekend.

When the painting is finished, a translucent white coating will cover the walls and a film of the 1969 Woodstock Festival will be projected onto the scenery.

For more information call the museum at 845/434-8044.