Descendants at our Door! And I don't mean the stairs.

We have just been contacted by a descendant of William Brandow and Joseph Groom (born in 1748, before the Declaration of Independence!), previous occupants of this very house!. She and her grandmother (also a descendant) are going to come visit us, and let us interview them. Hopefully, they will be able to help us fill in some of the gaps in the history of this place. I'll put everything up once I have their permission in early July.

Walk Backwards In Time With All of Athens

The Athens Cultural Center will be celebrating the Evarts Library's Centennial by hosting a walking tour of the stunning historic homes in our piece of the Hudson River Valley. Some of these homes (including ours) have not been open to the public since the library was a mere 50 years old. Join us in the festivities on Saturday, June 30th. In addition to gaining entrance and stories inside these gorgeous historic sites, there will also be a lunchtime concert in the park, a photography sale, and a parade (complete with horse-drawn carriage, 19th century fire wagon, and a procession of antique automobiles carrying our public figures to the reviewing stand)!

HERE IS THE ROSTER OF EVENTS FROM THEIR WEBSITE:

THREE RARE, EARLY HOUSES OPEN TO THE PUBLIC FOR THE FIRST TIME IN YEARS Celebrate Old Home Week with a tour of homes in Athens, a lunchtime concert in the park and a photography sale. Fete the Evarts Library on its centennial and watch as the Athens Cultural Center helps recreates the Old Home Week parade up Main Street. Saturday, June 30th To help the Evarts Library celebrate its centennial, the Athens Cultural Center has joined forces to stage a celebration replete with house tours, parades, exhibits, old time music and old-fashioned children's games. This revives the first Old Home Week celebration which was started 100 years ago, in conjunction with the laying of the cornerstone of the Evarts Library. In the way that only the village of Athens can do, we're recreating this slice of Americana on Saturday, June 30th. The centerpiece of our celebration is a tour of homes in the village including three major, early houses that have not been open to the public in at least 50 years and an exhibition at the Cultural Center highlighting the library centennial and the celebration of Old Home Week in Athens. The Greene County Camera Club will host a photography sale at the Cultural Center. The Evarts Library will host a centennial celebration on its lawn. Babe Ruth Little League and APAC will help host a lunchtime concert in the Riverfront Park. We'll all parade up Main Street together. So come out to Athens and help us fete the library as it turns 100. Tour of homes: 10 AM- 4 PM Photo: Howard Hall Farm, the earliest Federal House on the Hudson River Tour times: Guided tours of village homes will be held on the hour at 10, 11, noon, 1, 2 and 3 PM. Meet at the Athens Cultural Center at least 15 minutes prior to the tour start. Tickets: Tours cost $15 per person with advance reservation, $20 at the door. To reserve tickets in advance, email your name, number of tickets and requested tour time to info@athensculturalcenter.org. Please put "House Tour Tickets" in your email subject line. Parking: Parking is available on North Franklin Street, just north of the intersection of Second and Franklin Street. The Athens Cultural Center is located one block away, at 24 Second Street, between Franklin and Washington Streets. Haight-Gantley House Featured properties: The tour will feature the Haight-Gantley House, a significant work by Barnabus Waterman, the House of History architect, built during the War of 1812. This house has not been open in decades and the last recorded house tour was for the Athens sesquicentennial in 1955. The house is surprisingly in tact and features an impressive and rare oval ballroom and striking views over the Hudson River. Also featured is Howard Hall Farm, constructed circa 1780 and considered by some to be the earliest Federal house in left the Hudson Valley. This house, which has been in private hands since the 1970's, is virtually unknown to Federal architecture aficionados although in retains much of its early fabric including such rarities as cylinder glass windows and perfectly preserved period European marble fireplace surrounds. An impressive Civil War era house, retaining its elegant period detail and impeccably decorated with a mix of American and European antiques, will be shown on a house tour for the first time ever. This house was probably the last in-village farm in Athens and only left the hands of the original farming family a few years ago. The Evarts Library, other village gems and a stroll up Second Street and down South Franklin Street, which contain some of the most impressive houses in the village, round out the tour. Old Home Week Parade: 12:45 PM The parade route runs up Second Street from the Riverfront Park to the Evarts Library. The Athens Fire Department will pull their 19th century fire wagon, library trustees will ride in a horse-drawn carriage and classic cars will carry local dignitaries to the reviewing stand. Not since Norman Rockwell have you seen anything this quaint. Lunchtime Concert in the Park: 12-1 PM The Saints of Swing brass band and the Dented Fenders barbershop quartet give a lunchtime concert in the gazebo in the Athens Riverfront Park. Have some lunch while you listen to old time music and watch the Hudson River meander by. Evarts Library Centennial Celebration: 1-3 PM Photo: the Evarts Library Especially for kids or the kid in you, the Evarts Library will host its centennial celebration on its front lawn. Following the serving of the centennial birthday cake and lemonade, enjoy free horse and buggy rides, Professor Marvel's Old Tyme Magic Show, Uncle Sam the Stilt Waker and many turn-of-the century games. The Post Office will hold a special centennial stamp cancellation for those secret philatelists in the crowd. The Evarts Library will also be one of the stops on our tour of historic village homes. An exhibition highlighting the history of the library centennial and the Old Home Week celebration is on view concurrently at the Athens Cultural Center.

Announcing our 2007 Series of Workshops

We are pleased announce our 2007 Series of Workshops here at Howard Hall Farm. The series begins on July 24th with a Historic Lime Plaster Workshop taught by the infamous Rory Brennan (of Preservation Plastering and This Old House).. This on-site consultation will include hands-on lime plaster training, commencing with a certificate of completion for workshop participants.

Our classroom is a 220 year old Federal style home in Athens, NY, which offers a unique environment for hands-on learning and offers specific restoration challenges that are distinctive to this region. These classes are geared toward the restoration practitioner as well as the layman and are a sure to be valuable this restoration-heavy area of the country.

THUNDER IN THE GLOOM

This was the view from where I'm sitting as I watched the storm approach. Reggie (he took this picture) told me that this is the first time he's seen a storm come through here from the North-East in the entire time he's lived here. I'm sitting in the beautiful new open-air office we just moved into on the balcony of Howard Hall Farm.

Crackling in the far-off skies. I suddenly remember that we never finished fixing the lightning rod. I was indirectly struck by lightning in my car a couple weeks ago, but even that did not remind me. This old place is set in a dangerous, electric, storm-prone land. We haven't even put all the windows in yet so it's all fluttering plastic and pounding rains, and this clutching wind...It's only 7mph, but the old documents on the tables of the porch don't understand math and they fling themselves over the railings, past the melted candles and into the pooling waters below. The smell of wet antique woods wafts up from the floor.

It's a very strange storm. I'm listening to a Coil c.d. (the one with a magic mirror on the cover) very quietly beneath the rains, and it sounds like ghostly footsteps behind me as I sit alone in this old room between the deep cracking groans of thunder outside my window. The house suddenly feels as old as it is, and the creatures are crying out in the fields. A brief lull in the rains. ..[I ran out in the storm to feed Lucifer, the horned Shetland lamb. In his terror he lunged at the bottle frantically long after it was empty]....The storm reconvenes...thunder gathers in the distance on the southwest side of the house. It has wraithed around this place and it will pass. The house will survive another storm, and the sounds of the footsteps will fade away. We are lucky to have a chance to restore this place. That it's survived this long without being swallowed by the sky.

Sheffield Marble In The Rough

Where else would you find the elusive remains of marble from the same quarry that was initially commissioned to supply the materials for the Lincoln Memorial but in the middle of a junkyard? Reggie (for those new to the blog, he and Norah are the visionaries that dreamed up our project here at Howard Hall Farm) was telling me about a project he worked on that included redoing a stoop for a gorgeous Victorian home here in the Hudson River Valley. Apparently, to be historically accurate, he wanted to find the marble that would have been used around that time, which came from a local place called The Sheffield Quarry in Sheffield, Mass.

The catch: The Sheffield Quarry was commissioned to provide the marble for the Lincoln Memorial. Their marble was used for the base, but they couldn't keep up with the demand, and another quarry took over. (That's why anyone who's seen it will notice that the base of the statue is white marble, but the rest has grey veins.) The loss of that job drove them to ruin and put them out of business in the 1850's....So how in the world was he supposed to find some of this special marble?

A rumor reached him that SOMEWHERE there were some small chunks remaining from the quarry that hadn't been used. So he and a friend got into the car, and drove through the torrential absurdity of a hideous sleet storm to the area near the quarry. They passed a junkyard on the way, and knowing that junkyard guys are some of the greatest holders of secret local lore and clues, they decided to see if they could help. So they took the car along the windy road, passed through the graveyard of rusting car carcasses, and found the two proprietors sitting beside a fire.

(Now here's where serendipity comes in from the rain to play.) It turned out that the remaining pieces of this Sheffield marble were closer than they suspected. Two 10x10 foot pieces remained and were hiding out (where else?) right there in the center of the junkyard!

So they were able to redo the stoop as history dictated.

And now the exciting new addition to our home at Howard Hall Farm: (can you guess?)

We got a piece of Sheffield marble for our entryway!
The boys installed it yesterday, and it's stunning!

Undressing the Panes

Pat spent the morning scraping the old paint off some seriously decaying windows, so he can remove the surviving beautiful panes that were origional to the house and reuse them in a sturdier window frame (being built right now by Harry Klahr).

Our Mysterious Interloper

This mysterious red-taloned bird of elusive origin has been hanging around the farm. We think it might be endangered. I snuck up close to it and saw a red tag on its little leg. If anyone has any ideas what it is, let me know! We've never seen anything like it!

~THIS MYSTERY WAS SOLVED BY: OUR FRIEND LESLEY~

The bird is the KURDISH NATIONAL BIRD
For The Chukar Information...Our Thanks Go Out To: