COUNTRY SCHOOLS

This is the last week before the first day of school for elementary and high school students in the area. To coincide with this event, the Friends of MPL are offering a program entitled "Country Schools" at 6 PM, September 10 in the Community Room of the library. Carolyn Adriaansen, Marion Town Historian, will be sharing her knowledge of area country schools of the past. You are all invited to attend. (We guarantee you'll enjoy Carolyn's presentation, delivered with her wonderful sense of humor.)

To get us in the mood, we looked for Bullis school books and found this one that was used in one of the country schools that Carolyn will be talking about:

Graded Literature Readers--Fifth Book

Published in 1900 by Charles E. Merrill Co. 

Edited by Harry Pratt Judson LLD, President of the University of Chicago and 

Ida C. Bender, Supervisor of Primary Grades in the Public Schools of Buffalo, New York

Among fifteen or so stories in this reader is the short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne, "The Old-Fashioned School" which is accompanied with this illustration:

Doesn't this make you thankful that you didn't live back in "those days"? Join us on September 10 for the "Country Schools" presentation--and find out what else we can be thankful for!

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

This week, we went back to a Bullis Book Chronicles post made 4 years ago, to an entry that highlighted a book in the Bullis collection connected to the Aldrich Change Bridge. In case you're not familiar with this bridge, it's located in Macedon and Palmyra's Aqueduct Park.

We're pasting this previous post in below, in case you missed it the first time around.  (If you've already read this post, please scan down to "This week."

"Thursday, July 29, 2010

SQUIRE WHIPPLE'S BOOK

One of the special books in the Bullis Collection is titled: An Essay on Bridge Building: containing analyses and comparisons of the principal plans in use: with investigations as to the best plans and proportions, and the relative merits of wood and iron for bridges, by Squire Whipple (Utica, NY: H. H. Curtis, 1847).

A visitor to the Bullis Room this last week stopped by to look at this book again. The book and its author are of interest to many local people because the Aldrich Change Bridge, which was rescued from abandonment and re-erected in Macedon and Palmyra's Aqueduct Park during 2003 and 2004, was originally built in 1858 from a design by Squire Whipple.

We're not sure how this book came to be a part of the Bullis Collection, but it is invaluable as a source of bridge building techniques. If you haven't visited Aqueduct Park recently and looked at the Aldrich Change Bridge, we encourage you to do so this summer. Thanks to Squire Whipple's knowledge and a group of local volunteer bridge enthusiasts, it's there for us to appreciate and enjoy. "

This week we have an update to this post. On July 23, 2014, twelve members of the crew who reconstructed the bridge in Macedon and Palmyra's Aqueduct Park met for a special award presentation at the base of the bridge.  Erie Canalway Commission Chair Russ Andrews and Commissioner Vicky Daly presented an Award of Commendation from the Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor to the Friends of the Aldrich Change Bridge.  This award was in recognition of the tenth anniversary of the completion of the change-bridge project.

Here's a photo of members of the bridge crew who attended the ceremony, standing on their success.

Following the presentation,  several of the crew shared with their colleagues, as well as members of the community, memories of their bridge-building experiences. Jay Harding, the project's coordinator, received many accolades for the ideas, leadership, inspiration, and energy he put into the whole process.  Those present agreed that the success of the project resulted from a dedicated group of volunteers, like Jay, who were willing to get involved in their community and work together to accomplish a successful completion of their goal.

Community involvement--we think Nettie Bullis would have liked this. Very much.

'NINA" AND "PINTA"

The "Nina" and the "Pinta"  visited this area last week. No, they weren't the original ships that Christopher Columbus sailed on in his historic journey ... rather, two authentic replicas. Those of us who attended this exhibition in the Port of Rochester got the feel of walking on the decks and tried to imagine life aboard these vessels on the open sea.

The exhibit ended yesterday, so if you didn't go you'll have to wait until the ships' next visit.  IN THE MEANTIME, if you'd like more information on this subject, we can offer you two options:

1. Visit the Nina & Pinta website, http://thenina.com/

and/or

2.  Visit the Bullis Room and take a look at this book from the collection: Columbus and Columbia: A Pictorial History of the Man and the Nation, by James G. Blaine etal.,  published in Cincinnati in 1892.  The book reviews our country's progress, as of 120 years ago, and is an "illustrated description of the great Columbian exposition."