Online Collection circa 1845 In 1840, William A. Castleman posted this notice offering a reward for the capture of George Jackson (Dudley), an enslaved man who had escaped.

Online Collection 1843-10-02 Elected officials often offered a monetary reward as a way of obtaining information about a crime or criminals.

Online Collection 1912 This lavishly decorated vehicle appeared in a parade celebrating the 150th anniversary of the founding of Bernardston, Massachusetts.

Online Collection 1912 This parade celebrated the 150th anniversary of the founding of Bernardston, Massachusetts.

Online Collection 1912 The Bernardston residents of 1912 recalled with fascination and pride the dress, customs, and hardships of their ancestors and incorporated them into a horse-drawn float celebrating the 150th anniversary of the town’s founding.

Lesson On February 29, 1704, Deerfield was attacked by a force of French soldiers and their Native American allies. Students will examine primary and secondary sources about the attack for evidence of bias, to explain discrepancies among these reports and to discuss the reliability of various sources.

Lesson John Williams (1664-1729) Ebenezer Hinsdale (1707-1763) Ebenezer Sheldon (1691-1774) Jonathan Hoyt (1688-1779) Samuel Childs (1679-1756) Samuel Barnard (1684-1762) Daniel Arms (1719-1784) Dr. Thomas Williams (1718-1775) […]

Online Collection 1910 This image is from a pageant held in Deerfield, MA, in 1910. The pageant celebrated the town’s past.

Oral History Ruth Loving remembers much about her childhood. She recalls with fondness her participation in her school’s fife and drum corps, and becoming a youth member of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). She also well remembers the important lessons that her mother taught her about fairness.

Activity: Oral History Ray Elliott was born to Marie Davis Elliott and William S. Elliott on February 18, 1924. His family was one of only two or three black families living in his Cambridge, Massachusetts, neighborhood. As he grew, Ray remembers feeling as though he fit into neither a white world nor a black one.

Oral History Born and raised in New York City, David Cohen’s first job took him to the coal mining region of West Virginia. As a young man, David was a keen observer of many facets of American society. His story offers us a glimpse of life in the United States before World War II.

Lesson

Oral History The support of a mother who “never, never limited my dreams” and the opportunity to attend good schools in Springfield, Massachusetts, made Dorothy Pryor an avid reader and an enthusiastic student who thrived in a rigorous academic environment.

Oral History Paul Slater was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1924, and he grew up during the Great Depression. The Japanese attack on the United States Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, which occurred on December 7, 1941, changed the trajectory of his life.

Oral History When her mother asked Ruth what she would like to do as a profession, Ruth replied that she wanted to become a singer. Although as an adult Ruth would appear on stage many times, sometimes alone, sometimes with her children, she remembers that, as an 18-year-old young woman, she danced at Harlem’s Cotton Club once, and only once.

Oral History Having grown up in the north and attended college in the South before the end of World War II, by the time she reached adulthood, Dorothy Pryor had witnessed or experienced a variety of racially charged interactions.

Activity: Oral History It was in 1896 that the United States Supreme Court decided it was legal to have separate public facilities and services for white people and black people, as long as those services and facilities were of equal quality. The ‘separate but equal’ law remained in effect until 1954 when the Supreme Court ruled that, with regard to education, separate schools for black children and white children were not, and could never be, truly equal. It would not be until the late 1960s that the United States Supreme Court would rule that segregation by law was unconstitutional. In 1938, seventeen years before the Supreme Court determined that the states would have to integrate schools, 16-year-old Juanita Nelson publicly expressed her belief that segregation is just not fair.

Activity: Oral History Like his father before him, Ray Elliott served in a segregated military. African Americans across the nation decided that they would defer their own fight for civil rights until and only until the world war was won.

Activity: Oral History In 1942, Ray Elliott, a student at Northeastern University, walked away from a Cambridge, Massachusetts recruiting booth, believing that he had just joined the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC). A couple of weeks later, he was shocked to learn that he had actually volunteered for the Army.

Oral History Ruth Loving and her family supported the World War II home front effort in a variety of ways. In addition to joining the Massachusetts Women’s Defense Corps and dancing with soldiers at Westover Field, she volunteered for the USO. Ruth was also a Senior Aide for the Red Cross.