Guilford Students Donate Historic Photos from Putney-Born Photographer
On a cold Thursday in February, a group of eighth graders from Guilford Central traveled to the Brattleboro Historical Society to meet with president Hazel Phelps and Civil War researcher Peg Barry. Their mission was to scan the photographs of the Putney-born Civil War photographer George Houghton as part of the Poets Afield project at Guilford Central, funded in part by the Vermont Arts Council. Successful authors of the grant application included Putney residents Stuart Strothman and Susan Hessey. Recently, members of the Putney Historical Society determined that Houghton was indeed born in Putney, and probably spent much of his childhood here.
Houghton, a great-great grandfather of Putney Historical Society’s president Ruth Barton, took many precious photographs, and the Brattleboro Historical Society’s collection is a real treasure—these photos have been used in various productions including Ken Burns’ famous documentary of the Civil War. Now, thanks to the work of the Guilford students, a select group of the photos have been digitized and donated to various local historical societies in electronic form, including Brattleboro, Guilford, and Putney. Anyone can view them online at flickr.com, a photo-sharing website owned by Yahoo—once at the site, key in poetsafield, and then click on the blue, underlined poetsafield tag beneath the photos that come up. A set of Houghton’s Civil War photos will then be available for public viewing (along with a lovely set of photos from Brattleboro resident Dana Sprague’s collection of baseball memorabilia, and another of landmarks in Guilford). Viewers can create their own flickr accounts by signing up for a free Yahoo subscription, and then they can add comments to the photos as well.
Thanks to the Guilford students, and to the Brattleboro Historical Society, for sharing these remarkable photos from a Putney-born photographer.
