by Portsmouth Athenaeum | Jul 1, 2022 | Announcements, Manuscripts
Katy Sternberger, Archivist Continued from “Prevent the Spread: A History of Smallpox Inoculation in Eighteenth-Century Portsmouth.” In 1782 amid a smallpox epidemic, doctors Joshua Brackett, Ammi Ruhamah Cutter, Hall Jackson, and John Jackson built a hospital on...
by Portsmouth Athenaeum | Jun 24, 2022 | Announcements, Manuscripts
Katy Sternberger, Archivist After more than two years of living with the COVID-19 pandemic, we now have a unique sense of what it was like to witness pandemics past—quarantining, vaccine hesitancy, and reports of case numbers in the news are not novel. We just need to...
by Portsmouth Athenaeum | Aug 27, 2020 | Announcements, Manuscripts
By Archivist Susan Kindstedt Each collection at the Athenaeum holds the potential to tell many stories. One such collection arrived at the Athenaeum in 2019 during the exhibit “By the Bottle or the Barrel: 400 Years of Brewing in Portsmouth.” The gift of a...
by Portsmouth Athenaeum | Aug 11, 2020 | Announcements, Manuscripts
By Keeper Tom Hardiman In 2011, the Portsmouth Athenaeum received a remarkable bequest from the estate of long-time Athenaeum Proprietor Dudley Stoddard (1915-2009). Dudley descended from Portsmouth’s Warner family, and he left to the Athenaeum a collection of...
by Portsmouth Athenaeum | Jul 21, 2020 | Announcements, Manuscripts
By Archivist Susan Kindstedt The Athenaeum has two documents signed by Wentworth Cheswill (or Cheswell), a biracial Revolutionary War veteran born in Newmarket, NH, in 1746. Wentworth Cheswill was the son of Hopestill Cheswill and his wife, Katherine Kennison....
by Portsmouth Athenaeum | Jun 25, 2020 | Announcements, Library, Manuscripts
In the midst of re-numbering the entire library catalog, Librarian Robin Silva has uncovered some interesting history. In October 1907, a book had been discovered in the Athenaeum’s stock room, left there anonymously. Published in 1905, the book was The...