York Town News
Breaking new ground for Old York
By Jennifer L. Saunders
Old York Heritage Campaign Chairman Russell Peterson, OYHS Executive Director Scott Stevens and Old York Board of Trustees President Calvin Hosmer are all smiles as they officially “break the ground” for Old York’s new education and exhibition center, to be located adjacent to Jefferds’ Tavern in York Village.
Photo by Tori Rasche
YORK - A new era has begun for the Old York Historical Society as the first shovels full of dirt have been lifted to break ground for the education and exhibition center.
The Old York Historical Society had begun its site work in preparation for the construction of the new center earlier this month, but the official groundbreaking was held on the grounds of Jefferds' Tavern on Monday, June 11, at noon.
Old York trustees and staff members were joined by volunteers for the Heritage Campaign and members of the public to mark this new beginning for Old York as an effort that commenced with the idea back in 2004 of creating a new facility in the shape of an old New England barn, is now becoming a reality - with a few twists.
Instead of building a new barn-shaped center, the facility has been designed around an actual 19th-century Eliot barn that was dismantled and stored to prevent it from being destroyed when the property where it stood was sold for a subdivision.
Old York has been raising funds through the Heritage Campaign for two years, with the goal of $2.8 million to fund construction of the new facility and its landscaping as well as to strengthen the society's endowment.
Old York has $320,000 left to raise in order to reach its goal, Old York Historical Society Executive Director Scott Stevens noted, and the hope is to bring the campaign to a successful conclusion by the time the new facility opens.
As approved by the Planning Board, the Jefferds' Tavern site will be transformed with a new landscape plan, an expanded parking lot - to be screened from the street and shaded by large trees - and a perimeter sidewalk to allow people to walk around the site without wandering along the edge of York Street or Lindsay Road.
"Old York will raise the Vietnam War memorial and build a stone wall behind it to make it more visible," Stevens noted, adding that "new plantings of disease-resistant elms will restore an element missing from York Street since the mid-20th century."
From the outset, Old York staff and volunteers have shared the society's vision with the community that this new facility will provide for more educational and community programs and exhibitions, which are currently precluded by a lack of space in the society's historic museums.
"Jefferds' Tavern currently houses programs serving over 3,600 schoolchildren annually," Stevens explained after the groundbreaking, but added the tavern is "a fragile historic building divided into small rooms."
When the Eliot barn is resurrected as the new exhibition and education center, the fully accessible facility will feature 900 square feet of space adaptable for many kinds of presentations on its first floor alone.
"It will include a fireplace for the traditional hearth-cooking activities students and visitors love," Stevens said. "Old York will be able to host talks, meetings, workshops, musical performances and many other programs that now must take place off-site."
Curator Tom Johnson said the new facility will also allow residents and visitors a chance to see many more of the objects in the OYHS collections.
"The Old Gaol, the Emerson-Wilcox House and the Elizabeth Perkins House offer vivid experiences of life in early York. Their rooms are small, though, and lighting can be low," he explained. "A large, open gallery with special lighting and environmental controls will give visitors a chance to see wonderful objects in our collections in new ways."
For more about Old York and its programs, visit http://www.oldyork.org/.
