ROCKINGHAM-A pair of Stephen Belaski murals, in storage in northern New York for the past 36 years, have been gifted to the town.
Belaski, born in New York in 1909, grew up and lived in Bellows Falls most of his life. He became one of Vermont's most noted muralists, with many of his best known works created in the 1930s, including these two murals, funded by the Federal Art Project, part of the New Deal's Works Progress Administration (WPA).
The Vermont Division for Historic Preservation worked with the Rockingham Historic Preservation Commission to acquire the murals "as a deeded gift without cost from the Fort Ticonderoga Association," according to Walter Wallace, the commission coordinator.
The WPA commissioned Belaski to paint the murals in the late 1930s, and they were allocated to the Fort Ethan Allen Officer's Club in 1940 and installed there in the fall of 1941.
Fort Ethan Allen was officially closed in 1962, and the Officer's Club was renovated to become the Elley-Long Music Center at St. Michael's College in 2001.
The two murals - 10-by-10 foot canvasses attached to hinged, three-panel wooden frames - have been stored since then at the Fort Ticonderoga museum in upstate New York.
The storage years have not been kind to the paintings, which have been transported to Rockingham and are in "safe storage, pending restoration," according to Wallace.
Painting Vermont's history
Belaski was well-known for his murals depicting Colonial and American Revolution life among both early settlers and Native Americans. These paintings fall into that category.
Vermont's founding father, Ethan Allen, is famed for capturing Fort Ticonderoga on Lake Champlain in New York from the British early in the Revolutionary War in 1775. One painting is of the overland transport of 60 tons of captured British cannons to Boston shortly after the fort was captured.
The transport was overseen by a barely 25-year-old Col. Henry Knox, and the cannons were used in support of the siege of the city and the Battle of Bunker Hill, in 1775 and 1776. The U.S. gold depository at Fort Knox, Kentucky, is named for him.
Knox, a self-taught engineer, eventually was named a senior general in the Continental Army and would become the first United States secretary of war following the Revolutionary War.
The other mural depicts British Gen. John Burgoyne's surrender to U.S. Maj. Gen. Horatio Gates at Saratoga, New York, in 1777. Burgoyne's surrender is considered a major turning point toward victory for the Colonists.
Wallace said that the murals "are of regional interest for a variety of reasons."
First, the two events depicted in the murals are "significant in Vermont's involvement in the American Revolution," he said.
But the other link is Belaski himself, the artist who grew up in Bellows Falls and taught art at Bellows Falls High School for many years.
"The Brattleboro American Legion opened their hall as studio space, where he painted the murals," Wallace said.
He said that it is hoped that dedication of the restored murals in the Rockingham Town Hall will coincide with "the 2026 celebration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence."
And, "of note, 2026 also marks the centennial year of the opening of the Town Hall," Wallace said.
The murals are "lingering in storage," Wallace said, characterizing them as "in rough shape and requir[ing] restoration."
That work will take considerable time and money.
"Mike Stack has donated warehouse space as we work to fund the restoration," Wallace said. "For restoration, we are seeking grants as well as philanthropy so as not to burden the town, which is already deeply committed to historic preservation of the B.F. train depot, the Miss Bellows Falls Diner, and the Rockingham Meeting House."
The B.F. connection
Belaski lived in Bellows Falls until his death in 1987. His ability as an artist was evident early in his life. As a high school student, "he was employed by area stores to create advertising placards for display windows," according to Volume 1 of Art in Federal Buildings.
After graduating high school in Bellows Falls, Belaski attended the Vesper George School of Art in Boston, where he was awarded a tuition scholarship for one year.
Even as an art student, Belaski's work was singled out. On June 3, 1931, A.J. Philpott of The Boston Globe, writing about a group exhibition of works by Vesper George students, said "It seems almost invidious to pick out any of the examples in this exhibition for special mention. But one cannot avoid standing in front of that mural painting by Stephen J. Belaski."
Philpott described Belaski's work, depicting a group of Native Americans, as "fine in composition, in character and color."
Belaski was awarded a scholarship for a three-month summer term in France at the Fontainebleau School of Fine Arts. There, he studied under artists Jean Despujols, André Strauss, and Gaston Balande in a program that focused on decoration and ornamentation of murals using tempera and fresco.
When he returned to Bellows Falls at age 25, he quickly established himself as a professional painter.
In 1934, he painted his first major public commission, a series of two large and four smaller panels, three on on either side, in the front entrance of Bellows Falls High School. The school is now the Bellows Falls Middle School, and the murals are still there.
The murals depict, on one side, Abenaki people fishing in the Connecticut River at the Great Falls in Bellows Falls, a site where a large collection of indigenous petroglyphs can still be seen.
The mural on the opposite wall depicts the first Christian service being delivered by captive Rev. John Williams, at the mouth of the Williams River in Vermont, just north of Bellows Falls.
French soldiers and about 240 Native American warriors from several tribes raided the English Colonial settlement of Deerfield, Massachusetts, on Feb. 28, 1704. The raiders took some 112 captives from Deerfield up the Connecticut River to Montreal, Quebec.
On the trek north, they camped at the mouth of the Williams on March 5, where Rev. Williams conducted the service based on Lamentations 1:18, and prayed with his fellow captives, which included several members of his immediate family.
The river was eventually named in honor of Williams and the historic event.
The mural project was funded by the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP) and overseen by Pierre Zwick, who was an artist himself as well as Vermont director of the Federal Art Project.
The BFMS murals were restored in 1987, due to the efforts of then-BFMS art teacher Mary Lou Massucco. At that time she also interviewed Belaski about his life work.
Massucco said that Belaski died just a week before the murals were rededicated.
Belaski also painted other Vermont murals, including those in the lobby of the then-new Rutland Post Office and Courthouse, completed in 1933. It was subsidized by the Treasury Section of Painting and Sculpture.
Each mural depicts a significant event in Colonial-era Vermont. Five murals were initially approved, but six were executed and installed. Belaski painted the murals in his studio using oil paint on canvas, and they were then glued to the post office walls.
Massucco said she is delighted that these important but long neglected Fort Ticonderoga murals have made their way back to Belaski's hometown.
"I think it's great," she said. "I hate to see any part of our history being lost."
This News item by Robert F. Smith was written for The Commons.