ROCKINGHAM-The Vermont History Museum in Montpelier is hosting a special exhibit, "Rockingham's Acropolis: A Look at the Rockingham Meeting House in History."
Started in 1787 and completed in 1801, the building was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2000. It is considered an exceptionally well-preserved example of Colonial architecture. Meetings began to be held there in 1792, years before the building was completed.
"Today remaining largely unchanged from its completion in 1801, apart from a light-handed restoration in 1906," states the meetinghouse's Department of the Interior registration, "the Rockingham Meeting House is without a doubt the most intact eighteenth century public building remaining in Vermont."
The show highlights the history of the Meeting House and nearby villages from the 1770s to the 1840s.
An opening reception on Saturday, March 22 will include presentations from John Leppman of the Rockingham Historic Preservation Commission on "Rockingham's Acropolis," architect and historian Jane Griswold Radocchia on "The Geometry of the Meeting House," and "Ballads of Old Rockingham," presented by David Deacon, a historian, folklorist, and musician.
The exhibit is organized by the Rockingham Historic Preservation Commission, with funding from the Vermont Division of Historic Preservation, the town of Rockingham, the Preservation Trust of Vermont, the National Park Service, and private donations.
It brings together materials from the Bellows Falls Historical Society, the Saxtons River Historical Society, the Rockingham Free Public Library, and the Rockingham Meeting House. The Springfield Art and Historical Society also contributed valuable artifacts.
In addition, the exhibit includes several relics from private collections and antiques dealers.
"The exhibit is meant to convey an early sense of what the Rockingham Meeting House was like during that time," explained Walter Wallace, the coordinator of the Rockingham Historic Preservation Commission. "It was a worship space and a civic space. The exhibit tries to answer the question 'What was the Meeting House like in its heyday?'"
Early Rockingham Village history
The area around the meetinghouse was the original village center of Rockingham, and an earlier structure was built on this site in 1774. It was small (20 feet × 40 feet), primitive (with a dirt floor), and used only until the current one was approved in 1787. It would be sold off and removed by 1794.
Wallace said that ground-penetrating radar used around the meetinghouse grounds helped point to the site of that original building.
Early settler David Pulsipher, who contributed the land for the meetinghouse, joined a militia in response to a letter to Rockingham's Committee of Correspondence urging volunteers to come fight the British in Boston, immediately after the deaths in the 1775 battles at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts.
"The older men were cautious," Wallace said, "but the younger men were eager to go to Boston to fight."
At age 67, Pulsipher bucked that trend and went to battle, side-by-side with his son John. The elder Pulsipher died in Boston before he could return home. According to a family diary from his grandson, he died several months later from "cramp rheumatism in the breast" - perhaps a heart attack - after he suffered a bayonet wound in the Battle of Bunker Hill.
Rev. Samuel Whiting served as the Congregationalist minister in Rockingham as early as 1773. He lived in the parsonage, which is known today as the Soboleski Farm, located south of the meetinghouse.
"A minister had a lot of authority in the community at that time," Wallace said. "In that time, property taxes paid for the settled minister in a town. Everyone had to pay the tax for years."
In time, other religious groups moved to Rockingham, testing the waters of tolerance in the community.
"There were Presbyterians, Congregationalists, and some Baptists and Methodists," Wallace said. "These groups all had radically different views."
When the Universalists moved to the area, they were considered even more radical in their teachings by the other churches, Wallace explained. They would be warned out of Rockingham by the other churches and end up building their own meetinghouse on nearby Parker Hill Road.
Religious meetings in the Rockingham Meeting House slowed down and finally ended in 1839, as most of the local religions had built their own churches by then. Town meetings continued to be held there until 1869.
By 1800, about 950 people lived in Rockingham around the Meeting House, and it was in every sense the village center.
But the inn and post office there were destroyed in a major fire in 1909.
"The story is that the local citizens protected the Meeting House from that fire," Wallace said.
But with the advent of boat traffic on the Connecticut River, followed by the railroad coming into the area in the 1840s, the active village center moved away from the Meeting House and closer to the river. Rockingham's village of Bellows Falls then became the transportation, population, and industrial center of the town.
Early portraits and papers
The exhibit displays several early town records and manuscripts. It uses artifacts, historical materials, and period paintings that "offer insight into the daily lives, culture, and development of the region's early settlers," Wallace said.
Among the paintings in the exhibit are the folk art portraits by Aaron Dean Fletcher.
Born in Springfield, Fletcher had already made a name for himself as an exceptional country fiddler by the time he was 13. He then taught himself to paint.
He painted the likenesses of citizens from Rockingham, Saxtons River, and Springfield from about 1835 to 1839.
"He painted portraits of his neighbors," Wallace said. "We've collected 11 of his portraits, including three of Divoll family members."
The Divolls were also early settlers, with a dairy farm just across the road from the Rockingham Meeting House. The family owned and operated the farm for many generations until well into the 1990s and have been instrumental in preserving the building.
These portraits serve as a visual connection to the past, according to Wallace, providing a glimpse into the people who shaped the communities of southeastern Vermont.
"By bringing together resources from multiple historical societies, the exhibit not only preserves the past but also fosters a shared appreciation for local history," the Preservation Commission said in a news release.
"Visitors will gain a deeper understanding of the challenges, accomplishments, and lives of those who helped establish Rockingham and its neighboring villages," the commission members continued.
The Rockingham Meeting House Preservation Project is a few years into a three-phase, million-dollar restoration plan for preserving the building.
Planned work includes plaster and exterior woodwork conservation, and restoration of interior details such as the box pews.
"Rockingham's Acropolis: A Look at the Rockingham Meeting House in History" runs through Saturday, July 26 at the Vermont History Museum, 109 State St. in Montpelier. An opening reception takes place on Saturday, March 22, from 1 to 3 p.m. For information, visit vermonthistory.org/exhibit-rockingham-acropolis.
This News item by Robert F. Smith was written for The Commons.