by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, July 2, 2021.

Like most of the Black Revolutionary War veterans who settled in Exeter after the fighting ended, we aren’t entirely sure about Prince Light’s origins. In “Strong and Brave Fellows,” author Glen Knoblock offers convincing evidence that Light began his days enslaved to John Light of Exeter and later to Ephraim Robinson. We’re also uncertain about exactly when he gained his freedom. He may have first enlisted in the Continental Army as Prince Robinson or he may have used Prince Light as his name. The records are sparce and not specific enough to help researchers several centuries out.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, June 18, 2021.

It isn’t named ‘Barney.’ It would be a copyright violation if the purple dinosaur in the playground on Front Street was named ‘Barney.’ When it was installed as a riding toy, in 1996, the PBS program “Barney and Friends” was wildly popular with the under-five set. Purchasing a branded version of the popular character would have sent costs soaring, so the park’s version is simply called ‘Purple Dinosaur.’

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, June 4, 2021.

Earlier this week there was a small pickup truck parked in front of the Exeter Historical Society. The rear tire was precariously balanced on top of the granite curb due to a parallel parking mishap. We’ve all been there. Yet even though the situation looked pretty dire, the truck would be able to drive home relatively unscathed thanks to the technology involved in modern tire design. Modern tires are more rugged than their ancestors.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, May 21, 2021.

“Our little quiet village today, is alive, there is a circus in town, and the railroad annual meeting meets here today, which brings people from all parts, some for amusement, some for Business, some to get money, and some to get rum, I have heard and saw more intoxicated today than I should want to see in a long life.” It is clear, from her diary entry on September 8th, 1852, that Hannah Brown was not a lover of frivolity. As a small shareholder of the Boston and Maine railroad, she attended the annual meeting and not the circus. What is not clear, from her diary, is whether the drunkenness she so disapproved of was the result of circus goers or rail investors.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, May 7, 2021.

In 1951, the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Exeter sponsored the town’s first Soap Box Derby. Racing down Town Hill, eleven boys competed in the distance race: Robert Sargent, Stephen Pluff, Scott Carlisle, Dan Carlisle, Victor Rogers, John Rogers, Ralph Landry, John Anderson, Robert Lowther, Robert Taylor and Kenneth Linscott. Lowther, Landry, and Anderson won the race, earning them $5, $3, and $2, respectively. The VFW garnered some publicity for their building fund and pledges for the Red Cross blood drive. All around, it was a fun event. The Exeter News-Letter noted, “Judging by the enthusiasm of the boys and the spectators, the committee feels that the Soap Box Derby was a success. It is hoped to have a bigger and better Soap Box Derby in the spring.”

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, April 23, 2021.

Exeter’s early records include the following: “On March 30, 1682, it was enacted by general consent that the piece of land between Edward Sewall’s fence, Christian Dolloff’s fence or land, John Bean’s fence, Henry Magoon’s fence or land and the way that goes from Henry Magoon’s land to Pickpocket mill, which said piece of land now lying common, shall lie perpetually common for the use of the town, either for a common field or for what else shall be thought convenient for the town.” Nancy Merrill would write, in 1972, that this was the first reference to a triangle of land later referenced as ‘lower plains,’ ‘plains common,’ and the current name ‘Park Street common.’ Since the 1680s, the flat open piece of land has been used for a variety of purposes.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, April 9, 2021.

In 1850, Mrs. Mary Simpkins and her stepdaughter, Joanna, advertised their millinery business on Water Street. “Straw Bonnets, Ribbons, Flowers, Laces, Caps, Silk Bonnets plain and drawn, Mourning Bonnets on hand and made to Order.” The pair also offered cleaning services for straw bonnets, “Pressed and sewed to the present fashion. All work executed by experienced hands.” Readers of the Exeter News-Letter would have found it unusual to find women listed in the advertising section of the paper. There were only a few types of businesses respectable women would advertise—dressmaking and millinery. The dressmakers rarely had a designated shop. It was common for dress cutters and seamstresses to come to the patron’s house. Milliners, however, needed a shop to promote their wares.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, March 26, 2021.

In 1947, after the dust of the second world war had settled, the social climate encouraged women to leave the workforce and ‘return to the home.’ Problem was, a lot of women did not want that life. Women worked for the same reasons’ men worked – they needed the paycheck. And, like men, most women wanted purposeful work that matched their interests and skills. To support one another in this endeavor, the Exeter Business and Professional Women’s Club was organized and chartered.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, March 12, 2021.

On a February day in 1881, 13-year-old Lillian Perkins signed her name on the roster at the Robinson Female Seminary. She and her cousin, Maude, were new students having only recently qualified from their sub-grammar class. Having grown up on her father’s farm on Perkins Hill, it was not inevitable that Lillian would attend or even complete the full course. Her parents, B. Judson and Sarah Giles Perkins, were not your average farmers. Judson, had lost his left hand at the age of 16 while using dynamite to clear land. Perhaps thinking he might not be capable of farming, his father had encouraged him to attend Phillips Exeter Academy, where the boy excelled. He completed his studies in 1861 – having spent one year studying with Robert Todd Lincoln as a fellow student. He kept diaries for the years 1860 and 1861. He knew he would not be going to war due to his disability and turned instead to farming and courting a young schoolteacher named Sarah Giles. Even in his diary he was too shy to write her name, switching to Greek letters when he wrote about her.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, February 26, 2021.

Henry Mainjoy, formerly enslaved by Noah Emery, lived into his eighties in his house on Green Street. Here are a few reminiscences about him from some nostalgic white neighbors. “It is not necessary that I should say much in regard to Harry. He was well and favorably known to nearly all now living in Exeter and vicinity (this was written in 1879 –by an unidentified commentator to the Exeter News-Letter). “I remember him when he was first brought to Squire Noah Emery’s. Judging from his size I should think he could not have been more than 12 years of age. He was the blackest, sleekest, lithest little chap that I ever saw.” Exeter’s historian, Charles Bell, said of him, “Harry Manjoy, sometimes called Emery, is well remembered. He was brought to Exeter by Noah Emery, a shipmaster, not from Africa, probably, but from some foreign port where he was offered for sale. He claimed to have been a prince in his native country. He lived with Captain Emery until the latter’s death, and afterwards supported himself by his labor. He was industrious and respectable, and lived to a good old age.” Dr. William Perry, who delivered most of Mainjoy’s children, told a similar tale, “A negro well known in those days was Harry Manjoy. He was brought here by Captain Noah Emery, a sea captain, who picked him up in some foreign port. He was a very steady and industrious man and had a family equally industrious and respectable.”

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, February 12, 2021.

A few months after taking office in 1789, President George Washington took a tour of the New England states. His diary entry after his visit to Exeter had this to say about the town’s industries: “Above (but in the town) are considerable falls, which supply several grist mills, 2 oyle mills, a slitting mill, and snuff mill.” It’s slightly disappointing that he didn’t mention a chocolate mill. New Englanders, we are told, were crazy about drinking chocolate in the early republic. But was it popular in Exeter? After all, if we’re to time travel back, we’ll need chocolate.

By Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, January 29, 2021.

The darkest days are still ahead of us. This is the winter of COVID-19. A year ago we didn’t see it coming – couldn’t imagine that half a million people would die and we’d shrug off the numbers as they rose. As bad as things have become, there’s just the slightest sliver of hope. Since last Friday (January 22nd) when people over the age of 65 became the anointed ‘group 1-B,’ I’ve heard voices – spoken aloud, through email or hastily typed into Zoom chat – delightedly announcing their dates. The dates, mostly February and March, are for appointments to get COVID-19 vaccinations. A few people said the on-line registration was frustrating and complicated, a few more have said it went smoothly. Your results may vary, we can suppose. The 65+ crowd has become increasingly more tech-savvy in the past year.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, January 15, 2021.

In June of 1835, the newly formed New Hampshire Anti-Slavery Society met in Concord. Among the many resolutions passed was this: “Resolved, That this Society earnestly recommend to all its auxiliaries, to circulate, as soon as practicable, in their respective vicinities, petitions for the abolition of slavery and the slave trade in the District of Columbia, and forward the same to Congress, at the opening of the next session of that body.”

By Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, January 1, 2021.

We all know how 2020 went. It was a year suspended. A year we’ll forever break into the “before times,” prior to mid-March, and the pandemic times. 1920 was the “after time.” It was after the horrors of World War I and after the fear of the 1918-19 influenza. These two shocks still left lingering discomfort.

By Barbara Rimkunas

This "Historically Speaking" column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, December 18, 2020.

As if there weren’t enough deadly things to worry about in the 1880s, what with all the infectious diseases lurking in every cough, the Boston Globe began publishing articles warning the public that they might be slowly poisoned by the wallpaper in their homes. In January, 1886, Harvard professor David Gordon Lyon recounted his household’s close call after renovations to his Cambridge home. “There is a general impression that arsenic is used in the manufacture of wall papers, but most people are sadly ignorant of the extent to which this poison is thus employed,” he wrote.

by Barbara Rimkunas

This “Historically Speaking” column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, December 4, 2020.

A recent inquiry arrived, via social media, with a photograph of a large white house. “Any info out there about this house?” Generally, it’s hard to find information about a large white house in Exeter – so many houses in town fit that description. Numerous people replied that they remember the house and had, perhaps, known someone who lived there. The picture was a post card with the label “The New Lincoln House, Exeter, NH.” Sounds like a project for the Exeter Historical Society!

by Barbara Rimkunas

This “Historically Speaking” column was published in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, February 12.2016.

Buried on the last pages of the Exeter News-Letter in late January of 1834, was the following notice: “At the request of a number of Gentlemen of this town, notice is hereby given that a meeting will be held at the Court-House, on Thursday evening…for the purpose of organizing a Lyceum in this town.” It was buried so deeply that the editor felt impelled to add another notice to draw attention to the first notice, “We ask the attention of our readers in Exeter, to a notice in another column, on the subject of forming a Lyceum in this village.” What’s the big deal? And what was a ‘lyceum,’ anyway?

A few weeks ago, I encountered, a young child and his adult walking towards me on the sidewalk. As we drew nearer, the little boy – unprompted – pulled the loops of his face mask up over his ears, covering his nose and mouth completely. Then he waved happily, and we kept walking. This is everyday life during the 2020 pandemic. I couldn’t get my own kids to even wear mittens, but somehow this little guy knows that he needs to wear his face mask. It’s a temporary measure (we hope), but it makes one wonder about hygiene and public health and how things have changed over the years.

In late October of 1920, the Exeter News-Letter noted: “Visitors in Exeter are two former residents, Mrs. J.P. Emerson and her daughter, Mrs. J.H. Gay, of San Diego, California.” To better identify these married ladies, the notice continued, “As Miss Jennette P. Talbot, the latter graduated in 1893 from Robinson Seminary, in which she retains keen interest.” The mother and daughter, who most Exeter residents knew as Jeannette and Jennette Talbot, were visiting during a crucial year for women. In just a few weeks, the nation’s women would be casting their ballots for the first time in a presidential election.

George Dearborn was never described as an ordinary man. Accounts of him, written later in his life, describe him as eccentric. He was born in 1815, along with his twin brother, into a large family. His father, Freese Dearborn, was from Hampton, but had deep roots in Exeter. The family’s emigrant ancestor, Godfrey Dearborn, had arrived with the Reverend John Wheelwright in 1638. Freese moved his family from Hampton to Exeter around 1802, and long served as the town jailor. It must have caused some excitement when twin boys were born. Freese Dearborn celebrated the birth by naming his sons George Washington Dearborn and John Adams Dearborn.