ABOUT OUR SHERBURNE HISTORIC SOCIETY
We started in the fall of 2001, with the dedication of the gift from Bill Kehoe and his wife Hermene, of moving and restoring a Sherburne district schoolhouse. Soon there were a handful of people who were interested in relating and preserving the history of our town. The next step was acquiring ownership of the property onto which the schoolhouse was moved, w
hich belonged to the nearby Sherburne-Earlville School system. This was accomplished in 2002, soon after the first of the year. Our small group, led by Town Supervisor, Harry Conley, Town Historian, Rose Wellman and local historian, ‘Doc’ Bob Benedict, then proceeded to do a summer Saturday program “Open House” in 2002, 2003 and 2004, to share the rich history of our area. Several other people joined us for this program, which continued each year until the fall of 2004, when a decision was made to organize a historic society. We had our location, the Sherburne Historic Park, with the railroad section house having been moved from the lawn of the Sherburne News, to our park, thus establishing the start of what we hoped would grow and tell the story of Sherburne’s history. We were officially the Sherburne Historic Park Society. We went about ‘learning the ropes’ and rules of a historic organization. One of our first group efforts was the establishment of a Citizen of the Year Award to be presented. Our recipient in January 2005 for the year 2004 was Bill Kehoe, who had been responsible for us having the district schoolhouse. For 2005 we honored ‘Doc’ Benedict, area historian; for 2006 it was John and Betty McDaniel of the Sherburne News and for 2007 it was Rose Wellman, who had recently retired as town historian. In the fall of 2005 we were contacted by the 61st Regiment re-enactor’s group out of Delaware/New Jersey, who were in Sherburne doing research at the Public Library on the local soldiers who served with that regiment, mainly Charles A Fuller. They contacted the town historian and we were eager to oblige and ask them to come up in the summer for a Civil War re-enactment weekend. This continued each year, each year, bringing more and different groups to participate. It takes time to do a group program successfully and we are learning. It was in the spring of 2006 when we were searching for a building to use for the historian’s office and our headquarters for a museum that Jim Webb came to us with an idea. His late son, Josh Webb, who died in 1998 of leukemia, had started building a log cabin for a prototype for Lok-n-Logs and then was unable to finish it. Jim offered it to us for a far lesser sum than it would cost, along with the materials to finish it. Most of the time and labor was donated by various workman of the area. A lot of man-hours by many went into getting it ready for the dedication, which was done at our Heritage Day on July 26th of 2007. It serves as the town historian’s office, our society center and a museum. Please feel welcome to come visit us for answers to your questions about local history and researching your local family connection. Go back into the past history of your community with photos, artifacts, newspapers, stories and displays, which will change from time to time. Our open hours will be posted in the Sherburne News along with contact persons to set up appointments. We also have a picnic pavilion for anyone’s use; with projects contributed by our local Eagle Scouts of pleasant community sponsored park benches and also a perennial garden near Route 12 near our sign. Anyone is invited to attend our meetings the second Thursday evening at 7 pm at the log cabin. You may reach us at (607) 674-6312 or at [email protected]
We are located on School Street at the corner of Classic Street and Champ Drive, near the Sherburne-Earlville School campus. Come and visit!
