Curator's Corner

September 9, 2023| Collections, New Acquisitions, Uncategorized

A Dunning Down Under

I was immediately interested when I saw the auction listing and accompanying photograph. It was a fine example of the artist’s work and attracted my attention. Yes, very much so. That interest,...

December 9, 2020| Fall River History, FRHS Press, Projects

American Textile Colossus: A Definitive History

It is a brilliant book and in my estimation the definitive text on the history of the textile manufacturing industry that was Fall River. The book: American Textile Colossus by Jay J. Lambert. It is,...

December 4, 2020| Behind the Scenes, Christmas at the FRHS, Vexations & Such

Call me Ebenezer: How I Ruined Her Christmas Tradition

By far, the vast majority of people completely understand and are extremely sympathetic to the decision of the FRHS board of directors to remain closed during the 2020 holiday season, prudently...

October 28, 2020| Acquisitions, Behind the Scenes, Collections, Library & Archive

Durfee Mills Accident Reports & My Paternal Grandfather’s Missing Finger

If nothing else, compliance with Center for Disease Control and Commonwealth of Massachusetts recommended protocols pertaining to the coronavirus pandemic has allowed for long postponed archival...

August 28, 2020| Lizzie Borden

Lizzie Andrew Borden and the Paranormal

For some reason, as of late, there has been a resurgence of interest in the paranormal as it relates to Lizzie Andrew Borden (1860-1927). But, oddly enough, there is an interesting historical...

July 31, 2020| Acquisitions, Collections, New Acquisitions

Edward Chalmers Leavitt – A Masterpiece

I had been hoping to acquire a painting by Edward Chalmers Leavitt (1842-1904) for the FRHS collection for some time, and when alerted by a long-time FRHS member and benefactor, just a few weeks...

June 24, 2020| Acquisitions, Collections, Fall River History, New Acquisitions

Franklin Harrison Miller – A Pair of Landscape Paintings

It was a few weeks ago, while scanning the various lots of an online auction catalogue, that I noticed a pair of paintings. The artist’s hand certainly looked familiar – unmistakable, really, and...

June 8, 2020| Collections, Exhibits

An Important Fall River Motion Picture Discovery: The New Cotton Vogue

Film history fascinates me. I was first introduced to silent film while in my teens via a 1980 Thames Television thirteen-episode documentary series called Hollywood: A Celebration of the American...

May 22, 2020| Acquisitions, Collections

I Did Not Think It Had Survived: Heirloom Paisley and Florence Cook Brigham

Last Friday there was a delivery. The three medium-sized boxes contained material that had once belonged to Florence Cook Brigham – my dearest friend and mentor – and that after her death passed...

April 28, 2020| Acquisitions, Collections, New Acquisitions

Durfee Mills Textile Swatches

Of the countless miles of cloth woven or printed in Fall River’s mills during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, surprisingly few samples have survived with documentation of their production...