September 18, 2024

1 Becoming a Dress Detective

2 Black Heritage Trail of NH Marker Unveiling

3 Murder and Mayhem: A Manchester Game of Clue

4 2025 Historic Preservation Award Nominations

5 YMCA Food Pantry Collection

6 Millyard Museum Presents Two New Children's Books

7 Witch of Weston Tower

8 Now on Exhibit: Who Wore It? The Forensics of a Dress

9 Manchester Trivia Questions

Becoming a Dress Detective

Wednesday, September 25, 2024

6:00 p.m.

Millyard Museum

Join us at the Millyard Museum on Wednesday evening, September 25 at 6pm for a talk by Camille Myers Breeze, Director and Chief Conservator at Museum Textile Services, one of the leading textile conservation centers in the country.

Textile Conservator Camille Myers Breeze will share the story of how she has gone about identifying, dating, and preserving historic dresses from across New England. Examples of past research and conservation projects will set the table for a discussion of the museum’s Molly Stark dress, which is in the Millyard Museum’s current special exhibit, “Who Wore It? The Forensics of a Dress”.

Those interested in history, art conservation, or fashion and textiles will enjoy this richly illustrated presentation.

COST: $5 members/ $10 non-members

Click here to register

Pre-registration is requested. Call or e-mail today to reserve your spot! (603) 622-7531 / history@manchesterhistoric.org

Black Heritage Trail of NH Marker Unveiling

THIS SATURDAY - September 21, 10:00 a.m.

Millyard Museum, 200 Bedford Street, Manchester, NH

The Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire and the Manchester Historic Association are excited to announce the dedication of a new marker recognizing and honoring enslaved peoples’ contributions to Manchester’s textile industry. 

The unveiling ceremony will take place this Saturday, September 21, at 10 a.m., followed by refreshments in the Millyard Museum. The marker will be located on the south end of the Mill #3 building at 200 Bedford Street. The location of the marker and ceremony is the site of a three-story picker house where bales of raw cotton were delivered and mill workers separated the cotton fibers from stems and sticks. This was one of the first places the cotton was handled once it arrived from the south. 

Prior to the Civil War, the majority of the cotton used to manufacture cloth at the Amoskeag Manufacturing Company in Manchester was purchased from southern sources where it was grown and picked on cotton plantations by enslaved people. In 1859, Amoskeag purchased an average of 5,000 bales of cotton per week for its textile production. The cotton was received from cities including Mobile, Alabama; Galveston, Texas; Charleston, South Carolina, New Orleans, Louisiana, and Apalachicola, Florida. 

Murder and Mayhem:

A Manchester Game of Clue

Thursday, October 3, 2024

5:30 - 7:30 p.m.

Millyard Museum

Join us at the Millyard Museum on October 3rd a for a fun evening of intrigue, murder, and mayhem: A Manchester Game of Clue, featuring 3 distinct historic Manchester murders.

Partnering once again with the Majestic Theater, come experience a first person

reenactment of the events as they unfolded right here in our fair Queen City. Can you solve the case of the Chauffeur in the Kitchen with the poison? How about the Barkeep in the Woods with the Knife?

The evening will include a cash bar and heavy hors d’ oeuvres. Advanced registration is required. This is a 21+ event.

COST: $15 Manchester Historic Association members – $20 General Public

Pre-registration is required. Click here to register, or call or e-mail today to reserve your spot! (603) 622-7531 / history@manchesterhistoric.org

2025 Historic Preservation Award Nominations



The Historic Preservation Committee is now accepting nominations for the 2025 Historic Preservation Awards.  

The Historic Preservation Awards program recognizes and supports the efforts of individuals, businesses and organizations who have made significant contributions to the preservation of buildings, neighborhoods, traditions and other historic resources in the Queen City.

Over 30 years, more than 250 recipients have been recognized for a wide variety of preservation efforts in 40 different categories. The annual event is the MHA's largest fundraiser to support its non-profit mission of collecting, preserving and sharing the history of Manchester.

If you are interested in nominating a person, organization or business for a Historic Preservation Award, please complete the HPA 2025 Nomination Form by December 7.

The 33rd Annual Historic Preservation Awards will be held on May 20, 2025 at the Matarese Commons at the Derryfield School. Further details will be announced in the coming months.

YMCA Food Pantry Collection

This fall, we are partnering with YMCA of Downtown Manchester and hosting a food pantry collection box at the Millyard Museum. Please consider dropping off non-perishable food items to help fight food insecurity in the Greater Manchester area.

The box is available during the museum's open hours: Tuesday through Saturday, 10am to 4pm. Thank you!

Millyard Museum Presents Two Children's Books

The MHA is proud to present two new children’s books about the Millyard. Friends young and old will follow the adventures of Dewy, the water droplet about to embark on an Industrial Revolution water power journey and Bolly, a cotton boll, on his way to the Amoskeag Manufacturing Company to become world famous cotton fabric.

Both original books can be found exclusively at the Millyard Museum gift shop!

Now on Exhibit:

"Who Wore It? The Forensics of a Dress"

This special exhibit features 200 years of dresses worn by amazing women from Manchester’s past. These matriarchs of Manchester lived incredible lives as entrepreneurs, philanthropists, doctors, teachers, activists, New Hampshire First Ladies, and homemakers.

Generously donated by loved ones and lovingly preserved by the Manchester Historic Association, these dresses tell the stories of the vibrant women who wore them. Bearing witness to the happiest and saddest moments in the lives of their owners, these dresses witnessed both unspeakable joy and unbearable pain and every emotion in-between.

As you travel though the history of fashion and evolution of design and fabrication, we ask that you imagine the memories these gowns might hold. Motherhood, careers, and the simple tasks of everyday life become immortal through every worn hem and altered seam.

On exhibit through November 1, 2024 

Last Month's Trivia Question:

What Manchester Hospital, designed for the medical, obstetrical, and surgical care of the sick, was located on the corner of Belmont and East High Streets in the 1910s and 1920s?

ANSWER: Beacon Hill Hospital

 __________________________________________________________________

This Month's Trivia Question: In the early days of Derryfield/Manchester, the Town Pound gave stray cattle and other animals a place to be held until bail could be provided by the owner. Over time, the structure crumbled and the wall was removed, but the 1841 door to the Old Town Pound remains. Where in Manchester can it be found?

The answer will appear in the next newsletter.