Thomas Allen
Thomas Allen donated $50,000 to build the Athenaeum in 1876.
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A memoir in letters. Excerpts from letters that a father wrote his children each week for almost 30 years, full of the mundane and poignant, the witty and wise. Stories from a different time, from a small town in Connecticut.
History Shock
Pleased to announce the publication of my book in May 2021 by the University Press of Kansas. This collection of “stories with a history” narrates incidents over the course of my career in the Foreign Service when historical understanding – or lack of it – got in the way in the conduct of day-to-day diplomacy.Berkshire County’s Industrial Heritage
Check out this book on the nineteenth century mills and those who owned and worked in them. Available through Arcadia Press or Amazon.
Slide Show – Getting to Yes, Woman Suffrage in the Berkshires and Beyond
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Slide Show – Intersections, Pittsfield’s Neighborhoods
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Slide Show – Turning Points
Slide Show – Preserving the old Berkshire Athenaeum
Thomas Allen donated $50,000 to build the Athenaeum in 1876.
A yong architect from New York, William Appleton Potter, had his design selected for the new Athenaeum.
The original architectural drawing of the front elevation of the Athenaeum
An early photo of the High Victorian Gothic building, pointed arches, twin gables, multi-color stone patterns,skylight, stained glass windows
Majestic, quartered oak tresses in the addition built in 1896
Proposed new library design, in 1944
Bulging of stonework on from of building required drastic measures to shore up front, in 1979
A restored skylight is returned to the roof in repairs undertaken in 2001
Stained glass window on west gable, showing steel tie placed in 1979 stabilization repairs
Masonry work begins on the Athenaeum in the deep of winter
Removing the stained glass panels for repair
Cracks in the masonry
More cracks in the masonry
Lifting the capstone off the east gable, the first stone removedd
History All Around 