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| Peabody Library Post Mills Thetford Vermont |
The Peabody Library
Susan Cloke
Journal Opinion Winter Columnist
March 19, 2014
The Peabody library, given to the people of
Thetford by George Peabody, is well cared for and well loved. You are invited to join Librarians
Peter Blodgett and Emily Zollo for a fun-filled evening of Celtic music at the
Peabody Library in Post Mills on Wednesday, March 26, at 7:00 pm.
Peabody has been called “America’s First
Philanthropist” said Blodgett, Library Director at Peabody and Latham
Libraries. "In 1866, when the Peabody Library opened it was the 6th
largest library in Vermont. It is the oldest library building in the State that is in continuous
usage as a library and it has the most elegant public room in Thetford.”
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| Emily Zollo reading "Lemonade in Winter" and making lemonade with Sadie, Maggie, Max and Garrett |
Zollo, Children’s Librarian at Peabody, talked
about the library and how well used it is by the community. “The Library is
open weekly, on Tuesday evenings and Wednesdays from 2 – 8 pm. It has an active after school program,
well attended by Thetford Elementary School students and an adult book
discussion series.
“The Library also hosts annual events: the
Celtic Concert, in honor of St. Patrick’s Day; Chocolate Indulgence for
Valentine’s Day, the summer Penny Carnival and our Winter Solstice Readings,”
said Zollo.
“At the Valentine’s Day event the long,
original, central table is loaded with chocolate cakes, mousses, handmade
chocolates, chocolate cookies and chocolate pies.
“The Winter Solstice is celebrated with holiday
stories from around the world read aloud.
The Library is decorated with boughs and lit with historic candelabra,”
said Zollo.
Dalia Panani, a volunteer librarian described
the Penny Carnival saying, “It’s great because the 10 -13 year olds set up the
carnival for children under 6. The
price is one cent per game and everyone wins.”
Peabody was born in 1795, one of eight children,
to a family that struggled to get by.
He went on to be one of the most successful American businessmen in
London. Peabody’s fortune came from his merchant and banking companies.
“He never gave up his loyalty to America,” said
Blodgett. He was famous for hosting an elaborate yearly dinner in London to
celebrate the 4th of July.
When Queen Victoria wanted to bestow a knighthood on him for promoting
Anglo-American harmony he refused because he wanted to remain an American
Citizen.”
Local lore tells of George Peabody, when he was
a fifteen year old teenager, walking the 150 miles from his hometown in Danvers
(now Peabody) MA to Post Mills VT.
“He would walk 10 miles in a day and then stop
at a local town and ask for meals and a place to sleep in the barn. In exchange
he would split wood and do other chores,” said Blodgett.
The young Peabody arrived in Post Mills and lived
for a year on the farm of his maternal grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Dodge,
according to a manuscript published in 1882.
(“THE LIFE of GEORGE PEABODY” By PHEBE A.
HANAFORD
Boston, D. Lothrop & Company. Franklin Street 1882)
Hanaford wrote, “With such grandparents and such
surroundings, George Peabody’s year at Post Mills must have been a year of
intense quiet, with good examples always before him, and good advice whenever occasion
called for it; for Mr. Dodge and his wife were both too shrewd to bore him
needlessly.
“The interest with which Mr. Peabody remembered his visit to
Post Mills is shown by his second visit so late in life, and his gift of a
library – as large a library as that place needs,” wrote Hanaford.
In a letter, dated 1866, from Peabody to the
Library Committee, Peabody writes about the library and speaks of his “… sense of gratitude for kindness shown to
me in my early life by my late revered uncle, Eliphalet Dodge, and his
excellent wife, who still lives in your village,” and of his “desire that there
shall always be three of their descendants … among the trustees of the
library.”
In his lifetime he established The Peabody Trust. The Trust continues to “provide housing
of a decent quality for the artisans and labouring poor of London.”
He is best known for establishing the Peabody
Institute of Johns Hopkins University; the Peabody Museums at Harvard and Yale
Universities; the Peabody Academy of Science in Salem, MA; the Peabody Room of
the DC public library; and the Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. At the end of the Civil War he
established the Peabody Education Fund “… to encourage the intellectual, moral,
and industrial education of the destitute children of the Southern States.”
The Peabody library in Post Mills is listed on
the National Register of Historic Buildings. The 850 square foot, one story, white, wood building is an
iconic Vermont public building with both Greek Revival and Palladian
architectural references. It sits
right on 113 with flags flying from the columns.
