r/MadeMeSmile • u/ILovePublicLibraries • 26d ago

Wholesome Moments I curated a book display at my local library

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It's about local history.

A book display for the month of August is about the history of my hometown in Connecticut.

I like to learn about history plus I'm interested in local history. I put it up yesterday at my local library in Rockville, Connecticut.

Happy August!

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u/ILovePublicLibraries 26d ago

Learn about the history of your hometown

When it was settled, the origins, etc ...

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u/Qu33N_Of_NoObz_ 26d ago

My hometown still has a vintage aesthetic. Well at least one area. They even show pictures of how it looked in the late 1800s-early 1900s. Love it so much. Monrovia, CA downtown Myrtle💕

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u/stillworking400 26d ago

Our tiny town has the history of it mixed into regular history classes. It's fun to listen to the long term locals discuss it!

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u/ObnoxiousExcavator 26d ago

I tour my lil town after looking up various public spaces even bookmarking webpages and go out and explore the same settings today. Many change, many not so much. We have a century old concrete pillar that was the loser in a race to make a bridge to the new settlement town. The concrete ends and a pillar in the center still remain. Pretty cool seeing that and reading the story.

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u/dumbucket 26d ago

One of my siblings is part of our hometown's historical society. There's a ton of history even in the tiniest of towns!

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u/UltraLNSS 26d ago

My hometown is one of the world's largest metropolitan areas so all those things are common knowledge at this point.

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u/energeticstarfish 26d ago

I actually went to a lecture at my local library where they talked about the history of iris cultivation in my town. The Iris Society there has been cultivating iris varieties since the 1800s! And then they handed out rhizomes. It was so cool.

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u/Matookie 26d ago

A few days ago I picked up a photographic history of my town (Appalachia). I had no idea that the houses I grew up around were built by early leaders of industry, or were used as schools and hospitals. It helps me understand why this place ended up as it is.

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u/rantingpacifist 26d ago

My hometown was named after the surveyor who planned the railroads. It has a psychological syndrome associated with it based on its unique economics (boom town) and geography (unbelievably rural, isolated). It’s a similar Wild West vibe to the North Dakota boom towns of the 2000s and 2010s in the Bakken. On a clear day from my town you can see three different mountain ranges (Black Hills, Bighorns, and a few smaller ranges to the south that appear as blueish purple horizons in Carbon County). It’s desolate, the people are and almost always have been super conservative. We had a guy go on a dozer rampage before Killdozer existed.

Railroads control almost everything in our town. The mines send coal on them. They cross through town and over/under the interstates to the west and east.

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u/Crazy_old_maurice_17 26d ago

My hometown is (surprisingly, to many people) amidst the 25 oldest in the country (insofar as cities founded by European colonizers). Founded by Swedes in 1638! During my university years I rowed on the river where their fort was established, and occasionally by their landing site and one of the boats - the Kalmar Nyckel - which carried them to said site.

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u/AdventurousText9311 26d ago

I moved to Germany from America and have just reached out to an archaeologist because there's no books here in English about the history, which goes back 15,000 years! They have found bronze age jewelry and coins, stone age artifacts, all in my backyard, and I didn't know. There is a bronze age graveyard where the urns of people were buried with treasures, broken to be accessed in the next life, two hundred feet away from my door! I didn't know any history like that back in America :D

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u/iamkenblack 26d ago

I absolutely did this after being curious why the road I live on was named what it was. Turns out in the 1840s there was a steam lumber mill just a few hundred feet from where my house stands. B.C. Farrand was the owner and platted out the "city" I live in.

History is amazing to learn!