In spite of searing heat, John Torkos, Dave Cheatman & Charlie Breeland marched into Walters Park in full regalia on Saturday. They had to pause several times for pictures with swarms of kids (and a few old-timers, too), as they marched to the fife and drum to the Phillipsburg Area Historical Society tent. There they posed for more pictures, responded to questions about their uniforms and experiences as re-enactors. This is the second year John Torkos has joined us.

John Torkos, Dave Cheatam, Charlie Breeland

July 24 & 25 are Ole Towne Festival days in Phillipsburg, and the Roseberry House will be open to all.  Our hours are 10 am to about 5 pm both Saturday and Sunday, and there is free parking (the Middle School parking lot), and a shuttlebus from the main festivities at Walters park to the Roseberry House, just about 3 blocks away.

We’ll have a full schedule of period music (more about that in a post next week) and re-enacters. We’ve learned a lot about the wall paintings and stenciling, and hope to have some artifacts on display.

Documentation is an important part of every archaeological dig. Dan is in the trench (called a “unit”) and Andy is recording the depth at which the soil changed from one color and texture to another. Every bit of glass, pottery, nails, etc. is recorded by the  depth where it was found. Nothing very dramatic about this unit, but cumulatively all the little pieces may tell us something of the lifestyle of the people who lived here a hundred, or perhaps even 250 years ago.

Andy, Dan and Jim Lee will be digging underneath the floor in the kitchen next week (Monday, Wednesday and Thursday). All are invited to come and watch. And take a look at the unique wall painting and stenciling in the parlors.

Jim Lee of Hunter Research will begin the archaeological work at the site on April 26. He and another archaeologist expect to be there all week. The Hunter group will sample the builder’s trench, the “patio” area off the kitchen where we hope to find the privy, and the area underneath the kitchen floor. All are welcome to stop by, but don’t expect any dramatic finds. We hope to find a few things that date to the eighteenth century that tell us something of the lifestyle of the inhabitants. A lot of the work takes place in the lab following the dig, so we may not know anything new by the end of the week.  On the other hand, you never know.

an 8 inch portion of one column of daisies

Chris Frey spent the day in the two parlors at the Roseberry house on Wednesday. He uncovered several major areas and took samples. He determined that the paint is a distemper—a water-soluble type common in the colonial period, and that the paintings are covered with 5-7 layers of whitewash.

The background color of the wall is a medium gray—what photographers would classify as an 18% gray, which seems pretty dark. There are five colors used in the decoration—black, dark gray, light gray, buff, and red. We’ll know more about them when the lab analysis is completed in about a month.

There are several patterns repeated at various places—a pattern of crescent-shaped leaves and dots along the vertical edges of the walls and doors, two different horizontal patterns below the chair rails and above the baseboards, and alternating columns of daisy-like flowers and floral patterns. It appears there are stencils, free-hand painting and stamps—almost perfect circles of gray dots about 3/8 of an inch in diameter. Black is frequently used to produce a sort of trompe l’oeil effect with flower petals and sword-like leaves. The red pigment appears to be the top layer, and may come off very easily; there are areas we think were red at one time but only the barest traces remain.

There is a great deal more work and analysis to be done, even after all the chipping, peeling and lab analysis is complete. A cursory examination suggests three techniques were used—stenciling, free-hand painting, and stamping, but when we really enlarge the images we’ll get a better sense of the techniques and the order in which the various layers were applied.

Nether Chris nor I have the artistic background to make anything of these patterns. We examined photos from two books on early American Wall Painting and Stenciling, but gained no insight from them. We’re not claiming they are unique, but they are certainly not common. The Roseberry house  is a special place, but the wall paintings may turn out to be the defining characteristic, studied and cited by scholars of the decorative arts in the American colonial period.

Chris Frey of the Keystone Preservation group will begin to remove layers of paint from a small portion of the parlor wall on Wednesday, April 14. He’ll be there all day, and says it won’t bother him if people want to stop by to observe. He said he’ll probably know a little more in the afternoon, but major results won’t be known until samples of the paint are sent away for chemical analysis. Still, we should begin to see more of some of the areas with the old floral patterns.

daisies in the parlor

We are in the process of writing a formal Preservation Plan for review & approval by the state’s Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), a requirement for properties on the National Register. With all the attachments and appendices, it will probably run to more than 50 pages. That plan will eventually be posted here. In the meantime, we solicit suggestions and opinions from the public as to how the Roseberry house might be used five years from now, when the preservation and restoration process is (probably) complete.

We began our thinking about the Plan many months ago—certainly by last May. Here are the major assumptions we’ve made going into the planning process:

• The site must be available for educational tours and programs for students in the region’s schools
• The site may be used for workshops, lectures, concerts and other history-themed events
• The site should eventually be open regular hours to the general public
• Certain rooms and features (especially the wall paintings) should be available for study by preservation students and scholars
• The site should be an active venue (not merely a house museum) for programs & events during all seasons
• Consideration should be given to space for exhibitions, a library, a colonial garden, and perhaps other functions
• The primary interpretive focus should be the late colonial-early Revolutionary period of American history

We expect to submit the Preservation Plan to SHPO before the end of the month, and hope to begin the initial tasks of investigation and analysis by mid-winter.

The Warren County Freeholders awarded a $121,900 preservation grant to the Phillipsburg Area Historical Society for restoration of the Roseberry Homestead at their regular meeting Wednesday evening. Almost a dozen other preservation projects in the county also gained funding. The building, erected between 1750 and 1770, has many connections to late colonial and early Revolutionary War figures.

The money will enable development of a long-range preservation plan, required by the state’s Historical Preservation Office because the Roseberry Homestead is already listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It will also fund major work to secure the site, install authentic period windows and doors, and repair the masonry of the large stone building. The attached kitchen will eventually be restored to its eighteenth-century condition, but that will depend on additional funding.

Historical Society President Randy Piazza said “It is unlikely that we’ll begin any significant preservation work until February, at the earliest, because of the planning involved,” but he noted that the building will continue to open for occasional tours and special events, even during the restoration work. The public can follow the progress of the work and see what’s going on here at the preservation project’s blog.

On Friday, November 13 we lost Scott Curzi, the driving force behind the push to preserve the Roseberry house. He had a heart attack on Monday, and although he seemed to be recovering, died on Friday. Most of you who read this knew Scott and knew what he meant to Phillipsburg—we didn’t require the local papers remind us of his many preservation efforts with the buildings along South Main. But only a few knew about another half dozen (at least) other projects and activities he sponsored or assisted with. The town should be draped in black, and flags flown at half-mast in recognition of what we have lost. His energy and enthusiasm were infectious, and seemingly boundless. And now he has been taken from us.

The drive to preserve and restore the Roseberry house will continue; we have resolved that it will not miss a step because of his absence. Generations yet unborn will eventually learn something of the town’s connection to the late-Colonial and Revolutionary era in their tours of the house, but those who knew Scott will see little reminders of him and his continuing presence in the house itself, and we will recall the energy, the usually paint-splattered sweatshirts that he wore, the impulsive acts of kindness, his commitment to the town and its history, and his ability to suffuse some of the simplest tasks of restoration with a significance that stimulated us to greater effort.

The Warren County Municipal and Charitable Conservancy Trust Fund Committee met on November 9th and voted unanimously to recommend that the Warren County Freeholders approve our application for a $247,000 grant to stabilize and preserve the Roseberry Homestead. This is a very big first step. If the Freeholders approve (and we have some confidence they will—money for the grant has already been encumbered) then we expect to have a very busy year.

We’ll have funds to engage an architect (Michael Margulies) to help us prepare a long-range Preservation Plan and to supervise contractors who will actually carry out the many tasks needed to secure the shell of the building; to fund the work of archaeologists (Hunter Research) to dig under the kitchen floor and around the perimeter of the building; and to pay preservation specialists (Keystone Preservation Group and possibly others) to study and preserve the wall paintings and stenciling. Included in the application was funding for completely repointing the stone work, installing authentic reproduction windows and doors, reconstructing the front porch, and restoring the attached kitchen to its eighteenth-century condition.

None of that work can technically begin before about February 2010, but our planning will begin almost immediately. That Preservation Plan will have to be approved by the state’s Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), and all work will be done strictly in accordance with the guidelines issued by the U. S. Department of the Interior (which are available via a link on this blog). Long before we bring that preservation plan to SHPO (better get used to that acronym—you’ll be hearing  it a lot) we’ll sketch out a preliminary version for the Phillipsburg Area Historical Society and seek comments and suggestions—this is a task for public participation, not just something for the professionals.