Former name | Worcester Society of Antiquity |
---|---|
Established | 1875 |
Location | 30 Elm Street Worcester, Massachusetts |
Coordinates | 42°15′54″N71°48′24″W / 42.2648958°N 71.8067823°W |
Type | History museum Historic house museum |
Director | William Wallace [1] |
Curator | Shelley Cathcart [1] |
Architect | Frederick Coulson [2] |
Historian | Wendy Essery |
The Worcester Historical Museum, located in downtown Worcester, Massachusetts, was founded in 1875 as the Worcester Society of Antiquity. [3] This museum is the only institution in the area devoted entirely to local history and artifacts. The scope of their collection ranges from colonial to twentieth-century, encompassing manuscripts, textiles, paintings, and ceramics. [4] The museum is made up of permanent and temporary exhibits, a research library, and currently owns and operates the local Salisbury Mansion. [5] The library maintains more than 7,000 titles. [3]
There is one permanent exhibit at the museum in the Fuller Gallery of Industrial History, entitled "In Their Shirtsleeves." This collection covers the Industrial history of Worcester through recently donated artifacts as well as items the Institution has collected over the decades. Dealing with a time period spanning over a century, the collection highlights the accomplishment of Worcester locals and the impact their inventions had on the area and beyond. [6] They also have three other exhibit areas that house temporary displays.
Cultural history exhibits like "Smiley - An American Icon" explored the Smiley graphic and it's designer, Worcester native Harvey Ball, from October 2006 to February 2007. [7] [8] [9] In 2013, the exhibit "Game On!" covered 150 years of toys and was intended to be navigated like a board game. [10] [11]
The museum has highlighted the history of Worcester’s diverse population through many exhibitions over the past 40 years. In the 1980s and 1990s, there were exhibits like “Water Street: A World Within a World” about the historically Jewish section of Worcester and “ga till Amerika: Swedes in Worcester 1868-1993.” [12] [13] Since then, the museum has displayed and collected items relating to the history of many minority communities of Worcester. In 2008, the Guatemalan immigrant community was the focus of the exhibit “The Things We Carried: Guatemalan Stories,” in 2008. [14] Since 2018, the museum and the Worcester Black History Project have collected oral histories, objects, and photos of local Black history. [15] In 2018, the temporary exhibit "The Legacy of Water Street: 35 Years of Sharing Worcester’s Jewish History" revisited the original Water Street exhibit and expanded on the history of the local Jewish community. [16] From April to October 2019, the “For The Record: LGBTQ+ Worcester'' exhibit united “the scattered documentation of Worcester County’s LGBTQ+ experience” [17] in order to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. In conjunction with the College of the Holy Cross, Clark University, Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Digital Worcester, "For The Record" was created as a “down payment of sorts, in a larger project to build a sustainable physical and digital archive” [18] relating to the Worcester LGBTQ+ community. [19] [20]
In conjunction with the Latino History Project of Worcester, the permanent exhibit "Somos Worcester" will go on display in 2024 to showcase local Latino history. [21] [22]
The research library is open to the public for a fee, Tuesday through Saturday 10-4 pm. Access to the archives material is available through appointment. [23]
Worcester is a city in and the seat of Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. Named after Worcester, England, the city's population was 206,518 at the 2020 census, making it the second-most populous city in New England after Boston. Worcester is approximately 40 miles (64 km) west of Boston, 50 miles (80 km) east of Springfield and 40 miles (64 km) north-northwest of Providence. Due to its location near the geographic center of Massachusetts, Worcester is known as the "Heart of the Commonwealth"; a heart is the official symbol of the city.
Leominster is a city in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the second-largest city in Worcester County, with a population of 43,782 at the 2020 census. Leominster is located north of Worcester and northwest of Boston. Both Route 2 and Route 12 pass through Leominster. Interstate 190, Route 13, and Route 117 all have starting/ending points in Leominster. Leominster is bounded by Fitchburg and Lunenburg to the north, Lancaster to the east, Sterling and Princeton to the south, and Westminster to the west.
Clark University is a private research university in Worcester, Massachusetts. Founded in 1887 with a large endowment from its namesake Jonas Gilman Clark, a prominent businessman, Clark was one of the first modern research universities in the United States. Originally an all-graduate institution, Clark's first undergraduates entered in 1902 and women were first enrolled in 1942.
Harvey Ross Ball was an American commercial artist. He is recognized as the designer of a popular smiley face graphic picture, which became an enduring and notable international icon. He never applied for a trademark for the iconic smiley image and only earned $45 for his efforts. Ball later founded the World Smile Foundation in 1999, a non-profit charitable trust that supports children's causes.
The Higgins Armory Museum is the name of a collection in the Worcester Art Museum. It was formerly a separate museum located in the nearby Higgins Armory Building in Worcester, Massachusetts, dedicated to the display of arms and armor. It was "the only museum in the country devoted solely to arms and armor" and had the second largest arms and armor collection in the country from its founding in 1931 until 2004, behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The collection consists of 2,000 objects, including 24 full suits of armor. The museum closed at the end of 2013 due to a lack of funding. Its collection and endowment were transferred and integrated into the Worcester Art Museum, with the collection on show in its own gallery. The former museum building was sold in December 2014 and now serves as a local events venue.
The Telegram & Gazette is the only daily newspaper of Worcester, Massachusetts. The paper, headquartered at 100 Front Street and known locally as the Telegram or the T & G, offers coverage of all of Worcester County, as well as surrounding areas of the western suburbs of Boston, Western Massachusetts, and several towns in Windham County in northeastern Connecticut.
This article gives an overview of the media in Worcester, Massachusetts, United States.
The EcoTarium is a science and nature museum located in Worcester, Massachusetts. Previously known as the New England Science Center, the museum features several permanent and traveling exhibits, the Alden Planetarium, a narrow-gauge train pulled by a scale model of an 1860s steam engine, and a variety of wildlife.
That's Entertainment is a comics and collectibles store in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Madeline Davis was an American LGBT activist and historian. In 1970 she was a founding member of the Mattachine Society of the Niagara Frontier, the first gay rights organization in Western New York. Davis became the first openly lesbian delegate at a major party national convention, speaking at the 1972 Democratic National Convention. The same year, she taught with Margaret Small the first course on lesbianism in the United States, titled "Lesbianism 101" at the University at Buffalo.
The Burnside Fountain is a non-functioning drinking fountain at the southeast corner of Worcester Common in Worcester, Massachusetts. It consists of two parts, a pink granite basin, and a bronze statue of a young boy riding a sea turtle. The basin was designed by architect Henry Bacon, who later designed the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., and the figure was created by sculptor Charles Y. Harvey. Harvey died by suicide before finishing the sculpture, and Sherry Fry completed the bronze. The Burnside Fountain was commissioned in 1905 by the city of Worcester after Harriet F. Burnside bequeathed US $5,000 to create a fountain to provide fresh water for people, horses and dogs, in the memory of her father, a prominent lawyer. The fountain was installed in 1912 in Central Square, then moved in 1969 to its current location on Worcester Common. In 1970 the statue was stolen, and was re-installed two years later. An attempted theft occurred in 2004.
The GLBT Historical Society maintains an extensive collection of archival materials, artifacts and graphic arts relating to the history of LGBT people in the United States, with a focus on the LGBT communities of San Francisco and Northern California.
Temple Emanuel Sinai is a medium-sized Reform (progressive) Jewish synagogue located in Worcester, Massachusetts, New England's second largest city.
Arthur E. Chase was an American businessman and politician who represented the Worcester District in the Massachusetts Senate from 1991 to 1995. He co-founded the Central Massachusetts Legislative Caucus. In 1991 he designed the Massachusetts Academy of Math and Science at WPI and in 1992 sponsored legislation to create it. He was the Republican nominee for Secretary of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1994, but lost in the general election to William F. Galvin.
Joseph M. Petty is an American attorney, politician and the current mayor of Worcester, Massachusetts.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Worcester, Massachusetts, United States of America.
The Tucson Gay Museum maintains an extensive collection of archival materials, artifacts and graphic arts relating to the history of LGBT people in the United States, with a focus on the LGBT communities of Tucson, Arizona and Phoenix, Arizona. It became a member of the Arizona LGBTQIA+ Archives in 2020.
The Jewish Healthcare Center is a nursing home and rehabilitation hospital at 629 Salisbury Street in Worcester, Massachusetts. The JHC services 2,500 clients per year, 70 percent of whom are not Jewish.
Robert Deam Tobin was the Henry J Leir Chair in Literature, Language and Culture at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts from 2008 to 2022. He was a leading scholar of German and European literature, culture, and sexuality studies. Tobin died of cancer in August 2022.
Coordinates: 42°15′54.0″N71°48′15.6″W / 42.265000°N 71.804333°W