Self Guided Tour of Williamstown

Saturday, April 26th, 2025

President of Historic Deerfield, John Davis, PhD, to speak on “Local Legacy, National Relevance” of that historic site.

Join us at Sweetwood in the auditorium at
1611 Cold Spring Road (Route 7) in Williamstown.

Williamstown MA: On Saturday, April 26, John Davis, PhD, President of Historic Deerfield, an outdoor museum in Old Deerfield, MA, will speak at 11 am in the auditorium at Sweetwood, 1611 Cold Spring Road (Route 7) in Williamstown. This free lecture is being presented by the Williamstown Historical Museum (WHM).

Davis’ talk will cover three subjects: the Williamstown connection to Deerfield through people and objects, Historic Deerfield today, and their special summer exhibits, “Envisioning America: Deerfield Academy’s Collection of Paintings and Drawings”,  and “Body by Design: Fashionable Silhouettes from the Ideal to the Real”.

A graduate of Cornell University, John Davis received his doctorate from Columbia University. He previously served as Provost and Under Secretary for Museums, Education, and Research at the Smithsonian Institution, Executive Director of the Terra Foundation for American Art Europe (Paris), and Alice Pratt Brown Professor of Art at Smith College. The author, co-author, and editor of seven books, John’s research interests include landscape painting, religion and visual culture, music and art, African-American representation during the Civil War and Reconstruction eras, the history of artists’ organizations, archival and documentary histories of American art, and 19th-century architecture and urbanism. John is an elected member of the American Antiquarian Society.

Historic Deerfield, Inc., was founded in 1952 by Henry and Helen Geier Flynt of Greenwich, CT, parents of longtime Williamstown resident, and active WHM supporter Henry N. “Hank” Flynt, Jr. (Williams ‘44). In 1936, the Flynts enrolled Hank at Deerfield Academy, and with the encouragement of headmaster Frank Boyden, they began to purchase and restore the old houses along “The Street” to carefully restore them.

Today, Historic Deerfield consists of twelve carefully-preserved antique houses dating from 1730 to 1850, and a world-class collections of regional furniture, silver, textiles, and other decorative arts on display in the authentic period houses. The Flynt Center of Early New England Life is a state-of-the-art museum facility featuring exhibitions and a visible storage area. The Henry N. Flynt Library includes more than 21,000 volumes on the history and material culture of the region.

For more information visit www.williamstownhistoricalmuseum.org. You can find the museum on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/williamstownhistoricalmuseum) and Instagram (@WilliamstownHistoricalMuseum).

ABOUT THE WILLIAMSTOWN HISTORICAL MUSEUM

The Williamstown Historical Museum was founded in 1941, as the Williamstown House of Local History, to preserve and to promote knowledge of the town’s history. Our goal is to document the diverse people and buildings, the associations and businesses, the institutions and events, which form the town’s history from the earliest days to the present time. The Museum is currently located at 32 New Ashford Road in South Williamstown, on Route 7, just south of the Five Corners in the building which formerly housed the Little Red Schoolhouse. Our collection includes photographs, documents, and artifacts from the 1700s to the present day, as well as published works related to the town’s history.  We have a permanent display set up, and rotating exhibits which use many items in the collection to help educate our community on our shared histories and enrich our shared futures. Museum Hours: 10 am-2 pm Thursday, Friday & Saturday, and always by appointment. Admission free.