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David and Susan Read, Susan B. Anthony's first cousins once removed, and Cambridge Village Mayor Carman Bogle, a relative of Anthony's on the other side of the family, unveil a new historic marker Saturday at Susan B. Anthony's childhood home in Greenwich.
GREENWICH — The unveiling of a new historical marker at Susan B. Anthony’s childhood home Saturday was the occasion not only for celebration of the famous suffragist’s legacy but also a reckoning of how far the site has come since the house was saved from a foreclosure auction in 2006.
Anthony, as recounted by re-enactor Barbara Skiff during the dedication ceremony, spent her formative years at the house in Battenville, where her Quaker father managed a textile mill across what is now Route 29. The family lived there from 1832 until a financial panic in 1839, when the family went bankrupt. The house and all the family possessions were auctioned off.
Watching the auction, Anthony realized that “my mother owned nothing. All of her belongings were sold to pay my father’s debts,” Skiff said. That, plus unequal treatment of women and girls at the mill and at the one-room school Anthony attended, set her on a lifelong course to secure equal rights for women.
From left, Barbara Skiff, representing the young Susan B. Anthony, Linda McKenney, representing Anthony as an older adult, a visitor, Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner, D-Round Lake, and Helise Flickstein talk before the unveiling Saturday of a historic marker at Susan B. Anthony's childhood home in Greenwich. Flickstein persuaded the mortgage holder of the property to donate it to the state in 2006.
Anthony advocated for women’s suffrage for more than 50 years, said Linda McKenney, portraying the adult Anthony in a long black dress and Anthony’s distinctive red shawl.
“There is still so much more to do to secure equality, rights, and opportunities for everyone. Failure is impossible!” McKenney said, echoing Anthony’s famous slogan.
Alane Ball Chinian, regional director for the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, credited Debi Craig, president of the Washington County Historical Society, with obtaining funds for the marker from the William G. Pomeroy Foundation, as well as years of effort to ensure preservation of the house and grounds.
“This day is entirely her doing,” Chinian said. “She has fought tirelessly for preservation of this house. Today is a testament to the success of her work.”
Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner, D-Round Lake, addresses attendees at the unveiling of a new historic marker Saturday at the Susan B. Anthony house in Greenwich. The brick house, which is undergoing restoration, is at the rear.
Craig said she learned of the house’s history as a girl, when her father told her that she could vote because of Anthony and that the house hard by the state highway was the house where Anthony grew up.
“Dad instilled a love of history in me,” Craig said.
Colleen Jenkins, an area resident who is a direct descendant of Anthony’s great friend and ally Elizabeth Cady Stanton, brought a copy of a cast of Anthony’s and Stanton’s clasped hands. The original was made in 1895, toward the end of their long lives.
“It’s a wonderful symbol of who they were,” Jenkins said.
The two women were very different but met by chance and worked together for 50 years.
Cambridge Village Mayor Carman Bogle, related to Susan B. Anthony's father's family, and Assemblyman Jake Ashby, R-Castleton, talk to visitors Saturday at the Susan B. Anthony childhood home state historic site in Greenwich. Ashby's son Holden, at right, came with him. Ashby is running for the new state Senate district that would include southern Washington County.
“They found a common cause,” Jenkins said.
She challenged the people who came to the event to form a book club to read a biography of Anthony and Stanton, which she had brought, and then become docents when the house is ready to open to the public.
“We have to breathe life into this house,” Jenkins said.
Chinian credited “three strong women,” in addition to Craig, with saving the house from ruin: then-Lt. Gov. Kathy Hochul, Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner, D-Round Lake, and former state Senator Betty Little, R-Queensbury, who secured state funding to stabilize the deteriorating house and begin developing the site as a state historic resource.
The state acquired the house for $1 in 2006 after Helise Flickstein, who also attended the event, persuaded the mortgage holder to donate it to the state. A $695,000 project in 2020 repaired the roof, masonry and structure, removed mold, and improved drainage at the site. The state acquired the 1805 tavern immediately east of the Anthony property the same year.
The state will spend $63,000 for architectural plans to restore the Anthony house’s interior and $1 million to restore the tavern and create off-street parking, Woerner said. The steep site has almost no parking — attendees Saturday were bused from Greenwich Central School.
By 2026, when America celebrates its 250th anniversary, “we’ll have an important site that speaks to the evolution of women’s and workers’ rights, abolition, and the transition from an agricultural society to an industrial society,” Woerner said. “We will turn this into a destination site.”
“We’re making incremental progress,” Chinian said.
Recent projects included bringing internet service to the tavern and safely relocating a colony of 45,000 honeybees, she said.
Eight descendants of Anthony’s maternal grandmother’s family, the Reads, and one descendant of Anthony’s paternal grandmother’s family, the Anthonys, attended the event. Brother and sister Susan and David Read, who introduced themselves as Anthony’s first cousins four times removed, and Cambridge village Mayor Carman Bogle, related to the Anthony side of the family, pulled the green cloth off the new marker. The cream and lilac metal sign identifies the site and notes that it’s part of the National Votes for Women Trail. A QR code invites visitors to learn more about Anthony and women’s suffrage at the organization’s website.
The William G. Pomeroy Grant Foundation, which paid for the sign, helps people celebrate their community’s history by commemorating people, places, things or events that happened between 1740 and 1922. Since 2006, the foundation has funded more than 800 markers in 59 New York state counties. The state stopped placing historic markers in 1939, Craig said.
Craig said she submitted a grant proposal to the foundation in 2019, but processing was delayed by COVID. The Washington County Historical Society learned the application had been accepted in late 2021.
David Pitlyk from the Office for Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation placed the post for the marker earlier this month.
Linda McKenney, portraying the adult Susan B. Anthony, Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner, D-Round Lake, Washington County Historical Society President Debi Craig, and Barbara Skiff, representing the young Susan B. Anthony, stand under the new historic marker Saturday at Susan B. Anthony's childhood home in Greenwich.
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Community members are grieving after the death of an 8-year-old boy and a 38-year-old man who were killed by a speeding motorcycle as they stood along the Warren County Bikeway near Route 9 in Lake George on Sunday.
GANSEVOORT — A Gansevoort woman is one of a dozen people arrested on Wednesday in a heroin and cocaine trafficking ring.
A Ballston Spa woman has been arrested for allegedly slashing a 51-year-old man during an apparent road rage incident.
A 51-year-old man was slashed in the neck on Friday afternoon in Saratoga Springs in what police are describing as a road rage incident.
A GoFundMe page has raised over $28,000 for the family affected by the fatal motorcycle-pedestrian crash on Sunday in Lake George.
A Fort Ann man was arrested and charged with stealing more than $4,000 worth of items from a local business in Fort Edward.
A Granville man was arrested on June 7 after police said he stole property from a building.
An Argyle man is expected to get 1 to 3 years in prison after admitting to firing a gun at a woman during a domestic incident.
An electrical fire at 1164 Dix Ave. in Kingsbury displaced one adult on Saturday afternoon.
Police on Sunday released the name of the motorcycle operator hurt in a Route 9 crash just north of the intersection of Route 9 and Route 149 on Saturday.
David and Susan Read, Susan B. Anthony's first cousins once removed, and Cambridge Village Mayor Carman Bogle, a relative of Anthony's on the other side of the family, unveil a new historic marker Saturday at Susan B. Anthony's childhood home in Greenwich.
From left, Barbara Skiff, representing the young Susan B. Anthony, Linda McKenney, representing Anthony as an older adult, a visitor, Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner, D-Round Lake, and Helise Flickstein talk before the unveiling Saturday of a historic marker at Susan B. Anthony's childhood home in Greenwich. Flickstein persuaded the mortgage holder of the property to donate it to the state in 2006.
Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner, D-Round Lake, addresses attendees at the unveiling of a new historic marker Saturday at the Susan B. Anthony house in Greenwich. The brick house, which is undergoing restoration, is at the rear.
Cambridge Village Mayor Carman Bogle, related to Susan B. Anthony's father's family, and Assemblyman Jake Ashby, R-Castleton, talk to visitors Saturday at the Susan B. Anthony childhood home state historic site in Greenwich. Ashby's son Holden, at right, came with him. Ashby is running for the new state Senate district that would include southern Washington County.
Linda McKenney, portraying the adult Susan B. Anthony, Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner, D-Round Lake, Washington County Historical Society President Debi Craig, and Barbara Skiff, representing the young Susan B. Anthony, stand under the new historic marker Saturday at Susan B. Anthony's childhood home in Greenwich.
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