Ancestral Chilmarkers have a particular love for their town’s history, a love evinced by a stroll around town hall. Thanks to the stalwart efforts of the town historical commission, the walls are peppered with historical photos and documents telling the story of the isolated rural town of fishermen and farmers that Chilmark used to be.
At the center of the collection is the town’s early-20th-century scale, a brass behemoth prominently displayed behind glass in a town hall meeting room. Beside it sits the towns standard weights and measures, packed snuggly in a velvet case to avoid damage. It was with these weights that a town official would standardize trade, ensuring no citizen would be deceived on a basket of fish a few ounces light.
“This is our prime joy, we’ve always been proud of our weights” said Jane Slater, who recently retired from her 20-year tenure as chair of the historical commission.
After admiring the scale for a minute, she turned her gaze to town administrator Tim Carroll.
“Why haven’t you dusted it?” she said.
Now 91-years-old, and with her memory for Chilmark history still sharp, Ms. Slater has passed the torch to her protégé, Barbara Armstrong, another ancestral Chilmarker who will take Ms. Slater’s spot as gatekeeper to their collection of historic ephemera.
“They’re gigantic shoes to fill,” Ms. Armstrong said, admitting her trepidation at stepping up to the top spot. Ms. Slater, meanwhile, has no doubt that Ms. Armstrong is fit for the role.
“I’m delighted that she’s taking over,” she said. “It was important that a longtime Chilmarker take the job.”
Ms. Armstrong has a strong background in local history, growing up engrossed with tales from her father, Menemsha fisherman Jimmy Morgan.
Indeed, for Ms. Armstrong, Chilmark history tends to be family history. On a tour of historic photos and documents hanging around town hall, Ms. Armstong was asked to identify a photo of a mustachioed man smoking a pipe.
“I don’t know who it is, but with my luck he’s probably a relative,” she said, taking down the frame from the wall.
She flipped it over, read the label, and laughed.
“It is!” she exclaimed. The photo was of whaling captain George Fred Tilton, a distant relative.
Other parts of the town hall showcase a variety of historic miscellany, from an old photo of the first Chilmark town hall (Mr. Carroll said it was nicknamed “woodpecker hall,” its bug-eaten shingles hosting the birds’ favorite snacks), to an illustrated marriage certificate of a Chilmark man and Edgartown woman — a star-crossed match at the time.
Much of Ms. Armstrong’s efforts since taking over as chair have been directed toward organizing the eclectic collection of historic objects. Most recently, she has been sorting through the hand-painted boat models, wooden swordfish barrels and net-mending needles donated by the family of recently deceased Menemsha lobsterman Rasmus Klimm.
“He was a commercial fisherman, but he would also carve these things,” she said, pulling out from storage some small carvings of painted fishermen. Though now stored in the attic at the Chilmark town hall, the commission plans on putting together a display of the fishing gear and carvings in the new town fire department building.
Working through the donations, new and old, will help the group further their mission of bringing town history to the people.
“Any time we bring anything in, Timmy [Carroll] gets it framed and puts it up on the wall,” Ms. Slater explained.
As the collection grows, Ms. Armstrong hopes to begin a formal catalogue of the collection after a vacancy on the commission is filled.
And though Ms. Slater has retired as chair, she plans to remain on the commission, advising the group with stories of old Chilmark.
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