THIS MILL TALK EVENT WILL BE ONLINE ONLY
Innovation and Connections: The story of Isaac Markham and his machine drawings
presented by Polly Darnell
Innovation and personal connections led Isaac Markham from Middlebury, Vermont to Waltham, Massachusetts and the most advanced textile mill in the world. His story, mainly about how new ideas spread, also includes the possibility of women staging the first industrial strike in this country, a mystery, a tragedy, and a cautionary note. His drawings are rare documentation of the machines then in use or in development. Their rediscovery and subsequent identification by Mike Folsom in 1981, made new connections, between the Henry Sheldon Museum in Middlebury and the Charles River Museum of Industry in Waltham, that eventually led to the 2010 publication of Visual Mechanic Knowledge: The workshop drawings of Isaac Ebenezer Markham (1795-1825), New England Textile Mechanic by David J. Jeremy and Polly Darnell.
Polly Darnell is a former archivist and librarian who for 20 years ran the Research Center at the Henry Sheldon Museum, which holds such a rich collection of historical records (print, manuscript, and graphic) that Middlebury, Vermont might be the best documented town in New England. She retired from archives work after almost 20 years at the Shelburne Museum up the road from Middlebury. Connecting researchers with sources that helped them tell new stories about the past was her favorite part of the job.
The Mill Talks at the Charles River Museum of Industry and Innovation are free and open to the public and are made possible by the generous support of the Lowell Institute.
Registration for this Mill Talk is NOT required. It will be streamed live on YouTube.
