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Putnam Valley Begins Holiday Festivities with Historical Society Holiday Boutique
by Edward Paul Greiff
 | | Pictured above is a happy Putnam Valley Historical Society Director Lisa Delfino and her son Robbie as they get ready for the Society's annual Holiday Boutique on Saturday and Sunday |
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From the outside the Putnam Valley Historical Society Museum appears to be a one room schoolhouse, but upon entering you're transported into a holiday fantasyland overflowing with the sweetness of homemade maple syrup and honey. The tables and walls beckon with unique, different, exotic and unusual gifts for the discerning individual who wants to give a gift that was made with love and will communicate that message to its eventual recipient.
Historical Society Director Lisa Delfino and the Board of Directors have been busy planning this annual event and obtaining vendors to participate. Each Board member will be contributing one of their own family secret specialties and has promised to make them available for the Boutique. It's a joyous way to start off the holiday season.
The Holiday Boutique is also the Historical Society's biggest fund-raising event of the year. One of the Society's projects requiring immediate funding is repairs to the building's roof before the snow starts flying. The Putnam Valley Town Board is trying to have the labor done gratis and the Society would pay for the materials, so any money raised at the boutique will go to a good cause.
Director Delfino says she loves her job. She has now been the Director for a little over one and a half years. When asked what she would like to see done she quickly replied, "It's a little upsetting when we don't make as much money as we would like to make during one of our fund-raisers. I think all organizations go through that. You have this great idea and the people just aren't there. Like the Town Day for example. We did an old-time photo booth and it was great, and it was busy, but there just weren't enough people."
Lisa would like to be able to have more events so they could raise more money and provide more services to the community. "A lack of money prevents us from doing many things," she says.
Usage of the small facility is on the increase though. They have an excellent genealogical collection of records about the original families that settled in Putnam Valley. There are thousands of old photographs of how Putnam Valley looked in the olden days. "They're beautiful and fun to look at," says Lisa Delfino. They have photos of the cemeteries and individual headstones along with maps of how to locate the grave sites. There are files on the mines and Native Americans.
"The proudest thing that we've done since I've been here is to get back involved with the schools. We have the Putnam Valley History Club started by one of our summer interns. The club was here recently and they are doing a project on one of the families that settled here. They choose the Odells," says Lisa.
"People come and ask me questions and I would love it if Steve Andersen could be here to answer them because I am not a Historian, I am a Director. There are many questions I can't answer right away - we pull out files and do research. Sallie Sypher is amazing, she does our newsletter and she is incredible," says Lisa.
Lisa talked about some of the things she would like to see happen: We've discussed having classes here like a book binding class by George Olsen, or knitting classes or something to bring a group of people into the museum and have them work on something for an hour and a half or two hours on a weeknight or Saturday. "We sponsor a grant with Michelle Le Blanc, this will be our tenth year with her," says Lisa. The Putnam Valley schools and the Boy Scouts have started using the Museum for research.
There is definitely a growing interest in what the Historical Society has to offer says Delfino. Well-meaning individuals keep coming up with new ideas and projects for the Historical Society to be engaged in but each new idea takes some type of funding and manpower to get it accomplished. Two items the Historical Society is in short supply of.
"I think the people of Putnam Valley are very supportive," says Director Delfino, "but there are so many things out there it's difficult for everyone to support everything. We have our core membership who attends everything. They went on our hike, our bus tour, they're at the boutique, the annual meeting, and they're one group that you can always count on for everything. However, we are always looking for new members."
The Holiday Boutique will be held at the Schoolhouse Museum on Peekskill Hollow Road this Saturday and Sunday, December 1 and 2 from 10am to 4pm each day.
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