Around The Mountains

higbee_3
View of West Charlotte and Lake Champlain
by Daniel Folger Bigelow
Courtesy of the Shelburne Museum.

Historical Essays
About
Charlotte, Ferrisburgh
and Monkton
By
William Wallace Higbee

Editorial Committee:
Kathleen McKinley Harris
Kathleen Manchester
Harriet Patrick
Hazel W Prindle
Phoebe Siemer
Katherine Teetor
Mary G. Lighthall, Editor-in-Chief

Copyright 1991 The Charlotte Historical Society
All Rights Reserved
Printed by Academy Books, Rutland, Vermont
Second Printing 1991
Third Printing 2001
Hardbound, 337 pages

$47.50

(includes $7.50 shipping + handling)



A mid-portion of the Champlain Valley, in its scenic and historic splendor, is the heart of this book. Three towns, all chartered on June 24, 1762, are described in nineteenth century terms by a literate, affectionate, involved witness.

CHARLOTTE located in the very south of Chittenden County. bordering on the lake, graced with Mount Philo, Pease Mt. and Mutton Hill.

FERRISBRGH located in the very north of Addison County where Shellhouse Mt. is located, sharing a huge bay with Charlotte and blessed with lakeside farms.

MONKTON an inland Addison County town, laced with hills and rills, home to Cedar Lake and Fuller Mt .

The reader traverses roads, old and new, learning of the times. Earlier days are illumined: settlers, and indians, natural landmarks that still delight.

When did "today" begin? This redolent manuscript, reconstructed by the Charlotte Historical Society for the Bicentennial of Statehood in 1991, is prologue to what we now enjoy.


"It is not my intention to discriminate in the calling of names, neither shall I be fortunate enough in the gathering of information to meet my own demands in honoring our sturdy progenitors. But the will for the deed must suffice in the effort to perpetuate the memory of some who these many years have slept the sleep of the grave."
William Wallace Higbee
Chapter XIV, 12 March 1897

Harold M. Carr
1911 - 1987

These essays appeared originally in newspaper columns done by William Wallace Higbee. Now in book form, this publication is the work of both that 19th century local history author and more recent residents of Charlotte. Latter-day local historians have completed the project begun by the late Harold Carr in 1979. Carr, retired from a career in college teaching, was both historian and genealogist. In the Bixby Free Memorial library, Vergennes, he found the typescript of some essays. Later, he received a copy of a scrapbook made by Charlotte's Daisy Williams with clippings of some Higbee articles. Long hours at the Sheldon Museum in Middlebury supplied material from the Museum's copies of the Vergennes Vermonter. He typed many of the original newspaper articles from almost illegible microfilm records in the Bailey-Howe Library in Burlington. Tragically his work ended when he was injured in an automobile accident. He died in 1987 and the archive of "Harold's Higbee stuff" was left for other hands. This book, in recognition of his efforts, is dedicated to him by the Charlotte Historical Society and by the committee which completed his project.