Monty Cooke of Hamburg, NY, at the Chautauqua County History Expo.
A community-based project will culminate in a music and art festival commemorating the legacy of Marion H. Skidmore.
Department of English faculty member Dr. Emily VanDette and undergraduate Monty Cooke of Hamburg, NY, who is majoring in English Adolescence Education with a minor in Creative Writing, have spent the summer collaborating and working alongside Lily Dale community partners. They include Celeste Elliott, chair of the Lily Dale Woman's Day Event Committee, and Stacy Shull, owner of Sacred Grounds Coffee House.
Skidmore, an important activist and community organizer, was one of the founders of the Spiritualist community in Lily Dale, as well as a leading activist and organizer for the local women's suffrage campaign in Chautauqua County. She organized the first Woman's Day event in 1891, bringing such prominent suffragists as Susan B. Anthony and Anna Howard Shaw to Lily Dale to speak to crowds gathered in support of women's voting rights. She also founded a library in Lily Dale, which today holds one of the largest collections of Spiritualist literature in the world.
To commemorate the 200th anniversary of her birth, Marion Skidmore Day on Saturday, Sept. 5, will feature live music performances by SUNY Fredonia students, art vendors, poetry, historic tours, a talk by Dr. VanDette about Skidmore's legacy in grassroots organizing, and a roundtable of speakers reflecting on the relevance of her legacy today. The event will also feature historic displays highlighting local history and Skidmore's life, as well as a tent library with free books, as a tribute to Skidmore's founding of the library in a tent in 1886. The Chautauqua County League of Women Voters, the Jamestown YWCA, and other community and Fredonia student organizations will be present, as well.
The event is slated from noon until 6 p.m., in and surrounding Lily Dale’s historic auditorium, and is free and open to the public.
VanDette and Cooke presented a display about Skidmore's life and legacy at the Chautauqua County History Expo in Mayville on Aug. 2, where they networked with local historians and history lovers to promote the event and spotlight Skidmore's contributions to the local community. Cooke’s work on the project is supported by a College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Student Summer Fellowship, and the programming is also sponsored by the Fredonia College Foundation, the Lily Dale Woman’s Day Event Committee and Sacred Grounds Coffee House.
In addition to the event in Lily Dale on Sept 5, a brief ceremony on Skidmore’s birthday will take place on Sept. 8, at 4 p.m., at Forest Hill Cemetery in Fredonia, where she is interred alongside her husband and daughter. In collaboration with Town of Pomfret Historian Lillian Pacos, the ceremony will feature the unveiling of a women’s suffrage-themed “Little Free Library.” Another “Little Free Library” in Skidmore’s honor will be installed near the Marion H. Skidmore Library in Lily Dale.
