We’re been posting images of unusual implements to our facebook page in conjunction with our current “What is it?” museum exhibit.
The Goodell Bonanza Apple Peeler Corer was created by David H. Goodell whose Goodell company produce a variety of devices to aid in the processing apples and other fruits. Goodell became the Governor of Hew Hampshire in 1889.
Today is Tomorrow’s Yesterday
If history helps connects us to the past, then in a way it also helps connect us to the future. Today is tomorrow’s yesterday.
Despite decades of research done by our museum volunteers, there are still countless stories to be unearthed and told about the people, places, and events that have helped make our little community what it is today.
We love sharing those stories with you through our exhibits, school visits and tours, speakers and presentations, our website, and even a few new-fangled ways of communicating.
No one here is working for peanuts. (Well, except Chip.) We are volunteers and work for the love of history and the pleasure of sharing Webster’s story with you.
There is still no admission charge to visit the Webster Museum.
We rely on the kindness of our neighbors and friends to assist us in keeping the doors of the Webster Museum open.
Near the shores of Lake Ontario lie Parma, Hilton, and several other pioneer communities once connected by Indian trails. Parma was named in honor of the Italian city and province of the same name and Hilton village, once known as North Parma, was renamed after Rev. Charles A. Hilton, a Civil War veteran and Baptist minister. Before the Civil War, the area was known as the Nation's Breadbasket. It became a leading fruit production center near the end of the 19th century and attracted immigrants from around the world. Parma and Hilton uses images from throughout the century to illustrate the pioneer times, the development of government, life on the waterfront, transportation and communication,
schools and churches, business and industry, and festive days of celebration.
The opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 saw the rise of western New York as the gateway to the West. The ease and economy of shipping by canal brought commerce and factories to many communities along the canal's route. Thus, the area that we now know as Fairport and Perinton boasted a disproportionate number of businesses in the mid- and late-nineteenth century.
In Perinton, Fairport, and the Erie Canal, you will meet Daniel DeLand, founder of the DeLand Chemical Works which, beginning in 1852, shipped by canal hundreds of barrels of the leavening agent saleratus and baking soda to markets in New York City and the West. You will find out the secret ingredient of Taylor's Oil of Life and will read its endorsement by Buffalo Bill Cody. You will see the Main Street lift-bridge, which was cited several times in Ripley's Believe It or Not, and Cobb's Preserving Company, which experimented and promoted the solderless can that revolutionized food storage in America.