Historian Looks at the Three Causes that Shaped Seneca Falls

County historian Walt Gable speaks with vistors at the National Women's Hall of Fame during the annual It's a Wonderful Life Weekend. Mr. Gable will be speaking at the Seneca Museum of Waterways and Industry on Friday, June 15th.

Three causes: abolition, women’s rights and temperance, combined to make Seneca Falls a hotbed of political reform activity in the mid-19th century. This Friday, County Historian Walt Gable will recount how those three causes melded together in this Upstate Village.

His talk will explain how and why Seneca Falls became such a hotbed of reform in woman’s rights, temperance and abolition in the years preceding the Civil War. His presentation will be made at the Seneca Museum of Waterways and Industry on Friday, June 15, 2012. Gable will show how these three major reform causes were impacting Seneca Falls in the mid-19^th century. Several different societies were established seeking to achieve a total ban on the consumption of alcohol or to limit greatly its use. Several businesses advertised that they catered to “temperance” clientele.

All kinds of anti-slavery activism were taking place in Seneca Falls, including helping freedom seekers reach freedom via the Underground Railroad, speeches by famous abolitionist speakers, conducting anti-slavery fairs, meetings of the Free Soil and Liberty political parties, formation of a new Wesleyan Church, and the sending of anti-slavery petitions to Congress.

Basic events of the July 1848 woman’s rights convention will be covered, as well as some analysis of the signers and non-signers of the Declaration of Sentiments. Gable will also show how the Rhoda Bement church trial was a microcosm of how these three causes were evolving and interacting five years before the woman’s rights convention of 1848.

The formal part of the program will consist of a power point, followed by a time for questions and comments. Mr. Gable will make available copies of his written articles on each of the component parts of the formal program.

Mr. Gable has been the Seneca County Historian since August 2003. He was a social studies teacher at Mynderse Academy, the public high school of the Seneca Falls School District, for 30 years and a consultant for the State Education Department. He has been a life-long resident of Seneca County, having been born in the old Seneca Falls hospital. He is a graduate of the Romulus Central School, and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Syracuse University.

This program is free and open to the public. The museum is handicap accessible. This organization is supported in part with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts Decentralization Program, which is administered locally by the Phelps Art Center. For more information, call us at (315)568-1510.

Parking: If you cannot find Fall Street parking, please drive down Water Street to the municipal parking lot behind the Seneca Museum on the Canal Level. We will have our doors open and escort you to the elevator, for your convenience.

The Seneca Museum of Waterways & Industry

presents

“THE POWER OF THREE”

THREE CAUSES IMPACTING SENECA FALLS

Walter Gable, Seneca County Historian

Please join us – Friday evening - June 15th 2012 at 7:00 p.m.

89 Fall Street in historic downtown Seneca Falls.

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