The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Foundation, Inc.
Mission
Approved March 17, 2022
A PLACED PEOPLES
It is the Museum's mission to share the heritage and life-stories of the place in Hadley Massachusetts known as “Forty Acres and its Skirts” and to interpret the diverse histories that contribute to who we are today, and who we can be in the future.
The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Foundation, Inc. is a unique historical resource for immersion in the lived experiences, complexities, and inequalities of this landscape. The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Museum of Hadley includes surrounding structures, gardens, agricultural property; furniture, textiles, and works of art; books, papers, photographs and related items, all pertaining to the history of a site known as “Forty Acres and its Skirts” on what had long been Nonotuck land.
The site interprets the histories of one extended family and the enslaved, indentured, and female laborers, Indigenous peoples, and free Black people associated with this site over a period of more than three hundred years. The Foundation partners with individuals and institutions to explore how history is made, and to evolve and influence the communal heritage of the Connecticut River Valley.
It hosts an ongoing discourse between the known and hidden histories of life in this place so that the collective experience will be fuller, richer, deeper — truer.
The Foundation’s mission is:
To preserve as an educational and cultural resource the historic buildings, grounds, papers, and over 2200 artifacts related to the PorterPhelpsHuntington family and the many others who lived and worked on this place.
To provide access to the PorterPhelpsHuntington buildings, grounds, objects, and collections and to encourage their responsible use.
To strengthen the Foundation's holdings by identifying, acquiring, and preserving objects, papers, and property that relate to the history of the PorterPhelpsHuntington family and the Forty Acres site.
To enhance public historical understanding through educational and cultural programs using the Foundation's resources.
To encourage investigation and broaden interpretation of the history of this Connecticut River Valley site, including drawing upon the scholarly, professional, and local communities.
To use its resources for the good of the earth and humankind as participants in the difficult contemporary dialogues among neighbors and in so doing gain for this past-keeping historic house museum a present-keeping future.
Strategies for achieving these goals may include:
Partnering with the University of Massachusetts Special Collections and University Archives (UM SCUA) in Amherst, Massachusetts to preserve and make accessible over 300 linear feet of material collected by one extended family over 10 generations.
Preserving and protecting the land, including leasing to local farmers the fields surrounding these structures and collaborating with organizations that focus on ecological conservation and social justice.
Making available to the public, on its website and at the Foundation’s Museum, selected documents and artifacts from its collections, and developing interpretation strategies that draw upon the knowledge and skills of the scholarly, professional, and local communities.
Strengthening these holdings through new acquisitions from the extended family and others whose gifts open new research opportunities to enhance the public understanding of the natural and cultural life in the Connecticut River Valley and beyond.