PPH Opens for its 75th Season
Welcome to the 75th season at
the Porter Phelps Huntington House!
The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Museum opens for its 75th season on Saturday, May 18th. Guided tours will be available Saturday through Wednesday from 1:00 to 4:00 P.M. The museum is closed on Thursdays and Fridays. Admission is $5 for adults and $1 for children 12 and under. The Porter-Phelps-Huntington House is a part of the new “Forty Acres and Its Skirts” National Historic District and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The 43rd season of WEDNESDAY FOLK TRADITIONS, featuring some of New England's finest global folk music performers and ensembles, kicks off on June 12th with Tim Eriksen, experimentalist, ethnomusicologist, and leader in the “shape-note” tradition. Concerts are held outdoors in the sunken garden at 6:30, and picnics are welcome.
On July 3rd The Museum presents Stories of Slavery and Independence, a Stopping Stones remembrance ceremony for Caesar Phelps and Margaret (Peg) Bowen, who were enslaved on the site during the 18th century. The program features freedom songs with Evelyn Harris, and a reading of Frederick Douglass's speech "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" This is a free program offered in partnership with Ancestral Bridges & funded with a grant from MassHumanities.
The Porter-Phelps-Huntington House Museum is the designated Way-Point Center for the National Connecticut River Scenic Byway. The Museum hosts a panel exhibit on the natural history of the Valley, the Museum’s history, and sites travelers will find along the by-way. A trail system begins at the Museum, traverses the farm fields along the river, and continues up the old buggy path to the top of Mount Warner where the farm’s cattle grazed in the 18th century.
The Tour
PPH is engaged in a widespread reinterpretation project that aims to emphasize the impact that laborers, both free and enslaved, have had on the history of the site. Our new tour was developed with historian Professor Marla R. Miller, and crafted by Emily Whitted and Brian Whetstone to reflect the lives and artifacts that made life possible at 40 Acres. In doing so, we celebrate those that lived and worked on our grounds over the past 300 years.
The tour is 45 minutes long, starting in the Corn Barn and the route includes multiple staircases. While the house is not accessible by mobility assistive devices, our tour guides do offer the same information (and more!) in conversation on the grounds and in the Corn Barn. Tours are $5 for adults, and $1 for children 12 and under. Cash only.
Wednesday Folk Traditions
The 43rd season of our concert series, Wednesday Folk Traditions, kicks off on June 12th with Tim Eriksen, leader in the “shape-note” tradition, experimentalist and ethnomusicologist, performing traditional ballads from the Pioneer Valley and original pieces that have been described as “magical realism in song.” Since 1999 he has taught courses in songwriting, American and world music and film at Dartmouth, Amherst, Smith and Hampshire Colleges and the University of Minnesota. He is currently serving as musician in residence at Historic Deerfield.
Concerts begin at 6:30 and are hosted in the Sunken Garden, and picnickers are welcome starting at 5:00pm. Admission is $12 for adults and $2 for children under 16. Cash only please. We are a smoke-free, carry in/carry out site.
Wednesday Folk Traditions is funded in part by grants from the Amherst and Hadley Cultural Councils, local agencies funded by Massachusetts Cultural Council; Robinson and Cole; The Adams Foundation; Easthampton Savings Bank; Gage-Wiley and Company, and with generous support from many local businesses. The Foundation welcomes contributions from friends and visitors. Scroll down to see the full lineup, or visit our website for more information.
Meet the 2024 Porter Phelps Huntington Museum Interns! From left to right we have Alex Locher, a Simmons University graduate student in Archives and Preservation, Molly Frank, an undergraduate student at UMass Amherst majoring in History and Art History, and Lauren Brown. an undergraduate student at UMass Amherst majoring in Political Science and History.