Wed-Sat 10am-4pm thru Feb. 25th
To celebrate ConVal’s 40th anniversary, Peterborough Historical Society will open a new exhibit on November 11, 2011. The First 40 Years at ConVal High School will feature photographs, music, and artifacts guaranteed to take visitors back to their high school days. Alumni, faculty, current students, parents and the community are invited to attend the opening reception from 5 to 8 pm. Admission to the opening reception is free and light refreshments will be served. The exhibit will run through February 25, 2012.
In June 1971, Contoocook Valley Regional High School held its first graduation. Over the last four decades more than 7,000 students have marked their passage into adulthood with ConVal’s gold tassel and blue mortarboard.
As part of the exhibit opening, on November 11, ConVal High School has generously offered to host tours of the facility with current student acting as guides. These afternoon tours will be a great opportunity for former students and staff to see how the school has changed and grown over the years. (Tour times will be announced after November 1.)
A committee of former students and faculty have assembled the exhibit materials and traced the school’s history through academics and faculty, sports, drama, music, proms, graduations and social life. The committee is made up of Jill Lawler, retired teacher; Byron Neiderhelman, former teacher and principal; Lorraine Walker, former teacher; Liz Lawler, Class of 1999; Richard Ellingwood, Class of 1975; Carrie Whittemore, Class of 1978; and Michelle Stahl, Class of 1985.
Because the school’s history is so recent, the Society’s archives and artifact collections do not contain many items related to ConVal. Part of the committee’s task has been to identify photographs and objects that illustrate this recent history and add them to the Society’s collections or borrow them for the exhibit. The committee has assembled all forty yearbooks for visitors to browse and have a chuckle over. The school’s yearbook office has proven to be a rich source of photographs and some digging around has turned up tables, lockers, uniforms, prom dresses and other memorabilia. Among the gems found in the ConVal Library is a series of construction photos showing the transformation of a pasture into Contoocook Valley Regional High School, a state of the art facility when it opened its doors in 1970.
Just as ConVal made use of the latest technology when it opened, the Historical Society is using technology in the exhibit and to spread the word. The exhibit has its own Facebook page, 40 Years at ConVal High School, where the Society has posted photographs and users have shared their photos, comments and memories. Technology will also be integrated into the exhibit through electronic frames displaying the hundreds of photographs collected by the committee and an Mp3 player for the exhibit’s soundtrack, a playlist that will feature the popular songs of the last four decades.
Admission to the Historical Society’s museum is $3 per person. The Historical Society is located at 19 Grove Street and is open Wed. – Sat. 10am to 4pm.