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Since moving here, I have been doing much walking throughout our home town of Bellows Falls, Vermont. The town, once having been the site of a major industrial paper manufacturer, is rich with historic houses and buildings. Bellows Falls is well noted for its Victorian architecture, the study of which is a real passion of mine! I am constantly seeing little vignettes that cry out to be painted... I have decided to do a series of small paintings inspired by these walks. Please enjoy these photos of our home town. -- E.G. Click any image to view a larger version.
The below information was excerpted from Wikipedia and Virtual Vermont. The village of Bellows Falls was settled by Europeans in 1753, and was incorporated as a village in 1909. It has served as a key river and overland crossroad for commerce and travel by foot, stagecoach, riverboat, train, truck and automobile. New technologies blossomed here from the canal and railroads, to paper and farm machinery manufacturing.
In 1802, the first paper mill was established. Two railroads converged in 1849 at Bellows Falls, helping it develop into a major mill town. By 1859, there was a woolen textile mill, in addition to factories which produced furniture, marble, sashes and blinds, iron castings, carriages, cabinet ware, rifles, harness, shoe pegs and organs. The principal products, however, were paper and farm machinery.
A covered bridge, the first across the river in Vermont and the first of many subsequent road and rail crossings at Bellows Falls, spanned the gorge in 1785. The same distinctive rocky bend in the river that made it such a key fishing site has made the town a modern hub for tourism, travel and transport and remains a natural wonder. The town was named for Colonel Benjamin Bellows, one of the original grantees of Rockingham. A skilled surveyor, Bellows surveyed most of the town sites on both sides of the Connecticut River. The Colonel is said to have held title to some 9,000 acres in Vermont and New Hampshire at the time of his death in 1777. For much more information about our town, please visit: Town of Rockingham &Village of Bellows Falls Official Web Site |
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