Transcriptions
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We received a 2021 Digital Capacity Grant from Mass Humanities, with funding through the Mass Cultural Council, to build a Digital Volunteers Program. This program allowed us to increase both accessibility to the Hatfield Historical Museum collections and opportunities to be involved with the Hatfield Historical Society on-line.
One result of this program is a group of dedicated volunteers from across town and around the country who have taken on the work of transcribing hand-written documents from the collection. See their work below. You can learn more about this project HERE. |
The 2021-2022 transcription team also created a style guide to support a consistent way of approaching the work and to show some of the decisions that have to be made in doing transcriptions - especially in 18th and 19th century documents. It is offered HERE as a tool that may be of use to others.
Each document below has an orange link to the original images (where available) and a black link to the searchable line-by-line transcription spreadsheet of that document. This is an on-going project. New transcriptions will be posted below as they are ready to share.
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The Jandzinski Diary
Dorothy and Mary Ann's journal is a treasure trove of the daily life of two young women in Hatfield, 1927 to 1933 - with weather reports, fires, births, deaths, weddings, farming news, Smith Academy news, clippings and more.
For a deeper look into the story this diary tells, click HERE
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Records of the Congregational Church
From 1771 to 1869, the clerk's records of church matters, along with the list of marriages, births, and deaths, were kept in a single large volume. Peter A. Thomas photographed the records in 2020, and transcription by Hatfield Historical Society volunteers began in 2021.
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Porter Machine Traveling Salesmen's Letters, 1888 - 1893
Jonathan Porter and George Smith, salesmen for the Porter Machine Works Co., wrote letters home detailing sales, contacts, and glimpses of the country as far afield as the West Coast.
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For a deeper look into the story behind these letters, click HERE
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Deed from Samuel Partridge to Daniel White Jr., April 10, 1791
Samuel Partridge was involved in a number of land transactions in the second half of the 1700s, and through them we can examine how people and land were interconnected in the Colonial Era in Hatfield's history.
Daniel Wells Civil War Diary
Civil War Soldier Daniel Wells, kept a diary covering the dates Oct. 2 1862 through July 28 1863. This includes the Battle of Port Hudson, as well as details of his life. While the diary has been scanned and is available on the Internet Archive, this is the first full transcription.
Boyhood Journal of Reuben Wells
Diary entries from Jan 14 1894 through April 17 1894, including a list of his books, references to family and friends, and a record of his activities.
