Rutland Historical Society

Home
United States
Rutland, MA
Rutland Historical Society

Call Directions Website

A Historical Museum filled with treasures, artifacts and history of Rutland, Massachusetts and its settlers.

10/14/2026

Federal Prison Anyone?
The year was 1992, and the Rutland Heights Hospital site was being considered for just that.
Like the Prison Camp, it would have brought jobs, and replaced a few of the ones that were lost, but at what price?

10/13/2026

The Hatstat Cradle

On Christmas Day 1900 Emma (Strong) Hatstat, her Husband George Hatstat and their two children moved into their new home at the corner of River and East County Roads in North Rutland. Their new house sat on the foundation of the house that it replaced, and still does. The previous house was lost in a fire.
Moving in with the Hatstat family was their treasured cradle, a gift from Emma’s sister Eunice and her husband, A. Coleman Joney, preceding the birth of their first child. Coleman was a barrel maker by trade, and like barrels, cradles too are made of wood. It is obvious that this cradle was built with both the skill and care of a seasoned craftsman.
The cradle would not remain empty for long, as Emma and George’s son Raymond would be born three days after moving in to their new home. All four of their children, in fact, were soothed by the cradle’s rocking, along with infants from three additional generations of Hatstat babies. More than a dozen family infants owe their early comforts to the Hatstat Cradle.

The Rutland Historical Society will receive this cradle due to the efforts of three second cousins, none of which had seen each other in nearly half a century, or in some cases ever. Like the babies who occupied the cradle, the cradle itself has the power to reconnect.
Very soon, we are hoping to reintroduce the cradle to a baby that is believed to have used it in 1936.
Stop by our event this coming Sunday, and connect with the cradle yourself.

Visit the Historical Society’s open house celebration of our country’s 250th Anniversary on Sunday, October 18th from 1 to 3 PM!

10/12/2026

Whodat?, Whodat?, and Whodat?

This group is on one of their occasional field trips.
This trip was to the Optical Heritage Museum, previously known as the American Optical Museum in Southbridge. The group: the Rutland Historical Society Board.
Other field trips have included historical museums in Worcester and a hike to explore summer home ruins on the south end of Long Pond.
If activities like these are of interest to you, join us at our monthly meeting this Tuesday, October 13th at 7PM to learn more. Or just stop in to say hi and express your interest in what we do. Our meetings are open to the public, and we think that you would be surprised in all that we do.

10/11/2026

Quiz Time

Each one of these images has some connection to Rutland. The answers run from easy to nearly impossible. See how many you can identify. The answers can be found in each photo’s comments.

10/10/2026

“Blown to Bits”
For today’s post we return to life underground as lived by the miners of the Quabbin Aqueduct.
We present some photos and save the last frame for the project’s most horrific accident. With five deaths in a single mishap, the project’s death toll rose to an even dozen.
Any major construction project of this magnitude was inherently dangerous.

10/09/2026

Pre-Graffiti

The Root Cellar & the Cell Block (inside its outer wall).

10/08/2026

Prohibition
(or so they say)

“The First World War had left in its wake a world that nearly everyone thought shallow, corrupt, and depraved…”
Newspaper articles, such as the one shown, were common in nearly every newspaper, and community during the years of 1919-1933. The article, the only Rutland based photo, is dated 1929.
“Prohibition was in its eighth year and was a spectacular failure. It had turned ordinary citizens into criminals and created a world of gangsters and rattling tommy guns. New York had more saloons in 1927 than it had had before Prohibition, and drinking remained so transparently prevalent that the mayor of Berlin on a visit” (to NYC) “reportedly asked Mayor Jimmy Walker when Prohibition was to begin.”

Text in quotes were taken from Bill Bryson’s book ONE SUMMER America, 1927.

10/07/2026

Visit the Historical Society’s open house celebration of our country’s 250th Anniversary on Sunday, October 18th from 1 to 3 PM!
Our exhibits will highlight the people, places and events in Rutland during the time of the American Revolution! Find out who was here and who has family members still living in town. Find out how they lived, and what they did! Find out what their clothing looked like and how they dressed! These are the people who followed the American dream, the dream of freedom and more right here in Rutland!
(This scene is most likely not from Rutland but could represent how it may have been for the many who were here at this time.)

10/06/2026

Tough Commute

Few jobs were more dangerous than being a laborer hired to dig & finish the Quabbin Aqueduct. The attached article shows just how dangerous it was to just be lowered and raised hundreds of feet to and from the surface.
As bad as this accident was; there were worse, which we will surely cover in future posts.

10/05/2026

ANSWERS to the five questions on yesterday’s RHS FB post:

1. Where was this building? This seems to have been the easiest question as many of you identified the building as the Rock Crushing Plant located in the Rutland Prison Camp. This is correct!
2. What was it used for? The answer to this question was answered by many of you in answering question 1.
3. Why was it needed? This is where the questions got a little tougher. As the automobile came onto the scene, the need for crushed stone to build roadbeds that were more easily passable (and with proper drainage) was essential.
4. Who operated it? It appears that the plant was operated by the State Highway Commission they were one of four state agencies that were tasked to oversee the operation of the Prison Camp.
5. What else is visible in the photo that could have been used in connection with what was made here? There appears to be some type of heavy roller in the foreground that could have been used to compact the new roadbeds as they were being constructed.

A couple of great points that were made by commenters:
Nancy Jane Hubbard commented that rock from the Aquaduct was crushed here. I love this comment, and while it makes sense we have never seen evidence of this. If the evidence is out there, please share, and we will learn together.
Another commenter, Colleen Convery, Googled the image and it came back as a historic Ozark County Jail building in Gainesville, Missouri during the late 19th century. Could the Prison Camp rock crushing plant share the design of one in Missouri from an earlier time? That is a very, very interesting lead as this presents a second possibility of learning how the workings of the plant were designed.
Thank you to everyone who participated.

Address

232 Main Street
Rutland, MA
01543

Telephone

+15088864893

Website

http://www.rutlandmahistoricalsociety.org/

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Rutland Historical Society posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Want your organization to be the top-listed non profit organization in Rutland?