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April 7, 2005

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Thursday, April 07, 2005
Another Volume of William Jay Bolton's Sketches and Ruminations Located?

Please Visit the Historic Pelham Web Site

Located at http://www.historicpelham.com/.

It is fascinating to me how interesting tidbits of information about Pelham's rich history turn up when you least expect it. For the last few days I have been working to assemble a list of early publications relating to the family of Rev. Robert Bolton who built the Bolton Priory and founded Christ Church in Pelham Manor. Although Reginald Pelham Bolton wrote a number of articles published in the quarterly journal of the Westchester County Historical Society about various members of Rev. Bolton's family and their early activities in Westchester County, I have been interested in identifying less accessible publications by and about the family.

Last night, while doing my research, I ran across a very intriguing piece of information buried in an endnote in a volume published more than a decade ago about the stained glass work of one of Robert Bolton's sons, William Jay Bolton. The reference cries out for followup.

Readers may recall from my April 4, 2005 Historic Pelham Blog posting entitled "The Art and Poetry of William Jay Bolton of Bolton Priory in Pelham" that the collections of The Office of The Historian of The Town of Pelham contain two slim volumes filled with handwritten journal entries, drafts of The Pelham Chronicle and sketches prepared by William Jay Bolton. One of the small journals has a notation on its cover that is exceedingly difficult to read, but appears to say "VOL. IV". (It may say "VOL. IX" or "VOL. IY", but I believe it says "VOL. IV"). That volume begins with an entry dated March 7, 1842. The second volume contains no notation on its cover, but encompasses the year 1846. In short, there seem to have been other volumes the whereabouts of which are unknown.

Last night, however, while sitting at the desk of my study long after my family had drifted to sleep in their warm beds, I found the endnote I referenced above and the lightbulb went off above my head. The reference that I found reads as follows:

"The Bolton materials preserved in the archives of the Episcopal Diocese of Long Island, Garden City, NY include a book of sketches and letters given in 1906 to the Church of (St. Ann And) the Holy Trinity, Brooklyn, N.Y., by William Jay Bolton's daughter."

Source: Clark, Willene B., The Stained Glass Art of William Jay Bolton (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press 1992).

I suspect that the "book of sketches and letters" that William Jay Bolton's daughter presented to the Church of the Holy Trinity in Brooklyn in 1906 is another in a series of volumes like the two volumes in the collections of The Office of The Historian of The Town of Pelham. Below is an example of a page from one of those volumes:

Please Visit the Historic Pelham Web Site
Located at http://www.historicpelham.com/

posted by Blake A. Bell @ 7:05 AM

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Historic Pelham Blog Archive April 7, 2005

Historic Pelham Blog Archive
April 7, 2005