Historic Newtown Square Day: Celebrating Our Community, Past and Present

Our Community Feature by Christina Manning

Photos courtesy of Newtown Square Historical Society

June will mark the 25th anniversary of Historic Newtown Square Day, a day filled with historic demonstrations, tours, delicious local food, and more. To learn about this community event, we talked with our local Historian, Doug Humes, about why this fun and educational event, sponsored by the Newtown Square Historical Society (NSHS), has become an annual local tradition.

(L-R): Jack Grant and Historic Newtown Square Day founder Sam Coco at Newtown Square Railroad Museum

It all started in 1995, when Sam Coco, Stan Short and Jan and Sid Elston, all of whom Doug described as “the beating heart of the organization,” had an idea they called “Colonial Day,” a day-long celebration of our area’s Colonial history. One thing led to another, and with the help of dozens of volunteers, it became something so much more, “almost like a little Williamsburg.”

(L-R): Madaleen Ellis, President, with invited guests George Washington, Ben Franklin and Betsy Ross

On June 10, 1995, NSHS hosted the first Colonial Day, and Newtown Square families came together for some outdoor summer fun. Doug said the Opening Ceremony was “a fife-and-drum corps with volunteers in costume as Betsy Ross and George Washington. They kicked off the event at the Paper Mill Museum, and then went on to provide tours of eight historic locations in the township. That first year served as a template for what has become an annual event.”

Abe Lincoln (Doug Humes) speaks at 150th birthday party for Bartram Bridge in 2010

Each year since, the annual events have made countless memories for Doug, two of which involved weddings held at the Newtown Square Quaker Meeting House. In 1999, a Quaker wedding was featured, and Doug played the part of the groom. At the end of the day, there was a “wedding reception” at the Square Tavern, to which all volunteers were invited. Doug remembers a moment at that reception when he was sitting out in a beautiful moonlit summer night and marveling at the music, dancing and laughter behind this old tavern, which used to see its share of celebrations like that in the 1700s. He was struck by the thought:

What a great way to bring the community together and connect it to the past!

Elizabeth Humes and Danny Joseph, Colonial bride and groom

The second wedding involved Doug’s daughter, Elizabeth, who chose to do her high school senior year project re-enacting a Colonial wedding for Colonial Day. She even found the original records from the Newtown Quakers during the time of the American Revolution, incorporating those facts into an actual marriage that had occurred that year. All the hours of work that went into planning her wedding project seemed unlikely to be fulfilled when the night before the big day, a rainstorm rolled in. Madaleen Elis, then-President of the Society, made a bold call and decided to still hold the event. Intermittent rain didn’t keep wedding guests from showing up, and it turned out to be a very enjoyable celebration for all. After that wedding, they held a volunteers party, a tradition that has continued every year.

We set up outside the Paper Mill House, overlooking Darby Creek,” Doug recalled, “and we sang and played until the wee hours. The ghosts of the hundreds of millworkers who had lived and worked along those banks in the 1800s must have been thrilled to hear such life and laughter in this old building after too many years of empty silence.

Sid and Jan Elston, co-founders of Newtown Square Historical Society

This year will be different: On April 1, the NSHS Board decided to cancel this year’s event, due to the governor’s stay-at home order in place for April and possibly longer, making event planning and preparations too unpredictable. Canceling this beloved community event makes us reflect on what it would be like if there were no community events: No 4th of July parades, no youth or adult sports programs, no church- or school-sponsored events. 2020 will be the year when every community around the world gets to experience that. Perhaps this is an opportunity for everyone to understand and appreciate how groups of likeminded neighbors who organize and host community events have been Bringing People Together for centuries, and what’s lost when that doesn’t happen.

For more information about the Newtown Square Historical Society, visit their website:

www.HistoricNewtownSquare.org