OLD MUSEUM VILLAGE OF SMITH'S CLOVE Old Museum Village of Smith's Clove, Monroe, New York, began as one man's hobby many years ago when Roscoe W. Smith started to collect and to preserve 19th Century American tools and equipment which he observed were being discarded and lost. Mr. Smith had the aid of Mrs. Smith whose expert knowledge of American glass and china has brought to the Museum a very rare and beautiful collection of old American wear. Mr. Smith, who celebrated his 92nd. birthday in August 1969, founded the Orange and Rockland Electric Company in 1905 when he was twenty eight. In the half century following the founding of the company, it grew steadily as Mr. Smith acquired many of the utility companies of the region. In 1958 the Orange and Rockland Electric Company merged with the Rockland Light and Power Company, resulting in the formation of the present Orange and Rockland Utilities. Old Museum Village of Smith's Clove is situated at Monroe, Orange County, New York and is on U.S. Route 6 three miles west of the New York Thruway exit #16 at Harrison, New York. The Village consists of forty buildings built on a thirty acre tract of land. Mr. Smith's interest in collecting tools and American artifacts grew to monumental proportions. His penchant for mechanical devices, their invention, adaption and development, spurred him to collect extensively throughout New York, New Jersey, New England, and even throughout the Southeastern region of the United States. Although he collected everything from textiles and porcelain to horsedrawn vehicles, Mr. Smith primarily collected the tools and machinery that were commonly used by the "average" American before the turn of the Century. As the years passed his collections grew to the point where he ran out of storage space. His basement was filled; his garage was filled; and several warehouses in Orange County were packed to overflowing. He realized that if his collections were to be preserved and viewed by the public, special accommodations would have to be developed. This was the beginning of Old Museum Village of Smith's Clove. As the site of his Museum, Mr. Smith chose the farm-site of his great-grandmother, Abigail Smith, which is located about one mile west of the village of Monroe. Old Museum Village was built to house Roscoe Smith's extensive collections. It is not, as are some museums, a reconstruction or replica of any particular community. The museum developed as a village which is repre•sentative of those which existed in 19th Century Orange County. The term "Smith's Clove" seems to baffle many people. "Clove" is an archaeic Saxon word meaning "cleft" or -valley." Monroe is located in a Note: the Editor of the Year Book is very much indebted to the Director of Old Museum Village of Smith' Clove, Jerome D. Talbot, the Assistant Curator, M. Susan Thurston, and the Vice-President of the Board of Trustees, Mrs. Richmond F. Meyer, for the information about the Museum contained in this article.
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