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Historical Society annual meeting will feature Phil Crossman on political, religious, and social conflict in early Vermont

Sunday, Sept. 12 at 2 p.m. — MIDDLETOWN SPRINGS — Vermont historian Phillip Crossman will be the featured speaker at the 52nd annual meeting of the Middletown Springs Historical Society at 2 p.m., Sept. 12 at the Historical Society building. After a brief business meeting, including a review of the year’s accomplishments by MSHS trustees, there will be a dessert buffet prepared by Historical Society volunteers.

Courtesy MSHS
Phillip Crossman

At 2:45 p.m., Mr. Crossman will give a slide presentation, “Breeding Radicals: The Importation, Refinement, and Exportation of Social Conflict in Early Vermont (1761 – 1861)”, adapted from his lecture as part of the Vermont Humanities Council Speakers Bureau.

Present-day Vermont has a reputation for offering a peaceful break from the hectic stress of discord elsewhere. However, Vermont’s early history doesn’t align with this perception.

In this lecture, Philip Crossman looks at the turmoil in early Vermont and examines how political, cultural, religious, and personal contentions were imported from the older colonies, modified in Vermont, and then exported elsewhere.

Philip Crossman has spent most of his career teaching the humanities to high school and college students. His interest in Middle Eastern history was sparked by several years he spent working in Jerusalem. Upon his return to Vermont, he completed a master’s degree in Islamic-Western Relations at Norwich and went on to pursue a master’s in education in educational technology at the University of Toronto. He is currently an administrator at Community College of Vermont (CCV) and teaches part-time at CCV and Norwich University.

For more information, call David Wright 235-2376.

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