Oxford Historical Society, a 501 (c) 3 charitable organization
Twitchell Rowland Homestead Museum
P.O. Box 582, 60 Towner Lane, Oxford, CT 06478
Time to Renew!
It’s time to renew! A new year is here. OHS membership applications can be downloaded at the OHS website and checks can be mailed to OHS, PO Box 582, Oxford, CT 06478. Forms can be printed from the last page of this newsletter, too. Individual memberships are $10, Seniors and Junior Associates (under 18) $10, Families $25 and Business Supporters $200. Not only do member dollars help with society expenses and activities, the numbers of members are used by grant givers as an indication of involvement with the community. Also listed are opportunities for volunteer- ing. Be sure to check those that appeal to you. Being a member really counts for us!
Fiber Fest 2024!
Coming Saturday, April 20 and Sunday, April 21. Weavers and fiber crafters, vendors and live animals are back at the Twitchell-Rowland Homestead for this free event offering hands-on opportunities for all ages, demonstrations by crafters and tours of the Homestead. Weather permitting, there will be goats or sheep being sheared for the spring. Take a peek into our agricul- tural past. The Homestead is located at 60 Towner Lane which is across Route 67 from St. Thomas Roman Catholic Church. Look for OHS sheep signs around town!
Be sure to check the society’s Facebook page and website for other events that may be scheduled.
Help us win grant money. Vote for us in the Community Awards Program

Ion Bank’s Community Awards Program 2024 offers their bank customers a vote to support community non-profits. Each online vote garners one chosen group a 125 donation from Ion Bank. One vote per person is the limit no matter how many accounts, but each signer on an account may vote. Check with the bank to vote without online access. Voting begins in February and runs into March. Visit the Oxford Historical Society website for a link or speak with bank personnel. This is a wonderful way to support activities in your hometown and community – and with someone else’s money! Thank you. We appreciate your support.
THE GREAT BLIZZARD OF 1888 RECOLLECTIONS OF MARY HULL
The Great Blizzard of 1888 reached Oxford in the afternoon of March 12, and continued for a day and a half. The closest record we have to the amount of snow Oxford received is from New Haven where 45 inches fell. High winds at 80 mph created drifts and temperatures of 13 degrees added to the ferocity of the storm. The snow and ice were so deep that residents were isolated for weeks. Cattle died of starvation because their owners couldn’t reach them and people lost in the drifts perished from exposure.
Trains were stranded and the passengers inside were left without food, heat, or water. From bills submitted to the town in late March, we know that local men were hired to clear Oxford Road and to chip away the ice on the River Road. Mary Agnes Hull was almost 10 years old when the Blizzard struck, living with her family on Great Hill. On April 12, 1970, her 92nd birthday, she shared her memories of that extraordinary event in her life in a taped interview with Peter Ely. The following is an excerpt from their conversation. A complete copy of the transcript is available from the Oxford Historical Society.

(Photo by Louise N. Burr)
…I think sometime that noon (on March 12), around early afternoon, it commenced to snow. I could remember Grandma coming to the front windows there in ouliving room and looking out the window. She could see Mr. DeForest (Isaac) going down in the meadow across, toward the barn. That was all filled with the summer’s crop of hay. It had an open shed on the south side and cattle could all go in there, you know, to get warm. You had to go over there every once in a while, and pull down the hay. It looked like a bad storm, so he was doing this for someone else.
It commenced to snow and the wind was biting and the temperature was way, way down. It was only 13. Grandma said she was afraid Isaac would never get back home. He did get back home and he pulled down the hay for the cattle and didn’t any of them die of starvation over there.
But the next day you couldn’t possibly see across the road. By that time the storm had collected to such a degree that I would say you couldn’t see your hand before your face, hardly. It was sleet, it wasn’t snow. It was real biting, stinging particles of ice. It didn’t come from the Northeast where all storms were supposed to come from, it came from the Northwest, as if it had been born on the Rocky Mountains.
Well, we children – there was no school, of course. Father wouldn’t even let – Alfred had always done the milking. But he wouldn’t let even Alfred who was then 12 years old and nearly 13. He wouldn’t let Alfred nor me nor John go out the door at all. He ordered us not to go out to the toilet. We were not to go to the barn and not to go feed the chickens. Fortunately, the cows didn’t have to be milked because it was just before they came in with their spring calves.
Father tied the new clothesline to the back door. There was one of those handles on the door. He tied it to that and then he hung on to it, played it out until he got it down and he went in on the backside in the barn.He fastened the clothesline there. Then when he went back home, he took hold of the clothesline. You don’t have any idea. I never seen a storm since when you couldn’t find your way right around [your] own dooryard. He was afraid, you know, that he would wander away and never be seen again. There were quite a number of people that were. You know, there was the washerwoman down in Ansonia. Went to do her Monday washings. She never got home. She started for home. She got lost in the storm. Her dead body was found afterward in the snow-drift. She never reached home.
Anyway, we children didn’t have to go to school. You know, children always like something that’s exciting and different. We didn’t realize how serious it was. We thought it was great fun. It snowed all day Monday and all night Monday night and all day Tuesday. I don’t think it stopped until Wednesday afternoon or Thursday. It snowed, and the wind blew a terrific wind. We children, you see, as the sun shone every day for days after, it thawed the top and then the top would freeze. It finally got so that we children could walk on it. And then it was great fun.

(Photo from Nancylee Madorno collection)
The snowdrifts went right up against the barn and the cowshed barn.The snowdrifts went right up to the roof of the cowshed. We could go on the crust. We took our sleds right up to the top of the ridge of the shed and slid right down off the ridge.We had a grand time. We didn’t have any school for 3 weeks. Nobody went by our house for three weeks. Finally, one day we children were al- ways out with our sleds rushed in to tell our folks that someone was coming down the road. It was three telegraph men. They were walking. They couldn’t drive. They were mending the lines that had been broken in the storms. Each one carried a great big roll of copper wire. Very heavy.They were looking at the poles and I think they marked every pole they examined that was all right.
Easter came and Father and Mother had been for years to Christ Church, Ansonia, and they missed it very much. [They] must have talked it all over before they got up, because when they got up for breakfast they told us children that we would have to stay home and take care of our Grandma and Emmeline and get the meals because they were going to Ansonia to go to Church.
They were going to walk, and by that time there was so much crust, you could walk on the crust. They went right up over the hill and went to Easter Sunday services and walked back on the crust. Of course, we had some big drifts and the roads were full from the top of the walls to the top of the walls. It didn’t look as if we were ever going to get out of there. We never would only Old Sol helped us. In a couple of months, it was warm weather. The snowdrifts in the hollow meadow remained until after haying. When Father got hay, there still was a great big snowdrift that was packed down and it hadn’t thawed yet. That was about the first of July. So, you could see how long lasting it was.
(Information for the above article came from Wikipedia and from Peter Ely’s transcription of his interview with Miss Mary Agnes Hull (April 12, 1878 – July 28, 1972.)
Open Houses Scheduled
Join us on the first and third Sunday each month when the Twitchell-Rowland Homestead is open to the public from 2pm to 4pm. Docents chat about the history of the house and the items found inside as well as other topics of interest to the community.
There is no charge for these open days: January 21; February 4 and 18; March 3 and 17. Books written by the Society are available for purchase as well as the unique notecard sets produced using local art and photographs. In addition, this spring a unique collection of handkerchiefs is on offer. Proceeds benefit the society’s events and activities as well as maintenance of the buildings and grounds.
Join the Effort to Preserve Oxford’s Historic Rural Heritage
- Follow us on Facebook: @oxfordhistoricalsociety.
- Like our Facebook page to let foundations know the Society has your support.
- Join the Historical Society. Download a membership form at https://oxford-historical-society.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/oxford-historical-society-membership-form-2024.pdf
- Visit the Twitchell-Rowland Homestead and learn more about our activities.
- Sign up for special tours & programs.
The Ramp Railing on the Twitchell-Rowland Homestead Is Being Replaced

Historical Society members Bob Farnum and Richard Crane brave winter’s chill to replace the weathered railing along the ramp to the Homestead. Work will continue in the spring and will likely include painting the rails. Let us know if you would like to help.
Oxford Heritage Recipe: ORANGE CREAM CHIPS

The sociable was an important part of everyday life in Oxford, especially for women. Life was a continuous circle of hard work for them with few conveniences. Mary Harger’s diary for 1870 lists wash day which she obvi- ously hated, sewing clothing for her family, cleaning the garret and making jam. While her brother John helped with the housework, the rest was on her shoulders, in- cluding nursing her sickly stepmother.
Mary and so many others found relief from their drudgery in sociables, informal gatherings of friends who enjoyed refreshments and exchanged news. Some were planned: “Went to the Sociable at Mrs. Ebenezer Buckingham’s.” (September 22, 1870) Others were less formal: “Emma McEwen brought Ellen Stone & Sarah Hinman came with Della and Mr. Albert Chatfield’s wife, and we had a tea party.” Sometimes men were included in the party. Joel Osborn wrote on May 29, 1867, that he “went to [the] Sewing Society.” Presumably he was there for the fun and the food and not the stitching. The tea was no doubt accompanied by some form of des- sert: cake, pie, cookies, or pudding.
In the booklet Choice Recipes 1916 published by the Ladies Social Circle of the Congregational Church in Oxford, a member of Mary’s family, Mrs. E. B. Harger (Olive), submitted recipes for suet pudding, Indian pudding, chocolate cream cake and lemon pie. Mary must have known those sweets well, perhaps too well, for her diary mentions several no doubt unpleasant trips to the dentist for extractions and fillings!
Throughout the year, the Oxford Historical Society hosts informational programs about local and state history such as our most recent presentation by Dottie De- Bisschop featuring the evolution of Oxford’s schools. Following the talk, there is always food, perhaps cider to drink and cake or cookies to munch while renewing friendships, asking questions and simply relaxing and having fun. Today we call it “having refreshments,” but its purpose and pleasure are exactly the same as the sociable of Mary Harger’s time.
The cookies from the recipe below were served following the OHS November annual meeting. It dates from the 1980s or 90s. (Cream cheese was invented in 1872, chocolate chips in 1937.) We offer it here for readers to bake and enjoy as they continue the heritage of “the sociable” with family and friends.
ORANGE CREAM CHIPS
- 2 ¼ cups sifted flour ½ tsp. salt
- 1 cup vegetable shortening 1 cup sugar
- 3 oz. cream cheese, softened 2 eggs
- 2 tsp. orange juice 1 tsp. grated orange rind
- 6 oz. semisweet chocolate chips
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease cookie sheets or use silicone pads.
- Sift flour and salt on to waxed paper. Beat sugar, shortening and cream cheese until mixed. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Add juice and rind. Blend in flour mixture. Stir in chocolate chips. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls 2 inches apart on prepared cookie sheets.
- Bake at 350 degrees for 8 minutes. Cool on racks.
- Spread with the following
ICING:
- Gradually beat 2 cups sifted confectionary sugar into 3oz. softened cream cheese until blended. Stir in 1 tsp. orange juice and 1 tsp. grated orange rind. Frost cookies.
These cookies freeze well.