The next morning they walked into town together. It was three miles from their property to town hall, and gas was too expensive to waste.
The building that housed both town hall and the public library was a sturdy brick structure from the 1920s, with a flag out front and a brass plaque by the door. Adeline and Silas walked in immediately self-conscious about their worn clothes and the unmistakable look of people living too close to the edge.
A young librarian at the desk glanced up.
“Can I help you?”
“Yes,” Adeline said. “We’re looking for historical records about Riverside, specifically from 1847.”
The librarian’s expression shifted from polite to interested.
“Eighteen forty-seven? That’s very early for this area. Most of our archived material starts in the 1870s, after the town was formally incorporated. But we do have some older items in the historical collection.”
She led them to a back room where the older materials were stored in climate-controlled cabinets.
“What exactly are you looking for?”
“We’re trying to identify someone with the initials JW,” Silas said. “Someone who might have built one of the first structures in the area.”
The librarian pulled several document boxes and old folders from the shelves and set them on a table.
“You’re welcome to look through these. Let me know if you need anything else.”
As soon as she left, Adeline and Silas got to work. There were maps, early letters, surveyor notes, bills of sale, and fragments of records from Riverside’s founding years.
They searched for two hours and found nothing.
Silas was about to suggest they take a break when Adeline gasped.
“Silas. Look.”
She held up a letter dated 1846, written in careful brown ink on yellowed paper. At the bottom, clear as day, was the signature.
Josiah Whitmore.
“Josiah Whitmore,” Adeline read aloud. “JW.”
The letter was addressed to someone in Boston and described Whitmore’s plan to establish a settlement in Vermont near a river crossing used by trappers and traders. He wrote about clearing land, building a temporary structure to serve as both shelter and trading post, and his vision for a town that would grow around that central point.
“This is him,” Silas said, reading over her shoulder. “Josiah Whitmore founded Riverside.”
They kept searching and found more references to Whitmore in other documents. He had come to Vermont in 1846, purchased a large tract of land from the state, and built the first permanent structure in what would become Riverside. He had operated a trading post and served as an informal postmaster, turning his small building into the center of early settlement activity.
Leave a Comment