One very interesting donation that the Historical Society received this year was a “six-board chest.” This good-sized wooden chest is -have you guessed it? – made of exactly six boards – top, bottom, front, back and ends. The chest is 44″x 20″x 18″, so we know a good-sized tree must have been involved.
Written on the inside of the chest is the date and place it was made, Rochester, 1750. The chest was rescued from a home that was in the process of being demolished. A contractor was about to crush it and send it off to a landfill.
Robert Phillips saved it and after seeing the writing on the inside, he contacted us at the Rochester Historical Society, and it was delivered to the Museum in June. We don’t know a lot about it, but we know it was owned by Branch Barrows, born August 25, 1774. He married Rebecca Clark on Thursday, June 17, 1802. As I said, “we don’t know much,” but we do know that Branch always kept his Sunday clothes in the chest and now the chest is back in Rochester.
