We know how hard it is to get through a New Hampshire winter even with all the modern conveniences. How did the people who inhabited these lands before English colonists arrived live and survive through our changing seasons?
Join the Chocorua Lake Conservancy for “Algonquian Lifeways in the Lakes Region,” a talk and slideshow by historian and anthropologist Mary Ellen Lepionka at the Cook Memorial Library in Tamworth Village. How did Abenaki people use the land and resources around Chocorua, Ossipee, and Winnipesaukee to make their living? Who were the people, how were they organized and led, and what was their life like day to day and season to season? Mary Ellen Lepionka will discuss these questions and more as she explores the history of Native Americans in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire. Mary Ellen’s presentation in Tamworth last fall was standing room only. We’re excited to have her come back!
Before Mary Ellen’s talk we’ll enjoy a brief performance of “Life at Chocorua Lake,” a crankie drawn, painted and scripted by Brett School 3rd and 6th graders as part of a STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art & math) project that began with a collaborative field trip to Chocorua Lake led by Dexter Harding of Tin Mountain Conservation Center, Lynne Flaccus of the Chocorua Lake Conservancy, and the Brett School art and science teachers.
Mary Ellen Lepionka of Gloucester, Massachusetts, is an independent scholar researching the history of Cape Ann and northern New England from the last Ice Age to around 1700 for a book on the subject. She is a retired college instructor of anthropology and history, textbook developer, author, and publisher with a Master’s in anthropology from Boston University and postgraduate (ABD) work at the University of British Columbia. Mary Ellen has participated in salvage archaeology in Ipswich, MA, excavated an Iron Age Bantu refuge site in Botswana, and conducted fieldwork in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. She is a trustee of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society and co-chair of the Gloucester Historical Commission.
Image courtesy of Mary Ellen Lepionka.