A Dorchester Historical Society (DHS) event this week will help preserve a big piece of Dorchester’s history. The group wants to save and preserve the Clapp Family Barn, and on Friday night, a nationally prominent “candidate” for President will come to Dorchester to help the cause.
The candidate is actually comedian Jimmy Tingle, and he’s not actually running for the White House; instead, he’s staging what is called “The Funniest Campaign in History,” using this year’s national campaign season as a reference point to bring some sharp satire and wonderful humor to the seemingly endless political campaign season. Tomorrow night, Tingle will bring his show to the IBEW Hall on Freeport Street, and the proceeds will help preserve one of only a few remaining barns in the entire city.
“The Dorchester Historical Society’s Clapp Family barn stands as a symbol of the town’s agricultural heritage,” states a DHS news release. “Dorchester’s farms supplied Boston’s appetites over a long history – perhaps most notably during the occupation of the city by British troops at the start of the Revolutionary War. In the next century, several of Dorchester’s landed gentlemen joined to form the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. One of them, Marshall Pinckney Wilder, furnished the original plantings for the Boston Public Garden from his personal greenhouse.
“The Clapp family’s story can be followed from the settlement of Dorchester in 1630 through the centuries, from subsistence farming to the development of extensive orchards made up of fruits that were hybridized on the estate. The barn, then, is a physical artifact from earlier times that serves to evoke history better than words can ever do.
“The Clapps developed land in the north of Dorchester on either side of Boston Street, the causeway street that led to Calf Pasture, now South Boston. Over the decades the Clapps farmed their own land, placed a grist mill on the South Bay powered by the action of the tide, developed a successful leather-tanning business, and later expanded to horticulture and the development of fine pears including the Clapp’s Favorite.
“The Clapps were not alone – their surviving barn serves simply as the remaining symbol that reminds us of all the other families who worked their fields and developed new varieties of edible and ornamental plants. Many well-known varieties were developed in Dorchester, including the Downer cherry, the Andres pear, Frederick Clapp pear, Harris pear and the President Wilder strawberry.”
“The Clapp Family Barn needs lots of work,” said DHS president Earl Taylor. “But for now our goal is to repair the roof in an effort to stabilize the structure and save the treasures it houses – the horse stalls, the hay loft, some early 19th century farm implements, the Clapp family horse-drawn trap, and many other wonderful examples of our agricultural heritage.”
It’s going to be a fun evening for a worthy cause. The event begins at 7 p.m. Tickets are $40 at the door, and the admission price includes hors d’oeuvres, raffles, and door prizes. For tickets in advance, call 1-866-811-4111. or visit ovationtix.com/trs/pr/44051.
