Historical Society volunteers restore a valuable piece of local history

TEMPLETON — Just about every New England village and town was touched by the Civil War. Historical statues and memorials are centerpieces for town greens and commons.

Weary from war and its horrors, Capt. Varanus P. Parkhurst of Company 1, 25th Massachusetts Regiment, returned to Templeton and built the Grand Army of the Republic Hall on Patriots Road.

To remember the sacrifices of the men he was proud to call "brothers," Parkhurst installed two ornate frames with four granite memorial tablets in the GAR Hall.

In the early 1970s, the hall was demolished. The granite tablets were mounted in the carriage shed attached to the main building of the Narragansett Historical Society at 1 Boynton Road, where they remain to this day. The frames ended up in the barn of a man named Ralph Henshaw, a custodian for the Historical Society.

After nearly 50 years languishing in the barn, those newly restored frames will have a new place of honor at the Society's headquarters where they will shelter the memorial tablets.

As the GAR Hall was being torn down, then-Society president Col. Edwin Tucker halted demolition once the main wall was taken down and had those frames removed safely since they were too large to move down the stairways.

In 2016, Henshaw told Society Director Brian Tanguay about the barn's sorry state: it was in imminent danger of collapse.

Once he saw the frames' intricate woodwork and massive size, Tanguay wondered if they had been a part of the altar of the Trinitarian Church. At the time, Henshaw was unsure where they had come from since they had been in the barn for about 50 years. The double insert spaces in each frame raised questions about their use, but it was soon determined that their function was to hold the four granite memorial slabs in place.

John Manca volunteered to place the frames in one of his empty box trucks at Aspen Trucking until they could be brought to their final home in the Grange Hall, the informal name of the Society's headquarters.

To achieve that task, Tanguay and woodworker Michael Matuszewski came up with a plan in 2017 to cut a slot in the second floor of the Grange Hall between two windows and slide in the frames, using a sling and a lift run by the Bill Harris Co.

“Together with eight other volunteers, the plan worked, and about two hours after the frames were delivered they were safely laid on the stage of the Grange Hall,” said Tanguay in an email.

Alan Cyganiewicz of Gardner, a master woodworker and a vintage furniture restoration expert, was called in to preserve the frames and oversee their safe installation. Cyganiewicz traced and cut out two panels matching the void above where each pair of granite slabs would be located within the frames.

“To this day, we have no images of what filled that area, but a sliver of an image that hinted it might be a regiment flag, probably in canvas,” said Tanguay.

Over the next three years, Tanguay took the panels to several artists to find someone who was willing to paint them. But as time went by, interest dwindled. Just before all hope seemed lost, Tanguay met Sonja Vaccari, a mural artist from Royalston.

“When (Vaccari) was introduced to this story, she immediately volunteered to help,” Tanguay said.

Within two weeks, Vaccari had applied the finishing touches. The frames are now ready to be mounted on the stage wall, which will happen sometime in the next few weeks. Then the granite memorial slabs will be inserted back where they were originally installed back in 1880.

"I have many ancestors who were in the American Revolution and the Civil War. I respected what Tanguay was attempting to do and knew that I had the ability and the time to help him achieve his goal of restoring the memorials. Painting the eagle panels was just a portion of the project," clarified Vaccari in an email to The Gardner News.

According to her, the one-week process was done "methodically," which includes using gesso during the preparation process, sketching out the eagles and painting them.

The public will be able to get a glimpse of the frames and tablets once the Grange Hall is reopened in 2023.

Tanguay expressed his gratitude for all the help the Society has received.

“We are so thankful to all of those who came out and lent a hand in moving, storing, restoring and painting this important memorial to the men who gave their lives during the Civil War,” said Tanguay.

This article originally appeared on Gardner News: Restoration of frames for Templeton Civil War tribute nearly finished