Ames Family Reunion to Take Place at Stonehill

June 10, 2009

More than 100 descendants of the industrialist Oliver Ames (1779-1863) will arrive on the Stonehill campus for a weekend reunion beginning June 19, strengthening the ties that exist between the College and the Ames family.

Family members will travel from Australia, California, Colorado and throughout New England to dine at Alumni Hall, sleep in campus residences, tour historic sites in North Easton and learn more about the impact of their family business through the Stonehill Industrial History Collections (SIHC), which houses the Ames shovel company archives.

"There's a really strong bond between the family and the College," explained Gregory Galer, curator of the SIHC. "The goal of the reunion is to bring people back and keep them connected."

Oliver Ames founded his world-famous shovel company in North Easton in 1803. A century later, his great grandson, Frederick Lothrop Ames (1876-1921), built the mansion and 600-acre estate that would become Stonehill College.

Ames family members reunited at Stonehill for the first time in 1988 and again in 1998. Returning guests this year will make note of physical changes to the College campus - including the brick pedestrian walkway, W.B. Mason Stadium and the new Science Center--along with notable improvements to the industrial history collection.

In 1973, about 20 years after the shovel company ceased operations in North Easton, the property's new owner, Arnold B. Tofias, gave Stonehill the shovels and records that he discovered in the attic of a company office building.

The collection, which has grown to include donations of other Ames family business and personal artifacts, is part of the Stonehill Industrial History Collections. Housed at Cushing-Martin Hall, it occupies three floors with its own conservation lab and gallery.

The SIHC has more than 10,000 visitors a year, said Galer. Stonehill students studying history, American studies, chemistry, economics, business and education also make use of it.

A recent $60,000 federal grant from the Institute for Museum and Library Services has allowed the SIHC to hire a conservator who is photographing, repairing, analyzing and cataloging all 750 Ames shovels in the collection, Galer said.

Other floors house manuscripts and documents, including a business ledger and account book kept by Oliver Ames' father, John Ames, at his blacksmith shop in nearby West Bridgewater in 1794.

The SIHC will figure prominently in the reunion because Ames family members wanted "an intellectual context" to the weekend, Galer said. "They wanted to learn more about their history."

Maury Klein, professor emeritus at the University of Rhode Island, will speak on Saturday, June 20, about the railroad investments of the Ames family and particularly about Oliver Ames' son, Oakes Ames, who helped secure financing for the Union Pacific Railroad at the request of President Abraham Lincoln.

Later, as a Congressman representing Massachusetts, Oakes Ames found himself embroiled in the Credit Mobilier Construction Co. scandal, which Klein will discuss in its historic context, Galer said.

Bill Ames of Easton, who is coordinating the reunion with Galer, remembered how his father, David Ames Sr., once served on the both Stonehill's Board of Trustees and Board of Advisors. A financial adviser to former College President Bartley MacPhaidin, C.S.C., David Ames helped the College establish its endowment and, in 1978, assisted generously in the transfer of the Clock Farm on Route 138 to Stonehill. (David Ames is pictured left receiving an honorary degree from Fr. MacPhaidin.)

"The family has always enjoyed a very strong sense of bond with Stonehill College," said Bill Ames. "It stems from our origin of place and obviously is strengthened now with the shovel company archives being there. It's been a great relationship."

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