Special Projects

The HVHS works to bring history alive within the Hopewell Valley community through special projects, community outreach programs, and participation in community events.

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History Projects

Active special projects to collect and communicate local history within the community.

• Historic Interpretive Signage - Work with community groups to post historically appropriate signage at historic sites. Five signs have been erected so far; these have been professionally designed and have considerable historical content (example).
  
• House Lineage Project - Investigate linage of local buildings and house plaques with historic names and dates.
  
• Oral History - Ongoing project to interview long time residents to record their memories of life in Hopewell Valley. Also transcribing some 50 older interviews back to 1975 (see below).

Historic Signage at Hart's Corner Schoolhouse

House Lineage plaque at the Stout home (now the Hopewell Museum)

Community Outreach

The HVHS participates in a variety of community events and has ongoing projects to bring history to the community.

• Educational Outreach - Work with the local schools to provide curriculum information and guest speakers on requested topics.
• High School Scholarship Program - Annually award a scholarship (currently $750) to a Hopewell Valley High School students who have demonstrated an interest in history.
• Hopewell Heritage Weekend - Special events, concerts, lectures, and historic reenactments for a full weekend celebrating the history, heritage, and community of the Hopewell Valley. Labor Day weekend.

• Hopewell Harvest Fair - For over thirty years, this annual event brings together thousands of people from the Hopewell Valley for a day of fun, family, and entertainment. September.
• Pennington Day - Annual Pennington Borough street fair with local businesses, artisans, and non-profits. 3rd Saturday in May.

Hopewell Harvest Fair '19

Reenactors at Hopewell Valley Heritage Weekend

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About the Oral History Project

The Hopewell Valley Historical Society was begun in 1975. By 1977 several its members began recording oral histories from longtime area residents on cassette tape. In 2003 Noel Goeke began his term as the society’s president and had the old recordings remastered onto fresh cassette tapes and later transcribed.  Intrigued by the fascinating details and stories captured in these histories, he and other society volunteers restarted the HVHS Oral History Project.

Currently there are over 50 oral histories in our collection. Printed transcripts of these interviews can currently be accessed and read on Thursday afternoons between 1:00 and 5:00 PM in the Hopewell Branch of the Mercer County Library System. This is located next to the Hopewell Valley Central High School at 245 Pennington-Titusville Road. If you would like to visit, or know more, please send an e-mail to hvhswebsite@gmail.com or leave a message at the reference desk of the library.    

The HVHS is now performing new interviews to add to our collection. These are recorded digitally, and then transcribed into text transcripts. In addition, we are beginning to transfer previous interviews done on cassette tapes into digital files. The printed transcripts, along with photos and other miscellaneous materials pertaining to the person interviewed, are stored alphabetically in acid free folders within archival boxes.

The intent is to share these voices more fully, both online and through other organizations, such as the Pennington Borough Library or the Hopewell Public Library.

Volunteers in the HVHS Oral History Project will continue to preserve precious, colorful memories of people who have lived in the Hopewell Valley long enough remember it “when.”