On Thursday, March 21, the Greenfield Historical Society will celebrate the launch of its long-awaited book, “In the Shadow of Crotched Mountain: Revealing Greenfield’s Colorful Characters, Past and Present” with a New Hampshire Humanities Program featuring storyteller Rebecca Rule.

Rule will speak at 7 p.m. at Stephenson Library in Greenfield, and members of the Historical Society will be on hand to sign and sell copies of the book. The performance is free and open to the public.

Rule is the perfect storyteller to celebrate GHS’ new book, as she has made an art form of finding the humor in small-town New England life. One of her funniest books is "Moved and Seconded: Town Meeting in NH, Past, Present and Future.” For anyone who has ever sat through a three-hour Town Meeting (you just pray it’s not the year we have to buy a fire truck) you know that a sense of humor, as well as patience, is a requirement for getting through the purest form of democracy in the world.

“In the Shadow of Crotched Mountain” is the follow-up to the Greenfield Historical Society’s original history of Greenfield, “Greenfield: The Story of a Town,” published in 1972 and written by Dolores Hopkins. Lenny Cornwell, longtime president of GHS and a source of encyclopedic knowledge about  all things Greenfield, said the group had been talking about doing a  book to follow up the Hopkins book for years. 

After GHS board member Amy Lowell wrote a grant to fund the project, writing and research began in earnest. Thanks to Lowell’s efforts, GHS was awarded a Louise Whitney Foundation Community Preservation Grant for the project. GHS also raised money from the membership and took part in NH Gives. 

The book is part of the celebration of the 50th year of the Greenfield Historical Society.

GHS President Bruce Dodge said that originally, the GHS board had thought about re-publishing and updating the “The Story of a Town,” but the process of converting the book to digital proved extremely time-consuming and challenging.

“So then we started to think we should do a book that was not so text-heavy, to add color photos and illustrations, and try to make it more accessible and more reader-friendly. We also wanted to keep the voice of the writer in each story, and to keep the stories really focused on people. Ultimately, we would like to write a series of books; now that we’ve done people, we would like to keep going with books about Greenfield’s houses, businesses and recreation, keeping the format of smaller bites and sharper focus.” 

Cornwell said the group started by making a list of town legends and notable residents.

“We wanted to find some intriguing, ‘can't set the book down’ characters. I grew up in town and since my folks had a farm and did contract farming as well running a  truck and loader business, we met a lot of people in town from all walks of life. There was a lot of great material,” Cornwell said. 

“Shadow” was a group effort, with GHS volunteers putting in hundreds of hours researching, writing and copy-editing. Dale Russell, Amy Lowell and Bruce and Linda Dodge did the bulk of the organization, and Adele Hale, Sylvia Shea, Alan Easton and Cornwell submitted personal photos, wrote and contributed ideas. The result is a book that is hard to put down, especially for anyone who has spent any time in Greenfield. Even lifelong residents will probably learn some new stories, and  everyone in town will recognize names, places  and stories. 

“It has been amazing watching and listening to the progress over the past two plus years. It was difficult choosing who to write about, as there are many interesting folks who have made Greenfield their home at least part of their lives. My favorite sections are on the ‘old timers’ as they are often referred to, the true grit of Greenfield,” said Hale, whose family has been in Greenfield for many generations

Bruce Dodge said people may be surprised  to see the chapter about “Bad Will Gray” as a comic book, which he wrote and illustrated. 

“I think some of the stories will really surprise people,” Dodge said. 

Cornwell had his own surprise when he finally got to see the final book in print. 

“I was stunned to see it was dedicated to me,” he said. 

For information about the Greenfield Historical Society, please go to greenfieldnhhistoricalsociety.com.