“Passport to Manchester” taking shape in the hands of local craftsman

Former Riverfolk president and current board member Jim Horton is hard at work on the “Passport to Manchester” project.

Riverfolk and the Manchester Area Historical Society will be presenting eight live events over the course of 2021, and these physical passports will allow you to collect a record of each event as it occurs. As you can see, these handmade passports will be treasured keepsakes in their own right, and a perfect complement to the memories you will make when attending the event series over the course of the summer. (You can read our full coverage of the passports here.)

Horton, a lifelong resident of southeast Michigan, is an internationally renowned artist and printmaker. Each passport will have been letterpress printed and hand assembled by him in his studio on Waters Road. Each page will have a pocket for storing a keepsake from each event, as well as the space for a custom hand-stamp to be applied.

“Passports” may be obtained via Eventbrite and links will be provided for each event to help limit crowd size at events. All events are planned in four-hour blocks, from 10 am to 2 pm on Saturdays.

The proposed schedule of events:

• June 12,  “19th Century Industries and living in East Main Street Homes” at the Village of Manchester
• June 26, “The Role of Water Power Industries and the Underground Railroad” at Sharon Mills County Park
• July 10, “19th Century homes on West Main” will be centered upon Wurster Park with a presentation on founder John Gilbert’s vision of a “village green”
• TBD, An agri-tour featuring the development of rural agriculture around Manchester, will feature the Gary Bross Farm in Sharon Township and Earl Horning Farm in Freedom Township
• August 14, “Native American Settlements in Manchester” will be hosted by Wayne and Julie Oliver at River Bend Gardens at the north edge of the village
• August 28, “Ford Village Industries” will be feature Henry Ford’s Conversion of Historic Water-Powered Mills to Industrial Production at both the Manchester Village Hall and Sharon Mills
• September 11, Farm Tour hosted by Manchester Blooms on Bethel Church Road
• September 25, Alber Orchard and Cider Mill will wind up the activities

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by Fritz Swanson

Fritz Swanson has written for The Believer, the Christian Science Monitor, Print Magazine, McSweeney's, Esopus, LSA Magazine, and The Mid-American Review. He serves as a trustee on the Manchester District Library Board. He's the designer and publisher of The Manchester Mirror.

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