Quaker Hill / A Sociological Study

by Warren H. Wilson

The characteristic pleasures of the community, as a whole, are few. There is a group of women of leisure, of course, devoted to bridge-whist, who come in the summer and do not go far from the Hotel. Young men go hunting, and a few grown men are fond of fishing. The typical person provides himself with no pleasures outside of his family and home. Men and women are too busy to play, and the Quakers educated themselves out of a playful mind.

There are a few pleasures which are native and general. One of these is public assembly, with an entertaining speaker as a central pleasure. Quaker Hill audiences are alert and keen hearers, and indulgent critics of a public speaker. There are only two other forms of public entertainment more pleasing to them. The first is a dramatic presentation. Many of the Quakers are excellent actors, and the Irish are quite their equals, while the other newcomers are equally appreciative. The Christmas play in Akin Hall is a great annual event, assembling all the people on the Hill of all classes and groups, for it embodies very many of the appeals to characteristic pleasure. Only one other attraction is more generally responded to; I refer to a dinner. Something good to eat, in common with one's neighbors, in a place hallowed by historic associations, under religious auspices—here you have the call that brings Quaker Hill all together. On such a day there will be none left behind.

Of all these sorts is the attraction the Quaker Hill Conference has for the people of the neighborhood. It is a universal appeal to the capacity for pleasure in the community. It presents famous and eloquent speakers through the days of the week. Matters of religion, farming, morals, literature, are discussed, by men of taste and culture; and the closing day is Quaker Hill Day. On this day, after an assembly in the old Oblong Meeting House, erected in 1764, at which the neighborhood has listened to papers descriptive of the past of the Hill, all adjourn for a generous dinner under the trees of Akin Hall, or latterly under a tent beside the Meeting House, partaken of by four hundred people, of all groups and classes, and followed by brisk, happy speeches by visitors present. This, after almost two centuries of keen interest in the question of amusements, is the last and most perfect expression of the capacity for amusement in the community.

OBLONG MEETING HOUSE

MEMORIAL STONE

Of active pleasure-taking, Quaker Hill, purely considered, is incapable.

It should be said that the Roman Catholic Church in Pawling provides its people with a yearly feast, parallel with the Conference, which was for years held in a grove on the borders of Quaker Hill.

Traits of character which are general or even common among Quaker Hill people are worthy of mention under the heads of regular industry, frugality, cleanliness, temperance, chastity, honesty as to property, and compassion.