It only took me about four years, but I finally visited the Rockingham Meeting House – a National Historic Landmark. Construction began in 1787, completed by 1801. It is the oldest public meeting house in Vermont with such a high level of historic integrity. Meetings were held in this building until 1869, after which the building was neglected and vandalized until 1906, when local residents were concerned with its fate and took up its restoration. Today the building hosts weddings and special events, but remains unheated and un-electrified. You can visit in the summer months, from 10am-4pm. It’s quite the impressive building.
Rockingham Meeting House.
From the hill.
The drive up to the meeting house.
Foliage made the site even more beautiful
From the other drive. It’s hard to get a photographs of the front of the meeting house because it sits on a hill.
Front entrance.
Clapboard, rosehead nails, small panes of glass.
Looking through the window.
Edge of the cemetery.
Looking back to the meeting house.
Cemetery.
A National Historic Landmark.
In the cemetery.
Next visit, I’ll get there in time to go inside! And, when the federal government gets beyond this shutdown, you can the read the National Historic Landmark nomination and see photographs here.
Preservation in Pink 
I love historic places, especially the buildings/homes. I enjoy the architectural restorations… I like to imagine what life was like during those times; observing all the inanimate objects along the way. Nice pictures!
Thank you, Bobbi. I imagine in those buildings it was often cold. But beautiful!
thanks especially for the pictures. I’d read about it, but not seen really what it looks like.
Glad to share. š
In the cemetery behind the meetinghouse is a headstone with the epitaph: “I told you I was sick.”
Oh that’s funny. And it would be a good photograph! I’ll look for it next time.
This is a beautiful post. May I ask what denomination, if any, the Meeting House is associated with? Here in Ireland, the term ‘Meeting House’ is very much aligned with the Quaker tradition.
Like most (or all?) of Vermont’s early meeting houses, it was Congregational. It only served as a church until 1839.
Thanks!