Historic artifacts at Monroe book launch luncheon Jan. 7

Historic artifacts at Monroe Through Time II luncheon Jan. 7

A trove of Colonial-era artifacts uncovered with metal detectors by Monroe native son George Lattanzi goes on display Jan. 7 (Sunday) when a new paperback called “Monroe Through Time II” is launched with a luncheon at the Edith Wheeler Memorial Library.

Tickets for the launch at the library (733 Monroe Turnpike, Route 111) are $35 and cover a copy of the book and lunch. They can be obtained at the library and at the office of the town clerk at Town Hall. They are also available through Marven Moss at mmoss36@yahoo.com and 203.268.2961.

Proceeds go to the nonprofit Monroe Historical Society (est. 1959), dedicated to preserving Monroe’s heritage.

The luncheon (noon to 2 p.m.) also premieres a documentary video: “The Lost Cave of Monroe,” produced by Mike Sandone, described in the book as “Monroe’s Indiana Jones.”

Lattanzi’s finds—on excursions where he is generally accompanied by his son Jake, 9—reflect daily life in the Monroe from Colonial times up to the late 1800s. They were unearthed at locations that remain undisclosed to prevent souvenir-hunters from disturbing the grounds until the plots have been thoroughly scoured and the discoveries conserved.

A child’s shoe buckle from the 1700s is part of the collection. So is a button from a uniform of a Connecticut regiment in the War of 1812. And a toy train car.

Monroe Through Time II (Fonthill Media/Arcadia Publishing, 112 pages, illustrated) is a reprise, the second collaboration by Kevin Daly, John Babina and Marven Moss, availing themselves of the resources of the Monroe Historical Society and the World Wide Web. Daly provided the essential research, Babina, the contemporary photography, and Moss, the authorship. But they also worked individually and collectively across the full matrix of the manuscript.

Their book is the fourth pictorial account of Monroe’s transformation from a Colonial farming village into a charming New England community offering a bucolic lifestyle with proximity to the upbeat rhythms of today’s bigger cities and their spheres of commerce and global culture.

The publication follows Monroe Through Time (also Fonthill Media, 96 pages, $22.99) and Images of America: Monroe (Arcadia Publishing, 1998, 126 pages, $19.99), also A Glimpse of Old Monroe (Monroe Sesquicentennial Commission, 1974, 118 pages, out-of-print).

In a new collection tapping Monroe’s rich historical fabric, Monroe Through Time II presents a number of previously-unpublished photographs, the legacy of the marvelous vitality of Frederick P. Sherman, and traces the hardscrabble life of the homesteaders, the tradesmen in their shops, the entrepreneurs of bygone days, the talented figures in arts and sports and even the fumes of scandal.

Like its predecessor, the cover reproduces a segment of a David Merrill acrylic, this one depicting the Town Green and the old Town Hall erected in 1897 and the old library, both demolished in 1972. The artwork was made available courtesy of Merrill who used to play touch football on the Town Green in the 1950s and impishly inserted a football into the foreground of his rendering. The original hangs in the Town Hall.