MIDDLETOWN – Township officials are getting into the holiday spirit early this year with a Christmas celebration that will offer the usual holiday cheer, while bringing to life a historic part of the township’s 350-year history.
On Dec. 5 and 6, the Poricy Park Conservancy, located at 345 Oak Hill Rd., will serve as the host to its Colonial Christmas Celebration at the Historic Murray Farmhouse from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.
The fee is $5 per person, $20 per family.
“This is the first time we are doing the colonial Christmas in many years,” said Elaine Hinckley, president of the Poricy Park Conservancy Board of Trustees. “It was sort of pushed aside for many years.”
“We’ve been talking about this since March. We used to do photos with Santa the weekend after Thanksgiving and then the trustees felt that a lot of people would be away and couldn’t help out, so we moved it a week … and one of our new trustees thought that we should have a Colonial Christmas and feature the farmhouse so that is what we are trying to do.”
According to Hinckley, the Colonial Christmas Celebration features a number of activities for every member of the family to enjoy – including a hayride, a petting zoo and “A Colonial Christmas Story.”
“Visitors will go from the present to the past,” she said. “There’s a colonial garden that has been put to bed for the winter, we’re going to have a petting zoo with farm animals that would’ve been around at the time.”
According to Hinckley, a guided tour of the farmhouse will provide visitors with an insight into how individuals celebrated the holidays during the 1700s.
“[Holiday’s] were very simple,” she said. “They traveled to family, they feasted, they had some special treats and they went to church, but [an interesting thing] is that we are a middle colony.
“In New England, it was illegal to celebrate Christmas, and in Virginia they went bananas, so we were sort of a bridge between the two.”
Hinckley said “The Colonial Christmas Story” of Joseph Murray, which celebrates Christmas with his children in the 1700s, will be reenacted by deputy mayor, Stephen Massell, and his family.
“We have a narrator telling ‘A Colonial Christmas Story’ and he will be pantomiming it with what the Irish did in the 1700s [such as] decorating the house with ivy and holly, putting candles in the window … the children putting shoes in front of the fireplace, hoping to get treats in the morning,” Hinckley said.
“Also we’re hoping to have some singers in the barn, singing carols of the time. In fact, they’ll end with “Joy to the World,” which was written around the time of Joseph Murray.”
Hinckley said Poricy and its trustees love focusing on community events and getting people to come out and are happy they can highlight an “unsung hero” of the township.
“Joseph Murray is sort of an unsung hero,” Hinckley said. “He was a spy and … used to go out to where the lighthouse was on Sandy Hook and spy on the British ships that were coming into the harbor and reported back to George Washington through other officers.
“One day he was asked to commandeer some horses for Washington’s army so he stole [one of his neighbor’s horses] up from Marlpit Hall and [Edward] Taylor, who was under house arrest at the time, caught him and recognized him.”
According to Hinckley, the decision to steal his neighbor’s horses would ultimately led to Murray’s death, but she said that history has helped to shape Middletown to be the township it is.
“We have a lot of connections in Middletown and the Murray’s are more like a founding revolutionary family,” she said.
According to Hinckley, the Colonial Christmas celebration is made possible with the support of sponsors such as Edward Jones; Pool World of Middletown; URAS Monuments of Middletown; and Thornberry’s Appliance and TV of Middletown.
Children can visit and have their photo taken with Santa in the nature center from noon to 4 p.m. on Dec. 5 and 6. The fee is $9 per child; families can include additional children for $2 each.
“We’re running against a lot of events that weekend so I hope we get somewhat of a turnout, but we are excited and looking forward to seeing everyone come out,” Hinckley said.