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About the Museum | What People are Saying | History of the Building Who We Are About the Museum
The first floor of the Mariposa Museum features an entrance gallery with small museum shop, the beginning of our interactive exhibit, and an adjoining resource library and workshop space. The second floor contains our main gallery, performance space and “hands-on” costume and puppet/marionette alcoves. The third floor loft contains our gallery and “hands-on” musical instrument collection. Hopefully each visitor will find at least one artifact celebrating his/her heritage. For our regional exhibitions we also invite members of the community to share their stories or loan artifacts that bring added richness to our own offerings. Interactive exhibits, both rotating and permanent, showcase the creativity of people across cultures through folk arts, folk traditions, and story telling. Performance space encourages sharing cultural legacies such as folkdance, music and rhythm, oral tradition. The Mariposa is fully handicap accessible. It is non-profit 501C-3 and governed by a board of directors. The film club at Club Cannon / Creating Positive Change created this documentary about Mariposa during "Peoples of the North" (winter 2009-10). We thank them and the director of CPC, Sam Lafortune, for their wonderful work.
What People Are Saying Listen to Nancy Drogy, a teacher at the Temple Elementary School, talk about the importance of Mariposa to her and her students, at this link: http://www.nhpr.org/node/25779. From an e-mail received in May, 2010: "We were there yesterday with our kids and they absolutely loved it! My 11 year old said it was 'the best museum I have ever been to'. This means a lot, since she has seen the Neue Pinakothek and the Deutsches Museum in Munich, among others. Nice to know you bested them, right?" 40 people attended a performance by the Apple Hill String Quartet at Mariposa on June 13, 2010. Emily Carr, secretary of the Apple Hill Board of Trustees, wrote: "The concert on Sunday was a wonderful experience for those who attended. The music was outstanding, the amazing Mariposa provided a lovely setting (both the displays and acoustics). Equally important is the similarity of missions for Apple Hill and the Mariposa — peace in our world through understanding, working with and respecting other cultures." Holly Bull of Princeton, NJ visited with her daughter. On September 6, 2010, she wrote: "I wish Princeton had something like this that was so accessible to families, especially children. Lia was excited about her two visits there and described them to others in detail." Mia Manning-Osborne, a board member, a teacher for 9 years at the Peterborough Elementary School and now an adjunct professor at Keene State College, says: "For so many of the children in this area, it [a visit to the museum] is the only way they can experience a different culture." "Four years ago, my family and I moved to the Monadnock area. We had little money for any extras, so it was a gift when we discovered First Fridays at the Mariposa. We could explore the museum, indulge in tasty treats, make new friends and enjoy a variety of entertainment—all for free! The Mariposa is a gem." J.M. of Temple, NH, fall 2009 "As a totally blind person I have discovered that many museums and cultural institution programs are not very accessible. With delight, I encountered Ms. Terry Reeves who enthusiastically provided information as well as hands on access to many exhibit pieces." J. Roger Cicchese of Weymouth, MA. July 21, 2009 A Congolese visitor was astonished to find Kuba cloth in our Africa exhibit in the spring of 2009. She is from the Kuba people and never expected to find her culture recognized and honored in Peterborough. History of the Mariposa Museum Building From Baptist Church to Mariposa
The new building was constructed at 26 Main Street. The street level was designed to be a commercial rental space and was completed in 1841. The rental income enabled this working class congregation to build the upper level sanctuary, which was completed and dedicated in 1842. The Church flourished and was particularly successful in its Sunday school, which numbered over 100. The Church also provided leadership in the temperance movement and the abolitionist movement. The makeup of the mill workers changed as immigrant workers began to outnumber the New England workers. These immigrants had their own faith community, which was rooted in the Catholicism of their Old World homelands. By 1926 the congregation had become too small to maintain a pastor or services, so current members migrated elsewhere, primarily with the Methodist congregation. Some of the records of the Baptist Church are kept at the Peterborough Historical Society. The building itself continued on as an important retail space for the village. It provided easy shopping for scores of mill workers, who lived and worked in or near the village center. Through the years the first floor housed a harness shop, a barber shop, a shoe store, a dress shop and an electronics store. In 1952 Henry Lord donated funds to remodel the upper floor to serve as a center for Boy and Girl Scouts. This upper floor space later housed an art gallery and Ray Lyn ballet school. Ted Leach also used the upper space for the Monadnock Ledger. In 1986 he sold the newspaper but kept the building, which he lovingly transformed into the New England Marionette Theater. A fire on January 1, 1999 destroyed the Theater interior but not building’s outer structure. Downtown 2000 was formed and through their efforts and the support of the community the building was saved from demolition. On January 1st, 2001, David Blair and Linda Marsella bought the building and formed the not-for-profit Journeys in Education—Mariposa Museum. They rebuilt the entire interior but preserved all of the historic features of the exterior of the Baptist Church building. The Mariposa Museum opened its doors on July 1st 2002. other cultures, the world will know more peace and less war. 
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