{"id":645,"date":"2015-06-07T07:53:48","date_gmt":"2015-06-07T12:53:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.historicbelmontbandstand.org\/?p=645"},"modified":"2015-06-24T08:38:45","modified_gmt":"2015-06-24T13:38:45","slug":"belmont-residents-celebrate-return-of-bandstand-nh-union-leader-6-07-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/?p=645","title":{"rendered":"Belmont residents celebrate return of bandstand (NH Union Leader – 6.07.15)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Abraham<\/a>

Abraham Lincoln, as portrayed by Canterbury’s Jim Miller, stands at the edge of the repaired and refurbished Belmont town bandstand Saturday night. (COURTESY)<\/p><\/div>\n

BELMONT \u2014 A man calling himself \u2014 and looking like \u2014 President Abraham Lincoln joined the 12th New Hampshire Regiment Serenade Band in celebrating the refurbished town bandstand, which is now open for a summer concert series, as it was more than a century ago.

\nThe Civil War-Era tribute band and Lincoln, who was played by Jim Miller of Canterbury, brought a historic feeling to the bandstand, which is now located a few feet from where it was built in 1908.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s nice to have the bandstand back,\u201d said Belmont Historical Society President Wallace Rhodes. \u201cWhat\u2019s really nice is the job they did restoring it. As far as we can tell, it looks exactly like it did when it was first built.\u201d

\nLocal bands, and one band in particular, the Belmont Cornet Band, used to play in the center of town on Saturday nights from 1889-1950, Rhodes said. But the tradition faded after 1950, and the bandstand fell into disrepair and was moved to another spot nearby, where it sat until the town began revitalization efforts downtown seven years ago.

\nThe restoration cost about $60,000, said the society\u2019s Linda Frawley. About $20,000 of that came from town funds, and the rest came through grants, such as the $15,000 grant received last week from the state’s Land and Community Heritage Investment Project.

\nThe project was completed last fall. On Saturday night, with perfect summer weather, about 80 residents brought lawn chairs and blankets to the town green. Rhodes and others, meanwhile, reviewed drawings of the Belmont and Upper Gilmanton \u201clads lost\u201d in the Civil War.

\nBoth towns lost their share of soldiers in the war, Frawley said.<\/p>\n

The bandstand was restored with help from numerous volunteers, and with donated help from Marsh Electric, restoration contractor J.R. Graton, and painter John Thompson. The restored bandstand was honored recently with the Elizabeth Durfee Hengen Award for outstanding preservation achievement from the New Hampshire Preservation Alliance.

\nIt was Saturday night in downtown Belmont, as it used to be.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople were listening from parked cars and their porches,\u201d Frawley said. \u201cJust like they used to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

The next concert will be on July 3 featuring a different lineup of musicians.
<\/p>\n

dseufert@newstote.com<\/em>&nbsp<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BELMONT \u2014 A man calling himself \u2014 and looking like \u2014 President Abraham Lincoln joined the 12th New Hampshire Regiment Serenade Band in celebrating the refurbished town bandstand, which is now open for a summer concert series, as it was more than a century ago. The Civil War-Era tribute band and Lincoln, who was played […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=645"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/645\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historicbelmontbandstand.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}