Old Home Week in Valatie, 1919

During the first two decades of the twentieth century, cities and towns all across America (and Canada) celebrated homecoming. At first called "Old Boys Week", such celebrations were designed to entice prodigal sons to return for reunion with kith, kin, and the old home town. Not wishing to exclude prodigal daughters, but hesitant to bandy the term "old" too loosely, most communities adopted the more neutral "Old Home Week" to describe their festivities.

Valatie's Old Home Week took place in September, 1919, bringing with it the added pleasure of celebrating the end of World War I. Among the activities were band concerts, parades, baseball games, special church services and fireworks. Some recall that the fireworks even included debates on controversial topics like women's suffrage. In the pages that follow, we are pleased to offer a gallery of photos from that joyful event. The Valatie Library is most grateful to Bill Neander for the loan of his photos and postcards from old Valatie. Watch this web site for future presentations from Bill's wonderful collection.

For those with an eye to detail, the banner at the top of these pages is a slightly modified rendition of the balcony of the United States Hotel, then in its glory days and all dressed up for Old Home Week. The original image was taken from one of the photos in this collection. See if you can spot it!

About the music: if your computer setup supports it, you are probably reading this page to the tune of "The Battle Song of Liberty", written in 1917.  Click here for the lyrics and more information.

And now, on with the show.