Weathervane Wednesday ~ A Horse vane owned by two famous US Generals

Weathervane Wednesday is an on-going series of photographs I post weekly.  I started by publishing weather vanes from the Londonderry area, but now I've been finding interesting weather vanes all across New England.  Sometimes my weather vanes are whimsical, or historical, but all are interesting. Often, my readers tip me off to some very unique and unusual weather vanes, too! If you know an interesting or historical weathervane, please let me know.  Today's weather vane is from Massachusetts.

Do you know the location of weather vane #177? Scroll down to the bottom to see the answer!

This running horse weather vane used to be installed above the horse barn at the Patton Homestead in Hamilton, Massachusetts.  This estate was was owned by the Patton family from 1928 to 2012, and was then sold to the Town of Hamilton.  The Patton family archives are in this building, as well as rooms full of Patton family memorabilia and military artifacts. 

In this photo the archivist Carol Mori was telling the visitors a funny story about the weather vane.  In the old days General George S. Patton (who became the famous Four Star General during World War II) would sit on the back veranda with his son, George S. Patton (who became the Major General George S. Patton of the Vietnam War).  They would take turns shooting at the weather vane with pistols, and would know who hit it when the horse spun around.  The caretaker would climb up, remove the horse, repair it, and re-install it above the horse barn.  The two Georges would repeat their target shooting all summer at the estate.  

When the estate was turned over to the town and the archivist was taking inventory, she heard this story and thought that this valuable weather vane should be brought inside the museum.  The family agreed, and the weather vane was brought in to be photographed, cataloged and displayed.  When they shook the horse, it rattled because it was still full of bullets!

Stay tuned!  There was a second weather vane on display in General Patton's office.  I'll feature that weather vane next week right here on this blog.

Click here for a blog post about the Patton Homestead in Hamilton, Massachusetts:
http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/p/honor-roll-project.html   

Click here to see the entire series of Weathervane Wednesday posts!  

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http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2014/10/weathervane-wednesday-horse-vane-owned.html  

Copyright (c) 2014, Heather Wilkinson Rojo