Successful
Actions of Montague Grange - MA
Montague Grange 141 is located in Montague Center near the Interstate 91 corridor north of Springfield and Northampton in western Massachusetts, and bills itself as a “Grange with history… a Hall with personality!”
“Our Grange covers five different villages. We have about 8500 people. It used to be mostly farming, but the farms are slipping away. Now we have a lot of open space and conservation areas,” says Mik Muller, Lecturer of Montague Grange.
“To understand where our Grange is now, you need to understand our town,” says Mik. “Our membership was historically made up of the town fathers and mothers – and their families have lived in the town for a really long time. Many local roads are named after them. As they began to pass away, they left a vacuum for new people.
“About ten years ago we had a situation where all the members were from the older population of those prominent families, and some of them actually discouraged new people from coming in. They were hesitant to rent the Hall, and Montague Grange started to shut down.
“About this time David Kaynor, a fiddler and contra dance caller, joined as a new member and started to hold dances in the hall,” says Mik. “That raised some energy, brought some new members in and stabilized the income to pay for the hall, but it’s only now that we feel like we’re just starting to come back as an active and viable Grange.”
“I’ve been a member for five years,” says Mik. “And in those five years I’ve noticed that if new members did join and experienced the ritual in their first meeting, nine out of ten times they didn’t come back. Five years ago, we had 50-60 members on the books. Now we have 42 members, but still we don’t often fill the chairs at a regular meeting.
“Since this past December we’ve consistently started meetings with the very abbreviated opening and closing ceremonies from National Grange and run the meetings more or less at ease - and every meeting where we’ve gained a new member, they’ve come back.
“We’ve started trying to do more visible things in the community. We held a clean-up session around the hall, and most of our members showed up to help. We painted our foyer, got rid of some of the older detritus and generally spruced up the hall.
“A few weeks ago we held a fundraiser for a local family whose mother died from a heart attack. It was kind of a down-home variety show with a whole bunch of people singing off key. It was kind of hokey, but it was great fun and everybody who came walked out smiling.
“Chris Polatin and Colleen Skully, both naturalists and our two newest members, won a grant for the Grange to brush-hog some the conservation area in town – the ones that are too small for the state to do. Chris does remediation for invasive species, and Colleen did the work to hook us up with this grant funding. Once the money is in place we’ll be able to do some very visible events around the maintenance, and pay for farmers to mow.
“Chris Wise, our Assistant Stewart, just spearheaded an effort to develop an excellent brochure for Montague Grange – which you can find by going to www.ma-pomona19.org and going to the Montague section.” Click here to view the brochure. “We’d be happy to have Granges across the country took a look at what we did and use our brochure as a template for their own.”
“The process of writing the brochure was really helpful for our Grange,” says Chris. “It forced us to think about what we do and how we describe ourselves to people. It made us think more systematically and deeply because what we said because it was going to go down in print. I found it really helpful – just to put together a list of everything we’ve been doing over the past few years.”
Mik agrees. “It’s helped to allow us to think more about what we are and what we want to be.”
The brochure talks about what Montague Grange is, its connection to National Grange, and how the organization has evolved to include non-farm rural families and communities.
The brochure asks the question, “Why should I care about the Montague Grange?” and answers the question by saying, “The Montague Grange is dedicated to improving the quality of life in our town. You live here, and the Montague Grange is a uniquely valuable community resource… If you care about having a vibrant rural village, you should care about the Grange.”
The brochure lists events and activities as well as opportunities to rent the Grange Hall. And it goes on to list community meetings and projects where Grange has provided a forum to address issues such as maintenance of state-owned conservation areas, clean energy alternatives, road reconstruction projects, traffic concerns, and selectboard candidate forums. Fundraisers, dances, concerts, recitals, craft shows and art exhibits, educational programs, and holiday celebrations are included.
“One thing people respond to is a section that’s called ‘Myths Debunked.’ We take on the myths that Grange is just for farmers, and that we’re this big secret society. And we also let people know that anyone can join,” says Chris. Mik agrees. “At our last meeting I put forward a motion to pre-approve everyone in our county for membership. I got the idea from a Grange in Santa Cruz who pre-approved everyone in the state. We want to take away any barriers to membership.”
“We printed up 1000 brochures and spread them around town,” says Chris. “Also, a group of Grange members hand-delivered them to every house within a one-mile radius of the Grange Hall.”
“Writing the brochure was a real eye-opener to see all that we have done,” says Mik. “We’re at the point now in our Grange where we can steer the ship any direction we want. Environmental stewardship is one of those directions we want to go. We’re going to make a big community event out of taking care of conservation areas.”
Chris Wise added, “We’re also looking at alternative energy. There’s a program that encourages people to give $5 a month to the New England Wind Project, and then that money gets kicked back to your town to fund alternative energy projects like solar lights at the Town Hall. Montague Grange will be running the program and asking people in town to sign up.
“We’ve also extended an invitation to partner with the Town Historical Society to house their collection in the Grange Hall. We want to marry the two organizations so we don’t charge them for the space, and in exchange they will talk about Grange as an integral part of the history of the town.
“We hold dances two Fridays a month as fundraisers. Much of our leadership are contra dancers or musicians. And we have Family Dances once a month as well. There’s a lot of music in the hall, and we’re trying to encourage even more.”
“But we haven’t yet been very successful in converting people who come to an event like a dance into members. Leveraging membership is hard. But at our next meeting, we’re taking in three new members. So maybe it’s just a slow process,” says Mik. “Everyone is really stretched for time.”
“On Earth Day, we sponsored a Bike Clinic,” says Chris. “Fifty people rode their bikes up to the Hall, and we had three folks with racks who took off the tires, oiled up the chains, and generally checked out all these bikes. It was a fun event – and the three new members we’re getting came from that one event!”
Mik agrees. “We’ve got to show folks that we have fun!” |
