Area historian John Babina Jr., will be featured at the Oxford Peach Festival Saturday at 2:30 p.m. to present an illustrated talk on the history of the Stevenson Dam in St. Peter’s Church sanctuary.
The church is located on Route 67 at 421 Oxford Road.
Following his talk, visitors can view dozens of photos of the dam’s construction and old photos of the area that is now flooded under Lake Zoar and old photos of the Riverside area. This will be the first time many of the photographs have been seen by the public.
Also featured will be pictures and memorabilia from the Hale-Coleman Orchards of Seymour and Oxford.
Homemade peach shortcake with “all the trimmings” will be on sale from 4 to 7 p.m. Admission to the event is $1. Proceeds will go toward continuing restoration and operation of the Oxford Historical Society’s Twitchell Rowland Homestead Museum at 60 Towner Lane, Oxford.
John Babina has been active in area history preservation for many years. An engineer whose 45-year career includes both advanced technology marketing, systems engineering and failure analysis, he lived in Monroe for 36 years and now lives in Huntington.
For 15 years he was at Sikorsky Aircraft in avionics systems engineering where he retired from industry in December 1999. Since 2000 he has been an independent systems engineering and quality consultant.
Babina is well-known as the founder (1971) of WMNR, now a classical music public radio station. A Life Member of the Monroe Historical Society, he also belongs to the CT Society of Genealogists and the Shelton Historical Society.
A popular speaker in the region, he has given a variety of talks, including:
—The history of the Stevenson dam
—The Old Housatonic Railroad
—Searching your Eastern European roots and Genealogy
—Electronics demonstrations of real antique electronics
—Background of public radio – and WMNR Fine Arts Radio
—Old Time radio programs – audio
He also recorded oral histories of Monroe old timers, which were given to Monroe Public Library. His other activities include genealogy research, public radio, boating, photography, cycling, involvement with the bike trail in Monroe and Trumbull, and model railroading.
