Salem Witch Trails program October 17 @ 7pm

     The Friends of the Dover Public Library are pleased to present an intriguing program about the Salem Witch Trials of 1692-93. Through a grant from the New Hampshire Humanities Council, the Friends will welcome Margo Burns to speak about “The Capital Crime of Witchcraft” on Tuesday, October 17 at 7pm in the library’s Lecture Hall.    

     During 1692 and 1693, nineteen people were hanged and one crushed to death in Salem, Massachusetts. Margo will explore the Salem prosecutions from formal complaints to arrest warrants, to indictments and death warrants, and the rescinding of excommunications years after the fact. The witchcraft trials might seem to have been nothing but a free-for-all, fraught with hysterics, but in fact, the documents demonstrate how methodically and logically the Salem Court worked. Margo will also speak about variety of other cases against women in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.

      Margo Burns is the Project Manager and Associate Editor of “Records of the Salem Witch-Hunt”, (Cambridge University Press, 2009), the definitive transcriptions of the legal records of the period. Burns has appeared in a film for the National Geographic Channel, has been featured in the film which screens daily at the National Park Service Visitor Center in Salem, and with actor Scott Foley on TLC’s “Who Do You Think You Are?”, recounting the story one of his ancestors who was executed in Salem in 1692..

       Margo is herself is a descendant of Rebecca Nurse, who was also hanged in 1692. This past summer, she spoke at “Salem's Trials: Lessons and Legacy of 1692, A Symposium Commemorating the 325th Anniversary of the Salem Witch Trials” at Salem State University.

      She is a seventh-generation New Hampshire native, with two master’s degrees from UNH. She currently works at St. Paul's School in Concord as the Director of The Language Center.

     This program is free and open to the public. For more information, call the Library at 603-516-6050. Library hours are Monday-Wednesday 9am-8:30pm, Thursday-Friday 9am-5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-5pm and Sundays 1pm-5pm.