by Shannon Butler We here in the Local History department can certainly say that we miss visiting our local historic sites, museums, and galleries. One of the great things about Poughkeepsie is that we have so many fabulous places to visit that are close at hand. We happen to have a world famous art gallery right here in our city, the Vassar College Art Gallery, also known as the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center. This is the first college in our country’s history to have an art gallery as part of its original plan. As a result of the forward thinking of Matthew Vassar, the college began collecting some of the world’s greatest pieces of art long before institutions like the Metropolitan Museum or the Fine Arts museum in Boston were even established. What a pleasure to walk onto the fabulous campus with its breathtaking architecture and then take a right into the art gallery that holds a massive collection right here in our backyard. You can see some of the Hudson River School artists like Thomas Cole, Frederic Church and Asher B. Durand. Then there is the gallery filled with Egyptian and Roman sculptures from thousands of years ago. What [...]