Turner's Public Spirit, July 5, 1924
A look back in time to a century ago
By Bob Oliphant
Center. Rev. David Wallace, formerly of this town, is at present in charge of a Congregational church in Calverton, N.Y., which is in a prosperous farming community, being a part of Riverhead on Long Island.
John G. Fletcher is taking a summer course in German at M.I.T.
Mrs. Harry Gumb, who was operated upon recently at the New England sanitarium, Melrose, is as well as can be expected.
Master John Baker, of Hudson, is the guest of his aunt, Mrs. George Walker.
George Brigham, who has been quite ill at his summer home in town, is reported as showing improvement.
Mrs. Ernest Christenson and daughter Barbara, who have been on an extended visit to Walla Walla, Wash., have returned to their home here.
A son weight 9 ½ pounds was born to Mr. and Mrs. David Scott on Sunday, June 29.
Mrs. Martha McDaniels is reported as seriously ill at her summer home here, two trained nurses being in attendance. Her illness is the result of injuries sustained by having fallen down stairs recently.
Mrs. Elva Wright, public health nurse, who has recently had an attack of appendicitis, is able to be out again.
The Village Improvement society, which met on last week Thursday evening, voted to adjourn until the fourth Thursday in October.
Mrs. Francis Banister attended the meeting of the Middlesex County Council of the American Legion Auxiliary held in Medford on last Saturday.
Ray E. Parkhurst and Miss Blanche Robillard, of Lowell, were united in marriage on last week Wednesday afternoon at four o’clock. The marriage was followed by a reception at the home of the bride, and was largely attended. The bride was prettily attired in tan messoline with hat to match, and carried white roses, while the bridesmaid wore blue silk with hat to match and carried red roses. The best man was Wendell Parkhurst, brother of the groom. The young people were the recipients of many gifts, and after a short wedding trip will reside in North Chelmsford. The groom is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Bert Parkhurst (Lula Dane), former residents of this town.
Huntington Wells has returned to his home from the Lowell General hospital and is doing nicely.
The William E. Wright family, Mrs. Eliza Carter and Mr. and Mrs. John Feeney, Jr., are enjoying camp life at Lake Contoocook [in Jaffrey and Rindge, N.H.].
The guests of Mr. and Mrs. Fred McCoy this week were Mr. and Mrs. Lewis Robbins, Mrs. Robbins, Sr., and Miss Emmeline Cann.
Miss Ruth Tuttle, who has charge of the club work for boys and girls in town, is attending a three-days’ course in canning at Amherst this week.
Harry Erickson, who will be pleasantly remembered by many of the Westford people, is the guest of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Wright. Since leaving this town he has finished a four-years’ course at Mt. Hermon and just graduated from Yale college. He goes this summer to Northfield and next fall takes up his duties as teacher in a boys’ school in Chicago.
Mr. and Mrs. F. M. Hubbard and their two children started for Los Angeles, Cal., today. They have been the guests of the Lehman family at Minot’s Corner. They made the trip to this town in twenty days.
Large consignments of strawberries are being shipped each night to the Lowell and Boston markets.
The Unitarian church has closed for the summer vacation.
The library will close at eight o’clock during July and August.
The republican town committee will meet on Wednesday evening, July 9, at the town hall to take action regarding the outing to be held at Whitney playground before the state primaries in September. These outings in past years have been a get-together of the towns of northern Middlesex and have always been largely attended. The chairman of the republican town committee, Alfred W. Hartford, will call the meeting to order. The leading republicans of the state attend this affair and Governor Channing H. Cox has spoken on two different occasions at these events.
Angie Parfitt, Helen Gallagher and Alice Heywood, of the Willing Workers’ club, have been selected on account of excellency in canning or sewing to attend the two-days’ session at Amherst in July.
Livingston Wright, of Quincy, and Miss Frances Pollock, of New London, Conn., were united in marriage at the home of the bride on Saturday forenoon at eleven o’clock. After a wedding trip to Maine they will reside in Quincy. The groom is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Wright, of Quincy, and his many friends here extend their heartiest congratulations. The groom’s uncle, Harwood L. Wright, attended the wedding.
Edwin H. Whitehill will deliver the address on Sunday evening at 7:15 at the Congregational church. His subject will be “What are the young people asking?” It is hoped that there will be a large attendance to listen to this address.
About Town. The Caleb E. Fisher class of the First Universalist church of Lowell held their annual outing on last week Thursday at Lake Nabnassett, at the camp of Mr. Downing, one of the officers of the church.
Edward M. Abbot, one of the rising bright ones of this town, and youthful, had his first peas from his garden on June 25. This makes him third in the list of competitors. We are not yet quite certain whose peas were first ready for picking; we only know who picked first. To illustrate, the Old Oaken Bucket farm could have had peas on Sunday, June 22, but for several reasons. First, I was too lazy and pious to pick them; second, I had a house full of company getting ready for Europe and did not break into the Lord’s day and desert my guests. I am delighted to take off my hat to the winner, Mrs. Herbert E. Fletcher, of Oak hill, and tickle myself to counter with new potatoes for dinner Monday, June 30.
The Lowell Fish and Game association will hold their annual outing at Willow Dale, Thursday, September 18. This is certainly far ahead enough to write in your diary.
Richard M. Elliott, son of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas H. Elliott, of Westford and Littleton, is spending his vacation at the home of his parents. He is professor of psychology at the University of Minnesota. He will remain in the east until September, when he will return to the university to resume his work.
Mr. and Mrs. Harrison E. Byam announce the engagement of Ethel Florence Brushett to George Percy Bricket, of West Chelmsford.
The Old Oaken Bucket farm sent the first bushel of peas to market on last Saturday and there is a lot more to follow. No, the woodchucks did not get them all, in fact the doves have done more harvesting of peas than woodchucks.
Oliver Desjardens, of this town, and Helen Maria Sullivan, of Lowell, were married in Lowell on Monday evening. They will reside on Pigeon hill, Stony Brook road, Westford. [Oliver’s first wife, Maria Bridget Horan, died Sept. 3, 1923.]
The Morning Glory farm is pushing haying faster than the weather pushes sunshine. For help he [Amos Polley] has for steady Norman W. Phillips, and for temporary he has two brothers, Sampson and Simon Jonas.
The Downing family, formerly living on the old Walker place, have moved to Fall River, and a Reynolds family from somewhere have moved in.
The old Cyrus Hamlin barn at the Center [2 Hildreth St.] has been sold to Joseph Walker. The barn is being torn down to make room for a garage and dwelling house; at least this is “how the story grew.”
The largest sweet corn we have seen in our travels thus far this season is on the Whitten farm on the Lowell road. “Beat again” on length and color of fodder.
John C. Sheehan, a life-long resident of Chelmsford, died on Monday at his home on Pine Hill road after a long illness. As a milk contractor for the Lowell market he is well and pleasantly remembered by many Westford farmers on Frances hill and Stony Brook valley. He was always dependable. He leaves four sons, Thomas E., Francis J., John P. and Henry L. Sheehan, and two daughters, the Misses Mary E. and Annie G. Sheehan. He was an attendant at St. John’s church.
Harry L. Nesmith, tree warden, is doing an efficient work in cutting down the dead trees along the roadside. The large, several years old dead pine on the westerly slope of Frances hill on the Stony Brook road has long been an unsightly perplexity as to how to cut it down and not throw down the entire New England telephone system. Many thanks, Mr. Tree Warden, for not disturbing the nests of our beloved friends the crows, or the burrows of our beloved woodchucks, although I have just been informed by authority that it is my friends, the crows, who are eating up the profits of my peas and not the doves, as he caught them in the act of breaking and entering the pod. The potato bug boarders have sent in their resignations and we escape the expense of arsenate of lead spraying
Redmond Walch [sic, Welch], a former superintendent of police in Lowell, died at his home in that city on Tuesday morning [July 1, 1924,] after a long illness at the age of sixty-two years. He was born in Westford at Chamberlin’s Corner, in the house now owned by Mark W. Jenkins, June 11, 1862, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Redmond Welch. His father for many years was in the employ of the Zacheus Read farm. Redmond Welch, Jr., was appointed to the police force of Lowell in February, 1887, and had been connected with the police force of Lowell nearly forty years as patrolman, liquor inspector, deputy superintendent and superintendent, and was recently retired on a pension of $1500 a year. He was six feet tall and a fearless and courageous officer, and a stern and relentless enemy of evil. He leaves an aged mother and two sisters. [A longer obituary with portrait photo appears in the The Lowell Sun, Lowell, Mass., Tues., July 1, 1924, pp. 1 & 3.]
James K. Lambert is at home from Westford [a village in Ashford], Conn., from a school for boys [probably Ashford Academy; see https://catalog.archives.gov/id/132356071], and is visiting with his grandmother, Mrs. Lucy [surname illegible]. Mrs. Edwin Rylan and daughter Mrs. David Tomlinson, of Watertown, N.Y., have been visiting with Mrs. Lucy Keyes on the Providence road.
110 Years Old. Mrs. Marie Horton Chappell, of Rehoboth, recently celebrated entering her 110th birthday. She is believed to be the oldest person in New England and perhaps in the United States. A descendant of the Huguenots, she was born in Rehoboth, near Swansea, March 11, 1815, and has lived all her life in New England. She is the daughter of Eliphalet and Mary Chase Horton and comes of a long-lived family. One of her sisters lived to ninety-seven and the other more than ninety. She is in excellent health, mentally and physically; read without glasses until she was seventy-six; recovered her sight at eighty and read again without glasses until she was 100. She is probably the oldest radio fan in the country. At Christmas time a great-greatnephew, Norton R. Alexander, gave her a set, and Mrs. Chappell regularly listens in on the air service and greatly enjoys hearing the sermons of prominent clergymen. She was married in 1837 to Ralph Chappell, of Providence, R.I. In 1888 Mrs. Chappell, then a widow, went to live with her daughter, Mrs. Frank West. Every year her son, Frank B. Chappell, former mayor of Willimantic, makes a birthday pilgrimage to carry his mother a bouquet containing as many carnations as she is years old.
Y.M.C.A. Camp Open. Camp Nabnassett, the camp of the Y.M.C.A. of Lowell, opened for the summer last week Thursday. Camp Nabnassett has had a long and excellent record as a summer recreation camp for boys. The camp, as usual, has been extensively repaired and renovated for the season and is in first-class condition. Everything is now ready to receive the boys and the season lasts until August 30. The swimming facilities are of the best and there is an excellent diving platform. Every boy is taught to swim and paddle a canoe. The camp has an excellent fleet of canoes all in good shape, [and] is well supervised. Norman Long, a student at Tufts medical school, will be camp doctor and will be at camp throughout the season. Thomas R. Williams, director of boys’ work, has charge of the camp and of all its varied sports, of which there are many and healthy and happy. The camp is located in an ideal spot on the south shore of Nabnassett lake in the easterly part of the town about five miles from Lowell and about a ten-minutes’ walk from the trolley cars at Whidden’s Corner on the Groton road, and same distance from Westford Corner on the Brookside trolley line.
Graniteville. The married men defeated the single men in a red hot baseball game here on Tuesday evening by the score of 11 to 10. McLenna and Reeves did the battery work for the married men, while Degagne and Stepinski were in the points for the single fellows.
The Abbot Worsted baseball club will play Lawrence at Lowell on the Fourth of July morning, and the Millstreams in Chelsea in the afternoon. On Saturday afternoon the Abbots will play North Cambridge in North Cambridge. Saturday’s game will be the last of the first half in the Boston Twilight league series.
Beginning Saturday evening, July 12, the Abbot Worsted Company band will give the first of a series of free open-air concerts at the new bandstand at the Cameron school playground in Forge Village. These concerts will be held every Saturday evening in Forge Village from 7:30 to 9:30. All are cordially invited to attend these concerts. Plenty of free parking space for autos.
Mr. and Mrs. J. B. Carmichael will spend the next two weeks at Newfound Lake, N.H.
- G. Sargent’s Sons’ Corporation shop is now closed for two weeks.
The mills of the Abbot Worsted Company will close for the annual vacation from July 4 to July 14.
Miss Charlotte Perry left here recently for a prolonged stay in Detroit, Mich.
Rev. A. S. Malone, pastor of St. Catherine’s church, observed the twenty-fifth anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood on last week Friday. No formal celebration was planned, but after the evening service in the church he was asked to remain a few minutes. Leo Provost, in a neat speech, presented him with a purse of gold in behalf of the parishioners. It was a complete surprise to the pastor, who responded by thanking one and all for this excellent manifestation of love.
Reception. A reception was tendered Rev. A. L. O’Brien, the new pastor of the Methodist church, on last week Friday evening, the affair being largely attended. The Ladies’ Aid society had charge of the event, and Mrs. Emma Wright, who was the head of the efficient committee, is grateful for the hearty response and cooperation of the parishioners which helped to make the affair a success. In the receiving line were Rev. and Mrs. A. L. O’Brien, Mrs. O’Brien’s mother from Nova Scotia and Miss Alma Warren.
During the evening an excellent entertainment was given and dainty refreshments were served. The affair was in the nature of a surprise to the pastor and his wife and proved most enjoyable.
Rev. and Mrs. O’Brien were presented a purse and in addition Mrs. O’Brien received an old rose silk pillow.
The following is the entertainment and the names of the committee in charge: Selection by violin and piano, Misses Morris and Bartlett, of Lowell; vocal solo, Mrs. Bertha Whitney; reading, Miss Doris York; vocal solo, Malcolm Weaver; vocal solo, Miss Graves, of Lowell. Reception committee, Mrs. Emma Wright, chairman, Mrs. George Weaver, Mrs. J. B. Carmichael, Mrs. W. J. Robinson; waitresses, Mrs. De la Haye, Miss Lena Wilson and Miss Elizabeth Wallace.
News Items. While the poll tax collections compare favorably with past years there are yet those who forget or neglect and have to get forcible reminders.
The assessors have received the warrants for the state and county taxes for this year. The county tax, $6127.49, exceeds last year’s by $441.27. The state tax, $7700, is less than last year’s by $1540. The state highway tax is the same as last year, $989.80. Last year’s moth tax of $83.63 is entirely missing. Instead of an auditing tax of $282.98 we have $53.60. The total of all the above for 1923 was $16,082.63. For 1924 it is $14,870.89, a decrease of $1211.74.
Interesting Auto Trips. Mr. and Mrs. [Leonard] Wheeler have had two interesting auto trips. On the first they visited the country in Connecticut of Gen. Israel Putnam of Revolutionary fame. In Pomfret they saw the den into which the young farmer Putnam went by torchlight and shot the wolf that had wrought much mischief with his sheep. In the next town, Brooklyn, they saw the fine equestrian statue of the general, and on the road between the two towns a tablet marking his birthplace and also the farmhouse where he spent the failing years of his life. They camped over night in Mashamoquet brook park in Pomfret in which is a considerable area of splendid great old hemlock trees.
Another time they visited Woods’ Hole on the Cape. There in the biological laboratory is a large bronze tablet in memory of Charles O. Whitman, who was for years at the head of the laboratory. Mr. Whitman was principal of Westford academy about 1870, being succeeded by William E. Frost. The aquarium in the fish hatchery building of the United States government was another item of interest. The aquarium at City Point, South Boston, seemed to them to be fully as interesting. Fish hatching seemed to be adjourned for the season. A third point of interest was Miss Fay’s rose garden, where hundreds of varieties of roses of all colors and sizes were in full bloom.
Ayer
News Items. John McCormack, who has been employed by the Co-operative store as a clerk for the past three months, left Wednesday to take charge of the new store the company has opened in Graniteville. James Pender has taken his place here for the summer.
Real Estate Transfers. The following real estate transfers have been recorded from this vicinity recently:
Westford—Ruth M. Bright to Annie Rice, land on Depot street.