Stoughton Historical Society Newsletter Online Edition
VOLUME XLVIII NO. 4 APR-MAY-JUNE 2019
Upcoming Events
April 14, 3:30 P. M. Dr. Gary Hylander presents “Alice Paul: The Forgotten Suffragette” (Note the later time.) Gary writes: “With last month being Women’s History Month, let’s talk about Alice Paul’s contributions to the suffragette movement. Party bosses long opposed the idea of women’s suffrage. It was associated with dangerous political reform and the concern that suddenly doubling the electorate might result in unwelcome social change as well. Besides, politics was the work of men, not the concern of women. Suffragists endured years of public ridicule and were often arrested and jailed. By the turn of the century however, with increasing numbers of women engaged in the workplace and especially with their important contributions in the First World War, women were granted the right to vote. In August 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment became part of the Constitution.
March 10, 2:00 P. M. “Stoughton’s Girl Scouts in Parades and at Camp Walihiyu” – at the Lucius Clapp Memorial, 6 Park St. We received a Stoughton Cultural Council Grant to digitize a roll of film, which contained images from three past parades in Stoughton in which the Girl Scouts and their leaders, including Mrs Fred Magee Sr were featured prominently. Our program will play the parade clips, elicit comments on all the folks seen in the parades and discuss the history of the Girl Scouts in Stoughton, especially during the period when Camp Waluhiyu was running programs in the summer-time at the volunteer-built cottage and campground in what is now the Bird St. Conservation Area. If you have any material or pictures from the Girl Scouts at this time, please let us know. If you get them to me at least a week before the meeting, we can include them in the program.
President’s Report
On November 18, we watched a presentation on World War I, focusing on the role of the Yankee Division in the last year of the War and the outbreak of Spanish Flu, which hit Stoughton hardest in the middle months of 1918. We were fortunate to have access to two publications from the estate of Jim Fitzpatrick, compliments of Richard and Ruthie Fitzpatrick, which detailed the role of the 26th Division, the Yankee Division in the War.
Some of the presentation covered events in the Town in 1918. The Great Hall was much larger then; its floor was the current second floor of Town Hall and the balcony was the current third floor, and there were no office spaces on either side. In 1918, movies were shown in the Great Hall at Town Hall on 34 different evenings at $17 a night rental. The State Guard drilled there eleven times from January to March and eight times in November and December. . There was no charge for them, but they had been asked to select evenings when the hall was not likely to be rented. It was rented for dancing eighteen times, including a “Victory Ball on Dec. 6. If pictures and dancing were combined it was often an $18+ rental. On a few occasions it was also rented for basketball.
The largest taxpayers were French and Ward at $ 12,875, , Stoughton Rubber Company: $5,400, and Stoughton (shoddy) Mills: $4,035. Edison Electric, Charles Stretton & Sons, Panther Rubber, and Brockton Gas Light Co. all paid more than $2000 in taxes, and the NY, NH, &H Railroad, J. W. Wood Elastic Web and Meade Rubber all paid more than $1000. The highest individual tax payers was George Belcher: $5,792, while Louis Clapp, Charles Swan, Charles Welsh, Cornelius Murphy, James Lehan, and Walter Swan all paid more than $1000 each.
The Town Report reveals that the north end of Old Page St. was discontinued, that the Town voted to protest the fare increase on the trolley to Brockton run by the Bay Street Railway, and in a voter referendum for Amendments to the State Constitution, Stoughton voters favored empowering the state to buy historically significant houses and properties. Yes-463 No-148 Blanks-497.
Also favored was an Amendment to make voting compulsory: Yes-351 No-256 Blanks 501. The 501 blanks may tell a different tale than the majority vote would indicate. John E. Flynn, later to be our President was appointed a Library Trustee, a position that he would hold for many years.
Close to two million American men had enlisted or been drafted from April of 1917 to the signing of the Armistice. Most men from New England were in the “Yankee Division” the 26th Regiment. More than one million American troops were in Europe by early in 1918, but most were not seeing front-line action and being trained, mostly under the command of the French. However in June, American troops were thrown into action at the Battle of Chateau-Thierry, first to blunt a last-gasp, but powerful German offensive, which was headed for Paris. After Russia withdrew from the War, the Germans brought many of their divisions from the Eastern Front and threw them into this battle. By the end of June, the German offensive had been halted. In July, American troops played a major role in the offensive that would cost many American lives, but eventually force the Germans to retreat.
This action was followed by the Meuse-Argonne offensive in September, which caused many more casualties, and for a time the logistics of the Americans’ getting their supplies to the front-lines became hopelessly snarled. Gen. Pershing was overcome by the stress of the high casualties and logistical problems and essentially gave up his command for a time to the next two ranking generals. More than 26,000 Americans died in this campaign, which eventually ended the War on 11:00 A. M. on November 11, 1918. Obviously there were many more details to this program, also involving the outbreak of the Spanish Flu, which killed millions world-wide and several hundred in Stoughton. The information and pictures are in a PowerPoint presentation, which could be presented in other venues at a future time.
The Edward L Marden Diaries
One of the last America soldiers killed in combat in WWI was Stoughton’s Roy Marden, who was killed by an artillery shell four hours before the Armistice went into effect. A series of circumstances led our Society to be given several boxes of documents, one of which contained almost thirty diaries with hand-written entries from Roy’s father, Edward L. Marden. This diary might be considered a typical diary of an American man and his family at the beginning of the Twentieth Century, were it not for the two terrible tragedies, which befell the family. By the time of the Holiday Parade on December 8, we had read enough of the diaries to write the following: “To get into the Holiday spirit, consider the Christmas season of Stoughton man, Edward L Marden in 1905. His 33-year-old wife had died two years earlier, leaving him with SIX children, possibly seven, ages thirteen to two. In 1905, all the children were living elsewhere,: Westboro (2) , Saugus, Roxbury, and other places, yet-to-be-determined. Edward boarded in a house in Stoughton, and worked at many assorted jobs, but visited his children regularly…by train. Imagine his happiness at being able to get them all back together at the house at which he boarded, even if just for two days, for Christmas of 1905!! From his pocket diary: “12/24 first day at J. W. Guilds with all my children. 12/25 Christmas at H. W. Lamberts 12/26 took Gertrude and Ruey back to Westboro all had a fine time. 12/27 Took Dorris back to Saugus she had a nice time. 12/28 Harold (his oldest) and I went to printing office and Harold concludes to work there & try it.”
In 1905 Edward performed a variety of jobs including stitching thousands of pairs of pairs of shoes between Jan 24 and April 7. He also did carpentry and general labor for a number of people including, Baxter, Leathers, Farrington, Buckley, Randall, and E.P. Clapp. He worked for a Church, possibly the Methodist-Episcopal Church in North Stoughton. He also worked at the nearby cemetery where he had a family lot, which eventually included his late wife, Etta. The family stone with Edward, Etta, and Doris on it can be located at Maplewood Cemetery in North Stoughton. He boarded at J. W. Guild’s, the family that I believe is Etta’s parents. It is possible that young Etta (later called Barbara) lived there as well, but I did not see any references to her. On Aug 31 he writes, “moved 3 bodys into my lot.” Other entries in 1905: 5/25 suit of clothes for Ray 5.2, gloves 25c. 9/12 one day at Hayeses-discharged. 9/13 clean stove, pipe and more at H W Lamberts 6 hours. 12/15 went to Washington’s worked four hours. 12/16 took Ray in to C A society to be looked at. 12/18 packed engine for Mr Lehan” also in Dec. “sawed some wood, “ “ Harold came home,” 12/28 Harold and I went to printing office and Harold concludes to work there & try it. 12/29 went to Boston with Harold and see Rr Eastman? And out to Everett. 12/30 patch roof for JB Guild 12/30 Washington 1 spade, one shovel 1.25. In Dec he paid for tickets to Westboro, Boston, Saugus and other small amts to or for Ray. For the year he made 889.60 and spent $895.27 . He had been receiving $12 in rent up to August, not after that. We need more research to determine the houses that he rented or owned when the family was all together and what happened to them. The family history becomes much more clear when Edward Marden writes a page of family vitals at the end of the 1905 diary from which we learn that he was born on May 10, 1851, making him 54 years old by 1905. He married Etta Guild, (who was born in 1869,) in July of 1888 and Harold was born in January of 1889, followed by Stanley (deceased in 1890), Ray (1892), Dorris (1894), Ruey (1896), John (1898), Gertrude (1899), and Etta (1903). Etta, the mother died in 1903, at age 33, less than one month after the birth of Etta. When she died, Harold was 13, Ray 11, Dorris 10, Ruey 6, John 5 (although John is not mentioned again, and may be deceased), Gertrude 2, and Etta one month old! We do not have the diaries for 1903 and 1904, so we can only imagine the strain of relocating all the children with people who could care for them, while the then 51-year-old single father had to continue to work. In 1906 he was paying board and collecting no rent. He had nine “top teeth” removed on the second day of the year and had teeth made, soon thereafter. He remained at home for most of the next two weeks. During the year he tried to help Harold, the oldest, get a job, took children to the theater when they visited, and visited them in their various locations. We have read only a few of the subsequent journals in this collection, but we know that Ray Marden was killed in 1918. Edward’s diary for that year is the only year missing in the sequence of diaries. We learn from the Stoughton newspapers that Harold was serving with the army near the Spanish border, and that Ruey and Gertrude were both studying nursing at the Homeopathic Hospital in Boston. In 1919, Gertrude became seriously ill with the influenza, while at the hospital and Edward’s 1919 diary records that he visited her there. It took her a month to recover. Edward, who would be close to seventy, moved from where he had been staying (Ray’s tribute in the Town Memorial for the WWI soldiers says that Edward is living in Allston) and came back to Stoughton to begin the year working at Panther Rubber Company. Edward was still sending money to some of his children. He writes in February: “2/28 Barbara came out to Stoughton. Stopped at her grandparents 3/1 Barbara, Erma and I went to picture show. They enjoyed it very much 3/2 Barbara went back to Wellesley. (Where she may be going to college, as he later mentions paying for her class pin.) I went to Canton Junction with her and saw her on the train to Boston 3/5 worked 1 day got 1 week notice to quit (There had been a fire at Panther Rubber a few months earlier and Edward may have been doing repair carpentry, which may have been completed. In March: “3/12 worked 1d got through today paid 1.80 insurance on Harold, paid $10 to Ruey 3/13 recd 2 letters and postal cards from Harold 3/15 recd pay in full to date $24 Went down to farm Big Barn door blown off. I could not fix it alone. I framed the glass off of slate in cemetery. 3/20 paid Mrs Barton $18 for rent 12-33 months? Ruey graduated tonight. Miss Beaker and 59 other girls 3/23 rainy most of day I went down to farm with Ruey and put front door on. Polly and Erma were there 3/24 Gertrude came out, stopped at Maude’s looking good, next day goes down to see her grandmother 3/26 Gertrude and I went to Boston to 184 Boylston St, left her there I went to Malden. And then to Portsmouth to see the falls there.” He worked fewer days in the first half of the year, but worked on a number of jobs after August including two weeks for Robert Mullholland, who owned a meat market in Stoughton, as well as for the Yorks and the Brittons. On Nov 11th, he notes that Ray had been killed on that date, one year earlier. On Dec 8 he moved to 32 Wyman St. In his end-of-year entry, he notes that Ray was married to Marion Holbrook on Dec. 27 in 1909. For whatever reason, this wife of nine years earlier, when Ray would have been seventeen, is not mentioned in Ray’s page of tribute from the Town. Each of Edward L Marden’s entries are brief, and rarely are feelings expressed, except when he writes, “we had a good time,” but it is not difficult to read between the lines and imagine what it was like for him to follow the success that his children appear to be experiencing, at least as of 1919. There are many more of these diaries to be read with the latter ones taking Edward into his eighties. Getting background information for the diaries has also exposed us to some interesting facts about Stoughton in 1918/9. We were reminded of the Plain St Railroad crossing crash, which killed two people and led to the establishment of a crossing guard there. The Bristol and Norfolk Railroad (the trolley from Stoughton to Brockton) declared bankruptcy. William H White’s (of Billy White’s Field fame) 40 foot henhouse off Plain St was blown over by the wind, but the chickens were not harmed. Daniel Vaughn lost a close election for highway surveyor/road agent and left town to take a similar position in Attleboro.. At Town Meeting, mention was made of low water pressure at the French and Ward fire with some evidence that the water commissioner had not responded adequately to have the needed water pressure available, and there was grumbling about his running a separate personal business related to the water company. Our former President John E. Flynn was appointed to the Stoughton Public Library’s Board of Trustees in 1919 and served until 1946, the last fourteen years as Chairman.! Reading and taking notes on these diaries is only one of the tasks which our volunteers might perform. Come, join us! Two recent visits to our friends at the Canton Historical Society have proved productive. The first visit yielded the generous gift of a 1737 land plot, in pieces, but complete when assembled. It showed a plot of land on both sides of Bay Road, just north of Dry Pond. We could readily identify the location because it adjoined the large Glover-Stearns lot, on which we did considerable research for the 300th Anniversary of Isaac Stearns settling there in 1716. The hand-drawn plot plan/deed with a colorful florid border was crafted in 1737 by surveyor Ebenezer Maudsley, who had owned the land a generation earlier, as one of the original Dorchester Proprietors. The deed records the sale of this 260 acre parcel from James Clark to James Cross and it shows a house on the west side of Bay Road. One would infer that it was a Clark house being sold to a Cross, but we have no records of either name as settlers in the area. We might have expected an Estes, a Jordan, or a Smith. Richard Fitzpatrick and I spent considerable time making the plot fit into the Maps of the 12 and 25 Divisions. Four-fifths of its acreage is west of Bay Road, now Sharon in the area between Chessman Road and Dry Pond. We look forward to further research on the matter. You may view the map with more commentary on our Facebook page. During this visit George Comeau took several pictures of pages from the Abel Fisher Account Book, which we purchased several years ago, and I had brought over. Fisher had an account with Paul Revere and images of these pages may be displayed when Canton’s Paul Revere Copper Mill site museum is completed. The Canton Historical Society/Commission is also making much-needed repairs on the David Tilden house, parts of which date back to the early 1700’s. The second visit to Canton was with David Lambert, under the auspices of the Historical Commission. We had been asked to apply to Stoughton’s Community Preservation Committee for $9400 to supplement the $38,000 that Canton was supplying in order to preserve a priceless scrapbook, which was assembled by Canton Historian Daniel T. V. Huntoon in the late 1800’s. Huntoon asked the community to donate old documents in their possession and then pasted into the scrapbook many hundreds of donated documents, a few as early as the mid 1600’s with the signatures of Indian Chiefs (their marks) at the bottom. All of the documents were written before 1796, the year that Canton separated from Stoughton, so they are all 100% Stoughton history! The meticulous and therefore very expensive preservation will involve carefully detaching each document from the scrapbook, checking the back of it for any writing, making digital copies, which be fully available to Stoughton, de-acidifying or treating the documents as needed, and then reassembling a new scrapbook with archivally, durable pages. David and I immediately saw the value of this priceless document, a virtual Torah of Stoughton’s early history. The application to the Stoughton CPC will be made at a meeting on February 6. Around the Society: Trish Lentine has volunteered to join us on Tuesday afternoons and has begun to enter data on our Membership spread sheets, which were created several months ago by Maureen Wahl. New member and volunteer Dan Mark has also joined our Tuesday crew and is learning the ropes. Recently, we gained another new member/volunteer Richard Sawyer, and long-time member Richard Pratt hopes to spend more time volunteering. Joan Bryant acquired a rotating, floor-standing device, which will display up to half a dozen medium-sized posters. It is currently in use in the Jones Room. David Lambert and John Carabatsos continue to post special pictures and elicit great discussions and some new memberships on The Stoughton Time Machine and our own site Stoughton, Massachusetts Historical Society (you need the comma and the Massachusetts, or you will get an older, inactive site) on Facebook. John is in the process of entering all the pictures he has scanned from various collections into a 5 T.B. external hard-drive, which we have just purchased. When he is done, I will add many hundreds of documents from my computer files. We will soon be in the market for a new desktop computer, as our current Dell runs a XP program, which is no longer supported, and has many other problems as well. The boiler room and curator’s storage area now look significantly better after all the hard work put in by the people mentioned below in the Curators’ Report. What we have done is clear things out so that the even more time-consuming work can begin. Student volunteers Jahmare White-Savage and Zachary Mandosa have continued their work on the John Flynn and Michael Sullivan diaries, respectively. Both attended our meeting on WWI. Jahmare shared that he had learned that the “False Armistice” on Nov. 6, which was mentioned in the last NL was caused by a French journalist, who, when he saw the German delegation appear in Paris to discuss an Armistice, reported that the war was over, and the word spread quickly. Zachary has been taking notes on John Flynn’s observations in 1955, some of which concern the two Hurricanes, Connie and Diane, only a week apart with the second causing disastrous flooding, killing 60 people in Connecticut and sending many local streams and ponds over their banks.
A reminder that Howard Hansen can be visited or receive mail at Life Care Center of West Bridgewater, 765 West Center Street, Rm # 120, West Bridgewater, MA. 02379. I know that he would greatly appreciate a visit or a card.
We are sad to report the recent deaths of two people, who made significant contributions to our Society. Jeffrey Palermo died suddenly at age 36. As an Eagle Scout in Stoughton, Jeffrey made the sign, that several refurbishments later, still graces the lawn in front of our building. Jack Dembrowsky, 76, a life-long Stoughton resident and long-time member of the Stoughton Historical Society died suddenly in Pennsylvania, while driving to Florida. Jack served on our Board of Directors for many years, and along with his wife, Louise, was a faithful attendee at our dinners. With the help of Jack’s family, we will be placing a file in our archives on Jack’s life and contributions to the Town of Stoughton and our Society.
Archivists Report – Joe DeVito and I put up banner honoring Veterans and I worked on getting out the fall newsletter. We received a 2.5 oz. glass container stamped Brockton Crayon & Color Co. Stoughton Mass., which was the Crayon Factory that was directly behind the Stoughton Historical Society for many years. Linda Weiler and I put out a Dozen or so WWI posters in preparation for the Nov. 18 meeting on close of WWI. Linda Weiler, donated some International Order of Odd Fellows (I.O.O.F.) memorabilia that had belonged to her Great Grandfather, A. N. Whiting. His Jewel of office was presented to him in Oct. of 1888. I have re-glued the original case and polished the pin. 11/20 Assisted Michael Cramer with research on Samuel Connors family. We looked for material to be used on a series of murals for the new Stoughton High School. 12/4 Christmas decorations located and brought up. Linda Weiler, has agreed to work at filing a large number of Civil War pension records that have been in our files for several years. We received a large quantity of material from Estate of Robert Morrill; including US Department of Interior Geographical Maps and Calendar/Diaries for most years starting in 1905 thru 1935 of Mr Morrill’s grandfather Edward L. Marden and one from 1955. Cataloging still remains to be done. 12/11 Created a file for Louis Caplan who was a custom tailor in Stoughton. In the archive room, I traced and removed one old telephone cable and one old computer cable. I assembled a new clothes rack for the Clothing Department, and then helped Janet Clough move clothing from the old rack onto the new one. Dwight and I studied a newly acquired map c. 1737, that he had received from the Canton Historical Society. The property is along Bay Rd. adjacent to the Glover/Stearns lot. Larry Thomas donated several boxes taken from his parents’ house, which contained Town Reports, old local newspapers, and bulletins from Immaculate Conception Church. We received copies of two c. 1994 Board of Assessors maps from Carrie Seivers, one of Deady & Trowbridge Ave. area, and one of the area northwest of the intersection of Central & Pearl Streets. -Richard Fitzpatrick
I spent time helping to find materials for guests who were making inquires. I cataloged and filed numerous pieces that had been donated and returned things that had been on display to their proper place. I have spent time cleaning up including dusting displays and sweeping the floors with Evelyn Callanan. I contacted Brad’s Glass about getting glass doors for cabinets that needed them. I worked them to replace two cabinet tops that were badly scratched and purchased locks for all the cabinets that needed them. I also helped with the displays for the Girl Scout program. -Ruthie Fitzpatrick
Curator’s Report
In January 2019 I have taken on the additional role of Curator for the Historical Society. After being a member since 1980 I find most of our collections to be like old friends. I held the position as Assistant Curator Historian from 1981-1987 and was mentored by Howard Hansen. Since taking on this role I have worked with Denise Petersen, Joe Mokrisky, Joanne Callanan, Maureen Wahl and others to clean out and organize the lower basement (boiler room) where items have been stored temporarily. Joan Bryant and Andrew Bryant had begun the process by clearing many items from the aisles of the curator’s archives into the boiler room. We sorted those items, disposing of some and placing others back in more appropriate places in the curator’s room and did some general cleaning. In the coming year, I will be examining all collections and photographing each item. I will be matching our holdings to the existing inventory created by my predecessors. Collections will also be investigated to try to determine donation provenance relating to ownership by a Stoughton family, organization, church, etc. Acquisitions: two metal, stone-working objects found at Gilbert’s quarry from Mark Struck, a small pitcher and cup with Stoughton scenes on them, sold at Monk’s Cash Store in the early Twentieth Century from Carrie Sievers, a Stoughton WWII Civil Defense armband from Michael Fuenfer – David Lambert
Clothing Curator’s Report
Since our last newsletter, much of our time has been spent preparing to store away the items used in our Fashion Show. This has been almost completed with the help of Joan Bryant, Ruthie Fitzpatrick, and John Carrabatsos. My thanks to them. New items that have been donated include several baby clothing pieces, two adult blouses, and baby shoes from Denise Peterson. We also received 7 pairs of children’s shoes from Maria Carlson from the 1970’s, which were most likely purchased at the Carrabatsos (Christopher’s) shoe store in the square. All of these items may not sound “old” to some of you, but to others they represent fond old memories of their children growing up and will be of use in future displays. We greatly appreciate these donations. Also donated is a tote bag of Stoughton’s 275th anniversary in 2001—1726 – 2001. It depicts the Library as it looked in 1969 and is in excellent condition. We have received two graduation cap tassels from S. H. S. for the years 2004 and 2006. I have begun catching up with the computer input from the Clothing Department, which was neglected in the preparation of our Fashion Show. I also attended the Dec. 12th meeting of the Historical Society Executive Board. -Janet Clough
Membership
New members: Harrison and Stephanie Racicot, Robert Rubel, Dan Mark, John Sawyer, and Lisa Bucklin