USA > Massachusetts > Franklin County > Shelburne > History and tradition of Shelburne, Massachusetts > Part 31
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Living memory recalls the residence in succession of the families of Albert and Henry Lanfair, George and John Thayer, and John Hamilton.
From the latter, Donald Greene rescued the little house from a threatened old age. He covered the curl- ing clapboards with shingles, giving a Cape Cod aspect to the house. Following his death the old house for- tunately passed into the appreciative hands of Elizabeth and Fowler Pickhardt, who are carefully restoring its original charm.
ELLIOT TAYLOR'S HOUSE on Shingle Brook Farm -- The house at the east base of Shingle Hill, owned by Elliot Taylor, was built in 1832, probably soon after the fire which swept the first house.
The original house was the home of Solomon Hawks (born 1755) who settled early in Shelburne. A town record of 1794 describing "a road laid from the southwest corner of Solomon Hawks' barnyard to the east side of the town road that leads by his house to a walnut stand on the line between Eliphalet Dick- inson's and John Taylor's land" places his home on or near the site of the present house. Old deeds verify his ownership in this location. (John Taylor lived on the present Manners' farm and Eliphalet Dickin- son, living in Deerfield, owned land in Southeast Shel- burne.)
Like his brother Moses, who settled over Shingle Hill at the west on the present Murray Fiske farm, Solomon Hawks built his house a short distance from the old Charlemont Road. With four house founda- tions still visible in the barn pasture, we know he had near neighbors. Their homes were on the dis- continued road, which the present south road to Greenfield replaced slightly east.
Solomon Hawks was a rich man in his time. In 1796 the town valued his real estate at $1903, and his personal at $1335. He had a large family, some
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of whom married and moved to homes of their own.
To four of his daughters, Solomon Hawks deeded the north half of his farm - a quarter to each daugh- ter - while he reserved the south half for himself. Later two daughters sold their shares to Peleg Adams, who built the present house. He did not live in Shel- burne and possibly built the house for his brother, Nahum, who, we know, became owner of the house and the south half of the farm.
Rebecca and Rhoda Hawks retained their shares of the farm on which they lived over forty years and the right to live in the new house, which was built large, with north and south wings. Their home was the north wing.
In 1860 George E. Taylor, Sr., purchased Nahum Adams' house and the section of his farm which was west and adjoining the Taylor ancestral homestead and moved over Shingle Brook with his wife, Victoria Green. The Hawks sisters continued living in the north wing until the death of one.
Later the north wing was taken down and moved for a sap house. Another major alteration was the addition of a front porch about the time of the mar- riage of George Everett, who brought his wife, Lila Harrington, to his parents' home where he raised his family. Together father and son farmed for many years.
The old Solomon Hawks place has for three genera- tions been the Taylor farm which promises to continue in the family as Elliot and Dorothy Wheeler Taylor have two sons.
While obtaining facts for the above house history, road descriptions lead one to believe the road from John Taylor's to Solomon Hawks' house was built in 1841, and is presumably the present road.
WEST DEERFIELD ROAD
THE OSCAR HAWKS HOUSE ON THE ROAD TO THE "OLD WORLD" - In South Shelburne, below Randall Hill, on the West Deerfield Road stands the Oscar Hawks house close to the Deerfield town line. It is one of the oldest in Foxtown.
During the late 1790's Dorcas and John Chapman were living in the southeast corner of Shelburne on land believed to be the farm on which this house stands. In 1800 they deeded forty-five acres of their Shelburne farm, also twenty acres "with buildings and all," just over the town line in Deerfield to Samuel and Phineas Newhall of Conway. (Samuel Newhall lived in Deerfield on the 20-acre parcel for a year or so before coming to Shelburne, and Phineas settled in Shelburne in a small house on land purchased from the Chapmans.) It is safe to say that John Chapman was the original resident owner of the Oscar Hawks farm and that Phineas Newhall was a close second, because in 1816 he deeded John An- drews a farm "on which he dwells."
A new house followed this transfer. Built by two brothers, John and Andrew Andrews, the erection
date of this house by oral tradition was 1812, but from the following information taken from the recent "Family History" by Captain Russell Hitchcock, it seems likely it could not have been built until 1818 or 1819. "Andrew Andrews, born in 1790, when 20 years of age, went to Watertown for three and one-half years, thence to Hawley to his brother John's for three years, after which he and his brother John bought a farm in Shelburne and built a house which is still standing." From these figures we reason that Andrew Andrews arrived in Shelburne late in 1817 or early the following year. Since John Andrews had a son, J. Alfred, born in Hawley in 1818, and a daughter, Dolly, born in Shelburne in 1821, he must have moved to Shelburne between 1818 and 1821.
Another convincing proof that the Andrews brothers did not build their two-family house as early as 1812 is found in the early assessors' books which did not record taxing them until 1818. (Then John was taxed for "real estate $450" and Andrew for $200.)
John was a cobbler, making shoes while living in Shelburne, and Andrew was a tanner. Andrew mar- ried in 1820 and a few years later moved to Deerfield. In 1835 John Andrews swapped this place with Samuel Fiske, Jr., for a duplex brick house in Fox- town. Although this chapter is not embracing brick houses, it has been interesting to learn that Solomon Bardwell, who built the brick house, had lived in the South for awhile and built his home on the plan of a Southern one. It is believed to be the only duplex house in town.
After Samuel Fiske and his son's ownership of the house built by the Andrews brothers, several families followed.
In 1871 Ed Robbins, tall, lean, a typical New Eng- land Yankee, slid down the hills of Heath with his elderly parents to Foxtown to this place where he farmed under the shadow of Randall and Shingle Hills. When a former Heath neighbor inquired how he liked, Ed Robbins, with his Yankee twang replied, "I like fine; it's perpetual summer down here all the time."
George and Charles Dole purchased this farm in 1891 or 1892, and in a few months, when Charles Dole and his wife moved away, George became the sole owner. In a few years he married Eliza Anderson.
George Dole took down an east ell, consisting of kitchen, shed, and pigpen attached, and replaced it with a new kitchen. The front door (south) opens into a very small hall with winding stairs, in back of which stands the chimney from which the fireplaces in the two front rooms breathe. One of these rooms next to the hallway is distinctive for its attractive window seats under the two south windows with their narrow sills and wide board paneling to the floor. They are the only ones found in town. The kitchen with fireplace and brick oven of the original apart- ment next to the highway is still a part of the house.
Following the death of George Dole in 1908, his widow sold the farm to Oscar Hawks, whose paternal
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place, just over the Deerfield line, joined this farm. Here, Gertrude and Oscar Hawks lived forty-one years. Here, their son and daughter grew up. The Hawkses gave the house a modernized dress of grey shingles and in landscaping its surroundings acquired a picturesque effect. This friendly house built beside the road has recently been transferred to the daughter and son-in-law, Esther and John Herron.
BARDWELL'S FERRY ROAD
HOME OF GERTRUDE WILLIAMS - At the west entrance of the Bardwell's Ferry Road, the home of the late Lawrence Smead, and now the home of Gertrude Williams, is an old house built by Josiah Kellogg over one hundred years ago.
Elam Josiah Dole Kellogg, called Josiah (born 1821, died 1896), was the son of Elam. Like his father. Josiah Kellogg became "the village smithy." and his shop was next to Dragon Brook near the location of the stone library.
In 1869 there was an article in the town warrant "to see if the town will appropriate money for the purchase of hay scales to be located near J. Kellogg's Blacksmith Shop" and the affirmative vote placed scales near the Chair Factory of Alvord & Franklin just opposite the road from the present Seward home. Many will remember the scales, if not the blacksmith shop. Later the blacksmith shop was moved to the spot where Rufus Dinsmore had his workshop.
After Josiah Kellogg's death, his widow lived in the home a few years; then in 1901 John Fournier. another blacksmith, purchased the place. His shop was in the old barn. During the occupancy of the Fournier family a front porch was added and the old Kellogg house in weathered greyness blossomed white.
When the Fourniers moved, Fred Laird and his wife purchased. He, too, did blacksmithing in the barn. In 1920 the Lairds sold to a Smith, who soon transferred the property to Lawrence Smead.
Mr. and Mrs. Smead built and operated a roadside novelty shop and lunchroom, sold gasoline and, with six tourist cabins south of the house, did a thriving business during the warm months.
The present owner, Mrs. Williams, is proprietress of the Windsor Tea House.
JOHN HERRON'S HOUSE - John Herron's house in the Center, at the head of the Bardwell's Ferry Road across from MIrs. Williams, has had an interest- ing career.
Built by the town for Mr. Munn, a shoemaker by trade, it stood originally back of our present parsonage beyond the Frank Shields home, and was moved to its present location when the county road was changed. Timber from the second meetinghouse, torn down in 1832, was used in its construction, so says tradition ; however, reconstruction by the present owner, who is a carpenter, revealed no timbers believed to be of church origin, though the barn timbers appear to be in second use. MIrs. Munn was still living in the little house in 1858 and later.
The Levi Dole family next lived in this house for three years before moving to Bardwell's Ferry, where Mr. Dole became the first railroad station agent. While living in the Center, Levi Dole's son, Myron. owned a big red sled which, midst high waters, took a long trip sponsored by the furious old Dragon - that powerful little brook right back of Dole's house. There were many turns before Myron's sled was tossed upon the bank of the Deerfield River near the point where Dragon Brook empties into the river. There it was found by its owner after his parents moved to Bardwell's Ferry Station.
It was in 1868 that Levi Dole sold his place to Solomon L. Long. The following spring Long moved in and opened a carriage shop. Within a few months he sold to Lawrence Barnard Dole.
In 1885 Dr. E. A. Garrison bought Lawrence Dole's place. He was a well-liked doctor but, being visionary, and often looking for some promising busi- ness apart from his profession, he tarried briefly.
The little house between the road and Dragon Brook housed at least two other families, the Cran- sons and Miss Mirittee Bardwell.
In 1895 the three Hardy sisters - Sarah, Jane and Lizzie - sold their old homestead northeast of "Pattern Hill" and purchased this popular house in the Center. During their ownership, the house grew up into a two-story dwelling.
After the death of Miss Sarah Hardy, Benjamin Andrews and his sister, Anna, following the sale of their old homestead, chose this house for their home.
The present owner has given his house new life in repairs and improvements.
THE DAVID LONG HOUSE - Outwardly the late David Long's house, standing at the west base of Dragon Hill between Dragon Brook and the road. takes us back some over one hundred years. Within, aside from a few wide floor boards, little of its age is seen.
Obviously the ell was built later than the main house. The living room boasts of a new fireplace and picture windows; in fact. the whole house has re- ceived a modern touch throughout.
Sumner Bigelow, cobbler, purchased it in 1853. (The old deed has fifteen signers, indicating the place was inherited from a relative, whose name we have been unable to learn.) The following year he sold to Gardner Wilder Truesdell, whose home it was from 1855 to 1860 when he worked in the Chair Factory (Conant Shop).
The Daniel Fisk family followed, and from Clara Fisk, David Long purchased the house in 1900.
This sturdy house is now the home of the Clark Mckinnon family. Madeline Chamberlain Mckinnon is the granddaughter of David Long.
ARTHUR D. BISHOP'S HOUSE - The house on Dragon Brook Farm (so named by the Andrews fam- ily) occupied by the Arthur Bishop family, and re- cently purchased by him and a friend from the widow
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of the late Fred Wells and soon totally transferred to Bishop, was built in 1793 by William Long, Sr., who, having worked at the carpenter's trade before coming to Shelburne, doubtless constructed the house. It was sold at auction in 1879 by William Long, Jr., to Alfred Andrews, who moved from the Foxtown duplex brick house early the following year.
The original owner, William Long, came to Shel- burne about 1780 and bought forty acres, only four being cleared and the remainder dense timber. After clearing the land, he bought more until he owned two hundred acres. John Fellows sold to William Long of Shelburne, June 1783, the west part of Lot 35, 2nd Division +2 acres (Taylor item). Stephen Kellogg of New York State deeded land to William Long in 1785. This is thought to be the house lot that bordered on the old Charlemont Road.
William Long was deacon of the old Baptist Church that stood on the "South Cemetery" lawn. William Long, Jr., succeeded his parents in ownership and added fifty acres. He remodeled the house in 1870.
The original front door with its Christian cross and side lights, and also the east doors, are good-look- ing old designs. The inside window shutters which pushed out of sight into the wall were removed prob- ably when the four front windows downstairs were enlarged. The porches as well as the picket fence were taken down by Alfred Andrews when open lawns came into fashion.
The Longs built in their attic a cheese room where, without modern screening, hundreds of flies happily buzzed the warm months away.
The ell with double-arched shed may have been a part of the original house, as there was a massive chimney which Alfred Andrews took down. This did away with the old brick oven. Mr. Andrews built a small chimney, plastered the side walls and ceiling of the kitchen, and dug a cellar under the wing.
Benjamin Andrews, son of Alfred, successfully fol- lowed the hereditary occupation of farming on this place until he sold to a prominent Greenfield business- man, F. O. Wells. Mr. Wells, with his son, Fred, planted the farm to fruit trees and it became well known as the Wellsmont Orchards. Farm managers in succession lived in this house.
The well-house on the east lawn was taken down a few years ago.
Belonging to the old Long farm was a mill site on a small island in Dragon Brook near the present small bridge on the Bassett Road.
CLARENCE RICHARDSON HOUSE The house which was the home of the late Clarence Richardson family is now the home of his son, Verne. It was built by Nathan Osmyn Newhall in 1867 on the site of an earlier house, and its east wing, now greatly altered, was left over from the old house which was moved to Greenfield to the west end of Main Street (south side).
The old house was built by Olin Bardwell and we believe the year was 1824. He was the son of Chester, whose house location has not been established, and it may be that the house Olin Bardwell built replaced his father's, in which event the present house is the third one on the farm.
Olin Bardwell was a clothier. A town record of 1826 mentions Olin Bardwell's sawmill; also a county topographical map of March 1832 places "Bardwell's Mill" at the junction of the Four Year Old and Dragon Brooks. Were they one and the same?
Olin Bardwell moved in. 1840 to Ashfield. In 1843 N. Osmyn Newhall married Dolly Andrews and moved to the farm, though he may have bought it three years earlier.
When a young man, Osmyn Newhall was appren- ticed to Ira Barnard to learn the carpenter trade. He built the Town House, now known as the Vestry, and a number of houses and barns throughout Shel- burne. In 1875 he gave up carpentry and enjoyed retirement.
His daughter, Corilla, and her husband, Tyler Dodge, spent most of their married lives on her paternal homestead. After the death of Mr. Dodge, Mr. and Mrs. Clarence Richardson owned the place. Mrs. Richardson now leases it to her son, Verne, who operates the farm.
FRED RICHARDSON'S HOUSE IN FOXTOWN - On the Bardwell's Ferry Road, close to the Hawks Brook, stands the home of Hattie and Fred Richardson. The house is one of the oldest in South Shelburne and presumably built between 1780 and 1790.
James Dickinson, a "Cloth Dresser," who came to Shelburne in 1789, was its first known resident; how- ever, from the following facts, we may believe he was not the original settler.
In 1787, John Hinsdell of Deerfield sold four acres in the "west end of Lot No. 25" in the south half of Shelburne to Abijah Jones "Clothier of Shelburne." This deed tells us that Jones was living in Shelburne that year. The Congregational Church Manual tells us that his wife, Freelove Jones, joined the church in 1786, which proves earlier residence of the Jones family. The "four acre lot" purchased in 1787 was probably added to the already owned house lot, since it was bounded by Jones' land on the west. A later deed of 1790 informs us that Abijah Jones sold "the farm" and appurtenances on the east side of Dragon Brook, parts of Lots No. 25 and 37, to James Dick- inson. This was the farm now owned by the Richard- sons. Unless Abijah Jones lived in a log house, he may have built and lived in the present house.
The Dickinson home was a typical salt-box with large chimney and small windows. Close by on the brook, east of the present highway bridge, was his cotton mill, for which he was taxed in 1794 and 1795, and probably other years.
James Dickinson died in 1825. The following year the town voted "to accept of the road by Wid. Dick-
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inson's across the mill pond leading by Wid. Dickin- son's by the Clothier's Shop to Mr. A. Peck's Grist- mill." (Abner Peck lived across Dragon Brook at the east and a road once connected his place with the Dickinsons'.) This road description assures us the Richardson house was the home of James Dickinson.
Winslow Clark, who died in 1881, is the earliest owner remembered by a few older residents. Tradi- tion has told us that he came down from Maine, when a young lad, to live with the Dickinsons; but, since his folks lived in Conway's Hardscrabble, it is doubtful, unless he had been visiting his mother's fan- ily in Maine. His name is found in Joel Bardwell's account book as early as 1812. There is the item under James Dickinson's account, "mended shoes for Winslow."
With her right of dower, Abigail Dickinson re- mained in her home after Winslow Clark married Betsy Bardwell in 1830, until her death in the fall of 1833.
The Clarks had William, Joe, Judah, Lydia, Maria. and Abigail who lived to be ninety-nine. She is remembered in Greenfield, where she lived after her marriage to David Hunter.
Winslow Clark operated a sawmill slightly below the bridge and northwest of his dwelling. Tradition tells us he would roll a log before the old up-and- down saw, then go to the barn to milk a cow and when she was milked would return to the mill just as the sawing of the log was completed.
Following the Clarks, Lucius Wise was a brief resident of the "Dickinson house" and from him the property was purchased by Dumont Newhall in 1886. Here, the children of Dumont and Susanna Hawks Newhall grew up. After his death, and a few years later the death of their son, Ernest, their daughter and her husband ( Rose and Frank Vivier), with their children, came to live with Mrs. Newhall until the place was sold to the present owners.
James Dickinson's house down by the old mill stream has throughout its long life acquired some exterior changes which belie its age. As long ago as 1820 the long roof was raised, giving space for five rooms on the second floor.
A large room called the "summer kitchen" was added at the east. Following a fire which burned the original barn, Winslow Clark joined this room to his new barn with a series of arched sheds for wood and tools. Dumont Newhall added the large porch and paint to the weathered clapboards.
Inside, the "Dickinson house" is an excellent exam- ple of an early Shelburne home. The Christian cross front door with side lights opens into the staircase porch with a handsome cherry stairway occupying most of its space. This "porch" is a splendid speci- men of the little boxlike hall of the old-style house built around a big center chimney. The handrail, square newels and balusters of the winding stairway are still tightly joined together with wooden pegs.
The two front rooms have pine ceiling rafters,
narrow chair rails of pretty design and, next to the fireplaces, little cupboards with hand-wrought hinges.
Back of these rooms is the large living room which originally served as the social and domestic center of the home before the kitchen wing was added. During the process of careful restoration by the present own- ers the removal of successive layers of paint and paper brought to light the original pine sheathing on all sides. The wide panel over the fireplace is horizontal. Ceiling rafters again became visible.
At the north, the small bedroom became a bath- room. The two very small rooms at the south, one shelved for a buttery and the other an entrance hall, were removed, thus giving space and light to the big room.
Sitting before the large rebuilt fireplace, which once more cheerfully smiles a cordial welcome, we find it easy to believe the sheathing boards, some 20 to 26 inches wide, were sawed from trees that grew on the farm. Surely the bricks of the fireplace and old chim- ney were burned in an old claypit up the road beyond the sharp bend.
A wide closed stairway leads from the big living room to the large room above and probably was the only stairway until the house was raised. The tran- som light over the door between the living room and the modern kitchen (east wing) reflects the age of old glass. Many of the old wrought-iron latches worn thin, are still in use.
Interior restoration has revived the true personality of the old "Dickinson house," which, when a salt-box, was much like a number of other early Shelburne homes.
LAWRENCE WHOLEY'S FARMHOUSE - Originally, Ebenezer Bardwell's. Ebenezer Bardwell (born 1746) came to Shelburne before the Revolution and settled in Foxtown on the farm now owned by Lawrence Wholey.
Enoch Bardwell, father of Ebenezer (1st in Fox- town), also arrived in Shelburne before the Revolution - perhaps coming at the same time as his son - and settled on the lot adjoining at the north. Tradition tells us his house was on the west side of the road in sight of his son's.
His home was a log cabin, a little south of the present house, on the west side of the old Bardwell's Ferry Road and at a point nearly in line with the crossroad that joins our present highway at the east. Until recently a twenty-ounce apple tree, entwined with old-fashioned grapevine, designated the building spot.
The first frame house was built between this cabin and the present house. It, too, was west of the high- way, near an old well and a rise in the land. Ebenezer Bardwell was a young man when he came to Shel- burne, and it is probable he erected this house before his son Zenas (born 1777), who succeeded his father, reached manhood.
In 1835, Ebenezer (son of Zenas), when his last
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son was born, realizing his family was outgrowing the little home, built the present house. The upstairs, long, narrow room (N.W.) was the bedroom he de- signed for his four boys - Baxter, Daniel, Zenas and John.
Deacon Daniel R. Bardwell (born May 1831), told his grandchildren he was four years old when the house was built and the family ate Thanksgiving din- ner in the new house.
The ell is not a part of the first house, so often the case in many of our old houses; however, it is interesting to know the kitchen with buttery of the first house, in company with its stone steps and hearth- stone, was moved next to the open shed adjoining the new house, where it became a workshop and grain room.
The downstairs southwest corner room of the main house was originally a cheese and butter room. The kitchen, a small bedroom, and the combined living and dining room in the ell have completely lost their original appearance, and gone are the kitchen and dining room fireplaces. The hearthstone of one con- tained two grooves to which "Uncle Zenas," during his semiannual visits to his boyhood home, pointed with pride saying, "We boys did that cracking wal- nuts, winter evenings."
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