USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Newburyport > Waban, early days, 1681-1918 > Part 8
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THE POOR FARM
Reproduced from Mothers' Rest Report of 1900 kindness of Miss Elizabeth Bartlett
THE MOTHERS' REST
LOUELLA B. GATES
The Mothers' Rest was started in Waban in the summer of 1900 by the Rev. Everett Burr, at that time pastor of the First Baptist Church in Newton Center. Excerpts from the report of that year: "Early in June the old 'town farm' at Waban was secured . . . . . . at a merely nominal rent through the generosity of Mr. Strong and the syndicate represented by him. Friends for the enterprise arose on every hand; everybody who heard of it was interested and hearts and hands were open." Furniture was donated or sold at half price; market- men added to orders large personal gifts of provisions;
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plumbers gave their services; ten little white cribs were loaned by Boston's day nursery and other furnishings such as car- riages, high-chairs, beds, etc., came from various homes.
There were fourteen bedrooms, a large dining room, kitchen and laundry, two pleasant reception rooms, "carpeted and curtained," a "large cool bathroom," and a nursery filled with toys by the children of Newton Center. From the branches of the elms spreading before the door big swings were hung, and under the old apple trees were hammocks and sand boxes.
The dedication took place on June 20, 1900. The superin- tendent was Miss Harriet C. Wingate; aide, Miss Mary E. Thompson, graduate nurse. The guests were secured from pastors and missionaries in Boston, East and South Boston and Roxbury. The railroad transported all at half fare, and 193 guests came that summer - 78 mothers and 115 children. During this first season, 1,439 quarts of milk, half of it a gift from a dairy, were poured into children from the slums; many had never before tasted good milk. Over 500 garments were given out to these needy people. Each mother carried home in addition to other gifts, a bag of apples from the old orchard, from trees some of which remain today. There were also apples enough to send to various missions and homes - fifteen barrels were sent away.
There was an active visiting committee; ladies called with gifts and took parties to ride in their carriages. The day at the home ended with the singing of hymns by the guests whose gratitude knew no bounds, and who returned to the slums of the city with hearts filled with happy memories of restful and delightful days in Waban. The following year a house was secured on Winchester Street. Thus was born in Waban the now widely known and thriving charity called the Mothers' Rest Association of the City of Newton, Inc., which still carries on its splendid work in its own home in Oak Hill.
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MOFFATT HILL - HOUSELESS
On left, the Quilty house; on right, the Pest House
Courtesy of Mr. Ellsbree D. Locke
REMINISCENCES of MOFFATT HILL
ARTHUR BROOKS HARLOW
In 1888 my father, Louis K. Harlow, who was a nationally known water color artist, had the urge to build a house. His friend, William R. Dresser, induced him to come out to Waban in the hopes that he would select a lot on his land and build there. At this time, the Boston & Albany Railroad had just connected Newton Highlands with Riverside, completing a circuit from Boston to Boston, and established three stations, Eliot, Waban and Woodland. The Railroad Company believed that Woodland would be the principal station because of its proximity to the Newton Cottage Hospital and its nearness to Washington Street which connected the Newtons with Wel- lesey.
At that time Waban was practically all farm land owned by the Hawkes, Locke, Gould, and Collins families on one side of the track, and on the opposite side, from Beacon Street up over the hill, the land was owned by W. C. Strong. Farther down, on the opposite side of the track, the Dresser Estate owned the land from the railroad to Upper Falls and the Charles River. Opposite, on the other side, was the Henshaw- Page properties and the Seaver Estate. Mr. Seaver was then Superintendent of the Boston Public Schools. With the open- ing of the railroad all of these owners were hopeful that Waban would develop and they would make money on their properties.
My father went out with Mr. Dresser and looked over his property. But he was hill-minded, so Mr. Strong drove him up over his fields and my father selected a lot on a proposed road which is now Windsor Road. He didn't put up any deposit, but
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REMINISCENCES OF MOFFATT HILL
took a trip to Europe, only to find when he came back that Mr. Saville had bought the lot he had selected and was building a house, and that Mr. Saville's friend, Davidson, was building a house lower down on the proposed Windsor Road which was then being constructed. (Incidentally, it might be interesting to know that George M. Angier, who became so prominent in Waban's history, was employed as a line man by the surveyors who laid out Windsor Road.) Finding that his first selection had been sold, my father went further up the hill, bought a lot, and built the house that is now on Windsor Road facing the right of way.
At that time he had a superb location. On a clear day we could see Mt. Monadnock. But it was not long before father's brother-in-law, Robinson, built a house next to ours, and Mr. Childs built a house still further up that blocked the mountain view. Shortly after that Mr. Webster built a house and within the next few years other houses were built around us on the hill.
There is a tradition that a hermit named Moffatt once lived on the hill, but at the time we moved in there was nothing but a cellar left of what was supposed to be his house, and the hill was called "Moffatt's Hill" for some time. After that it lost its name, but Moffat Road was named for him.
My father's home seemed to be a mecca for many well- known celebrities. Not only did many eminent painters come out to visit his studio but famous people in other professions.
Ernst Perabo, who at that time was one of the leading pianists in this country, seemed to me to be constantly out at the house and would play on our piano, or on our automatic organ, until two or three o'clock in the morning. It cost five dollars a ticket to listen to Ernst Perabo play in his concert at Symphony Hall.
Emma Thursby, a nationally known concert singer, was constantly at the house overnight and, of course, sang as well as practiced there. And so was Mary Beebe, who was the first
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Yum-Yum in the Bostonian's "Mikado." Also Tom Carl, who was the leading baritone or basso of "Robin Hood." Governor Curtis Guild, and many others whose names I don't remember, were guests in our home. I confess that as a boy eighteen years old, I didn't realize the importance of the privilege I had at that time; so, I frequently walked out on it.
I recall an amusing incident that occurred. Benjamin Har- rison was President of the United States at that time and his wife was an amateur artist. Mrs. Harrison and a relative went to spend the summer at the Woodland Hotel in Auburndale, now part of Lasell Junior College. Word came to father that Mrs. Harrison would like to visit his studio, and the news spread. (As a matter of fact, she never came.) Now there was in Boston, a very wealthy man, a friend of father's, named Joel Goldwaithe, who had a big carpet store on Washington Street, and who looked and dressed like President Harrison.
One day, Joel Goldwaithe, wearing a tall silk hat, and riding in a beautiful open carriage, with a coachman in uniform and a spanking pair of horses, drove up to our house. At that time there was a Miss Cushman who was taking care of the Saville children as Mrs. Saville had died. Spying Joel Gold- waithe, she assumed that it was President Harrison himself, so she collected all the children she could, equipped them with all the flags she could find, and when Joel drove down the street on his way home, all the children hung over the fence waving their flags and cheering at the top of their voices. Joel told father afterwards that he never saw such courteous children in his life. He, of course, knew nothing of the reason for it. I don't believe he ever found out, for a year or two later, so intrigued was he with his reception to Waban, he hired our house on the hill for the summer while our family was down at Oak Bluffs.
When the Waban station opened a man named Stronach was station master. I think he came from Nova Scotia. He had
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a cracking voice with which he sang to the accompaniment of a zither which he insisted on playing to entertain people waiting for trains.
As a matter of fact, nobody had to wait for trains long as we had fifty-five trains a day from Waban to Boston. Every train ran around the circuit and one could go to the Waban station, or the Boston station on Kneeland Street, and get a train in a few minutes. The ticket that was sold allowed one to go around over the Highland Circuit or the West Newton Cir- cuit at the same price.
When winter came, although Stronach had a room at Newton Highlands (his salary was fourteen dollars a week), he frequently slept in the baggage room in the station instead of going home and would cook his meals in there, which con- tributed to the aroma of the waiting room and helped out his vocal efforts with the zither. Of course, there was no hot water, and I never saw Stronach use any soap. He used to rinse his hands under the cold water faucet and by spring they got pretty grimy.
At that time the Boston & Albany Railroad had so much money that landscape gardening, with the planting of bushes and shrubs around nearly all of the stations, was used to get rid of some of it. Furthermore, the company supplied us with cane-seated chairs in the summer time and changed them to plush-seated chairs in the winter. We could buy a book of 100 coupons and go around the Highland Circuit or the West New- ton Circuit for eleven cents a coupon. But there was a printed condition that the coupons must be torn out by the conductor. This condition caused some feeling among the commuters be- cause when they sat down to a card game in the smoking car they wanted to extract a slip, put the books back in their pockets, and go on with the game.
There was an exacting conductor that wouldn't accept coupons in this way, so many of the Waban commuters devised
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the cute idea of tying up the books with paper and string and handing them to the conductor. He would have to untie the string, tear out the coupon, and return the book to the rider, which prevented him from getting through the cars in time to get all the fares. This little joke went on until, finally, the commuters felt that they had satisfied their displeasure and that the conductor had learned reason.
An amusing fact not generally known is that some bright person suggested planting trees near the station which could at a later date be cut and made into railroad ties and thus save much money. At the end of the railroad platform towards Boston a number of these trees can be observed. They have been growing for fifty-five years and the trunks are not much larger than a person's wrist. It is going to take some growing for them to ever reach the size to make railroad ties.
We had a night patrolman by the name of Fred Mitchell who, afterwards, rose to be Chief of Police and has long since been retired on pension. Mitchell was a most likeable man and I, as a schoolboy, frequently walked part of his night beat with him. About the only thing that he had to do was to take charge of some man who had imbibed too much, and instead of get- ting off at Newton Center or Newton Highlands stations slept by his stops and was put off into the arms of Mitchell at Waban.
There were no police call boxes then so Mitchell would take the unsteady person down to a telegraph pole opposite Charles Buffum's house, handcuff him around the pole so that he wouldn't fall down, and then go in and wake Charlie Buf- fum, who had one of the few telephones in town, and call the wagon.
On the Poor Farm, not far from the end of Kent Road, there was the city pest house. When the city decided that the land was too valuable to hold for a Poor Farm in Waban, it moved the almshouse to Oak Hill. On one fourth of July night, the pest house mysteriously caught on fire, and because
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there was no hydrant nearer than Windsor Road and the fire department didn't have hose long enough, it burned to the ground. I was in bed at the time the fire started, but was one of the early arrivals, naturally. I think every boy in Waban, excepting me, was asked to appear at police headquarters and was questioned, but nobody ever knew who set the place on fire. I didn't. The other pest house was razed shortly after- wards, and the only remains of those two houses are the cellars which were changed into sand traps, and which the members
WINDSOR ROAD, 1890. (Saville House at right) Courtesy of (Mrs.) Margaret Davidson Peabody
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WABAN - EARLY DAYS
of the Brae Burn Country Club play through and never know how they came about.
In the early days Mr. Strong occupied a large house on Windsor Road near Beacon Street. He needed some new steps, so he engaged Jimmy Troy and they set to work to make some concrete steps. Jimmy wasn't a carpenter and he put up a crib- bing that wasn't very even, in fact, it was very far from being even. When the concrete was poured and before it hardened some one or more of Dr. Fish's students carved into the soft concrete, "God bless out steps." This was too much. The steps were demolished, a carpenter was engaged to put up proper cribbing, and the steps were rebuilt.
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VIEW OF HILL FROM 102 WINDSOR ROAD, 1890 Courtesy of (Mrs.) Margaret Davidson Peabody
REMINISCENCES
ELLEN L. BREWER
At the Poor Farm lived a man who was marked by a snake; he used to wiggle along on his stomach like a snake and it was a great source of interest and curiosity to the children of the village to watch him. They called him "the snake man." All the land from Lower Falls up to Varick Road used to be owned by Governor Alexander Hamilton Rice and was used as a cow pasture. His daughter married a man by the name of Varick from Manchester, N. H., hence the name Varick Road. While not actually in Waban, but on the outskirts, it might be of interest that one hundred years ago there stood at the corner of Wales and Washington Streets a great wooden building called the Wales Hotel. One night it went up in flames. When the new fire house at Lower Falls was built the old one was abandoned; my father, Fred- erick Curtis Lyon, carted it up to his house on the other side of Wash- ington Street, near the end of Beacon Street, next to the old sand bank. This little old fire house, with domed ceiling and a window on each side, he attached to the house, using it for a dining room. From this fire house the hand-drawn hose reel, and later the horse-drawn one, had responded to the fires in the territory now Waban, as well as to fires in Lower Falls.
NOTES on MOFFATT HILL
Chester H. Childs writes: "We found arrowheads and flint coring in our yard, which was the highest point on the hill. We also found some on the knoll overlooking a spring near the old pest house. I imagine there are flint corings or chips there now. Indians often used places like this to watch for game, meanwhile chipping away on arrowheads, etc.
"We also had visits from the Indians at Nonesuch Pond in Wes- ton. They used to scare us as little kids, and although Mother bought baskets of them, she always had our big St. Bernard dog around so they would not return to bother us. I also camped on Nonesuch Pond with Rev. Williams and the choir boys and many times we went into the Indians' camp."
When the village was in its infancy there was a famous toboggan slide on the hill, the idea of William Saville and Alex Davidson. Mike Cummings built it and into it incorporated a most fiendish kink. The whole town went over this slide; several broken bones resulted. The Strongs had a fine coast from the top of the hill to Beacon Street.
RECOLLECTIONS
FREDERIC A. FROST
My first remembrance of Waban was when my father took me, as a small boy, to the site of the Waban Club House to see a hot-air balloon deflated that had arrived from an agri- cultural fair in Worcester.
My father then pointed out a group of pines he called "the island," near where the Boston Gardening greenhouses are, and said that as a boy he went skating over this flooded meadow. Later a ledge was blasted and the meadow drained.
Where Mr. Childs' house on Windsor Road now stands, a government survey point was placed and a forty-foot mast was erected with three legs to brace it. This was in 1884. Near and beyond the end of Windsor Road was a cellar hole where Moffatt lived for whom the hill was named; also Thompson, who had a large flock of sheep. This man Thompson later moved to the district beyond Newton Center on Boylston Street, now called Thompsonville. A man by the name of Quilty farmed a part of the west side of the hill, and the swamp or wet ground on Brae Burn on the northwest side of the hill was known as Quilty's Swamp.
On Brae Burn, on the southwest side of the hill, is a large mulberry tree, a well and cellar hole. It was here my father's cousin lived; Richardson, I think, was the name. The house stood until seventy-five years ago.
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MOFFATT HILL and the HERMIT
From KING's Handbook of Newton
"From the crest of the gracefully rounded hill, situated among the pastures and groves, one gains a charming view over many tall-spired villages, the picturesque hills of Waltham and Wellesley, bits of the distant Mounts Wachusett and Monadnock, with parts of Boston and the turquoise-tinted Blue Hills of Milton. Thence may be seen also the public buildings at Newton Upper Falls, the spires of the Highlands and the Center, the theological buildings on Institute Hill, the round crest of Waban Hill, the Woodland-Park Hotel and Haskell estate at Woodland (Auburndale), Bear Mountain in Weston, Maugus Hill in Wellesley, Pegan Hill at South Natick, and the tall church of High- landville, down in Needham. The hill rises 223 feet above the sea- level."
The hill had been long called Moffatt Hill, but with scant
reason. Mr. Edward L. Collins of Waban discovered the follow- ing facts about the first settler on this ridge: 'In a conversation with an old resident I learned something of the unknown Moffatt. As near as can be remembered, this Moffatt "squatted," as he expressed it, on the top of the hill that bears his name. He was a very old body, living quite by himself, with the exception of a horse, a cow, and a couple of dogs that occupied the same room in his miserable hut. Moffatt associated with no one, save when he was obliged to buy provisions or some other dire necessity. Indeed, the neighbors knew nothing about him. He was as much of a mystery to them at that time as he is to those of today. As near as my informant remembers, it was some fifty or sixty years ago he lived on the hill.
JOSEPH L. MOFFATT
There is no record of any grant of land to or by him from 1639 to 1846. The only recorded reference to him as owning land in Waban is in a deed from William Wiswell, 2nd, to the inhabitants of Newton for the poor, dated April 17, 1847, in which one of the boundaries is as follows: "thence running North 5 rods, and about 5 links (853/4 ft.) to corner of land owned and improved by Joseph L. Moffatt, thence Easterly and Southeasterly by said Moffatt's land 39 and about 1/4 rods (647.42 ft.) to a stake and stones." Yet less than three months later on July 1, 1847, he conveyed what must have been this same land "owned and improved by Joseph L. Moffatt," to Sarah Smith of New- ton, and which was later acquired by David M. Kinmonth.
CHARLES C. BLANEY
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THE PEST HOUSE
(With the assistance of Mrs. Cotter, Mrs. Coward, Chester Childs, Cyrus Ferris, Ellsbree Locke and others.)
The Pest House sat below the crest of Moffatt Hill on the lower slope, surrounded by apple trees. It was a small, primitive house, originally a dwelling, with beautiful lilacs growing at the door. It was reached by driving in from Beacon Street across the bridge over the railroad at the Hawkes farm and thence through the meadows. The Pest House was run by the city, this acre of the old Scott farm being purchased for the purpose. It had no connection with the hospital at any time, although there may have been some interlocking with the City Farm, the Poor House and the Pest House making a nice com- bination. Presumably the residents of Newton were given a choice and poverty won out by all odds over being classified a pest. At any rate, few recall that the Pest House was over- crowded. The children of Waban were sternly ordered to run like mad whenever in their excursions they neared the property.
When a pest was in residence, they ran up a red flag. Mrs. John Coward (Minnie Locke) says that in her earliest memory of it, it was just an empty old house which was later put to this use, and but once as far as she can recall; that was for a case of smallpox. This was before the Cottage Hospital was built. However, we do know that the George Bartholemew family of West Newton contracted black diphtheria and was brought to the Pest House. Two of the children died and were buried right there on the property. Long ago this tragedy occurred where people knock golf balls about today.
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THE PEST HOUSE
On this sloping hillside there were two houses, about two hundred feet apart, the Pest House and the Quilty house. Next to the Scott farm land whereon stood the Pest House, was the old Bartlett farm. Bridget and Timothy Quilty owned forty- two acres of this land. ' (Later, Mr. Strong bought it from them.) The original Quilty house burned down, then the father and mother and their thirteen children lived in their barn.
Within the memory of many present residents, the Pest House followed suit by burning down, from causes unknown, at exactly midnight on the night before the 4th of July. The year is uncertain, but it was in the middle nineties. The house was unoccupied at the time. The whole town turned out promptly, in fact with suspicious promptness, especially the boys who were lying abed fully clothed - waiting! The populace cheered the late arrival of the Fire Department which added much to the entertainment. Waban had usually cele- brated the night before the Fourth with a most ordinary bonfire. There has always been a singular quietness regarding those who know most about the Pest House fire, but to quote Chester Childs: "The year the Pest House burned it was filled with hay and the fire started from a well-planned plot to dig into the center of the house and then call the Fire Department when it was too late to put it out. The plan was 100% successful. Al- though I was too young to be the instigator, I was wise to the doings and my brother Howard was in the gang. The members of the gang turned up at a party in West Newton when the fire was noticed. I went to the fire, of course, and enjoyed it with a great crowd who all agreed that it was a blessing in disguise."
The cellars of these two old houses are now hazards for the Brae Burn Country Club course; thus the Pest House still remains a hazard!
THE RAYMOND-COTTER HOUSE
This house, known as the Raymond house and now owned by Mary Sullivan Cotter, was built in 1787. It stands now on the section of Fuller Street which curves between Chestnut Street and Commonwealth Avenue, but formerly stood on the corner of Chestnut and Fuller Streets across from the Pine Farm School. The authoress, Lydia Maria Child (Mrs. David Lee Child), boarded in this house and her friend, Harriet Beecher Stowe, used to come to visit her there, "both in search of peace," says King's Handbook of Newton. Mrs. Stowe's brother, Henry Ward Beecher, also frequented this neighborhood. We have been unable to establish the dates when Mrs. Stowe was here. We know, however, that on her seventieth birthday, June 12, 1882, she was royally entertained at the estate of her friend Ex-Governor William Claflin in Newtonville. Mr. Claflin was Governor of Massachusetts from 1869 to 1871. Uncle Tom's Cabin, Mrs. Stowe's most notable work, was written in 1852. She was devoted to the game of croquet, refusing to abandon a game even if overtaken by a heavy shower or by darkness, in which case the game went on by lantern light. She was very fond of pets, loved flowers and birds, which abounded around the Raymond house, and she often painted flowers. One more person to whom Waban meant Peace in those early days.
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THE PINE FARM
"The Home for Boys" was maintained by the Boston Children's Aid Society, a pioneer project which became very well known. It stood at the corner of Chestnut and Homer (now Fuller) Streets and was considered to be in Waban rather than West Newton after Waban became a reality. This farm, embracing twenty-six acres, was established on June 25, 1864, with a dedicatory service "in the grove." It was for the benefit of homeless little waifs who needed reformatory care; many of the boys had run afoul of the police. The school was reputed to have maintained very strict discipline, although the boys were not treated in any way as prisoners and wore no
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