USA > Vermont > Windham County > Rockingham > History of the town of Rockingham, Vermont, including the villages of Bellows Falls, Saxtons River, Rockingham, Cambridgeport and Bartonsville, 1907-1957 with family genealogies > Part 5
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM
tions from state or federal government. It has done, in the almost forty years of its existence, a remarkable job of servicing children's lives all over Vermont and the Bellows Falls office, with its excellent staff of workers, has carried a major share of the load. This office has now been removed to Springfield, Vt.
WOMAN SUFFRAGE
Probably it was Miss Lucy J. C. Daniels of Grafton, Ver- mont, as much as anyone else who brought the unladylike sub- ject of woman suffrage home to local people. In November, 1917, she picketed the White House to protest against the sentence of one Alice Paul, another ardent suffragette although Miss Daniels bravely declared herself "the greatest sinner of them all" and who evidently gloried in it. She wrote at great length in the local papers of her rigorous treatment in the Wash- ington, D. C. jails where her revolutionary tactics landed her but which evidently failed to cool her military ardor as she was again arrested in Boston upon the occasion of Pres. Wilson's arrival from France in 1919. Carrie E. B. Neill of Saxtons River was just as ardently on the other side of the fence from Miss Daniels and they carried on a spirited debate in the TIMES. Such was the feeling which grew in Grafton when she consistently refused to pay her taxes, evidently on the old ground of "taxa- tion without representation," that her home and grounds were damaged on several occasions by irate citizens which drew more outraged letters in the TIMES.
Some states had already seen the light and by 1914, Michi- gan, Kansas, Oregon and Arizona were putting their women on an equal status with men. Susan B. Anthony was crusading for women's rights all over the country and in Vermont women speakers cried that if women must continue to pay taxes, support schools, highways and towns, they should in all fairness, be given the ballot. Because Vermont had not ratified the proposed equal suffrage amendment to the Federal Constitution, one speaker cried that "the present batch of legislators were ignor- ant" as well as various things which she named. She didn't mince words. She insinuated that women could do a better job in Montpelier with both hands tied behind them.
Uneasy sat the legislators in their chairs. Senator Cary of the Capitol City remarked that the govermental halls "were filled with smoke and filth," (perhaps he meant cuspidors) and that "it was no fit place for any woman whose job it was to rock the cradle at home." It was acidly suggested by his female opponents that some women had no cradles to rock but plenty of time in which to use their brains, which, sadly enough, some of the male persuasion seemed to lack. The women of Vermont had gone to bat for equal rights and they didn't begin at the bottom of the ladder.
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM
In Rockingham a meeting was held in the High School at which the Vermont Branch of the Equal Suffrage League was formed with Mrs. Robert Twitchell of Bellows Falls, head of the local group presiding, and Miss Ann Batchelder of New York, noted campaigner for equal suffrage, the first woman to wear slacks it is said, editor of The Delineator and for 21 years until her death at her home in Woodstock, Vt. in 1955 at the age of 73, associate editor of The Ladies' Home Journal, also on the platform. Dr. J. H. Blodgett and Rev. J. L. Clark also spoke in behalf of the women and their rights.
Gov. Clement had vetoed the proposed bill and a New York clergyman, doubtless worried about the future condition of the universe, claimed that women were "attempting to solve the destinies of the world." He added that "many of their children look like tramps and their husbands as if they did not get a square meal once a week." But the women of Vermont went right on working to get 35,000 signatures to a petition to the next legislature. Pres. Wilson was agreeable but two-thirds of the states must ratify the "Susan B. Anthony Amendment." In spite of their resistance, the men must have seen the hand- writing on the wall for as far back as 1909, the Montpelier Journal had remarked that "when the majority of women want the ballot, husbands and fathers will not be slow to grant it." They had heard the old adage, to never under-estimate the power of a woman. In fact this same Amendment had come up before Congress since 1887 but not until the fifth try did it succeed.
While most people looked skeptically at the militants as they marched and counter-marched and waved banners with the new word "suffragette" on them, the majority were in sympathy with the idea and on Aug. 25, 1920, the 19th Amendment was declared ratified. The marching women had achieved their goal. And the first local woman to cast her hard-won vote at the General Election on Nov. 2, 1920, was Mrs. E. A. Pierce, when out of the 808 women on the check list, only 484 had the courage to vote after all.
However, many women became suddenly uninterested if not downright hostile toward their new status when they found that like the men, they were also subject to a poll tax! The listers had a hard time, that first year, ringing door bells, armed with blanks for the new voters to fill out, only to have the doors slammed in their faces. The women were deciding that all that glittered was not gold and that perhaps they were not so interested in voting-to the tune of $5.70! And in 1926 they found still more cause for disillusionment when they had to buy a fishing license to go out in a boat with the men. But that year they were holding many public offices and proving them- selves just as smart as the supposedly superior sex.
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM
In 1914 women had been given the right to vote on school questions-in Kansas it was 1861, the first state to give women the power to vote on anything-with 124 women in Rockingham eligible for that privilege. In 1918 they acquired the right to vote on the liquor question also, a matter on which most local women felt quite strongly since Vermont was notoriously a dry state but that part of New Hampshire at the other end of the Arch Bridge, notoriously moist. But of the 102 women on the check list that year, only 45 took advantage of their opportunity to control the situation. One of the first of these to vote was Mrs. E. Carson Mason, well-known WCTU leader.
The next year 1,512 names were on the check list with still only 45 ladies interested to vote on school and liquor questions but in 1922, with the whole vote finally in their hands, 1,275 women took the Freeman's Oath and went to the polls. They slacked up again in 1924 when only 824 voted in November against 977 men. In 1928 Bellows Falls and Saxtons River had their separate polling places for the first time and out of 2,244 names on the check list out of 2,483 voters in the whole town, only 893 voted. At present there are about 2,500 names on the check list for March meeting, the General Election swelling it to about 3,000 of which women do their share today.
DAYLIGHT SAVING
The annual procedure of pushing the hands of the clock ahead an hour each April and keeping them there until autumn, originated in W. W. I when Germany and England both adopted it as an emergency war measure. Other European countries followed suit and the United States tried it out but repealed the Daylight Saving Act in 1919. Western farmers said they had to use two clocks, one of which kept "God's time and the other Wilson's." They forgot that it was the railroads which initiated standard time in 1883.
The longer daylight hours came into favor again on June 28, 1936, but not until February 9, 1942, when W. W. II reared its ugly head was it made a national institution to save electri- city for defense purposes. It became so popular with its longer evenings that most cities put it into effect each year from the first Sunday in April until the last one in September, although farmers continued to argue that the hay never dried off until ten o'clock no matter what the clock said. In 1954 most New Eng- land towns voted to carry it over until the end of October and Rockingham fell into line. The 1955 Legislature voted the Daylight Saving a state law with the governor empowered to extend the time through October if necessary to coincide with bordering states and this has been done since.
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM THE BLUE LAWS
As far back as 1910 Bellows Falls was getting upset about Sunday violations of what were derisively referred to as the "Blue Laws," the old Puritanical decrees enforced by our an- cestors and first printed on blue paper. The issue was arbitrated off and on for many years until it came to a show-down in 1930. At that time notice was served on several stores who remained open on the Sabbath, that they must hereafter close on that day but no heed was paid to the edict. The trustees insisted that the law prohibited Sunday work of all kinds unless for charity or of necessity. One of the trustees had conferred with the state's attorney and another quoted the village charter which clearly stated that the Board should enforce its bylaws and ordinances without mentioning public statutes. But, he added, this has been tried with no results. So they had called in the state's attorney.
The Board decided to regulate Sunday closing without definitely suppressing it and suggested a meeting of the store- keepers and the Board to lay down closing hours in black and white and the police to secure evidence of any violations. This was it, people said; this would bring things to a head, there would be a showdown now! All of which happened when twenty-six merchants faced violations of the Sunday law and over a hundred people grimly signed a petition against "secular business and employment" on the Sabbath. After all, they said, the law is the law and you cannot get around that old Vermont statue which read that "a person shall not, between 12 p. m. Saturday night and 12 p. m. the following Sunday night, exercise any secular business or employment except for works of necessity and charity nor engage in any play, game, sport or entertainment during such hours at which admission is taken or for which any compensation is received directly or indirectly or which disturbs the public peace. A person who violates the provisions of this section shall be fined not more than $50 for each offense."
So one minute after midnight on Sunday morning of December 5, the police went into action, stopping truck drivers who were passing through town and arresting paper mill em- ployees and filling station operators, store owners and car drivers. About all that was lacking was a tithing man to patrol the roads and arrest anyone who profaned the Sabbath by walking abroad without a good excuse. There were 68 violators on that day and Bellows Falls was once more thrown violently onto the front page of the nation's newspapers as the whole country watched.
On top of it all, three of the Pilgrim Fathers turned out again, to march grimly to church, carrying out another old statute which required all men to bear a musket to divine serv-
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM
ice together with seven rounds of ammunition. They were Robert Ashcroft, Francis Clark and Dan Thompson. A few Indians to shoot at would have been the finishing touch to the masquerade. If the people wanted the Blue Laws upheld, let them all be upheld!
A test case was made of two offenders in the Brattleboro court. Raymond Kiniry, manager of the offending Sunday movies, was acquitted by the jury in 13 minutes. The Hart- ford, Conn., radio station dramatized the whole business but an attempt to broadcast the situation over a national hook- up was thwarted by Attorney A. T. Bolles who felt that the town had had enough notoriety. State's Attorney Berry announced the old laws unenforcible in this day and age and at the next session of the Legislature, the statute was changed and Rockingham again faded from the limelight. But theaters remained under the ban and again in 1938, in spite of fines and costs of $159.80, they opened to capacity crowds on Sunday nights. The next year the town voted for Sunday activities and just twenty-five years after the first furor, the state also allowed Sunday movie matinees to begin in 1956, as well as evening shows. While today practically no shops remain open on Sunday and drug stores have Sunday hours, occasionally the old Blue Law raises its head again as in Brattleboro in 1955.
But the old laws pertaining to Sunday baseball were still unsettled in 1915 when they came to a climax and were brought sharply to the attention of state and nation. The new Twin- State Baseball League, including Newport and Bellows Falls in Vermont and Claremont and Keene in New Hampshire, and which succeeded the old League organized in 1911 under Herbert Morse, hankered to have some Sunday ball and a meeting was held in Banquet Hall to vote on the controversial issue. There was much spirited discussion pro and con since Sec. 5995 of Vermont Law prohibited such things as baseball, golf, etc. on the Lord's Day.
Many prominent men spoke their views at this meeting, some very decidedly, some evidently uncertain of where all this would lead and of just where they should stand. Among these latter was E. L. Walker who said he was surprised at the attitudes taken by various business men whom he was sure would veto it and vise versa. No one seemed to act according to expecta- tions. Probably they all enjoyed a ball game on any day but were afraid to say so. Mr. Walker insisted that those who supported it morally should also do so financially.
W. C. Belknap got to his feet to say that baseball in your own backyard and baseball at Barber's Park, with paid ad- missions, were two different things. W. E. Stockwell, for many years superintendent of the Baptist Sunday School, denounced it because "it just didn't seem the right thing to do." Finally
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM
it was put to the vote, no boys under 18 eligible to ballot and the result was uproariously in favor of Sunday ball, 80-13.
Immediately things began to hum. One out-raged citizen of Saxtons River wrote to the Brattleboro Reformer that that village was taking steps to proceed legally against the law breakers of their sister village. State's Atty. Orrin Hughes said that he had heard complaints but wasn't worried that there would really be any ball games. Some folks thought Bellows Falls and Saxtons River should settle their squabbles among themselves without forcing the state to spend money on them. At a Sunday service in the virtuous village of Saxtons River, church-goers who opposed Sunday ball were asked to stand. Every- one stood up. Saxtons River was going to be its brothers'keeper.
But the baseball team stuck to its guns and played two games as scheduled, the first one at the Park on an August Sunday in 1915. But they did not charge any admission, no tickets or score cards were sold. It was a field day for small boys and every street car was filled and 150 cars parked nearby as 1100 people broke the law to see Bellows Falls trim Claremont, 11-1. But Saxtons River wrote to the Governor who was obliged to instruct Atty. Hughes to prosecute, and Manager Crowther was found guilty by jury and fined $2 and costs of $25.
Then J. H. Blakely, a staunch supporter of the League, got his dander up which meant that the fur would fly. He sat down and wrote a letter also to the Governor, too, a letter of indigna- tion, suggesting that he start cleaning house nearer home. He suggested blandly that His Honor investigate the popular Brattleboro golf links which were altogether too near Atty. Hughes' own home and which enjoyed a wide Sunday clientel. He added that if baseball was under the ban, so, too was golf and fruit and drug stores, livery stables and garages. The Governor said that he would be glad to run down and look at the golf links in Brattleboro. It is not recorded whether or not he was fond of golf. The Saxtons River church did not hold its annual Sunday School picnic at the Park that year; it repaired in dignity to the grounds of Vermont Academy. A TIMES editorial, with tongue in cheek, said that now the Baseball League had only joined the other law breakers, the railroads, fruit stands-Patsy Baldasaro did a thriving Sunday business- garages and every place which helped to keep the world moving- and enjoying itself-on Sunday. However, the Twin-State League died a natural death the next year and whether it was cause and effect, history does not say. But conscientiously, the High School that year of 1915, banned all raffles and games of chance at their annual Senior Bazaar which raised money toward the seniors' spring trip to Washington, D. C. Maybe the seniors of 1915 got the worst of the deal; at any rate, it cost them more to visit the White House than previous classes.
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM DEPRESSION YEARS AND CCC CAMP
In 1929, following a period of inflation, the stock market crashed and many investors lost their money. Credit suffered and false values were created. There was loss of faith in insti- tutions and leaders, resulting in low national morale. There was over-expansion in agriculture, industry and capitol; surplus credit, decline of interest and trade, accompanied by political unrest. These are known as the Depression Years, a world- wide condition that President Hoover could not prevent in this country. The years of economic disturbances lasted from 1933 to 1940 and had their counterpart in the sphere of money. In the industrial nations of the world, unemployment rose to an all-time high (Numismatic Scrapbook Magazine, Oct. 20, 1955, p. 1519.) Between 1929 and 1932 the national income declined by more than 50% in money. In 1933 came the bank holiday when banks were forced to close for a number of days during the economic crisis.
In Rockingham, as everywhere, jobs were scarce, banks declared a holiday and in one month of 1932, there were 150 "knights of the road" lodged in the local jail. The same year four teachers were dropped from the payroll with further cuts pending and in 1936 those still on the staff couldn't draw any pay until after town meeting and a new appropriation.
In Morgan's Field gardens were again planted as in the War, the government providing the seed which was distributed by Mrs. Thomas (Judge) O'Brien who also conducted a canning kitchen in the Methodist church basement. About 1,500 tins of food were put up for relief work besides those canned for personal use. In 1938 many needy families received butter and potatoes, wheat flour and dry skimmed milk from the Federal Government through the office of the Town Manager. Used furniture was also picked up by town trucks for these people.
In the Oak Street Fire Station, a WPA sewing project (WPA for Works Projects Administration, established in 1935 by Pres. Roosevelt when national unemployment was wide- spread) employed an average of 12 women who made garments for Rockingham families. In one year, 1937-38, 4,036 garments were made, received ready-cut from central cutting rooms in Montpelier. Women brought their own sewing machines and the town paid half the cost of materials and furnished all "find- ings" such as buttons, thread and tape. At this time lack of funds forced people to enjoyment of inexpensive pastimes and such amusements as sewing, gardening and landscape planting became popular in Rockingham as in communities everywhere.
It was during the Depression Years that the CCC camps sprang up across the country, in a make-work program which initiated many city boys into the mysteries of the country as
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HISTORY OF ROCKINGHAM
they opened mountain areas to the public by building roads and picnic spots, learned pest control and vocations in the field of arts and crafts.
Although in the town of Westminster, the Civilian Conserva- tion Corps there was closely connected with Rockingham as the town had purchased the land in Westminster for a gravel pit in 1927, the site of the former John K. Thayer home which had been sold and burned shortly before. With mixed feelings, Bellows Falls watched the arrival of the CCC boys in 1933.
The new camp was known as the Wilgus Camp after Col. Wilgus of Ascutneyville, builder of the New York Central Rail- road station and other well known buildings. In this camp the boys were employed amost entirely on the pest control jobs of white pine blister rust and gypsy moth under the Forestry Serv- ice, differing in this work from most CCC camps. The territory immediately surrounding the camp for a distance of two miles was the most heavily infested in the state and provided excellent training after which the boys worked in forests 14 to 20 miles away. In the Westminster area alone, 55,000 gypsy moth egg clusters were destroyed in one winter by creosoting egg masses on tree trunks and trapping caterpillars under burlap sacks on shade trees. Today airplanes spray and dust local woodlands to kill the worms which arrived here accidently from Europe in 1869.
The boys came to Camp Wilgus that first summer, 185 strong from Massachusetts, for a six-month period on a special train from Fort Devens and were carried out to the camp in trucks and buses. Second Lt. Freeman Bigelow of Bellows Falls was an officer in charge and the boys lived in tents until permanent buildings were erected.
People differed in their reactions toward the camp. Many felt that it served a good purpose and their relations were friendly. But some decided that the camp was too near Bellows Falls for the good of its young people, a result of some unpleasant ex- periences. So in January, 1936, it was announced that, in the face of public opinion, the camp would be closed as of the next April and the boys moved to Waterbury, Vermont. But when April came, the boys were still here with extra men from Bethel making 170 inmates.
In 1939 the sixth anniversary of the Corps was celebrated throughout the country. At the local camp, open house on Saturday, April 8, was held with an exhibit of arts and crafts and a complete display of the Blister Rust and Gypsy Moth Control by the Forestry Service. A program open to the public was held from one to four p. m. with Gov. Aiken invited and a grand parade of officers of state and national CCC. All the boys were nattily attired in their olive-drab uniforms and the new buildings were open for inspection. This was the year
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following the hurricane and the boys had been a Godsend as they cleaned up the forests and re-opened the roads after the storm. The down timber in the woods had, however, let the gypsy moths get another head start and the next year, many hills began to show the brown of deforestation as they did again in 1953.
Early in 1940 a vocational school was planned for the boys where many crafts and trades could be learned such as aviation, transportation, mechanical and electrical work. The seventh birthday of the Corps was celebrated April 14, 1940, part of which included a picnic at Dutton Pines near Brattleboro, a recreation area which the boys had developed and opened and which is still in use although many of the mountain areas opened by them with picnic and camping facilities, have fallen into disuse. On this day, local citizens co-operated with camp officials to make it a big affair. An advisory group of business men was formed to help the boys with information on various occupations. In April, 1941, with war looming large on the horizon, the camp was discontinued. The next year the town granted the Forestry Service permission to allow the Army Engineers and Military Police to use the buildings which they did for about a year but in 1943, Byron Robinson, acting for the town, accepted the 20 buildings, now again empty. The offer was made by the Federal Security Agency through the United States Representative Charles A. Plumley. Unless accepted, the buildings, then in charge of Percy Muzzey, care- taker, would be torn down.
In 1944, 30 acres of land and some buildings were sold to Cassius Wilson, Sr. for $7,500 who sold 15 acres to the Elks for a recreational center for children's outings as well as their own. Wooden bowls are made there today with R. S. Wilson in charge.
RED CROSS
The Red Cross is a National Organization chartered by Congress and whose Honorable President is the President of the United States. In order to keep its charter, each Chapter must work for two projects, Home Service and Disaster Relief. The Rockingham Chapter, consisting of Saxtons River, Old Town, Brockways Mills, Westminster, Westminster West and North Westminster, did not function as such until 1923 when it was organized by Clayton Erwin, superintendent of schools. Pre- viously it had held the position of a branch of the Brattleboro Chapter. However it had a membership of 2,000 at the close of W. W. I. One of the founders of the first branch was Mrs. George Guild who was in charge of surgical dressings. In 1929 the Chapter held artificial respiration classes and in 1932 it ran swimming classes under Mrs. Harry Reed with an instructor
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