Friday, December 24, 2010

My (Former) Little Town

Without fail, around Christmas for the whole 43 years of our marriage, Walter Zepka of Zepka Florists would call at 7 or 8 at night and ask for Alexandra Zabek. Sandy would come to the phone.

"Alexandra do you want poinsettias at St. Stan's midnight mass in memory of your Dad, Jimmy Zabek?"

She always answered, "tak, dobry dobry," and then dziekuje (yes and thank you) gin koo yah. You always say good twice. I don't know why. I am only one half Polish.

"How are you?"
"Dobry, dobry."

Zepka's closed this year. I know because we never got that phone call. Sandy's cousin Joan Brodalski confirmed it when she sent us the little newspaper clipping stating that after 101 years, Zepka's was no more.

Here is a photo that our son in law, Chris Bernstein, took of Saint Stanislaus Kostka Church. You called it the Polish church if you were from the little town of Adams, Massachusetts.

Monday, December 6, 2010

The Sharp Shinned Hawk



Never seen one? It is a hawk with short wings and long tails. 10-14 inches. Blue Jay-size, but thinner. A larger, rarer, Coopers Hawk has a rounded tail tip.

Last winter a sharp-shinned flew into a large window of our sunroom. Otherwise I would never have seen one. They are quite beautiful.

Range: Alaska; MacKenzie, British Columbia; and Newfoundland. Newfoundland -- I was there once for two weeks, climbing telephone poles and running telephone lines with the Seabees. Also sharp-shinned hawks can be found south to Florida and northern Mexico. Don't you find that amazing?

I saw one again today as I was cutting wood in the front of the house. It preys on warblers and sparrows, small rodents and insects. It flies low and rapido. Like five-feet-or-so low. The sparrows were chirping away, so I guess he was after them. He landed for a few seconds in a large rhododendron that our neighbor Teddy and grandson Abel call “The Sloth Cabin.” He had no luck today.

Sharp-shinned hawks are intolerant of civilization and have become scarce as breeding birds in more settled areas.

The Wampanoags said that when you see a special animal, you will be blessed for that day -- and I was. It was a good day. A really good day.

Friday, November 19, 2010

Russell Rene Roulier

Here is a photo of him.



This photograph made my mind reach back fifty six years to 1954, when I was nine. Growing up in extreme western Massachusetts was wonderful. Right or wrong, all of our parents let us run pretty wild. Loose reins as my grandfather Frank would say. I was sort of the leader of a small band of boys, mostly because I was the oldest. There was Michael Burke, John Louis Lawson, my brother (three years younger) Mike Bacon, Bobby Gamache (called Little Bobby, as I was Big Bobby) and Russ Roulier.

As a teenager, Russell really looked a lot like Elvis.


(Left to right: John Louie, Russ, Michael Burke, Mike Bacon)

John Louis lived two houses north of us. They rented. Most people in Adams did. No one thought anything of it. His mother, who was from Belgium and spoke with an accent, would call out to him, “John Louie, come here, dinner!”

I remember my mother saying, “Go holler for your brother.” No one hollers for you any more.

They were the first family that I knew that had a television. I would go there occasionally -- climb to the second floor, knock on the door, and ask Mrs. Lawson if I could watch their TV. I thought nothing of it. She would always say yes.

We received our TV signal from Albany, New York, and we needed large outside antennas. I remember being hooked on the “Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color” television shows especially. The Lawsons’ TV was black and white -- and being in a valley, the reception was lousy. Remember SNOW and the picture going sideways?

“When Knighthood Was in Flower” was my favorite. By the time Superman came to television all the families had their own TVs. Or so it seemed. I have no idea how or why I remember that, but when I saw the photo of Elvis Presley everything came back to me clearly. Google will back me up that I have the years correct.



Now you have to wonder what my parents were thinking when I would disappear for hours at a time. I don't know. They would not think twice about letting us load up our gear and camp for the night in the foothills beyond Gamache's cow pastures, near the old Georgia Marble Company. You know where I mean -- off of old Columbia Street. People from Zylonite referred to it only as “the back road.” I wonder if the spring is still ther? Zylonite was a plastic that was produced there with the help of the Hoosac River, which ran through Adams. This part of town, full of mostly first- and second-generation Italian families, came to call this section Zylonite. It’s funny, but none of the small group of boys I ran with were Italian. But the boys my age had last names such as Bongiolatti, Smachetti, Ballardini, Dellagelffa, Volpe, Tomasini, Malioni, Monchecci, Carnazola, Chicceti, Sondrini, and Bianchi. These original families all came from north of Pisa to work the limestone quarries and they still do to this day.

We boys, all around the age of ten, would set up camp beyond Split Rock, to the north of the old quarry. We would return home in the morning and I do not remember anyone asking us anything about our night in the woods. I know for sure that they never checked on us. That’s just how it was.

After grade school, in the cold snowy winters of Berkshire county, we would cut through Gamache’s farm, past the haystacks, and walk up to Georgia Marble on the old white limestone road, then slide down it on our Flexible Flyer sleds. No one ever said after school, "I'll meet you there." We just did. It was a long walk up, and at the most you could only get in two slides. Then it was a long, snowy walk back in the dark, along the path that you cut earlier on the snow-covered pasture to Mom's warm kitchen for a nice hot supper.



There were no streetlights on the back road. It was a long, snow-lit walk past Gamache's farmhouse lights to finally reach home. It could be especially long if the wind was blowing down Mount Greylock via the Thunderbolt Trail. We would leave our wet clothes and boots on the front, unheated porch. If we forgot to bring them in later, they would be frozen as hard as boards in the morning. I recall that sometimes we couldn't get our boots off because of the ice-covered laces. Before supper Mom would always have a shot of grappa ready for her boys. OK, so I made that part up. I didn't know if you were still following the story or not.

We played pick up baseball. You would just show up in the summer at the ballfield behind the Howland Avenue school and play. It was always hardball. Boy did we have fun! We also played War.


(That's John Louie's house to the right.)

Adams is very much a fishing and hunting town. John Louis’s father and grandfather were French Canadien AYE! You could always tell when it was deer season. Dad put a picture window into the north side of our house and from it you could see the deer hanging off the clotheslines of the Lawsons’ yard, two houses away. Playing War, we would dress ourselves in the World War II helmets and canteens of our fathers and uncles, carry toy rifles and backpacks, and go at night to the swamp near the back road. We would crawl up the dry ditch that ran under Howland Avenue and pretend we were on patrol.

Forward to June 21 1967, Quang Nam, South Vietnam.

A message was left on the Vietnam Memorial Wall. It was from Wayne Gregory who called himself "A Marine Brother In Arms."

“Russell was an M-60 machine gunner. We were together on this hill in Quang Nam when he was killed in action. Russell was an outstanding Marine, handsome sort, quiet and intelligent. We were attacked in the early morning hours under the cover of darkness and Russell's gun hole was out on the flank. He is remembered and respectfully loved by his fellow Marines.”

When looking up Russell's name on the wall I found these additional facts.

The largest per capita loss of any town in the United States was Beallsville, Ohio --population 475. Six young men killed.

Highest state casualties: West Virginia with 711.

The Marines of Morena -- They led some of the scrappiest high school and basketball teams that the little copper town of Morena (population 5,058) had ever known and cheered, in the state of Arizona. They enjoyed roaring beer busts. In quieter moments, they rode horses along the Coronado Trail, stalked deer in the Apache National Forest and in the patriotic camaraderie typical of Morena's mining family; the nine graduates of Morena High School enlisted as a group in the Marine Corp. Their service began on Independence Day 1966. Only three returned home.

Robert Dale Draper, 19, was killed in an ambush.

Stan King, 21, was killed less than a week after he reached Vietnam.

Alfred Van Whitmer, 21, was killed while on patrol.

Larry J. West, 19, was shot and killed near Quang Nam.

Jose Moncayo, 22, was part of an entire platoon that was wiped out.

Clive Garcia, 22, was killed by a booby trap while leading a patrol.


The youngest American soldier killed was Dan Bullock at age 15.

The high school with the highest number of casualties: Thomas Edison High School in Philadelphia -- 54

The oldest, Dwaine McGriff at 63.

Killed on their very first day: 997

Killed on their last day: 1448

Most casualties in a single day: January 31, 1968 -- 245

Number of brother (pairs or more) killed: 38

Number of fathers and son pairs killed: 3


Chiseled on the Vietnam War Memorial is this:

RUSSELL RENE ROULIER MC CPL E4
BORN December 16, 1946.
DIED JUNE 21, 1967 QUANG NAM, SOUTH VIETNAM
HOSTILE, GROUND CASUALTY, EXPLOSIVE DEVICE
BODY WAS RECOVERED
PANEL 22E - LINE 33


And this is on the Virtual Wall at http://www.virtualwall.org

Russell Rene Roulier
Corporal

PERSONAL DATA
Home of Record: Adams, Massachusetts
Date of birth: Monday, 12/16/1946

MILITARY DATA
Service: Marine Corps (Regular)
Grade at loss: E4
Rank: Corporal
ID No: 2221013
MOS: 0351 Antitank Assaultman
LenSvc: Between 1 and 2 years
Unit: K CO, 3RD BN, 7TH MARINES, 1ST MARDIV

CASUALTY DATA
Start Tour: Not recorded
Cas Date: Wednesday, 06/21/1967
Age at Loss: 20
Remains: Body Recovered
Location: Quang Nam, South Vietnam
Type: Hostile, Died
Reason: Other Explosive Device - Ground Casualty

ON THE WALL Panel 22E Line 033

Sadly, there is no photo.

My boyhood friend, Russell, was the only young man from Adams, Massachusetts to die in Vietnam.

POST SCRIPT:

From Facebook: Lorraine sent you a message.

January 11, 2011 at 3:45pm

Subject: Bob from Adams, MA?

If you are the Bob bacon from Adams who has a blog then this will be relevant-if not please disregard. A friend who is in Africa right now came upon your blog and sent it to me-it was the one about Zepka's and then Russ Roulier. Russ was not the only young man to die in Vietnam from Adams. Here is a link to the town's veterans was dead.

http://www.facebook.com/l/6c3cfAz8kdTB9GrqiCYB5du6k8A;www.town.adams.ma.us/Public_Documents/AdamsMA_Veterans/warlist

The website lists two other Vietnam War casualties from Adams, Massachusetts:
Robert T Goyette
John R. Hartlage, III

I obtained the casualty information off THE WALL in Washington D.C. website and obviously according to Lorraine K. of Adams and the public records of Adams Massachusetts it is incorrect. So the story is even sadder.

From a friend in AFRICA ? You can't make this st ...... There has to be a connection with Joy Sylvester who just got there recently.

That Adams public records web site says 19 men from Adams died during the Civil War.

Monday, November 1, 2010

The Ancient Path


If you leave our casa and take a right you will come to the Old Colony Railroad bed. There are no rails left, but occasionally I will find a railroad spike. The last time a train ran here was 1939. Founded in 1844, it ran from Provincetown to Boston. If they decided to relay the tracks, they would go right through my casita, behind the swimming pool.

Walk straight, all the way to the end of the roadway/railway, and you will hit Careswell Street. Careswell was the name of the house that was built in 1699 on the present Careswell Street by Isaac Winslow, the grandson first governor of Massachusetts. The house still stands.



Local legend says that this cottage on Careswell Street belonged to a train conductor. A local historian confirms this. H. Delano lived there in 1879. But was he the railroad conductor?



Philipe Delano  (1603-1681) came to Plymouth aboard the Fortune in 1621, as a 16-year-old servant for someone on that wooden ship. Eventually he was given the land that the current Duxbury High School is on. He did well in his new country. His son married John and Priscilla Alden's daughter, Mary. The name Delano is of French origin.

At the end of the railroad bed/trail is Long Tom's Pond.



Did it get its name from a slave or freed man from the Winslow, Thomas or even Webster house? I don't know, and neither does Google.



The photo above shows Black Tom Pond on the right, and a cut-off, smaller pond on the left. It also shows how much they had to fill to make a railroad bed. This was way before bulldozers -- or as my grandson used to say, “Bull Sodas.” This little pond is where I see tons of turtles sunning themselves on old logs . . . and the only place where I saw a beautiful green heron . . . but only once.



Crossing the trail I walk is the Pilgrim Trail, signified by granite markers.





It ran from the Plimouth (not sic) Colony to Greens Harbour (not sic again), which was named for the First Mate of the ship Mayflower, William Greene. He fished here and ran a sea salt business.





The Pilgrim Trail goes over the hill and down through a neighborhood area named Wampanoag Woods -- which is indeed where the native tribes camped while fishing at Brant Rock during the summers. As the crow flies, it is only one mile to the beaches. Carbon tests from their ancient campfires confirm the fact that they camped there.


Above, Wampanoags from Cape Cod playing drums at a pow wow at the Marshfield Fairgrounds. The bare chested drummer told me his great grandfather taught him how to play and they are keeping the tradition going.

The French explorer Samuel de Champlain noted the natives fishing off the Gurnet in their dug-out canoes in 1605. The North River, close by, is where archeologists have found many such campsites. They were always situated on the south side of the river, to take advantage of the sun. Hundreds of years ago, the North River was a major travel route, just like Route 3 is now. This waterway still can take you all the way to Taunton.

I own some arrowheads and even a spearhead taken from swimming pool excavations nearby.



I started running on the railroad bed in 1977. It was the first running mile of a 10 to 30 mile training run. Now I walk. I hike the trails off the railroad bed. I find the pine needles way easier on my legs than the 54,00 miles of blacktop and concrete that I ran on for 23 years. I try to walk every day for an hour and a half. Freshly falling snow might be the best time to be out there.

On my walks I have encountered owls, hawks, turkeys, swans, ravens, a green heron, and a great blue heron.









Plus turtles (painted, box and snapping), geese, raccoons, bald truck tires, coyote, opossum, skunk, muskrats, fox and deer -- and even a human suicide. It is a full story on its own.

I haven't seen a fisher cat yet. But I know they are out there.



My trapper friend called the other night. He asked a simple question. Do I see any raccoons along the side of the road lately? “Gee I haven't.” That is because the fisher cats are killing them. In 2009 he trapped 20 fisher cats. In 2010 he trapped 40. Who knew?

Someone dammed up a stream for the deer to drink without being disturbed. It is working. One day I watched them drink for a long time. The wind was right and they never heard or smelled me. Almost always they do, and bound away.



Above, my favorite view from the trail. This waterway is actually the Green Harbor River, where it forms a pond adjacent to a cranberry bog. The river runs into Marshfield from Duxbury, then under Webster Street and finally into Green's Harbour and the Atlantic. It is here that I see the swans and the great blues, and the beautiful sunsets.

I burn firewood in the winter to heat the house. You can take the boy out of Adams, but you can't totally take the Adams out of the boy. This year I didn't know where I would get my wood. I have never bought a cord 8x8x4 ever.

The trails are covered with rock-hard dead wood, both on the ground and standing. Initially I took my chain saw into the woods, only to clear the downed trees on the path. If it was 1600, and a tree was marked with the King of England's stamp, I could not cut it, for that tree was to be saved to build the King's ships. If, however, the wind knocked down that same tree, I could take it as " a windfall.”

Eventually I came up with an idea -- to walk the paths and cut the old oak trees into 6 foot lengths. On every walk, I carry one down to the side of the railroad bed and leave it there in a pile. Luckily, no one has seen me carrying a 6 foot log through the woods yet.

Today I drove my pickup truck to the pile 5 times, and here is the result.



There are about 130 logs in this pile, but I still need to go back for more loads -- but not today. I had help unloading them as you can see.





Abel loves to help me work, and he is a really hard worker. A different Abe said you get warm twice with the same wood -- once when you saw it, and again when you burn it. I would add another number to that, for my carrying the logs out.

Stop over sometime and we will have a drink of tea or maybe even a margarita in our living room . . . and don't bother to bring a sweater.

Who said I couldn't handle retirement?

Snow will soon put an end to my hiking with running shoes, but the winter also means snow shoeing the trail -- and I look forward to that.

Guided tours available -- late Saturdays and Sundays.


P. S.

The area has been surveyed. You can see the red and blue markers in the trees and on the bushes. I have been thinking that someone bought the land and will soon develop it.

Occasionally people will ask me, “Who owns the land?” At Marshfield Town Hall this morning, I discovered that this whole area (15 acres) is called Sweet's Hill, and that the town recently purchased it for $400,000, to protect the drinking water wells. No one can ever build here, forever. Hooray!

--



Years ago Randy Adams and his wife Donna Jean and I ran thousands of miles together. Recently Randy and I have started walking. The Adamses live on Duck Hill Lane. The old railroad bed is a stone's throw to Duck Hill Lane. This week I noticed that the very first Cape Cod style house on that street has a date of 1695. The old Winslow House just down the street on Careswell has a 1699 date. Interesting! So I Googled it.

The name of the 1695 house is John Rouse Jr. John Rouse Sr. was a Pilgrim descendent and was a servant of Governor Prence. He married Anna Pabodie. That doesn't sound like a Pilgrim name, does it? Junior married Mary Rogers of Marshfield in 1656. He was born in 1643. His tombstone says that he died in 1717 but the historian who researched this believes that the birth date is an incorrect date unless he was married at 13. What did he do for a living? Did they have children? Where are they buried?

The house, recently renovated, sold for $325,000. The balance of the houses on that same street are probably $1,000,000.

So who was Governor Thomas Prence? Well he was the fourth (1634), eighth (1638) and twelfth (1657) governor of Massachusetts. He came to Plimoth Colony just after the very first Thanksgiving, aboard the sailing ship Fortune. He co-founded the Cape Cod town of Eastham. His first wife was a daughter of Elder Brewster of the ship Mayflower. And to top it off, he gave Massasoit's sons Wamsutta and Pometacom their English names, Alexander and Philip (of the very famous King Philip's War). Massasoit the Wampanoag Indian Chief is known to have visited the Winslow house on Careswell Street.

Oh do you want to know some of the Governor's descendants? Bing Crosby, Sarah Palin, the Wright brothers and Taylor Swift. WOW!

--

The Old Colony Railroad was built in 1871. Eight trains a day ran through our back yard. Exactly where the casita sits.

The hurricane of 1937 took out the causeway over the North River. A year later the Old Colony shut down the section from Marshfield to Duxbury. It was deemed too expensive to build over the North River again. The railroad track path still runs along the west side of the CVS parking lot on Route 139 and stops at the North River looking out at Scituate. The main station in Marshfield Center was about where the Dairy Queen on Webster Street stands today.

WWII saw an upswing of business at the Hingham and Cohasset Ammunition Dumps. Sandy's father was stationed at Hingham for a while in the 1940s. I maintained the lights on the water towers in Hingham and Cohasset from 1966-1968 from the Naval Air Station South Weymouth.

The finishing of the Southeast Expressway in 1959 cut deeply into train ridership. Later Route 3 to the Cape did even more damage.

I have been kicking up old railroad spikes for years. Today on my walk I kicked up another piece of coal. The Old Colony trains ran on it until diesel came along. So that piece of coal is at least seventy years old and maybe even one hundred and thirty three.

In the 2010s you can once again take the train into Boston. Ridership is on the upswing.

p.s.

On December 2nd 2015 I came across a 1879 map of Marshfield. Of course at that time there were no houses in the Blackmount area where we built our house in 1972.

Seth Peterson’s land was marked. It eventually turned into a curvy street called Peterson Path. He was Webster’s handy man and hunting partner. On Webster street it showed Daniel Webster’s house and the opera singer Adelaide Phillip's and of course the Winslow house of 1699. Somehow I knew that the house pictured above (way, way above) was the Old Colony Railroad’s conductors house.

What I didn’t know was where this railroad bed hits Careswell Street, to the right heading south towards Duxbury, there was a railroad station and it was called, according to this map, Webster Place Depot. I said to Sandy, “Why would they call it Webster Place? The Winslow house is closer." She said, "But the railroad ran through Webster’s land," . . .  which it does. I wonder if any photos exist
of this building . . .

A woman living next to where this railroad station originally sat told me that this railroad house was moved to 89 Moraine Street but there is NO 89 Moraine Street in Marshfield. I took a photo of a house that was basically on the same street, just over the Marshfield/Duxbury line, on Enterprise Street in Duxbury, but it doesn't match either of the original photos.

I called the real estate agent who is selling the house at the bottom of Duck Hill Lane. She knew nothing of the history of the house, including that maybe it was the train conductor's house. Who told me that it was?

There are two photos above. Both have horse-and-buggies in them. The building sat at the corner of Careswell Street and the railroad bed heading north. A very small house sits there now, but not exactly in the same spot. The railroad bed looks the same today except it has no rails or railroad ties.

I now own a map of Marshfield circa 1879. It shows that that railroad house was called Webster Place Station. It was the most southern of the five train stations in Marshfield. The largest station sat at the current skate park near Dairy Queen on Webster Street (no cigar if you guessed it was where the DQ stands). It closed down in 1939. (The Old Colony Railroad was built here six years after the Civil War.) If you drive up South Point Lane in Marshfield, to the right of that house, you can clearly see where the Old Colony train tracks ran. (South Point Lane is the newer street straight across from where the Webster Place Depot stood.)

The next station south of Marshfield was near the present-day FarFar's Danish Ice Cream Store. The train through Duxbury came out on the left side of the FarFar's building, if you're looking at it from St. George Street. Today there is a sign that reads PRIVATE. Right across the street is Railroad Avenue. The town historian said that the train went right by John and Priscilla Alden "speak for yourself" house. A little Myles Standish history.

The train traveled from Rockland, through Abington, Hanson, Plympton, and Kingston, then to Duxbury. People used it to get to all the Green Harbor hotels on the Atlantic, to day-trip or vacation. The Fairview Inn & Restaurant, which just closed, was the last of the grand hotels.

But how did travelers get to Green Harbor? To go from the Webster Place Depot to Green Harbor years ago you would have had to pass through the marsh of Duxbury Bay. Daniel Webster paid to have Careswell Street filled in, to be used as a road, which is probably why the depot is named after him. The land was filled in way before the depot was built. When winter starts, you can see into the woods where the workers got the landfill.

So many people traveled to Green’s Harbour then that most folks referred to the station as Green Harbor Station. Green of course being for William Green first mate on a ship called Mayflower.

The train ran right behind where my swimming pool currently sits. When I am sitting on my boat dock, if the wind is from the west, I can hear the trains whistle from the new Kingston Station as they pull out. It is an electric train, not like the old one run by coal and steam. I still kick up railroad spikes and sometimes I find pieces of coal when I walk the line. Isn’t this history all fascinating ?

Glory B

From: ROBT BACON
Date: October 6, 2010 7:48:51 PM EDT
To: David Chapman
Subject: Glory b.

Hi David,

My daughter Marnie was so happy to meet you in the Berkshires recently.

As you do, I also have an interest in the Civil War, but Marnie may have overstated mine. I have only been to two civil war battle sites -- once to Gettysburg and twice to Manassas or Bull Run.

Reading Killer Angels certainly set me off.


A tour of Gettysburg by a friend from Pennsylvania clinched the deal. The fact that a friend from Connecticut does tours there didn't hurt either.

I have read quite a few books on the subject, especially biographies or autobiographies, or some simply on particular places.



Stonewall Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Diaries, Balls Bluff, Mount Vernon, Lee's Arlington house, Savannah, John Mosby, Fort Sumter from Charleston, Fort Pulaski, scores of books on General George Armstrong Custer (he married Libby Bacon), Booth, Kit Carson, Robert E. Lee and Nathan Bedford Forest.

I have visited the house where General Grant died. It is in upper New York State. And Ford’s Theatre, where Lincoln met his end. Also I went to Joshua Chamberlain’s house in Maine.

Do you remember in the movie Gettysburg, where at the end of Little Round Top, Chamberlain holds his sword to the neck of one of General Oates’ officers of Alabama -- for his surrender – at the same time as that officer pulls the trigger pointed at Chamberlain’s head . . . but his pistol is empty?



Later in life, that officer actually visited with Chamberlain at his home in Brunswick, Maine. How weird is that? Mrs. Chamberlain found out that her husband had joined the Union army by reading it in the local newspaper.

In my reading pile, I have General A.P. Hill's book by James I Robertson Jr.



and Gettysburg Requiem, about the life of William C. Oates.



Oh, and then there was The Civil War by Ken Burns.



Wow. My daughter Kezia graduated from the same college as him, Hampshire, in Amherst, Massachusetts.

I have a blog post that I have just finished. I will send it along to you.

Any interest in the French and Indian War or the Revolutionary War?



I have read: The Battle of Brooklyn, Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, Paul Revere, Andrew Jackson, Robert Rogers of Rogers’ Rangers, Sam Adams, John Hancock Brown brothers, Sons of Providence, Jesse James, poetry by L. Cohen, Brooklyn Was, 1776 , . . . to name a few. I have been to Saratoga, General Philip Schuyler's house in Schuylerville, New York (one of his daughters married Hamilton). Martin Van Buren's house, also in New York. Bunker Hill and Valley Forge, Fort Anne, Fort William Henry, Glorietta Pass, Little Big Horn and Fort Ticonderoga.

Living near Boston we have done Abigail and John's house tours a couple of times.



Lexington and Concord, of course. We actually live on one of Daniel Webster's original 1200 acres. His son was killed at 2nd Manassas. Recently on a trip to Lake George, New York, we visited the falls at Glen Falls that figured into James Fenimore Cooper’s book "Last of the Mohicans."

Currently I am reading about Samuel de Champlain.



He was quite a guy. He made twenty eight North Atlantic crossings in a Mayflower-type ship. He sailed past our town’s coast in 1605 on his way to Cape Cod. I thought the Pilgrims were first!

Fort Massachusetts, made of logs, was in North Adams, Massachusetts, where my wife Sandy and I both grew up.



I just lent the movie Gettysburg to Marnie. Now she will be hooked. Because of your recommendation, she has rented Glory.



She did not know of the magnificent bronze piece that sits in the Boston Common, honoring the black Massachusetts 54th Regiment of Glory fame. It is near Cheers. Too bad it starred Ferris Bueller.

Have you read any of Nathaniel Philbrick’s books, Mayflower or The Last Stand?



You probably think by now that I like American history.

And you? Drop me a line, please.

Bob Bacon
(tocino is Spanish for bacon)


From:
David Chapman
Date: October 9, 2010 2:21:41 PM EDT
To: robertotocino@verizon.net
Subject: Civil War History

Hi Bob!
Nice meeting you. Hopefully, we will meet in person one day. I met your lovely daughter (Marnie) in Lenox, Mass. She was introduced to me by my daughter (Carla). They are long time friends.

Carla shared with her that I am a Civil War Buff and former Civil War Enactment Cast member with a US Parks and History Production Company. I worked as a US Park Ranger for 30 years as a seasonal.

Marnie and I had a wonderful discussion. It was amazing to me how brilliant she is with knowledge concerning the Civil War era. By reviewing your broad intellect concerning all the books you have read, places you have visited and other involvements, I can see why your daughter is well versed.

I told her about my opportunity to star in the movie (“Glory”) with Denzel Washington, Morgan Freeman, and other stars -- along with my own guys in the 54th Mass Regiment. She was quite impressed. However and unfortunately, I had to cancel, because we were scheduled to depart to South Carolina (the movie site) on March 15, 1989. My Father passed on the 7th and was funeralized March 11th.

The Movie was great.

Anyway, we will continue sharing knowledge.

Take Care,
Dave

Thursday, October 28, 2010

In Between Hurricanes

September 29, 2010

Hey Bruce and Deb, on vacation in Port-u-gall,



Our weather in Abaco was PERFECT and, as Bruce predicted, HOT.





The only day I dried off with a towel from the shower on the deck was the early morning that we left. Before Spell-check did you also believe that you were a good speller? Well, dried is a complicated word.

We had no problems whatsoever except for nearly missing our connection in Newark. It's in New Jersey.



It's so much nicer in the Bahamas, where they load and unload on the tarmac -- so much better than those enclosed connectors!







We have our photos back today. Sandy has a perfect one of your house, late in the day, with the moon in the background. I am sure that Sandy will mail you some.



I have picked out my favorites and will ask Kezia to put them in a blog that I will send to you and the whole world probably next week.


Above, Gumbo Limbo is the name of a type of tree. Ted Williams had them on his property in Florida.

Tomorrow Kezia and Chris will be married for 10 years and Sandy and I for 43. So we are busy. Sandy and I met 50 years ago so it is really longer for us. Sandy says it feels way longer than that. I think she means that in a good way.

/>

There was a full moon when we were there on Thursday.

Only saw one person the whole week on the beach. But we did see her twice. The ocean water had to be in the high 80s, approaching 90. I know water temperature from being in the swimming pool business for 40 years. We have rated the beach "the best white and pink sand beach we have ever seen."





















You can see the next cay south, Scotland Cay, in this picture:



Sleeping at night with the wind blowing through the bedrooms was a real treat. We didn't even turn on the fans until Hurricane Igor calmed down with the wind and waves he was creating on his way to Bermuda. We never used the AC.

We listened nearly every morning at 8:15 over that walkie talkie-type telephone, to all the news of the day. We ourselves had a plan of the day (an old Navy term), which never really developed into anything exciting, except we did clean the beach a few times.



Oh yah, and our sand castles were pretty astounding.



Well to us they were. Okay to me they were.

Sunday was Talk Like A Pirate Day and they sure had fun with that, Matey. Arrrrrrrr! Well, shiver me timbers.











We loved the lobster and mahi mahi, until we found out that it was dolphin. My $22 dollar pizza at Grabbers was almost worth it. Love the local KALIK beer and even the Sands Beer, a bargain at $60.00 per case. Wow!



I wish I could have brought back some of Ruthie’s Hot Sauce. The guy in front of me at customs in Marsh Harbor lost his -- and his bottle of rum and his three bottles of sun tan lotion. Do you know the size bomb you can make with Ruthie’s and the sun tan lotion alone? Just Ruthie’s and one shoe could be powerful.


The above photo was taken at Roll's store, the only shop at the Marsh Harbor airport. The airport building itself is not that much bigger.

We cooked in way more than we thought we would, because only Nippers was open all week and the wind from Igor was blowing the lettuce off of our salads. It really was.







We always ate on the screened-in porch, which was lovely and cool.



The bartender at Nippers was married to a girl from Denmark and quit his job. It was a pirate wedding the Saturday that we arrived. This pirate was the groom.



Jackie and her daughter were nice enough to leave the wedding long enough to drive us by golf cart to your hideaway.



The hammica actually had instructions. In all my years in Mexico, I never knew you were supposed to lie sideways, as I am doing correctly in this photo.


Check out the old Panama ship life preserver!

I enjoyed the hammica and tried not to touch any poisonwood trees.



Thanks for the warning.

On the wall, by itself, is a large turtle shell, probably 5 feet long. It must have a story.



The people there are really warm and friendly, but some of the white ones look alike and not in a good way. I talked to at least five black Bahamians and asked them about their family history, which has to be good stuff compared to mine. Only Roll -- at the only place to shop at Marsh Harbor Airport -- knew further back than his grandmother and grandfather. He knew that his great grandparents were slaves and that they came from Africa. I did speak to Sampson, a Haitian who has been there for seven years and knows how very lucky he is to be there.

The couple of hundred black and white feral cats living all over the island all looked the same, and that was spooky.

We have hundreds of questions about how you built the house over a five-year period. The work is impeccable and the house is perfect. REALLY PERFECT.

Where are the shore birds? The frigates weren't flocking. Where were the seagulls, the pelicanos, or the black birds that land on restaurant tables -- like on Isla Mujeres, where they open and eat the white sugar packets but never the azul Nutri-Sweet ones. We did see one plover. We saw one on another day, but I know it was the same one.


Could this be a heron?

I read a book from one of your bookshelves that your Dad gave you in 1983 -- on the Bahamas. Other than a week spent, years ago, in Eleuthera, Harbor Island and Spanish Wells, I knew no history at all and really nothing about the 1,000 or so other islands of your Bahamas. It was an interesting history, especially about one of the cays, Man-O-War Cay, that listed among its vocations ship building, cotton and DRUG RUNNING.

While there, Sandy and I both read a book written by Paul Newman's best friend. Did you know that they both visited Guana Cay -- I mean Key? We enjoyed your library.

We read and napped a lot.



I started to read the biography of the writer from Columbia who wrote 1,000 Years of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez) and was loving it until we had to leave for home.But I did manage to purchase myself a copy for $4.95 from my bookseller in Connecticut.

Any potential renters can call us, and we will praise it to the hilt. What is a hilt? Glad we missed all the rain (5-10 inches on September 29), and NO I don't think that there was a hurricane along with it.

Thank you for renting it to me and my pirate crew: Sea Urchin Sandy, Honest Eileen, Terrible Tom, and meself, Bahama Bob. Arrrrrrrr!









By Bob Bacon