Red Burtts Storys

Hello
I have just noticed that there are quite a few Comments posted on "The Blog" that I have never answered, I am sorry, I'm getting old half the time I forget what I have even posted....
Thank you all for the comments, especially the Greasy Village people...
Red Burtt

I didn’t plan on writing this but something happened this morning, I have a screened in porch my son built for us that faces out into the forest, I have seen many wild animals in the two short years we have lived here they include a Black Bear, Deer, Raccoons, Skunks, Wild Turkey’s and a Bobcat.
I am a morning person; I have always loved the early morning especially in the woods or on an Ocean Beach, a few days ago at 6:30 AM I was sitting on my porch having my morning coffee when very silently out of the trees a Mother Doe appeared followed by two small Fawns, I think the Mother knew I was there as she stared right at the porch twitching her tail and ready to flee at the first sign of movement, I remained perfectly still then as suddenly as she froze when she sensed me she decided there was no threat and she just as quickly resumed her nibbling of grass and leaves. Watching this Mother Doe and her two Fawns somehow reminded me of a women who also for many years always seemed to have her young around her, if not her own children than her grandchildren, she was like a Mother Doe, I will tell you about her.

Once many years ago there was a young girl, a very pretty and beautiful girl who grew into a fine strong loving, kind and gentle women, as a young women when she walked into a restaurant or a room she turned heads it was often said by those who knew her “that she looked like a movie star” her beauty never went to her head, she never tried to be pretty or beautiful she just was, she loved life, she loved children especially her own she never had a bad word to say about anybody, if she was hurt, physically or emotionally she would hide it, if she cried she would find some way to privately shed her tears, she never looked for sympathy, this women was a good women, this women was a strong women, she grew up during the great depression those were bad times for the working families but her little family was especially hard hit as her father was unable to work or provide for the family due to a very lengthy illness, her mother went on welfare and somehow they managed to survive the bad years. I believe that the hardships her family endured during the 1930’s is what made this women the person that she was, this women was a survivor.

World War II ended the depression but with no man in the house her family was still struggling, at that time a child could leave school at the age of fourteen if they could prove “hardship” the young girl obtained all of the required paper work, she then got what was called “a working permit” the Mt Auburn Hospital in Cambridge Mass hired her as a kitchen worker delivering meals to bed ridden patients, she left school at the age of fourteen, she never returned, her wisdom, her education, her common sense, her respect towards others didn’t come from a school book they all came from life itself.

At the age of fifteen the young girl met a young man who had just turned eighteen, they flirted, then they began dating at the age of seventeen she married this young man, just before her eighteenth birthday she gave birth to her first child, a baby boy “The Doe and her Fawn”

Years flew by, three more children came along, then the grandchildren, eleven of them then the great grandchildren, eight of them, all through these years this women never wavered from the gentle, kind quiet loving human being that she was, as a young mother her instincts came from within just as they do with all living things she didn’t have to be told how to protect, love or care for her young she just knew as the mothers of all living creatures do “the Doe does it with her Fawns”

The young girl and her husband were blessed with excellent health for most of their life, they watched their family grow, they had their bad times and they had their problems along the way as all people do but they were never alarmists they were never worriers or brooders they just got on with life, right or wrong the young girl and her husband did it, they did it their way.

As with everything in life nothing is forever, I drank my coffee that morning and watched the Doe with her Fawns, just as suddenly as they appeared they slowly vanished back into the forest, all was quiet, my coffee cup was empty, day would turn into night, the sun would rise tomorrow, a new day would be born.

The Fawns I watched that morning would grow into adults they would leave the security and protection of their mother they would now face the forest on their own, the Doe would now herself age with the passing of time then the day would come when she would go off to some secluded place in the forest, she would lay down, she would close her eyes and sleep, never to awaken, the Doe would die as all living things do.
So it was with the young girl, I was there when she left this world, I held her hand, she died just as she had lived, bravely uncomplaining and quietly, the young girl was my wife, we were together for 66 years, I miss her every minute of every day.

I will look again each morning for the Doe and her Fawns but I don’t think they will be back.

My Wife
Barbara Edna (McFerren) Burtt
1929 ~ 2013

Westport Island Maine:
This story will probably only interest people who happen to Google "Westport Island Maine"

Westport Island Maine
By Nelson H. Burtt

This is a short description of the Westport Island I knew as a young boy during the great depression of the 1930’s. My knowledge of Westport Island is of the East Shore Rd. area, Swanton’s cove, Long Cove and Kehail Point. All my relatives on my mothers’ side of the family were born and raised on Westport Is. My grandparents, Arthur Alexander Kehail and Philena (Tarbox) Kehail were the owners of a piece of property and farmhouse on the East Shore Rd., located at Long Cove. The original house was destroyed by the great fire that swept over that part of the island in 1918, a new house was built in 1920 and remains there today. My aunt, Hazel (Kehail) Templeman and her husband, Ronald B. Templeman are still living there at this writing. Ronald remodeled the whole building sometime in the 1960’s. My first memory’s of Westport are in the middle 1930’s, my grandmother spent every year from March to October on the island, she would leave Boston by train and a friend of hers by the name of Maude Webber, one of the few people on the island that owned an automobile, would pick her up in Wiscasset and bring her back to the island.

My parents were very poor during the thirties, my father lost his business in the stock crash of 1929 and it was much easier on him financially for my mother and myself to spend the summer on Westport. We lived in a three decker tenement in the Cambridgeport section of Cambridge, Mass., and coming to Westport for a twelve year old boy was like a whole new world compared to the city streets that I was used to. School let out the second week in June and the very next day at 4 AM we started our trip to Maine. There was no Maine Turnpike then, we would drive out to Saugus Mass. and then travel the old “Rte 1” all the way to Bath Me. This same trip today would take about three hours, our trips would take anywhere from ten to thirteen, it was one flat tire after another, inner tubes were used then and the tire had to be broken down, the tube taken out, find the leak, scrape it, put glue on it, then put the patch on, let it dry then remount the tire, drive thirty miles or so and do it all over again.
In-between the flats there would be water pumps, fuel pumps, broken hoses and anything else that could happen, and usually did.

I always remember the times that we arrived after dark, we would pay a ten cent toll and cross over the Carlton bridge in Bath and continue north on Rte 1 toward Wiscasset, a few miles ahead we would turn right onto a dirt road that is now Rte 144, a short distance ahead the road dipped and railroad tracks crossed, back then all railroad crossings had signs that read, “Stop Look And Listen” this crossing also had a wrecked automobile that had been hit by a train and dumped beside the tracks so all passing cars could see it. My mother would always make my father stop, turn the engine off, then look and listen, she wanted to make sure a train didn’t come along and kill us, now one of the things that I always looked forward to was coming up, getting onto the island.
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Today, crossing from the mainland to Westport there is a well built modern day bridge but back in the thirties we crossed on a two car ferry, (My mother said it would carry four) that was pushed along by a motor boat made fast to the side. When we arrived at the waters edge my father would turn the engine off and blow the car horn several times, after a few moments, across the water we would see a kerosene lantern flickering in the little building close to the shore, then we would hear the putt, putt, putt of the old one lunger motor boat starting it’s short trip across.

The approach to the Ferry on the Wiscasset side of the river was very steep, my Mother would pull me out of the car and we would stand at the top of the of the short hill and watch as my Father let the car roll down onto the Ferry, he would have to be almost standing on the brake peddle to keep the car from rolling right off the other side of the Ferry and into the river which is what my Mother always thought was going to happen.

The current could be quite strong here as the tide went in and out, and to prevent the ferry from being pulled off course there was a steel cable that stretched from one shore to the other, this cable passed up and through large pulleys that were attached to three or four posts that were built into the side of the ferry, the cable would come up out of the water and through the pulleys as the boat pushed the ferry along. This cable would also act as a guideline bringing the ferry into the exact spot on the opposite shore for unloading.

In all the crossings that I can remember the same man ran the ferry, his name was Luther Cromwell, after my father drove the car on board Luther would set the engine and climb out of the boat onto the ferry, they would all shake hands and then Luther would give my parents all the latest news, what kind of winter they had, who was visiting the island and so on. When we reached the shore Luther would lower a large ramp, there was one at each end of the ferry, and we would drive off and up what is now called, “The Old Ferry Road”. Most of the roads on Westport today are paved, although as I write, the section of the E. Shore Rd. in front of our place is still dirt but that will probably soon change. Back then the roads were nothing but two ruts with grass growing up the middle, but the Main Rd. that connects the E. Shore Rd. to the W. Shore Rd. was a dirt road but it was always graded and fairly smooth.

Driving down what is now Rte 144 we would come to the split in the road where the E. Shore Rd bears left and the Main Rd goes off to the right, if it happened to be a foggy night my father would have to pay close attention as it would be very easy to miss this turn.
A mile or so down the E. Shore Rd. the first house on the left back then had a very small driveway, you had to look real close or you would drive right by it (today this driveway is called “Old Pier Lane” this driveway went right down to the shore of the Sheepscot River, the house that sits at the end of this driveway on the left is the house that my grandmother grew up in during the 1800’s, her father, my great grandfather, built this house, his name was Amasa Tarbox, he left this place to my grandmother’s twin brother, Arthur Tarbox, it then went to my grandmother Philena ( Tarbox ) Kehail and then passed on to my aunt, Hazel ( Kehail ) Templeman.
I spent several vacations in this house after I married with my wife and two oldest children,
my aunt sold it sometime in the late 50’s or early 60’s.

My mother didn’t care much for the water or boats, but my grandmother loved the sea, two or three times each summer they would want to give this little house a good cleaning, my mother and my aunt Eliza would walk up the road to Swantons Cove but my grandmother and myself would go down to our beach on Long Cove where we had our big row boat tied up and I would row out of Long Cove and around Kehail Point and up the Sheepscot river to Tarbox Cove, I would tie up at the landing there and my mother would be waiting for us, we would then take the mops and pails out of the boat and they would spend the day cleaning while I climbed the rocks along the shore with my dog.
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Directly across the road from the boat landing is the Swanton house, the Swanton family and my family were very good friends I only remember the man of the house as “Mr. Swanton” but I believe his name was Harry. Several times each summer after supper we would all walk up the road to the Swanton house to visit, play the piano and sing hymns.
Down close to the waters edge across the road from the Swanton’s, there were two house boats, my grandmothers brother, Henry Tarbox, lived in one of them and a women by the name of Mary Dickson lived in the other, I guess the house boats are long since gone now (I am not sure). Tarbox Cove looks pretty much the same today as it did back then, the roads are paved now and more traffic passes but each time I drive over now to visit my aunt and her husband I slow down a little and look down at the Swanton dock and it brings back a lot of my boyhood memories.

As we pass the Swanton house now after our long trip from Cambridge we are only a few minutes from Long Cove, just past the Swanton’s the road makes a sharp right turn, during the daylight hours from this turn you can look right out to sea, you can also see Mark Island, a small piece of land right at the tip of Kehail Pt. This was another one of my favorite places of which I will talk about later.
Everybody on Westport used kerosene lanterns then as there was no electricity on the island, I loved walking into my grandmothers late at night, she would be standing in the kitchen holding a lantern and our shadows would be on all the walls and I could smell her fresh doughnuts that she must have cooked up during the day, I loved my grandmothers doughnuts.
These were bad times for us back in Cambridge and there were many instances that there would be next to nothing for us to eat, (we were always hungry) but Westport was different, we had fresh clams from our beach and the creek down the road, we had flounder, cod, haddock, and my grandmothers brother, Henry Tarbox, had lobster traps and he would always give us fresh caught crabs and lobsters. Not being on the island year round we didn’t have our own vegetable garden anymore so for fresh vegetables we would walk up the island toward the town hall and a man by the name of Mr. Perry had a place there, he always had a big garden and we would buy a few cents worth of vegetables, for a few cents we would walk home with two big bags.

There were also two trucks that came onto the Island I can’t remember how often, I think once every two weeks, one of them was Nissens Bakery and the other was a big truck that looked like a moving van, this truck had pull down steps on the back, the driver would lower these steps and we would all walk up into the back of this truck and it was just like going into a grocery store, there was a walkway down the middle and on each side there were shelves and cases and drawers with anything and every thing you would buy in a regular store.
The products we would purchase from these vendors would be canned goods, bacon, coffee, tea and any other dry goods that weren’t perishable, the bacon and unused canned meat we would put in an airtight metal pail and lower it into the well, this would keep it fresh for a day or two. The money for these things that we bought from the trucks would come from the laundry that my mother, grandmother and aunt did for some of the summer people that were visiting the island, they did all the washing right out in the yard using two big wash tubs and a hand wringer. The hot water would come from the big tank built into the side of our kitchen wood stove. After the wash had dried they would put these big heavy flat irons on top of the stove until they were good and hot and then iron everything they had washed, mostly bed clothes.
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When the wash was all ironed and folded they would put it into a big red wagon that was very popular with the kids of those days, I think my aunt still has that wagon, and then they would get their berry pails and we would head up the island to deliver the laundry.
Our closest neighbors were a couple by the name of Joe and Gladys Hodgdon, Joe passed away sometime in 1949, he used to walk down the road to our place and cut our grass with a big scythe that he carried over his shoulder, my grandmother used to tell me a story about him cutting grass for a summer family when he came upon a bobcat and her kittens and the cat came at him, he killed her with his scythe, his wife Gladys loved cats, she had one for all the years that I knew her, he brought the kittens home but they realized they were wild and that they couldn’t keep them so Joe put them in a burlap sack and took them down to the shore and threw them in, they were very young and would never have survived on their own.
Joe was gone now and Gladys lived alone year round in the same house up the road from ours until the 1980’s I believe, then she had to go to a nursing home where she passed away, Gladys is buried on Westport Island.

As we pulled our wagon up the road Gladys would be standing out in front of her house with her berry pail and we would be off to deliver the laundry. After the laundry was delivered the berry picking started, all the way home they were picking berries, back then as I remember it berries grew everywhere on the East Shore, all kinds, maybe it was because that part of the island was still coming back from the great fire of 1918.

When my father left to return to Cambridge we were more or less stranded we were on our own, no electricity, no running water, no refrigeration, no transportation, we had an outhouse for the daytime and big chamber pots for the evening if we needed them. Gladys Hodgdon was our only neighbor, there is a house right down the road from ours it was then owned by a family by the name of Ladd, we always called it the Ladd house, (today it is the Mason house) the Ladds only came to the island for a week or two during the summer the rest of the time we were all alone. If a real emergency had come up we would of had to walk all the way up to The Swanton’s or Maude Webbers, about three miles, or we could of rowed our boat across the Sheepscot to get help.
Earlier I mentioned Mark Island, this is a small little island on the Sheepscot River right off the tip of Kehail Point, ( Kehail Point is named after my Grandfathers family, my mothers maiden name was Kehail ), I used to row our boat out to Mark Is. when my grandmother would let me, as I said we were all alone on that end of the island and if anything happened to me in that boat I would of been in big trouble. I used to tie my boat up on the rocks, I had my dog with me, and we would jump out and look for sea gull eggs, a big egg with brown spots, if you put a pin hole in them you can drain them out, let them dry and make a mantle piece decoration of them. I never left Mark Is. without sitting down for a while and just looking out to sea, it was like being all alone in the world, I also did this on Kehail Point, at low tide I would go down to our beach and climb the rocks up onto the point, there is a pine grove there, it has a house on it today, and I would go through the grove to a path I had made and go all the way down to the tip of Kehail Point, I would stay here for a very long time laying in the grass and looking up at the sky and the large white puffy clouds and listening to the gulls. It wouldn’t be long before I would hear the big horn that my grandmother kept in the house to call any of us in if we were berrying or digging clams when it came time to eat, they didn’t like me out of sight to long for fear that I might fall down the rocks into the water.
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Kehail Point today, is all developed and there must be ten or fifteen houses maybe more built there now but back then it was my private playground. When I heard the horn I would head back up my path to our beach and up to the house for some crabmeat sandwiches. ( Sandwiches that I would lay in bed thinking about during the cold hungry winter back in our third floor Cambridge tenement )
Another of my favorite places was the Mill Pond and the Creek that lies inside Long Cove. In the years before the great fire there was a tide mill that one of my Kehail relatives owned, this mill was destroyed in the fire of 1918 but some of the pilings survived and some are still there today. I used to row my boat out to these at high tide and tie up to one of them and fish for Cunners ( a small sea perch ) these were used for bait in the lobster traps, my grandmother said she also used them for fertilizer when she lived year round on the island and had a large garden.
There is a strange rock in the Mill Pond, if one should row into the far end of the pond and tie up on the left bank facing in, then climb up the bank about ten or twenty feet there was a very large rock about the size of an automobile, this rock was black all the way through just like a piece of coal, my father said it probably fell out of the sky, but fathers tell their boys things like that, but who knows….. It must still be there.
The Mill Pond empties into a creek that passes under a small bridge, this is a modern well built crossing today but back in the thirties it was a wooden structure with wooden railings built onto the sides, it was supported by large boulders, the bridge measured about twenty feet from side to side to allow the tide flow in and out. I don’t know if a boat can row under there today but another of my favorite pastimes was to row in through the Mill Pond about an hour or so before a full high tide and go under this bridge into the creek, the current ran quite strong in the creek when the tide was flowing and all I had to do was sit in the stern with one oar to steer with and I could drift a good distance up the island until the tide flow started to slow down. At high tide the water would come to a standstill, it would stay calm and unmoving for almost an hour before turning and starting it’s flow back out.
During this time I would push my boat through the tall sea grass and tie up on shore then my dog and I would prowl around in the woods.
I had three women back in that house thinking that they would never see me again, so my time out here was short, it wouldn’t be long before I heard that horn and that meant get back here. If you were to stand on the road in front of the Ladd house ( now the Masons ) you could see a long way up the creek and as I came into view I would wave and they would be assured that I was still alive and had survived another trip up the creek.

Garbage, as I said before we were stranded on this end of the island, everything that had to be disposed of was destined for one place, off the bridge, there was no dump, no rubbish pickup and nobody would think of lighting a match outdoors to burn anything, not since the 1918 fire. Gladys Hodgdon, the Ladd family (when they were there) and my family all disposed of their garbage and rubbish off the bridge into the creek, Gladys had a path behind her house that led down to the river that she used at times for her garbage but she used the creek quite often as she enjoyed visiting and talking as she walked past our house.

After each meal and all the dishes were washed it was my job to take the pail of leftovers down the road to the bridge, I would especially enjoy doing this at high tide, I would throw the food particles over slowly and almost immediately out from under the rocks and sea weed would come all the little salt water creatures and gobble up everything I threw in before it hit bottom. Tin cans, paper and things of that nature were something else, they would float off, depending which way the current was flowing, when you went back the next day, everything was gone; it went somewhere, out of sight out of mind. I hope today’s EPA won’t hold it against us, we knew no better, the Ladd family, Gladys Hodgdon, my family, they all did it, probably every body that lived near the coast did it, the old timers always said “If you don’t want it throw it overboard”, but times have changed.
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Now, MOSQUITOS…………….Dear God………..My grandmother said they came from all over the world to spend the summer in Long Cove and wait for one of us to step outside the house after 6:00 PM. During the day Long Cove, Swantons Cove, The Mill Pond, Kehail Point, these places were all like being somewhere up in heaven, but come supper time, wherever you were you ran, you didn’t walk to get behind closed doors as fast as you could. I haven’t been out doors in the evening on the island for many, many years but I imagine there are still plenty of them out there, waiting.
My aunt, Hazel ( Kehail ) Templeman, who lives on the island today was a working girl back then and probably lucky to have a job, she was a stenographer for a Boston insurance firm, she had a two week vacation in the summer and she always came to Westport, she would come up from Boston the same way my grandmother did, she would make arrangements with Maude Webber to be picked up in Wiscasset and driven over to the island. I always liked to see her arrive, I mentioned the Swanton family earlier, my aunt Hazel and Mary Swanton were very good friends, if Mary Swanton happened to be on the island at the same time as my aunt she would spend a lot of time at our house, I remember her as a very happy person always laughing and kidding around, I enjoyed having them around it seemed like there was always more doing, more time on the beach, more walking the old dirt roads, and we always had at least one or two singing sessions at the Swanton house, I hope my memory is right, I seem to remember going in the front door of the Swanton house and directly across the room in the right hand corner there was a piano, my mother or somebody would play hymns and everybody would sing. The last time I was in that house was 1938, so I don’t know if I have remembered everything correctly.
Once every summer my mother and my grandmother would save enough of their laundry money for us all to take the boat trip to Boothbay Harbor, this was a big day for me, we would all put our best clothes on, comb our hair, brush our teeth, shut the dog up in the house and start the walk up to Tarbox Cove, I remember once my grandmother telling us to wait while she went in and asked Gladys if she would like to go with us, but I don’t recall her ever being with us, the way things were in those days she probably couldn’t afford to go. We would go up to Swantons landing and Mary Swanton would come running out of her house laughing and yelling and I knew I was going to have a good time. We would wait around on the dock for twenty minutes or so and pretty soon the boat would appear coming up the Sheepscot river. This boat was maybe fifty or sixty feet in length with passenger seats on both sides, it looked just like some of the tourist boats you see in Boston Harbor or other waterways that they use for sightseeing. I loved the ride to Boothbay, we would veer off to the left past Mark Is. and Kehail Pt. and then we would make another stop on the other side of Long Cove and then straight across to Boothbay Harbor. My grandmother would make maybe a dozen of her crabmeat sandwiches and a dozen of her home made doughnuts and pack them in a tin suitcase she kept for things like this, there were five or six of us on this trip so there was no “laundry money” for a fancy restaurant, my treat would be a bottle of Root Beer with lunch and an Ice Cream cone later in the day.

We didn’t have to be back on the dock until 4:00 PM, so we had all afternoon to roam around the harbor. They all liked to window shop and walk but I liked the docks and the boats, so they would leave me alone for a while to do what I wanted. I was a city kid and being around people and lots of things to look at made me feel good.
My wife and I now live in a small south western town in Maine, it is called Hiram, I have often said to my wife that if I had ever had to grow up in a small country town I would have gone crazy. I can’t imagine life without subways and street corners to hang around on, railroad tracks, ten cent movie houses, the Burlesque Shows in the old Scollay Square in Boston, going out into the streets at 8:00 AM on a Saturday and coming home at 7:00 PM so dirty and tired I could hardly stand up, but I loved Westport, it has been in my head all my life.

Well summer is winding down it is late August, we have been walking up to Mr. Perrys house for fresh ears of corn and my Father has written and told us the day and date that he will arrive after his twelve hours of changing tires and fixing water pumps, my aunt Hazel has returned to Boston, Maude Webber picked her up and took her over to Wiscasset for the train ride back. I was eager to get back to Cambridge but I also didn’t want to see the summer end because I would have to leave Westport. My father always arrived a week or so before we had to leave, so we would have some time to collect and cut wood for my grandmother and stack it in the hen house for her to use when she returned the following spring. My father loved salt water fishing, we would go down to the creek and dig a pail of clams and shuck them, then we would get our hand lines out of the hen house, grab some doughnuts, load the boat and head out of the cove.
My father was a very big and powerful man, we would be well past Mark Island and out into the Sheepscot River in no time with him rowing, very few people had motors in those days, we rowed everywhere, sea food was plentiful in those days, it is hard for someone my age to be told that there is no more fish out there.

We didn’t even throw an anchor in; we were maybe a ½ mile off Mark Is. My father would stop rowing, we would bait our hooks, throw the lines over the side, let them hit bottom and then bring them up a foot or two, we would be slowly drifting with the current and within five minutes we would get our first hit, fishing is fun, but pulling in a large cod or haddock on a hand line from that depth for a thirteen year old skinny kid can be a lot of work, but it was worth it, some of the best memories I have of my father were these fishing trips I had with him on the Sheepscot River. I don’t know if anybody living on Westport Is. today will ever read this but if they do, some of the biggest Cod Fish I have ever seen came out of the waters just a half mile or so off the tip of Kehail Point. I have a picture today of my father standing in the middle of the East Shore Rd., holding up one of these Cod’s by the gills, this picture is in the photo section of our “Family Genealogy”

Westport is changing but that is to be expected, cars drive past our place on the E. Shore Rd. at all times of the day and night now, I can remember back in the thirties if a car went by during the day my grandmother and my mother would drop whatever they were doing and run to the window and say “I wonder who that was” then in about ten minutes or so Gladys Hodgdon would be at the door and she would come in and say “did you see that car, I wonder who that was” my grand mother would make some tea and they would all sit out in the yard and talk for two hours about “the car” that went by. There is electricity on the Island now and telephones, running water, computers, two or three cars in every driveway, they have a Fire Dept. and they even go to the bathroom right in the house.

The summer of 1939 would be my last trip to Westport as a young boy, my Mother passed away in the summer of 1941, WWII came and went, my Grandmother passed away in 1945.
I married in 1947 and in the summer of 1948 with my wife and new little baby boy I had my last ride on the Westport Ferry.
I have carried the memories of Westport with me all my life, little things that happen will bring a flashback such as the smell of seaweed when the tide is going out, the smell of blueberry bushes, I can close my eyes and hear the old fog horn and bell buoy off Kehail Pt. late at night, all things that stay in a young boys mind, I suppose this past summer somewhere on Westport there was a boy and his dog climbing around the rocks down by the shore and maybe he will hold his memories of Westport the way I have. This was his summer. Mine was long, long ago…..The End.

Nelson Hardy (Kehail Tarbox) Burtt Jr

Our First Car

Westport Island, Maine:
The Lobster and My Wife, The Summer Of 1948:

In the late 1940’s there were very few young people who lived in the City of Cambridge Massachusetts that had ever eaten a fresh cooked Maine Lobster, I was one of the lucky ones who had the good fortune to spend most of my school vacations at my Grandmother’s home on Westport Island located in Midcoast Maine.
As a young boy on my summer vacations to the island my grandmother gave me my own lobster trap that she had borrowed from her brother who was a Lobsterman for most of his life.
Lobster traps need bait, I would have to get my own bait, I would do this by fishing down on the shoreline, I would first pick some mussels out of the seaweed at low tide I would shell them and then I would use these as bait to catch the bait for my lobster trap, I used a small salt water fish that were called “Cunners” they are a Sea Perch I don’t hear of them today, after catching one or two of these I would cut them in half and put them in my trap, I would set my trap just outside of Long Cove on The Sheepscot River, two days after setting I would row out and pull my trap there would always be 3 or 4 good sized lobsters in the pot, lobsters were plentiful in those days off the coast of Maine as were Cod and Haddock. Those were great days, gone in the blinking of an eye.

My last trip to Westport when I was a boy was the summer of 1939, in 1940 I was old enough to start working I was 14, I went to work driving a horse and wagon through the streets of Cambridge peddling Ice and oil my Mother was diagnosed with incurable Breast Cancer in the month of August 1941 she passed away, she was just fifty one, I was fifteen.

I married in 1947, my wife was a city girl and like most all of us came from a working class family who all had gone through some pretty bad times during the Great Depression, in September of the same year our first child was born, we were children ourselves at the time but we didn’t know it, on the day my first child was born my wife was just about to turn 18 and I had just turned 21.
Now, on our first vacation my wife was about to go through an experience that she would often talk about for the rest of her life, She Met Her First Live Lobster, A Whole Bunch Of Them.

The summer of 1948 was the very first time I had a “paid vacation” I told my wife to pack all the things she would need for the baby and herself that we were going to Maine she had never been out of Cambridge in her life, I drove over to my Aunts home in Braintree Mass and told her I wanted the keys to one of the houses on the island we had two them in the family, I told her I wanted “Uncle Arts House” this was the one right on the Sheepscot river, my grandmother was born in this little house in 1864.
Well we were all set now early Saturday morning we headed for Maine in our first car that my father had found and bought for us an old Hupmobile, it looked like one of Al Capone’s old cars, today the trip from Cambridge to Westport Island takes maybe three hours it would take us at least five, my wife would pack a picnic basket and a gallon of Kool Aid she insisted we stop and have lunch in some farmers apple orchard along the way I was always in a rush I wanted to drive straight thru there was always the possibility of a flat tire I had two spares on this Hupmobile they were located in spare tire wells right in the front fenders on each side of the car.

When we finally arrived at Westport we had to get onto the Island from the mainland in Wiscasset this was done at the time by boarding an old four car ferry that was pushed by an old time inboard motor boat sometimes called a “launch” attached to the side of the ferry, the ferryman at the time was an old family friend named Luther Cromwell, the two names that I mention in this story (Cromwell & Greenleaf) are both old time Westport Island natives as are my own family who were Tarbox and Kehail, back in those days many Mainers were “territorial” they didn’t trust people “from away” but they all knew who I was so they were never uneasy around me.

Now that I’m back on the island I had to do something, for the past eight years I would many times think about my “fresh lobster and corn on the cob” in the 1940’s I don’t remember any stores that were called “supermarkets” we had one large grocery store located in Central Square Cambridge called “The Manhattan Market” we all did most of our shopping in corner grocery stores such as The A&P or First National, I really can’t remember who sold lobsters I believe that you would have to go to a large fish store in Boston to get one, anyway nobody in our neighborhood had never laid eyes on a lobster let alone eat one my wife was one of them she knew what they were but had never seen one, I had a surprise for her, little did I know what it would do to her.

My great uncle Henry Tarbox the lobsterman who was my Grandmothers brother had passed away sometime in 1945 but I knew another old time lobsterman named Amos Greenleaf who was a good friend of the family he came to our house quite often when I was a very young boy to visit with my Mother and Grandmother, on my way down the island to our house I stopped at Amos’ place and when I saw him I know he didn’t recognize me, I said “you know who I am” he said “nope” then I told him I was Mildred Kehail’s son, he started laughing and yelling and said “you that little freckled red head” then he started telling me story’s about my family and his family and he went on and on finally I had a chance and I said “I want some lobster” he started yelling again and said “sure how many you want” I said “about four, I’ll get them tomorrow” he said “no I’ll bring them down” I told him I was staying at my Uncle Arts house and he said “ok I’ll see you tomorrow” I liked Amos Geenleaf, tomorrow would be the last time I would ever see him.

Well here we were our own little house no neighbors just sea gulls ocean water and our own big lawn, green grass, my wife was going nuts I don’t think I ever saw her so excited this was a whole new world to her she had known nothing but city streets, subways, trolley cars, railroad tracks and tenement houses now she was in a house right on a large saltwater river where if she went a few steps out into the yard she could look right out to sea, there it was, The Atlantic Ocean.
During the 1940’s there still wasn’t any electricity on the island we used Kerosene Lamps at night and a kitchen oil stove that you lit with a wick, my grandmother used wood in her kitchen stove, no running water we used to fill buckets from a well in the back yard and now the big one for her to think about, an outhouse, at night we never went out to the outhouse we used large “chamber pots” if we needed them. My wife adapted very quickly, when she was young she would try anything she loved adventure, I don’t think she slept at all that night as we lay there in the pitch dark all she did was talk, I think the last thing I remember before I fell asleep was her babbling something about Wildcats breaking into the house and eating us, she didn’t know what a wildcat was.

Well this is it, today is the day my wife would meet a lobster, most people aren’t introduced to a lobster the way Amos Geenleaf brought the lobster into my wife’s life, I told Amos we wanted them sometime in the afternoon, I was in another room when I heard my wife yell at me “that guy is here” I looked out and there was Amos coming down the driveway with a big burlap bag, I invited him into the kitchen and introduced him to my wife then he said “got your lobster” this was it my wife was about to see her first lobster, I told Amos I only wanted three or four he opened the bag and emptied it onto the kitchen floor, these lobsters were lively they had been out of the ocean for only a few hours, out came seven or eight scrambling fresh Maine lobsters, my wife said nothing she ran into the living room, grabbed the baby and bolted out of the other door into the front yard then she started screaming and yelling she called me “a stupid idiot” and was screaming something about “bugs” she thought they were big bugs. Poor Amos didn’t know what to do he probably thought she had something mentally wrong with her, I told Amos that she had never seen a lobster before then he understood. We put the lobsters in a box I had ready and then Amos took one and we went out into the yard, as I said earlier my wife would try anything when she was young, she knew what a lobster was and she knew what they looked like but she never had imagined a whole bunch of them running around on her kitchen floor holding their claws up ready for a fight. I took the baby and then Amos showed her how to pick them up (behind the claws) then he told her to put them in the boiling water head first because he said that would knock them right out (I wanted to tell her that they scream when they hit the hot water) but this wasn’t the time to fool around with her, Amos handed her the lobster and she took it, she stood there holding it I knew it wouldn’t take her long as I said before she would try anything, Amos told her to bring it in and put it in the box I put the baby back in the playpen, well that was that, Amos wouldn’t take any money, we all smoked back in those days I had just bought a full carton of Camels I took three or four packs out and stuffed them into Amos’ pocket you would have thought I gave him a thousand dollars.
My wife was hooked I couldn’t even try to imagine how many lobsters she has eaten over the years of our marriage wherever we were whenever we would go away for a week end she would always look for her lobster.
Later that afternoon we stuffed ourselves, we ate as only young people can like starving wolves, we shelled the few remaining ones I then put all of the meat in a stainless steel container that my grandmother used to keep her perishables fresh for a couple of days as we had no refrigeration or ice, I then cut a long piece of clothesline and tied it onto the pail I took this out to our Well and lowered the container down into the water until it hit bottom and secured the line to the top of the Well this would keep the food fresh for a day or two, my wife was already talking about how she wanted to eat it, for all the years of our marriage she has eaten lobster in every conceivable way known to mankind, boiled, fried, baked, roasted and grilled, that night she decided what she wanted to do with her new found love “the lobster” she fried the boiled meat in butter for a few minutes, it was delicious.

During the 1970’s we owned a Camper and spent a lot of time on Cape Cod down in the Brewster, Orleans, Truro area we would buy a couple of them and make our own lobster rolls, fresh hot dog rolls packed with lobster meat with just a touch of mayonnaise we would then take a bottle of white wine put it all in a small cooler then go out and sit on the beach at The Cape Cod National Seashore many times just before sunset we would be the only people for as far as you could see on this large section of beach, the good times come and go far to quickly but you never realize it until they are long since over.

My wife passed away a few months ago, I miss her terribly, but the lobsters are still around and every time I see one in the supermarket I smile, I can still see that pretty young teenage girl with her motherly instinct grabbing her baby and running out of the house because she thought these big bugs were going to attack her, a strange thing to say but “seeing a lobster today reminds me of her” and I have to smile.

That One Day, The Day Of My Wife And The Lobster Took Place 65 Summer’s Ago.
Red Burtt.

A True Story, I was there
Red Burtt:

Many stories cover lifetimes, this story covers one day, a summer day in the year 1946, it starts on a street corner in Cambridge Massachusetts.

August 1946, 10:AM:
It has been one year now since WWII came to an end, all the young men from our corner (Brookline St and Putnam Avenue, Cambridge Mass) that fought and survived in that war were now home, we had Ten of them that didn’t return, their remains are to this day lying at the bottom of the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans and in Cemeteries located in France and on the Island of Iwo Jima.
In a very sad case that was reported in all the newspapers we had one of our crowd that died eight years after the wars end in the Bridgewater State Hospital For The Criminally Insane, he had a nervous breakdown (it was called shell shock back then) while fighting in North Africa. After spending some time in a Veterans Hospital here in the United States he was released and had been living with his sister her husband and their three-month-old baby. One evening he had been left alone with the baby for a few hours, the child started crying and wouldn’t stop; he smothered the baby with a pillow killing it. I spoke with him a few years later and he told me that he didn’t remember a single thing of that evening; he died shortly after this visit from a massive heart attack, he was thirty years old.

Summer days in the city of Cambridge during the Forties were quiet and hot, there was no traffic, there were no parked cars lining the streets as there are today, traffic lights were only installed on streets such as Massachusetts Ave and other main thoroughfares leading in and out of the city or into Boston.
Every so often a Horse And Wagon, would be seen slowly moving along the street, usually a Rag Man or Fruit Peddler, they were the last remaining holdovers from the thirties, by 1948 most all horse drawn wagons would disappear save for a few that could still be seen in Boston working the Piers and Back Alleys along the waterfront on Atlantic Avenue and Commercial St, soon they too would be gone, the post war period brought a boom into the production of automobiles and trucks. The horse drawn delivery wagons were now fading into history.

I had just turned Twenty this past May, my friends and myself were still hanging around our old boyhood haunts, the Charles River, Fort Washington, and our second home, “the corner”. I had saved up Twenty Dollars working the Ice Wagons and purchased a 1934 Plymouth Four Door Sedan, I had just painted it, in those days when you wanted to paint your car you would go up to Woolworth’s Five And Ten Cent Store in Central Sq and buy a can of paint and some brushes, you would then take your car to someone’s back yard where you and several of your friends would paint the whole car in about fifteen minutes.
The car would look great for about a week, and then, after a few rain storms it would look worse than it did before you painted it.

Today, this “one day” was a beautiful day, sunny hot and dry, I drove my car up to the corner and went into the Village Spa to have my daily “doughnut and milk, several of the guys were sitting outside on milk cases bragging and telling each other lies about some girl they had been with the night before down on the banks of the Charles River or some big event that had happened in some bar they were in, they would all be laughing then one of them would say “your full of shit” that would be the end of the lies for awhile.
I grabbed a milk case and joined them, a few drifted off and there were four of us left, Dickey Ferguson, Eddie Preston, Eddie Kelley and myself.
I now had a brilliant idea on how to spend this glorious summer day; I was dating my future wife at the time but didn’t have anything planned for tonight so I asked them how much money they had, between the four of us we had about twenty three dollars, that was plenty. A glass of beer back then cost ten cents, gas was about twenty-five cents a gallon, so, with the money we had we could have quite a day.
I said, “lets go to Billerica”, going to Billerica in those days was an adventure and to our crowd it meant one thing, “Nuttings Lake and Kitty’s”.
Nuttings Lake is located on the Middlesex Turnpike about a mile or two from Billerica Center, at the northerly end of the Causeway that crosses the lake, back in the forties there were two bars, “The Red Pine Inn” and “Kitty Kallbach’s” across the street there was a Roller Skating Rink, Kitty’s was our favorite.

Well this was it, no hanging on the corner today; we were headed for the country, trees, fresh air, hot dogs and cold beer, lots of it. My car had about a half a tank of gas and we were ready to go, so the four of us climbed in, rolled down the windows and headed for Billerica.
After driving through Arlington and Lexington we entered Burlington and were now on the Middlesex Turnpike, there was no Rte 3 as it is known today nor was there a Route 128, in those days if you were driving your car between the hours of 9:AM and 5:PM you pretty much had the roads to yourself.

Driving along this road in the Forties was like being up in Vermont or Maine, there were no buildings, no houses, no cars in front of you and no cars behind you, it was a very remote stretch of highway and it was also a great day to be alive.

A few miles before Nuttings Lake there was a bar (roadhouse type) called “Martins” we would always stop here first to start our day of beer drinking. I could never understand how this place made any money, the women that owned it would always lay down her laws on us even before we had a drink, she would tell us we could only have three or four beers than we had to leave, she would serve us our first beer, then she would say, “I don’t put up with any fighting, loud noise, or cursing in here, and I will not allow anyone to get drunk in here”, well my God, this was no place for us, we would sit there snickering and mumbling, she knew we were talking about her. We would never give her the satisfaction of drinking “her limit of four beers” we would have two and we were gone (never a tip). This women must have known us, people from our corner always stopped there to have a drink before they reached the Lake, but she never once greeted us or said hello, nothing but her three or four beer lecture. Martins remained there for years though before it was torn down, it was well known but is probably only remembered now by some older folks from another time. (Such as me).
If I am correct, I believe The 99 Restaurant now stands on the site of the old “Martins”.

Well there it was up ahead, Nuttings Lake, today hundreds of cars pass this spot day and night on their way to and from work or to go shopping in the Burlington Mall or visit the Lahey Clinic or to eat in the restaurants that are now scattered all over that area.
It was a different story back then though, to us city guys this was something special; this was country, no cars, no people, plenty of fresh air, birds flying around and very quiet. When you left the city for a place like this you always noticed the dead silence when you stepped out of your car.

Kitty’s was a big one room roadhouse with a bar all along the back wall, a big jukebox, a small area for dancing and large screened in windows surrounding the room, “no air conditioning”, on a good day there would be a nice cool breeze coming off the lake carrying with it the unmistakable odor of green forest and pine trees, booths lined the walls, and tables were set up all around the “dance area”.

Billerica was to the best of my memory the only town that had bars that sold “Pitcher Beer” and Billerica had only two that I was aware of, “Kitty’s” and a place over in the Pinehurst section on Rte 3 (Boston Rd) called “Ma Newman’s”.
Pitcher Beer was a novelty for us so that is what we always ordered; bottled beer or ten ounce “Tap” glasses could also be purchased.

Well we settled in for an afternoon of “beer guzzling”, we had some hot dogs and then after a few pitchers of beer we decided to go across the street and go roller-skating, this would be a horror show. It cost 50 cents to skate all day; we skated for maybe 45 minutes, during this time Eddie Preston fell on his face at least three times and Eddie Kelly almost skated through the front window. The women that ran the place told us she would gladly refund our money if we would quietly leave, if not she would call the police. We left.

We now crossed the street to the Roadhouse that was on the other corner opposite Kitty’s, this was “The Red Pine”, this place was similar to Kitty’s but a little classier and with a bigger dance floor.
Within 30 minutes our table was covered with empty beer bottles, the owner was keeping one eye on us at all times but nothing out of the ordinary had happened, that is, “not yet”.

Eddie Preston was getting drunk; when Eddie Preston got intoxicated something was bound to happen. Dickey Ferguson, Kelly and myself were yelling, laughing and blabbing among ourselves when Kelly said “where’s Preston” we kept an eye on each other when we were in, as we called it “foreign territory”, Dickey got up and went into the mens room, Preston could fall asleep anywhere when he was drinking, he wasn’t in there so we all stepped out the back door, there was Eddie.

Nuttings Lake itself is across the street from where the Red Pine was located; if you walk down a small incline you will be right on the shore of the lake behind Kitty’s.
Well there he was, Eddie Preston, a big tall lanky blonde Polish guy that was always laughing, he was drunk as a skunk and standing knee deep in the lake still wearing his shoes, socks and pants, under his right arm was a big white Goose, the Goose was flapping one wing and trying to bite Eddie in the face. We knew what was coming next so we ducked back into the bar and sat down at our booth. We could hear it coming, “squawk, honk, squawk”, Kelly said, “Jesus Christ”.

The back door flew open and there he was, Eddie Preston, our hero, he had Goose Shit all over his shirt and legs, he was hanging on to the Goose under his arm while it flapped and honked and he was laughing and yelling, “look at this”, Eddie was a city kid he probably thought it was a chicken, he didn’t know a Goose from a Cow.
The worse was yet to come.

The bartender could sense that trouble was brewing, Eddie could care less, he wasn’t afraid of anything, he kept yelling and laughing and then it happened, “The Goose Got Loose”, off it went right into one of the large windows that overlooked the lake, it screamed then started flying all over the room, it was having bowel movements on all the tables, two couples that were dancing ran out into the street, the bartender was chasing the Goose, Eddie was standing on the dance floor with Goose Shit all over his shirt laughing and yelling at the bartender, finally somebody got the back door open and herded the Goose out. The bartender informed us that it was also time for us to leave.
The story of Eddie Preston and the Goose was told many times on the corner as we sat on our milk cases but something else happened that day, Eddie wasn’t through yet, he had another incident up his sleeve that topped even the Goose, and he didn’t even know it.

Heading Home:
I was driving, it was about 6:00 PM, Dickey and I were in pretty good shape but the two Eddie’s were wasted, they were both in the back seat, that was a big mistake, we never should of let them sit together.

We took a different route home, Rte 4 through Bedford and Lexington, I stopped in Bedford for gas, we went to the men’s room, I paid the kid that pumped the gas, when we were all in the car I pushed my foot onto the starter, (all cars started with a foot pedal back then) the car wouldn’t start. Eddie Preston was in a coma in the back seat covered with Goose Shit, Eddie Kelly was sitting beside him talking to himself, Dickey Ferguson was sitting beside me laughing his ass off.
The gas kid opened the hood and was playing around with wires then he came up to the window and said try it now, nothing. He leaned in the window looked around and then said, “turn your key on and try it again”, the car started, he then said, “how far are you guys going” I replied “Cambridge”, he looked in the back seat at Preston & Kelly who both now appeared to be in a coma and just shook his head and walked away.

As I said earlier, letting Preston and Kelly sit together was a big mistake. Dickey and I were singing, the windows were all open and the fresh air was great, this was a wonderful day to be twenty years old and not a care in the world, then it started.
I heard Kelly say to Preston, “get your leg off me” Preston was unconscious, Kelly threw Prestons leg off to the side, this woke Preston up, Kelly said, “stay on your own side” Preston punched Kelly right on the side of the head, now they were swearing and trying to hit each other, they wrestled and called each other names, I had to stop the car, luckily we were still in a wooded area, they stumbled out, Dickey said, “let them fight for awhile then they will get tired”. I wish Video Cameras were around in those days, they would punch the air then they would fall down, they fought for ten minutes and never hit each other.

We loaded them back into the car and resumed our trip; Dickey and I started singing again, war songs, “The White Cliffs Of Dover”, being young, no responsibilities, healthy, it is the greatest thing in the world, it is gone before you know it though.

Well the “Two Eddies” had another fight in Lexington, Preston must have landed a punch because Kelly had a black eye, by the time we reached Arlington they were hugging and kissing each other.

We were almost home, then it happened, we were going through Harvard Square, Kelly had his head out the window yelling at the students and calling them names, we were always fighting with the students from both Colleges (MIT & Harvard) they called us the “locals” and we called them far worse than that, we considered them “Rich Jerks” and they considered us “Morons”.

We had just rounded the curve on Massachusetts Avenue where the old “Harvard Sq Cab Stand” used to be when Kelley let out a scream, “YOU DIRTY BASTARD” he yelled, then it hit, the odor was unbearable, Eddie Preston had just had a “Diarrhea Explosion” in his pants, it didn’t even wake him up.

God it was horrible, Kelly and Dickey had their heads out the window, we stopped singing, and I started to speed it up, I had to be careful though and keep a sharp eye out for a Cop, if we got stopped in this condition we would surely be locked up for the night. I drove up Mass Ave to Putnam Sq, I turned right and headed down Putnam Ave, it was about ten blocks or so further down to our corner.
We drove right to Prestons house, we had to drag him up onto his front porch, we propped him up and took off, by then the whole neighborhood smelled like a “cesspool”.

Our corner is only one block away from Prestons house, Kelly and Dickey both said; “we ain’t getting back in that car” they walked away.
I drove up to the corner and jumped out of the car, it was now getting dark and we wanted some more beer after this glorious day in the country. There must have been about ten or fifteen guys from our crowd standing around, I said “lets go over to the Choo Choo Inn” then the smell hit them, “Jesus Christ, what the hell is that” Dickey started laughing and said “Preston Shit In Burtts Car”.

The Choo Choo Inn was a Bar in Brighton located right across the street from the Brighton Railroad Yards, there was only one other car on the corner at that time and all these guys couldn’t fit in that but they tried, they ran and pushed each other out of the way until the car was full and they took off laughing.

Well, here we were, there was about six of us left, I asked them all if one of them wanted to drive, they all had the same response, “are you shitting”.
The old cars from the thirties all had “running boards” and large steel bumpers, four guys stood on the running boards, two on each side of the car, two more stood on the rear bumpers, one of my real close friends, Billy Dahl was standing on the drivers side next to my open window, he was saying over and over “Jesus Christ what a stink” and he was laughing his head off. I was all alone inside the car; it was like a “gas chamber”.

We made it across the River Street Bridge without the Cops spotting us and we parked in front of the “Choo Choo”, soon we were all drinking and yelling and the “Crap” was forgotten for awhile but every so often we would hear one of the customers say, “I smelled shit when I came in here”.

We stayed in the Choo Choo until closing time then we piled onto the car again, I thought for sure after all that beer drinking that one of them would fall off on the way home but we made it. This was the end of our summer day in the country with all the trees, birds, fresh air, Geese, roller skating, cold beer and “Shit”. Tomorrow had to be faced, I had to clean the car or dump it.
I quietly snuck into bed that night thinking to myself “I hope that smell doesn’t drift up into my Fathers bedroom”.

I drove up to the corner the next morning, they were already talking about Preston and his latest escapade, a few came over to the car, they wanted a sniff first hand then they would laugh and run away. I bought some Ammonia and a couple of brushes, two or three of the guys said they would help me so they jumped on the running boards and we headed down to the Charles River.
I borrowed an old bucket from The Village Spa, we filled it with water several times from the river and then we scrubbed the whole back seat down with the Ammonia. When we were satisfied that the job was complete we opened all the doors and let the car just sit in the fresh air.

We all lay down in the grass and started talking soon we were napping, we were still a little tired from the previous days beer drinking, those were great times.
The car seemed to dry out quickly we all sniffed and said, “that’s not bad”. I had a date that night with my “Wife To Be”; we were going to the “Drive In Theatre”

Back in the mid-forties the only “Drive In Theatre” around was in Saugus Mass on Rte 1, we arrived just before dark, I hurried up to the refreshment stand and bought some French Fries and Drinks, I did this quickly because I didn’t want to miss the Cartoons. The show started, I was happy, I was hungry, I loved Cartoons, everything was quiet for a few moments then my pretty little girl friend said, “whats that smell”, I said to myself, “oh shit”, I then turned my head towards the window where she couldn’t see me, I smiled, then I said, “it must be the oil from one of these cars” my pretty little girl friend replied, “oh”.

Eddie Kelly went on to become a Cambridge Police Officer; Eddie Preston married shortly after I did, Dickey Ferguson was the “Best Man” at my wedding.

Both Eddies are gone now and the last I heard of Dickey was that he now lives in a Nursing Home, Dickey also married and had one child, both his wife and his son have died.

All the guys that rode on the running boards and the bumpers of my car are now gone, all the guys that helped me clean the car and then lay in the grass looking at the sky and talking about life as we knew it back then are now gone. There are very few of us left. I should try to find Dickey; he might not even know me.

For many years after that “One-Day” the “new generation” the “younger guys” that were growing up on the corner would sit on a milk case and listen closely to some of the older guys, (my generation) talking to each other about some of the bygone days and sooner or later one would say, “remember the day Preston shit in Burtt’s car”

Of course, there were many “other days”.
From time to time I will tell you about a few of them.

Author: Red Burtt.