| Bob Holmes
People employed had picture "ID's" to gain entrance to work There were guard houses in a few places around the shop. One place was at the corner of Hopedale and Freedom St where our "Little Red Shop" is currently located. As kids we passed this corner at least four times a day going to and from school. I vividly remember one of the guards in particular was a gentleman by the name of "Bill" Honey. He was extremely well liked by the kids. He being a smoker, as most men were at that time. But "Bill" had smoking tricks to entertain us with. One of them was to take a lit cigarette and flip it into his mouth and make it disappear, only to flip it back out in a second or two and continue puffing away on it. This was with no hands, just a flip of his tongue Another was to hold the cigarette up to his ear and appear to breath the smoke in through his ear and exhale it out of his mouth. Sure fooled us. He would always have some type of harmless trick or entertainment for us. I am sure that more than once, I was his assistant, or at least he told me that he needed my help. Incidentally, around 1949, I was the lucky kid that was the "Safety Patrol" (today they call them "Crossing Guards") on that same corner. Needless to say there were no more guard houses needed in 1949. Just another little thought. When we walked along Hopedale St., in front of the shop approaching the "windy corner" of Freedom St., we often looked into the "tilted" open shop windows and talked with the folks doing "piece work" at the work benches in that area. I remember that one of them was "Larry" Heron, a well know disabled WWII blinded veteran. We marveled at the way Larry could precisely insert small loom parts into his "jig" and bend, punch, shape or whatever he did to them just as quickly as possible. Not only that, but he would talk to us and knew many of us just by our voices. Wonderful times, great people, great little town. Bob H. The following is from an email sent by Bob on May 15, 2008. DAN, I was sad when I saw these pictures of the rail cars being scrapped. I still picture them in fine shape, well not so much anymore. Progress? We grew up in what we thought was a very healthy environment. Living at the corner of Freedom and Progress Streets seemed just about as good as it could ever get. However, when you think about the G& U tracks about 100' to our west, the large scrap iron piles next to the tracks and right next to that, the dump burning almost constantly. We would watch the magnetic crane hoist the dusty, rusty scrap iron into the rail cars, breathe in some of the dust for sure. They then were taken to the foundry for smelting and when the furnace was stoked with the necessities for the high quality gray iron casting of Draper Corporation, the black smoke would billow all over the valley of our fair town on warm, humid days, I remember my Mom having to do the wash all over again because they would be covered with cinders from the foundry. We often would enjoy climbing on the scrap iron and "pig iron" piles, a bit of a challenge. Sometimes we would find very interesting discarded treasures in the iron piles. I am sure that the air in Hopedale is of a better quality than it was then, but I think the quality of life and the feeling that your neighbors were almost family was greater than it is today. This is not to say the neighbors are not as nice, but not many of them have lived next door for two or three generations. Dan, I did enjoy the pictures. Thanks for the memories, Bob H. Bob sent the following memories in June 2010. Pete's Meadow The area was at the north end of the dump, was definitely not a pond, more of a swamp with moguls, or hummocks, scattered all over the area. I suppose that is why it froze over so easily, being very shallow as well. It did turn into a brook as it meandered along the northwest side of the dump, behind what eventually became Draper Field and went along to the ski hill where we had a culvert under the bottom of the ski hill to ski over. I have no idea what happened to the brook after it went by the ski hill, but it must have continued under the old trolley or rail line that went up to Mendon. We did skate in between and around the hummocks. Probably just enough to cause us to look forward to some real skating, knowing that the big pond would soon be safe for the whole town go occupy on a Sunday afternoon and any free time available. Just beyond Pete’s Meadow was where there were many victory gardens during WWII. I believe that Norm Henry was the farmer that would plow and harrow the garden area every spring during the war years and even after for a time. The gardens were right at the bottom of Salt Box Hill (Freedom St.) and were thus accessed from Freedom St. Wonder what the EPA would say about having the gardens so close to the town dump in today’s world. As kids, the dump, before all of the restrictions were created, was quite a place to live and learn. Shooting rats for target practice. At 12 or 13 years of age and older, we would have pellet guns or 22’s. Whenever there was a dump fire, burning back underground, the fire department would come and hose into the dump banking. When this happened the rats were extremely numerous and very actively moving all over the banks. It would be when the fire department was putting out the underground burning that we would be on the other end of the banking firing away. We reduced the rat population considerably at those fires The entire dump story is an interesting tidbit in itself. I’ll save that for another time.
And in September 2011, Bob sent this: Dan, I just read about the “Seven Sisters Gang””. I have to tell you that I loved it. I did get a laugh out of the fact that it was near Draper Field. of course that means where Draper Field was later located, since that gang of “groupies”s melded in the mid 30’s, long before Draper Field was even a dream. The Holmes’s (46 Progress St.)and the Soderberg’s (136 Freedom St.) lived in the house on the corner of Freedom and Progress St., in fact Shirley and Gladys Holmes moved into that house in 1927 and the Soderbergs not to far from that date. I never heard of the Tulen name so the Seven sisters Gang must have driven them out before I was old enough to know the Tulen name. Good job guys. I did know or recognize most of the names in the “Gang”. They were a generation ahead of me or I am sure that I would have been mixed up with them as well. I hate to think what might have happened to the poor cat. I’ll bet Johny Cembruch knows. Bob Memories Menu HOME |