Here we are with more words that first appeared in the
    Merriam-Webster fifty years ago. It's hard to remember
    a time before studly roadies drove sport utility vehicles,
    or power forwards suffered from mood disorders.
National Register Nomination

Above - Hopedale Airport, c. 1950.

Below - Google Earth view of airport and vicinity.

Click here to see Now and Then - Hopedale Airport   

    The Statue of Hope prototype at Waldo Story's studio in Rome. That was
    okay for Rome, but Story had to get her a bit better dressed for Hopedale. .
    Thanks to Kathy Lawrence for the picture.  Click here for a page on the story
    of Story's creation.

    This is evidently the part of  the golf course (the western side) where
    the skeet range was. At another time there was a skeet range off of
    Route 140 near the Upton line. More on shooting sports in Hopedale.

Hopedale - October 2019


Hopedale history ezine for September - Griffin Apartments Dedication   

Ezine for October -
Winning Pitch   

Hopedale in September 2019   

Hopedale in October  2018   

Recent Pictures Menu                  HOME   

.

    In 1913, the Pythian hall was in the Harrison block
    (below,) Ten years later, the Community House
    was built and they had their own room there.

    It's interesting to see that what was usually known as The Larches was called Hillcrest in
    this article. As far as I know, it was only called that when the Townshends lived there.
    Hannah (Osgood) Townshend, was the daughter of  Edward Louis and Hannah Thwing
    (Draper) Osgood, and twin sister of Fanny Osgood.

    It's also interesting to read in the article that GOD was presiding at the event. That would
    be George Otis Draper, not to be confused with... Well, anyway, the first home on the site,
    The Larches, was his home. It burned in 1909, shortly after he sold it to his aunt, Hannah
    Osgood. She had it replaced with The Larches you and I have known since 1910.

    Map from Heavens on Earth: Utopian Communities
    in America 1680 - 1880, by Mark Holloway.

October 1969

    Thank you, thank you, thank you, Bob Anderson. Yesterday, (Oct 1) Tom Bair of the
    Upton History Museum emailed me to let me know that Bob Anderson of Upton had
    quite a collection of Draper photos that he'd pass on to me. I called Bob and then
    went to see him. He had been working for Draper to within a year of two before the
    closing of the Hopedale plant in 1980. The Rockwell people had no regard for the
    things that the Draper people had saved for decades, and were throwing photos
    and other items into Dumpsters by the hundreds. Bob thought much of it should be
    saved, so he began taking many of the photos home. He put them in albums and
    had about ten of them. We spent a couple of hours going through two of them. I'll be
    getting back to him for more information on the people, processes and machines
    shown. I'll be a long time getting them all scanned.

    In 2008, I met another person who had seen what was being thrown out at what
    was then called the Draper Division, and decided to save some of it. That was
    Gordon Keegan of Uxbridge. He called me and told me that he had noticed the
    restoration work going on at the Little Red Shop, and had decided that was the
    place his Draper collection should go. Elaine and I went to his house to meet him.
    He gave us a loom model, medals given to the Draper Company at several world
    fairs in the early twentieth century for worker housing design, and several other
    items that are now at the Red Shop.

    Bernie Stock told me recently that he rescued portraits of the Drapers, now in the
    Draper Room at the Town Hall  when he was told that they were being dumped.

    I'm putting more of these pictures on this site. I'll put about 15 per page. Here's a
    link to the first page of them. At the bottom of it, you'll see a link to the second page;
    then the second to the third, etc. If you recognize any of the workers, let me know and
    I'll add the name(s).


Michael Tougias to present "King Philip's Indian War."

    Thanks to Tom Daigle for this picture. Click here to go to a page on
    the icehouses in Hopedale. Thanks to Tom also for several copies
    of the Hopedale High periodical, the Blue Flame. The ad below was
    in it in 1930. The long-gone store was at the five-corner intersection.

    The lot in the picture below, behind the stop sign, at the corner of Freedom
    and Williams streets, is where the Sneiderman grocery store was. I remember
    it, but in my time it was no longer a grocery store. There was a dry cleaning
    business in the building. I've never seen a picture of it. Click here to read how
    Pearl Sneiderman saved her brother's life.

    At the bottom of that page, you'll see a comment sent to me after I put the
    article about Pearl on the site. It was from Susan Caressimo. She told  about
    the former grocery store being where her parents started Economy Cleansers,
    that many of us remember in its later site, on the other side of the hill, and also
    her fond memories of the Sneidermans.

    Notice from the Upton Historical Society

    Russ Wood will conduct a tour of Maplewood Cemetery
    (Maple Avenue, Upton) on Oct. 19th at 1PM. All are welcome.

    The cemetery was established by the Knowlton family and
    has many interesting features: the chapel, the mausoleum,
    the mail-order grave marker and Mr. Knowlton keeping a
    watch on the village he created.

Pike's peak

    DJ and I paddled along the Taunton River on Columbus Day. Lucky for us evidently
    the pirates were observing the holiday and not attacking those of us on the water,
    Their lair, shown above, was right where the Mill River enters the Taunton. Not the
    same Mill River as the one that flows through Hopedale, but Route 140 passes
    near this one too, and the water in both goes into Naragansett Bay.

    In the Google Earth view below, you can see where  the Mill enters the Taunton  At
    the very top you can see a bit of Route 140.

Hopedale Pond - October 15

    From disposable headphones and plastic cutlery to food scraps and
    toilet waste, the average airline passenger leaves behind over three
    pounds of garbage, according to one estimate. New York Times.

    Drawn by "Red" Pennington. Click here to see more cartoons
    by Red. Most of the rest are of scenes in the Draper shop.

    Draper shuttle department workers heading out on a hayride
    in August 1945. The picture was sent by Ingrid (Anderson)
    Colby. Click here to see more photos from Ingrid.

Click here for more pictures of Hopedale Pond in October.

Beaver dam a bit upstream from Rustic Bridge.

Taking wedding pictures by the pond - October 19

From 1958 here's Little Richard with Good Golly, Miss Molly.

    Here are a couple of views of our morning (Oct 21) on the
    Charles between Cambridge and Boston. Here are more.

Hopedale Pond - October 24 - More   

Freedom Street - October 24

    I've added 32 more of the Draper photos rescued by Bob Anderson.
    These are from a salesmen's book and, like the ones here, all have
    explanations of the process being shown. I've put them on two
    pages. Here's the first   -   and here's the second.

    By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
      Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
    Here once the embattled farmers stood
      And fired the shot heard round the world.

    There it is - the rude bridge over the Concord
    River. We paddled that area on October 26.

Tour of Hopedale Village Cemetery - October 27

    The paragraph above is from Sports Illustrated. Thanks to Dick
    Grady for sending it. Here's a link to the article. Jon is son of
    Paul Tosches and Luanne Bresciani Tosches of Hopedale.