THE SCRIBBLER II
The Cavendish Historical Society Newsletter
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PO Box 472 Cavendish, VT 05142
802-226-7807 margocaulfield@icloud.com
Fall 2024 Vol. 18, Issue 4
CALENDAR OF EVENTS
October 31 (Thursday): Cavendish ghost stories for CTES 5th/6th graders
November 1 (Friday): Dia de los Muertos for CTES 5th/6th graders.
November 2 (Saturday): Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead): Starts 3 pm at the Cavendish Library, 573 Main St. Proctorsville. Workshop from 3:30-5:30 Pot luck supper follows
November 10 (Sunday): Proctorsville Ghost Walk. Meet at 2 pm in front of the Proctorsville War Memorial. This event is free and open to the public.
REMEMBERING MALCOM MACMILLAN
We recently learned that Malcolm Macmillan who wrote “An Odd Kind of Fame,” a detailed history of the Phineas Gage accident and recovery, died in Australia at the age of 95. Stacia Spaulding, who had been one of the organizers of the 1998 Cavendish 150th anniversary of the accident posted the following,” I need to give credit where credit is due. There would not have been a 150th Anniversary Phineas Gage Celebration in 1998 if not for Mac. He sent an e-mail in 1996 and mentioned that the anniversary was approaching and suggested that Cavendish might do something to commemorate the occasion.
Mac is the one who came up with idea for the bronze plaque that now sits on the Town Green in Cavendish. He worked tirelessly with the designer, Dr. Ross Bastiaan (a periodontist and designer of more than 200 plaques) in Australia, for many many months and raised all of the funds to cover its cost. In fact, the plaque was cast by the Arrow Foundry in Australia.
Mac presented a lecture entitled "Restoring Phineas Gage: A 150th Retrospective" in the Stone Church on Sunday morning of the anniversary weekend, as well as gave a short speech at the plaque's unveiling a short time later.
We exchanged dozens and dozens (maybe hundreds) of e-mails during those many months leading up to the 150th Anniversary. And we exchanged Christmas cards more years than not since then. Mac remained passionate about Gage right up until his death at age 95.
CAVENDISH IN GLASS: Part II
This past summer, glass artist Peter LaBelle donated one of his glass art works that consists of 12 panels depicting historical sites in Cavendish. The CHS summer newsletter, available at the CHS Blog, provides the history for nine of the panels. Below is the history on the three remaining panels.
Proctorsville Fire Department: The Proctorsville Volunteer Fire Department (PVFD) was founded in 1833. The current fire house was originally the carriage house for the adjacent residential property at 493 Main Street (now condominiums). The Fire Department purchased the property in the 1950s and moved from the old Firehouse on Main Street near Singleton’s Market. In approximately 1986, the department renovated the building, adding a large addition that expanded the meeting area and increased housing for their apparatus.
Cavendish Post Office: The Cavendish Post office has functioned in various locations throughout its history, with the
postmaster often serving as the librarian, as was the case for Richard Dutton in 1874. However, in 1880, Elliott White bumped it up a notch and then some as he was the town clerk, librarian, postmaster, undertaker and insurance agent in Cavendish Village. Since he had recently constructed a new building on Main St. (burned in 2015), he moved all of those services there. By 1916, Marion White replaced her father as postmaster. Between father and daughter they ran the post office for 55 years. In 1935, with the Democrats in office, the job of postmaster was given to Alvaredo Gibson. There was no Civil Service exams at the time and appointments were made based on party loyalty. He was replaced by Katharine Moore in 1946. Reports are that the current location of the post office started being used sometime in the 1960s with postmasters being required to take the Civil Service exam.
Gethsemane Episcopal Church: The church dates back to as early as 1840, though the building that stands today was completed in 1889, In 1885 Miss Sally Parker, whose nephew was Redfield Proctor, governor of Vermont, modified a parlor in her home for use as a church. However, with a growing congregation Miss Parker’s chapel was too small. At her death in 1886, her will specified that a church was to be built on land adjacent to her home, which was to be used in perpetuity as an Episcopal church, with the consecration taking place in 1890.
While the church weathered the floods of 1927 and 1938, the flood of 1973 inflicted slight damage to the parish hall. Unfortunately, Irene in 2011, destroyed the parish hall and caused considerable damage to the church itself. The building was raised several feet and a new parish hall was built on the back. The church was refurbished, including the many stained-glass windows. While the church itself was minimally impacted by the floods of July 2023, the grounds around the building were destroyed and required considerable landscaping.
With a dwindling congregation, the church has not been used regularly for a number of years, the plan by the Episcopal Diocese in Burlington is to sell the building.
PROCTOR PIPER PARK PAPER
With the close of the Museum, we’ve turned our attention to the archives, setting aside Sunday afternoons as the time for cataloguing and organizing. This past week we came across copies of the “Proctor Piper Park Paper,” from the Civilian Conservation Corp (CCC) that was located in the Proctor Piper Forest on Bailey Hill above the Hillcrest Cemetery.
The CCC was established by the Roosevelt administration in April of 1933. Single men 18-24 were enlisted in conservation work across the country. A camp was set up in the Proctor-Piper State Forest in Proctorsville in November, 1933. The CHS Winter 2024 Newsletter has a lot of information about the 1218th Company, which can be read on-line at the CHS blog- https://cavendishhistoricalsocietynews.blogspot.com/2024/02/the-scribbler-ii-cavendish-historical.html.
While they cleared hiking trails, created horseback riding trails, built bridges over streams, as well as fireplaces and picnic facilities at various sites, they also found time for sports, dances and even the publication of a weekly newsletter that sold for 5¢. The Proctor Piper Park Paper included news and information that would be of interest and use to the men. Below is an example of some of the stories included.
January 24, 1935 Sports
January 16, Proctorsville met Weston CCC Basketball Team and defeated them before a large crowd at Ludlow Town Hall. This is the second tie P.P.P. engaged Weston and emerged victorious on both occasions. Weston played sparkling basketball but the Procorsvillers were on their toes at all times and held them in check. Fouls were few and far between which made the contest all the more exiting. The final score found P.P.P. on top with the score 21 to 12.
Here'n There: Health
“A word to the wise is sufficient.” We have listed here, a few DON’TS for those who are fortunate enough not to be on the sick list.
DO NOT unbutton your jackets if you are perspiring. Doing so may promote a cold, chill or fever.
DO NOT wear wet or damp clothing. Dry clothing, (especially stockings) is advisable.
DO NOT wear too much clothing, when working, for this causes one to perspire more easily than otherwise.
DO NOT delay in reporting to the infirmary, should you have a chill, fever, cold, headache, or sore throat.
Let us see how many of you can profit by this advice.
Be careful, make sure that the other fellow does not stand a chance of catching your cold.
On Saturday, January 19, the first bob-sled was utilized by the Davis’s Carpenter Crew, better known as the “Bantum Crew” of the Proctor-Piper Park. This sled was donated by Mr. Davis to the boys on his crew as a token of appreciation to the boys. The sled on its trial run was doing about 40 miles coming down the Brook Road and about 50 miles coming down the Bailey Hill.
July 4, 1935 Topics of the Day
Flash: Information has been received from the Second Corps Area Headquarters, of the probability of the 1218th Company being transferred to vicinity of Cape May, at the extreme southern point of New Jersey, on or about August 1. The enrollees will be engaged in mosquito control work.
May 30, 1935 Barack Box
Who was the guy, working so hard that he broke his shovel from applying too much pressure?
I wonder what that kid in Proctorsville will say when she finds out that her boyfriend has another’s name tattooed on his arm.
Can it be that two of our plumbers have been fighting? They were seen the other night quarrelling in C Barrack and the following morning one had a cut over his nose and the other had honey on his eye. Tch Tch boys, mustn’t do.
Polly was talking about the cooks who are supposed to move when and if this camp does move. He said, “I’ll be sorry to leave the boys in this camp and go to another camp.” But heard a lot of cheering when he mentioned that he was not going to the same camp.
The barber. Couldn’t take it. His leaving camp cost him a pretty penny. I bet half the camp is laughing up their sleeves at their getting a free haircut. The other half is probably blue because they didn’t get one before he left.
May 30, 1935 Topics of the Day
Flash: In an effort to find the perpetrators of the Vermont mystery murder cases, which came to light with the findings of three bullet-riddled skulls in a wagon road near Middlebury, Lt. Detective Dorsey and State’s Attorney J.P. Conley of Vermont left on a tour of 12 states and a score of large cities. Note: On May 15, 1935, the skeletal remains of a woman and two boys were found in the woods near East Middlebury, Vermont. The victims were shot in the head and were believed to have been killed 3–5 years prior. To date, the case remains unsolved.
MARCH 1917: THE RED WHEEL, NODE III, BOOK 4
Written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn during the time he lived in Cavendish, The Red Wheel is the Nobel prize winner’s multivolume historical novel about the Russian Revolution. March 1917―the third node―chronicles the mayhem, day by day, of the Russian Revolution. Book 4 presents, for the first time in English, the conclusion of this four-volume revolutionary saga.
The action of Book 4 is set during March 23–31, 1917. Book 4 portrays a cast of thousands in motion and agitation as every stratum of Russian society―the army on the front lines, the countryside, the Volga merchants, the Don Cossacks, the Orthodox Church―is racked by the confusing new reality. Soldiers start to fraternize across trenches with the enemy. The Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, the emperor’s uncle, arrives at military headquarters to assume the supreme command but is promptly dismissed by the new Provisional Government. Even this government holds no power, for at every step it is cowed and hemmed in by a self-proclaimed and unaccountable Executive Committee acting in the name of the Soviets―councils of workers and soldiers. Yet the Soviets themselves are divided―on whether to call for an end to the war or for its continuation, on whether to topple the Provisional Government or to let it try to govern. Meanwhile, in Switzerland, Lenin quietly dictates his own terms to the German General Staff, setting the stage for his return to Russia.
The book is now available at Amazon and other book sellers. CHS has limited copies, which can be borrowed. If interested, please contact CHS at 802-226-7807 or e-mail margocaulfield@icloud.com
CAVENDISH IN THE FALL
Between the Northern lights and the foliage, It’s been a spectacular fall this year, We thought we’d end the newsletter with a few pictures. Leaving the Museum of Sept. 30, we were amazed at how beautiful the tree by Mack Molding looked.
The Northern lights captured everyone’s attention but not everyone was up late or early enough to see it. This picture was taken by Justin Savage around 6 am.
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If you have not joined the Cavendish Historical Society, need to renew your membership, and/or would like to be a volunteer, please complete the form below and sending a check, payable to CHS, to CHS, PO Box 472, Cavendish, VT 05142. All contributions are tax deductible.
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