04-18-15 Old Stone Dock Gets a History Lesson from Mr. Bill Swift and Mr. Al Irish

Mr. Swift opened the presentation with remarkable footage from the water’s edge at Surf Drive Beach. Rarely seen remnants of the wooden pipes that brought ocean water to the evaporation pools of the historic salt works are visible only when the sand has shifted just right and the tide is low enough.

Saltworks were a major component of Falmouth’s economy in the days before refrigeration. Salt was used to cure meat around the time of the Civil War.  The most efficient way to produce salt was to evaporate ocean water. Large 10 – foot square, shallow vats were filled with salt water and exposed to sunlight. Roofs closed across the bin when it rained to keep the salt water from diluting.

Long, square, wooden pipes were built to extend from the vat into the ocean. Falmouth’s south shore was lined with saltworks. Windmills pulled the water from the shore up to the vats. Bill showed several historic photos of the small windmills. Bill and Joan Swift were walking the beach several years ago when they saw three wooden pipes in a row exposed by a recent storm. His video clip astonished the audience.

Bill started his narrative with the Mariners’ Memorial at the intersection of Mill Road and Locust Street. The large stone was left by the retreat ing glacier some 10,000 years ago. It was dropped on Elm Road on top of another rock and could be rocked back and forth on top of it. It was called “Tilting Rock” until it was moved to its current location and fitted with a memorial plaque in 1907.

As a child, Bill and his friends enjoyed sleeping in the Old Burial Ground at the head of Mill Road. He lived on Pin Oak Road with his family, and the neighborhood kids would often play among the gravestones. In those days, the grass was only cut twice a summer, so they had many games they could play in the tall grass.

Not only was the grass high in the cemetery, but Bill pointed out that there were very few trees along Mill Road and most of the area was covered with fields. You could see the ocean from anywhere in the area. Walker Street was very short and ended in Mr. Beebe’s extensive farmlands that stretched from there almost to Surf Drive. Beebe Acres is named for this farm.

Mr. Irish added that the ocean end of Walker Street was marshlands and actually had to be filled in 1931 in order to build the houses that are there now. Al’s family moved to King Street, where he still lives, when he was a boy and he used to go down to that area and pick pond lilies for the family table. He also noted that he would catch herring in the Herring Run which came to be called Fresh River. “It used to have plenty of herring swimming in and out with the tide,” he said, “and we caught lots of them, although you weren’t allowed to catch them on Sundays.”

Where the Shining Sea Bike Path crosses Locust Street is where Bill and his friends would while away the day sitting with Bill Driscoll, the crossing guard on the former railroad tracks. Mr. Driscoll would come out with a stop sign when a train approached to halt traffic while the train went through. Bill would write down the number on the front of the steam engines as they rolled through.  The “Cape Codder” would come through to Woods Hole enroute from New York, and local trains like “Buttermilk Bay” would be heading to Bourne. The boys would later compare notes on who saw what trains at the end of the day.

Bill and his friends would often take canoes across Sider’s Pond down to the end, and then carry their canoes across the road to paddle some more in Salt Pond. They would go to the end of Salt Pond and then walk down the beach to go swimming off the pier at the old “Bathing Casino” which was the precursor to the Ellen T. Mitchell Bathhouse.

“The Casino was a much larger building than is there now,” recalled Bill. “It had two large sides that stuck out toward the water and there was a pier in front of it. The remnants are still in the water. We used to dive off the pier all summer.” The water was deep enough then at the Old Stone Dock that they could also dive off the large granite rocks at the opening in the dock’s perimeter.

Both Bill and Al recalled swimming to the rafts that were just offshore. There were two rafts, one nearer than the other. The life guard was Joe Goudreau, and he kept an eye on the youngsters to be sure they didn’t get into trouble by trying to get to the distant one before they were ready. The near raft was a simple platform. The further one had a tower that you could dive or jump from.  Bill recalled it as being about 12 feet high – but admits that it might have only seemed that way.

Bill’s friends Richard and Charles Clark, generally called “Ricky and Chickie” lived on the north end of Mill Road. They would play in the fields and farmlands that were part of the larger estates that were built in the 1880’s. They could cut across the fields all the way from Salt Pond to Shore Street. In the course of their lifetimes they saw several of the mansions swept out to sea or demolished by the Hurricanes of 1938 and 1944. Otherssurvive as guest houses or private homes.

The Swifts live in what was the carriage house to the Dwight Mansion, which was a large Victorian home where the Mill Road parking lot is now. The carriage house was occupied by the Dwight’s caretaker George Gammons, who was given lifelong rights to live in the carriage house – to everyone’s amazement, he lived into his 90’s. Al Irish drew a chuckle from the audience when he recalled posing as a model for an artist who used the north side of the barn for his studio. The main house was washed from its foundation in 1938 and finally destroyed in 1944. A similar fate befell the Olney estate on the opposite corner of Mill Road.

John Dwight was the President of Arm & Hammer Baking Soda Company and a very wealthy man who kept his horses and carriages nearby and maintained a winter home at the other end of Mill Road. Richard Olney was the Secretary of State for Grover Cleveland and enjoyed playing tennis on the land that is now occupied by a dozen smaller cottages, primarily used by summer residents.

In the time that the Swifts have lived on Salt Pond, they witnessed the disappearance of one of the two islands in the pond. There was an island large enough to support a hunting camp about where the osprey pole now rises. “Mrs. Dwight’s Island” remains just where she had it built so she could sit and read in tranquility. The Dwights and Emmonses were proponents of making Salt Pond into Falmouth’s Inner Harbor, rather than its current location. It was resisted by an estate in the Moors, and the decision was made to open Deacon’s Pond instead.

Skating on Sider’s Pond and coasting at Highfield Hall and Tanglewood (before it was torn down) were local winter activities. Fishing off the Old Stone Dock and in the ponds in Beebe Woods, and playing ball at McVitty’s Field on Locust Street were favorite summer activities.

Al also reflected on when Belvidere Plains was just a smattering of older Victorian homes and a privileged few with waterfront lots. There were no house s on Sider’s Pond in 1927. Rawson Jenkins was the realtor who sold 13,000 – 20,000 square foot lots for $1,250 to $2,500. There were dairy grazing fields where Brown Court and Pleasant View Avenue are today. “We got our milk straight from the cows that Jim Nicoll grazed in those fields,” Al said with a smile.

The current Beach Breeze Inn was the home of Mrs. Charles Morse, the widow of a Civil War colonel. Al used to pick up her mail at the post office on Main Street and deliver it to her.  “She drove an electric car. Everyone else had a gas driven vehicle in those days,” he said. Among his other childhood memories was going to the Village School for grades 1- 6, located where the Town Square parking lot is now. The school was torn down in the 1950’s after the Mullen Hall School was built.

Both men recalled when the Garret Schenks Estate filled the gap between Shore Street and Fresh River. It was bought from Schenks by George Bywater Cluett, a fabric magnate and the man behind Arrow shirts. Most people think that the street name refers to its location, but it was likely an inside joke based on Mr. Cluett’s middle name. They both also recalled when the estate was broken up and developed in 1942 by Gunnar Peterson, the builder of the Dome Restaurant in Woods Hole, whose son lives on Mill Road on land that used to open onto the Harding estate, that abutted the Olney property.

A scary memory was Al’s recollection of returning from Hyannis in September 1938. No one knew it would turn out to be the worst storm in a hundred years. “We were heading down Central Avenue and before we got to the end, we had to turn back. The water was coming up over the road. If we hadn’t gone back, we probably never would have made it to Maravista.”  This was borne out by those who recalled Joel Peterson’s father driving by a woman whose car was stuck in the water by Oyster Pond. Mr. Peterson urged her to come with him while he got help, but she wanted to stay with her car.  When he returned, the woman and the car had been washed out to sea.

On a lighter note, Mr. Irish noted that a recent photograph in the Enterprise from the Don Fish collection showed the Column Terrace. It was a hotel and function hall where the Royal Nursing Home is on Main Street.  It was built by John Dwight from Mill Road. Al and his bride Esther Clark, who was from a long-established family in Falmouth, had their wedding reception there.  The timing of the picture in the paper was coincidental, but it sparked a twinkle in Al’s eye.

The Old Stone Dock members in attendance were amazed at the simplicity of life just decades ago when 10 and 12 year olds could roam through the fields and ponds of the neighborhood all day long.  The only time of day that mattered was when the fire station whistle would blow to tell them it was noon, and again at 4:30 to tell them it was time to go home.

As a token of their thanks to the Swifts for hosting the event, Mr. and Mrs. Swift were presented with a small rendering of the dock at Spohr Garden, that was painted by artist and Stone Dock member Karen Rinaldo, who was also in attendance.

Fortunately, Mr. Brian Nickerson, a member of the Falmouth Historical Society, volunteered to video the event so these rare, personal recollections could be captured for inclusion in the oral history.