Reminiscences of Center Harbor

[Pineedles]

This was a presentation that my grandfather, Fred Warren Goldthwait gave to the Centre Harbor Historical Society February 15th, 1971. It may be of historical interest to some folks, as well as any descendants of the families mentioned. His purpose was to relate who and where these people lived to the best of his recollection during he late 1800's and early 1900's in Center Harbor. He was 88 when he gave this talk.

While I do not remember it at all, my first recollection of Center Harbor was in 1883, when our family spent a vacation at Pine Hill, a boarding house run by the Hutchins called the Sunset House. I do remember more clearly the second time, when on a stage coach ride from Meredith to Sandwich to visit relatives there (old Dr. Hoag's parents), the coach stopped at some big barns (probably the Senter House barns, the Senter House having burned a few years ago) to change horses.

In the summer of 1891 our family occupied the house on "The Point", called Fern Heights, and later occupied by Mudgett, then Guardino, etc. Joe Grant, a boyhood friend of my father's, had purchased this place a few years previous, then acquired the Sutton Place on Meredith Road. Incidentally the Sutton House and twin barns were built by Eliza Sutton, of Peabody, Mass., my birthplace. I well remember the Grand Sutton mansion there.

In the summer of 1891 my grandfather Alfred Berry purchased a lot of land on the Point from William Butterfield and built the house Pineneedles. I spent my summers there ever since until 1958, when I retired and we built a home in Sandwich.

So much for an introduction Let's start in Center Harbor Square. The present library wasn't there, (1892) nor was fountain, nor the store now Heaths Hardware (*NOTE, now Yikes Bookstore plus others) It was built a few years later for a general store, first operated by Frank Towle, who moved up from a Lake Street location. Smith had a photographic studio on the second floor.

Across the square the building now called Burton's Corner, (*NOTE previously Nichols) was general store run by Morse and Stanley, groceries, hardware, grain, almost everything. On the side, facing South was Post Office. Postmasters were George Simpson 1892-93; John Coe 1894-97; John Locke 1898-1900. On his death Mrs. Locke was Postmistress until Allie Bennett (Albert A. Bennett) took over in 1904. Morse and Stanley continued until 1902, when Allie Bennett took over.

Moving up the Plymouth Street (the large building now used by the N.H. Music Festival and/or Belknap College had not been built) then Garnet Inn much smaller than now. I cannot remember who operated it in 1902; the name Kelsea - Hugh Kelsea has a familiar sound. A Kelsea daughter married Prof. Haley; she, I think ran Locust Cottage (where the Mathesons lived). The name Hanson seems to fit in there somewhere. Allie and Ethel Bennett came here about 1901, took over the Garnet Inn, enlarged it greatly, operated the Great White fleet of autos, taking guests and others to Mt. Washington, etc.

Next Dr. Morrills. He came here about 1894, succeeding Dr. Page (William A. Page) who lived in the next house occupied for many years by Chase and Helen Atwood, now by Dr. Wedger.

Back to the Moulton House, which stood opposite Garnet Inn, and operated by Smith Emery. The I.G. Lunt house and the one occupied by Miss Woodward and her niece had not been built. I am uncertain about other houses on this side of the street, Percy Kelley for a while, I think, then Ezra Perkins and his stable. Ezra arrived here about 1904. He kept a fine stable of riding horses, mostly for Camp Asquam and other summer camps.

Up the street on the other side was the house occupied by Brownie (W. Irving Brown) and family, then the school house. Across the street the Bates estate {The Briers}. Mr. Bates had a small herd of deer in an enclosure near the street. Mr. Bates sold it and Mr. Dane and then LaSalette became the owner.

Nothing much up Plymouth Street until we come to the large house, Mr. Edward Dane’s winter home. Further along another old house (occupant at the time, I don’t know) then the Whittier homestead. I have rambled through this house in the old days, seeing Whittier’s cnopied bed and room where he wrote “Snowbound”. (Packed lunch and ate under the Whittier Pine)

Little west of here except the fine road Mr. Edward Dane built to Rt. 3, there was a farm house owned by Mr. Pierce. I remember he delivered milk around Center Harbor.

Back to the Square. Let’s go west. First the old Senter House barns, then the Church, then the Mansion now occupied by Dybros Jewelry. (*NOTE this building no longer exists) I remember Sheafes and Gammons. Up the hill a Graves {J.S. Graves} family, then the Minot Bickford’s (maybe I have the last two in reverse). Across the street Charlie Butterfield, later Ole Olson.

I remember little about Gilnockie. I used to trudge up the hill to tutor “Georgie” Armstrong in Latin. Across the road the John Coe house. I cannot remember any other occupant until Mr. Dane purchased it.

No recollection of another house on this road until one comes to the house Gene Sturtevant, built for his bride, Alice Gould. Next a farm house and barn where George Sturtevant, Gene’s father lived. I visited this house frequently, because Gene’s mother was my grandmother’s sister. Gene’s brother Walter became a Baptist minister. At the top of the hill was a large ark of a house called Houston or Clouston Place. It is long gone.

Back to the village. Let’s go down Lake Street. About where the new road crosses was Simpson and French’s general store. French dropped out and it was Simpson and Towle, then Simpson dropped out and Frank Towle (Flicker’s {J. Irving Towle} father, I believe) ran it until he moved in the recently built store, which I. G. Lunt soon after took over. I am quite sure the post office was for a short while in the Simpson and Towle store. Then came Charlie Butterfield’s barber shop (later taken over by Tony Amabile), then Bill Butterfield’s printing shop. Some small shops, also a tent occupied yearly by an Indian couple, who sold baskets.

Then George Sturtevant’s stable. George kept heavy draft horses and several high wheeled three seated mountain wagons. We leased one yearly for a family picnic to Ordination Rock in Tamworth. Back of the stable on the Colonial Inn property was a bowling alley, where I sat up pins occasionally. I have been told that this building was moved away and is now in use as a dwelling.

Now down to the wharves or docks, for there were two entirely separated docks at the time – the one on the right probably owned by the town or perhaps the Concord and Montreal R.R. for the side-wheeler Lady of the Lake and later the Maid of the Isles docked there. I will not elaborate on these boats and their Captains, as they are amply treated in two fairly recent books. One of them omitted an important fact. When the Old Mount slid up onto the sloping ledge at Mile Island in a dense fog (1904) my grandmother and I were on the boat. The boat’s whistle quickly drew several small launches to the scene. What a job we had getting my grandmother down into the launch, no doubt Lew Kelley’s.

Over on the left the “Old Mount” docked. George Simpson was the station agent, ticket seller, dock supervisor, freight handler, and catcher of the bow docking rope. There is a picture which I believe we contributed, showing the Mount arriving on its afternoon trip. On the left stood the Colonial Inn coach, with the Coachman hollering “Colonial Inn”. Next the Moulton House with George Jackson and Smith Emery yelling “Moulton House”, then the Green’s Corner Coach with driver, perhaps Green yelling “Cambridge House”. Also the Sandwich Coach. Ryvers Ainger of Sandwich tells me his father drove that coach.

On the approach to the Mount’s wharf was a group of large willow, and a large houseboat, apparently grounded after a considerable service on the lake. Here Minnie Emerson, I think that was her name had a little café and shop. I cannot refrain from telling of the week-end afternoon arrival of the Mount bringing 20-25 young couples bound for Green’s Corner. About the same number, who had spent a couple of weeks at Green’s Corner, were on the dock eager to get off on their home trip. The moment the gang plank was down there was a grand rush. Every fellow and girl in each bunch had to hug and kiss each one in the other bunch and there was a grand melee. George Simpson and the Mount’s policeman actually had to tear them apart and push the outgoing crowd up the gang plank. I am sure it delayed the departure at least 20 minutes. Talk about the teenagers these days. The boys and girls of perhaps a generation older had a wild old time around Green’s Corner.

Near the Mount’s wharf and right at the shore of the lake was the Center Harbor jail. It was a small wooden structure with only a door and a barred window. One afternoon a young fellow (I dare not guess on names.) was jailed for attempted murder. All the kids from all around gathered and gawked at the barred window, Apparently the judges were not as lenient as today, for the prisoner got a long jail sentence.

Back to the Square. Let’s go east. First was (and is) the stately Coe Mansion with its beautiful wall paper in the front room. Waddie (Wadsworth) Coe was a striking gentleman, frequently in a very stately garb of Colonial days. Not so along towards night when we would go up in the late afternoon and watch him milk his Jersey cows and incidentally get a cup of nice warm milk. Mrs. Coe was a charming little stately lady. She was librarian, the library held in ell on the west side of the main dwelling.

The first occupant of the next house I can remember was George Simpson and family. As you see from what I have said George did everything. Mrs. Simpson kept a boarding house the Lake House, and raised a large family. Next lived Frank Morse, a grocer, a town-father, and church pillar. The Winn house, I little remember. Across the street, opposite Morse’s lived the Granville Sargent family. I have tried to remember a previous occupant , for my grandfather and his helper boarded there in 1892, while building our house on the point- seems the name was Berry.

Bean Road. Next to the Winn House , Bill Jackson had a jewelry shop and fixed watches and clocks. Next, where Shirley Bickford once lived, lived a family named Bryant. A Bryant boy with Harry and Henry Blackey, Henry Leighton, George and Poly Belmore, Steve Wallace, and perhaps Charlie Leighton and my brother formed a Center Harbor junior ball team and played junior teams from and in adjoining towns. Don’t ask me where we got transportation or uniforms. A “city fellow” whose name I cannot recollect got some caps, bats, etc. The ball field was above the Bryant’s house, a cow pasture where Lewis Penniman let us play.

Across the street Willow Cottage. Here a Wentworth (initial S, I think) bult the famous Center Harbor Dory, a large flat bottomed, square sterned boat, extremely safe and durable. I know because we always had two and they were replaced several times over the years. Next lived some years later Isabelle Sturtevant, George’s widow, then the Jim Leighton saw mill and house. It would take a volume to adequately tell of Jim Leighton, a real big man of the town. Next and on the corner of Kelsea Avenue the Simonds. He played coronet in the C.H. band. I think today they might be called the “Odd Couple”.

I know little of Kelsea Avenue. On the right, going west Leon Manville. Then up on the hill George Neal. Lew Kelley lived further on, then Ed Lockewood (considerably later). Back on the other side Clarence Nichols, George Leighton, I think.

Going back and up Bean Road. Mrs. Jim French’s widow (probably a few years later) built the house now occupied by Heaths (Stanley). Then the Pines and Mrs. Gowdy. Here board the Pipers, Peter and Paul. They lived on Two Mile Island during the late Spring, Summer, and Fall. This was a great rendezvous for kids, state troopers, fishermen, and horse shoe pitchers.

Further on, the house and farm of the Greens (where the Scribners live now). Then the fork which helps make the “Heater Piece” so called at the time. Sometimes I want to argue about the derivations of the phrase “Heater piece”. When a kid growing up in Peabody, Mass. , when we saw the side-walk plow approaching, we would yell “Here comes the heater” Why? – well it was shaped much like the old flat iron heater – see?

Taking the left fork, the Daigneaus, Jim Batchelders, the Lord place. Straight ahead to Center Harbor Neck, High Haith, Camp Asquam, one of the oldest girl’s camps in the country.

At the Lord house a road, dead-ending at the Anthon’s, then right down to the Mead farm. I knew quite a bit about the farm end of the Mead Estate. Gene Sturtevant was Supt. and Mrs. Goldthwait and I spent a week in the winter, living with Don and Dot Wright.

Taking the right fork on the Bean Road at Jim McIntire’s then the right at the cross roads, we go between Long and Round Ponds. On the way passing a farm house occupied )I do not know the order, but Lew Kelley and family and Charlie Sanborn and family lived at a farm on the left). My father used to take me fishing in Round Pond. (the name has probably changed) The fishing was great, if you like eels. When my father caught the first eel, I actually went overboard.

Nothing further up Bean Road. I remember when Gene Sturtevant built the first Harvard Engineering Camp. Gene used to pick me up early in the morning (not before 4:30) and I’d help him pounding nails, then bunk down for the night in what we had built during the day.

Back up to Route 25. (not 25 then) Next to the Winn House , the Universalist Church, then the blacksmith shop run by a Garland or Caverly. Few ever heard of a Universalist Church but I have verified it from the old timers (Percy Kelley, for instance). Across the street George Neal’s blacksmith shop, the more popular of the two. George and his shop perfectly typified the Village Blacksmith of Henry Wadworth Longfellow. There was no chestnut tree, but George supplied the large sinewy hand. I have seen brow wet with hinest sweat, with George astride a huge horse’s leg, and George saying things to the horse. I hope the horse understood.

This junction was broken up and so changed by the new road that some of the above may have been replaced.

We live over the line into Moultonborough but our family even today sort of feels that up to Kanasatka is still Center Harbor.

I do not remember where Harry Blackey lived, but just over the bridge, I am sure there was a little rustic bridge over a brook which at least trickled in the Spring, was a long house with shop extension. Here lived the Emersons, Minnie above referred to, and Mr. Emerson had a TIN SHOP, so called probably because the windows were always solidly filled with kitchen tin ware. Across the street the Websters. Mrs. Webster was at a time a town librarian.

The on the right, the Mc_____house, then occupied by the Wallaces. A boy, Stevie also played on our ball team, but was built like Poly Belmore that he would make a better back-stop than base runner.

Across the street (the Rooney house) lived Al and Julie Blackey (Al was Jim’s brother). We visited them almost everyday, watching them sew covers on small on small baseballs for Draper Maynard of Plymouth. It was somewhat pitiful to watch, because they couldn’t have made more than a dollar or two a week. Perhaps that was good money then. Al was a fisherman and a good and popular guide. He had no power boat but often rowed his fisherman to Salmon Meadow Cove and back in a day.

Next to Blackey’s in the large white house lived the Gould family. He was a house painter. Daughter Alice married Gene Sturtevant. Across the road where the White Diamond Inn is now (*NOTE no longer an inn) lived the Pennimans. Many of you probably remember Walter and Herman.Lewis also kept a few cows and we often (later than Waddy Coe’s) got milk there.

Now I’m guessing. Then there was the Belmore House, older than the Towle house. Mr. Belmore was a mason, I guess, and worked up on the hill, perhaps for Bates, McRoy. Sons George, Poly, and Frank perhaps more. Later here lived the Walkers.

On the corner, where Oak Corner House (*NOTE corner of Lake Shore Drive and Alpine Park Road, now condos) there was a boarding house, cannot remember who owned it, later occupied and run by the Amabiles, Tony and Augie

There is quite a story in regard to the Point Road (Alpine Park Road) or First Neck. Since I covered it in a talk to the Moultonborough Historical Society a few years ago, I will not go into it now but in 1892 the road was known as Park Avenue and through the years has changed several times.

Across the road lived John Edwards, after leaving Lake House. Mrs. Edwards was the town librarian or several years.

Further along the other side of the road (*NOTE Lake Shore Drive) just before you come to Chet Wilder’s was a small white house, occupied by Mr. and Mrs. John Locke.

Jennie Graves would probably turn in her grave if her spirit could see the Jennie Graves place today. Hers was a well-kept place. A the shore – North end of Blackey’s Cove she had built a boat house with a balcony. It seemed to be a custom in those days to build a rather large boat house for a rather small launch and a balcony over the entrance. There was such a building at the Joe Grant place, the Sutton shore, and a boat house for the Swallow at Salmon Meadow.

Beyond Jennie Graves, the Mason cottages. Skipping a few houses, was Jim Blackey’s, where he raised a large family. Next two houses, owned by the Goodrich brothers who ran the mill at Long Pond – later named Quinebarge, then Kanasatka. Later Percy Kelley ran this mill and I have heard that he produced the first electricity in Center Harbor (Moultonborough).

This the eastern end of the excursion. What have I forgotten, Oh yes, the new or newer road to Meredith. First the Sutton Estate. Opposite a house built about 1900 by Cal Currier, a partner of Joe Grant.

Next to the Sutton house, lived for many years, Frank Stanley, partner of Frank Morse. Frank Stanley was another town stalwart, church pillar.

The next house, where Leslie Woods now lives, was owned by William Butterfield (1891) father of Charlie and Bill. Around 1890 Mr. Butterfield owned most of the Point with a man named Smith.

Further along and on the right, the Whites. I imagine this is where Pete and Hazel White grew up. Further along, the Braggs.

On the other side of the road the “Great Woods” so terribly devastated by the hurricane of 1938, there was a road leading to the Dane’s summer home. I do not know who owned the property at the time (about 1900) but the owner built a rustic pavilion, half way down the road on the left. He made a show piece of it. It is my firm in my mind that they found a free flowing spring. Lewis Sibley did the stone work of the well and my grandfather set the beautiful, pictured white tile. I wonder if it still stands.

Standing at the new Dane home, one now looking north sees nothing but forest. In the late 1890’s this was a cow pasture where my brother and I picked quantities of raspberries and sold them to the Colonial Inn. What a job nature does to idle land in three quarters of a century.

At the turn of the century Half Mile Island and its smaller mate to the rear had a growth of small bushes. The owner of “The Barns” put a flock of goats on the islands and soon they were bare.

FWG

[SIKSUKR]

Pineneedles,that is absolutely priceless stuff!!What a great read.

[AC2717]

Originally Posted by SIKSUKR

Pineneedles,that is absolutely priceless stuff!!What a great read.

it is awesome

[Pineedles]

I thought I would re-up this one, as there are many new members on the froum that might be interested in this.

[Ross_t]

Originally Posted by Pineedles

I thought I would re-up this one, as there are many new members on the froum that might be interested in this.

great read, thanks

[Karolynsdollshop]

Hi: I was very interested in the article. My grandfather left Canada in 1885 and settled for awhile in Center Harbor. I was hoping someone might know something about the John Blackey family. He was married to a Jane F. True and they had an adopted daughter Jenny C Blackey. Jenny died in May of 1894. My grandfather and Jenny had a little girl. I would like to know anything about the Blackey family. There was a mention in the article of a Blackey - but I don't know how he fits in with John and Jane and Jenny.

I am also looking for vintage Center Harbor photographs that might show these people. My grandfather's name was J. Bernard Mc Donald and he stayed in Center Harbor from 1885 to approximately 1895, when he moved to Milton Massachusetts (bringing the little girl with him). My grandfather was a teenager when he came to Center Harbor and left when he was about 25.

Thanks in advance for any help anyone might offer. Karolyn

[RLW]

Karolynsdollshop, I just noticed that you are fairly new to posting on the forum and glad you have joined us. Have fun and enjoy the Winni Forum while making many new friends. Thanks for coming onto this thread as I'm sure someone will be able to give a helping hand.

[secondcurve]

Originally Posted by Karolynsdollshop

Hi: I was very interested in the article. My grandfather left Canada in 1885 and settled for awhile in Center Harbor. I was hoping someone might know something about the John Blackey family. He was married to a Jane F. True and they had an adopted daughter Jenny C Blackey. Jenny died in May of 1894. My grandfather and Jenny had a little girl. I would like to know anything about the Blackey family. There was a mention in the article of a Blackey - but I don't know how he fits in with John and Jane and Jenny.

I am also looking for vintage Center Harbor photographs that might show these people. My grandfather's name was J. Bernard Mc Donald and he stayed in Center Harbor from 1885 to approximately 1895, when he moved to Milton Massachusetts (bringing the little girl with him). My grandfather was a teenager when he came to Center Harbor and left when he was about 25.

Thanks in advance for any help anyone might offer. Karolyn

There is a Blackey cove in Center Harbor. It is a neat little place and represents some very expensive real estate. I wonder if it is named after your grandfather?