By Muriel Bristol (Transcriber) | January 19, 2020
In this year, we encounter a retired headmaster’s lecture, chicken dinners at the Hotel Braemore, real estate, a Goodwin Road fire, highway construction, escaped Strafford County prisoners, and a West Milton camp for sale.
Dr. George E. Carmichael, a retired headmaster, was apparently an early “snowbird.” He gave a lecture to other retirees in Florida on the last survivor of Bunker Hill, i.e., Ralph Farnham of Milton Mills. (Ralph Farnham’s swan song appeared in various news articles of 1860).
Retired Teacher Will Give Talk. “The Last Survivor of Bunker Hill” will be the lecture topic of Dr. George E. Carmichael, Milton Mills, N.H., at 2 p. m. today at the Tourist Center Lounge. His talk is sponsored by the International Retired Teachers Association. Dr. Carmichael is retired headmaster of the Milton Mills Preparatory School. Dr. Arnold D. Collier, president of the teachers organization, has extended an invitation to members of the Friday Night Club and the New Hampshire Society to attend the Monday meeting (Tampa Bay Times (St. Petersburg, FL), January 16, 1950).
Dr. George E. Carmichael is principally remembered as the founder of the Brunswick Preparatory school of Greenwich, CT, which he founded in 1902, and of which he was headmaster until 1933.
His obvious Milton Mills connection was his wife, who was a daughter of Everett F. and Carrie B. (Ricker) Fox of Milton Mills. George E. Carmichael, a teacher, aged thirty-seven years, married in Milton, December 25, 1912, Helen G. Fox, aged thirty-one years, he of Greenwich, CT, and she of Milton. Rev. Myron P. Dickey, then of Kennebunk, ME, performed the ceremony.
Al Braman turned over the proprietorship of the Hotel Braemore to his wife, Madeleine (Van Reybroeck) Braman. She advertised reasonable rates, hotel dining room hours, and special chicken dinners.
HOTEL BRAEMORE. Milton, N.H. Special Chicken Dinners $1.00. Open 7 a.m. to 12 p.m. Transient rooms, $1.50 single, $3.00 double. Some furnished 2-room Apts. Reasonable weekly rates. Madeleine Braman, prop. (Farmington News, February 3, 1950).
Madeleine (Van Reybroeck) Braman was born in Moerkerke, West Vlaanderen, Belgium, July 6, 1896. She died in Inglewood, Los Angeles, CA, January 28, 1977.
Henry H. Pillman had still his Mountain View camp for sale, as he had in the previous year.
Summer Cottages and Houses. MILTON. N.H. Shore front camp, $3300 ; also lots. Call LY 5-4311 (Boston Globe, April 9. 1950).
FARM, VILLAGE HOMES. 6-RM. house, 5 acres, oil furnace; near school, stores and church; $2300. Brook H. Jedrey, Milton Mills, N.H. (Boston Globe, April 16, 1950).
Realtor Chester T. Balcom of Melrose, MA, offered several Milton properties for sale. He would seem to have had a local agent or representative with a Milton telephone number.
REAL ESTATE. NEW HAMPSHIRE. Route 16, 8 single and double cabins, furnished, running water, flush toilets, sinks, stoves, electric lights, septic tanks, excellent fishing, swimming; prominent location. C.T. BALCOM. MElrose 4-2140 and Milton, N.H. W AMS AM Su (Boston Globe, April 19, 1950).
REAL ESTATE. MILTON, N.H. – Colonial, 8 rooms, steam heat, barn, 25 acres, in field and woodland, $5700. C.T. BALCOM. Realtor. MElrose 4-2140; Route 16, Milton, N.H.; tel. Milton 41-32. SSu (Boston Globe, May 6, 1950).
Leslie W. and Hazel A. (Perkins) Anderson had a two-alarm fire that damaged the second story of their two-story Goodwin Road house.
Leslie W. Anderson, a shoe shop wood heeler, aged forty-four years (b. MA), headed a Milton household at the time of the Sixteenth (1940) Federal Census. His household included his wife, Hazel A. Anderson, aged forty-two years (b. NH), his children, Ellaine A. Anderson, aged sixteen years (b. NH), and Lena E. Anderson, aged fifteen years (b. NH), and his boarder, Jacob M. Swinerton, a shoe shop treer, aged thirty-seven years (b. NH). Leslie W. Anderson owned their house, which was valued at $1,200. They had resided in Farmington, NH, in 1935.
Leslie Walter Anderson, of Goodwin Road, Milton, registered for the WW II military draft in Rochester, NH, April 27, 1942. His mailing address was P.O. Box 71, Farmington, NH. He was aged forty-six years (b. Stoneham, MA, June 21, 1895), and worked at the Rondeau Shoe Co. in Farmington, NH. Hazel A. Anderson, of Goodwin Road, Milton (or P.O. Box 71, Farmington, NH), was given as his contact. Leslie W. Anderson was 5′ 10″ tall, weight 163 pounds, and had brown hair, brown eyes, and a light complexion.
FIRE DAMAGES HOME OF LESLIE ANDERSON IN MILTON. Fire of unknown origin cause considerable damage to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Leslie Anderson on the Goodwin road in Milton last Monday night. The blaze, which originated in an upstairs room of the two-story house, was discovered by the Anderson family who were occupying the first-floor rooms at the time. They immediately called the Milton fire department and firemen were quickly dispatched to the scene. Upon arrival, the Milton fire chief called for assistance from the Farmington fire department and Chief Gibbs sent Farmington’s new tank truck unit. The two departments worked together as a team, and the superb performance of the tank truck, soon had the fire under control, but only after one room of the house was gutted and other portions of the upstairs considerably damaged. Damage is unofficially estimated at close to $1,000 (Farmington News, April 21, 1950).
In the Milton taxpayer inventory, i.e., property assessment, of April 1949 (for the year 1950), Leslie Anderson’s property included the 90-acre Hersey farm ($200) and its woodland ($200), the 45-acre Daniel Goodwin farm ($150) and its woodland ($150), the 45-acre George Goodwin farm ($250) and its woodland ($100), and the 5-acre Canney farm ($1,000). His residence, and the property damaged by fire, would seem to have been the 5-acre Canney farm.
Highway construction in Milton was being “figured,” presumably by the NH State Department of Transportation, for May 11.
New England Building Projects. According to Gainey’s Construction Newsletter the following is a partial list of projects now being figured. Silver Lake Elem Schl, Athol, Extn., May 11; Sanders St. Elem. School (Addn & Alts), Athol, Extn., May 11; New Church & Parish Hse. (Alts), Quincy, May 11; Elementary School, Dover, N.H., Ext., May 11; Bridge, Conway, N.H., May 11; Highway, Milton, N.H., May 11; Theatre & Stores, Littleton, N.H., May 12; Parochial School, Salem, May 12; Concr. & Stone Msnry. Bridge & Approaches, Grafton County, N.H., May 16; Install Fire Detection System, Chelsea, May 17; Day Sq. Station, E. Boston, May 18; Alt. to Four Schools, Lexington, May 18; Elem. School Addn., Hadley, May 22; Hospital (Alts. & Addn.), Brattleboro, Vt., May 23; Pierce Elem. School, W. Newton, May 23; Hospital, Fort Kent, Me., May 26; Hospital (Addn. & Alts.), So. Braintree, May 31; Housing Project 200-2, Worcester, June 2; Motor Vehicle Storage Bldg., North Scituate, RI, Abt. June 16 (Boston Globe, May 7, 1950).
Bernard G. Sprague of Acton, ME, pled “not guilty” to charges of setting fire to the Milton Mills Knights of Pythias hall. He was held until bail could be determined.
Bernard Sprague, a lumber (firewood) chopper, aged twenty years (b. Waterboro, ME), headed an Acton, ME, household at the time of the Sixteenth (1940) Federal Census. His household included his wife, Virginia [M. (Smith)] Sprague, aged twenty years (b. VA), and his child, Irving Sprague, aged one month (b. ME). Bernard Sprague rented their house on the Milton Mills Road, for $3 per month.
Bernard Sprague enlisted in the U.S. Army in Portland, ME, May 25, 1943. He had a grammar school education (as did most people). In civilian life he had held what the army classed as semi-skilled jobs: “chauffeurs and drivers, bus, taxi, truck, and tractor.” He was born in Maine in 1920, and stood 68″ (5′ 8″) tall.
Maine Man Held for N.H. Grand Jury on Charge of Arson. ROCHESTER. N.H., April 28 – Following a hearing in Municipal Court today, Judge Justin A. Emery found probable cause to hold Bernard Sprague, 30, of Acton, Me., for September grand jury action on a charge of arson. The state alleged that Sprague set fire to the wooden three-story Knights of Pythias building, owned by the town of Milton, at Milton Mills. N.H., on April 20. The building was nearly destroyed in a blaze fought by firemen of five communities. Sprague, represented by Municipal Judge Errol S. Hall of Farmington, pleaded not guilty. County Solicitor Alfred Catalfo presented eight witnesses, including two women, who were across the street and testified they saw Sprague enter the building a short time before the fire broke out. Defense presented no evidence. As bail was beyond the jurisdiction of the local court, Sheriff Wilfred J. Pare and Deputy Sheriff Hervey Tanner took Sprague, father of several children, to the House of Correction (Boston Globe, April 21, 1950).
On August 6, after three months in jail, Bernard Sprague and another prisoner, Leonard I. Boutin, overpowered Strafford County’s head jailer, took his keys, and escaped. Boutin, who had a prior drunk-driving conviction in his native Vermont, was “working off” his time on a Strafford County drunk-driving charge.
Prisoners Who Fled N.H. Jail Sought. DOVER. N.H. Aug. 7 (AP) – Police searched today for two prisoners who escaped from the Strafford County Jail near here. Bernard Sprague, 30, of Milton Mills, and Leonard Boutin, 37, of Vermont, overpowered and injured the head jailer, Daniel Cronin of Dover, late yesterday afternoon. A jail official said the two escapees hid in a dark corner near the main door of the jail and rushed the head jailer as he was releasing another prisoner to help with evening chores. Cronin’s hip was injured as the two fleeing men pushed him to the floor. A cordon, consisting of local and state police end deputy sheriffs, surrounded the area, but no trace of the convicts was found (Boston Globe, August 7, 1950).
Posse Searches For Two Escaped Prisoners in Dover. Two prisoners, who fled the Strafford county jail in Dover late yesterday, are still on the loose today. Sheriff Wilfred Pare said all-night search for the men was unsuccessful, although a posse made up of deputies, state and local police combed the wooded areas near the jail. Pare said the men are Bernard Sprague, 30, of Acton, Me., who faces the Superior court in September on a arson charge, and Leonard Boutin, 37, of Bennington, Vt. Boutin is working out a $199 fine assessed by the Somersworth municipal court on a drunken driving charge (Portsmouth Herald, August 7, 1950).
ONE OF TWO ESCAPED PRISONERS IS CAPTURED. MILTON MILLS, N.H., Aug. 8 (AP). – One of two prisoners who broke out of Strafford county jail in Dover after slugging a guard Sunday was captured in woods today. Leonard Boutin, 37, surrendered without a struggle to a posse headed by Sheriff Wilfred J. Page (Rutland Daily Herald (Rutland, VT), August 9, 1950).
Two Strafford County Jail Fugitives Back. STATE AP NEWS. Dover, Aug. 9. – Two prisoners who slugged a guard and broke out of Stratford county jail last Sunday were back in custody today. BERNARD SPRAGUE, 30, returned to the jail last night with his wife, Virginia, 23 [30], and six children ranging in age from one to seven. Mrs. Sprague said: “I told the sheriff if I could find him I was going to make him give himself up.” She didn’t give any details, SPRAGUE arrived at the jail as a posse was searching for him in a wooded area in Milton where Leonard Boutin, 37, was captured without a struggle several hours earlier. Sprague and Boutin escaped by overpowering Guard Daniel Cronin and seizing his keys. Sprague was awaiting a hearing on an arson charge. Boutin serving an eight months sentence (Nashua Telegraph, August 9, 1950).
The Town Warrant for Tuesday, March 13, 1951 included Article 32: “To see if the Town will vote to retain the Knights of Pythias lot in Milton Mills Village for use as a park in future years, allowing the Selectmen to sell a narrow piece adjoining the property of Mr. Lombard.”
Nothing has come to hand regarding the disposition of Sprague’s case. He died January 3, 1959, aged thirty-eight years.
Harlan Feyler of Farmington, NH, offered to swap a nearly completed four-room West Milton house for a car of equal value.
FOR SALE. CAMP 12 FT. by 20 ft. with addition of 15 ft. by 20 ft. most completed for four-room house, on lot of land 125 ft. by 75 ft., with spring of water on lot. Located in West Milton, three miles from Farmington, excellent hunting. Will sell or swap for car of same value. Harlan Feyler, Charles St., Farmington (Farmington News, December 8, 1950).
“The essence of the [voluntary] exchange is that both people make it because they expect that it will benefit them; otherwise they would not have agreed to the exchange. A necessary condition for an exchange to take place is that the two goods have reverse valuations on the respective value scales of the two parties to the exchange” (Rothbard, 1970).
Previous in sequence: Milton in the News – 1949; next in sequence: Milton in the News – 1951
References:
Find a Grave. (2010, August 25). Bernard C. Sprague. Retrieved from www.findagrave.com/memorial/57688337
Find a Grave. (2013, August 4). George Edgar Carmichael. Retrieved from www.findagrave.com/memorial/114887435
Van Atta, John. (2017). A Brief History of Brunswick. Retrieved from admissions.brunswickschool.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/BRIEFHISTORY_ATTA2.pdf
Wikipedia. (2019, December 16). Brunswick School. Retrieved from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunswick_School
Wikipedia. (2019, July 17). Voluntary Exchange. Retrieved from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntary_exchange
The 
MATING GAME. After 62 years, he’s an institution of marriage Preacher has heard vows of 1,200. By Bob Hohler, Globe Staff. CHICHESTER – Rev. H. Franklin Parker had just donned a railroad conductor’s cap – to remind him that he likes “to get people on the right track and keep them going” – when Michael Valenti pulled into Parker’s driveway with a marriage license. Valenti and his fiancee. Susan Leighton, wanted a holiday wedding – a small ceremony at Leighton’s family home in Barnstead. And they wanted Parker, known by some in these parts as “Marryin’ Sam,” to officiate. “Why not?” Leighton said later in a telephone interview. “He’s married just about everybody else around here.” Parker, soon to celebrate his 86th Christmas, is one of New Hampshire’s last old-time country preachers. Worn Bible in hand, he has spent much of his life crisscrossing a short stretch of the Suncook Valley east of Concord, marrying more than 1,200 residents, three generations of the Brown family of Epsom among them. Parker has gone to mountaintops and hospital wards to pronounce couples husband and wife. He has accommodated couples seeking hasty weddings, marrying them next to the old pedal-powered organ in his study or under the solitary cherry tree in his front yard, just up the road from the 140-year-old Chichester Country Store. And two years ago, in exchange for a cord of wood, Parker stood in the chill of an 18th-century gristmill in Loudon to marry a 47-year-old dairy farmer and a 42-year-old Concord secretary who had arrived on the farmer’s doorstep for a blind date on Valentine’s Day and never left. Both had been married twice before. “One reason so many people come to him may be that he doesn’t judge them that way,” said Ruth Hammen of Chichester, who was baptized and later married by Parker. “He doesn’t feel it’s his place to judge.” Last week. Parker wanted Valenti to answer only one question – had he and Leighton known each other long enough to give their marriage a strong foundation? – before he would agree to marry them. Is it any wonder Parker’s favorite television show is “The Dating Game”? “Everything else is pretty boring,” he said. For 62 years, Parker has entered hundreds of families’ living rooms – and welcomed hundreds more couples to his own – to begin marriages. He has kept the ceremonies short because he says people like it that way. And he has etched each wedding date, among other events great and small, in a diary that traces the lives of a popular country preacher and his flock. It is a story of mutual affection, beginning with Parker’s arrival in Chichester – soon after electricity – in 1926. Before he “retired” in 1969 after 41 years as pastor of the Chichester Congregational Church, Parker often doubled as a circuit rider, delivering five sermons a Sunday at churches in Chichester, Epsom, Barnstead and Gilmanton Center. His congregation grew so wide, according to Carole Brown of Epsom, that she “didn’t even know what church he was affiliated with” when Parker performed her wedding ceremony 10 years ago. “All I knew,” Brown said, “was that he. married everybody,” including Brown’s husband’s parents and grandparents. Later, Parker tracked many of the couples he married. He sometimes delivered a single red rose to women who had given birth. He baptized the children, knitted them mittens for Christmas and wrote them stories when they were sick. And he saw many of them again in his jobs as town librarian, historian, ballot clerk and chaplain for the Chichester Grange. “Rev. Parker’s a landmark, like one of those old country doctors,” said Robert Feeny of Pittsfield, whose wedding Parker conducted 37 years ago. Parker often scanned local papers to learn which area residents had been admitted to hospitals and nursing homes, and once visited more then 1,000 patients in a year. He told many of them his philosophy of life – a Latin phrase [Per aspera ad astra] that he translated as “through adversity to the stars.” “If we get to the stars,” he told the patients, “some of us will get there only through adversity.” And when congregants died, Parker conducted their funerals, sending many of them off with a poem by John Greenleaf Whittier that ends: “I know not why His islands lift their fronded palms in the air, I only know I cannot drift beyond His love and care.” Through the years, Parker has seen the coffins of dozens of men and women he once baptized lowered to their graves. But he has no philosophy of death. “It’s just one of those elements you have to reckon with,” he said. “I take it as it comes.” Recently, Parker has gotten out less and less. He still cuts firewood, gardens and walks to the store, waving his cane to passersby. He visits the local nursing home and hospital about once a week. When someone asks him to conduct a funeral service, he does. And he still performs small weddings. But big weddings worry him. “My memory doesn’t serve me as it ought to anymore.” he said, rocking slowly in his chair as a grandfather clock ticked behind him. “If I slipped up, it would be embarrassing to everyone.” So he stays at home more, sometimes sitting before his 12-inch television to watch Rev. Robert Schuller broadcast from the Crystal Cathedral. Other times, he writes poetry. Or sits by the woodstove, reading aloud to his wife, Alice, before entering the book title in his diary on the day he completes it. And when he has the energy, Parker pumps the pedals on his church organ – adorned with his childhood teddy bear – and plays spiritual tunes, among them his own composition, the “Chichester Hymn.” He regrets that his falling eyesight prevents him from driving 10 miles to Concord to see a performance of Handel’s “Messiah.” But he yearns for little else. “I’ve had a simple, uneventful life,” Parker said. “Others have drifted along, but I’ve gone at my own pace and gotten a lot of enjoyment out of it.” Now the “Happy Holidays” welcome mat lies at Parker’s front door, and much of his flock is returning. Many couples, renewing an annual tradition, are stopping by with good wishes. Some are bringing gifts. Others are sending cards. And most are saying thank you. Among them will be Feeny, who credits Parker with “tying a good tight knot” for him and his wife of 37 years. Parker is “a minister you can look up to,” Feeny said. “He’s an honest, upright man who is always there when you need him, night or day.” Hammen, too, will pay a visit soon, giving Parker a date book to help him chart another year of his life. Hammen remembers when Parker stood by her family eight years ago after their house was destroyed by fire. “It was no great big thing,’ Hammen said. “But that’s not Rev. Parker’s style. In his own way, he has showed a lot of us around here that sometimes the simplest gifts make the greatest impressions” (Boston Globe, December 18, 1988).
Gladys Cope, a Citgo co. stenographer, aged thirty-nine years (b. PA), headed a San Francisco, CA, household at the time of the Sixteenth (1940) Federal Census. Her household included her son, David Spruance, aged twelve years (b. CA), and her lodger, Richard Jones, an assistant insurance actuary (life insurance co.), aged fifty years (b. VA). Gladys Cope rented their house at 1295 Thirty-Ninth Avenue, for $32 per month.
New England Clubwomen Have Day as WACs at Ft. Devens. By RUTH LYONS. Special Dispatch to the Globe. FORT DEVENS. Sept. 9 – They were the adopted children of a WAC detachment at Fort Devens for a day of military life . . . the first group of women from the New England Council of the Federation of Women’s Clubs to be guests of the Army. They stood reveille at 5:30 in the morning, learned how to make a GI bed, ate in the mess hall, inspected barracks, slept in Army bunks, rode in jeeps, changed tires, learned how and when to salute ranking officers . . . all the things that make a good WAC. The group making the tour, in the interests of WAC recruiting, comprised: Mrs. James C. Calmark, Providence, R.I., president of the New England Council; Mrs. Edward Troland of Malden, president of the Massachusetts Federation of Women’s Clubs; Mrs. Wilfred Bodine, Bellows Falls, Vt,; Mrs. J. Herbert Willey, Milton, N.H.; Mrs. Leroy Folsom, Augusta, Me.; Mrs. Charles F. Towne, Providence, R.I., and Mrs. Raymond Andrews, Hamden, Conn. WAC officers accompanied the group, with the Boston Globe reporter, to the fort, where they were greeted by Maj. Anne Cowan, chief of WAC recruiting for the 1st Service Command, and Maj. Elizabeth W. Stearns, WAC director of New England. We were taken to the barracks, assigned to our bunks, given toilet articles and an extra blanket. At the officers’ day room, we were greeted by Col. Howard M. Estes, commanding officer of Fort Devens, who sketched the program of activity. WAC enlisted officers took us to the mess hall for our first meal. At the post chapel, Maj. James Kenealy, a Catholic chaplain, explained the religious activities of the men and women. At the post exchange we enjoyed soft drinks and went to the motor pool where the Army cars are kept. Then followed a tour of the reception center where the overseas boys are processed and back to the mess hall for supper. In the evening we were taken to a movie and to the service club where a variety show was in progress. Eleven o’clock found us in our bunks after a strenuous day as skirted soldiers of the Army. Reveille sounded at 5:30, but no one heard it so five minutes later we were awakened by a WAC sergeant. We were a sad-looking bunch of women that half-slid down the stairs and outdoors for roll call. After breakfast we were taken to Lovell General Hospital and spent the entire morning walking through corridors, through the laboratory, the clinics, X-ray department and then into the wards where Mrs. Troland talked with several Boston boys. Pfc. Orland L. Giannatonio of 56 Dean st., Everett told us about the birthday party that the hospital staff gave him Friday. Then there was Pvt. Murray Ward of 113 Lanark road, Boston, who wore several decorations including the Purple Heart. He was being discharged later in the day. They were all cheerful, glad to be home and alive. Speaking for the visiting club women, Mrs. Calmark remarked that “now we have been WACs for a day . . . and are convinced that there is a great need for more young women in the medical detachment. These boys need our help, and so every possible aid must be given in obtaining WAC recruits to help in this great work.” (Boston Globe, September 10, 1944).
Mrs. Anna Shaw sought a woman to work in her Milton Hotel. She advertised her hotel, which was situated on Route 16, between at least the years 1942-45.
Milton Observer 