pt at large

Westport Friends (Quaker) 53rd Used Book Fair: Loads of Pulp Fiction, Non-Fiction

Published October 16, 2014

Westport Friends (Quaker) 53rd Annual Used Book Fair
938 Main Road, Westport, MA
July 12, 2014
11 AM - Sunset and for the next two weeks...

The Westport Friends Meeting (Quaker) calls their annual book fair its signature fundraiser of the year. That signature is as bold as John Hancock’s on the Declaration of Independence. Early in the morning of the second Saturday of July every year, Meeting members and volunteers lay out 20,000 used hard and soft cover books under two venerable yellow and white striped tents in front of the Friends Meeting House. 

Like bees to pollen, hundreds of book lovers assemble around the tents waiting for the opening whistle. At precisely 11 AM, they surge into the tents, a swarm of acquisitive shoppers with bags at the ready. Everybody wins here. Bibliophiles load up on a year’s worth of reading material. Cashiers take in money that will cover the annual costs of maintaining the historic Westport Meeting House (built in 1816) and their Macomber Community Hall next door.



For the first hour, you’d never guess by listening that several hundred men, women and children surround you and the 70 sturdy wooden folding tables under the tents. Like bees, shoppers are not noisy. But they do possess a bee-like GPS that leads them to the categories of books they’ll feed on for the next year. History, science fiction, philosophy, photography, cooking, mystery, biography, religion, travel, humor, romance, coffee table books - this is Amazon, Barnes and Noble and flea market all in one - at about 10% of the original retail price.

Shoulder to shoulder, they use a boarding house reach to pluck titles from the piles on each table. It’s decidedly polite, even shoppers are “Friends” today. The sun filtering through the yellow and white tents casts a golden glow over shoppers and books – perfectly heavenly, and the smell of old books is the accompanying incense.

Strategies abound, from the book dealers who grab an armload of books at a time to those with eagle eyes fixed on specific titles. Some bring lists. All bring an appetite for a good deal. The arm loaders exit the tent, rifle through their piles, take what they want and return the rest to the tables. Savvy searchers like Providence, RI bookseller Althea Grady go back for a second round after the first hour.

“The dealers don’t necessarily return books to the category tables they hauled them from so I look everywhere,” she says, with a knowing grin.



The Meeting House, filled with books priced at 25 cents apiece and 6 for a dollar, opens at 10 AM, sort of a way to prime the pump. Loaded with hundreds of children’s books, it’s a gold mine for kids and parents. What isn’t sold today will be moved to the tents at the end of the day. The weekly Friends Meeting is held at 10 AM the next morning, no need to be distracted by “Good Night Moon” during the spiritually reflective hour-long meeting.
 


The sale continues for the next two weeks. As the books dwindle in number they are consolidated until all but a few tables of books remain. The cash business uses the honor system – a coffee can in which you calculate what you owe from the price written inside the cover and pay up.  Sort of like a Dollar Store without a cashier.

Thousands of books have been donated, left in a specially designated shed on the grounds of the Meeting House, and are sorted, priced, and organized into categories in a year long process. After a brief breather, committees begin the process again shortly after this year’s fair has concluded. Book sort VIDEO1 VIDEO2

"This is my wife's favorite day of the entire year," says Shane Sher of Fairhaven. “She started a lending library in a laundromat near our home. After she’s done with the books they get shuffled off to the laundromat.” Following a book’s history can be similar to a Where’s Waldo illustration. Lord knows where these books have lived before being donated to the book fair.

Many of them will be re-donated and find new homes next year, and a new address will be added to their Where’s Waldo portfolio.

Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.

Companion posts

http://ptatlarge.typepad.com/ptatlarge/2014/07/westport-friends-quaker-53rd-used-book-fair-photo-gallery.html

http://ptatlarge.typepad.com/ptatlarge/2014/07/westport-friends-quaker-53rd-used-book-fair-video-gallery.html

 

Westport MA Friends (Quaker) 52nd Annual Used Book Fair: Westport Shorelines

August 1, 2013 Edition: Front page, top fold
"Paperback pilgrimmage: Throngs flock to Friends summer rite of reading"

Westport Friends (Quaker) 52nd Annual Used Book Fair
Grounds of the Society of Friends Meeting House
918 Main Road
Westport, MA
July 13, 2013

The opening moments under the tents in the annual Friends Used Book Fair feel like a combination of religious observance and tag sale. The pilgrims drawn to this event revere books and have acquisitive tendencies.

Like pilgrims of yore, they want to return to their homes with relics, in this case pulpy ones, to enrich their lives. They may even proselytize, encouraging friends to establish faith with their favorite authors when they arrive back home. As with pilgrims the world over, they bond quickly with others on the same quest. Even in the first hour, when seekers are especially focused on finding prized books amongst the tables lined with row upon row of paperback titles, you might hear, “That’s one of my favorite books,” uttered quietly by a shopper who sees a seeker pluck a title from a tightly packed row.

After initial whoops of excitement when the opening whistle pierces the air, the areas under the yellow and white striped tents have the aura of an outdoor chapel, hushed voices, the sound of feet shuffling over the gravel underfoot, and the soft plunking sound as shoppers drop a paperback into a sack or carton.

The area is wall-to-wall people. Moving along the narrow rows between tables is not accomplished by volition but by flowing with the languid current of engrossed shoppers. This is not the place for claustrophobics. This is one place where little kids never have to be told twice to stay right next to mommy or daddy. After thirty seconds, they realize that with one lackadaisical moment they’d lose contact with the parental unit.

On this hot, humid, July morning, the atmosphere under the tents feels like a greenhouse. Scents of sunscreen, shampoo, and perspiration hang like musk in the breeze-less shade of the tents and blend incongruously with the smell of paperback books having been packed and stored for months, now liberated chock a block on the tables.

If you were to bottle the competing aromas, I’ll bet that anyone who’s previously attended one of these book fairs could identify it in a heartbeat as “Eau de Book Fair.”

Sometimes the pebbles on the ground are as captivating as the book in your hand as Levi Sardinha, 3, discovers as his brother Colin Sardinha, 6, focuses on print and pictures.

 

 Nancy and Jeffrey Sardinha got the book fair bug last year. ”We had just moved here from Fall  River,” Nancy says. “My husband read about the fair in the paper. We can never have enough books in the house.”

Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.

 

Westport Shorelines: Westport Friends Meeting (Quaker) Used Book Fair

Westport Shorelines

July 19, 2012 edition, pt at large photos top and bottom fold of page 1!

Caption: "Friends of books, 10:59 AM - The troops are to charge inside the tents as soon as volunteer Tristan Peirce blows the whistle precisely at 11:00 AM to open The Westport Friends Meeting Used Book Fair, 2012 edition. One of the biggest and best such book fairs around, this  one draws thousands and is a regional favorite."

Westport Quakers Awesome 50th Annual Used Book Fair

Westport Friends Meeting (Quaker)
938 Main Road at Adamsville Road


Westport, MA 02790
50th Annual Used Book Fair front page story
Saturday, July 9, 2011
11 am to dusk (and continuing through the week)

10:45 AM, Saturday, July 9
Bright sunshine reflects off the yellow and white striped tents in front of The Westport Friends Meeting House on Main Road. For hundreds of book lovers, this is the pot of gold at the base of the rainbow. In a quarter of an hour, they’ll be able to dig their hands into the treasure in front of them and take home as much as they can carry. The 50th edition of the Westport Friends Used Book Fair is about to be opened for business.

 

Ready...set...GO!

Shoppers crane their necks to read titles of books stacked on heavy duty folding tables a few tantalizing feet away. Twenty thousand used paperback and hardcover books are piled up on sturdy tables in a space the size of the fruits and vegetables section of your local supermarket. Anticipation hangs in the air like incense. You can almost feel the shoppers twitching with excitement.

At precisely 11 AM, the shrill blast of a whistle announces the 50th edition of the vaunted Westport Friends Used Book Fair is open. The yellow tape surrounding the two tents is lowered and scores of bargain shoppers wade into this bookish nirvana. By noon, customers with satisfied Cheshire cat grins begin to line up to pay for their haul. 

For some, the book fair is the official beginning of summer in Westport and a chance to restock bookshelves and night tables with enough booty to last until next July.

The crowd that dives into the tents is as varied as the book jackets on the tables. Young, old, and in between, they span three generations. The veterans have sacks slung over their shoulders that will soon bulge with books. The first timers always seem surprised to find themselves trying to balance a load of books up to their chins in the crook of their arms. That’s when they discover the reason dozens of empty cartons are stacked against the Macomber Meeting Hall. They stagger outside to drop their treasure into a brown cardboard box and jam themselves back into thick of it.

By 11:30 the space under the tent feels like a humidor, the thick musty scent of thousands of books that have been liberated from attics, garages, and bookshelves and transported to this depot fills the nostrils. Mountains of books have been donated, left in bags and cartons, all year long. Committees have sorted and priced them. Today, they’re on their next glide path.

Forget multi-tasking. This is fierce, concentrated mono-tasking. Amidst hushed voices reminiscent of a public library, people intently scan the spines of books packed chockablock on tables to find that elusive title or that favorite author. The entire mass of people moves as one slow deliberate task oriented organism.  Despite the earnestness of the search, decorum prevails.  No shoving, over-reaching, or squabbling – not to worry if a big one gets away. With 20,000 books piled up, an even better one might be just a few inches and a glance away.

Shoppers with specific lists shuffle side by side with consumers who rake the books in like fishing trawlers.

“If you think you’re even remotely interested, grab it,” says a college kid to his posse.
 
Delores and Edward Charette of Fall River are more particular. “My wife is sending me to the Romance Literature table to find Danielle Steele books she got from the computer,” Edward says. “I have a whole book case of her books. I’m sending him to find some of her older ones,” Delores says as she heads into the literary mosh pit.

Warren, RI resident Hannah discovered the book fair last year. “I’ve been insanely excited for three months and have been saving up my money to spend here. I’m going to have to make more book shelves this year,” she says. “The books I buy here are way cheaper and people here help each other out. If someone sees you pick up a book they say ‘If you like that one, you’ll like this one, too.’” Hannah shook out her piggy bank and shelled out $64. She will definitely need more room on her bookshelves.

An email making the rounds lately entitled “Ten things that will disappear in our lifetime,” cites “physical books that you hold in your hands” as number 4.

If today is any indication, there will be people who still want to touch, sniff, and finger the pages of books for years to come whether they’re card carrying AARP members or college kids like Hannah who read the fifth Harry Potter book in 17 hours straight or grade schoolers who relished finding their own books that filled tables in the Macomber Community House.

   
Greg Marcello, Book Fair Steering Committee Clerk, wasn’t shy about making the most of the occasion. “We hope you spend 50 times more money today, the 50th anniversary of this fair!” he said as the opening whistle pierced the air.

By dusk, a few hundred men, women, and children did their best to comply.

MORE PHOTOS, CAPTIONS

 

Books for 25 cents in the Meeting House...what a deal! Next week, a committee will begin sorting and pricing books for next year in the Book Shed behind the Meeting House.

 
Kids and parents had terrific choices in the Macomber Community House.

Mono-tasking under the tents...a book lovers paradise...categories of mystery, history, religion, philosophy, travel, gardening, cooking, photography, science, science fiction, humor, romance, art, and more.

Any books that remain at the fair's conclusion will be shipped to other booksellers who may send them overseas or recyle them. Encyclopedias and text books don't sell well and are  shipped to other booksellers or recycled, as are thousands of donated books that are so tattered they are not marketable.
 

 

Greg Marcello (top Left), Book Fair Steering Committee Clerk, had lots of help, instantly visible in bright blue T shirts. "You'd be interested to know that this year we've upgraded from tape on the backs of key people to printed t shirts! It only took us 50 years to make that decision!", Meeting member Kevin Lee says.

Kathleen (L) and Jim Shannon (baseball cap)...three generations of Dartmouth book lovers. "We’ve been coming here since before our kids were born,” Kathleen says.

 

Dr. Stewart Kirkaldy (with pt), the family physician who practiced for more than 45 years in Westport, blew the whistle to open the fair. Dr. Kirkaldy, who now resides in Middlebury, VT, has been present at opening day of every book fair since 1961 and until he retired was present in the Westport Friends Meeting House every Sunday.

“Seeing people I know working together to make this community event happen and the huge crowd here almost brought tears to my eyes. People come up and remind me of advice I gave to them during my 45 years of practicing family medicine.”

 

By the way, you're welcome to attend the Meeting Service any Sunday.

8th Annual River Run Sponsored by Westport River Watershed Allliance and Osprey Sea Kayaks

The 8th annual River Run - a canoe, kayak, SUP Race and Family Fun Paddle, on the East Branch of the Westport River, organized by the Westport River Watershed Alliance (WRWA) and Osprey Sea Kayak Adventures.  All skill levels, all ages, invited.

Saturday morning, June 18, 2011, registration/start at Hix Bridge Landing, East Branch of the Westport River, celebration and awards ceremony at the finish line at The Head of Westport River.

 
When you’ve got two septuagenarians in one canoe and a seven-year-old with her mom, dad, and grandmother in another as entrants in the 2011 River Run, you know you have an event for the ages.

The 8th Annual River Run sponsored by the Westport River Watershed Alliance (WRWA) and Osprey Sea Kayak Adventures got underway at Hix Bridge Landing on Saturday morning, June 18. It was hard to distinguish what was more impressive - the assortment of plastic, carbon fiber and exotic wood watercraft floating around at the starting lines or the outfits and outlooks of the people in said watercraft.

Gone are the days when the only self-propelled vessels on the river were kayaks and canoes. Today’s flotilla includes SUPs (stand up paddleboards powered by a long pole) and “prones,” surfboards propelled by a paddler lying or kneeling on the board’s narrow deck. Try doing this balancing act and you’ll have a quick appreciation for the athleticism and endurance of these paddlers who do it for miles and call it fun.

The River Run’s five starting times were staggered from 9:15 to 10 AM to accommodate the type of vessel and the temperament of the paddlers. The 6.5-mile Challenge Paddleboard Race and Challenge Boat Races started fifteen minutes apart, headed south around Lower Spectacle Island then blasted back to the Head of Westport.

Samantha "Sam" Ladd (far R), co-owner of Osprey Sea Kayaks, issues instructions for the Family Fun Paddle while event co-chair Larry Hookey looks on.

Who knew that the competitive juices flowed in the ranks of contestants in the shorter 3.5-mile course from Hix Bridge to the Head of Westport? A Paddleboard Sprint and a Boat Sprint Race got underway within the next fifteen minutes with a good deal of cheering from the landlubbers on the dock.

The Family Fun Paddle, the laid back group that actually pays attention to the scenery en route, began casually cruising from the start line at 10 AM. “I’ve been interested in the science and beauty of the river for the past eight years and appreciate the Alliance's efforts to preserve it,” Westport resident Catherine Williams said as she piled into a canoe with her son, his wife, and their 7-year-old daughter.

By the time the ripples had settled at the Head of the Westport River, Ed Halpin, “going on 74,” and his young pal Pete Olson, 71, had blown past the finish line First Overall in their Kevlar canoe.  The unassuming duo in Bud Light T-shirts and floppy hats has been paddling together for five years. They’ve earned the nickname “The Ringers” by churning down the waterways like a sea-going locomotive fueled by energy drinks and H2O.

The common denominators of the paddlers in each of the 53 boats in the River Run? Enthusiasm and a love of the beauty of the world as seen from the surface of a gorgeous river.

Westporter Rob Fisher has practically grown up on the river. “I’ve worked at Osprey Sea Kayaks for ten summers since high school,” he says. “I love seeing reactions from people as they learn how to navigate kayaks or SUPs. Westport takes on an entirely new personality when you see it from the water.  I love introducing people to that.”

Sheila Hutchinson moved to Westport 30 years ago has seen a ton of that kind of scenery. “I’ve been kayaking for twelve years, long before it became as popular as it is today. I’ve paddled both branches of the Westport River, Assonet, Taunton, and Acushnet Rivers, and rivers in NH and in Bar Harbor.” She won the Senior Division of the Family Fun Paddle and knocked off some of the younger participants in the process.

Phil Casey of Little Compton, RI, finishes Challenge Race on his "prone" paddleboard.

The colorful pennants that come into view as the contestant’s vessels pass the last curve in the river gave some a boost for a final flourish of paddling and others a reason to smell the roses and let the incoming current drift them lazily past the finish line.

Ami Chitwood, winner of last year’s SUP race and runner up this year, was like a kid with a new toy as she raved about her “Joe Bark” manufactured paddleboard and praised the event. “I’m a huge patron of Osprey Sea Kayaks. I blame and thank them and the Westport River Watershed Alliance for getting me in the water in 2008. I look forward to this event all year long. Not to mention the watermelon from Lees Market is usually the best watermelon I get all year.”

Heather Cronin and Chloe Bachstein (foreground) smile for the camera at the finish line.

The smile on the face of teenaged Chloe Bachstein, who crossed the finish line in a double kayak with Heather Cronin of Dartmouth, was testament that her first race isn’t going to be her last.

The Westport River Watershed Alliance and Osprey Sea Kayaks are natural prime movers of the event but they could never pull this off without volunteers. Dozens of their supporters helped register participants, patrol the river as safety crews during the race, and serve food and beverages donated by Lees Market, Village Pizza, and Bittersweet Farms. Chief organizers were volunteers Anne Fitzgerald and Larry Hookey, who really have the planning down to a science after taking on the responsibility in 2004.

Co-organizers Anne Fitzgerald (L) and Larry Hookey (R) present Westport resident Sheila Hutchinson with the Senior Division first place medal.

The shady, grassy hillside at the Head is a perfect setting for the race’s conclusion. A contingent of teenagers delighted youngsters by making outlandish hats from woven strips of colored paper and enthusiastically painted faces and arms of kids and adults alike. With 14 categories for awards (with 'fun' awards made up on the spot by Fitzgerald), the post-River Run celebration feels like an aquatic block party.

As in the past, the biggest winner is the Westport River, the natural resource that is the heart and soul of Westport.

MORE PHOTOS...

WRWA Science Director Roberta Carvalho and board member Sheila Hughes at registration table and Safety Team duo Barbara and Bob Bridges of North Easton. "We got lessons at Osprey Sea Kayak 11 years ago- the Ladds are the best instructors east of the Mississippi!" Bob shouts enthusiastically.

Pre Paddle protection and pre paddle relaxation.

Polly Gardner and Brandon Gunderson can relax now...they just finished, and won in their divisions!

 
Marty Casey built his "prone" paddleboard from paulownia, a light, fine grained, soft wood. It is used as a reforestation tree in several countries. The gorgeous, blonde wood could double as a piece of sculpture if not for the rubber mat that helps keep him centered on it.  “I spent 200 hours laminating and gluing this one together,” he says. “It weighs 23 pounds and has a hollow core.”

 
Victoria Martin makes 7-year-old Hannah LaFrance happy with a creative hat; face painting was another big hit today.

Participants enjoy food and beverages before the awards ceremony.The DeVeuve Clan (Hanson, Hopkinton, Orleans, Westport, and counting) takes home the Family Award for the Largest Contingent.

RACE RESULTS

Paddlers from Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Vermont entered the 2011 River Run. Contestants hailed from Westport, Provincetown, Orleans, New Bedford, Plymouth, Hanson, Dartmouth, Carver, Lincoln, Uxbridge, Somerville, East Freetown, Cambridge, Hopkinton, Seekonk, Dover, Roslindale, Marion, Whitman, and Jamaica Plain, MA and Warwick, Little Compton, Newport, Tiverton, and Barrington, RI  and Saxton's River, VT.

6.5 Mile Challenge Course

Challenge Double Canoe
Pete Olson (Carver), Ed Halpin (Seekonk)
Michael DeVeuve (Hanson), Kendra Osgood   (Hanson)

Challenge Single Canoe
Joe Lukaszevicz  (Plymouth)

Challenge Single Kayak
Bev Bernard  (Dover)
Larry Kidney (Westport)

Challenge Paddleboards – Prones
Phil Casey (Little Compton)
Marty Casey  (Newport)

Challenge Paddleboards – SUPs
Brandon Gunderson  (Dartmouth)
Ami Chitwood  (Roslindale)

3.5 Mile Family Course

Family Fun Single Canoe
Polly Gardner  (Little Compton)
Eric LaFrance (Westport)

Family Fun Double Canoe
Tate and Thomas Tarrant  (Marion)
Abigail DeVeuve (Hanson) and Kevin Donovan

Sprint Paddleboards
Tom Pierce  (Westport)
Jeffrey McCarthy  (Little Compton)

Sprint Single Kayak
Andrew Davis  (Barrington, RI)
James Hunt  (Westport)

Family Award – Largest Contingent
The DeVeuve Clan  (Hanson, Hopkinton, Orleans, Westport)
Soares/SMS Plumbing  (Westport, New Bedford, Warwick)

Fun Award
Yvonne Zuther with her pooch Maury  (Westport)
Heather Cronin and Heather Bachstein in their double kayak  (N. Dartmouth)

Seniors (60 or older)
Sheila Hutchinson (Westport)
Gerd Zuther  (Westport)                                          

Multi-Generational Award
The Williams/Dodge Family – three generations in one boat  (Westport, Saxton's River, VT)

Youngest Paddlers (15 or younger)
Chloe Bachstein  (N. Dartmouth)
Ross LaFrance (Westport)

49th Annual Westport Quaker Used Book Fair: Big Bang for your Buck

This story was published in the September 2 edition of Westport Shorelines. It contains photos not printed in the Shorelines story.

49th Annual Westport Quaker Friends Meeting Used Book Fair
938 Main Road, Westport, MA
July 10, 2010

At precisely 11 AM on July 10, a shrill whistle blast is followed by a loud whoop, then near silence. Dr. Stuart Kirkaldy has kicked off the 49th Annual Westport Friends Used Book Fair. For the next forty five minutes, all you can hear under two giant yellow and white striped tents is the sound of hundreds of pairs of feet shuffling through the gravel on the ground and hushed whispers of the searchers.
 
Those colorful tents, erected in early July, are a huge bookmark to anyone driving past the Friends Meeting House on 938 Main Road. The book fair is always held on second Saturday of July. Every reading enthusiast, from serious commercial collectors to recreational readers in need of a page-turner for the beach, has the date scrawled in their calendars.
 
This crowd is on a mission. Their eyes are locked in on titles on the spines of the thousands of used books laid out on ancient wooden tables. Some have lists clutched in their hands. Others, veteran readers with prodigious memories for titles and authors, are ready to reach and pluck. Some have computer gizmos that can scan the ISBN number and come up with some esoteric information that might identify the book as a good eBay prospect.
 
It is almost comical to watch bargain hunters with a stack of paperbacks under one arm try to read the first few pages of a book of interest with the other free hand. Others fill cloth sacks, paper bags, or cartons to store their booky booty.
 
 The types of shoppers are as varied as the books on the table. Seniors, teenagers, boomers, beach bums, nine to fivers on vacation, and little kids hanging on to an adult’s sleeve for dear life so they don’t get swallowed up by the rummaging book beast slowly grazing its way along the tables with single minded purpose.
 
For the Quaker Community that operates the book fair, this qualifies as a successful trifecta: a cash infusion to support the Meeting’s annual operating expenses, a chance to do good works by supporting charitable causes, and a way to brand themselves.
 
Meeting member Kevin Lee tapes a big sign on Greg Marsello’s T-shirt that reads: “Question? Ask a Quaker!” 

“It’s part of our outreach program this year. Lots of people don’t know who we are or what our religion is. We printed bookmarks explaining a brief history of the Friends Meeting, worship times, directions to the Meeting House, and our web address,” Mr. Lee says.
 
Greg Marsello of Tiverton is the Steering Committee Clerk and oversees committees that are part of the scheme. He manages the tent committees, finance committees, hospitality committees, and sorting committees. By this morning, just about everyone in the small but robust Quaker community has been involved in the fair.

“Last year we sorted over 20,000 books over a period of eleven months. Every book we took in was sold or dispersed. We shipped the books that remained overseas or to places we knew that could use them or to a paper recycler. We start fresh every year,” Mr. Lee says.
 
For some book lovers the fair is the answer to The Dollar Store. While most books are priced individually, there are categories of six-for- a-dollar books and categories of more pricey hard cover first editions.
 
 Book dealers are not involved in the pricing and sorting process and cannot get into the tent before that famous whistle blast at 11 AM. Since books have been known to be delivered by the pickup truck load, you never know what treasures will be unearthed. In the early years of the fair, a first edition of “Moby Dick” was found on one of the tables.

“What makes this work is their committee system. And they work very hard,” longtime Westport observer Jon Alden says.
 
Today, they’re having fun. The money is rolling in, the books are being carted out, and someone has asked a Quaker a question.

Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.

The waiting game

Waiting for the whistle

 

Show time

A keeper?

   

Dr.Stuart Kirkaldy, bookfair originator in 1962 and now retired, returns yearly to take in the action...and blow the opening whistle at 11:00 AM sharp

 

Got a question...?

 

Taking inventory
 

Why wait? Let's start reading now...

Feasting on books and food from the concession

What a haul! 

 Whewww. First wave of consumers has left, next wave, primarily from the beach, will pick up the slack at around 3 pm.

Westport Friends Used Bookfair: Books Galore

CAPTION for photo appearing on Westport Shorelines edition July 22, 2009

The 48th Annual Friends Used Book Fair attracted hundreds of book lovers and bargain hunters at the Saturday July 11 event held in front of the Friends Meeting House on Main Road. Over 30,000 hardcover and paperback books were donated to the book fair. Volunteers began sorting, cataloguing, and pricing books last fall. “Books for next year began coming in today. We sort, price, and store books from September till just before the book fair,” Meeting Treasurer Deana Chase said as she surveyed the lines circulating around the 80 book-crammed tables under two huge yellow and white striped tents. The proceeds are used to maintain the Quaker property on Main Road and are used for “Benevolences ” - local causes or Quaker causes chosen by a committee. 

Captain Paul Cuffe: Westport's Most Illustrious Resident

The shadow of the Westport brig Traveler passed over the Quaker Meeting House on Main Road on Saturday, June 13. A gathering of descendants of Captain Paul Cuffe (1759-1817), state and local officials, students and teachers from the Paul Cuffee Charter School in Providence, and local residents packed the Meeting House to honor the 250th anniversary of Cuffe’s birth and witness the re-dedication of the Cuffe monument originally placed in front of the Meeting House in 1913.

The 3 P.M. program featured praise, poetry, and song. After introductory remarks by Jenny O’Neill, Director of the Westport Historical Society, and Lee Blake, President of the New Bedford Historical Society. Candida Rose sang a rousing version of  “Lift Every Voice,” written in 1900 by James Weldon Johnson (titled by Weldon as ‘Negro National Anthem’ in the event’s beautifully designed program).

“The South coast has a rich history of people of color who worked hard to have this country live up to the ideals of liberty and justice for all. The members of the society endeavor to tell the story. Paul Cuffe placed this country on the road to civil rights and mutual respect, changing our society profoundly as we journey along that road, “ Ms. Blake said.

Citations honoring Cuffe were read by Chair of the Westport Board of Selectmen Steve Ouellette and State Representative Michael Rodrigues and presented to Cuffe descendant Susan (Su) Almeida.

The Westport citation reads that Cuffe “carved out a successful career as a farmer, mariner, whaling merchant, and ship builder, becoming one of the wealthiest African Americans of his time.”

“His entrepreneurial spirit and religious faith led Cuffe to struggle against racial discrimination everywhere, to challenge taxation without representation and to envision a dream to return slaves to Africa and to create an environment for economic independence and pride amongst Africans.”

After Ms. Almeida’s welcome to the assemblage, David Burnham, founder of The Paul Cuffee School  in Providence, told the gathering that the 440 student K - 8 charter school is so popular that “acceptances are by lottery rather than by choosing students by talent, ethnic or economic backgrounds. I believe Paul Cuffee (there are two variations of spelling of Cuffe’s name) would have approved of this.”

Dr. Stewart Kirkaldy, prominent former member of Westport Meeting who now lives in Vermont, spoke about Quaker History, Westport Meeting, and Paul Cuffe.

Dr. Kirkaldy recounted Cuffe’s introduction to Westport Meeting, his decision to build a school on his 140 acre property on Drift Road in 1790 to educate children, free, of any race, which may have been the first integrated school in America, and Cuffe’s vision to return freed slaves back to Africa and a life of economic independence.

Born of Kofi Slocum, an African American freed slave, and Ruth Moses, a Wampanoag, on Cuttyhunk Island, Cuffe made his way to New Bedford and eventually Westport. His entrepreneurial disposition and innate curiosity led him to learn to read, write, and navigate.

Dr. Kirkaldy cited Cuffe’s 1780 petition that the General Court of Dartmouth exempt him from paying taxes since he did not have the right to vote. The Commonwealth eventually provided equal rights in the new Massachusetts constitution in 1783. "He spoke truth to power to a degree that few others have done," Kirkaldy said.

Dr. Kirkaldy noted Cuffe’s vision to use his beloved brig Traveler to transport free slaves to relocate to Africa. As noted in the Paul Cuffe exhibit in the Macomber Community House next door, the “Back To Africa” movement, Cuffe “envisioned a triangular trade between Africa, Europe, and America, a dream that encompassed not simply the return of slaves back to Africa, but a dream for creating an environment for economic independence and pride among Africans.”

 Enthusiastic Paul Cuffee School second graders Federico Martinez and Anissa Rivera read first grader Ayanna Rowe’s poem about Paul Cuffe.

After a spirited singing of “The Old Ship of Zion,” by Candida Rose, Carl Cruz (a "collateral descendant" of Cuffe), Louise Parsons, George Salvador, and Albert Lees and Laurie Robertson- Lorant read excerpts from Captain Cuffe’s letters and logs.

The crowd of approximately 200 gathered outdoors to watch Cuffe’s great, great, great, great grandson Robert Kelley place a wreath at the Paul Cuffe monument next to the Meeting House, whose construction Mr. Cuffe substantially underwrote in 1813.

With Mr. Carl Cruz singing at the head of a procession, the entire group wound its way to the Cuffe gravesites behind the Meeting House. After a moment of silence, Mr. Cruz invited descendants and others to lay flowers at the markers and invited one and all to the Macomber Community House for refreshments and a look at the Cuffe Exhibit inside.

Ms. Blake noted that the event was one year in the making and acknowledged the committee of Westport and New Bedford Historical Society members for their labor of love in organizing it.

Photos: Paul Tamburello

Photo 1: Robert Kelley (at left), great, great, great, great grandson of Paul Cuffe, asks for a moment of silence during 250th anniversary of Captain Paul Cuffe's birth. Cuffe descendants and Paul Cuffee Charter School of Providence students prepare to lay flowers at the re-dedication of the monument originally placed at the Friends Meeting House on Main Road in 1913.

Photo 2: Second graders Federico Martinez and Anissa Rivera read first grader Ayanna Rowe’s poem about Paul Cuffe.

Photo 3: Carl Cruz of New Bedford, a collateral descendant of Captain Paul Cuffe and one of the organizers of the 250th anniversary of Captain Paul Cuffe's birth. leads the group in singing "He's Got The Whole World In His Hands" while students from the Paul Cuffee Charter School in Providence look on. After flowers were placed on the graves of Paul Cuffe and Alice Pequit,the crowd gathered in the Macomber Meeting House for refreshments and to view the Paul Cuffe exhibit set up by the Westport Historical Society.

Sixth Annual River Run: A Westport River Paddle

 

6th Annual Westport River Watershed Alliance River Run: Crawlers, Sweepers, Kayaks and Canoes Swirl to the Head of Westport on Saturday, June 13, 2009

Whether racing the 8.5 mile Challenge course or paddling the 3.5 mile Family Fun route, families and teams made up a huge chunk of the participants in the Sixth Annual Kayak Race and Family Fun Paddle organized by the Westport River Watershed Alliance and held on June 13.

There was a definite peanut butter and jelly feel to the event as the morning unfolded. Grandparents climbed into canoes with their children and their children’s children.  Mini-squadrons with familial bonds swelled the ranks. Lots of teenagers, their parents bobbing around somewhere nearby, traded in iPods for paddles.

Nine vessels of the colorful field of 78 kayaks, canoes, and paddleboards in the race paddled under the DeVeuve banner. Three generations of the family, ages from 15 to 74 (we promised not to reveal this Westport paddler’s identity), accounted for eleven of the approximately 100 paddlers that assembled at the Hix Bridge boat landing.

Bright yellow T-shirts identified Team SMS. The WRWA happens to be a customer of SMS Plumbing and Heating owner Stephen Soares, who happens to be engaged to Corey Gifford, grand-daughter of Norma Judson, who happens to be a big supporter of the WRWA, whose President Gay Gillespie happened to ask Soares if he’d like to enter this year’s race. Mr. Soares fielded a team of nine, if you include two six year olds, who added enthusiasm but not much paddle power to Soares’ and Gifford’s canoe on Saturday. A canoe and three kayaks held the other five members of the SMS  team.

Argh, matey, what were those five strange looking vessels lining up for the 10 A.M. Challenge Race? Paddleboards, the latest rage in recreational craft on the west coast, had made their first appearance in the River Run.

“Paddleboards are long surfboards but more buoyant,” Sam Ladd, Co Owner of Osprey Sea Kayaks, said.  “Their design has roots in ancient Polynesia, There are two types of paddle boards. First, there are Stand Ups called Sups (stand up paddle boards) or Sweepers, which you paddle with one oar. Next are Prone types, called Crawlers, on which you lie prone or kneel and propel with your hands. “

Photo: Crawler and Sweeper

The Casey clan of Newport and Little Compton entered three exotic “crawlers” and added to the family feel of the event.

At precisely 10 A.M., Sam Ladd shouted, “Go!” The 16 Challenge Class entrants - crawlers, kayaks, canoes, and one sweeper, headed south to curl around Great Island before turning back north to the Head of Westport.

The real fun began a few minutes later when Ms. Ladd ordered the 63 boats in the Family Fun to push out to the water for the required safety instructions. An eclectic assortment of rented and custom-made kayaks and canoes with an equally eclectic group of paddlers shoved off into the water just south of Hix Bridge. Looking down at the colorful swarming mass from the bridge was like peering through a kaleidoscope.

Ms. Ladd then sent them to the start line just north of the bridge. At 10:30 - Whoosh! Paddles began to windmill furiously. The whole mass of plastic lurched forward, visions of medals or sandwiches, depending upon how strongly the competitive juices were flowing, propelled the paddlers.

About an hour later, cheered on by friends and organizers, the first boats began squeezing through the narrow passage leading into the Head.

Spread out along the emerald green grassy bank at the Head, paddlers grazed on sandwiches and watermelon, kids played toss games, little kids colored and had their faces painted, and medals were given out for every conceivable category (see list below). The sun made a guest appearance after days and days of being AWOL. All was right with the world.

 “I liked being neck and neck with people on other boats,” Brian Cormier, 16, said as he and Adam Doerr, 14, both Westporters, finished first in the Family Fun tandem kayak division.

The Casey clan, Phil from Little Compton, his brother Marty and his son Justin, both of Newport, brought their “crawlers.”

 "This is a good course with interesting sights. It's challenging without being overwhelming, " Justin Casey said.

“We were in the Aquidneck Island Paddle last year, a 38 mile relay race around Aquidneck Island to raise money for the Aquidneck Land Trust and Lucy’s Hearth,” Phil Casey said. They plan to return next year. Who knows how much more competition they’ll have then.

No matter how many boats enter the race next year, volunteer organizers Anne Fitzgerald and Larry Hookey will make it smooth paddling for the whole fleet. With their committee of volunteers and Westport River Watershed Alliance staff, they begin planning the race each January. The duo has tweaked the event to improve it each year since they began in 2004. Sponsorships from 43 local businesses show that the community is behind this event, which showcases the unique beauty of the Westport River.

Some day, teenagers like Brian Cormier and Adam Doerr may become stewards of the river. They’ll know it from the waterline up.

SIDEBAR 1
Family Fun River Run Results

Single Kayak Overall
1. Chris Barnes
2. Mike Spadea

Under 18 Single Kayak
1. Nicholas Gonsalves
2. Jan Costanza

“AARP” Kayaks
1. Robert Barnes
2. Deb Crossley

Double Overall - kayak or canoe
1. Brendan Cormier and Adam Doerr
2. Hilary and Curt Carlson

Double Under 18 - kayak or  canoe
1. Joe and Noah Doerr
2. Grace and Asa Sweetser

Double “AARP” kayak or canoe
1. Barbara and Jim Carlin
2. Joan Hodgson and Susan Miller

Challenge Class Results
Challenge Single kayak
1. Bill Starz
2. Murray Lord

Challenge Single “AARP” kayak
1. Phillip Sherman
2. Alex Voikas

Challenge Double kayak
1. John Poulton and Janet Sheridan
2. Cathleen Dionne and Mike Lawrence

Outrigger
1. Wally Houghton and Paula Flint

Clan Awards
1. SMS Plumbing
2. DeVeuve Families
3. Mayer Families

Paddleboards
1. David Fitzgerald
2. Phil Casey

Clan Award for Paddleboards
The Casey Family
Family Fun Totals: 41 single kayaks  or canoes, 21 single kayaks  or canoes
Challenge Totals:  8 single kayaks, 3 double kayaks, 5 paddleboards

PHOTOS
1. Team SMS ready to rock: Ron Isidore, Connie Isidore of New Bedford (one canoe), Stephen Soares, Corey Gifford of Westport (canoe with the Stephen’s daughter Morgan Millhomme and Jacob Darosa, both 6  years old), kayakers Kate Goodwin,Tiverton, Danny Darosa, New Bedford “South End,” and Julian Gamache.

2. Marty Casey of Newport aboard his “crawler” paddleboard and Mike Simpson of Little Compton aboard his standup paddleboard, a ‘sweeper.”

3. Three generations cross the finish line: Catherine Williams of Westport, grand-daughter Anya, Laura Senes, and William’s son Owen Dodge.

==============================

Sponsors of the 2009 WRWA River Run (not published in the Shorelines edition)

A.J. Potter Jr. & Sons Inc.
BankFive
Bittersweet Farm
Branco Landscaping
Country Woolens
Dartmouth Building Supply, Inc.
Dennis Talbot Builder
Dr. Joseph Boivin, Optometrist
Doug Brown - Durfee Buffington Insurance Agency
Fernandes & Charest P.C.
Graphix Plus
Handy Hill Creamery
JOALS Garage Inc.
Lapointe Insurance
Lawton Builders
Lees Market
Lees Oil Service, Inc.
M & R Feed Store, Inc.
MA Cultural Council
Marguerite's Restaurant
Mattie Imports
Mid-City Scrap
N.A.C. Security & Stereo Systems, Inc.
Ocean's Catch
Partners Village Store
Rent-a-Jon
Sage Environmental
Sakonnet Bay Manor
Sakonnet Vineyards
SMS Plumbing & Heating LLC
State Representative Michael J. Rodrigues
Sylvia Group of Insurance Agencies
The Bayside Restaurant
Tim's Lawn Care
TMJ Orthopedics
Village Bicycle
Village Pizza
Walden Forest Conservation
Westport Apothecary
Westport Bait & Tackle
Westport Chiropractic
Westport Federal Credit Union
Westporthappenings.com

Jennifer Gelinas: Designer, Coordinator, Teacher

The Westport Fishermen’s Association cap Jennifer Gelinas sported at the organization’s recent clambake is but one of the many hats she wears. Appointed to the position of Project Coordinator of the WFA in June, she’s hardly had a chance to break in the hat. Her other roles include designer, church and school volunteer, entrepreneur and mom.  Ms. Gelinas’s first glimpse of Westport happened around 1990 when she visited her future husband at SMU while she was attending Mass College of Art in Boston. After marrying in 1993, the couple followed their instincts and found employment in rural Pennsylvania, where they established their artistic reputations. Ms. Gelinas struck out on her own in 1994 and opened her home-based Gelinas Design Studio, specializing in art work for wall coverings. The lure of a northerly rural environment closer to their families and a job opportunity brought them to Westport in 1997. Mr. Gelinas serves on the WFA Board of Directors. The Gelinas two daughters, Lily, 10, and Janey, 8, attend St. Stanislaus School in Fall River. Ms. Gelinas and her family live at 703 Drift Road.

First job?
“I was an assistant design director for a design studio in Pennsylvania. I created hand painted artwork that was sold to wall covering and textile industries.”

Design Studio?
“I’m a painter as well as a computer designer so I can appreciate the techniques in which art is produced. For me the importance of starting my own studio was my desire to produce artwork that would merge both of those skills.”

Husband Stephan’s work?
“Stephan works at Murdock Webbing in Central Falls, RI, one of oldest mills in the country. He designs the decorative embellishment for woven textiles that might appear on everything from sandals to ski goggles.”

First sight of Westport?
“I remember the first time I drove down Route 88 to visit Stephan at SMU and took a left on Hix Bridge Road. I came down the hill, saw the rolling hills beyond the river and thought, ‘This is a beautiful place, wouldn’t it be great to live here some day.’”

Home in the country?
“We bought a late 1800s farmhouse that we’ve had to restore. It’s a work in progress and it always will be. It took us three years but we finally have a lawn. And our girls can run around as much as they please in the woods of our three-acre lot.”

Role in daughter’s school?
“Once they found out about my background in design, I became the set designer for the school’s annual theater productions. I’m now a volunteer art teacher on the faculty. I’m also on the parent’s group that puts on fundraisers and sponsors events like Math Night and Family Craft Night. ”

Benefits of involvement in school?
“Volunteering gave me insight into the quality of education and the environment in which they’re receiving it. I like the atmosphere and the way they try to connect with families from Taunton, Westport, and towns in Rhode Island who bring their kids there. ”

Textiles to fish?
“I came to the conclusion that the combined pressures of designing and full-time parenting were too great. The job of Project Coordinator for the Westport Fishermen’s Association appealed to me because it’s a part time position and allows me quality time with my family. ”

Duties of Project Coordinator?
“I may not have had experience with every requirement of the job but I knew that I could learn what I had to learn about fund raising, advocacy and PR and do the job well. I whole-heartedly believe in the mission of a healthy river. A bonus is that there are possibilities with the newsletter, mailers, and invitations to be artistically creative because visuals are important to people.”

Family Fun?
“Stephan is teaching our girls how to fish, boat safety, and how to drive the boat. We enjoy camping and use the stamp passbook issued by the Department of Conservation and Recreation. Our girls get a huge kick out of getting stamps to put in the passbook. We’ve camped in Vermont, New York, and and Canada.”

Pastimes?
“I’m the kind of person who’s more content doing something than relaxing. I volunteer at St. John’s Church and am on The Women’s Guild there, volunteer at my kids’ school, and of course the WFA. I can get excited about reeling in a big fish but I most enjoy spending time with friends and family.”

Latest artistic venture?
“I design, box, and sell my own line of computer-designed stationery. I have a rep and I head for Manhattan twice a year for trade shows. I promote my stationery line at craft fairs locally. I have control over the whole process from creation to distribution. This fits my need to stay involved in the art world on my own terms and have time for family and responsibilities closer to home.”

Westport Fishermen's Association: 25 years and counting

 It was probably fitting that there was so much water in evidence at Sunday’s 25th Annual Westport Fishermen’s Association Clambake. Showers fell from late morning till early afternoon while steam rose from the 5-foot high pyre of hot granite rocks, sizzling rockweed, and crates filled with bake food.

Rather than stand outside in the drizzle to watch Bake Master Raymond Davoll orchestrate his crew in the four-hour traditional clam bake process, scores of ticket holders exercised a temporary rain delay and waited for the weather to clear.

A handful of enthusiasts came early, grabbed mesh “bake bags”, and circulated past WFA members Jack Reynolds, Tom Mello, and Cukie Macomber, who doled out food and wise cracks with equal efficiency. The hundreds of bags were packed in wooden crates, ready to be plunked down on the bake fire at about 1 pm.

Others who arrived at the Sportsmen’s Club in Little Compton before noon entertained themselves by playing cards, talking politics from local to Palin, and speculating about the Patriots. While their views might differ, they all agreed that the Westport Fishermen’s Association Bake is one of the best around.

“Good bakes are hard to come by,” Louise Costa said as she sat with her husband Fred. Born in Westport, the Somerset residents are fixtures at the bake. “I practically drool while I’m waiting for the chowder,” Mrs. Costa said. 

Time and tide waits for no one and neither do Bake Masters. At 2 pm on the dot retired Dartmouth fire captain Davoll, no stranger to heat, was itching to pull the canvas tarps off the bake fire and get the food to the serving tables.

“They all showed up,” twenty year WFA member Tom Mello shouted as he began lining up the big crowd that snaked all the way from the food pavilion to John Dyer Road.

For Jennifer Gelinas, recently named WFA Project Coordinator, this was a baptism by bake fire. “I’ve been running around here since 8 this morning and everything seems to be under control.” she said. “This has taken lots of planning but I’m surrounded by people who know what they’re doing.”

Ms. Gelinas, whose husband Stephan is on the board of directors, is fully versed on projects dear to the association. Along with educational programs and annual scholarships, she’s excited about the restoration of the Horseneck Point Life Saving Station.

“This event is the major money-maker for our non-profit organization,” she said. “We’re grateful to the local businesses who donate items to the raffle and the bake.”

Indeed, hardly a soul left the premises before the raffle was complete. About thirty people left with prizes under their arms but Philip Weinstein of River Road hit the jackpot. He won the hand crafted 18’ Hybrid Night Heron Kayak. 

The 25th anniversary has given long time members reason to appreciate past accomplishments and look forward to new challenges.

President Jack Reynolds recollected a program that benefited the river. He recalled that in the late 1980s, the upper reaches of the East Branch were closed to shell fishing.

"Arnold Tripp, with assistance from Dale Thomas, set up a laboratory, funded by the WFA, in Town Hall to run water quality tests before and after rainfalls. The data he collected was accepted by the state and used to develop system of conditional closings and openings of the river after rain events in Westport. It was used as a prototype for other towns located in river environments,” Reynolds said. Mr. Tripp, at 89 years of age, is still a member of the WFA.

Howie Gifford and Tom Perkins agree that funding legal action that ended pollution into the East Branch from a cattle feed lot was a big step toward the river’s health.

Mr. Gifford cited the 2006 decision upholding the Rivers Act, confirming the Westport River was a river, not an estuary, gave the river greater protection. "It was an example of cooperation between three like-minded organizations - the WFA, the WRWA, and The Coalition for Buzzards Bay,” he said.

Both men are excited about the restoration of the Horseneck Point Life Saving Station. “It will give the building back to the town in excellent shape and help maintain local maritime history,” Mr. Perkins said.

“I was one of the original members of the association in 1983,” Bruce Letourneau said. “I like the way it gives back to the community with scholarships, quahog seeding, and water testing programs.”

Mr. Letourneau has been bringing his 20-year-old daughter Jamie to the bake for years. She hadn’t been there more than five minutes before she asked him the date of next year’s Clam Bake. Two hundred other people probably want to know the same thing.

Perry Davis: Westport's own 'pain killer'

 

Perry Davis, who lived in Westport from 1795 until 1837, could have been a hero of one of Horatio Alger’s wildly successful novels of the late 19th century. The typical Alger hero is born in poverty, lives by a strong moral code, and with hard work and perseverance leapfrogs from adversity to fame and fortune. He falters often but never gives up his dream.

At one point in 1843, Perry Davis had one thin dollar to his name.  By the time he died in 1862, he had amassed a fortune from the sales of Perry Davis’ Pain Killer. Alger couldn’t have made up a story more compelling than Perry Davis’s.

Speaking to an overflow crowd in Lees Market Community Room, Westport Historical Society President Tony Connors, who holds a Ph.D. in American History, painted a picture of a man who never gave up his dream of making something of himself. Connors’ insightful style and informative slide presentation were as potent as the medicine that propelled Perry Davis to become a household name in the mid to late 1800s.

Perry Davis was born in Dartmouth in 1791 to parents so poor they don’t show up on tax records because they owned no personal property.

Perry’s father, Edmund Davis, moved his family to Westport in 1795. When he was 14 years old, Perry Davis fell from scaffolding and broke his hip, causing him to be lame for the rest of his life. He had respiratory problems that persisted despite visits to doctors who were so ineffectual that people often suffered rather than visit one.

In 1810, his father sent his 17 year-old son to apprentice to a cordwainer, a craftsman who makes shoes from scratch. “ This is the first indication we have that Perry had a sense of ambition,” Mr. Connors said.

In search of spiritual sustenance, Davis embraced the First Baptist Church in Tiverton where he met Sarah Davol and married her in 1813. His faith in God and the constancy of his wife’s presence would be pillars of strength for the rest of his life. He would need them. Misfortune tested his faith mightily and often. Of their nine children, only two survived, Sarah born in 1817 and Edmund born in 1824. As Mr. Connors observed, a pattern was forming in which, “Fortune doesn’t smile on the Davis family.”

With an idea to manufacture an improved grinding mill, Davis relocated his family to Pawtucket - just in time for the Great Panic of 1837 in which businesses and banks folded like decks of cards. He moved his family to Taunton, another industrial town. Again, his idea for a grinding mill met with failure. He was now $4500 in debt.

In 1840, Davis became very sick and was in great pain. Not one to give in without a fight, he dug in. “I searched the globe in my imagination, selected the best ingredients and directed as I believe by the hand of Providence compounded these medicines so that the narcotic influence of one might be balanced by the other. I commenced using my new discovered medicine with no other hope than handing me gently to the grave,” Davis wrote later. He not only survived, he got better.

After moving the family to Fall River, Davis actually patented four or five inventions but found no backers. An enormous fire consumed 20 acres of Fall River in 1843. Davis’s home, of course, was obliterated. Men of lesser determination, faith in God, and pluck would certainly have given up.

On the wings of charitable contributions, the Davis’s relocated to Providence, RI, with the clothes on their backs, a wagon, and a charred harness. Mr. Davis fell back on his only creation that ever worked for him. He would make and sell the pain killer that once saved him from death.

While experimenting with the pain killer’s formula with his wife and daughter, Davis’s face was terribly burned when a can of alcohol exploded. Like many of his time, he had no faith in doctors. He fell back again on his homemade medicine. He was back at work two weeks later.

People were not inclined to spend money on quack doctors, and there was no regulation of medicines, but a salesman with a good pitch could convince them to reach into their pockets to buy a product that could alleviate pain.

Davis, who parked himself near the gates of the 1843 State Fairs in Pawtucket and Taunton, was just such a salesman. He knew his product worked for him and shouted it out for all to hear. His bottles of Perry Davis’ Pain Killer began to sell. With the eternal zeal of a born entrepreneur, he opened a factory on Pond Street in Providence. Success was on the horizon.

Mr. Connors cited a host of social, political, economic, and religious trends that helped make Perry Davis’ Pain Killer a brand known around the world. (See sidebar)  The Pain Killer's ingredients were potent. It is no wonder that a formula of vegetable extracts, camphor, ethyl alcohol, and opiates would make a sick person feel better. Davis trademarked the name “Pain Killer” and never divulged the formula for his product.

“ During the Civil War, it was given not only to soldiers but horses, too. Opium and alcohol even made the horses work longer and harder,” Connors said to laughter from the crowd. Among testimonial to the product, Mr. Connors quoted Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) who said,  “Those who could run away did. Those who could not drenched themselves in cholera preventatives and my mother chose Perry Davis’s Pain Killer for me.”

Davis was a portrait of humility and business acumen. “He was a devout Baptist all his life and he gave free samples to Baptist missionaries to go overseas. For every bottle he gave away, many cases got sold “, Connors said.

Mr. Davis was generous to causes small and large when he became prosperous. He donated $36,000 to the new Baptist church in 1850. When he died in Providence in 1862, he was mourned by throngs of poor people he’d helped during his lifetime.

“He made tremendous amount of money. Poor till he was about fifty, he gave a lot away, and didn’t forget his own struggles. The third generation had great wealth but none of the drive, modesty or moral fiber of Perry Davis himself,” Mr. Connors said. The Davis and Son label disappeared forever in 1940.

Photo: Audience member reads label of Perry Davis Painkiller bottle Mr. Connors' wife found on eBay.

“Did he know what he was doing with this opium and alcohol?  Yes. But he believed God had directed him to come up with this kind of medicine and in some way he believed he was doing the right thing. People believed and Perry Davis provided,” Mr. Connors concluded.

It took 50 years of struggle, but Fortune finally smiled on the Davis family.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Davis sidebar: Social, political, economic, and religious trends that helped make Perry Davis’ Pain Killer a brand known around the world

• Spirit of Jacksonian Democracy inspires more respect for the intelligence of the common people, less need for them to depend on upper class, including doctors.
• Religious Revivals proclaim that salvation can be achieved by reading the Bible, less need for trained ministers to lead the way.
• Cholera Epidemic of 1849 in Providence, Davis claims his Pain Killer can cure it (“Outrageous,” says Connors), historians of the time give him credit for doing so.
• Civil War stimulates sales of all patent and proprietary medicines. Government takes over production and distribution of Pain Killer, returns profits to the Davis company.
• Newspapers proliferate, an age of national advertising ensues as population becomes more literate. Newspapers prosper from ads for medicine. Davis is clever advertiser.
• Legal protection: Davis trademarks the name “Pain Killer.” Supreme Court upholds case when another company calls their product ‘Pain Killer’.

For Whom The Bell Tolls

The bells from an ice cream truck rolling slowly through the neighborhood on a late August afternoon have a “pied piper” effect on all within hearing distance. Laura Pineda, with her son Ruben and daughter Maya, buys dessert from the Ice Cream Express of North Dartmouth. It’s an open question whether the contents of the bag reached their home on Red Cedar Road without being sampled by the hungry kids.

Davis sidebar

Davis sidebar

• Spirit of Jacksonian Democracy inspires more respect for the intelligence of the common people, less need for then to depend on upper class, including doctors.
• Religious Revivals proclaim that salvation can be achieved by reading the Bible, less need for trained intermediaries to lead the way.
• Cholera Epidemic of 1849 in Providence, Davis claims his Pain Killer can cure it (“Outrageous,” says Connors), historians of the time give him credit for doing so.
• Civil War stimulates sales of all patent and proprietary medicines. Government takes over production and distribution of Pain Killer, funnels profits to the Davis company.
• An age of national advertising ensues as newspapers proliferate and population becomes more literate. Newspapers prosper from ads for medicine. Davis is clever advertiser.
• Legal protection: Davis trademarks the name “Pain Killer.” Supreme Court upholds case when another company calls their product Pain Killer.

Polly Gardner: painter, paddler, singer, sailor

Polly Gardner of Adamsville is no armchair adventurer. When she puts her mind to it, whether a new job, music, interior decorative painting, canoeing, or a dozen other interests, she dives right in. Headfirst…with vigor. Gales of hearty laughter punctuate stories she tells about her childhood in Westport and the succession of jobs that she trailed behind her over the years. Nearly 40 years ago, when she volunteered to switch from the mortgage department to the new drive up window at Rhode Island Hospital Trust, a customer with three kids in a beige VW drove up. Several visits later, the customer deposited a humorously addressed invitation to dinner. In time, Polly married Lee Gardner, the fellow who had the offbeat style she appreciated. They have one daughter and those three now grown-up girls who were in the VW. Ms. Gardner and her husband worked together for years when Mr. Gardner was director of the Norman Bird Sanctuary in Middletown, RI. When they decided to leave Middletown in 1980, the first house they saw in Adamsville was the one Ms. Gardner used to visit when she and her pals the Barker brothers would go snake hunting as thirteen-year-olds. They bought the place and have lived at 68 Stone Church Road ever since. In every card her late father wrote to her, he closed by writing, “Have fun.” Dad would be proud to know that his daughter took his advice to heart.

Working with your husband?
“We set up mist nets all over the salt marsh.  We’d be in the mud banding all these tree swallows, warblers, and other incredible species. The Norman Bird Sanctuary is a 450 acre wild life refuge in Middletown, RI.”

Lee Gardner?
“Lee has great sense of humor. He’s a real character - one of a kind. That’s why it’s worked for us for 38 years.”

Home in Adamsville?
“It’s only a couple miles from where I grew up on Cornell Road. The river was my back yard. I remember going berry picking and fishing with my dad. My brother Dick and his family still live there.”

Childhood in Westport?
"My dad had a sword fishing boat. I remember tautoging off Cutty Hunk and spending nights on an old Matthews boat my dad called ‘The Bender’. It had an A frame and a pulpit - we loved that boat."

Childhood in Westport?
"The Barker brothers and I used to go on snake hunts when we were about 14. They had a 500 gallon barrel sitting on well in back of their house. We put all our water snakes from the Mill Pond in Adamsville in there. One day were invited to come to The Grange to do talk about snakes. We passed them around the audience and to end the program we sang ‘I know an old lady who swallowed a fly, perhaps she’ll die, perhaps she’ll  die.’” 

Love of the water?
“I’ve had this life-long love of being on the water. I crew for Lanny Goff on his J-35 on Mt Hope Bay on Wednesday nights. I race for the Opera House Cup every year in Nantucket with Woody Underwood and my two dear friends Carol Long and Josie Woollham.”

Favorite boat?
“Woody Underwood’s Buzzard’s Bay 25, a Herreshoff design. I love the boat because it’s a beautiful gaffe rigged sloop and it doesn’t have a motor. When you’re sailing this boat, you know you’re having the sail of your life.”

Day job?
“A small business called The Wallnuts. Pam Walters, myself and a gal who just joined us do
decorative painting, interior painting, and wallpapering. We consult and help people choose wallpaper and colors. We’ve been doing it for 20 years.”

Benefits of this job?
“I’ve worked for an engineering company, designed septic systems, and worked for a vineyard, a bank, and a retailer. I’ve done a thousand things but there’s nothing like working for yourself.”

Monday night jams?
“Several friends, some I’ve known since childhood, come here Monday nights with guitars, fiddles, banjos. We play bluegrass and folk music. Lee and I wanted some music at our daughter’s wedding ceremony in the church in 1999. When it was over, we said we’re having too much fun, let’s keep these instruments out of the closet and keep playing.”

Your instruments?
“I play fluke (type of ukelele) and tin whistle. My latest acquisition is Virginia, a standup bass I’m learning to play now.”

Music to go?
“We’ve played for the Council on Aging, nursing homes, weddings, churches, everything from bluegrass to waltzes.”

Travel group?
“For the past ten years, a group of us we call the Ya Ya’s pick an area in Europe to explore. We’ve had fabulous excursions to Italy, France, England, and Croatia.”

New Bedford Sea Chanteys chorus?
“We’re a group of about 30 volunteers. We sing sea chanteys (work songs from the age of sail) to benefit the ‘Ernestina’. We’ve played at Waterfront Festivals, coffee houses, libraries, the New Bedford Whaling Museum and other places.”

Mornings on the river?
“I love to get up at 4:30, throw my canoe on my car and head for the river. There’s nothing like catching a fat bluefish in a 17-pound canoe at 6 in the morning while you’re watching the sun come up.”

Hot air balloon meets canoe?
“One morning on the river, thinking I was all alone in the world, two hot air balloons descended to few feet over me. I actually had a conversation with half dozen people in the basket of a hot air balloon.”

Away from it all?
“My little Kevlar canoe is 17 pounds of freedom.”

Dylan Dobbyn: Nothing Better Than Messing About In Boats

If there’s a way to enjoy the waters of Westport, Dylan Dobbyn will find it. The Juniper Road resident owns an impressive array of things that float, glide, putt-putt, sail, and paddle and deploys them here twelve months a year. His first taste of life in Westport was when his parents trundled him off to visit relatives here in the summer.

 Ten years ago, when scouring the coast to find an ideal spot to launch his nautical toys, he found that Westport floated to the top of his list. During the work week, Mr. Dobbyn, an electrical engineer, commutes to his job at Terradyne in North Reading. Every weekend Mr. Dobbyn and his wife of four years, Ellen Culliton, leave Harbor Towers in Boston and hit the road for Westport. Outside their house, and at their pier, and on the harbor, you’ll find windsurfing boards, kayaks, and motor boats. Recently, his wife Ellen was seen relaxing with a good book on a beach chair on their East Branch pier while her husband learned to ‘drive’ his latest acquisition, an AquaSkipper.

Job at Terradyne?
“Terradyne builds equipment that tests chips for any electronic device you can think of. One of our big customers is Broadcom, which makes cell phones and communication equipment. As an engineering manager, I oversee the design efforts to verify that the chips used in our chip testers actually work.”

Training for the job?
“ I went to the University of Massachusetts/Amherst and graduated with B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering.”

Globalization?
“Of the 60 people I manage, 50 are in India and the rest in North Reading. A few years ago, we all would have been in America.”

Rewards of the job?
“Whatever I do has an impact. I can tell right away whether I’m doing a good job or not.”

Childhood memories of Westport?
“I remember Westport as a cottage-y place where the kids would spend all day messing around at the beach, then eat watermelon, go straight to a salty, sandy bed and loving it.”

Choosing Westport?
“For years, I had trailered my laser around and wanted a avoid the big production of finding a harbor to get to the water. My aunt Polly Emilita, a Westport real estate broker, showed me the place on Juniper Road that had dock access and I said this is it!”

Racing a laser?
“A laser is a 14’ Olympic racing class, one-design one-person sailboat, one of the most popular sailboats there is. There are a gazillion of them and I love racing them.”

Other boats you own?
“I have a 17’ Seaway skiff at the dock and a 28’ Cape Dory power boat in the harbor off WYC for cruising, We cruise to Block Island, the Vineyard, Edgartown, and Nantucket. I’m still trying to convince my wife to set out on Friday nights as soon as we get here but it’s usually on Saturday mornings.”

At the beach?
“My favorite place to body surf is at Baker Beach. There’s a spot off the flagpole there where the bottom contour makes the water break there consistently good. My dad was a life guard at Coast Guard Beach when he was in college and he taught me how to body surf.”

Winter kayaking?
“I love this. For safety, I did a survival test, dunked myself in the water. The struggle I had to get back in the boat awakened me to how dangerous it could be. I’ cautious now and don’t go out when it’s rough.”

Building models?
“I’m kind of a big kid and love toys. I have a Mindstorms Lego Kit and designed a model of a self-balancing motorcycle. It’s computer-controlled so after I built it, I wrote the software for it. It had a balance sensor so if it was starting to fall over, it would straighten itself out by steering that way.”

Sailing in Boston?
“We live next to the Aquarium so when I get out of work, I head for the Boston Sailing Center and cruise the harbor in a J-24.”

Latest water toy?
“I bought an AquaSkippper to use off the dock. It’s made of aircraft aluminum, weighs 26 pounds, is 6’ long, and is designed to be self-propelled. Sort of like a pogo stick. You have to get a rhythm going or you sink. Luckily, it floats.”

A nautical partnership?
“ Our first date was a cruise to see the sunrise at the entrance to Boston Harbor. On one or our early times together we did a week-long cruise up to Provincetown and around to Nantucket on boat. That’s when I figured it was going really well. If you can live a week on a boat with someone and have a great time that’s a good sign.”

Westport wonderland?
“Westport’s a water wonderland - a great boating harbor combined with a beautiful surf beach and a nice harbor behind it, all within walking distance of each other.”
“

The River Run's Real Winner Is The River

 

At the 10:30 starting time on a picture-perfect Saturday morning, the kayaks, canoes, and, oh yes, one tiny row boat,  were a swirling mass of fiberglass and wood on the south side of Hix Bridge.  Viewed from the bridge fifteen minutes later, the 74 vessels in the Family/Fun division appeared to be dots of colorful confetti paddling toward the Head of Westport 3.5 miles away. The Fifth Annual Canoe/Kayak Race and Family Paddle, sponsored by The Westport River Watershed Alliance and Osprey Sea Kayaks, was in full swing.

The Challenge Class had begun their 8.5 boomerang route a half hour before, looping south to Gunning Island then reversing course to pass under Hix Bridge and blast toward the Head. Many of the 16 Challenge Class would finish way before the more laid back family paddlers.

The name of the game for the racers was speed. Most sported kayaks and canoes built for competition. Many were equipped with GPS systems to monitor time, speed, and distance.

“I want to fool around and get some exercise. If I happen to pass one or two people, that’s fine,” David Crocker said as he checked over his Seda Glide Kayak prior to the race. A look at his brawny physique and the gleam in his eye belied that statement. He blew out of the start at the head of the pack and stayed there till the finish, winning himself a $50 gift certificate from White’s of Westport for his efforts.

Even the family paddlers wanted to pass at least one boat. Rosemary Crocker of Providence tapped into a nearly universal sentiment when she said, “I want to finish it and not be last in my class.” She wasn’t.

For Josie Woollam of Westport, the East Branch had a way of neutralizing the competitive instinct. “The trouble with this race is it’s too distracting,” she said. “There’s so much beauty behind each bend in the river. Every time I see a stone wall, swans, or meadows, I want to paddle nearer and get a good look.”

Woollam and her two pals, Polly Gardner of Adamsville and Carol Long of Westport, paddled lightweight fiberglass canoes. Apparently, Gardner and Long were less distracted than Woollam. They placed one and two in the single canoe division.

The venerable, somewhat battered, 1978 Sea Pal canoe entered by the brother/sister team of Dana Gillum of South Dartmouth and Jan St. Germain of New Bedford has more water under its bow than any other on the river. “By the end of the race, we’ll have traveled 4003.5 miles. We’ve been on the Saco. Slocum, and Paskamansett Rivers, “ said Gillum. “This will be no problem.”

Race organizers Ann Fitzgerald and Larry Hookey oversaw the largest turnout ever, 74 Family/Fun and 16 Challenge Class boats. Dozens of volunteers  monitored the event on land and on water.

“Sponsors and vendors really stepped up this year,” Fitzgerald said, naming four major sponsors and 30 others who provided goods, services, or hard cold cash.

Tots, teenagers, and adults from twenty-somethings to those who’ve owned their AARP cards for more than a decade crewed the assortment of boats that passed the finish line.

Fitzgerald and Hookey handed out dozens of medals while paddlers and friends munched on wraps, pizza, and watermelons in the shade of the trees at the river’s grassy edge at the Head of Westport.
If there were a medal for Beautiful Natural Resource, the river would have won it, paddles down.

SIDEBAR OF WINNERS
Challenge Class
Racer
Paul Cordelia
Single Kayak
1. Dave Crocker
2. Mark Edwards
Over 55
1. John Cooper Mullen
2. Bruce Meacham
Female
1. Denise Hixon
2. Marcia Hathaway
Plastic Kayak
1. Bob Wilkinson
2. George Kyller
Double Canoe -
1. Halpin and Olson (first names not available)
2. Darrill Goldizen, J.F. Paquin

Family Fun Class
Overall
1. Mike Spadea, Kara Gilson (Double Kayak, 2008 Grads Oliver Ames HS, Easton,MA )
2. Rob and Jamie Pollack (Double Kayak)
Double Canoe
1. Dana Gillum, Jan St. Germain
2. Mike and Molly Sullivan
Over 55, Double Kayak
1. Ted and Tom Gibney
2. Peggy and Jonathan Stevens
Family Boat, more than 2 people
1. The Toth Family
2. The Chan Family
Fun Boat
1. Dan and Ben (age 2 1/2) Harrington in row boat
2. Tim Groves in kayak with Ruby Groves (age 4)
Single Kayak Overall
1. Edward Earle
2. Eric LaFrance
Single Kayak, under 16
1. Nicholas Gonsalves
2. Cody Flynn
Single Kayak, over 55
1. John Hiller
2. Prue Goodale
Single Canoe
1. Polly Gardner
2. Carol Long
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SIDEBAR
SPONSORS AND VENDORS HELP FLOAT THE RIVER RUN
The Westport River Watershed Alliance and Osprey Sea Kayak Adventures are riding a wave of good will. The long list of supporters of this year’s River Run illustrates their event’s growing footprint and acknowledgement of the river’s value to the town. Major sponsors Bittersweet Farm, Graphix Plus, Lees Market, and TMJ Orthopedics were joined by 30 entities from A to Z that provided goods, services, or cash support.
A.J. Potter Jr. and Sons; Country Woolens; Dartmouth Building Supply, Inc; Doug Brown-Durfee Buffington Insurance Agency; Ellie’s Place Restaurant; Fernandez & Charest, P. C.; Graham Enterprises; Handy Hill Creamery; LaPointe Insurance; Lawton Builders; Marguerite’s Restaurant; Mid-City Scrap & Salvage Company; N.A.C. Security and Stereo Systems, Inc.; Ocean’s Catch, Inc.; Partners Village Store; Plamondon Electrical; Potter Funeral Service, Inc.; Rent-A-Jon; State Representative Michael J. Rodriques; Sticks. Stones, & Stars; The Bayside Restaurant; Tim’s Lawn Care; Village Pizza; Westport Apothecary; Westport Chiropractic; Westport Federal Credit Union; Westport Marine Specialties;  WestportHappenings.com; Zibra Corporation.

Arrrgh, Matey, A Cockatoo on the Bow!

Well, blow me down, a cockatoo on the bow.  Not since Long John Silver’s seagoing parrot has there been evidence of squawkers and their owners on the bounding sea, or in this case, the rolling river.

Dusty the cockatoo and his owner Hank Protzmann of East Greenwich, RI, showed up at the Westport River’s Hix Bridge Landing Saturday morning to man (and bird) the safety crew monitoring the kayers and canoers entered in the Fifth Annual River Run Race and Famiy Fun Paddle.

Aside from Hank, Dusty may have been the most experienced adventurer on the river.

“Dusty’s been mountain biking, wind surfing, and kayaking with me for years. This is his fourth kayak ride this week, He’s been with me hundreds of times, ” Hank said.

 Hank bought the well mannered bird from a breeder when  it was a few weeks old, Dusty spent 13 years with Hank in Delray Beach where Protzmann grew up and owned a water sports rental business. The duo has spent the last eight years in Greenwich. 

When on rescue boat jet ski, Dusty grabs on with his claws and holds on with the grit of an old salt.

Protzmann and Dusty have been friends with Osprey Sea Kayaks owners Sam and Carl Ladd for years and winged it over to Westport when invited to join the safety crew. Osprey Sea Kayaks and The Westport River Watershed Alliance organized the event.

“He’s our safety bird,” says Sam Ladd. “He’s an adventure parrot.”

Little Acoaxet Chapel has a long history

One of Westport’s most enduring structures, erected on the farmlands that slope into the sea in Westport Harbor, is the Acoaxet Chapel. If you’re not on the lookout for it, you might miss the compact little building tucked into one of the first lots on Howland Road.

The Westport Historical Society focused a spotlight on the chapel with a recent presentation, “A History of the Acoaxet Chapel.” Reverend Robert Hollis, standing at a rostrum from which other pastors in the chapel’s unique history have preached to their flocks, harkened back to the 1840s to begin charting the story of the building and the community that erected it.

The history of the Acoaxet Chapel is a story of Yankee thrift, practicality, and resoluteness. It is veined with an uncommon sense of inclusion that far predates the contemporary sense of ecumenism. It also reveals the sustaining importance of the church in the lives of the farmers and businessmen who made up Westport Harbor’s population.

Farm families in the Harbor began meeting in each other’s homes for prayer, singing, and religious instruction in the 1840s. Over time, sentiment grew for having a formal meeting place. In January 1872, with the nearest church four miles distant, Frank Howland spearheaded a successful effort to build a local chapel. One of the group’s first acts was to form the “Free Chapel Association”; all in attendance became members. They wrote a constitution and ratified it.

By the time they broke ground on January 23, 1872, two things were abundantly clear. First, they would pay cash for everything and avoid debt by raising money within their own community.

Second, they decided unanimously that the chapel would be “held in trust for the free use of all Protestant denominations for the worship of God and for moral and religious instruction” for the community.

“That, I believe, is what makes the Acoaxet Chapel different than almost any chapel or church built in New England,” Reverend Hollis said. “The people in the harbor said that anyone who wants to use it as a church can come use it free, without charge. What an incredible statement on that first meeting night January 10, 1872.”

The founding group included Quakers, Baptists, and Congregationalists. They practiced what they preached.

Over the next ten years, the members voted to add a chimney, stoves for heat and kerosene lamps for illumination. In 1882, one year after members voted to erect a closed-in shed to protect horses and carriages in inclement weather, disaster struck.  A fire was set by “a miscreant, who was pursued but never found, at least by the legal authority.”

The chapel played a vital role in their social and spiritual lives. They would not abide living without the nexus it provided. They set their jaws and built another chapel upon the ashes of the first - in less than one year - and added a belfry to the building.

Hardly a month would pass without functions and events being conducted at Acoaxet Chapel. Walter Elwell, one of three long-time chapel members who participated in the evening’s program, reminisced about chapel goings on in the 1940s through 1960s. Mr. Elwell recalled the days preceding September’s Harvest Sunday and Auction Monday. Mr. Elwell watched his grandmother spend two days cooking corned beef, hand chopping it in a wooden bowl, then pressing it so it could be cold sliced at Sunday night’s supper.

Elwell’s father was in charge of Auction Monday, a highly anticipated annual fund-raiser. Families brought produce and foodstuffs from their farms and gardens, filling the chapel with goods to be auctioned off. The proceeds of the auction, conducted by Everett Coggeshall, supported the chapel financially and gave families a head start on stockpiling food for the winter.

“There were very few houses around, you could count them on your fingers,” Gladys Corey said of growing up in the neighborhood.  She got a laugh from the audience when she recalled getting tired on one of her youthful excursions and deciding to take a nap in one of the sand traps on the golf course near her house. A frantic search ensued. A neighbor found her and carried her, still slumbering, back home.

Ralph Bodington’s main memories from the 1970s to the 1990s centered around food. After cooking beans for Sunday suppers became too much for Mrs. Marian Gifford of Little Compton, young Ralph offered to help. Twenty-five years later, he’s still the man in the chapel kitchen at 4:30 am preparing beans for the Saturday Ham and Bean Suppers. The chapel offers more than comfort for the belly. “The chapel offers a refuge, a place for peace in a world that can use more of them, “ he said.

Finances and food took up a good deal of the content of the minutes (recorded since 1872) of the chapel’s annual meetings. They might have written how pleased they were to have made $50 “but they did understand that the money raised wasn’t the most important part. It was the work they could do with it. Above all, it was the fellowship they encountered here and the joy they had with the community coming together,” Reverend Hollis said.

After spending a few quiet moments in the simple, elegantly designed chapel, a visitor familiar with its history can imagine the echoes of farmers’ boots entering for Sunday services.

Until this year, the chapel was open from Easter to the last Sunday in September. Reverend Hollis announced that the Acoaxet Chapel would be open year round beginning this October.The legendary ham, bean, and brown bread suppers live on. Check their web site for more information: http://www.acoaxetchapel.org

SIDEBAR
Special services that have been held at Acoaxet Chapel through the years:
* Christmas Tree Decoration
* Christmas Eve services
Easter
Thanksgiving
Harvest Sunday, Auction Monday
Washington’s Birthday
* Memorial Day
July 4
Mothers Day
Father and Sons Day
* Oddfellows and Rebeccas
* Grange Sunday
Fanny Crosby Sunday
Freemason Sunday
Missionary Sunday
* Music Sunday
* still on annual calendar

Suppers played a dual role of raising money and providing fellowship at the Chapel.
Box Suppers
Cold meat and strawberry suppers
Ice cream festivals
Men’s Turkey Supper
Cold Meat and salad supper
Fish/quahog suppers   
Harvest Suppers
Oyster suppers
* Ham and bean suppers
* still going strong

Meet Kathryn Graham Lamontagne: PhD candidate, librarian

Kathryn Graham Lamontagne has packed a lot into her first 28 years on the planet and shows no signs of slowing down.  Between wanderlust and a hunger for knowledge, she’s traveled around three continents and worked at an intriguing assortment of jobs.

Sky miles aside, Ms. Lamontagne’s roots are planted firmly in North Westport. Her late grandfather George Graham developed the Holly Hill Campground and Christopher Circle with his late wife Mary, who drove the dump truck and dug the drainage ditches there. Ms. Lamontagne’s Boston-based younger brother Robert works at the Department of Workforce and Labor at the State House and is a speechwriter for Governor Patrick. She resides on Watuppa Road with her parents Norman and Mary Ann.

Ms. Lamontagne’s educational pedigree includes a bachelor’s degree from Providence College, master’s degrees from Providence College (Modern European History) and the University of London (Cultural Memory). During her college career, she studied in Quebec and Newfoundland and journeyed to Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, Spain, and Portugal. Ms. Lamontagne is currently in a Ph.D. program in British History at Boston University.

NORTH WESTPORT ROOTS
“My mother’s family has been summering or living year round on Watuppa Pond since 1901. My father grew up on the reservation in Fall River at the end of Blossom Road. His father was from Westport Factory. My father’s side were all mill people so we’ve been North Westporters forever.”

MELTING POT HERITAGE
“I’m English, Irish, and French-Canadian. My father was French-Canadian, and my grandfather only spoke French. My mom’s maiden name is Graham, her mother’s maiden name was Pelletier but her mother was born in Ireland…it gets confusing!”

A BUSY SCHEDULE TO JUGGLE
“I’ve been a reference librarian at the Barrington Public Library for the past 5 years. I work at White’s and Rachel’s Lakeside. I answer phones, manage rooms, bus tables, hostess in the dining room and even made drinks. I’m also a grader of exams at
Boston University and will begin a teaching fellowship there next spring.”

FAMILY FUN
“We love doing beach stuff.  We go to Gooseberry and collect sea-glass, And I’ve always done quahogging with my father, that’s our daddy-daughter thing that we do together.”

FAVORITE WESTPORT ACTIVITY
“My absolute favorite thing to do is get a book and go to East Beach, that’s where everybody finds me all summer. It’s quiet, you don’t have to walk far, the rocks get all warm and you can lay on them, and the water is so much cleaner there.”

VISITS TO LONDON
“I go over about every two months which is why I work so much so I can afford the travel. I visit my boyfriend and do research at the British Library in London."

WHAT DRIVES YOU
“I used to be really competitive and wanted to make everyone proud of me.  Over the years it changed. Now what drives me is more about providing for the family that I’ll have and making sure that I’m best prepared for that.”

WHO INSPIRED YOU
“My grandmother and my mom. My grandmother was proponent of women’s rights, she dug all those ditches at Christopher Circle herself, and was a voracious reader. My mother’s a voracious reader, too. My mom took me to the library to borrow books about famous black women, Native Americans, and presidents. She made every effort to let me know about the world outside.”

PASTIMES
“My mom and I like to go antiquing in New Bedford. I love to cook. I’m a voracious reader. And I collect cook books, a perfect merge for me of food and books.”

AN AMERICAN DREAM STORY
“My great-grandmother was an immigrant from Ireland. She worked in the cafeteria at Boston University. There’s something that resonates with me so much that she worked in the cafeteria and now here I have the opportunity to get my doctorate there. It feels like an American Dream story.”

WESTPORT TEACHERS
“When I enrolled in Bishop Connolly in eighth grade I was the only student from public school who got placed in advanced classes. I attribute that to Mrs. Finnuci, my first grade teacher, Mrs. Croft, my 4th grade teacher, and Mr. Holt at the middle school.  Mrs. Croft had me dress up as a Pilgrim and walk around the school when it was Westport’s bicentennial. I think I was officially a history person from then on. I got a really good education in Westport.”

MEETING ROSA PARKS
“When I was in fourth grade my mom took me to see Rosa Parks at the Congregational Church in Fall River and that changed my life. Rosa Parks was such a little woman on that big, big altar and she’d done some big, big things. I’ve carried that with me my whole life.”

COMING FULL CIRCLE
“I’m studying labor leaders from Lancashire England who immigrated to Fall River in the 19th century which is when my mother’s family came over to work in the mills here.”

Westport Point: An architectural treasure

Nearly surrounded by water and splashed in sunlight from dawn to dusk, Westport Point held as much allure for Native Americans centuries ago as it does to the residents of that village today. Westport architect James Collins, Jr. shared his fascination for the Point’s unique location and the rich architectural heritage of its residences with a capacity crowd at Lees Market Community Room at a recent meeting of the Westport Historical Society.

Mr. Collins is president of Payette, a firm that has become one of the nation's most award-winning architects for high technology health and research buildings. You could probably fit the entire village of Westport Point into one of his Boston firm’s current projects, a study of how to renovate a million square feet of national historic buildings in MIT’s main campus.

In order to appreciate how architectural styles varied within themselves and how some houses on the Point mutated from one style to another, Collins gave a spirited slide-show tutorial that showed classic examples of residential architectural styles from the 1600s to the mid twentieth century. He followed this with photos of dozens of Point homes that currently line the last mile of Main Road.

The Collins house in the heart of historic Westport Point, MA has evolved since its first owner built it in 1776.

 

Mr. Collins’s family has owned property in Westport for three generations and unhappily lost three beach houses to hurricanes in 1938, the mid forties, and 1954. His talk was buoyed by an infectious enthusiasm for the Point neighborhood he’s lived in for the past fifteen summers and an obvious grasp of the principles of architecture.

Mr. Collins made the case that Westport Point is one of the most unusual harbor villages in the country.  First, it’s protected by a barrier beach and surrounded by an estuary with a river that splits around it. Next, the area is not that wide and there’s a road running smack down the middle of it. “The result is that you’re equally aware of the urban aspect of a central street and a rural quality that allows you can look past the buildings and over the grass behind them and see water on both sides of the street,” Collins said.

The wild card for Collins is that the entire area faces south so both sunrise and sunset are visible from most of the houses.

“There will be people who say you need to travel thousands of miles to get these four different experiences but here have them within feet of each other,” Mr. Collins said.

How did the village get this way? “Enlightened self-interest zoning” Mr. Collins said with a bemused laugh.

From the beginning, it seemed that everyone built close to the street to take advantage of using the back yard for gardens, animals, or water access. The roofs of the cape and colonial style houses in the Point are all pitched the same way and that creates a natural grade down to the water.

Mr. Collins insights about “ventilation” and “rhythm” should register clearly with anyone who has walked past the houses near the end of Main Road and wondered how the views down to the water on both sides were orchestrated.

He noted that most of the village houses “huddled up” to the north side of their lots and didn’t build in the middle of them. Next, the lots are random widths, depending on how much money the property owner could afford to spend.

“No one ordered them to build on the north side of their lots but the fact that they did and the random lot widths create a rhythm of openings between them,” Mr. Collins said. “You look left and say ‘nice house,’ look right and say ‘nice gap to the water,’ and you can say this all the way down the street.”

When families got bigger and more space was needed, they “telescoped” their houses by adding on to the back so the village got denser “but those all-important gaps (views to the water) didn’t get filled in,” Mr. Collins said.

Heading north, away from the river from the Paquachuck Inn, most of the houses are capes or colonial styles. The capes are one story, never two, have simple detailing, and perhaps sport dormers or an attic. Classic colonials are usually two stories, have regularized sets of windows, a central chimney, and several types of roofs.

And oh, what a range of them there are. Full capes, 3/4 capes, half capes, and in one case a cape that morphed into a colonial. Owners continually tinkered with their Cape and Colonial style homes, adding, subtracting or replacing windows and adding porches and extending living space. Chimneys have been added to some houses and in one case built partially over a window on the side of a house. Hardly any of them are carbon copies of another.

Farther up the road, the architecture gets more kaleidoscopic.  Styles including Greek Revival, Arts and Crafts, Italianate, Gothic Revival, American Foursquare, and Bungalow Craftsman are all represented.

“When architecturally knowledgeable people come to the village they flip out. This is an important place because it houses as many great homes of architectural style as anyplace I’ve ever seen in my life,” Collins said.

On a stroll through Westport Point with his dad when he was five years old, Mr. Collins asked him why he loved the neighborhood so much.

“Oh, Jim, this is a special place, this is sacred ground,” his dad replied. Now that he’s lived there for fifteen years, Jim Collins feels the same way.

SIDEBAR
Of the architecture described by Mr. Collins, Westport Point contains examples of Cape, Colonial, Greek Revival, Gothic Revival, Italianate, Second Empire, Victorian Shingle, Georgian Revival, American Foursquare, Arts and Crafts, and Bungalow styles. Some houses are a mix of two or more styles.

Architectural styles described by Mr. Collins
1626 - 1725 First Period Architecture
1600s - 1960 Cape
1725 - 1775 Georgian Colonial
1780 - 1830 Federal
1830 - 1875 Gothic Revival
1825 - 1850 Greek Revival
1845 - 1860 Italianate
1860 - 1880 Second Empire
1870 - 1900 Richardsonian Romanesque
1875 - 1925 Victorian Eclectic
1880 - 1910 Queen Ann
1880 - 1900 Victorian Shingle
1895 - 1930 Georgian Revival
1895 - 1930 American Foursquare
1905 - 1930 Arts and Crafts (Craftsman)
1905 - 1930 Bungalow

Big helpings at the WFA Clam Bake

Lynda Perkins (right) and Barbara Bates serve up helpings of clams, codfish, chourico, franks, corn, potato, sausage, brown bread (and, for a few bucks more, a lobster) to a long line of hungry ticket holders at the 24th annual Westport Fishermen's Association Clam Bake on Sept. 16.

A record setting crowd of 262 people gathered for the event at the Little Compton Sportsmen's Club. Proceeds will help underwrite restoration of the Horseneck Point Life Savng Station, The winner of the dinghy which was raffled off at the Bake  was Chris Vemfi of Lexington, MA.

Meet The Kiteman of Westport Beach: John Davenport

John Davenport’s presence on Westport’s Cherry and Webb beach is easy to notice. His calling card, a massive array of whimsical, colorful kites drifting lazily in the sea breeze, pinpoints his location from April till October.

With hand-made appliqué banners set firmly in the sand to mark off the edges of his “flying field,” he sits happily in a lawn chair, ready to answer questions from curious or admiring beach-goers about the soft fabric wonders floating above him. Born and raised in Somerset, Mr. Davenport recalled coming to Westport since 1956 when his family spent time at his mother’s family cottage on Cadman’s Neck. He’s lived in Westport full time since 1971. The first place he purchased was Al Lees,  Jr.’s Sea Swing Farm on Old Horseneck Road. He currently lives on Cadman’s Neck in a home his late father built.

A graduate of MA College of Pharmacy in Boston, Mr. Davenport, is a long-term care consultant for PharMerica of Warwick, RI. A chance walk down Thames Street near one of his work sites in Newport brought him to the High Flyers Kite Company. The colorful displays and the owner’s enthusiasm and knowledge of the hobby hooked Mr. Davenport. He’s been flying kites “religiously” since 1987.

First summers in Westport
“We kids all had boats and would zoom around, go quahogging, waterskiiing, and generally have a good time around my mother’s family summer cottage. This place just gets in your blood.”

First kites
“We had big cemetery behind our house in Somerset and we’d fly paper kites off fishing poles with hundreds of feet of line on them. Sometimes kites got so far away we never got them back.”

Day job
“Federal law states that every long-term care facility has to have a consultant pharmacist. When PharMerica supplies medications to a facility, they package me with the deal so I come along with the contract. I’ve been with PharMerica for over twenty years.”

Kites as magnets
“I’ve been flying kites in Westport for a good ten years. Put up a kite and it puts a smile on people’s faces. They come right over, it’s like a magnet. They ask did I build it, where I came up with the idea and the next thing you know I’m preaching the value of kites. ”

The kite man
“Kids will see me unloading my car and you’ll hear them shout, ‘Look, mommy, there’s the kite man!’ I’m known as the ‘Kite Man of Westport Beach.’”

Westport beach ideal for kite flying
“As the land heats up, the cool air from the ocean starts this heat pump so you get a stable, reliable southwest wind around noon. Since the beach faces SW if anything happens to your kite you can always recover it on land. A salt water landing would ruin a kite. The ideal wind is SW 10 - 12 mph.”

What you like about Westport
“Where else do you have three choices how to get to the beach on a summer morning - by bike, by boat, or by car!”

Materials used for kites
“They’re made out of rip stop nylon, basically in two weights, 3/4 oz. for light winds and 1.5 oz. for durability in stronger winds. I’ve made animal kites -frogs to elephants- rainbow kites, kites that spin, and a revolver kite.”

Friendships made
“I’ve made many friends. We send Christmas cards and email each other about our projects and send pictures of our latest creations.”

A great chance to combine two hobbies
“I’m a big civil war buff and have been to most of the civil war battlefields. Next year the American Kitefliers Association is going to have its grand national festival in Gettysburg PA. I will work all this winter to build a kites that have a North/South theme.  All the kites flying under my main lift kite will be war related - cannons, cannonballs, flags, rifles and whatever else I can think of.”

Other hobbies
“One of my other favorites is astronomy. I belong to Astronomical Association of Southern New England.”

An emotional 9/11/01 experience
“I think we all felt a sense of desperation. I felt the need to fly kites so I packed up every single one of my red white blue kites and went to the beach and put up this huge red, white, and blue display. National pride overwhelmed me.  People came up to me and said thank you. It was the most emotional time I've ever had flying kites.”

New Year’s Fly in Newport
“Members of the region’s American Kitefliers Association show up in Newport no mater what the weather. The age-old story is that when you’re flying a kite you’re taking all your troubles and attaching them to the kite and watching the wind carry them away. When you pull the kite back down it’s the start of a new year.”

Life Lesson
“It’s a lesson in life that people have to learn to find a hobby that gets the stress right out of their lives. Kite flying has done that for me and done it for many other adults.”

Radiology technologist knows detection is critical to survival

Monday, September 10, 2007   

Radiology technologist knows detection is critical to survival

Laurie Palmer of Westport has been a radiological technologist with a specialty in mammography for 27 years.Our health. Some of us take it for granted — maybe we all do — until it becomes a question mark. That's the time we head for our doctors, nurse practitioners, and to hospitals that house the technology we've come to depend upon to determine what ails us.

X-rays, ultra sound tests, MRIs, and CT scans are front line tools doctors use to assess our body's general heath. Each and every one of the pieces of equipment used for these assessments has to be administered by a skilled technician.

Laurie Palmer of Westport is one of these technicians. For the past 27 years she's been a radiological technologist with a specialty in mammography at Truesdale Radiology Imaging Services in Fall River. The facility is part of the Southcoast Hospitals Group that includes Charlton, St. Luke's, and Tobey Hospitals.

An annual mammogram (x-ray) is recommended for women over 40 and is used to detect cancer in a woman's breast. A mammogram produces a black and white image of the breast that is "read" by a doctor who specializes in interpreting these images.

"For most women it's not a pleasant exam. The more I can get them to relax, the better chance I have of getting a really good exam for them," Mrs. Palmer said. During the exam the breast is pressed between two plastic plates to flatten and spread the tissue. The pressure lasts for a few seconds and is necessary to get a good picture. Those few seconds of the 20-minute procedure can hurt.

"I've learned from physical therapists how to position women while doing the mammogram and even tried to position myself on the machine to see how to be as gentle as possible while getting more of the tissue on the plates," she said.

Mrs. Palmer administers two types of mammograms. One type, a screening mammogram, is a routine part of an annual exam for women who exhibit no symptoms. A doctor orders the second type, a diagnostic mammogram of a particular area of the breast, when a lump or other irregularity is found.

"Cancer" is one of the scariest words in our vocabularies. Since the chance of a woman having breast cancer at some point in her life is 1 in 8, women coming for mammograms have cause to be anxious. Mrs. Palmer needs to be able to read a woman's emotional state as well as she reads the dials on her x-ray machines.

"You have to be a really good listener," she said as she thought about her daily interactions with women. "I know many of them from previous exams, so I might ask how their sons or daughters are doing. Since I'm from Westport there are people who know me from town and might ask me about myself or my family."

It took some trial and error for Mrs. Palmer to find the glide path into her career. "I had originally wanted to go into radiology when I was at Westport High School but was told I'd be bored. I can't understand that now, because it's such a versatile, challenging field," she recalled with a laugh.

But she heeded the advice when she graduated from high school in 1974 and entered the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth as a psychology major with a minor in special education. By 1977 she'd figured out enough of her own psychology to realize that her heart wasn't in that career path.

The medical field, on the other hand, was in Mrs. Palmer's DNA. Her mother, Lois Montigny Guay, had been the director of the Westport Visiting Nurses Association. "She was a smart person, an RN, and was respected by the physicians, especially Dr. Kirkaldy and Dr. Lepreau. She was always there for people," Mrs. Palmer said.

And there was Mrs. Palmer's grandmother, Agnes Raposa, who was a 1947 founder of the Schwartz Center for Children, now located in Dartmouth.

Back to school went Mrs. Palmer. She enrolled at Northeastern University and spent the next 28 months rotating between clinical practice and academic radiology classes at Northeastern, graduating in 1979 with an associates of science degree in Radiology. Since then she's been granted newer licenses and passed more exams to keep up with advances in radiology.

Early detection has helped make the big "C" a curable disease. Mrs. Palmer fondly recalled a cancer survivor whom she got to know during two decades of annual mammograms. During one of her visits, the woman presented Mrs. Palmer with a beautiful porcelain pin of an angel, a gift she cherished. One day, the pin fell to the floor and broke. Two days later, Palmer heard that the woman had died at about the same time.

"She was a 20-year survivor. She had a good life because her cancer was caught early. She died of heart failure," Mrs. Palmer said. She gave the pin to the woman's daughter, also a survivor, who later gave Mrs. Palmer an angel Christmas ornament the mother had made.

"I keep it in my bedroom and think of her every day. That pin reminds me of her and of what I do. It's one of the reasons I get up every day to go into this stressful job," she said.

At Truesdale, one of the buffers against the stress of the job is the staff with whom she works. "I work with a really nice group of people. I've been with some of them over 20 years. We laugh together, yell at each other, and cry together. We're like family," she said.

Mrs. Palmer has no trouble finding ways to relax when she returns home to Westport. Yoga, gardening, boating and volunteer work at the Westport Point United Methodist Church help diffuse the tension from her Tuesday to Friday occupation.

Mrs. Palmer, her husband, Matthew, and their two children, Kristin, 24, and Ryan, a freshman at Westport High School, often trek less than a mile down the road to the Point to row out to their Boston Whaler for a day on the river. "One of the things I love about Westport is the river. It's so tranquil. As soon as I get in the boat, I let out a big sigh of relief," she said.

X-ray machines dedicated to mammography are much more sophisticated than the first breast imaging equipment that was introduced in 1969, and Mrs. Palmer has kept up with the advances. She earned a bachelor of science degree in Health Management from Anthem College in 2005 and is currently taking an online certificate program in PACS Administration (Picture Archiving Communication Systems) through Bunker Hill Community College.

"Everything in radiology is now computerized. We're going from film to imaging on high-resolution computer screens. Some day I might like to teach how to integrate radiology and PACS. I'd miss the contact with patients, but in the meantime the college program helps me be better at my job as the system changes," she said.

American Cancer Society guidelines for early breast cancer detection

• Mammogram: Women ages 40 and older should have a mammogram every year and should continue to do so for as long as they are in good health.

• Clinical breast exam: Women in their twenties and thirties should have a clinical breast exam (CBE) as part of a regular exam by a health expert, preferably every three years. After age 40, women should have a CBE by a health expert every year.

• Breast awareness and breast self-exam: Self-exam is an option for women starting in their twenties. Women should be told about the benefits and limitations of the self-exam. Women should report any changes in how their breasts look or feel to their health professional right away.

For more information, see www.cancer.org

Ron Costa — for veterans, he's the man with answers

Ronald E. "Ron" Costa is in his second career of government service. He has served as Westport's Veterans Agent for the past 26 years. From his office in Town Hall Annex he meets with veterans and fields phone calls Monday through Friday. Prior to that he was a career Air Force man, signing up in 1953 and retiring in 1975. Mr. Costa served in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam.

When stateside, he was posted as close as Otis Air Force Base in Bourne and as far west as Lowry Air Force Base and the Air Force Academy in Colorado. Mr. Costa saw Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Nixon and Vice President Humphrey when they visited bases where he worked. In 1964 he witnessed one of Bob Hope's famous Christmas shows for veterans overseas. Both natives of Fall River, Mr. Costa and his wife Roberta were married in September 1959. They built a house on Newton Street in Westport in 1965 and moved in full time after Mr. Costa retired in 1975. The Costas have four children: Vicki, Steven, Michael and Kathleen, all of whom live in Westport.

SIGNING UP?: "I originally enlisted in the Air Force in 1953 as an electronics repairman. After I finished basic training, I went to tech school at Lowry Air Force Base in Colorado then to bombsight school and flexible gunnery school to learn how to repair bombsights and guns on aircraft."

FAMILY? "Roberta was with me on all of my tours of duty. Our first two children were born in the U.S. and the second two were born in Japan. We're a close family. All my kids live within half mile of each other, work in the area, and talk together just about every day."

WHERE STATIONED? "I was stationed twice each in Colorado, Japan, Hanscomb Air Force Base, and Otis Air Force Base. My second duty in Colorado was at the Air Force Academy. Whatever place I put in for I got. Somebody was looking out for me."

AIR FORCE DUTIES? "First I was involved with bombsight repair. Next I was in consolidated maintenance and supplied power units to aircraft as specialists were working on them. Then I worked as a transportation coordinator at the Air Force Academy. Wherever cadets were going, here or abroad, we took them."

VETERANS AGENT SERVICES? "I've worked with vets from WWI to the present. If a veteran qualifies for services, I can provide financial assistance for food, clothing, shelter, housing supplies and medical care. I have an average of 2,000-3,000 calls a year. Veterans ask what they're entitled to, what their spouse is entitled to, and information about everything from medical matters and to burial forms. I answer an average of 15 calls a day."

SEEING EISENHOWER? "President Eisenhower loved Colorado and had a summer home there. I used to see him every day when he had the Summer White House at Lowry Air Force Base between 1953 and 1955. It was impressive. You had to have clean uniforms and we worked long shifts. You might get a nod when he was passing by."

BOB HOPE? "When Bob Hope's 1964 Christmas Show was in Tokyo, I got off duty after a 12-hour shift and walked over to take a peek at the hanger the show was going to be in. When the ambulances came in, one of the drivers says if you give us a hand wheeling in the wounded on wheelchairs and gurneys I'll get you into the show. Not only did we go in but we sat in front row center. I got my ticket signed by Bob Hope, Lana Turner and Anita Bryant. A photo of me in a crowd of guys around the comedian Jerry Colonna was in the next day's Far East edition of Stars and Stripes."

HUBERT HUMPHREY? "In June 1968, the night Bobby Kennedy was assassinated, I was working at the Air Force Academy compound in Colorado where Humphrey had come for the cadets' graduation and I was called to guard his compound. He gave me a card that entitled me to sit at a reserved spot to watch the proceedings in the Senate."

FRIENDS AROUND THE WORLD: "Every Christmas I get mail from around world from people we knew while I was serving. Occasionally some of them stayed with us when passing through. When we traveled across country we visited with others we knew."

FAVORITE LOCAL SPOTS? "I used to enjoy walking around getting exercise and watching the people at Lincoln Park. I could get jobs for my veterans there. My kids worked there in the summer, too."

PASTIMES: "I really love reading Louis L'Amour Western novels. I have at least 40 of his books. If I haven't read one of them, it's because I can't find it. I think the plots of many Hollywood, even Japanese, films, are based on his stories."

VACATIONS? "In October, I'll spend week in Newport fishing and going out to good restaurants in the evening."

LOOKING BACK? "Thirty-five people applied to be veterans agent in 1975 and I'm still here enjoying the job."

Westport gets preview of Noquochoke Village housing plan

The "Final Concept Plan" for the Noquochoke Village Community Housing project was the solitary item on the Board of Selectmen's August 13 meeting.

The final plan calls for 54 units to be built on the 32-acre site just off Route 177. Thirty-nine of the units will count toward the affordable requirements of the state. Sixty percent of the units would be rental, 40 percent for sale. The total development cost is approximately $12 million ($220,000 per unit).

The plan was outlined by GLC of Boston, a real estate consulting firm that analyzes projects like Noquochoke Village, and Kennen Landscape Architecture, based in Cambridge, Mass., a design, landscape architecture, and planning practice that has done extensive planning work with municipalities on Cape Cod. They have been working with the HPC since last April.

"GLC created plans that work economically and match the objectives heard to date and have written a draft RFP that could be used to solicit a developer to develop a mixed housing development," GLC partner Drew Leff said.

Kate Kennen opened with a project overview showing the design goals for a 54-unit project. She addressed traffic patterns, buffering, safety, water supply, property values and maintenance. She stressed that the plans included citizen input about making Noquochoke Village a model for future development and provided an advanced wastewater treatment system that would remove substantial amounts of nitrogen from a 10,000-gallon per day waste water septic system.

Ms. Kennen showed topographical slides of the Quinn and Perry properties that comprise most of the site and various configurations of residential and rental units that would be built there. The final plans had what Ms. Kennen called the "look and feel of Westport," including recreational areas and conservation areas that preserve open space.

The second part of the program laid out GLC's market analysis, financial assumptions, and zoning considerations. Projected rental costs and sales prices of Noquochoke Village units were based on comparably sized homes for sale in the area, rental costs of complexes in Dartmouth and Fall River, and estimated costs of units that will be offered at Strawberry Fields and Lincoln Park developments.

The maximum number of bedrooms in the village's layout would be 90, based on state standard of each bedroom producing 110 gallons/day and a septic field that can handle 10,000 gallons/day.

The Perry parcels on the north of the area were purchased with CPA funds and cant be resold so GLC recommended placing rental units there.

Condominiums in a town house format could be built on the Quinn parcels that have no restrictions.

Mr. Leff concluded by discussing the RFP (requests for proposals) process. He suggested creating a document that protects the town — a developer selection process, subject to the approval of the HPC and the Board of Selectmen — that makes sure "we get the goals and objectives we established for the project." The selection process would aim to find developers who have experience, are financially responsible, and are willing to abide by the constraints of the document.

Mr. Coughlin asked for permission to apply for state grants to clean up contaminated soil on the site so it wouldn't be an impediment in developing the land. He was granted permission in a unanimous vote.

During the question and answer period, Mr. Mauk asked whether owners of affordable units could get market value profits when they sold their units. Mr. Leff said that there are requirements that units be resold to people that meet the criteria for buyers of affordable units. The returns on the seller's investment are limited by the state as well, he said.

Mr. Mauk expressed concern that out-of-towners could displace Westport residents in state mandated lotteries that select renters. Mr. Leff said that a preference might be stipulated that a certain percentage of renters be Westport residents.

From the audience, Elizabeth Collins said that many children of Westport families have moved out of town because they can't afford to buy homes here and that the lottery would give them a chance to return.

There was some discussion about whether the project would be 40R (provides financial incentives for the town providing the zoning is suitable) or a "friendly" 40B. Mr. Leff said that could be decided later in the process.

The board made no motion to act on GLC's proposal.

Westport Selectmen close Beach Ave. for three months

The quandary about Beach Avenue arose during Town Administrator Michael Coughlin's Informational Report to the Board of Selectmen Monday night.

Mr. Coughlin recommended closing Beach Avenue temporarily for public safety reasons. Sergeant Majewski recommended placing a barrier 20 feet down Beach Avenue. The 20-foot stretch would provide sufficient turn around space for vehicles that attempted to enter it.

Several land owners who live near Beach Avenue were present and complained about the issues that have plagued them increasingly in past years: trespassers and party people who leave trash, trudge over fragile dunes, and get their cars stuck in the sand as they attempt to drive ever closer to the beaches.

Photo courtesy of Shorelines

Board member Duncan Albert noted that the public should be advised that these are not town beaches or public beaches but private property.

"People think because it is a town street it must be a town beach; it is not," Mr. Albert said.

He encouraged people who live in that area to form an association to petition the town for the removal of Beach Avenue as a public street and make it a private street. The road could then become gated as long as keys are provided to public safety personnel. He also said there are environmental issues that arise when moving all the sand to clear that road.

Mr. Mauk moved to follow Mr. Coughlin's recommendation provided that a key be given to Mr. Morad, who was in favor ot the motion and has land on Beach Avenue, so that he could have access to his property and it wouldn't be viewed as a land taking.

Mr. Coughlin was not in favor of distributing keys to public personnel and to private landowners and reiterated his recommendation to temporarily close the road. He reported that the Westport Land Conservation Trust, which owns seven lots abutting the road, had written a letter to his office in favor of abandonment of Beach Avenue and closing it permanently.

"It's not a taking of land because it's a temporary measure for public safety reasons," Mr Coughlin said. "Permanent solutions could be abandonment of the road as the WLCT suggested or formation of neighborhood association to hammer out property rights to the roadway." Presumably, that process would involve determining if there are town landings anywhere along Beach Avenue and what to do about one piece of town owned land on Beach Avenue.

"I'm not trying to give you a hard time, I'm trying to bring this to a successful conclusion," Mr. Mauk said, "If I move to exactly what you want to do, could you put a time to come back to come back and report your follow up recommendations."

Mr. Coughlin agreed. A motion was unanimously passed to temporarily close for a three month period after which Mr. Coughlin would appear before the Board to offer his follow up recommendations about Beach Avenue's future.

"Fred" Bettencourt: Trucker, Entrepreneur, Adventurer

Mr. Alfred G. Bettencourt, universally known as Fred, was born and raised on the family farm on the Dartmouth side of Horseneck Road. Widowed since 1974, he has three children, Andrew and Jo-Ann of Westport, and Janice of Dartmouth. By the time he struck out on his own at the age of 22 he’d witnessed an event that changed Westport’s landscape forever, the 1938 hurricane.

The succession of businesses he’s operated at 821 Main Road reflects both his independent and entrepreneurial instincts and the changing economies of the times. In 1949 he opened his first business, The Village Spa, selling sandwiches and ice cream. The A.G. Bettencourt Trucking Company followed in 1958 with one truck and he eventually added excavating services. In 1972, Mr. Bettencourt added heating oil and fueling equipment to his line.

Two years later he tried hauling one or two loads of mulch and liked it so much he expanded that part of his business to what it is today. As the construction climate cooled in 1976, he shuttered the excavating enterprise and continued long distance trucking, hauling crushed glass to a recycler in Maine. He retired in 1990. He’s always enjoyed the call of the open road, whether for business or pleasure, and has visited nearly every state in the union.

First business
“In 1949, before I started the present business, I had a place called the Village Spa that sold ice cream and sandwiches. It ran till 1960.”

Army service
“I got drafted into the army between 1951 and 1953. I was a motor sergeant in charge of 42 trucks in Heilbronn, Germany.”

Change in course
“When I came back I was more interested in running equipment than being inside and pulling sodas so I rented out the Spa and began operating heavy equipment for someone.”

Present company
“We provide heating oil, diesel fuel, mulches, and aggregates  - 22 products in the yard here including chips, loam, clamshells, crushed stone, fill, loam, and sand.”

Horseneck Beach
"I have fond memories of Horseneck Beach, the way it was then versus the way it is now. When I was 11, where the trailers now there were homes on both sides of that road. There were lawns in back of homes on water side, in front of homes on other side That’s how badly the shore has eroded. Now you can barely get trailer on without it getting washed away overnight.”

Travel
“In the summer I go north where it’s cool, in winter I go south where it’s warm. Last summer I visited Amish country in Pennsylvania. I’ve been to 37 states.”

Next state to visit
“I’d like to catch the northwest quadrant.”

Favorite places
“The west coast of Florida.  It’s less congested than the east coast. We have friends and relatives there. I hauled crushed glass up to Maine for many years, got to know lot of people and am very comfortable going up there, too.”

1938 hurricane
“It was like a warm-weather blizzard that came unannounced. The winds and rain were heavy.  Two south facing buildings were lost on my father’s farm.”

The next day
“I wasn’t involved in any rescue during the storm I was only 11. But the following day I helped voluntarily in the search for bodies. Bodies were found upriver in drainage ditches. I never found any.”

Destruction
“A lot of the homes had washed up on the first farm that was in the Bayside area. My uncle was renting that farm and most of homes got washed up in the marsh there. Half houses, whole houses, crushed up houses, and boats that had been driven from the sea.”

What do you like about Westport
“The fact we don’t have anything to brag about. Most of the things I like are that we don't have certain things - water, sewer, sidewalks. It’s laid back more than other towns and very much countrified over here.”

Present role in company
“I retired as president of the business in 1990. I’m still available as a consultant and advisor to my son Andrew who runs the business.”

Looking back
“I enjoyed very much servicing my customers. I enjoyed that part of trucking that involved traveling to Maine, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York and other parts of Massachusetts. I never looked at any trip as a job.  I looked at it as a vacation. I had no one to answer to but myself.”

75th Annual Feast of the Holy Ghost, Westport, MA

The 75th annual Feast of the Holy Ghost was blessed with fair weather and good crowds at the Holy Ghost Club’s Sodom Road grounds on Saturday and Sunday, July 7 and 8. Eighty people filled the club Saturday night for a caciolla dinner and live music. On Sunday, a procession carrying the crown of the Holy Ghost entered the sunny grounds at noon.

Dolores Amaral serves "sopas" on Sunday.

Nearly 200 people enjoyed a free traditional Portuguese dish of sopas. The auction that followed lunch is one of the ways the club raises money. The club and pavilion are available to rent. The club will hold a lobster and steak dinner and dance at its Sodom Road Pavilion on July 29. For more information call Andy Rutkowski at 508-678-3357

George Lewis: chief taste tester

One of the highlights of the 75th annual two day Holy Ghost Feast is Sunday’s procession that carries the Crown of the Holy Ghost into the Sodom Road club grounds. Longtime club member and procession crown bearer Patricia St. Laurent of Tiverton, RI, died unexpectedly last week.  Her grand niece Cassandra Barry of Fall River carried the crown in St. Laurent’s memory,  Six week old Kacie Vieira was crowned queen of the seventh Sunday. Photo L to R Mitchell Lynch, Cassandra Barry, St. Laurent’s sister Dorothy Chretien of Fall River and Dorothy’s cousin’s infant daughter Kacie Vieira.

Westport's Farmers' Market Blasts Off

 

Opening Day, July 7, 2007

 

Nine-year-old Courtney Gauthier pitches in with her mother Kelly at the family's George Farms of Dartmouth stand at Saturday’s Farmers’ Market in Westport.

Hundreds of shoppers streamed through the market from 8 am until closing time at noon in search of locally grown produce, plants, herbs, and flowers plus arts and crafts.

The market is held at the Westport Grange, 931 Main Road, on Saturday mornings from 8 am till 12 noon in July August and September. An Adamsville resident summed up her experience enthusiastically. “I did the whole weekends grocery shopping in less than ten minutes, saved gas, supported the local community and local agriculture. I got food my kids love. It’s  a win-win for everyone and the planet. Everyone will be talking about this around the table tonight.”

 

Farmers' Market Opens at the Westport Grange 181

 

Farmers' Market Opens July 7, 2007 at the Westport,MA Grange 181

The Westport Farmers’ Market got off to a roaring start last Saturday.

Over 20 shoppers had lined up at the gate by 8 am and the crowds swept through in steady waves till precisely noon when organizer Beth Easterly rang the closing gong.

Three generations of the D’Agostino family, Thelma D’Agostino, her daughters Shirley and Joanne, and her granddaughter Ashley Robbins were on hand to sell produce from Paradise Hill Farms on Cadman’s Neck. Locally grown produce, plants, herbs, and flowers plus arts and crafts were on sale. The market is held at the Westport Grange, 931 Main Road, on Saturday mornings from 8 am till 12 noon in July August and September.

4th Annual Westport River Run: Racers and Lollygaggers paddle to the Head

From 36 pound Kevlar kayaks that skim the water like dragonflies to pedestrian green canoes that can carry the whole family plus a picnic basket, the 4th annual River Run Race had it all. With sunny skies, a gentle breeze, and an incoming tide to boot.

The 11 serious kayaks and canoes in the Challenge Race, an 8.5 mile route from the staging area at Hix Bridge south to Gunning Island then north to the Head of Westport, got underway in orderly fashion at 10 a.m.

Order, however, was not the word a casual observer might have chosen to describe the starting line for the Family Fun race just north of Hix Bridge.  A constellation of sixty-four swirling, pirouetting kayaks and canoes filled with exuberant crews with good intentions and dubious paddle coordination might be more accurate. Looking at the starting line from a perch atop Hix Bridge looked like three score of boats in spin cycle. By 10:30 a.m., race director Sam Ladd had coaxed enough order into the line to send them off to their reward (lunch) at the Head of Westport 3.5 miles away.

By noon, paddlers had been cheered past the finish line at the grassy knoll at the river’s edge near County Road. The youngest - 3 years old- to the oldest - often their grandparents- were rewarded with cold soft drinks, sandwiches, pizza, and watermelon. As was evident in the laid back medal ceremonies, this was as thoroughgoing a multi-generational event as one will find in Westport.

With such perfect conditions for four years in a row, it’s clear that organizers Anne Fitzgerald and Larry Hookey, co-hosts Sam Ladd of Osprey Sea Kayaks, and the Westport River Watershed Alliance have connections in high places.

Osprey monitors check for chicks on the Westport River

Osprey papas and mommas screeched and swooped in the cobalt blue skies.  Below them, a team of osprey monitors from the Allen’s Pond Wildlife Sanctuary was inspecting the contents of their nest and the parents weren’t happy about it. Holding a pole to ward off dive bombing parents intent on protecting the nests, Osprey Monitor Andrew DeLong and volunteer Alan Poole took turns climbing a ladder to count the number of eggs and chicks in 14 of the osprey platforms on islands and marshes on the East Branch of the Westport River.

The inspection was the second of a four part annual program that has tracked the osprey population since Gil and Jo Fernandez began rejuvenating the faltering local colony in the 1960s. The late legendary couple imported healthy eggs from Chesapeake Bay to replace the DDT weakened eggs produced by the local nesting birds. The osprey now flourish here.

During the cold, gray days of March, the first winged pairs arrived on the river from astonishingly distant winter habitats as far flung as Brazil.  By April, monitors completed the first part of the program by determining exactly which of the 83 platforms on the East and West Branches of the river were occupied.

The Tuesday May 24th assessment was to determine how many pairs were incubating eggs. Most nests contained three warm, chestnut brown, speckled eggs. Scrawny, grayish brown one to three day old chicks with eyes closed and beaks open were noted in several nests.

“The osprey population here is the longest monitored bird population in the world,” Poole said as he, DeLong and navigator George Yeomans shuttled between islands and marshes in the flat-bottomed outboard borrowed from the Westport River Watershed Alliance.

Dr. Poole, editor of “Birds of North America Online” (bna.birds.cornell.edu) has been monitoring ospreys here while pursuing a doctorate in Woods Hole (Boston University Marine Program) in the late 1970s. He’s lived part-time in Dartmouth since the early 1990s.

“Osprey can recognize landmarks from here to Brazil. They even recognize boats they associate with nest visits and generally ignore other boats at a similar distance, “ Dr. Poole said. They get riled up when the monitor’s boat approaches the nest.

This reporter was startled to hear a swoosh of feathered wings distressingly close over his head as he busily lined up a photo of the monitors setting up a ladder to climb one of the platforms. Within minutes of shoving off from marshy shores, one or both parents alighted upon their nests to reconnect with their eggs.

This is Mr. DeLong’s fledgling year as an osprey monitor. As soon as he saw the part-time job posted on the internet, the Warwick, Rhode Island resident knew he wanted it. Next April, Mr. DeLong, a retired inner-city social worker in Providence for 25 years, and his wife will be off to Africa as Peace Corps volunteers.

“It’s been a pretty steep learning curve for the past two months,” he said as he and Mr. Poole compiled data. “ This is an excellent place to work. The community avidly supports the effort and they’re really knowledgeable.”

Through June, Allen’s Neck Wildlife Sanctuary monitors will continue slogging out to the islands and marshes to count how many eggs hatch. The final part of the program will count how many pairs successfully raise their fledglings.

“Success takes luck, skill, and a lot of fish,” said Dr. Poole.

Memorial Day, May 28, 2007, Westport, Massachusetts

Town officials, civil servants, politicians, and veterans salute as a band plays "America" at the conclusion of Memorial Day ceremonies for the nation's veterans.

Pizzazz was added to patriotism as the 215th Army National Guard Band from Fall River marched the route and delighted onlookers with snappy versions of martial music.

School Committee  member Russell Kleber, Representative Michael Roderiques, Select Board Chair Veronica Beaulieu spoke briefly at ceremonies at Beech Grove Cemetery. Veterans Agent Ron Costa has already invited the band to return to next year's parade.

Professional fisherman Dave Cornell reels in audience at Westport library event

Real fishermen see the glass as half full. When Dave Cornell watched ice forming on the Westport River during the gray days of the early March, he looked on the bright side. Only a few more months and we'll be fishing for stripers again, he smiled to himself.

Now that April has arrived, fishing season looms even closer.

Like most fishermen, Mr. Cornell enjoys telling stories. He told a few on March 15 when the Westport Library presented a program titled, "Fly-Fishing with Dave Cornell." The event was sponsored by the Westport River Watershed Alliance and the Westport Fishermen's Association.

A cabinetmaker in the winter in Dartmouth where he has lived with his wife Linda for the past 25 years, Mr. Cornell is on the water from late spring until deep into the fall. By 1994 it had become clear that he washopelessly hooked on fishing. He decided to bait and switch and turned an avocation into a vocation. He's been a professional fishing guide since then.

Mr. Cornell is as good at reeling in an audience as he is at catching fish in Buzzards Bay. His slide presentation was chock full of information useful to beginners and experienced anglers alike. As you listened to him, you could infer that a good fisherman must be observant and patient. Mr. Cornell has studied the characteristics of local game fish, cataloged the places he has fished, the flies he used, and the conditions that produced the best results.

Mr. Cornell has tried using live bait, lures, and trolling and could probably figure out a way to scoop them up with his bare hands but the method he loves the most is fly-casting.

The first thing he cleared up is that he doesn't fish with flies. "Salt water flies are meant to represent bait fish whereas fresh water flies are representing insects a lot of the time," he said.

He showed pictures of flies representing silver side minnows, the most common bait fish in our area. The flies may not look the same as a minnow to us but they are the right size and shape and can get a fish's attention when it moves just like a minnow. Larger flies used might represent scup or even baby crabs.

"I think everyone would agree that the number one fish that people go after in this area is the striped bass," Mr. Cornell said. "Stripers come in all shapes and sizes virtually an unlimited supply of school sized fish here and in Buzzards Bay."

Stripers can reach hefty sizes. It isn't unusual to hook 25 pounders. The best way to catch them is to learn how they hunt their prey themselves, he said.

Second on the list of predator fish are bluefish, Cornell said. While stripers lie in wait to ambush prey, the more sleek bodied bluefish chase them down. Other game fish in the area are false albacore, bonito, and summer flounder.

Photo: Timothy Leary

"We have world class fishing around here, Mr. Cornell said. "You could spend your whole life fishing here and you wouldnât be wasting your time. You've got flats fishing where you can go sight casting, deep channels for fish with sinking lines, and rocky shorelines where surf breaks when water is rough."

An observant pair of eyes is as important as good rods or reels. A little bit of agitation on the surface might indicate that bait fish are underneath. Little bubbles or wakes might mean a school of fish is feeding underneath. A "blitz" of birds in the air grabbing minnows means bigger fish are chasing them to the surface. All of it means it's time to cast a fly into the water. An experienced angler can cast a fly 80 feet.

Outside of the Westport River, Mr. Cornell's fishing grounds are Buzzards Bay from Sakonnet Point to Dartmouth and across the bay to the west end of the Elizabeth Islands. It's not necessary to have a large boat to catch large fish. Mr. Cornell uses a 20-foot Sea Craft as his primary boat. He carries a push pole for shallow water and a small electric motor for approaching fish quietly. He uses an 18-foot Johnboat with a poling platform for fishing the rivers and estuaries.

No boat? No problem, says Mr. Cornell. Many areas of our rivers are wadeable. The tide scours deep holes around points in the river that often hold small to occasionally big stripers and bluefish. Outside the river, try standing on a rock near big boulders, rough water, and a drop off to deeper water.

Mr. Cornell showed slides of trusty old navigation charts his family used for years and showed digital and aerial photos of local fishing grounds. "My favorite things to look for are boulders, deep water, and flats," he said.

What can't be conveyed on film is the attitude of a dedicated fisherman. Anglers like Cornell enjoy the hunt as well as the catch. Sure, they love outsmarting the fish but they love the smell of the salt air, the ever-changing color or sea and sky, and the sense of getting away from it all. And it takes a true sport fisherman to release a thirty-pound striper he or she has just landed.

"When's a good time to go fishing?" Mr. Cornell mused. "Whenever you have time to go," he said with a grin.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Some of Dave Cornell's favorite spots are:

*Hen & Chickens Reef

*Outlets of Allens Pond, Slocum River, Gosnold Pond

*Pockets of deep water south of Cuttyhunk shoreline

*Quick's Hole north side

*Robinson's Hole

From shore:

*Tip of Gooseberry Island

By Paul Tamburello

Candidate Mauk: Any new police station should be in north end

Gary Mauk usually sits at the far end of the table for the Retired Old Men Eating Out meetings. Last Thursday, March 8, he was in the spotlight at the head of the table as the speaker at the ROMEO's weekly luncheon.

Running for a contested seat for Board of Selectmen, Mr. Mauk spoke for about 40 minutes about four major talking points then answered questions from his peers.

"I came to Westport in 1975. I'm what's known as a 'wash-ashore,'" he said.

Mr. Mauk is married with four grown children, two of whom have children in Westport public schools. He said he spent most of his career working with industrial equipment, installation, startup, heavy construction, project design, project management, departmental management, and manufacturing facilities.

"One of the highlights of my public career was that I was appointed to the Finance Committee. Being a wash-ashore, not a native, it made me proud. I served three terms and was elected chair of that committee six of the nine years I served."

During his watch on the Finance Committee, Mr. Mauk said his leadership helped get the town through the toughest financial times the town had seen up to that point.

Mr. Mauk said his past experience gives him the knowledge of the responsibilities of the committees, boards and commissions in town. "And most importantly, I know what they are not," he said. "Today some people on committees lose sight of what their responsibilities are. What that results in is very little forward progress. It's the responsibility of the selectmen's office to provide good leadership and direction"

Why did he decide to run? Mr. Mauk said, "If the Finance Committee is right in their projections, this town's about to go through some really bad financial times in the next two or three years."

Mr. Mauk said his past experience of working with a board to achieve a majority and his policy of being a financial conservative will help the town ride out the tough times ahead.

Mr. Mauk's major talking points were town finances, public safety planning, housing and Route 6.

"New growth is down, construction is down, foreclosures are increasing at a phenomenal rate all across the state and here in Westport I've been told by the tax collector that some of these new homes in the $400,000 to $600,000 range have changed hands four times in the past two years," Mr. Mauk said.

Mr. Mauk said raising property taxes would "put people who are in a bind in a further bind."

Mr. Mauk questioned efforts to spend $15.000 on a special election to raise taxes when the result is likely to be negative. "Leadership might be to face the reality and say don't cause another $15,000 expenditure on a special election. Let's use some common sense on this. I think I can bring that to the table," Mr. Mauk said.

Mr. Mauk advocated applying common sense to the public safety buildings issue as well. "Let's do a south end fire station. I didn't say take the police out of this but don't use a documented well-known need for a fire department to push something else that the public's not behind, that's not well documented, and not generally accepted yet," he said.

He recommends doing a good analysis to find the needs of the police department. "If it becomes a fact and well accepted that we need a new police station, we take a look at what can we do with the old building to bring it into compliance and put it where it should be. If that's a doable thing and in the taxpayers best interest we probably should do that," he said.

Mr. Mauk said that if bringing the facility into compliance wasn't achievable and a new police station is needed, then it made sense to site it farther north. "I'm told with a good deal of authority that 80 percent of the calls in this town are north of 177. It doesn't make sense to put a new police station further south than the existing one. It would make sense to put it around Route 177 someplace."

In sum, he said, "The public safety complex, the big look there is that 1,300 people voted no and the longer it goes on and the more they try to force feed that, the more it's aggravating people."

On the subject of property rights, Mr. Mauk said, "Growth can be shaped and molded but its got to be done right. You cannot stop people from using their properties. You can work with them and help them but you're not going to get far when you go in and tell them you can't do this and you can't do that. You've got to work with people."

Mr. Mauk said he agrees that there's going to be an increasing need for water and sewer on Route 6. "We're going to have to come up with ideas on what's to be done and how it's going be done and how much it's going cost and how we're going pay for it because the people of Westport are not going to afford to put $30 or $40 or $50 million into infrastructure in the northern part of town. It will go into a bond and it will never carry," Mr. Mauk said.

When asked by Ted Rich to comment on the situation that's developed with the Conservation Commission and the Board of Selectmen, Mr. Mauk said, "I think to some degree the Conservation Commission has got into an area in some cases that they're not supposed to be doing. They're supposed to be looking at existing laws and apply them but every time you turn around they're trying to legislate something and they're not an elected body to legislate, they're an appointed body to apply."

He said that he didn't see the selectmen providing leadership. "They're not looking at facts. They're doing things based on emotions and listening to their friends. I'll listen to everybody but I'm going to do what I think is right for the town," he said.

Mr. Mauk continued by saying, "When it's on TV and four members have got lawyers and the town's lawyers are involved, we're wasting our time and not facing some real issues. This should all be fixed behind the scenes and if there are some people who are there who are inappropriate then they need to get cleaned out or leave of their own volition."

In response to Jack Baughan's question about the job description of the town administrator, Mr. Mauk said, "I don't think the position should be town administrator. I think it should be administrative assistant to the board of selectmen and the selectmen ought to step up and do the job they're running for."

Bill Fanning asked about the administrative assistant. Mr. Mauk said, "If we're going to have tough financial times we can't start leading ourselves out of the problem by bolstering the selectmen's staff. We have to be lean and mean."

"What is your point of view on the escalating school budget, which of course then escalates our health and pension plan?" Mr. Baughan asked.

"There's not a lot the selectmen can do about the budget. There's very little the members of the school committee can do about the school budget, either."

After describing town demographics, which affect any vote regarding schools, Mr. Mauk said the selectmen "might be able to do something about the benefits package, which is the next biggest budget item but that's going to take several selectmen and its going to take some input from the employees and the unions to come together collaboratively to keep from getting mired deeper into the problem."

ROMEO moderator Ed Towne announced that Paul Menzies, candidate for school committee and presently its chair, would be the guest speaker on Thursday, March 15. Sean Leach, candidate for selectman, is scheduled to be speaker at the Thursday, March 22, meeting.

Osprey nest building blitz blankets Westport Rivers

The boom in remodeling and rebuilding homes isn't limited to those occupied by the two-legged denizens of Westport. On Oct. 14, the Massachusetts Audubon Society hatched a plan to rehabilitate 13 of the 88 osprey nests in Westport.

Photo: Jim Dorsey, Paul Doran, and Ray Bosse rebuild a nest as navigator George Yeomans looks on.

If location is the most desirable feature of a home, the ospreys have the best places in town to raise their families. All 88 of the osprey nests are located on the marshes and islands that dot the east and west branches of the Westport River.

Some of the nests' platforms were originally constructed in the 1970s. Westport residents Gil and Josephine Fernandez realized that after years of ingesting pesticides like DDT (banned in 1972), ospreys produced eggshells so thin that even the weight of the incubating bird would crack the eggs. Their solution was to gather healthy osprey eggs from the Chesapeake Bay, place them under local ospreys and even build platforms on which the birds could raise their offspring.

Their labors took flight. From 10 successful nesting pairs in the 1970s, there were about 70 nests that produced eggs this year.

Over the years, the platforms have been repaired on an ad hoc basis but the Audubon Society decided it was time to inventory the whole community of osprey nests.

"One day in September, my husband Vic and I visited all 88 platforms," Audubon osprey monitor Lora Fasolino said. "We took photographs of each one to determine what repairs were needed, how many boats we'd need to do the job in one day, how many people needed in each boat and what materials each boat would need. We determined that 13 nests needed work - either complete replacement or strengthening the bracing or the platforms."

The undertaking was no helter-skelter operation that typifies some volunteer efforts. "My husband Vic and I have taken part in Habitat for Humanity  "Building Blitz" events in which professional home builders join together and build decent, affordable homes in five days. We modeled the osprey nest program on the Blitz," Ms. Fasolino said.

When 17 volunteers in seven boats showed up at the state boat ramp south of the Fontaine Bridge to help at 10 a.m., Ms. Fasolino was waiting with her truck full of work packets for the blitz. Each work team was given a laminated 8 x10 color-coded map of the rivers identifying the locations of every nest, and a 5x7 laminated color photograph of the nest they'd work on. On the reverse side of the photo was a list of materials needed, tools needed, and complete description of work to be done.

Ms. Fasolino handed each crew a work packet containing nails, screws and every piece of wood, necessary to complete the job. Many of the pieces had been precut by Ms. Fasolino and her husband. Volunteers were advised in advance what tools to bring for the job. If a platform needed a new pole, the pole was pre-cut to the right length and marked so the work crew could see how deep to plant the pole.

"Nothing was left to chance," said Westport Fishermen's Association board member George Yeomans, who navigated for the Fasolinos when they took their inventory of the empty nests in September.

Some volunteer rebuilders came from the ranks of Allen's Pond Sanctuary supporters who currently sponsor osprey nests on the river. "I keep in touch with the 52 sponsors, send them emails every two weeks or so giving updates about the platforms. In July, after the fledglings had left the nests, we told them we'd be doing a maintenance weekend in October and asked them if they wanted to help rebuild nests that needed repairs," Ms. Fasolino said.

One workboat crew included Ray Bosse, Paul Doran, and Jim Dorsey. Mr. Bosse lives about a mile and a half from Allen's Pond. "My wife Denise read an appeal in local newspapers to sponsor an osprey nest. We talked with Gina Purtell and began sponsoring a nest last year," Mr. Bosse said. Mr. Bosse has also participated in bird mortality studies with SEANET (Seabird Ecological Assessment Network),

"I've been around the river forever," Paul Doran said as he packed his bag of Bosch battery-operated tools into the workboat. "My neighbor Jim Dorsey called me about this. I've always supported the WRWA. My daughter wrote a paper about Gil Fernandez when she was in school and my wife has invited him to speak to her first graders at the Paul Cuffe School in Providence," he said.

Jim Dorsey and his wife sponsor two nests a short kayak paddle from their home on the East Branch. "My wife Wendy learned about the osprey's migration flights all the way to South America, and attends MA Audubon meetings," Mr. Dorsey said. "Westport is one of the few places in the Northeast where so many of these wonderful birds have a habitat. They are majestic fliers, their sheer presence in Westport makes it a special place to live."

The Massachusetts Waterfowl Corporation solicited donations for the project and contributed money for what wasn't donated. "We've been in business for about seven years," Chairman Bob Rebello said. "We've been raising money for wetland protection and this is the first year of helping directly with osprey protection." The corporation provided a hearty supply of sandwiches and beverages for the volunteers at midday.

By mid afternoon, each workboat had returned to the boat ramp bearing volunteers with soggy boots and big smiles. Every targeted nest had its makeover.

"This was a wonderful hands on effort that galvanized residents up and down the river. The level of preparation was the key to success," Allen'sPond Audubon Sanctuary Director Gina Purtell said.

"It was a fantastic team-building experience. I think everyone not only had fun, but also walked away with a sense of accomplishment and pride from marking their own little stamp on the osprey habitat here," Ms. Fasolino said.

The ospreys returning from their winter sojourn in South America are in for a pleasant surprise when they glide back to their Westport nests next March.

 

Example of building blitz work packet

E39 - Complete Re-build! (photo at right)

Materials needed: new pole, new platform, upper bracing pak, 3 lower braces with 3 cedar stakes, 40 screw pak

Tools needed: hammers, catspaws, screw gun, small sledge hammer, battery operated or hand saw, digging tools

Description of work:

1. Remove old platform, breakup  into organic pieces, remove nails

2. Attach new platform to new pole using upper bracing pak

3. Plant the new pole at least 24" into the soil

4. Add lower bracing in three directions using cedar stakes

5. Add some branches to platform to "put out the welcome sign!"

Westport Harbor forged by history, characters

Richard Hawes' roots run deep at Westport Harbor and he recently shared stories from this lively corner of town with a Westport Historical Society audience.

The phone rang at 4 a.m. one snowy February morning during Prohibition. "Bring Richard down to the beach club but don't say anything to anybody," said a friend of Richard Hawes' father.

"There were about 100 people on the beach, about 20 or 30 skiffs and a rum runner was ashore on the rocks," said Richard Hawes describing the scene. "The boss man was pacing the beach in a Chesterfield coat and a derby hat and all the other fellows looked like pirates, rowing out to the boat on the rocks and bringing in cases of booze.

"Trucks would come down and back up onto the entryway to the beach club and fill them with booze until they got the whole thing unloaded and everybody disappeared. The next morning, the beach club where they'd broken a few boards was all fixed up with beautiful new boards and there was a case of scotch in front of the door."

It got nasty, though, with shootings and mobsters. Mr. Hawes said he was relieved when Prohibition was over.

Mr. Hawes, who was born in 1916, recalled the goings-on in Westport Harbor in an interview conducted and videotaped by Jim Panos and Nancy Burkholder. About 50 people watched the video at a gathering sponsored by the Westport Historical Society on Sept. 21 at the Council on Aging.

In the comfort of his armchair, Mr. Hawes told stories about the Westport Harbor Aqueduct, a place called "The Casino," and the Howland House. He talked about night patrols in World War II to spot German submarines.

Mr. Hawes has a prodigious memory. His recollections of manners, mysteries, and occasional mayhem in his part of town were peppered with a sense of humor as dry as salt marsh hay. His clipped Yankee accent steamrolled the letter "r" turning it into an h (harbor, in Hawesspeak = "haabaa")

His stories tacked back and forth between his and his wife Anne's family roots in Westport Harbor. He recalled the social life of the times, the various incarnations of the Elephant Rock Beach Club - including its pummeling in the Hurricane of 1938 - the formation of the Acoaxet Club, and the provenances of many harbor homes.

At the time Mr. Hawes' father bought property and an 1811 farmhouse from George Brayton in 1926, the Harbor area was rolling farmland.

"My grandfather and some of the Tripp family, which is my mother's family, came to the Harbor area variously between 1885 and 1916 and a good many of their children and grandchildren are still living," he said.

Mr. Hawes said there were no houses then in front of the Howland House and few houses along Atlantic Avenue.

"I've been around a little bit from here to there but most of my life's been spent right here in Westport Harbor," Mr. Hawes said. His absences included four years in college, one in law school in Virginia and a couple of years "off to war in a Navy ship."

In 1930, he returned to live with his mother and father year round. His grandfather's house on Atlantic Avenue is still standing.

Anne Rogers Hawes was raised in a house perched on the shore at the end of Acoaxet Road. It was damaged in the 1938 hurricane but repaired in time to be the site of her sister's wedding in 1939. In Westport Harbor, it takes more than a hurricane to wreck plans for a wedding.

Mr. Hawes called the Elephant Rock Beach Club "a wonderful place for us to play in those summers. There were benches, a big porch with big roof, and outjuts on the seaside of it and individual bathhouses and a shower."

Since then, there has been a lot of damage from hurricanes but each time, the structures have been rebuilt. The hurricane of 1938 provided the first knockout and Hurricane Bob the latest. Mr. Hawes showed dramatic photos of powerful waves shoving the first club, called "the pavilion" onto what is now the parking lot on the other side of Atlantic Avenue.

The video presentation occasionally sounded like the History Channel with an echo chamber. Every time Mr. Hawes paused to recollect a name of place, someone in the audience would invariably pipe up with the information, moments later to be remembered by Hawes as if he'd heard. Occasionally, Anne Hawes got into the action as well.

While describing some of the older houses in the harbor, Mr. Hawes reminisced about summer parties and dances and the great view from the Howland House.

While detailing the succession of owners of homes in his neighborhood, Mr. Hawes said, "Tom Rogers' present house was owned by Charles Chase, his wife was a relative of mine. Everybody's a relative of everybody else around here."

That comment drew a round of laughter from the audience.

"The Acoaxet Club was formed by a group of people from my father's generation who came to Westport in the teens (1900s)," Mr. Hawes said. That's when they purchased a farm that had been foreclosed. Earl Charlton matched the money the men from the Harbor raised. Within a year they'd built a golf course. The original farmhouse is still part of the clubhouse.

Mr. Hawes called Westport plumber Everett Coggeshall, "the oldest living plumber in the United States when he died in 1996." His recollections of Mr. Coggeshall and other inhabitants of Westport Harbor depict a place with no end of colorful characters.

A eye out for UBoats...

Among Mr.Hawes' many anecdotes of life at Westport Harbor was this one from World War II.

"After World War II what was known as Harbor Inn was owned by the Macomber family. Charles Macomber's son-in-law Herbert Ogden and my father used to parade around at night on patrol," watching for German UBoats," Mr. Hawes said.

"One night he was parading around Howland Road and Herbert was parading around the Harbor House.

"Herb said, 'Why don't you parade here and I'll parade up there?'

"Why would I want to do that?" my father asked.

"Otherwise it doesn't seem like we're doing anything!" Herb said.

This clambake is the real deal

With the sun beating down from the cloudless blue sky above and the makings of an authentic New England Clambake steaming underneath the canvas tarps, there was plenty of heat emanating from the Westport Fisherman’s Association 23rd Annual Clambake at the Sportsmen’s Club on John Dyer Road in Little Compton on Sunday September 17th.

The comforts of a well-established tradition were well in place. The 222 ticket-holders for the sold out event began arriving at noon to stake out their places on the three enormously long picnic tables set under the pavilion and getting in line for a serving of hearty New England Clam Chowder. Lively conversations about fishing, the fleet disappearance of summer, the collapse of the Red Sox, choices for the state primary election, and juicy tidbits of gossip were a backdrop for the spectacle of ‘the bake’.

Westport is blessed with opportunities to witness time-honored country traditions. The agricultural fair, complete with farm animals, crop and produce displays, and the hear-it-a-mile-away roar of tractors dragging their loads at the annual “pulls” is a gem in mid summer. Clambakes, often held in early fall or late summer, are another.

The crew gets ready...

There are few traditions in New England to match the building of a “bake”, an authentic production in which history intersects with appetite and community. A crowd gathered to watch the crew rake off the embers of the pyre of wood that had super-heated the round granite stones, then pile dense green rockweed atop the stones. With the rockweed already beginning to steam, the sweaty crew next piled on the trays holding over 200 mesh bags of food. The finishing touch was applied as the crew gracefully draped wet canvas tarps over the whole shebang.

then covers the steaming food with wet canvas tarps...

Some of the “veterans” involved in the yearly bake began learning as young men and are now elders.

Raymond Davol must be considered one of the deans of local Bake Masters. A fireman since 1963, and former chief of the Russell’s Mills Fire District 2, Mr. Davol remembers his mentor. “As a youngster in the 1930s I used to watch John Sheehan set bakes in Dartmouth, “ Davol said. He orchestrated his first bake in the 1960s and has been at it ever since, heading up 4 or 5 a year now.

There are a couple of young men on Davol’s crew who look up to him the same way he did to Sheehan. And the chief senses that it’s time to pass the torch. “I’ll be 76 in October,” he says, “and there are several young ones coming along now who are working their way into being a bake master. Next year might be my last.” In the meantime, the sturdily built Davol was in the hot seat again and produced a perfectly cooked ‘bake’.

While many men scale back when they reach age 65, Arnold Tripp joined the WFA crew of men gathering rockweed around the same time he got his senior citizen card. Now a spry 85, Tripp was one of ten WFA members who gathered 43 heavy bags of rockweed from the shores of the East Branch the day before the bake.

Mr. Tripp, like Mr. Davol, feels the march of time. “Jack Reynolds is the backbone of the whole group now and is an excellent leader. But these younger men who help out right now will carry us into the future”

By the time the canvas tarps had been pulled off the bake fire and the food piled high on the serving tables, the line of hungry people that snaked all the way down to John Dyer Road wasn’t thinking about the future. They were thinking the present - food, to be precise. And what a feast. Softshell clams, frankfurters, pork sausage, chourico, onion, potato, sweet potato, codfish, corn on the cob, dressing, brown bread, and, according to Cindy Reynolds, “lots of TLC”, went on to each plate. Plus a lobster for those bought the special. Whew.

and pulls the steaming trays out of the fire to bring to the serving tables.

Diners came from all over the southeast coast. “Clamboils are more common and I prefer clambakes. It’s a nice way to end summer,” said Ruth Niemczyk of New Bedford, who came with her husband Michael.

“It’s our signature event, an authentic tradition rooted locally,” WFA Project Coordinator Jeanne Girard said. “Our income is generated here and from our road race, membership drive, grants, and endowments.” The association’s programs include scholarships, a shellfish seed propagation program, a fisherman’s relief fund, maritime history project, and the MA Estuaries Project.

“We got lots of support from the community”, Girard said. Local businesses donated much of the food and thirty-five raffle prizes.

The grand prize, a handsome wooden Macomber 15’ Skiff built by Scott Gifford, was won by David Cole of Westport Point.

To some in the crowd, there’s another prize that we already have in our possession. “I like the tradition, the food, and the good cause for the environment and the commercial fishermen,” Paul Meagher said, Meagher immigrated to America from Ireland in 1978 and has lived in Westport since 1998.

“I’ve lived all over the world. Westport is my favorite place and I intend to die here,” he said. Many wouldn’t be quite so candid about it but share the same sentiments.

Paul Winter shines at Westport summer gala

Last Saturday was one of those clear, sunny, impossibly blue-skied August days that sets Westport’s beaches and pastures off as the jewels of Buzzards Bay. When Executive Director Gay Gillespie kicked off the Westport River Watershed Alliance’s 30th anniversary gala by announcing, “Welcome to the most spectacular evening the Watershed has ever seen,” she was hardly exaggerating.

Photo: Paul Winter and wife Chez

The “perfect 10” weather, the gala’s setting adjacent to the Charlton Estate, a benefit concert by five-time Grammy award winning musician Paul Winter, and 611 supporters of Westport’s watershed who arrived ready to bid on 137 items in a silent auction certainly qualify as 'spectacular'.

Mr. Winter and the Watershed Alliance are birds of a feather when it comes to preserving the environment. During the past forty years, Winter has packed his soprano saxophone and sound equipment around the world in a mission to create musical conversations with endangered species such as wolves and humpback whales, and find inspiration within pristine environments like the Grand Canyon, which he believes may be slipping away. “We need to protect what we have left,” he said.

Standing on a small stage in the grand pavilion, he recreated his duets with wild creatures by weaving his solo saxophone melodies between synthesized music and recordings of the sounds of wolves, whales, elk, and songbirds he’s encountered on his journeys in the wilds of North America. Many of the songs were taken from recent albums titled “Prayer for the Wild Things” and “Songs of the Humpback Whale.”

Mr. Winter’s introduction for each song gave insight into his methods and the passion that drives him to attempt to achieve a sense of time and place by painting with sound. The soprano saxophone’s haunting, keening tones evoke Winter’s sense of awe and reverence for the raw beauty within the places he studies.

“I wanted to bring home the experience of the environment with sounds that echo the history and biology of the place, 11,000 feet high, above tree line. I wanted to capture the silence within the panorama around me,” he said during a visit to the Grand Canyon.

Photo: Two minutes before bidding closes

Since its inception in 1976 as the Westport River Defense Fund, the Watershed Alliance has been on a mission to capture and preserve Westport’s panoramas - its rivers, marshes, and beaches. The organization’s broad mission is much the same as its original one: “The beauty of the river, the wildfowl it supports, the abundance of shell fish and finfish it nourishes, is something very precious that must be preserved, promoted, and defended.”

Photo: Nearly "Zero - Waste" event
The summer gala generates a good deal of the money the WRWA relies upon to conduct its stewardship of the river. A unique twist of this year’s event is it was a nearly “zero-waste evening.” The cups, plates, and forks were made from corn-derived plastics (PLA resins) instead of petro-chemical based resins. Within 80 days, the refuse from the gala will be composted, dissolve and end benefiting someone's garden instead of adding to the landfill.

Duck Dash Delivers Dinner

WESTPORT - San Juan Capistrano in California has its annual spring arrival of swallows. The Allen's Pond Wildlife Sanctuary on Horseneck Road has its annual summer arrival of ... rubber duckies. The appearance of the brilliant yellow flock corresponded with the 3rd annual Allen's Pond Duck Derby on Saturday.

This race brought a big payoff to a young Taunton man. One of Patrick Cleary's stable of 13 little quackers swam to victory down the Allens Pond entrance channel course. That duck's swim earned Mr. Cleary dinner for two anywhere in the world. He has not yet announced where that dinner will take place. Another winner was the wildlife sanctuary.

The derby "has become the Audubon sanctuary's major annual fund raiser," sanctuary director Gina Purtell said, "and brings in 20 to 25 percent of our annual budget."

http://www.eastbayri.com/story/286766768369697.php

"The proceeds help the sanctuary contribute matching money to qualify for grants. Our Osprey Project and a 55-acre Grasslands Project are two examples. So is our new Shrubland Project, in which we intend to replace invasive shrubs with shrubs native to the area," Ms. Purtell said.

"The list of ways the Duck Derby helps us is endless. It helps subsidize our school programs, summer camps, and to maintain trails and clean graffiti. It also helps pay for summer interns. I'm the only full time year-round staff member of the Sanctuary."

Sponsors adopted 3,423 ducks in hopes of winning the grand prize — dinner for two anywhere on the planet with transportation and two nights stay included.

"This is a high return event, with terrific sponsor participation, and lots of volunteer labor. Our only costs are printing and certain taxes, "Duck Master Norman Buck said. Mr. Buck, who lives across the street and volunteers, was instrumental in bringing the derby concept to Westport/Dartmouth.

Scores of volunteers signed up to support the sanctuary.

"We had around 65 volunteers, many today and more who did leg work before the derby, clearing the field here, setting up signs, making food we're serving for lunch, and setting up the tents, " derby volunteer coordinator Gabriela Shuster said.

"My husband and I moved here from Quincy, " Janet Desrosiers said as she worked in the food tent. "I wanted to get involved in small town life, my son worked at Audubon and told me about this event. I began to volunteer here. I've even become a bird watcher!"

Families began arriving at noon to buy a picnic lunch, see exhibits, and play educational games. "Just about every kid and more than a few adults have come over here to paint a duck or do some drawing, " summer intern Jeff Wagg said as he managed an Audubon educational table. Mr. Wagg, a coastal water monitor, attends Ana Maria College in Paxton, Mass.
Photo: Two brothers and their mom give duckies a practice run

Other exhibits and games provided information about endangered shorebirds (piping plover, least tern, common tern) and the 1,000 acres of protected ecosystem of salt marshes, ponds, barrier beaches, and grasslands between Barney's Joy and Allen's Pond.

The 2 p.m. race time was slightly delayed as Race Director Peter Thornton adjusted the course that runs from Buzzard's Bay inlet to Allen's Pond on incoming tide.

"Today was especially trying. The breeze, normally southwest, was more northerly, so after doing some test runs, we moved the booms at the finish line about 15 feet to compensate. The key is to remain flexible when it's crunch time and make sure we do the right thing," Mr. Thornton said.

The crowd let out a whoop as Mr. Thornton and his crew finally released what looked like a yellow cloud of duckies from the netting on the launch boat.

As the pack lazily jostled each other and played the current, Mr. Buck sprang into action. Attired in a yellow plumed duck cap, he wove his way along the shore several hundred yards from start to finish between cheering spectators and provided a colorful radio account that was relayed to listeners at the paddock area a mile and a half away on Horseneck Road.

"And here comes Dashing Don Duck on the inside rail!" For the next six minutes, the shoreline excitement sounded like any racetrack in the world, with spectators cheering their bets to the winner's circle.

The event itself was a winner for all: The Allen's Pond Wildlife Sanctuary; for the nearly 200 men, women, and children who got a low cost, gorgeous summer afternoon's entertainment; and for the volunteers who put on a positively ducky event.

And the winner is ...

Grand Prize Winner - Patrick Cleary, Taunton

Photo: "You won!"

Mr. Cleary is a 22-year-old June graduate of U Mass Dartmouth with a major

in Management Information Systems. A friend told Cleary about the Duck

Derby after seeing the flyers at the Allen's Pond Sanctuary booth at the

Agricultural Fair.

Cleary bought a "box of quackers"(13 ducks for $100). Allen's Pond

Sanctuary Director Gina Purtell reached Cleary by cell phone as he was

playing baseball. After realizing that she wasn't playing a prank on him,

he was nearly speechless but very happy. He hasn't yet determined where on

the planet he intends to dine or who might accompany him. He does think

this might add a certain element of interest in his resumé.

Corporate sponsors for the prize: Bayside Restaurant; Sylvan Nursery; Nye,

the Smart Grease Company; Oppenheimer of Fall River; Ralph's Chrysler,

Suzuki, Jeep of New Bedford; Buckley and Moniz - Village Travel,

Dartmouth, MA; Bizarro's Transportation (Limo to airport)

Other winners

2. Balloon Adventures of New Bedford, hot air balloon ride: Eric Aarsheim, Mattapoisett

3. Lees Market, shopping spree: Nancy Janelle, Edgewater, Md.

4. Sylvan Nursery, gift certificate: Jean Donati, Westport

5. Village Bicycle, gift certificate: Nancy Janelle, Edgewater, Md.

6. Joseph Abboud, two silk ties: Mary Ellen Hurley, Little Compton

7. Residence Inn, one night studio suite stay: James R. Weir, Adamsville

8. Dartmouth YMCA , two youth memberships: Peter Kastner, Westport

9. Hawthorne Country Club, 18 hole foursome with two carts: Maureen Williams, Duxbury

10. Allens Pond Collectibles, 8 x 11 framed print: Sachs family, Newton

11. Wind Drift Studio, Sharon Andrade, custom art/mural: Tess Raymond, Dedham

12. South Coast Music Together, family classes: Sally Dibble, Jamaica Plain

13. Henley House B&B. one night deluxe stay: David Hicks, Westport

14. Ash-a-Way Hearth and Chimney, gift certificate: Peter Huidekoper, Dartmouth

15. Comfort Inn, one night stay: Mary Anne Sidney, Westport

16. Country Woolens, gift certificate: Alice Morgan, Brookline

17. Osprey Sea Kayak Adventures, gift certificate: Karen Desjardins: Greenfield Ctr., N.Y.

18. Lloyd Center, moonlight canoe ride for two: Robert and Tanya Powell, Park City, Utah

19. Mass Audubon membership and gift pack: Kate Corkum, Mattapoisett

20. Westport River Watershed, membership and print, Jennifer Holewka, Adamsville

21. The Back Eddy, gift certificate: Fred and Nonnie Hood, S. Dartmouth

22. Black Bass Grille, gift certificate: Susan Charette, Westport

23. New Bedford Whaling Museum, family membership: Mark Lawrence, Westport

24. Artworks! family membership: Vickie Cunningham, S. Dartmouth

25. Nancy Juvinall, one hour personal fitness training: Robert and Tanya Powell, Park City, Utah

26. Tripp's Boatyard & Marina, boat safety kit: Sally Lemelin, S. Dartmouth

27. Bayside Marine, gift certificate: Virginia Pasquantonio, Westport

28. Dartmoor Gifts, gift certificate: C. Stites, Dartmouth

29. Dartmouth Building Supply, gift certificate: Jeremy Holden: Westport

30. DNRT, family membership: Mike Travers, Westport

31. Flora, gift certificate: Louise Moore, Little Compton

32. Not Your Average Joe's, gift Ccrtificate: Bettina and Victor Mailek, S. Dartmouth

33. Peckham's Greenhouse, gift certificate: Charles Walsh, Tiverton

34. Pine Hill Service Station, gift certificate: Eric Aarsheim, Mattapoisett

35. Salt Marsh Pottery, gift certificate:Mark Ferreira, S. Dartmouth

36. The Packet, gift certificate: American Research, Marion

37. Westport Apothecary, gift certificate: Betsy Temkin, Westport

38. Partners Village Store, inflatable kite and gift certificate: Bettina and Victor Mailek, S. Dartmouth

39. A. S. Deams, gft certificate: Lisa Sousa,Dartmouth

40. Baker Books, gift certificate: Michael Pope, Dartmouth

41. Bittersweet Farm Restaurant, gift certificate: Pamela Prescott, Swansea

42. Davolls General Store, gift certificate:Janet Durette, Westport

43. Ellie's Place Restaurant, gift certificate: Dorothy Shattuck, Dartmouth

44. Navigator Shop, gift certificate: Mark Adler, Tiverton

45. Norton Gallery, gift certificate: Janice and Kim Saal, Westport

46. Tippi Toez, gift certificate: Charles Dacey, N. Dartmouth

47. Simmons Store, gift certificate for ice cream: Bob Carroll, Westport

By Paul Tamburello

Holy Ghost feast and procession celebrate tradition

Holy Ghost feast and procession celebrate tradition
By Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.
Westport, MA

The annual Holy Ghost Feast on Saturday and Sunday, July 8 and 9, attracted hundreds of celebrants from all quarters of the region. Dancing and dining were the mainstays of Saturday’s celebration that was held in the Holy Ghost Club at 171 Sodom Road. A procession down a short stretch of Sodom Road after Sunday mass at Our Lady of Grace Church, followed by lunch and a live auction in the pavilion next to the club building, capped the two-day event.

Feast is the operative word here. Food has been a key ingredient of the celebration since its inception in Portugal centuries ago. Traditional Portuguese dishes, cacouila (pronounced cah-sair-la) were served on Saturday night, and sopas and favas on Sunday along with chourico, hot dogs, and hamburgers.

For many in the Portuguese community this is a highly anticipated annual weekend, a time to get caught up on family news and tell stories of the old days or ways. For a group of about twenty-five volunteers though, it’s a labor-intensive weekend of organizing a party for several hundred guests.

The old saying “too many cooks spoil the broth,” does not apply in this kitchen. Friday, men cut roast beef and chourico (pork) into chunks, set up the huge cast iron ovens, organized the big fridges to accommodate the trays laden with what would be served on Saturday and Sunday. Women peeled potatos, prepared the stock for sopas, cut cabbage, kale and onions, prepared beans for the traditional favas soup, and laughed as they shared family stories.

“We’re the best crew here,” Joyce Araujo said as she sat with Albertina Santos, Bernadette Correira, and Jane Medeiros, who cheered heartily in agreement.

“Favas is a Portuguese ethnic dish,” said Barbara Medeiros of Westport, the club’s former secretary for eight years, as she stirred a huge aluminum pot filled with fava beans, onions, ground chourico, crushed red pepper, garlic, oil, and tomato sauce. “If there’s a Portuguese feast, there’s favas.” If the number of gargantuan pots being stirred was any indicator, this was going to be a very big feast.

“What’s next, boss?” Frank Ray asked Holy Ghost president Frank Lopes of Fall River. Lopes is not only the Club’s president for the past 12 years, but in charge of spicing the “carne”, the meat served on Sunday. Sodom Road resident and twenty-five year member Ray, the club’s treasurer, measured spices into each pan of meat, as his wife Wendy, a fourteen-year member, and another volunteer followed adding wine, garlic and other essentials.

“I don’t do this alone, I get lots of help,” Mr. Lopes said as he orchestrated the production with authority and no recipe in sight. “98% of the people helping are members of the club but we would welcome anyone to join us, any nationality, any religion,” Lopes said.

Sunday’s lunch and auction took place in the pavilion, which houses an industrial sized kitchen and prep area, an informal dining area dominated by five long picnic tables, and the tiny chapel dedicated to Queen Elizabeth of Portugal. Sunday’s procession ended at the chapel as a Portuguese band from New Bedford played the Portuguese hymn, Portuguese national anthem and the United States national anthem.

The original Holy Ghost feast was celebrated during the reign of Queen Elizabeth (Isabel) of Portugal, who lived from 1271 to 1336. There are several variants explaining the original feast but wide agreement about the queen’s devotion to her people and to the Holy Spirit. The Azores suffered destructive earthquakes and volcano eruptions in the 1200s and the islanders prayed to the Holy Ghost for relief. A ship arrived in Fayal bearing necessities, which were distributed to the people in various islands. In a procession held later in Portugal, Queen Elizabeth left her crown on the altar as thanks for the intervention of the Holy Ghost that saved her people. She began a tradition of feeding the poor at Pentecost. Since then, Azoreans have commemorated her charity in an annual procession displaying her eight-sided crown.

At 11:30 Sunday morning, a parade of men, women, and children marched a quarter mile from Ridgeline Drive to the Holy Ghost Club. A replica of Queen Elizabeth’s eight-sided crown was placed in the chapel.

By noon the aromas of chourico, favas, and sopas lured about 150 people to fill the five long picnic tables inside the pavilion. Extra large sized bowls of sopas were brought to the tables and the hungry pilgrims dug in heartily. In the charitable spirit of Queen Elizabeth, the sopas was free. Diners could pay for chourico, cacouila sandwiches, hot dogs, hamburgers, or favas or for beverages served at a small concession beside the pavilion.

“I’ve been coming here for since my grandmother brought me when I was 14 years old,” George Lewis of Westport said as he sat with his wife Mary Lou. One can envision one of the youngsters present saying the same thing to one of their grandchildren in years to come.

The live auction, presided over by Mr. Lopes, began after the second seating of diners. Proceeds from the auction help maintain the club’s upkeep. Many bidders on dozens of donated items purchase an item, then in the name of beloved relative who has passed away, give it right back to the auctioneer to sell again. Assisted by his son Mark Lopes of Fall River and Richie Medeiros of Westport, the auction went well into the afternoon.

“This is lots of fun, but it’s lots of work too,” Mr. Medeiros said as he cheerfully delivered auction items to winning bidders.

Events like this are the glue of ethnic communities. Portuguese-Americans from places like Fairhaven, Fall River, Assonet, New Bedford and several Rhode Island towns mixed with Westport residents who take pride in the ethnic diversity of the town.

You don’t have to wait till next year to enjoy hospitality at the Holy Ghost Club. The club hosts a dance every Saturday night and welcomes guests and potential new members.

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Sidebars:
Sopas: kale, cabbage, and onions are cooked in a stock made with soup bones, salt and pepper. The soup is poured over thick slices of day-old Portuguese bread. Boiled peeled potatoes are added into a family sized bowl and a sprig of fresh spearmint is laid on top.

Carne: chunks of roast beef (carne), tender after being marinated for hours in wine, spices, salt/pepper, onion, garlic, are served with the sopas.

Favas: fava beans, onions, ground chourico, crushed red pepper, garlic, oil, tomato sauce

Holy Ghost Club:
177 Sodom Road, Westport, MA
To become a member or to rent the club or grounds, call 508-636-3661.
The club hosts a dance every Saturday night, guests welcome.

Celebrating Westport in Central Village

Celebrating Westport in Central Village: Come Out and Play
Shorelines
Paul A.Tamburello, Jr.

A Big Top is coming to Westport on Saturday, July 8, and the whole town is invited to “Come out and Play” there, rain or shine. There won’t be a three-ring circus underneath the canvas set up behind the Town Hall Annex on Main Road but there will be enough fun, games, singing, and dancing between 5 pm and 9 pm for the whole family to enjoy. Tickets are $5.00. Children 14 and under enter free but must be accompanied by an adult.
(see sidebar)

Like the other eleven events in the Westport Arts Council’s ambitious 2006 “Celebrate Westport in Central Village” series, “Come out and Play” is intended to mix good old-fashioned fun with events that highlight Westport’s culture and diversity.

A Silent Auction between 5:00 and 7:30 pm, replete with everything from “bargains to treasures” will be the most sedentary part of the evening. One part of the silent auction is the traditional sign-up variety. Auction veterans know the excitement peaks a few minutes before bid time runs out. Luck plays a far larger part in the other auction. Participants simply buy tickets, raffle style, and plunk them into the buckets representing the item they’re keen on winning. Carol Vidal and Betty Fitton head the auction committee and had assistance from Selena Howard and Ruth Bournes with soliciting auction items.

Children and the young at heart get out of the starting blocks when the shindig begins at 5 pm with face painting, sack races, arts and crafts (tie-dye, for example), and games of four square, tic-tac-toss, outdoor checkers, and beyond hopscotch. “Chair massages” for kids will be provided by Linda Richter. Children’s activities coordinator Betty Slade, with assistance from Norma Sears and Dick Magovern, has a slew of experienced help from Rhonda Plourde (music), Toby Dills (tie-dye, either bring your own shirt or buy one), Melissa Danforth (face painting), and several other volunteers who will handle prizes and manage the games in progress.

Food, chairs, and blankets for a picnic supper are on a “bring your own” basis but food coordinators Selena Howard and Liz Collins say that food concessions will be open for those whose idea of a night out doesn’t include cooking food.

At 6:30 pm, celebrants can catch their breath while listening to nationally acclaimed performer Bill Harley, who in the past 20 years of singing, writing, and story telling, has managed to figure out exactly what entertains kids from age from Pre Kindergarten to Grade 6. Kids love his down to earth slightly goofy sense of humor. Teachers and parents enjoy the good-natured truisms that are embedded in his work. It’s not often these days that parents and kids can sit together and laugh at the same stories but Mr. Harley has found the common ground and mines it with relish.

After twenty-five recordings of songs and stories and five children’s books to his credit, you can believe that Harley provides lots of chuckles sandwiched between pearls of wisdom in his performance. Plenty of people would agree. He’s been nominated for two Grammies and has earned accolades from Parent’s Choice, The American Library Association, and other national organizations. The Westport River Watershed Alliance arranged Harley’s participation. Tongue planted firmly in cheek, Harley claims the reason for his success - “I never grew up!”

The evening hits its stride at 8 pm with a chance for adults to polish their dance skills to the music of the Magnolia Cajun Band. Although Cajun music has its roots in the southwest bayous between Louisiana and Texas, this band has a local brand of “south coast” flavor. Three of the seven performers, Christine Ash and Richie and Maggie Moniz (who grew up in a French speaking household), live right here in Westport.

Many French Canadians immigrated to the United States in the 1800s and found work in the mills in southeast Massachusetts. Others made their way down south where they maintained their French culture and created a hybrid language known today as Cajun. The Magnolia Cajun Band may be singing in French, but the band's twin fiddles, accordion, guitar, bass, percussion and vocals will provide a universal language. No translations are necessary to waltz and two-step around the dance floor to their music.

Advance tickets are sold at Partners, Country Woolens, and Village Bicycle. To make reservations, call 508-636-2205.

Just as children are called home when darkness falls, the “Come out and Play” evening ends at 9 pm. By that time, if the co-chairs Barbara Bates, Liz Collins, and Selena Howard wish comes true, everyone who attends will be ready for a good night’s sleep.

River Run lures racers, relaxers

Westport River Watershed Alliance 3rd Annual River Run
By Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.

“Which blade do we paddle with when there’s one on each end?”
Sam Ladd of Osprey Sea Kayaks has heard lots of memorable rookie questions in the three years she and her husband Carl have coordinated safety checks and race course management for the Westport River Watershed Alliance’s annual river race. This one should lodge firmly in her list of all time favorites.

The 3rd Annual River Race, a canoe/kayak race for all classes of paddlers, attracted a record 75 boats last Saturday, nearly doubling last year’s attendance. Under blue skies with nary a headwind to thwart their progress, serious racers, weekend water warriors, entire families, in one case including the family pooch, piled into all manner of floating plywood, Kevlar, and fiberglass products to test their mettle. Or not. Casual observers noted more evidence of laid-back fun than adrenaline.

“We have great weather, I hope we have enough numbers for everyone,” event co-chair Larry Hookey said as he watched an incessant stream of trailers and SUVs rolling down to the launch ramp at the Hix Bridge landing, the starting point for the race. It was a thought an organizer loves. “We advertised in national magazines and local outlets since last December,” he said as he smiled at the buzz of activity.

(Photo:Family Fun start)

The 15 entries in the 10 A.M. Challenge Race would head south to Gunning Island and loop back past Hix Bridge to the Head of Westport, The 60 entries in the Family Fun Race would line up, more or less, on the north side of the bridge, and whoosh for the Head at 10:30 A.M.

Before the starts, though, pre-race bonding was in full swing. Paddlers compared accessories, boat designs, and the thinking that got them to the water’s edge.

(Photo:Bush-Fass family prepares for launch)

Gazing at a two-person kayak, Jim Kelly, who lives on the west branch, struck a philosophical note. “We’re too old for the challenge race. You’ve got to know your limits”

“If we knew our limits, we’d go home!” Kelly’s wife Susan said with a chuckle. For the record, they didn’t go home until they finished the race.

A pair of paddlers self-described as “two ninths of the Westport Finance Committee” was getting acquainted with a white fiberglass kayak (rented half price by Osprey Sea Kayaks to contestants on race day).

“That’s a very safe stable boat. It’s the mini van of kayaks, an indestructible two-person boat.” Sam Ladd said, as she surveyed Lisa Arnold and Jane Loos readying themselves.

“We’re in the duffer race, it’s my first time in a kayak in my life. Jane Loos got me into this,” Ms. Arnold said. “We’re not athletes, our idea of winning is making it over the finish line. ”

“If we finish, it will be a miracle,” Loos said, her wry grin signaling otherwise.

(Photo: Loos and Arnold after miracle finish)<

A boat loaded with New Bedford’s Glen Guilbeault, his wife Toni, young daughter Tori, and little dog Toto heard a few jokes about “We’re not in Kansas any more!”

“My husband got us all up this morning and said, ‘Let’s get in this race today, and here we are’,” Ms. Guilbeault said. Toto, as able-bodied dog as was ever created, sat like a royal mascot and reveled quietly in the attention.

If there were a prize for the paddlers hailing from the most distant port, it would have been awarded to Ali Dietzgen of Tempe, AZ and her pal Susan Krauskoph of Phoenix, AZ. “Hey, girls, I signed you up for a canoe race,” was the first thing they heard from their local host Yvonne Zuther. Their response - “Cool!”

“Considering our zig-zaggy route, we probably paddled farther than anyone else,” Ali said.

“Plus there was food at the end!” Susan added. Spoken like true teenagers.

True enough, by the time boaters had paddled the 3.5 mile Family Fun course or the 8.5 Challenge course, there was plenty of food and drink spread out in the shade of the trees at the Head of Westport.

While paddlers told ‘war stories’ about the race, children were kept busy making osprey hats, playing river animal twister and bean bag toss, and getting faces, arms and legs painted.

Co-Chairs Anne Fitzgerald and Larry Hookey praised the on-the-water help from Carl and Sam Ladd of Osprey Sea Kayaks and their eight volunteer spotters who made sure everyone that started made it safely to the finish line. They also tossed kudos to the many volunteers who pitched in to supervise games, pick up trash, and drive contestants back to Hix Bridge Landing.

“Balancing a family fun event with a challenge race makes for a good race,” Ms. Fitzgerald said. “And watching families do this together is a real treat for Larry and me.”

It may be the wrong metaphor, but the Westport River Watershed Alliance’s River Run has taken root in the Westport River.

SIDEBAR
FAMILY FUN RACE
Single kayak: 1st Gerald Desrosiers, 2nd, Deb Grossley
Double kayak: 1st Peter Holmes, Dick Deyount; 2nd, Rob and James Pallock
Canoe: 1st Eric LaFrance, Tyler Carlson; 2nd, Janice and Mark Welden

Challenge Race
Racing boat: 1st Richard Rotnem
Single kayak (male): 1st Whitmore Boogaerts; 2nd Mark Edwards
Single kayak (female): 1st Diane Fletcher; 2nd Schweighardt
Double kayak: 1st John Poulton, Janet Sheridan; 2nd Peg Resnick, Robert Downing
Canoe: 1st Pete Olson, Ed Halpin, 2nd Tom Borges, Jacob Mello

Other awards:
Family Fun Awards: The Toth Family (all 5 of them), The Doerr Family, The Bartles Family
Young Paddlers Awards: Adam Doerr, Kristen Harper, Cody Flynn

ENTRIES BY CATEGORY
Challenge race
11 single kayaks
2 double kayaks
2 canoes

Family Run Race
39 single kayaks
10 double kayaks
11 canoes

TOTAL 75 boats

Weather to cooking — Macomber's youngest try new things

Weather to cooking — Macomber's youngest try new things
May 4, 2006

The corridors of the school building were quiet but behind each door there was a buzz of activity.

Youngsters were sitting in a circle listening to a story read by Susan Welsh in their pre-kindergarten class, drawing pictures to accompany their book about weather in Melissa Parker's kindergarten class, playing a math game to practice math concepts with kindergarten teacher Inge DeFusco, or practicing singing and sign language skills from pre-Kindergarten assistants Mrs. Cardozo and Lucy Cordeiro.

Photo: Melissa Parker explains different types of weather so her kindergarteners can complete their weather book.

The kindergarteners in Jane Lavenda's class were enthusiastically decorating ginger bread cookies. They'd recently read and compared three variations of the same tale, The Gingerbread Man, The Gingerbread Boy, and The Gingerbread Baby, with Integrated Arts teacher Jane Dufault. The project was an endeavor that Ms. Dufault and Ms. Lavenda cooked up to help their students remember the three stories.

These were some of the activities visitors would have witnessed on April 6 as the Macomber School joined the April 2 - 8 national celebration of the Week of the Young Child.

The Week of the Young Child is an annual event sponsored by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). The purpose of the celebration is to recognize the needs of young children and thank teachers and other adults who work to build better futures for all children. The NAEYC established the Week of the Young Child in 1971 to promote its core belief "recognizing that the early childhood years (birth to age 8) lay the foundation for children's success in school and later life."

"The focus of the week is to show how we are providing a good educational program for our children," Macomber principal Paula Sullivan said.

"Our affiliation with the NAEYC lets families know that we focus on the quality of education and developmental services for all children. Accreditation also helps support grant initiatives that allow us to acquire competitive grant money from the Department of Education that help us support our programs." Mrs. Sullivan has overseen the event in each of the 12 years she's been principal at the school.

Lees Market, which donated the gingerbread cookies, is a long-time "business partner" of the school. After lunch period, two women from Lees were happily encouraging two long tables of creative five year olds.

Teachers aren't the only ones in line for special recognition this week.

"This is a family friendly school. Not a day goes by in which parents aren't involved in some capacity here," Mrs. Sullivan said. The parent-teacher collaboration involving the 225 Pre K and Kindergarteners at the Macomber School seems to confirm the saying, "It takes a village to raise a child."

http://www.eastbayri.com/story/286016712316005.php

Earth Day photo

David Ure puts his back into celebrating Earth Day by repairing the stone wall in front of his Drift Road home. "I'm doing this without the heavy equipment that pollutes the air," he said. "I'm just using blood, sweat and tears." Moral support is offered by Ure's neice Alexandra Orlich, his daughter Kayla, and neighbor Sophia Lejacq Smith.

Photo on Opinion Page April 27, 2006

A birder's eye view

A birder's eye view;
how man has shaped the bird's environment over time
April 20, 2006
By Paul Tamburello

Wayne Petersen's view of "Changes in Massachusetts Bird Populations" begins when the Pilgrims began to nest in New England about 400 years ago. Since then, deforestation, fashion trends and pesticides have caused changes in the bird population of Massachusetts and the Northeast.

Speaking at the WRWA's annual meeting on March 26, Mr. Petersen said that at the first colonists' arrival 400 years ago, this area was mostly unbroken forested land. Over time, settlers set about chopping down everything in sight in order to open it up for subsistence farming and agriculture.

Photo: Petersen answers a question from Lucy Goodridge

While some birds like pileated woodpeckers and turkeys nearly disappeared, other birds that thrive in open landscapes like bobolinks and upland sandpipers began to colonize as they migrated from the Midwest.

Mr. Petersen said another forestation phase occurred as the country became urbanized and clear-cut forests began to fill in. Birds that thrive in shrub lands (Eastern towhee, brown thrasher, field sparrows) began to colonize in the shrubland that developed.

"From mid-1800s and forward there was continuous change of forests due a combination of logging and new forest growth," Mr. Petersen said. Another factor was what he described as the "Smoky the Bear" syndrome, the policy of suppressing forest fires.

In the late 1800s, a phenomenon known as "market gunning" had a severe impact on a narrow segment of the bird population. Market gunning was the "indiscriminate persecution of shorebirds like sandpipers and plovers and waterfowl like long-legged wading birds, egrets, terns and roseate spoonbills that had spectacular plumes. These birds were systematically slaughtered for the plume trade in women's fashion and millinery industries."

In the tremendous decline in bird population that ensued, an outcry was spearheaded by two Boston Brahmin women who "got the ear of William Brewster, the most important ornithologist of the day, who was to become the first president of the Massachusetts Audubon Society in 1896," Mr. Petersen said.

Legislation was passed over the next 20 years and the practice of market gunning was shot down.

The introduction of DDT in WWII and its widespread use thereafter was another event that affected bird population over time. Mr. Petersen said that by the time Rachel Carson's book "Silent Spring" sounded the alarm on pesticides, "signature species like bald eagles and ospreys, as well as red shouldered hawks, peregrine falcons, and brown pelicans, were all impacted by pesticide overloading."

By 1972, DDT was taken off the shelves. One of the consequences of DDT use was that "high in the food chain predators like fish eating ospreys, peregrine falcons, and bald eagles couldn't metabolize calcium. That resulted in eggshell thinning so that even weigh of incubating bird would crack the eggs." Mr. Petersen described two intervention programs that helped falcon and eagle populations breed successfully in the Northeast.

Mr. Petersen also praised the intervention programs begun in the 1970s by Gil and Josephine Fernandez to rescue the faltering osprey population (only ten successful nesting pairs) in Westport. The Fernandez plan "brought healthy eggs from the Chesapeake and placed them under beleaguered birds here and then provided nesting platforms. The population increased and we now have a "robust and flourishing colony."

About Wayne Petersen

Wayne Petersen is a founder of "Bird Observer" magazine. His 1993 "Birds of Massachusetts," co-authored with Richard Veit, is considered the bible of Massachusetts birders today. He was the 2005 recipient of the American Birding Association's prestigious Ludlow Griscomb Award. Part of the citation is for individuals who have dramatically advanced the base of ornithological knowledge for a particular region.

Like the birds he loves, Mr. Petersen's career has had an interesting migration pattern. He spent the first 18 years of his career as a middle school life science teacher. He followed that with a 15-year tour with the Massachusetts Audubon Society and a shorter one with the Swarovski Birding Community. He is currently director of the Important Bird Areas Program for the Massachusetts Audubon Society.

WRWA awards

The following people were recognized at the WRWA's annual meeting on March 26.

Volunteer Awards

* Russ Craig ("for the best summer event ever in the history of the WRWA")

* June Roche ("for the best auction event ever in the history of the WRWA")

Education awards

* Emma Sears

* Gregg Swanzey

Outgoing board members

* Carolyn Duby

* Edward Dufresne

New board members (three-year terms)

* Sheila Hughes

* Peter Kastner

* Samantha Ladd

* Jonathan Stevens

By Paul Tamburello

[email protected]

Westport whalers practiced the art of scrimshaw

East Bay, RI
East Bay Newspapers
Thursday, January 12, 2006

Westport whalers practiced the art of scrimshaw

The origin of the term scrimshaw remains a mystery but nearly everyone around New England seaports knows what scrimshaw looks like. By the time Dr. Stuart Frank, senior curator of the New Bedford Whaling Museum, completed his talk to members of the Westport Historical Society on Sunday, Nov. 6, they knew the names of 16 Westport whalemen who practiced this art form.

Dr. Frank has written extensively about whaling and is a leading authority on maritime history. His power point presentation, with lots of scrimshaw photos and captions, sped along like a fully canvassed Westport whaler captained by an experienced skipper with a good sense of humor.

Scrimshaw refers to the carving or engraving of sperm whale ivory, baleen, or skeletal whalebone. These materials had less commercial value than spermaceti or whale oil and were given to the seamen to do with as they pleased. The most recognized form of scrimshaw is probably the sperm whale tooth that could be polished to a high gloss then engraved with a whale hunting scene or a whaling ship.

Baleen (sometimes called whale bone) was derived from the boney plate in the mouths of certain kinds of whales (not including sperm whales) and was used to make corset stays, hoops for women's skirts, frames for hats, fans, umbrella ribs, swifts, fishing rods, and more.

"Scrimshaw was a characteristic occupational interest of most of the men who went whaling, men who tried it at one time or another, of course with varying degrees of talent," Dr. Frank said.

The rise and fall of the era of scrimshaw parallels the rise and decline of the American whaling industry and spans from the early to late 1800. "There are about 25 great scrimshaw artists we know by name or by reputation, and none of them, at least so far, are known to be from Westport," Dr. Frank said.

Entry into these hallowed ranks requires that a man have several excellent examples of scrimshaw attributed to him. Although Westport men authored some fine examples, as of now they have only one or two outstanding objects apiece attributed to them.

Whaling voyages were generally measured in years. No matter how many whales the ship could harvest, and how many times the deck could be swabbed, the sails mended, the rigging set or furled, there were thousands of hours where nothing else happened. Scrimshaw was a good remedy for boredom. Michael Cumiskey, of Westport by way of Charlestown, went a-whaling from 1835 to 1859.

Aboard the bark Abigail in the 1830s, he wrote in his journal, "I am unsettled for the want of work, saw nothing, and work all done. An idle head is the workshop for the devil, employed scrimsham."

Researching the identity of scrimshaw artists is as challenging a task as harpooning a whale. "Only about one percent of scrimshaw is signed and maybe up to five percent can be reasonably attributed to a named person," Dr. Frank said.

"We don't always know the names of the master scrimshaw artists, but we identify them by stylistic characteristics, the same way one would identify an unsigned Rembrandt," he said. And since the work was often undated, "We can identify the period the piece was illustrated by observing the clothing the people were wearing."

According to Dr. Frank, the first American whose great scrimshaw is positively identified is that of Edward Burdett of Nantucket. Ironically, both the beauty of the art and the danger of the occupation are evident in Burdett's story. At the age of 27, he was dragged to his death when he was caught up in a harpoon line. From 1825 until 1833 he made nearly 40 beautifully engraved sperm whale teeth, some of which are in the New Bedford Whaling Museum collection.

Several outstanding pieces made by Westport men stood out in the show. One was a double -cage swift (yarn winder) with beautifully crafted slats, fastened with handmade brass rivets and probably made by Peleg Sanford between 1828 and 1850. An extraordinarily elaborate device, it could have taken three years to make. Other examples were two inlaid cribbage-board boxes, one decorated with horseshoes and the suits of cards, the other with geometrical figures most likely made at the tail end of the whaling era by Andrew Corey sometime between 1888 and 1916.

Alexander Augustus Tripp, born and bred in Westport, made his first voyage on the frigate Elizabeth as cabin boy in 1840. He was reported as fashioning water dippers with whalebone handles attached to coconut shell ladles but theyâve never come to light.

Seamen's journals in the whaling museum are full of accounts of on-board scrimshaw activity. Dr. Frank, ever the optimist, thinks it's possible that scrimshaw items like Tripp's water dipper are gathering dust in attics or closets in homes on the southeast coast.

"Keep your eyes open for these dippers because we'd like to see them," he said.

Dr. Frank has been cataloguing the New Bedford Whaling Museums scrimshaw collection in preparation for a major permanent scrimshaw exhibit. Examples of scrimshaw from the museum's collection may be viewed at www.whalingmuseum.org.

Westporters who made scrimshaw...

Dr. Stuart Frank's research revealed the following facts about Westport men who are believed to have made scrimshaw.

* Asa Russell Gifford - whaling captain of ships Roscius, Roscoe; whaled between 1829-1856

Scrimshaw - Letter seal with the name of his father-in-law James H. Beetle; sperm whale tooth with pinprick-transfer views of a full-rigged ship under-way and a trotting horse; a large bodkin; a whale ivory needle; and a whale ivory tatting shuttle

*Horace Young - captain of Westport bark President, whaled between 1832-1856

Scrimshaw -- the famous "Hands Box"

*Michael Cumiskey -whaling captain of ships Roman, Lapwing; whaled between 1835-1859

Scrimshaw -Journal entries of his own and his shipmates reveal that he made scrimshaw, but none has come to light.

*Joseph C. Little - whaling captain of ship Marengo, whaled between 1836-1871

Scrimshaw - Pie crimper with a wooden handle and whale ivory jagging wheel; whale ivory butter mold, inscribed backwards "ELIZA D. LITTLE" (his wife)

* Peleg Sanford - whaling captain of ships Herald, Mercator; whaled between 1828-1850

Scrimshaw - attributed to Peleg and kinsman Wm. P. Sanford: canes, fids, sperm whale teeth, double-cage swift (yarn winder) with beautifully crafted slats fastened with handmade brass rivets

* Alexander Augustus Tripp - Westport whaling master, whaled between 1840-1884

Scrimshaw - As master of New Bedford bark Globe during 1869-1872, reported as having made coconut-shell dippers but none have been found.

* Benjamin D. Gifford - Westport whaling master of ships Mattapoissett, Dr. Franklin; whaled between 1839-1879

Scrimshaw - coconut-shell dipper bearing the names of his father and mother, Captain Humphrey A. Gifford and Phebe Davis Gifford

* Charles Williams Chace - Westport whaleman, whaled between 1853-1870

Scrimshaw - Coconut-shell dipper inscribed "Present to Ruth M. Chace" (his wife)

*George L. Manchester - Westport whaling master of ships Mattapoissett, George and Mary, Kate Cory; whaled between 1842-1859

Scrimshaw - As captain of the George & Mary during 1852-54, cut out a cardboard template for a pie crimper (jagging wheel), found in his journal.

*Albert Augustus Gifford - Westport whaleman, whaled between 1842-1857

Scrimshaw - Pair of monochrome-engraved teeth with standing female portraits and spreadeagles and patriotic vignettes; canes, pie crimpers, letter seals, folding knife, double cage swift

*David Green Mosher - Westport whaleman, whaled between 1845-1863

SCRIMSHAW - at least three pictorial sperm whale teeth with unique Bible-era scenes of Pharaohic Egyptian figures

*Andrew A. Corey [Cory] - merchant sea captain of ships Hastings, Frederick Roesser, Richard W. Clark

Scrimshaw -at least two inlaid cribbage-board boxes, one decorated with horseshoes and the suits of cards, the other with geometrical figures and a name (spelled Corey)

*Charles F. Smith - whaleman, whaled between 1846-1861

Scrimshaw - whale ivory and bone double-cage swift with an octagonal wooden base that has a spool rack and drawers for storage

*Frederick H. Tripp ö whaling master, whaled between 1859-1888

Scrimshaw - probably made scrimshaw throughout his 30-year whaling career, and certainly as captain of the New Bedford bark Palmetto during 1880-1884. None have been found.

*Frederick H. Lawrence - whaleman

Scrimshaw - Mentions scrimshaw in his journal on his one and only voyage, as a green hand in the New Bedford ship Gazelle in 1865

*Charles E. Reed - whaleman, whaled between 1866-88

Scrimshaw - sewing box with compass rose inlaid with whale ivory, mother of pearl, tortoise shell; pair of whale ivory bracelets; serpent walking stick.

By Paul Tamburello

[email protected]

Read story at
http://www.eastbayri.com/print/346160875463370.php

Copyright © 2003, The East Bay Newspapers

Sorting through Westport's ancient treasures

East Bay, RI

East Bay Newspapers

Tuesday, November 1, 2005

Sorting through Westport's ancient treasures
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Jennifer O'Neill, recently appointed executive director of the Westport Historical Society, has history in her genes. Jenny, as she prefers to be called, grew up in a family of historians. Her father was a history professor and her mother was involved in history research. Ms. O'Neill spent the first 10 years of her life in Canberra, the capital of Australia, then moved to the United Kingdom with her family.

She pursued her interest in history, receiving a bachelor's degree in ancient and modern history from Oxford University and a master's degree in museum studies from the University of Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. Realizing that there were more opportunities outside the UK, Ms. O'Neill embarked to the United States seven years ago. She worked at internships at the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. and at the Kendall Whaling Museum in Sharon, Mass. (now part of the New Bedford Whaling Museum). During her stay at the Kendall Museum in Sharon, she met and married Michael Dyer, the librarian at the Kendall. They've lived in Fairhaven for the past three years.

FAMILY HISTORY: "I grew up in a family of historians. My father was a history professor and my mother was involved in historical research so I grew up in an environment in which history was always of interest."

COMING TO U.S.: "My master's degree in museum studies gave me theoretical background for working in museums but I was looking for hands-on experience and American museums offer more opportunities for internships than those in the UK."

MIT EXPERIENCE: "For the past six years I was curatorial assistant at the MIT Museum in Cambridge, Mass. I worked with a maritime collection and with a very large archive of photos and documents concerned with MIT and its development."

CONSULTING: "For the past two years, I also worked as a consultant to the Sippican Historical Society in Marion. When I arrived, the collection was in disarray; no one knew what was in it. I found it rewarding to see the difference I made by cataloging their collection."

WHY WESTPORT HISTORICAL SOCIETY: "First of all, I wanted to work in a local community. From a professional viewpoint, it's exciting to come to a place where the collection is unknown and undiscovered. What are the gems that we're going to find? What are the stories behind the objects? The challenge is to gain physical control over the collection, to catalog it so we know what we have. I was pleased to see that was what the board was looking for and that they needed someone with a professional background in museums to show them the way."

CHALLENGES: "I'd love to broaden the membership. We can offer more diverse programs, slightly different exhibits, find different ways to do outreach, perhaps set little satellite exhibits here and there. I want to understand the community better so I can see how to make this society a presence in town and I want to use the collection to help interpret Westport's history."

NEW ENVIRONMENT: "It's wonderful to be able to work in this beautiful region which is unique in that it still has rural areas, countryside which has disappeared in many other areas, It's a big change for me from working in a concrete, urban MIT setting, to come to the tranquility of Westport."

OTHER INTERESTS: "I love to travel and go home to Australia once a year to visit my family in Canberra. I'd love to go back and visit the UK. I'm a novice at gardening and have a little kitchen garden."

FAVORITE WESTPORT SPOTS: "Mike and I are nature lovers. Since I'm the wife of a fisherman, we spend lots of time around the water. Two of our regular beats are Horseneck Beach and Allens Pond. That combines beautiful surroundings, relaxation, exercise and fish!"

By Paul Tamburello
 
http://www.eastbayri.com/story/310273890718264.php
Copyright © 2003, The East Bay Newspapers

Claude Ledoux is this year's town historian

Thursday, October 20, 2005
Claude Ledoux is this year's town historian

It's hard to imagine anyone more vigilant in preserving the town's history than Claude Ledoux. And Mr. Ledoux has used every imaginable media to document local history, including video, literature and the computer.

The Westport Historical Society acknowledged those efforts at its annual meeting on Oct. 13 when it presented Mr. Ledoux with the 2005 History Award. The citation reads, "For his skill in saving the Westport past for the present and the Westport present for the future."

Beginning in 1993, Mr. Ledoux embarked on three initiatives to preserve local history. The cable access program "Westport Matters" documented the people and life in Westport around the turn of the millennium. It contained about 300 episodes and spanned 11 years.

"I estimate I spent about 1,500 hours and a few thousand dollars on this activity," Mr. Ledoux said.

Mr. Ledoux co-authored the booklet "A History of Westport in the 20th Century" with his good friend Carmen Maiocco, a project that lasted from 1993 to 1995.

"My part was to trace the evolution of the last century's events, which determined the status of Westport at the turn of the century and at the millennium. That project occupied a few hundred hours of my time," Mr. Ledoux said.

The third idea that preoccupied him was the ambitious project of inputting the official town records from 1787 to the present into computer format. With the help of a few others, Mr. Ledoux completed the conversion of records up to 1927, when they began to be typewritten, not handwritten. In the new computer format, the records are searchable and easy to reproduce.

"The conversion from 1927 to the present involved a monumental amount of work," Mr. Ledoux said. "Town Clerk Marlene Samson and (her assistant) Beverly Kut wore their fingers out finishing in that time frame," Mr. Ledoux said. "My best guess is that I spent about 1,000 hours on that project over the period of a few years."

Mr. Ledoux thanked his wife, Clarisse, for her forbearance while he was engrossed in these projects and thanked the society for the recognition of his work.

The Westport Historical Society's annual meeting also provided an occasion to introduce the newly appointed, part-time director, Jennifer O'Neill.

Ms. O'Neill has a background in museums and she spoke about the historical society from that perspective. She said that since 1990, the American Association of Museums has articulated a code of ethics that provides an ethical framework for three aspects of museum activity - collections, programs and governance.

Ms. O'Neill said Westport Historical Society has intuitively embraced the essence of this code. She said it now needs to articulate its mission to the public and set a standard for other institutions.

Ms. O'Neill summarized three major issues facing the society in the coming year - the Bell School house itself, the society's collection and growth of the organization.

As pluses, she counted the location of Bell Schoolhouse at the Head of Westport and its watertight nature as distinguishing characteristics and said the building itself was part of the historical society's collection.

While the interior space is adequate for displaying the present collection, on the down side, "The temperature and relative humidity levels inside the building pose a real threat to the collection it houses," Ms. O'Neill said.

Ms. O'Neill said there are reasonable, low cost, low tech ways to improve the situation. She said the first thing on her wish list is to monitor the interior environment and use the data to decide how best to resolve the problems.

"The greatest uptapped resource you have is the collection," Ms. O'Neill said. "We need to find out what we have, track its location and condition and record the significance of the objects and their meaning to Westport."

Ms. O'Neill said she wants to scan photographs in the society's collection and digitally photograph each object in the collection. These efforts will pave the way for developing high quality exhibits and educational programs, she said.

"We can set the standard for preservation and documentation. We can open the collection to researchers and offer access to Westport history to others in the community," she said.

Ms. O'Neill deferred discussing the society's growth until later in her tenure. She said the initiatives with the Bell School House and collection will help define how the society might evolve.

by Paul Tamburello

[email protected]
Read story at
http://www.eastbayri.com/story/336030836548495.php