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Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
Postcards from Falmouth Oral History Transcript
Recorded: March 3, 2020
Oral Historian: William Swift
Interviewer: Barbara Kanellopoulos
Topic: Dwight Estate
Note: The right column references postcards by identifiers searchable in the Digital
Commonwealth online collection.
00:00
[Music]
00:45
I am Barbara Kanellopoulos
00:47
and Bill Swift is going to talk about
00:51
the Dwight Estate on Mill Road and the
#dwightestate #millroad
Gunning_Village_Sts_0001 through
0016
Hunt_Village_Sts_075 through 178
00:54
history of that
00:56
building thank you Bill you're welcome
01:00
uh I’ll try to bring you up to date a
01:04
little bit on the uh
01:07
the house uh back in
01:10
1882 or 3
01:14
John E. Dwight who was the CEO
#johndwight
01:18
of Arm and Hammer soda
#armandhammer
01:22
baking company and he decided
01:26
to build a summer cottage for his family
01:30
and in
01:34
1884 or so he brought his family from
01:38
Princeton New Jersey down to Falmouth
01:42
and back in those days when houses were
01:46
built along the waterfront
1
#1884
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
01:48
they actually owned the land right
01:51
to the waterfront so he ended up
01:54
owning the beach front and right to the
01:57
water
01:58
in front of his his house and
02:02
he built a beach house on the beach at
02:04
the end of his property
02:06
which is still standing today it's the
02:08
first house you see it's up on stilts
02:11
but it's still there and
02:15
he also built a big carriage house
02:18
down at the other end the north end of
02:20
his property which is still standing
02:23
today
02:25
and he was quite a land owner he owned
02:28
quite a lot of land in Falmouth
02:31
he owned the property down on Locust
02:34
Street right
02:36
as you hit Mill Road on the left there
02:39
was a farm in there and that was his
02:41
farm
02:42
he lived in a farmhouse in the fall and
02:45
spring
02:46
of the year when he probably didn't have
02:48
heat in the mansion he used to live in
02:50
the farmhouse
02:52
and on that property they had
02:55
two other houses and a few outbuildings
02:59
and a big barn which is still there
03:02
today and
2
#locuststreet
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
03:04
they are now remodeling the house but
03:08
he owned that property and
03:11
down Locust Street across from a
03:14
7-Eleven store where the
03:16
Cape Cod Apartments are now he owned
#capecodapartments
the
03:20
land from there
03:21
all the way back to Siders Pond which
03:24
was quite a big
03:26
big piece of land and when we were boys
03:29
we used to play baseball out on the
03:31
field there there
03:32
was a mowed field
03:35
right next to Barbara Jones's house
03:37
which I think
03:39
was included on his property at that
03:41
time
03:42
but he uh also owned
03:47
two houses in Belvidere Plains and
03:51
a piece of property next to the
03:54
Catholic church on Main Street with
#siderspond
#belvidereplain
#mainstreet #saintpatrickschurch
Gunning_Village_Sts_0017 through
0041
03:58
where the nursing home is today he owned
04:00
that property
04:02
and in 1921
04:06
he built a hotel in there called the
04:09
Terrace Gables
04:11
uh excuse me Column Terrace and
#1921
#columnterrace
3
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
04:14
he ran the hotel for
04:17
six or seven years and then he sold it
04:19
to someone else who
04:21
bought it and then eventually they put a
04:24
nursing home in there
04:25
but that was his property
04:28
and he also was a
04:31
shareholder and one of five board
04:34
members
04:35
on the mushroom plant that was on
04:38
Gifford
04:39
Gifford Street across from the
Hunt_Village_Bldg_030
#giffordstreet #coonamessettinn
Coonamessett
04:42
Inn where
04:43
Homeport is now and
04:46
he was running he ran that for a while
04:50
or he was on the board for a while and
04:53
eventually it
04:54
went out of business but he was also
04:58
involved in the
05:01
racetrack the Trotting Park racetrack
05:05
he was an original member of the
05:07
Falmouth
05:08
gentleman's racing club
05:12
and I have happened to find in
05:16
in my home where I lived a stock
05:19
certificate of his
05:21
back in the day when he belonged to the
05:24
racing club
05:26
and Sundays they would have a trotting
#homeport
#trottingpark
4
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
05:28
race
05:29
and that was a big entertainment in
05:31
those days
05:34
and a lot of people attended
05:37
and he also was an early member of the
05:39
Woods Hole Golf Club
#woodsholegolfclub
05:41
back in 1899 when they first
#1899
05:46
built the club it only had nine holes
05:49
then but
05:50
a few wealthy men in town wanted to play
05:53
golf and they had no place to play so
05:55
they
05:56
they started the club
06:00
and when he brought his wife
06:03
and family down
06:06
his wife liked peace quiet and solitude
06:11
so he decided to build her
06:14
an island on Salt Pond
#saltpond
Gunning_Village_Sts_0010 through
0016
06:18
so she had her own little island which
06:21
is still there today
06:23
and she could go out there and bring a
06:25
chair or bench or whatever and
06:27
sit read and meditate and
06:30
have her own private time and
06:34
they had two daughters one was
06:37
Ruth and one was Janet Ruth married
06:41
Albert McVitty and Janet
06:44
married Frank Nicholson and
5
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
06:49
they lived they lived there they
06:52
actually
06:52
the Ruth and and Albert McVitty
06:55
eventually
06:56
bought the property why I guess
07:00
Mr. Dwight might have died and the estate
07:03
was
07:04
uh trying to be settled when they
07:08
they bought the house and used it for
07:10
their family in the summer
07:13
and uh
07:18
I can't remember exactly when
07:22
I think that was in 1921
07:25
they they uh they bought the house from
07:29
the estate
07:31
and well
07:36
because I think I’m going to
07:39
you may want to cut it a second um
07:44
Bill and maybe it strikes me that um
07:47
Bill that um Mr. Dwight was quite
07:50
influential
07:52
in the town uh doings in at Town Hall
07:56
would
07:56
would you think that he had quite a lot
07:59
to say about how
08:00
the town was run yes
08:03
he did I think he was on some
08:07
quite a few boards and
08:10
at one time uh there was a group of men
08:14
who who decided that Salt Pond would be
6
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
08:18
a great place for Falmouth Harbor
#falmouthharbor
Hunt_Village_Har_103 through 120
Gunning_Heights_Har_1320 through
1334
08:21
because the Old Stone Dock
#oldstonedock
Gunning_Village_Har_0173 through
0188
Hunt_Village_Bch_0089 through 0095
08:23
was not large enough anymore to handle
08:27
the boating traffic and he and some
08:30
other
08:32
influential gentlemen went to the
08:35
legislature and tried to get
08:37
the permit to build a harbor
08:41
well that was fine except that would
08:43
mean
08:44
the road would have to be detoured
08:47
because you couldn't you couldn't have a
08:50
bridge it would be too
08:52
inconvenient so the road plan was to go
08:56
up to Elm Road
08:57
through the moors and down Elm Road uh
09:01
to the beach and that didn't sit too
09:04
well with some of the
09:06
landowners up in the moors and that was
09:10
quickly squelched so that deal fell
09:12
through
09:14
and they did talk about Siders Pond
09:17
being a harbor because it was right to
#elmroad
7
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
09:20
the middle of the town where the
09:22
town hall is today but
09:26
that was too much it was too far to
09:28
dredge a channel so
09:30
they ended up at uh Falmouth Harbor
09:33
where it is today
09:39
I suspect that the joint the Dwight’s had
09:42
some
09:42
rather influential neighbors too they
09:45
did the house across the street
09:48
belonged to Richard Olney
#richardolney
09:52
who was secretary of state to Grover
#grovercleveland
09:55
Cleveland President Grover Cleveland
09:58
and I think he used to invite them down
10:01
and take them out on fishing
10:02
trips the President and
10:06
they had a lovely estate across the
10:08
street and the Minot family
10:10
finally ended up owning that property
10:15
but down the street there was quite a
10:18
few
10:19
uh wealthy people wealthy estates
10:23
and there was a Spalding house
#spalding
10:27
and Harding and
#harding
10:30
there was the E. E. Swift house
#swift
10:34
and uh Emery Leland owned
#leland
10:38
a big house big estate there and these
10:41
were big estates which
10:43
where Salt Pond Road goes in it's the
10:46
loop in there
#minot
#saltpondroad
8
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
10:47
that was one estate and they
10:52
after the war uh housing was
10:55
critical and so these estates were
10:58
bought and and developed
11:01
now the farm that you spoke of was that
11:04
a working farm
11:07
I think he it was a working farm for his
11:09
own use
11:10
I think I don't think that was a
11:12
commercial
11:14
but it was probably a hobby farm but he
11:17
did have a huge
11:19
barn there that took quite a lot of uh
11:22
carriages or horses or whatever he
11:24
wanted in there
11:26
and he also
11:29
as I mentioned he owned the carriage
11:33
house down on
11:34
on Mill Road and he had a caretaker
11:39
that used to come down and take care of
11:41
his property that lived
11:43
in the carriage house and his name was
11:46
George Gammons and he was a Swedish
11:49
gentleman
11:51
and very friendly and when we were boys
11:55
we used to walk to the beach every day
11:58
in the summer
11:59
and outside his house outside the
12:03
carriage house
12:04
he had a Doberman Pinscher dog
9
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
12:07
chained up to a leash on the yard and
12:10
every time we walked by
12:11
he was straining at that leash to get it
12:15
we were scared to death of that dog but
12:18
he was friendly and he befriended us and
12:22
I think I was around 12 years old at the
12:24
time and he taught us how to fish
12:27
because at night when his duties were
12:30
over at five or six o'clock
12:32
he had free time and he'd go down to the
12:34
beach
12:36
and cast off the beach and catch fish
12:39
and we were young kids and didn't know
12:42
too much about it but
12:43
he taught us a lot about fishing and
12:45
we'd go down there and meet him
12:47
and go fishing and
12:50
when the when Mr. Dwight died
12:55
in his will he had left George
12:58
life rights to live in that carriage
13:01
house
13:02
and so as the years went by
13:09
actually in 1938
#1938
13:12
we had a big hurricane and it destroyed
#hurricane
13:15
the main house
13:17
and the parking lot and they rebuilt it
13:21
and during the
13:24
the war years I think in 1943
13:28
the government leased the house for
13:31
housing
10
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
13:32
because Camp Edwards was being built
#campedwards
and
Gunning_Hatchville_Miltry_0557
through 0561
13:35
was growing and they didn't have place
13:37
for family so they actually had eight
13:41
married couples living in that house
13:44
during the war until 1944
13:48
when the next hurricane came and
13:51
destroyed the house again
13:54
and this time they didn't rebuild it
13:57
they said
13:58
enough's enough so that is when
14:03
I think in 1945 the Town of Falmouth
14:06
wanted to extend
14:08
the beach and so from the beach house
14:11
down at Old Stone Dock
14:13
they bought the beach front all the way
14:15
down
14:16
to his property where his first beach
14:19
house was
14:21
and so the town owns that today and they
14:26
they also after the
14:29
hurricane the town wanted to buy the
14:32
land for
14:33
a parking lot for the beach so
14:37
that's why the parking lot is there now
14:40
but
14:41
they couldn't do anything with the
14:44
carriage house because of
14:46
the life rights so
#1944
11
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
14:49
the town owned halfway down to the
14:52
carriage house and the carriage house
14:53
was separate
14:55
and back in 1980
15:00
I think it must have been when uh Mr.
15:04
Gammons died
15:05
because one day my wife and I were
15:08
walking by and we saw a for sale sign
15:10
out in front of the carriage house
15:13
and it was kind of in
15:17
disrepair because no one had lived in it
15:19
for years
15:20
it was strictly a summer house with no
15:22
heat
15:23
and no insulation but my wife said
15:27
why don't we look at it and I said are
15:29
you crazy
15:31
and we know the reality and
15:35
we did take a look at it and we decided
15:39
we fell in love with it the the sunsets
15:42
were just
15:42
gorgeous and we decided
15:47
we would take a chance and buy it and we
15:52
did
16:06
[Music]
#1980
12
�
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Title
A name given to the resource
William Swift's Oral History on the Dwight Estate
1884
1899
1921
1938
1944
1980
Arm and Hammer
Barbara Kanellopoulos
Belvidere Plain
Camp Edwards
Cape Cod Apartments
Column Terrace
Coonamessett Inn
Dwight Estate
Elm Road
Falmouth Harbor
Falmouth Main Street
Gifford Street
Grover Cleveland
Harding
Homeport
hurricane
john dwight
leland
locust street
mill road
minot
Old Stone Dock
oral history
Postcards from Falmouth
richard olney
saint patrick's church
salt pond
salt pond road
siders pond
spalding
Swift
transcript
trotting park
william swift
woods hole golf club