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Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
Postcards from Falmouth Oral History Transcript
Recorded: July 5, 2023
Oral Historian: Miguel Moniz
Interviewer: Phoebe Acheson
Topic: Personal Memories and Portuguese and Cape Verdean Life in Falmouth
Note: The right column references postcards by identifiers searchable in the Digital
Commonwealth online collection.
0:14
[Music]
0:45
well thank you so much for the invitation for
me to talk to talk about this community and
about some of these wonderful postcards in
this collection I'm a huge fan of this of this
project
0:54
and and of the of the Falmouth Public Library
really what they've been doing over the over
the
1:00
years to help promote some of these
community histories that we have and um you
know I I'll
1:07
be talking a little bit about some of this
today but um if you want to take a deeper look
at some of these there's a whole series that I
that I did for Falmouth Public Library's Joy of
Learning
1:16
about Portuguese community history I'm going
to try and not repeat anything that I that I said
in any of those and try and come come up with
today with all brand new things that I haven't
talked
1:24
about before in some of these uh with some of
these great postcards that that you have but um
yeah as you say um some of the postcards and
most of the postcards that people
1
#joyoflearning
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
1:34
um are are talking about are representative of
specific communities are represented
by specific communities in some of the images
and um when I got invited to do this project or
to
1:45
do this interview I um I went through the
whole collection just beginning to end and
tried to
1:51
find some some of those what are those
postcards about about uh the Portuguese and
Cape Verdean
#portugueseamericanhistory
1:57
communities in Falmouth and I found that
there weren't really a whole lot you know
there's a one postcard of Saint Anthony's
Church which is a was a Cape Verdean or is a
Cape Verdean
#saintanthonyschurch
2:07
Portuguese community founded a church um
but but aside from that there really isn't a
whole lot
2:16
um if you look at a one of the postcards of
Shown in video:
Main Street for example um what you don't see Hunt_Teaticket_Sts_362
in this
2:24
postcard it's this one is um if actually if I have
one complaint with the the postcard
2:29
project it's that there aren't really a great dates
on the postcards I don't know if
that's something you're trying to uh yeah they
they mostly aren't dated unless they were
mailed and have a
2:38
postmark on them so we can really only
ballpark it by the styles of cars and that kind of
thing right
2:44
right that well you need to maybe crowdsource
this because I'm sure there's people in town
that can take one look at this and and you
know know exactly where it was and when it
was photographed
2
#capeverdeanamericanhistory
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
2:52
but this this image you can see in the
background here um an image of what was the
old East Falmouth
2:58
#agriculture
Village School and you know what you don't
see to the sides of this are the Portuguese farms
and the
3:06
Cape Verdean farms that were interspersed
around and about some of these buildings as
you as you go
3:11
down Main Street and some of the other
postcards also of Teaticket they they are kind
of in the
3:16
margins and not really not really quite seen um
and this is interesting most of the Portuguese
3:22
were came here to work as farmers and the
one the one kind of farming photo that you or a
3:28
postcard that we have is the of the
Coonamessett Ranch which was an important
large agricultural
3:34
farm that employed a great number of workers
many of them Portuguese as it turns out as
happened
3:41
in many cases though when the Portuguese and
Cape Verdeans were working on farms for
others
3:46
they decided it'd be much easier and better for
themselves to start their own farms which they
did growing the most famous crop and
Falmouth of this community is of course the
crop of strawberries
3:57
but this was not limited to strawberries
they grew yams they grew blueberries they
grew all kinds of other all kinds of other other
things as well as doing other other kinds of
work in
3
#eastfalmouthvillageschool
#teaticket
#coonamessettfarm
#strawberrries
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
4:08
town as well in Woods Hole but also around
the rest of town they ended up moving into the
eastern
4:15
what was then euphemistically called the
eastern part of town which was this kind of
area of East
4:21
Falmouth and further over into Teaticket
towards the Coonamessett River that was
largely abandoned
4:27
farmland nobody really wanted it nobody
wanted to live there there wasn't really a lot
going on and so these communities moved into
these uh started farmsteads and and some of
these um in some of
4:37
these plots of land that they had bought
built houses um and you know you can see
here again that
4:43
you've got this great image of Coonamessett
Farm not a lot of postcards of some of these
other places
4:49
um this isn't necessarily nefarious intent
it's just that these communities were were
largely
4:55
invisible I think to a lot of the people that
were coming and also why are people buying
postcards you're buying a postcard because you
visited a special unique beautiful place and you
want to
5:04
write home to someone and tell them you
know all about this this fantastic place that
you've seen and um you know East Falmouth
in these areas they didn't have a lot of tourist
attractions in them
5:14
you know so they had it was um an area that
that was largely relegated to the people that
5:23
live there and the farmers that live there
most of them immigrants but some other
4
#eastfalmouth
#cranberrybog
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
people that also owned other cranberry bogs
for example and which many Portuguese and
Cape Verdeans worked at
5:32
and actually also owned a number of
cranberry bogs as well but you don't really get
to see some of these um in in in in the
postcards um although on this on the sides of
the postcards
5:43
are all of these are all of these communities um
the one postcard that we really have of
5:49
um of a prominent Portuguese institution
community institution is of Saint Anthony's
Roman Catholic
5:55
Church in East Falmouth and um this uh
Catholic Church was built in the 1920s it's
famed everyone
6:07
or most people know the story of the the
"the church that strawberries built" as it's been
called
6:13
um with members of the Portuguese and Cape
Verdean community tithing uh parts of their
their
6:18
strawberry profits to give to the building of
this church what's lesser known are the many
many other
6:25
community buildings that didn't get postcards
most of them much older including for
example
6:31
#holyghostsociety
um the many the the sa- the Holy Ghost halls
that the town had one of these still stands today
it's
6:37
the Saint Anthony's Club on Brick Kiln Road
this was a building that also served as an
important
6:42
community center as well as the the actual hall
itself that got moved next to the church and
5
Shown in video:
Gunning_Menauhant_Bldg_0493
#brickkilnroad
#saintanthonysclub
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
6:51
um has since I believe been reconstructed but it
was um originally also a Holy Ghost hall and
then
6:57
of course there's a Falmouth's most wellknown Holy Ghost hall which is the um the
Fresh Pond Holy
#freshpondholyghostsociety
7:03
Ghost Society on um on Carriage Shop Road
and this is a building also that um you know
was a very
#carriageshoproad
7:09
prominent community center they had there
were political meetings at these some of these
places
7:14
they had senators coming down the U.S. U.S.
Senators coming down governors coming
down I talked to
7:21
um to give talks and these kinds of things
it's where a lot of the Mass Agricultural
College
7:28
um scientists would come to talk to
the Portuguese community as a result of
people like Bertrand Tomlinson who brought
them in to try and help Falmouth's strawberry
crop yield and
7:37
protect it against various blights that uh
that the that the crop often oftentimes had to
face
7:44
um so Saint Anthony's Church of course a
very important central central cultural
institution
7:50
but again there's all these other other
places that would have would have made great
great postcards if I was visiting Falmouth I
would have loved to have written a postcard at
home
7:58
if I wasn't from Falmouth of course of the of
the Holy Ghost one of the Holy Ghost halls in
6
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
8:03
town it's not too late anyone wants to make
a postcard they're still there so we also have
8:09
um the back of this card is actually something
I'd like to talk about a little bit um you know
on the on the card it says that you know the
Saint Anthony's Roman Catholic Church is
Shown in video:
Gunning_Menauhant_Bldg_0493
(back)
8:17
Falmouth and then it says a Portuguese
National Church which contains a famous
painting of Our
#ourladyoffatima
8:23
Lady of Fatima so anyone who's ever been
inside of um of Saint Anthony's Church knows
of this
8:30
this well-known beautiful painting of the
version of Fatima there's a great story behind
this which
8:37
I'd like to tell a little bit of if I can um with uh
while looking at this at this at this postcard of
the church I'm fortunately there's no postcard
actually of the the Nossa Senhora de Fátima
but
8:48
you'll have to stop by the church sometime
to take a look at it if you're if you're
curious um but what's interesting about this is
that it it says right off the bat that this is a
Portuguese
8:57
National Church and this was an interesting
kind of a a political arrangement that
this church had so most churches are arranged
as parishes as when you live in a certain
9:06
geography and you go to that church because
you uh you live in that in that in that parish that
9:11
that geographic parish territorial parish and
in the case of Saint Anthony's church this was
not
9:17
um how people belonged you belong to it if
you were Portuguese so um this is something
that
7
#portuguesenationalchurch
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
9:23
many of us have known in town for a long
time especially those of us who you know were
baptized
9:28
and had First Communion Confirmation in
Saint Anthony's church as I did and um you
know it's
9:33
a place that um was always known as a
Portuguese church and what's interesting about
this is that
9:41
this and the painting itself was part of a
broader effort on the part of Portugal's Estado
Novo
9:50
dictatorship the fascist dictatorship to
promote cultural diplomacy in the United
States by relying
9:58
on working with immigrant communities in
order to gain political advantage in the places
where
10:03
they were this doesn't mean that the people you
know some people were actively involved in
this consciously involved in this the vast
majority of Portuguese in New England of
course had no
10:14
idea this was going on you know they were just
participating in you know in these power
processes
10:19
that really didn't have anything to do with
their conscious awareness of what they what
they were participating in certainly you know
the case of the of of the parishioners of Saint
Anthony's
10:28
Saint Anthony's church but some of the
operatives that were working on this was a
good friend of
10:35
the parish priest at the time of um in in the 40s
Father Avila no relationship to the current
8
#estadonovo
[Jose M. Bettencourt Avila]
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
10:43
Father Avila that's Steve Avila that's now the
the parishion- or the um the the priest of
10:48
uh of the church but Father Avila was involved
was good friends with someone named
Abecassis who
10:56
was one of the individuals involved in trying to
create some of these cultural diplomacy efforts
and what they were doing was one of the
things they did was to try and send artists and
11:06
um and and literary people into communities
in the U.S where they could become friends
with some
11:11
high high level people one of the people that
they sent to to do this was a man named
Henrique Medina
11:17
Henrique Medina was the painter of the
Virgin of Fatima painting at Saint Anthony's
church
11:22
now Henrique Medina was a well-known he
was born in 1900 uh 1901 something like that
died in 1988
11:30
but he was a well-known portraitist and a
portrait artist and one of his activities working
on behalf
11:38
of the Portuguese Estado Novo was to try and
get a film made in Hollywood about the Virgin
of Fatima
11:43
so the Virgin of Fatima was this apparition of
the the of the Virgin Mary to these three pastor
11:49
children in a field in Fatima Portugal there's
a huge cathedral and shrine built to this to this
11:57
apparition and um in in any case the painting
was designed um for it was it was painted so
that it
12:06
could appear as a promo for the making of the
film so the painting was made ahead of trying
9
#henriquemedina
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
12:12
to promote the film or get the film made the
film eventually did get made but not for many
years later but while Henrique Medina was
was in Hollywood he actually was asked to
paint the
12:23
famous painting in The Picture of Dorian
Gray this film that that was that was made I
think
12:30
it came out in the 30s or for 40s I think it
was like 45 or so but this film came out of
Hunt was I
12:37
believe the actor his his painting was the
before picture not the after Picture of Dorian
Gray but
12:43
um because he was a skilled and gifted
portraitist but you can look it up online and see
Henrique
12:48
Medina's Picture of Dorian Gray but in any
case um I was in an alfarrabista in um in
Lisbon and
12:55
an alfarrabista is one of these old ancient used
bookstores where you can find things that go
back you know hundreds of years uh and uh
you know if you're if you're looking carefully
and
13:05
I came across a silkscreened print of the Virgin
of Fatima this painting by Henrique Medina
that's
13:11
had that you know hung in this church that I
went to every Sunday since I was a little kid
and um I
13:17
was astonished that this was there and I
looked at it excited to see uh whenever I'm in
Portugal I like to run into people from
Falmouth or see things from Falmouth so I got
very excited to
10
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
13:25
read “Saint Anthony's Church, Falmouth,
Mass” when I read where it was it was in a
church in California
13:31
um and I was very surprised by this
because the story that I had always heard about
this
13:36
painting was that Father Avila had a
commissioned directly from uh Henrique
Medina as it turns out
13:42
not really quite the case um once the
painting was made it was actually given to a
Portuguese
13:47
church another Portuguese National Church in
California um and uh and then eventually when
13:54
um when Father Avila was looking for this
painting and trying to find one he ended up
getting the
13:59
painting that had already been made and and
was and was brought to him from um you
know from from California so it's a kind of an
interesting story about how this painting got to
this got to this
14:09
church and more interesting even for my own
work and research is how these kinds of of
activities
14:15
promoted the sense of the Portuguese
community here I mean this is a very famous
painting people are very proud of this painting
also in in town and um it also speaks to how
sometimes how
14:26
um the reasons for something creating a
community is not necessarily as important as
the creation
14:32
of the community itself that the creation of the
community has a life of its own beyond
sometimes beyond beyond the the actions of
11
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
others to you know to try and create this these
efforts
14:42
to help the Estado Novo and in the end
maybe maybe didn't didn't quite quite do what
they what they wanted to set out and wanted to
do um but everybody should go to take a look
at that
14:51
go to a Mass sometime at St Anthony's Church
and and you can see the the painting hanging
above the altar it's really a really a masterwork
a beautiful beautiful piece of piece of art
15:01
um another thing I'd like to talk about when
we talk about the Portuguese community is
also is
15:06
um there are a number of mythologies that
get spoken about saying that Portuguese and
Cape
15:12
Verdeans weren't very politically active
um and there's a great um a postcard here of
the
15:20
um the what's now the school
administration building uh that got built in I
believe 1920s
Shown in video:
Gunning_Village_Bldg_0233
15:27
I want to say 1927 um but it was
thereabouts after the old um Teaticket Village
School burned
#teaticketvillageschool
15:35
down uh then was briefly rebuilt if I'm not
mistaken it's where the VFW Hall is now
15:40
um you also have a postcard of the old Village
Teaticket Village School as well
15:46
um but um I I bring this up this postcard up
because when Portuguese and Cape Verdeans
started
15:52
to get politically active it's really
interesting um another very important
community institution that I haven't mentioned
12
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
are some of the other clubs in fact one of the
oldest in Falmouth the
16:01
oldest civic and immigrant civic club is the
Cape Verdean Club of Falmouth this actually
started off
16:06
as a as a political club where they used to
have meetings at Frank Rose's barber shop on
Sandwich
16:12
Road there isn't a postcard of that either and
and then eventually they moved their meetings
16:18
bi-weekly meet or bi-monthly meetings rather
to the school administration building where
they held them from the 30s they also
sponsored candidates' nights sometimes they
would hold them in some of
16:28
the other Portuguese community halls like
Saint Anthony's Club sometimes they would
hold them at the uh the Teaticket building
eventually they built their own club starting in
1941 changed
16:38
the name of the political organization it was all
the same people that were that were the the
board members but they just re-changed
the name to a to a civic club which is a
Falmouth
16:48
Cape Verdean Club another extraordinary
Falmouth institution that still is going quite
strong today
#falmouthcapeverdeanclub
16:54
and has a great a great number of
wonderful activities that's on Sandwich Road
as well so um why did they start getting
involved why the school um you know the
school administration
#falmouthgovernment
17:05
building well it was very difficult
for Portuguese people and Cape Verdean
people to get elected to office townwide people
13
#civicclub
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
wouldn't vote for them however school
districts were based
17:16
on geography and they were smaller so the
very first successful political campaigns that
were
17:21
waged and won by by Portuguese were first in
the school board and so this is uh this is a great
17:28
postcard to kind of to bring that all home also
it's because it's located really at the kind of
17:35
the crux of of what's a major thoroughfare of
the Portuguese community so you have um you
know Route 28 or Davis Straits turning into
Route 28 and going off towards through
Teaticket
17:44
and then into East Falmouth and you have
Sandwich Road shooting up to Hatchville
17:49
um and um both of these streets were lined
with Portuguese and Cape Verdean farms
strawberry farms
17:55
mostly as you got further in there were
cranberry bogs where many Cape Verdeans
and Azoreans especially were working on
those cranberry bogs as you got further out you
know towards
18:06
Waquoit you also had some Cape Verdean
cranberry bogs and Portuguese-owned
cranberry bogs but
18:12
um you know this this school
administration building is really kind of in the
in the smack in the middle of where the
Portuguese community started to really grow
and it's
18:21
almost a monument to that that community
in some ways I also feel fondly about it
because my mother also worked when she was
a young she was the salutatorian of Falmouth
High School
14
#falmouthpublicschools
#hatchville
#waquoit
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
18:30
there were I think limited opportunities
for young Portuguese American girls at that
point to go to go to university which she
certainly would have done if she was born in
my generation
18:40
um but she became a secretary in the school
admin building so my mother worked at this
building
18:46
um you know for for many years I don't know
if there's one of of of the um of the uh the
18:52
fire department but if you had one you could
show that now because that's where my my dad
worked for for his whole life he passed away in
2017 but but he was he was a fireman there
from for his life
19:03
and also it was a was a captain um I would
also bring up some of the other political
activities
19:09
that took place with some of these
communities by looking here at um Terrace
Gables um what Terrace Gables and the
Heights has to do with the Portuguese
community is kind of another
19:17
small little story that um that doesn't really get
talked about a lot but um there were two a
19:22
couple of really important civic
organizations in Falmouth that that arose out of
the movement
19:28
to "Americanize the immigrant" which was
this post-1920s Progressivist movement and
the idea
19:33
was that immigrants in America were not
suitable for citizenship this was the the
argument from
19:40
um from from certain quarters that they
immigrants shouldn't be allowed to have
citizenship because
15
#terracegables
#falmouthheights
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
19:46
they were mentally psychologically
inferior and they weren't civic-minded people
and so
19:52
the movement to "Americanize the immigrant"
was a Progressivist movement that certainly
had its uh its problems most definitely in its
definitions of what it meant to be an American
and what it meant
20:02
to belong to a community but what they
promoted was effectively the education classes
in civics
20:09
teaching people how to participate in
political political processes teaching them
English these kinds of activities and there were
two organizations in town that were deeply
involved in
20:20
this one was an organization called the
Portuguese Fraternity which was a insurance
scheme like these
20:28
beneficent societies that were very common in
the 20s there was no personal insurance
there was no workman's comp right so you
would belong to these insurance schemes that
would help you to
20:38
pay in every week and then you would get get
it if you were sick or heaven forbid you died
you
20:44
would have money for a funeral or you would
have money to pay for your you know
convalescence while
20:49
you got better so one of the more prominent in
not only New England but in the the United
20:55
States was one called the Portuguese Fraternity
they had branches that were over 40 branches
in its heyday 40 or 50 branches in its heyday
and they had an annual retreat every year and
in 1926
16
#portuguesefraternity
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
21:08
they held their annual retreat with all their new
officers the national officers at Terrace Gables
in Falmouth and there's a wonderful
article written in the Enterprise another great
initiative
21:18
of Falmouth Public Library that everybody
should check out is the Enterprise digitization
archives and um you know this this archive is
uh has some really rich stuff in it and one of
the they have
21:29
a great description of this event and in it the
Enterprise actually translated from Portuguese
21:35
and into English and then printed this in 1926
in the Falmouth Enterprise an article
describing
21:41
the describing this event and the really
beautiful way that people the the author
described Falmouth
21:47
sort of saying it was no doubt that people
from the Azores were so interested in this
beautiful place that was on the ocean and how
could it not help but you know remind them of
home so this was
21:58
uh this was I thought a um there's a couple of
great postcards you have in the collection from
Terrace Gables this of course was a tourist
attraction which is why there's a couple of
great
22:07
postcards about it but it wasn't just tourists
going there obviously this was a place that um
that
22:12
that other people in the community were using
and relying on in this case the Portuguese
Fraternity
22:18
um you know had had these great meetings
there another one that I'd mentioned is the
Portuguese American Civic League that also
17
“Portuguese Fraternity Meets in
Falmouth,” Falmouth Enterprise,
6/12/1926
Gunning_Heights_Bldg_1169
through 1206
Hunt_Heights_Bldg 229 through
243
#portugueseamericancivicleague
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
was another organization civic-minded
organization highly
22:26
involved and they did a number of activities at
the Lawrence High School which you have
also some great uh some great images of so
these were sort of some of the you know there
was a spread
22:36
of the you know we sometimes I think think
about uh Portuguese history Cape Verdean
history as if
22:42
um that's something apart from or separate
from Falmouth history but it's not you know
it's um
22:47
this is this this is uh Cape Verdean and
Portuguese history is it is Falmouth history so
um and the
22:53
people that that belong to these communities
were not limited to these you know to their
churches and their social clubs um they were
people that had a reach throughout town that
participated in
23:02
many organizations throughout town um that
were Veterans of Foreign Wars and um you
know that
23:07
uh that also lived in many other places all over
town um Hatchville was kind of at the outskirts
of
23:13
a lot of these Portuguese the Portuguese
farming there were a great number of
Portuguese farms in Hatchville spreading off
towards North Falmouth as well but they
bumped up against some of the
23:24
some of the um the non-Portuguese or the
the WASP I guess um Falmouth resident farms
and
18
#lawrencehighschool
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
23:34
um personally I grew up I I did the math once
and I did all the I kind of measured it all out
and
23:41
found out that I was almost equidistant where I
grew up on I grew up on Turner Road from all
23:46
the main Portuguese clubs like the
Portuguese American Association from the
Holy Ghost Feast
23:51
from the Cape Verdean Club from Saint
Anthony's Church so um but I was I was
equidistant but I
23:57
was kind of a little bit removed from
them where I was on Turner Road now by my
family
24:02
um there's a great house actually just my my
the house that my grandparents had their farm
in uh was a home right on the corner of John
Parker Road and Sandwich Road it actually
just got bought
24:14
recently I'm I I it's it's a gonna be a great
tragedy one of the other things that that
happens
24:20
is a lot of these old Portuguese farmsteads
because they're not in wealthier parts of town
or in West Falmouth they don't get
historical recognition the way that some of the
other houses
24:28
do many of the these old Portuguese
farmsteads are older than some of these other
places have
24:33
you know I don't want to say they have
richer histories every family history is
beautiful and important but you know they
have they have histories that are important to
the town's you
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#turnerroad
#historichomes
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
24:40
know economic life and and community life as
well and um you know they will get torn down
so
24:46
this old uh you know a beautiful 1800
1800s farmstead um that you know was then
purchased
24:53
by my uh by my family when they came to
America and then used as a as their base for
their farm
24:59
um uh which had land all across along uh
Turner Road uh and then as each of one of
their kids got married they just built a house on
you know on the farmland and there was five
of them and you know
25:09
this is a very typical Falmouth story you
know I know I know tons of family I was
talking to uh to Mary Bishop who's a great
Falmouth resident and she was telling me how
a very similar thing
25:19
happened to her family on Trotting Park Road
and this is a very typical story that that people
tell
25:25
um growing up in a place like that I was
very was not strange for me I think it was
strange anytime I talked to people not from
Falmouth about it or not from you know these
Portuguese
25:33
communities about it um but you know I had
all my cousins and aunts and uncles all in one
street and then eventually my grandparents left
that house and moved across the street
25:43
um you know um and and you know we had
this great life there and it was a very family
oriented and
25:49
very fun um I mean at the time I think I
probably was I felt a little restricted by it of
course um
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�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
25:54
you know you couldn't like leave the house
without 20 relatives seeing everything that you
were doing
26:00
um which made some of my you know the
fun activities that I might have done a little a
little more difficult to pull off but um my sister
didn't seem to have any problems
26:07
with it you know she she uh but this is
always the case yeah the younger sibling
always gets away with a lot more than the
older one does um so but anyway uh you know
growing up on on in
26:18
this in this area my family also um you know
we I went to the school district that I belonged
to
26:24
was not the Portuguese the school where all the #northfalmouthschool
Portuguese were most of the
Portuguese residents went which was like
Teaticket School or East Falmouth school I
went to North Falmouth
26:31
and um this was you know it was
interesting because there weren't a lot of there
were a couple but there weren't a lot of
Portuguese kids at North Falmouth School and
um I don't really think
26:41
I ever had a sense of myself as as you know
being different until I went to North Falmouth
School not not necessarily in a bad way I didn't
I wasn't I didn't feel like I was left out of
anything but
26:50
I just I got a real sense of like that I was oh
yeah I'm really from this Portuguese part of
town that's a that's a really different part of
town than this than North Falmouth and West
Falmouth
26:58
um and and anyway it was it was
something that I was made very aware of as a
result of um being kind of on these borders um
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�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
but also you know quite interesting as well
because it I think
27:09
#oldsilverbeach
that it allowed me a facility to kind of
move between some of these different worlds
um a lot more fluidly um as a result but
anyway um I spent most of my days as a young
kid on the Old Silver
27:20
Beach in the summers um which was you
know in that part of in that part of town my
father was a real
27:26
avid beachgoer in fact so speaking of postcards
um there's a really famous like it's I think
27:32
one of the most famous postcards in the world
if you are over a certain age it's the famous
"where the boys are" postcard of Fort
Lauderdale Florida and it was a a postcard that
came out right after
27:42
the film and as many people did who saw
that film they immediately went down to
Florida to
27:49
um you know to go um to go go to the beach
and go to Fort Lauderdale and these kinds of
things
27:55
um my father's family actually would go would
go down there before during this time period in
the winters they worked construction and were
um you know were were people that you can't
really dig
28:05
in the ground when it's freezing out so
they would sometimes go they would go to
Florida um you know and uh and and and get
away from the the cold uh but
28:16
um my father is on he's he's the biggest person
on the on this really famous postcard
28:21
um and he sticks out like a sore thumb the poor
thing he was a huge uh he loved going to the
22
#florida
#postcards
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
beach but in the picture he got a little bit of a
sun exposure and so he's
28:28
in in this jacket like zipped up and he was
very embarrassed about this for the for his
entire life being you know zipped up in this
jacket and this really famous postcard that's all
over you know
28:40
I'm sure that uh that if any if anyone had a
relative that went to Florida you know uh in
28:46
Falmouth from you know basically up through
the 90s so they they got they got this postcard
sent to them by someone at some point uh
anyway uh so there's Old Silver Beach my first
job also actually
28:57
that's not true my first job um was working as a #falmouthenterprise
uh a hawker for the Falmouth Enterprise
29:04
um they um Bill Hough um was was then the
editor-in-chief and um they needed someone
#billhough
29:10
to walk around selling the Road Race
supplement on Road Race weekend so he hired
me to I think
#falmouthroadrace
29:16
I got like four cents a newspaper and I
just went around to selling because they had
the the edition had the program to the uh with
all the uh the runners in the road race and other
little
29:26
interviews and tidbits and what have you so
yeah so I would just take these things and they
would um you know I sold them all over all
over Road Race weekend and then I sold them
also in town
29:36
um walking down Gifford Street uh in front of
the hospital extension and stopping traffic and
29:41
eventually Mr. Griffin who was my social
studies teacher at Lawrence Junior High
School he uh
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�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
29:47
they they stopped me and said I couldn't walk
down in the traffic anymore and eventually
they they had to stop the program because it
was um obviously a horrible you know
horribly dangerous
29:56
hazard but you know those were the days um
uh so anyway um yeah we uh my first real job
though uh
30:03
real proper job was working at the Sea Crest uh #seacresthotel
in Falmouth and the Sea Crest is a really famed
place there's a great postcard here of the Sea
Crest Hotel um with a couple of images and
this
30:15
is this is actually an image of the old one of the
old the older version of the uh of the hotel
30:20
um it's it's a place that that really has a great
fame I mean originally there was a a theater
there
30:27
with uh Jimmy Stewart I think was part of this
and Henry Fonda Margaret Sullivan also and
then after
30:34
that it was uh the site of a a music club called
the Latin Quarter which was run by Lou
Walters who
30:41
was Barbara Walters' father and then
eventually um it was it was bought and
purchased and tried they
30:48
tried to turn it into a kind of a you know
like the Cape Codder or some of these other
places some of these other big resorts creating
a you know creating a seaside resort in
Falmouth and this
30:57
was during this large push you know in the 40s
and 50s when they when when Falmouth really
started
31:04
turning towards a tourist economy and they
really tried to promote Falmouth as a place for
24
Shown in video:
Hunt_North_Bldg_396
#latinquarter
#louwalters
#tourism
#1971
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
tourism and eventually it was bought in 1971
and this is who I worked for by Red Auerbach
who was the
31:16
the you know the great coach of the of the
Boston Celtics and a later general manager um
Mr. Battles
31:22
I think I always called him Mr. Battles I think
his name was Ken Battles if I'm not mistake
and then Steve Hill who who was an incredible
uh incredible person who just he was an
entertainer a performer
31:33
and what they really did was they tried to
create almost like um like a Catskills at at the
Sea Crest
31:40
and um you know there are a lot of Jewish
families that would come down for uh for
holiday uh they
31:47
had mahjong tournaments um you know
where the whole place was just filled with um
with
31:52
um Jewish women playing mahjong it was just
a lot of fun and um I literally had every job at
this
31:59
place I worked as a uh predominantly I worked
as a waiter and a um and a um a busboy but I
worked
32:07
you know I also worked in the kitchen I
worked on the line sometimes they'd hired me
that I was in the I was in the pantry I was a
bellboy I did I did so many things at this place
I um you know I
32:16
once waited on Sid Caesar actually uh was was
a guest there sometimes and I waited on him a
couple
32:22
times great tipper by the way um and um but
one thing that they asked me to do um this is
when
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#kenbattles
#stevehill
#sidcaesar
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
32:28
Steve Hill died shortly after I was only there
for a couple years before uh before Steve
passed away
32:36
um but he had he created this place that was
an incredible venue for live music and
entertainment so they would have nightclub
shows all the time with comedians and you
know like uh
32:44
bands like the The Drifters played there
and you know these kind of older bands that
that
32:50
um uh that were very popular at the time
um would come through and play in Falmouth
and
32:56
um they would hire me every every night or on
the weekends to work the spotlight so I would
like you
33:02
know I was a young kid you know 14 15 16
years old I worked there from like 14 to 17 or
18 and
33:09
um you know it just uh was was quite an eyeopening experience for this young you
know Portuguese Catholic boy from a pretty
strict family Catholic uh family uh Portuguese
Catholic
33:19
family to um you know to be put into
this world of uh of of you know entertainment
and
33:26
um you know Steve Hill had some really
crazy parties that we would we sometimes
asked to work
33:31
um and it was a real eye-opening experience
for a you know for a young man to um to see
this kind of
33:36
world and possibilities and also the Sea Crest
had so many people from all over that were
working there as well you've had a lot of
26
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
people coming down over the summers from
outside of Boston and
33:46
New York and other places you had a lot of
people from Bourne working there again like
these kind of different communities of people
all coming together and it was a great
experience to work
33:55
there and and kind of um uh kind of come
together with all these people and it really
changed me as
34:01
a person I think um I I won't say his name but a
um you know there's a a a law enforcement
officer
34:10
let's just say on Cape Cod somewhere who
was uh um who was a a great a great running
mate
34:16
there and was was someone who you know
opened my eyes to a lot of things in the world
that um that
34:21
he's probably arresting for people now but um
in any case uh it was a really dynamic and
fantastic
34:27
place to to hang out um and so and also yeah
I was working there right so yes to work at as
well
34:33
um one of the things that we did um
there's some pictures here the of the of the
ballpark the Heights um uh you have the
Heights ballfield there's three great great
images that you have
#falmouthheightsballpark
34:44
um one that I'm um really shows the
ballpark though as it looks out and I bring this
up because
Shown in video:
Gunning_Heights_Ball_1251,
Hunt_Heights_Bldg_267
34:50
you have one of people like in the early 1900s
at the you know watching a ball game at uh
you know at the ballpark and this was the set
#capecodbarleague
27
#baseball
#softball
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
the scene of the uh what was called the Cape
Cod Bar Leagues and
35:02
this was a a really well known I mean it was
it was we got tons of people to come out to our
games
35:09
um and it was a real you know it was kind of
like you were you were drinking while you
were playing of course like most softball is but
with the added extra push that this was actually
the bar and so
35:17
all the all the big bars in Falmouth had fielded
teams and it was a fairly big deal you know the
the Enterprise would list um capsules of of
the games you know next to the Commodores
games they
35:28
kept uh listings of the standings you know
they had photographs when teams won the
championship
35:34
um and you know I would always look we'd
always look in the capsules and read them next
day and see where we were in the standings but
we played all over teams like a number
35:42
of great Falmouth bars that no longer exist you
know like the Yesterdays and the Casino used
to have it used to have a team the the
Towne Tavern actually had a very competitive
team they
#casinobar
were usually a real good team Captain Kidd
had a team the Landfall had a team and then
you know the Sea Crest also had a we had we
had a team as well and yeah we played all over
the place
#captainkidd
35:51
36:01
um the one story that I would tell about
the about the ballpark here um is um you know
is
28
Shown in video: “Yesterdays Fell
Yesterday to Landfall,” from the
Falmouth Enterprise, August 3,
1984
#yesterdays
#townetavern
#landfallrestaurant
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
36:06
a uh it's it's uh we were playing a game and um
I think it was Brendan McCarthy who who
worked there
36:14
as a waiter as well uh his uh he was from
North Falmouth his his dad was part of the
McCarthy Ice
36:19
Cream McCarthy Brothers Ice Cream which I
think they that doesn't exist anymore but as a
kid I
36:25
used to think it was so cool that my
classmates could just get ice cream whenever
they wanted
36:30
um but anyway he uh he must have it must
have been all that dairy that that helped him
because he he hit a shot uh in a game once at
the ball field that went all the way to what was
was then
36:40
known as the Finish Line Tavern it was
it's now no longer that it's and they rearranged
36:45
the space there's like a bar over there now
I think I think it was the a beer a beer joint
36:50
for a while and that place went out of
business because I don't it wasn't really good
um and then there's a new place there now um
but anyway he hit a shot and at that point the
kitchen was
37:00
on that side facing the ball field and the
ball went rocketing through them it was it was
just a
37:06
rocket shot of a of a home run that he hit and
it went blasting just smashing through the
window and
37:13
unfortunately just spread glass like all over the
kitchen into all of the dishes everybody's food
29
#brendanmccarthy
#mccarthybrothersicecreamcompany
#finishlinetavern
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
37:19
right they had to obviously throw everything
out basically shut down for the afternoon and
the chef
37:24
um you know I I mean we've all read
Anthony Bourdain's book and you know
especially in the 80s
37:31
um speaking of all those all those early
vices um you know the chefs were often times
under the
37:37
influence of of certain of certain things
that made them a little agitated and excitable
and the
37:42
chef when his entire you know meal service
was destroyed for the afternoon came running
out of
37:48
the the Finish Line Tavern with his largest
knife and uh came chasing after uh poor
Brendan McCarthy
37:54
on the you know on the field fortunately
cooler heads prevailed and there was there was
no damage
37:59
but when when we went back the next year for
games there was an iron gate over the over the
window of
38:06
the uh you know of the Finish Line Tavern so
you know those are the kind of some of the
postcards
38:12
I wanted to to talk about in and sort of
also doing so I I would just like kind of say
that
38:17
um you know this community of Falmouth like
we're talking about different communities in
Falmouth but really it's one community of
Falmouth it's um you know it's it's people that
have they're
38:26
all sharing their lives together that we're all
participating in all these um you know fun
30
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
activities together um in these different
institutions um and um you know families that
38:38
have gone back for generations independent if
they were Portuguese or Cape Verdean or not
and um and
38:43
all these people living all their lives together in
this in this really wonderful place um I really
love these postcards and um you know it's a
it's it's a great a great treat and pleasure to have
38:52
been able to uh to talk about some of these
uh some of these postcards with you
31
�
Text
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docx
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Title
A name given to the resource
Transcript of Miguel Moniz's Oral History on Portuguese and Cape Verdean Life in Falmouth
Subject
The topic of the resource
Portuguese American history
Cape Verdean American history
Falmouth history
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Postcards from Falmouth
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Falmouth Public Library
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2023
Contributor
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Miguel Moniz
Phoebe Acheson
Falmouth Community Television
Falmouth Public Library
Format
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pdf
Language
A language of the resource
English
1971
agriculture
baseball
Bill Hough
Brendan McCarthy
Brick Kiln Road
Cape Cod Bar League
Cape Verdean American history
Captain Kidd
Carriage Shop Road
Casino bar
civic club
Coonamessett Farm
cranberry bog
East Falmouth
East Falmouth Village School
Estado Novo
Falmouth Cape Verdean Club
Falmouth Enterprise
Falmouth government
Falmouth Heights
Falmouth Heights ballpark
Falmouth public schools
Falmouth Road Race
Finish Line Tavern
Florida
Fresh Pond Holy Ghost Society
Hatchville
Henrique Medina
historic homes
Holy Ghost Society
Joy of Learning
Ken Battles
Landfall Restaurant
latin quarter
lawrence high school
lou walters
McCarthy Brothers Ice Cream Company
North Falmouth School
old silver beach
Our Lady of Fatima
Portuguese American Civic League
Portuguese American history
Portuguese Fraternity
Portuguese National Church
postcards
Saint Anthony’s Church
Saint Anthony’s Club
Sea Crest Hotel
Sid Caesar
softball
Steve Hill
strawberrries
teaticket
Teaticket Village School
terrace gables
tourism
Towne Tavern
Turner Road
Waquoit
Yesterdays
-
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PDF Text
Text
Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
Postcards from Falmouth Oral History Transcript
Recorded: May 20, 2022
Oral Historian: Valerie Harding
Interviewer: Troy Clarkson
Topic: Falmouth Heights
Note: The right column references postcards by identifiers searchable in the Digital
Commonwealth online collection.
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[Music]
I am Troy Clarkson it is Friday May 20th
2022 and
this visit is with Valerie Harding
so welcome Valerie today we're going to
talk about some of the history of
Falmouth Heights and just before the
camera came on you and I were
well you were sharing stories
about that rich history so let's let's
actually start
with that there are so many roads within
Falmouth Heights
that are familiar to people
but you know the history behind some of
those names so for instance
when I was first married my wife and I
lived
in a rented apartment on Jericho Path
where there are condos now before that
they were apartments before that they
were tennis courts oh yes just before
what we used to call the “wee bump”
where
that hill went over and you could if you
drove fast enough you could get your car
airborne uh I so I’ve heard well
you'd always ask your parents
especially your father to drive really
fast right so tell us though in that
immediate area I mean Falmouth Heights
has a history as the first planned uh
summer resort community but it's so much
more than that well long before it was
1
#falmouthheights
#jerichopath
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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developed as a summer resort in 1880 by
a man from Worcester
actually a consortium of men from
Worcester
before that in back in the 1700s and the
late 1700s
it was considered a very remote part of
Falmouth
and Jericho Path the name always
interested me because I grew up on
Johnson Road and you know
why was it called Jericho Path well
after doing research to come to find out the
inhabitants of Falmouth from the late
1600s to the 1700s when they had large
dead animals they couldn't bury them off
Main Street
so they would take them up to what they
called Jericho which was the hill on the
Heights and they would car- I guess drag
them up there and leave them there so
that was
it was called Jericho on the Heights
hill and it became Jericho Path
and I since have heard from
actually someone whose father was an
excavator in Falmouth that sometimes
when he would dig foundations he would
find bones of large animals up there
they the kids thought they were dinosaur
bones but they were probably
horse and cow
but the other thing is in that same
vicinity is Lake Leaman Road
when they developed
Worcester Court
and Grand Avenue
#falmouthheightslandandwharfcompany
#lakeleaman
#worcestercourt
#grandavenue
Hunt_Heights_Sts_320 through 322
Hunt_Heights_Sts_324 and 325
Gunning_Heights_Sts_1064 through
1074
3:24
3:25
3:28
they also
laid out other roads Worcester Court was
where I ended up in high school
2
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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and that was in 1959 and there were
still dirt roads down there
and Worcester Court
intersects with Lake Leaman Road well
where was Lake Leaman they decided to
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3:48
3:50
3:53
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4:01
4:04
4:06
change the name of Little Pond to Lake
Leaman
and it remained so for probably about 20
years until the local townspeople
decided to change the name
back to Little Pond which is where you
which is where the tennis courts were
right yes and uh
and so I’ve got lots of connections in
that part of town we moved here to
Falmouth when I was four
but before that my grandparents had a
had a home it was a summer home and
then
they moved here full time on Hudson
Street okay right in that area all right
there was nothing there it was all woods
we kids used to play in there lots of
skinny little dirt roads and in fact
Worcester Court
where Lake Leaman and Worcester Court
intersect
and Worcester Court is now well we
called it Worcester Court Extension
which goes down behind the plaza that
was all dirt roads right down to the
cranberry bog which is the Falmouth Mall
so they were just little dirt roads even
back in the early 60s
so let's talk about that a little bit
then because I uh
as we sit here in May of 2022 that
former cranberry bog Falmouth Mall
property just sold
to a developer I read in the paper for
59 million dollars so tell us share with
us your memories of that tract of land
and how it unfolded okay so if you go
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#littlepond
#hudsonstreet
#falmouthmall
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down Teaticket Highway
right where the bank is across the
street from CVS
that was Hazelton’s junkyard
and the Hazeltons later moved their
junkyard to Gifford Street which is
where the storage units are
just beyond the Little League field and
all but that was a junkyard and it was
downhill down to the Walmart area was
all junk cars and everything else
as kids we used to ride our bikes
down the dirt road which was - became
Worcester Court
when the bog froze and
we used to put our skates on and run
across the dirt and jump over the ditch
and skate on the bog our parents weren't
too worried because it was a bog and how
far can you fall in a frozen bog
Little Pond we also skated on that used
to freeze over and there were a lot of
bonfires and there weren't many there
weren't any houses down on Miami Ave.
one or two
actually my father bought a lot of
land down there but my mother wouldn't
build a house down there because it was
too deep into the woods
imagine that too deep into the woods
right in Falmouth Heights yeah
now a beautiful
year-round residential area and imagine
being on the water on Miami Ave you
know
right on Little Pond there right near
the beaches and yeah
so um and
from Jericho Path
down to Falmouth Heights Beach
in the winters it was
it was like a ghost town there was no
light no lights on in houses or anything
like that there were no lights on
all the homes were dark
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#hazeltons
#cranberrybog
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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because they were all summer homes they
were not insulated they were
pretty much just large cottages
in the winter we used to go down and
sled on Heights Hill but
when we would sled on Heights Hill we
would sled down Grand Avenue
because no cars traveled there and
sometimes they plowed it sometimes they
didn't
and then we would sled across the street
right through
the casino
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and out onto the beach
now uh I’ve had the chance to do
several of these interviews over the
last couple of years and
and then through the work that I do with
my column
uh talk a lot about the history of that
area so
my uncle Henry
who was a pediatrician in Brockton had a
summer home right there in fact
on the corner
on the ball field that was that was his home
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he then ironically sold it to the Stone
family and of course
decades later Phil Stone became my
stepdad right so okay yes I remember
Dickie Stone and his brother living
there but the predecessor to the Cape
Cod Baseball League used to play games
at that Heights field do you have any
recollections of that no I grew up in a
family of three girls and we really
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#falmouthheightsballpark
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#baseball
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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weren't into those ball games or
anything
what I really have strong recollections
about are the large hotels
they were still the old wooden hotels
with the turrets
and you know on the corner of Worcester
Court was the Park Beach Hotel of course
#parkbeachhotel
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the Terrace Gables
#terracegables
the Tower Hotel was still there
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#towerhousehotel
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it was really
the type of resort area that families
came to from the city
and on the train and then they would
stay for a week or two
in those hotels
well in the winter when those hotels
were closed up
as kids you'd run across the veranda
and it looked
very ghostly inside with the table still
set up
you know with salt and pepper still on
the table and
it was kind of creepy
because there you also got home before
dark because there was as I say there
was not a light on in any house down
there and
that was from
Jericho Path up and also
we had a little tiny post office for
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Falmouth Heights that was only open in
the summer and where was that
that was
I can't think of the name of the motel
but it is still there I think it's
called the Heights Motel actually
#heightsmotel
and it's just before you hit Grand
Avenue coming up Heights Road right oh
sure yeah yeah and on the other side of
it there was a little donut shop that's
where I had my first job
but that building also you know these
these buildings even these um big summer
homes they didn't have any
sheetrock or anything they just had the
studding
and the wooden walls
and you the wires ran up the wooden
walls the electricity it was
pretty unsafe but they were all built
that way right you know even if you went
to visit someone you knew who was living
I knew a couple of people who lived
right on the right on the height of
Heights Hill
right on the facing the ocean with the
ocean view
and those cottages were
pretty rustic so um
they were built
pretty rustic that way and of course
they um
were from
in the beginning they the men who
were the business group they sold mostly
to families from Worcester
as in Menauhant the man who developed
#menauhant
that
sold mostly to families from Attleboro
really yeah I didn't know that isn't
that interesting yes so
um
and in in Menauhant they had a Menauhant #menauhanthotel
Hotel
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and they sold the property
you know surrounding the hotel
eventually to people who came and stayed
in the hotel and then decided to build
their summer cottages which those
cottages at the foot of
Central Avenue are kind of similar you
know Victorian looking
but they were roughly
the outside looked nice but inside it
was very rough living but they liked
that back then in the 1880s you were
going to stay in your summer camp right
right and some of those families both in
the Heights
and the Menauhant area are still
there yes have been coming for
generations yes yeah
and of course up on the Heights hill
they had a the small chapel
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and it eventually became an observatory
and right around the circle
that's why there's still Chapel Ave. up
there there was a chapel there and
that little area there which is so
interesting to me because it's
very much like Oak Bluffs
the little cottages yes with the
gingerbread houses that's funny you
should say that let's talk about that
for a second because a lot of people I
know
come here or live here for years and
never
get to that area because you know you go
to the Heights and the beach in the
restaurants there
but the area we're talking about is
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#falmouthheightschapel
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tucked away it is up high yes but you
have to sort of know how to get there to
get there even though it's right there
right exactly and I think it's it was
that style of building because they had
Methodist camp meetings that's how Oak
Bluffs started
and that's how the that area
started up in the Heights and also a
tiny bit of Menauhant started the same way
that's why they built Grace Chapel over
there
so um you know the architecture it's
very interesting to look at it because
it was popular at the time to build your
little summer camp and have everybody
come down to a revival
you know Methodist meeting and
I just find that so interesting you know and
I don't know if you remember but Mr.
Craig who was a teacher when I was in
school he probably retired shortly after
I left high school but his family owned
the Craig House which was a big hotel
#gracechapel
#craighouse
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which was up there
was later bought by
two guidance counselors in Falmouth I’m
trying to think uh Mr. Wasseth and um
who you probably remember sure Paul
#paulwasseth
Wasseth right
I think he was an employee of Mr. Craig’s
and eventually he and his family
bought the Craig Hotel which is gone now
but I sometimes drive up that
little hill there
and around Chapel Ave. and wonder where
they tucked a hotel up there
but by the same token right
not one tiny little block in front of it
was the was the Terrace Gables
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that hotel and then
just down the hill was the Tower
House Hotel
and then you had the Park Beach Hotel
you think about right there on basically
Heights Hill and just down at the foot
of it were so many hotels
in that amazing and then
adjacent
to what was
the Tower House Hotel people today
would recognize is that expansive open
space we call the kite field
yes and that's an interesting story
that um
when the Tower House Hotel was sold
well let me back up
the kite field used to be tennis courts
Mr. Tower of the Tower House he built the
tennis courts there and uh
eventually in the late 60s his family
sold the hotel
and it they were selling it to the
timeshare people
and the timeshare wanted to
uh put a whole lot of buildings there
you know little
share buildings
and a lot of people objected who lived
in the area they objected the homeowners
objected because their view was going to
be displaced
and they won out I think they took them
to court and so the Tower family
left it to the town as open space in
perpetuity
and that's how it became the kite field
and today I think lots of folks
don't even know that that's public
property I think you're right and
available for public enjoyment
and passive
recreation but you know what's funny as
we talk about these things I
have vivid memories of my own
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childhood in that area
and I think
instinctively it's
20 years ago but it it's 50 years ago
and so the ability for us to have these
conversations and preserve that history
so that future generations can
understand and learn
what those landmarks are and what
they meant and how they developed is
really important I think it is too
Worcester Court with the open space that
runs down the length of Worcester Court
was drawn out that way by the by those
developers from Worcester
which to me is so interesting that they
had the foresight to you know lay out
just that little strip of grass but it
runs all the way down what three or four
blocks yes and um you know it kind of
opens up everything in that area
it really does and it and because it's
now public property it always will and
so it would be some green space
in the middle of what's pretty densely
residential property yes and actually
when the Heights was developed
and not down by the water I mean the back
what I call the back end of that area
which was Johnson Road Holland Road
Hudson Street Raymond Street
that was after World War II when so many
soldiers were coming back to Falmouth
and there was no housing
and the soldiers when they came back to
Falmouth they at first lived in the
World War I
soldier housing which was over where the
Windfall Market is now
just beyond the Windfall Market and um
it was pretty decrepit but that's where
they lived you know it was built for
World War I returning veterans
and um so
of course there was a building boom to
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#worldwar2 #veterans
#worldwar1
#windfallmarket
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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build for all these young soldiers and
their families
and along Heights Road also were the
first houses that were built and because
that really was
not developed yet and um
you know around the Robbins Road area
you know in the corner of Jericho Path
that if you go up a little bit they were
all modest Cape homes that were built
along that area
and we're just beginning to see some of
those homes being turned over into
larger homes
you know um and uh but right after World
War I into the early
60s they were just little Cape homes
which is what they built I remember my
parents bought their house on uh
Johnson Road and paid seven hundred and
fifty dollars I’m sorry seven thousand
five hundred imagine that yeah
ten uh not even ten a hundred times that
today oh it's amazing yeah and then we
moved we built another house on
Worcester Court but
again that was all woods beyond there
Raymond Street Hudson Street and all of
those
so it's so interesting that that area
was considered so far out of town
you know and
Falmouth kind of ended
you know right there at Heights Corner
right you know
it seemed out of town you you'd uh tell
someone where you lived and they'd be
like really
so that uh
we're nearing the end of our time
together but that when you mentioned
the Heights Corner at the beginning and
now towards the end uh
I remember that building on the corner
uh as a Howard Johnson it was when I was
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#howardjohnson
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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a kid
I don't and then of course
it was Jack in the Beanstalk
that
was the first Jack in the Beanstalk I
think and it's moved around
to several spots since and been a bank
for many years but do you remember
anything there before Howard Johnson I
don't but across the street where the
Driftwood Plaza is
was nothing but marshland and they
filled it in a little bit that's why
that corner always floods it's very low
marshy area from Morse Pond it flows
over there and there's a culvert
underneath
but that was where Mr. Limberakis had
his first Clam Shack after the war and
he you didn't eat inside he just had a
couple of picnic tables and he was only
open in the summer and you went to a
window
and you ordered there and then of course
Davis Straits was just two farms on
either side of the Davis family
and across the street where Staples is now
was just a farmhouse and
big fields and a couple of times the
circus came to town and put up tents there
yeah it's crazy really that that when I
say Falmouth ended there it did
Falmouth center right then of course we
had Teaticket which was a separate
village
you know and they were their own little
village with a village market and
uh you know
post office they had their post office
their village market and there was a farm
actually there was a farm right where
Burger King is a very large farm and
farmhouse and that farm went way down to
the cranberry bog in the mall where the
mall is today
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#jackinthebeanstalk
#driftwoodplaza
#limberakis [Leo Limberakis]
#clamshack
#davisstraits
#teaticket
#agriculture
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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so it was very rural
yes and agricultural as well and so
that's wonderful well thank you for
painting that wonderful
picture for us I uh as I leave here
today and drive down there I’ll
have a wonderful
landscaping I have one other tidbit
to give you because I do like the
little hidden secrets
the Heights hill was used by Dr.
Donaldson
back in the late 1700s for a smallpox
hospital as was
Nobska because both places were so far
out of town
and he was he had studied in England and
he had brought back smallpox vaccine and
he was vaccinating people and they did not
believe in it the local townspeople so
he vaccinated his own children and took
them out there
so that he could prove that it was safe
isn't that fascinating
Dr. Donaldson lived in the house where
Harriet Dugan has her real estate office
that was his farm at the foot of Nye Road
but you think the Heights is so
such a
smart little area now but it was once
considered
so offbeat we had a contagious hospital
out there
wow remote in those days and really part
of the heart of the community today
absolutely
well speaking of that being the heart of
the community I think that's a good way
to conclude thank you for sharing all of
those wonderful stories and those happy
memories that are in your heart and
sharing them with us so that future
generations can paint those same lovely
pictures
Valerie thank you so much
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#hughgeorgedonaldson
#smallpox #vaccination
#nyeroad
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
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thank you very much for having me here
it's been a delight
[Music]
15
�
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
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docx
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Transcript of Valerie Harding's Oral History on Falmouth Heights
Subject
The topic of the resource
Falmouth Heights
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Postcards from Falmouth
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Falmouth Public Library
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2022
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
pdf
Language
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English
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Valerie Harding
Troy Clarkson
Falmouth Community Television
Falmouth Public Library
agriculture
baseball
Clam Shack
Craig House
cranberry bog
Davis Straits
Driftwood Plaza
Falmouth Heights
Falmouth Heights ballpark
Falmouth Heights chapel
Falmouth Heights Land and Wharf Company
Falmouth Mall
Grace Chapel
Grand Avenue
Hazeltons
Heights Motel
Howard Johnson
Hudson Street
Hugh George Donaldson
Jack in the Beanstalk
Jericho Path
Lake Leaman
Limberakis
Little Pond
Menauhant
menauhant hotel
Nye Road
Park Beach Hotel
Paul Wasseth
smallpox
teaticket
terrace gables
tower house hotel
vaccination
veterans
Windfall Market
Worcester Court
world war 1
world war 2
-
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Baseball Game at Falmouth Heights, Mass.
baseball
Central Park
Falmouth Heights
Falmouth Heights ballpark
-
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Base Ball Park, Falmouth Heights, Mass.
baseball
Central Park
Falmouth Heights
Falmouth Heights ballpark
-
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The Ball Field Falmouth Heights, Mass.
Subject
The topic of the resource
Falmouth (Mass. : Town)
baseball
Central Park
Falmouth Heights
Falmouth Heights ballpark
-
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Still Image
A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Central Park, Falmouth Heights, Mass.
baseball
Central Park
Falmouth Heights
Falmouth Heights ballpark