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Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
Postcards from Falmouth Zoom Program Transcript
Recorded: September 23, 2020
Presenter: Gus Widmayer
Host: Jill Erickson
Topic: A Gentleman’s Guide to the Belvidere Plain in Falmouth, Massachusetts & The Belvidere
Plain Revisited, by Gus Widmayer
Available in the Falmouth Public Library Reference Department REF LocHist 974.492
WID
Also mentioned: How to Read a Book, by Mortimer J. Adler, available from CLAMS
under 801.9 ADL
Note: The right column references postcards by identifiers searchable in the Digital
Commonwealth online collection.
00:30
[Music]
00:45
good morning I think it's appropriate
00:49
on the sesquicentennial 150th
00:53
anniversary of the postcard
00:55
that we also acknowledge that it's the
00:59
sesquicentennial of Belvidere Plain
#belvidereplain
Hunt_Village_Har_114
01:03
a real estate development from 1870
#1870
01:08
I believe it was completed around 1872.
#1872
01:12
so I want to draw your attention to uh
01:15
where it is located
01:17
on the shores of Vineyard Sound
01:20
nestled in between the beach
01:24
and what's known as what was known then
01:27
as Deacon's Pond
#vineyardsound
#deaconspond
Gunning_Village_Har_0190
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�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
01:28
we now know it today as Falmouth Harbor
#falmouthharbor
Hunt_Village_Har_103 through 120
Gunning_Heights_Har_1320
through 1334
01:32
and you can see a lot of little postage
01:35
stamp sized
01:36
lots that were
01:40
planned out and really most of them
01:42
never
01:43
um wound up that way because
01:47
when people came in to buy properties
01:49
they bought several
01:51
at a clip so
01:54
my focus today is on the postcards
01:58
that depict uh various scenes from
02:00
around Belvidere Plain
02:03
and there are about 20 and
02:06
I’ve added a few photographs and I’ll
02:10
even
02:11
finish off with a plug for my book
02:15
which hopefully
02:18
Jill Erickson and Kim DeWall can make
02:21
available
02:22
to you from the Falmouth Public Library
02:26
so let's go to the first slide
02:31
most people recognize this house
2
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
02:35
it was owned by
02:39
a family named Butler around the turn of
02:42
the century
02:46
fairly prominent on the point it sits
02:49
today just behind the Falmouth Yacht
#butler
#falmouthyachtclub
Gunning_Village_Bldg_0385
02:51
Club
02:53
uh had a beautiful expansive lawn
02:56
right on the harbor overlooking the
02:58
ocean
02:59
a nice tennis court and I
03:02
found this picture in an old antiques
03:06
uh market in the Fenway section of
03:08
Boston
03:10
probably in the 1990s
03:13
and it hit my eye I recognized it right
03:15
away
03:17
but most importantly for me uh right
03:20
over here
03:21
on the right hand side um was an early
03:25
photograph
03:26
of Belvidere Plain which is on the west
03:30
side of the harbor
03:32
so I grabbed the picture and I expanded
03:35
this section
03:39
to what you see here and for those of
3
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
03:42
you familiar with the harbor
03:44
you'll recognize the home here that
03:48
once belonged to Bill Wyman
03:51
and his family for
03:54
probably 75 years
03:59
and you'll be able to see by the time
04:02
we're done
04:05
various homes that are no longer
04:08
no longer there
04:12
particularly these two what we call
04:15
beetle houses
04:17
which I’ll point out a little later
04:21
um this photograph
04:24
is about circa 19
04:29
20 I I would say
04:36
this photograph uh which I acquired
04:40
on eBay from an auction
04:44
in my mind is the oldest
04:48
known photograph of the Belvidere Plain
04:52
I don't want to say absolutely
04:55
positively
04:56
because
05:01
I don't have proof so I’ll leave that to
05:06
a younger generation to figure out for
05:08
me but
05:10
the back side of this stereo card does
#wyman
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�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
05:13
say Falmouth Harbor and
05:17
these this is a
05:20
windmill that drew water from the ocean
05:27
onto flats where it dried
05:31
in the 19th century
05:34
for salt and uh
05:38
this hill here um
05:42
I believe to be Falmouth Heights it
05:44
doesn't look that tall
05:46
but you know perspective is very
05:49
um a very tricky thing in the 1870s
05:53
1880s um
05:56
I believe we can also date it from this
06:00
man's hat
06:01
this man's hat so uh in time
06:06
one of you might be able to
06:10
research this to nail down
06:14
a date and these
06:18
two structures here might also
06:22
help us but um
06:25
I’m keeping my fingers crossed the
06:28
oldest
06:29
beach photo Belvidere Plain
06:35
now I’d like to tell you about a book
06:37
that I acquired from
06:39
my father's second cousin Rita Keckeisen
#falmouthheights
5
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
06:44
she was a librarian
06:47
in the Butler Library at Columbia
06:50
College
06:51
in New York City and when she passed
06:54
away
06:55
in 2003
06:58
her family distributed her possessions
07:01
and then asked me if I’d like to go in
07:05
to see if there was anything that I
07:07
wanted
07:08
because Rita and I had been
07:11
a 30-year correspondent uh
07:16
had been correspondents for 30 years she
07:18
more or less was my mentor
07:20
she taught me everything uh I needed to
07:23
know to be a good
07:25
uh thorough genealogist my hobby has
07:28
been
07:29
uh family tree research uh practically
07:32
all of my life
07:34
and uh it really inspired my
07:37
um interest in the history of Belvidere
07:40
Plain
07:42
so Mortimer J. Adler he
07:46
is um a well-known editor
07:49
in New York circles back in the day
#mortimeradler
6
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
07:52
and it struck me as very odd that he
07:56
wrote a book
07:58
entitled How to Read a Book
08:01
and uh I’d never seen anything like that
08:04
before so I read it
08:06
cover to cover and I’ll give you the uh
08:09
I’ll give you the cliff notes he
08:11
essentially
08:13
is um asking
08:16
us as as the readers to
08:20
imbibe every aspect
08:24
of every book that we read don't just
08:26
open it and start reading page one
08:29
start at the fly leaf on the cover
08:32
start uh with the um
08:36
publisher page publishing page
08:39
read every line in the table of contents
08:44
he really wants us to treat every book
08:46
like a fine bottle of wine
08:49
savor every sip and so
08:54
I thought that was appropriate for this
08:56
morning's talk because
08:58
the same uh rules can apply to postcards
09:03
we need to not just see them for
09:06
a picture or a quick note but
09:10
there's a lot more there's a lot more
7
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
09:12
behind it
09:14
and we can start with
09:18
postage stamps now
09:21
if a postcard is 150 years
09:25
old then
09:28
the first stamp that was designed for a
09:31
postcard
09:32
the one penny stamp in 1926
09:37
means that an awful lot of postcards got
09:40
shipped um before and after
09:45
for a penny and in fact it wasn't until
09:47
1952
09:49
that the rate went up so
09:53
if you see a postcard with a one penny
09:55
stamp on it
09:57
it's not going to be too too helpful
10:00
because
10:00
there's um there's a 75
10:05
year period there where where they
10:09
posted for one cents you get
10:12
luckier from 1952 on because
10:16
postal rates seemed to outpace inflation
10:21
and they kept going up and
10:24
in fact if you see for example
10:27
a postcard with seven
10:30
cents on the stamp you can actually
#1926
#1952
8
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
10:36
tell yourself you can actually date that
10:39
postcard to
10:40
three months in 1975.
10:44
so as you see the dating methodology
10:48
becomes much clearer
10:51
the later you get now at some point and
10:54
I don't know when this was
10:56
but probably in the 2000s
11:00
um these became these stamps became
11:04
forever stamps
11:05
so I don't know if 2006
11:09
is um applies but if you see a postcard
11:13
with a forever stamp
11:14
that's 24 cents it could have been
11:17
posted last week
11:19
I mean they last forever
11:22
um here's an example of
11:26
an early I think 1902
11:30
one cent Franklin stamp so you'll see a
11:33
lot of these
11:34
on postcards I think Lady Liberty is on
11:38
one
11:40
in 1952 it went to two cents
11:44
but uh this is an early two cent stamp
11:47
from 1902
11:49
which you would not have seen on a
9
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
11:51
postcard
11:55
so going by Mortimer J. Adler’s
11:59
methodology what are all the ways that
12:02
we can
12:03
um partake of postcards
12:07
we know there's a picture on the front
12:09
side
12:11
if we're lucky we see a really beautiful
12:17
post mark on the back here's Falmouth
12:20
Mass
12:20
July 28th 1pm
12:24
1943. uh
12:27
you can't get any better than that um
12:31
another thing you can determine from a
12:33
postcard oh and by the way
12:34
see the one Lady Liberty stamp here
12:38
um obviously we've got until 1952 before
12:42
that goes up
12:43
to two cents published by E.D. West
12:46
Company
12:47
South Yarmouth Mass you can actually go
12:51
on eBay or you know your favorite flea
12:54
market
12:55
and collect postcards
12:58
that were published by E.D. West
13:01
there are a number of different
10
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
13:03
companies you can collect all of them
13:05
and they oftentimes will
13:08
number them so you can
13:11
collect them in sequence once in a while
13:15
you can also
13:16
identify the photographer
13:19
that's a little bit tricky you sort of
13:21
have to
13:22
find his body of work first and then
13:26
tie it in to a postcard
13:30
the other things that postcards tell you
13:33
are
13:34
the sender and
13:37
the recipient those are sometimes
13:42
fascinating and this particular one
13:46
tells you that is that the vacationer
13:50
stayed at the Catalpa Cottage on Shore
#shorestreet
Gunning_Village_Sts_0080 through
0084
Hunt_Village_Sts_171 & 172
13:52
Street
13:53
in Falmouth um in July of 1943
13:59
so uh if you happen to
14:02
live at that address you might
14:05
know Cokie and
14:08
Mrs. Carl Gulchmark
11
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
14:12
Riverside Drive New York City
14:16
so as you can
14:20
see there are many many interesting
14:22
aspects
14:23
to a postcard
14:28
this is the earliest postcard
14:31
in my collection um
14:36
I date it to 1905.
14:39
it shows Belvidere Plain in the
14:41
foreground
14:42
these um these
14:46
beetle shaped roof lines
14:50
they were probably practical to
14:54
have wind off the beach go right over
14:57
the house
15:00
though not very successful because
15:03
in 1938 these two
15:06
were knocked off their foundation by the
15:10
hurricane
15:10
this one still stands at the tail end of
15:13
Spinnaker Lane
15:16
one thing you'll notice about early
15:17
postcards 1900 maybe to 1910
15:22
is that the um the pictures
15:26
do not extend to the boundary of the
Variant from the Hunt collection:
Hunt_Village_Har_113
#1938
#hurricane
#spinnakerlane
12
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
15:29
paper
15:30
that's a function of the technology they
15:33
once they got very popular they quickly
15:36
learned how to print these
15:40
by bleeding the photograph off the edge
15:43
of the of the
15:44
card
15:48
and this is another trick that you can
15:51
try
15:52
with I use a photo editing software
15:56
called Adobe
15:57
Photoshop and I can take that same
16:00
postcard
16:02
get rid of the arrow where the sender
16:05
was staying
16:06
get rid of an ink mark
16:10
clean it up brighten it up and
16:15
make it presentable for and in my case
16:18
for the book that I was
16:20
publishing
16:23
you need a good scanner and you need a
16:24
good software program
16:26
I highly recommend Adobe products
16:31
here is a postcard taken from the Old
#oldstonedock
Variant from the Gunning collection:
Gunning_Village_Har_0180
13
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
Other postcards of this site:
Gunning_Village_Har_0173 through
0188
Hunt_Village_Bch_0089 through
0095
16:34
Stone Dock
16:35
in Falmouth which used to be Falmouth’s
16:37
harbor
16:38
at the end of Shore Street and you see
16:41
the same view
16:42
the um the
16:47
houses here along the beach in Belvidere
16:49
Plain you can see
16:50
Falmouth Heights in the distance
16:54
a couple of young boys running down the
16:57
jetty
16:58
and some sailboats again this would need
17:01
to be heavily cleaned up
17:03
I don't think I used this one in the
17:05
book I used another
17:06
copy that I found that was much cleaner
17:11
oh this must be it
17:14
and what I would do is just brighten it
17:16
up so that when it's printed in the book
17:18
it's um it's uh
17:22
it becomes clearer and
14
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
17:26
black and white versus this is scanned
17:29
in color
17:37
this is a picture of the old harbor
17:41
from the other side and oops and
17:46
there's a nice little um
17:50
note here please send as usual to last
17:53
address
17:53
by Tuesday if possible E.B.
17:58
Salandin he was probably looking for a
18:01
rent
18:02
of his on his summer cottage
18:08
I include this photograph of the
18:11
Heights from around the same time period
18:14
19
18:15
1905 because uh you can see
18:19
from uh perspective from a different
18:23
perspective
18:24
at the end of this long wooden wharf
18:27
the Butler house that was in the first
18:30
photograph that I shared with you
18:33
this is the Tower House Hotel
#towerhousehotel
Gunning_Heights_Bldg_1207
through 1210, 1217 through 1223
Hunt_Heights_Bldg_244 through
251
18:37
which I think came down in about 19
18:41
50 Jill Jill’ll know better
15
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
18:44
on that excuse me
18:49
excuse me for a minute I had to get a
18:52
drink of water
18:53
so in this photograph you can see
18:56
the windmill
19:00
that was on the old Waterside estate
19:04
and you can also see
19:07
the Weinberg house here so
19:10
that was built in I think 1914
19:14
and it looks pretty new the wood looks
19:16
clean
19:17
so I would date this postcard to
19:22
1914.
19:26
let's take a look at the next one
19:29
it is the mouth of the harbor being
#waterside
#weinberg
Variants from the Hunt & Gunning
collections:
Hunt_Village_Bch_084,
Gunning_Village_Har_0190 & 191
Similar cards:
Gunning_Heights_Pnd_1311 &
1312
19:33
dredged by the
19:35
barge Wollaston and
19:38
it was colorized obviously and
19:41
we can also see that by 1910
19:45
the pictures are bleeding
19:48
off the edge of the postcard there's
#1910
16
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
19:52
our focal point that always tells us
19:55
where we are
19:56
the Butler house on the uh
20:00
on the end of Falmouth Heights
20:03
this by the way was Clinton Road
20:07
Clinton Avenue used to uh run right
20:10
across
20:11
here and that's essentially what they're
20:13
digging away
20:14
is the spit of land
20:18
across which was Clinton
20:23
this is a really great photograph that
20:26
shows
20:27
in perfect detail
20:30
that activity in 1919 you can see the
20:34
name on the
20:35
barge here the Wollaston and these two
20:39
were dredging the harbor there are a
20:42
number of
20:44
aspects to this photograph that
20:47
helped to date it this is the William
20:50
Wyman
20:51
house on the edge of the harbor
20:54
this is the tower on
20:58
11 Wheeling Avenue which
21:01
came down in
#clintonavenue
#1919
#wheelingavenue
17
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
21:09
I believe around 1913
21:12
so we know that
21:15
this was taller this used to be taller
21:20
in its day um this house number four
21:24
Wheeling Avenue
21:25
burned to the ground I’d have to look up
21:28
the actual
21:29
year that that happened number one
21:31
Wheeling Avenue
21:34
this is 20 Tim Nye's Cartway
21:38
16 Tim Nye's Cartway those
21:41
are the houses in which I grew up as a
21:43
boy
21:46
and this is the
21:50
back end of 151 Clinton Avenue which
21:54
sits on the
21:54
edge of Tim Nye’s Cartway and this
21:58
is the house on the at the foot of
22:00
Sheridan Avenue
22:01
on Clinton Avenue on the corner of
22:04
Clinton
22:05
and Sheridan and you can see how all of
22:08
this
22:08
land was vacant at that
22:12
time so when the family who lived
22:15
in our family homes
#timnyecartway
#sheridanavenue
18
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
22:18
was here in 19
22:22
up until 1925 they had
22:26
a beautiful uninterrupted view of the
22:29
harbor this
22:32
house here
22:39
is
22:45
um I can't think of the family's name
22:48
but this is also gone
22:50
and has been replaced by
22:53
a new house if I think of it I’ll
22:56
mention it
22:57
later postcards were
23:00
also made from
23:03
pictures from photographs that you could
23:06
mail into a company and they'll return
23:10
back to you
23:11
a set of 10 or 20.
23:15
this happens to have been a photograph
23:19
taken by a member of the Lowry family
23:22
Mrs. Lowry was Bill Wyman's mother
23:25
and this house front and center is
23:29
43 Harrisburg it's now been moved right
23:32
up to the water
23:34
this is the Tim Nye Cartway house that
23:38
my family moved to in 1967.
23:46
this is number one Wheeling Avenue on
19
#lowry
#harrisburgavenue
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
23:50
the corner of Girard
#girardavenue
23:52
this is the old Lowry house with the
23:55
tower
23:56
this uh house is number four Wheeling
23:59
Avenue that burned
24:00
to the ground and it's gone you can
24:03
still see some
24:05
you can still see some concrete
24:07
foundation
24:08
markers there unless they've been
24:11
removed recently
24:13
and this is one of the
24:17
uh beetle shaped homes that
24:20
was knocked off its foundation by the
24:24
hurricane in 1938 so that
24:27
is now gone and it's a private private
24:29
community beach
24:32
here are the two homes that were knocked
24:34
off their foundation
24:36
they're both uh they're both gone they
24:39
must have been beautiful
24:41
beautiful homes right on the beach again
24:46
this is a photograph that was turned
24:47
into a postcard
24:49
there are notes and stamps on the back
24:56
this is a similar view probably
20
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
25:00
around 1914 you can see
25:04
some familiar structures these are the
25:06
two
25:08
Wheeling Avenue homes that were
25:11
destroyed
25:12
and this is the Weinberg
25:16
house on Girard Avenue
25:19
um brand spanking new I would say
25:23
the uh the wood looks still looks bright
25:25
and clean
25:27
it hasn't aged so this postcard is very
25:31
likely
25:32
1915 1914
25:36
and uh there's a nice wooden pier here
25:39
that
25:41
that is no longer there
25:45
same view um showing a better
25:49
perspective
25:50
on the houses on the at the end of
25:54
Harrisburg um this is the Drummond house
25:58
now
26:01
this is the Burns house again the homes
26:05
on Wheeling Avenue the two
26:07
I don't know why I want to call them
26:08
eyebrow houses but the two
26:11
beetle beetle houses on Wheeling Avenue
21
#drummond
#burns
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
26:15
and the Weinberg home
26:20
it's a beautiful beach my father loved
26:22
this beach
26:24
he used to this is the uh now
26:27
this is now the the neighborhood
26:32
beach where this house used to be and my
26:34
father would sit there and
26:36
say to me where he said to me one day
26:40
how could you believe that God doesn't
26:42
exist when
26:43
he created such beauty as this beach
26:48
he was he was enraptured
26:53
this is a fascinating shot it took me a
26:56
while
26:57
to stare at this photograph
27:00
to understand what exactly I was looking
27:03
at
27:05
but it clearly says Deacon's Pond Harbor
27:08
the fleet at anchor Falmouth Heights
27:11
Mass so here's the harbor um
27:14
it has access to the ocean but
27:17
it doesn't really look like this is
27:20
where
27:20
Falmouth Heights should be and it took
27:24
me
Variant from the Hunt collection:
Hunt_Heights_Har_314
22
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
27:25
a little while to determine that the
27:27
publisher had reversed the shot
27:30
so when we turn this around
27:34
you will see this makes sense
27:37
here are the two beetle houses on the
27:41
end of Wheeling Avenue
27:42
here is the Wyman house the jetty at the
27:46
end of the harbor
27:47
here's the where the Clam Shack is
27:51
at the tail end of Clinton Avenue
27:55
and um this is the
27:58
house that I’m trying to remember the
28:00
name of
28:02
and it will come to me
28:06
this house I don't recognize but
28:09
uh one of you may or Jill might be able
28:12
to help us out
28:13
a house with two little outbuildings
28:17
a little further down on Scranton
28:21
so I wouldn't be as familiar with it but
28:24
I’m sure
28:26
I’m sure we'll get it identified and in
28:29
in the uh
28:31
in this shot you can see the same house
28:34
with the two out buildings
28:36
somewhere down along Scranton Avenue
#scrantonavenue
23
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
28:40
um if you find out
28:44
let me know I’d like to know who that is
28:47
I skipped past this one but I do want to
28:51
point out that this is Waterside
28:54
at the end of Shore Street at the beach
28:58
where you turn that 90 degree turn
29:03
along the public beach there I don't
29:06
quite
29:07
recognize these homes but
29:10
with a little further analysis I’m sure
29:12
we could figure them out
29:15
and this home here is across
Hunt_Village_Bldg_068 & 69
Gunning_Village_Bldg_0417
29:19
Shore Street on the other side and it
29:21
belonged at the time
29:23
to an old Navy man named Richard Olney
29:27
there's probably quite a bit written
29:29
about him
29:31
that you can look up at the library
29:35
it's a nice shot colorized obviously
29:43
I love this shot it must have been taken
29:46
right after the harbor was dredged
29:47
because these two jetties look brand new
29:50
they still look like piles of rock
29:52
and uh the beach is still kind of taking
24
#richardolney
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
29:56
the contour
29:57
of where the old spit of land used to be
30:02
this is all fill very clearly all
30:05
fill um
30:08
this house someone
30:12
can identify for us on Falmouth Heights
30:16
I don't recognize it but I’m sure it's
30:18
been gone for a very long time
30:20
and just out of frame here would be the
30:25
Butler house our our point of reference
30:29
on on Falmouth Heights
30:32
oh and it even says new harbor so that's
30:35
a brand spanking new
30:37
photograph 1919 in 1919
30:44
um this
30:47
is a photograph not a postcard but a
30:51
photograph
30:52
that a neighbor sent to me taken from an
30:56
airplane
30:57
you can see Falmouth Harbor
31:02
Clinton Ave Clinton Avenue has been cut
31:05
so this is uh post 19
31:09
19 1920 maybe and you can see Clinton
31:13
Avenue here
31:15
uh this house on what is now Settlers
31:18
Path
#settlerspath
25
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
31:20
is brand new so I’m guessing 1920s for
31:25
sure
31:27
and this is the little inlet
31:30
at the mouth of Falmouth Harbor I
31:35
blew it up a little to get a better view
31:38
but obviously the plane was shaking so
31:41
whoever took the photograph
31:42
had to contend with a little vibration
31:48
you can see the columnated building here
31:52
which I forget what that
31:55
was but we'll be able to identify that
32:06
this is Harrisburg this
32:09
is Timothy Nye’s Cartway
32:12
Clinton Avenue this house
32:16
um uh Vivian Center lived in for years
32:20
and years and years and I interviewed
32:22
her
32:22
for my book as I did
32:26
um many of these residents
32:30
and you can see the Butler house right
32:33
here
32:35
and the Tower Hotel
32:39
it's too bad it's really too bad that
32:41
this wasn't clear
32:42
because it's just an amazing old shot
32:44
that you just wouldn't see
26
#viviancenter
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
32:46
otherwise
32:51
this photograph um was taken about 1920
32:55
by Theodore
32:57
Gerloff the father of Miss Anna Gerloff
32:59
who was quite
33:00
elderly when I uh knew her
33:04
in the late 1900s
33:09
but it was probably taken um right after
33:12
this house was built
33:14
on Harrisburg Lane
33:17
you can see the roof line of the
33:21
two beetle-shaped houses that were blown
33:24
down in 1938
33:27
you can see the tower here on the Lowry
33:30
house has been
33:31
brought down in height
33:38
this is one of my favorites again um
33:42
1920 these two big sloops here you can
33:45
see a couple of old
33:48
Model T's that were still hanging around
33:51
and this house which is the big
33:55
yellow mansion that belonged to
33:58
to [Dr. K Leland] for many years
34:03
I believe that went up in 1920
34:09
so
#gerloff
Variant from the Hunt collection:
Hunt_Village_Har_111
Sp. unknown. May be “Kay” for Dr.
Katherine Leland.
27
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
34:12
let's see I’ve got my I believe that one
34:16
up in 1920 so we can date
34:20
we can date the postcard
34:23
if it didn't have a postmark on the back
34:26
to about that period
34:36
and this is a similar shot this was one
34:38
where
34:39
um you know I mentioned that all aspects
34:43
of the postcard are
34:44
are fascinating and this one was
34:48
kind of fun because it was from
34:51
one young sailor to a friend back home
34:56
and uh he's he
34:59
says he wrote dear Newbold
35:02
we're having a fine time up here and
35:05
wish you were near us
35:07
will you come to lunch when we get home
35:10
Bayard Kane Fox posted 1935
35:16
and addressed to Master
35:20
Newbold Black
35:23
two school school chums keeping in touch
35:26
with one another
35:32
and um I wanted to show this
35:36
circa 1952 aerial shot
35:39
of Falmouth Harbor
35:43
this is the Butler house this is the
28
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
35:47
Yacht Club the Tides Motel
#tidesmotel
35:50
Belvidere Plain pretty much encompasses
35:54
this entire
35:55
flat land uh
35:58
and you can see even even by 1952
36:02
standards
36:03
quite a lot was not yet developed
36:05
there's a lot
36:06
of open land and in
36:10
in the early days in the 1800s
36:14
people would buy lots along
36:17
Clinton Avenue that stretched in long
36:20
rectangles
36:21
all the way back to Main Street so a lot
36:24
of these lots if you follow their
36:26
history they go back
36:29
from Clinton Avenue to
36:33
Main Street and the Belvidere Plain
36:38
as we saw from the early development map
36:41
probably stopped at King at
#kingstreet
36:45
Queen Street and everything
#queenstreet
36:48
beyond would fall under the
36:52
classification of Falmouth Center
36:58
this is a closer view you can start to
37:00
see some of the houses
37:02
that are familiar in
29
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
37:06
on Belvidere Plain this is the Robertson
37:08
house
37:11
this is the um
37:14
Regatta the Regatta
37:17
Hotel this is the Regatta restaurant
37:24
it's a nice clear shot I’m not sure
37:26
where I got it I probably bought it on
37:27
eBay
37:30
and then that this is a close-up Clinton
37:33
Avenue
37:34
this is Sheridan Avenue
37:38
this is the Wyman house
37:49
and then I wanted to uh just add in this
37:52
um
37:53
later view probably 1950ish 1945
37:57
maybe shows the Butler house um
38:01
the the uh
38:05
oh the old sailor what is this name
38:07
begins with the letter g
38:10
Gallagher Gallagher used to live in this
38:12
house next to the Yacht Club
38:14
and the um
38:18
Tower House Hotel
38:24
so in 2003
38:28
I believe I published
38:32
the stories of the various families
#robertson
#regatta
30
#gallagher
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
38:35
who lived on Belvidere Plain
38:38
and I included photographs and chapters
38:41
on each of their houses
38:43
and I did research on a lot of the
38:48
titles land titles the deeds that passed
38:53
and put it all together into uh
38:56
into book form published it
39:02
I was very uh very happy to get it
39:05
in print because I had talked to a good
39:09
many neighbors and had scraps of paper
39:13
you know from my various interviews
39:17
with them it really was a fascinating
39:19
hobby I started when I was
39:22
probably 13 or 14
39:26
and I loved just loved hearing
39:29
stories of the history of the
39:32
neighborhood
39:36
oh and I want to show you this postcard
39:38
because the cover of my book
39:40
see these green shutters and red roof
39:43
uh comes from this postcard
Variants from the Hunt & Gunning
collections:
Gunning_Village_Har_0172
Hunt_Village_Bch_079
39:47
so obviously I oh and you know I think
39:51
the back cover
39:52
this extends to the back cover this
31
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
39:54
would be the spine
39:56
and this is the front cover of the book
39:59
this is a
39:59
this is another one of my favorite
40:02
postcards
40:05
um this book is
40:08
out of print there are no there are no
40:11
more copies although you can
40:16
read it at the Falmouth Public Library
40:18
they have they have a copy
40:21
but I I expanded it
40:25
and re-published it
40:29
in 2018
40:33
with this cover
40:36
um no slip cover
40:39
just a hard cover book and called it The
40:43
Belvidere Plain
40:44
Revisited it's approximately
40:48
twice the number of pages
40:51
quite a few more photographs and a
40:53
number of new stories
40:55
from people who um
40:58
who let me know that I forgot about them
41:02
in the first
41:04
in the first printing so we got him in
41:08
to this one and I think that's
32
#thebelvidereplainrevisited
�Falmouth Public Library – Postcards from Falmouth
41:11
it ah here's the
41:14
author as a young man 1967.
41:20
um when we first when my family first
41:24
arrived
41:26
in Falmouth
41:35
[Music]
#1967
33
�
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Transcript of Gus Widmayer's Zoom Presentation on the Belvidere Plain
1870
1872
1910
1919
1926
1938
1952
1967
author talk
Belvidere Plain
Burns
Butler
Clinton Avenue
Deacon's Pond
Drummond
Falmouth Harbor
Falmouth Heights
Falmouth Yacht Club
Gallagher
Gerloff
Girard Avenue
Gus Widmayer
Harrisburg Avenue
hurricane
king street
lowry
mortimer adler
Old Stone Dock
Postcards from Falmouth
queen street
regatta
richard olney
robertson
scranton avenue
settlers path
sheridan avenue
Shore Street
spinnaker lane
the belvidere plain revisited
tides motel
tim nye cartway
tower house hotel
transcript
vineyard sound
vivian center
waterside
weinberg
wheeling avenue
wyman