Sometimes a man can get too comfortable in familiar surroundings … and err. Honestly, though, there’s no excuse. I know better.
There is no such thing as excessive fact-checking in this business, even, or maybe especially, pertaining to subjects in your own backyard. But in my own defense, 20th century dance pavilions are not high on my local-history priority list. No, my focus is on much earlier times.
My crosshairs have for many years been fixed on the colonial period and prehistory reaching all the way back to the days when our valley was submerged beneath pro-glacial Lake Hitchcock of Sugarloaf Beaver Myth fame. Still, I must correct the record and render this dance-pavilion question to a speck of dust on my rearview mirror.
A couple of weeks ago, in writing right here about 1930s Civilian Conservation Corps construction of the current road to Sugarloaf’s summit — and the dynamite blasting it required — I placed the old dance pavilion between the foot of that road and left field of the Little League diamond along Sugarloaf Street. Well, I was wrong, though not too far off — maybe a couple hundred feet, max. Hey. What’s a couple hundred feet among friends?
The first person to chime in was old friend Phil Allard, who shows up from time to time on my caller-ID, usually regarding much earlier historical topics. He said he was confused by my placement of the pavilion, that the building remains I referred to nestled behind the left-field fence of the youth baseball diamond were what’s left of the old Lankowski homestead, where dance teacher June Lankowski once lived. The pavilion was on the other side of the Sugarloaf road to the summit, situated on a shelf overlooking Route 116. The only remnants are piled cement slabs.
“Hmmmm? I remember June Lankowski,” I told Allard. “I attended her downtown ballroom-dancing classes in the ’60s, up in the old Red Men’s Hall.”
“Yes,” he said, “she moved to Eastern Avenue. Before that, she lived in that house that’s no longer standing on the end of Sugarloaf Street, right above the parking place.”
OK, I got it. Almost a generation older than me, Phil usually has his facts straight, so I had little doubt that he was correct. Still, I wanted confirmation and knew exactly who to call. My source was Paul Grabowski, a state Department of Conservation and Recreation employee who’s more times than not stationed at Mount Sugarloaf. A New Jersey native, Grabowski has developed a keen interest in Sugarloaf that has led him on many intriguing research diversions about an iconic and distinctive Pioneer Valley landmark that’s become part of his and many others’ consciousness since the peopling of the region.
When I identified my topic of inquiry, his knee-jerk reaction was, “Wow, you must have ESP. I have been meaning to call you about that pavilion. Your buddy is right. It was on the other side of the road. To tell you the truth, I was first told it was where you placed it, but when I researched it, I discovered it was on the other side of the road.”
He knew nothing of the Lankowski home, the footprint of which I got to know more than 50 years ago while hunting baseballs hit over the fence. Later hearing of a dance pavilion, and probably even running it past my late father at some point, I either closed-mindedly assumed or was told that the Lankowski-home’s footprint behind the left-field fence was it, and never gave it a second thought. Maybe my father and others believed that was the site, too, although I cannot say that for sure. The pavilion has been gone for many years and the two sites sit close enough to easily create confusion, especially when you don’t even know you’re confused.
“(The late) Ed Crafts had fond memories of that pavilion,” said David “Bud” Driver when, on a whim, queried earlier this week in passing. “He said they had dances and picnics and weddings there … even boxing matches (between local pugilists).”
Uh-oh. Better leave that one alone. I cannot confirm it. So, let’s not go there in an effort to avoid any possibility of another embarrassing correction related to hometown history.
Hey, these days, even the aforementioned downtown Red Men’s Hall is a mystery to most who call South Deerfield home. A three-story building located where the Deerfield Spirit Shoppe now stands, it was the headquarters of the Improved Order of Red Men’s Wequamps Tribe. My great-grandfather partied as a member there, my dad played basketball there, and I learned to dance there before the wrecking ball demolished it in short order during the early ’70s.
How many people know anything about the Red Men? I’m guessing few. Probably a great future topic, huh?
Why not?
Recorder Sports Editor Gary Sanderson is a senior-active member of the outdoor-writers associations of America and New England. Send your questions, stories about our area to him at: gsanderson@recorder.com.