Here are some brief thoughts on recent happenings in Franklin County and the North Quabbin region.
Museum curators never know where their next gift will come from but they know that treasures are still out there, like the iconic Boston Post gold-headed canes, a tradition that dates back to 1909, when the Boston Post newspaper awarded canes to the oldest person in every town in Massachusetts, to be passed down from one recipient to the next.
Over the course of more than a century, many of these canes have gone missing; others are replicas of the originals. But recently the Swift River Valley Historical Society Museum in New Salem hit the jackpot when Charlie Hunting of Greenfield donated the real thing. Hunting’s great-grandfather, Frank E. Stevens was the last recipient from the town of Dana before it was flooded in 1938 to create the Quabbin Reservoir (along with the towns of Enfield, Greenwich and Prescott). Thus was the chain of recipients broken by the Metropolitan Water District Commission, which subsumed the quaint village in a watery abyss. Hunting said it was in his family’s possession in 1947, when Stevens was 96 years old.
Curator and historian Elizabeth Peirce, 96, accepted the cane on behalf of the society, noting it also possesses the cane from the town of Enfield. While the locations of the Boston Post canes from Greenwich and Prescott remain unknown, Hunting and Dot Frye, the historical society’s administrative assistant, said they hope they will be found.
“Some day, all four of them are going to be together,” Hunting said.
Eateries in the center of Orange got a business boost with an outdoor dining area conceived and executed by citizen volunteers. Polly Bixby and Karen Grzesik came up with the idea in July after purchasing coffee and scones from the Corner Cafe and having to enjoy their items while standing on the sidewalk. With indoor dining limited due to coronavirus restrictions, Bixby and Grzesik eyed the parking lot in the center of town and envisioned what could be done with a half-dozen spaces: Tables with umbrellas, benches and colorful planters came to mind. Town Administrator Gabriele Voelker was all in, and Janice Lanou joined the project. “It was a community affair, basically,” Voelker said.
Seemingly overnight, a pocket park sprang up, attracting customers from the Corner Cafe and Quabbin Harvest Food Co-op. Other nearby eateries include The Pizza Factory, reportedly reopening soon, and Subway.
And that’s not the end of the story. Their project fit to a “T” the requirements of a new state program, Shared Streets and Spaces Program, to “conceive, design and implement tactical changes to curbs, streets, on street parking spaces and moss-street parking lots in support of public health, safe mobility and renewed commerce.” Orange was awarded $9,700, which it will use to replace the three loaned tables with five (two of which comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act) as well as five planters and flowers, three sets of umbrellas and stands, and garbage and recycling bins.
Now the space is also being used for open-air, socially distanced meetings with various town departments and committees. “It’s a community space,” Julie Davis, store manager at nearby co-op said. “It for everybody to use.”
Thus has a grass roots effort transformed a downtown.