Ward Hitchcock with his horse and wagon in 1948. Ward and his wife Martha, also called Mattie, lived on their farm on Round Top on Route 1. They had two children: a daughter, Marion Emily Hitchcock, and a son, Alton Hitchcock. The little girl in the back of the wagon was Ward and Martha Hitchcock’s granddaughter, Connie Colwell, of Waldoboro. (Photo courtesy Calvin Dodge collection)
Once again this past week I went through another old box containing a large amount of notes and handwritten notes written down by Kathleen Cooper. Many of these letters or notes were just held together by a paperclip or in an old envelope with a note written on the outside with questions she wanted to ask her neighbors about the history of the area when Winfield and Kathleen Cooper bought their new home, then called Knowlton Farms, in 1943.
One of these envelopes contained a number of notes and questions.
Kathleen wrote down that looking out from the kitchen window on the east side of the house, there was a very large elm tree which was over three feet through. It completely covered the house and provided wonderful shade in the summer months.
Kathleen went on to say that there was one very large limb that needed to be removed because it had died. This large limb hung out over the so called back house, which they used before they had Carrol Ludwig build them a new bathroom.
In her notes, Kathleen wrote that her husband Winfield found out their neighbor, who lived just across the road, was a farmer who also did tree work as a sideline.
So Winfield hired Ward Hitchcock to come over on a Saturday morning and use a wooden ladder to place a rope around the limb so it could be pulled away from doing any damage while Ward cut the limb into pieces.
According to Kathleen, when the job was safely done and the wooden ladder put away in the barn, she asked Winfield to invite Ward Hitchcock to come in and enjoy a hot cup of coffee and a couple of homemade molasses doughnuts she had just made.
When Ward started to eat his second molasses doughnut, Kathleen refilled his coffee cup and asked about his family and wife and children. Ward Hitchcock started off saying his parents were Rufus Hitchcock and Emily Martin Hitchcock. He went on to say he grew up as a boy right on the farm where he lived. Then he married his wife Martha or “Mattie.” Her parents were Elmer E. and Ethel Rollins Stetson, of Bremen.
Ward went on to say he and Mattie built a new house and barn on land across the street from where they lived. Their home, barn, and chicken house were built on land that belonged to Ward’s parents.
On their new farm they raised dairy cattle, sheep, hogs, and hens, and Ward said he did extra jobs to bring in extra money. They had two children, a son, Alton, and a daughter, Marion Emily, born in Damariscotta on May 10, 1914. They both went to the one-room grammar school that sat on land next to their home of their grandparents, Rufus and Emily Hitchcock. It was called the Hawthorne School.
When doing some research, I found Marion Emily Hitchcock in Lincoln Academy’s 1931 Lincolnian. She was called “Tartar,” according to the Lincolnian, and her intentions included going to Gorham Normal School. She was also listed as a freshman in the 1928 Lincolnian.
Alton Hitchcock was born in 1916 and also attended the Hawthorne School, grade one through eight. His teacher was Miss Rema Stevens.
Now checking back to Kathleen’s notes, Ward Hitchcock said when his father passed away his mother, Emily Hitchcock, wanted Ward and Mattie, to take over and run the family farm. After talking it over, Ward and Mattie agreed to move back across the road with their two children.
After a few years they decided to sell the new farmhouse and barn and chicken house and some of the land. According to Kathleen’s notes, Ward Hitchcock said when Castner School opened in 1927, they closed the Hawthorne School, and the school building and land went back to the Hitchcock family.
Ward Hitchcock said at that time he and his wife had eight milking cows, two young heifers, a dozen sheep, two hogs, and a chicken house full of egg-laying hens.
He had decided to make the schoolhouse into a slaughterhouse and do some butchering of cattle, sheep, and hogs. Ward Hitchcock said this was one of many jobs he did to make a living for his family.
Marion Emily Hitchcock stands behind 2-year-old Marjorie A. Cooper and 5-year-old Llewellyn Cooper and playmate Carolyn Denny on a sled at Round Top Farms during the winter of 1932. Marion Hitchcock was babysitting the children that day. (Photo courtesy Calvin Dodge collection)
He went on to say he caught and sold live bait to the local ice fishermen in the area. He went smelt fishing on Great Salt Bay and sold the fresh smelt to local stores and shipped them to the Boston fish market by sail. He did tree work. He picked up cans and bottles and cashed them in at the local stores.
He also ran a trap line to catch fur bearing animals to sell the hides for extra money. He cut and hauled block ice for area farmers and for his own farm where he had an ice house. He used the ice in his milk cooler where he kept his five and 10 gallon cans of milk.
Ward and Mattie sold milk and cream to local people. They also sold eggs and fresh butchered chicken for extra cash. Mattie sold braided rugs as well as hooked rugs and embroidered needlework. She also did some baking of bread and pies.
She also worked for Kathleen and Winfield Cooper at their auction business and helped run the copying machine that printed flyers for Winfield Cooper’s auctions.
Ward Hitchcock said they always had a large vegetable garden. They would raise all kinds of vegetables and always raised a crop of solider beans which they dried and stored in the barn where he would often thrash out and clear the soldier bean free of dust and chaff for his wife to bake on any Saturday.
Mattie Hitchcock also canned all kinds of vegetables and different kinds of pickles for winter and spring use. Ward told Kathleen he loved to make sauerkraut from the cabbage they raised in their garden and they stored it in a large covered crock for winter use. Ward said Mattie made all kinds of jams and jellies also.
Ward went on to say they always slaughtered a pig in the fall and had the meat smoked, salted, and cured, as well as all the bacon. They had all the pork salted and stored in a large crock to be used for frying out pork scraps, or to be used when baking a pot of baked beans for their Saturday night meal.
In Kathleen’s notes, she asked Ward what was his favorite dinner meal. She reports Ward answered, “I guess I am a true New Englander. My Saturday baked bean supper with all the fixings. That is a big plate of baked beans, with a slice of pork, dish of sauerkraut, homemade buttermilk biscuits made from the buttermilk left over when my wife Mattie made her sweet butter, and also a slice of ham or hotdogs.
“That meal will really stick to your ribs. I also like a Sunday breakfast with warmed up beans and ham, and a toasted biscuit with homemade butter and some jam or jelly and a good strong cup of coffee. I even like a baked bean sandwich during the day on Mattie’s homemade bread.”
Ward went on to say he had a team of horses and his mother used to drive them to town in her small carriage.
From left: Winfield Cooper, Kathleen Cooper, Mattie Hitchcock, and Beatrice Barstow print flyers on a mimeograph copier in 1945 in the Cooper kitchen on Round Top. The Coopers bought the former Knowlton Farm in 1943. We have many copies of the auction flyers and photos of Winfields Cooper auctions. (Photo courtesy Calvin Dodge collection)
Ward went on to say, “Kathleen I have to tell you a true story. My mother learned to drive a car which they bought. My wife Mattie one day went with my mother in her car to go downtown. When coming back she turned in to the driveway a little too fast and headed right for the barn door. She screamed, ‘Woo-woo’ and my wife Mattie screamed, ‘Put your foot on the brakes!’ and with a quick action my mother did and the car just softly came up against the large sliding barn doors.”
Ward told Kathleen he was blessed to have a wife who always worked beside him on the farm and around the house and kept him in clean clothes and warm wool socks that she often knit for him to wear in his rubber boots in the wintertime, or when dressing out an animal.
Mattie Hitchcock also wrote a weekly newspaper item in The Lincoln County News each week on Round Top events. I have one in my collection which was printed on Dec. 18, 1958 which read, “Ward and son Alton Hitchcock were on Louds Island Tuesday dressing two pigs for Cecil Prior.”
On July 31, 1958 Mattie wrote, “Ward Hitchcock and son butchered a veal calf belonging to Ward dressing 149 pounds at five weeks old. …Westley Oliver of Jefferson was here Saturday having Ward Hitchcock dress a pig for him.”
Mattie Hitchcock also told Kathleen Cooper that Ward would always slaughter and dress a spring lamb and she would bake a leg of lamb with all the fixings for their Easter dinner. Mattie often said they were blessed for they never went hungry for want of food on their farm.
When my wife Marjorie was a young girl about the age of 13, Mattie gave Marjorie a beautiful handmade quilt to put on her bed when they moved into their home here on Round Top in 1943.
Ward Hitchcock also worked as a janitor at the schoolhouse which was located next to his farm. The Damariscotta town report of 1927 recorded he was paid $102 for that year and also received $7.02 for shoveling snow. I have the 1927 town report that was sent to Ward with a 2 cent stamp on it. It is still in good shape at 97 years old.
I truly hope that this story gives the Damariscotta Historical Society a true life history of Ward and Mattie Hitchcock, their daughter Marion Emily, and their son Alton.
Please take time to enjoy each day and take a good walk and breathe in all the fresh air and check on your older neighbors.
