Christmas Replay #2 - Caroling in JP.

Christmas carols at Curtis Hall - 1913.

Christmas Replay #1 - The Disappearing Pine

I'm linking to a few old posts this Christmas week.

The mystery of the disappeared pine tree.

Elizabeth Bethune Campbell - Socialite, Minister's Wife and Legal Pioneer

St John's Rectory, Alveston street.



Twenty-four Alveston street is a rather architecturally busy, if not particularly notable house on Jamaica Plain’s Sumner hill. It was not present in 1884, but shows up on an 1896 property map. It was apparently built as, and today remains, the rectory of St John’s Episcopal church, which sits around the corner at the intersection of Roanoke avenue and Revere and Elm streets. While the ministers who lived in the parsonage over the years may be the subject of future articles, this on will focus on one minister’s wife - Mrs. Elizabeth Bethune Campbell.


Elizabeth Bethune Campbell - wedding picture.


Elizabeth Louisa Bethune was born in Toronto in 1880. Elizabeth’s father was a successful politician and barrister, and her mother was a popular society hostess. When Elizabeth was just four years old, her father suddenly died, leaving her mother an estate of between $40,000 and $60,000. This the widow Bethune left to the management of her brother-in-law, lawyer William Drummond Hogg. Mrs. Bethune later remarried and separated, but her inherited property was kept in trust through this temporary relationship.

Reverend Thomas Campbell - in military Chaplain's uniform.

Young Elizabeth traveled through Europe, spent time in a French convent school, and was introduced, as befitted her social standing, as a “debutante” in her late teens. After receiving the attentions of William Lyon Mackenzie King, a future prime minister of Canada, Elizabeth married Reverend Thomas Clyman Campbell, an American Episcopalian minister, in 1907. After the Toronto society wedding, the couple moved to the United States, where Reverend Campbell took a position at St John’s church in Jamaica Plain. The Campbells lived in the rectory on Alveston street for the next thirty years, raising two children, James Bethune and Elizabeth Thomasine.

At right - the Campbell children --->


During the First World War, Reverend Campbell served as a chaplain in England. The children were sent to exclusive boarding schools, with parishioner Susan Revere Chapin (great grand-daughter of Paul Revere) apparently contributing towards their tuition. James went on to earn a medical degree from Harvard, and Thomasine (as she was known) attended Barnard College and studied in Vienna.

Described as a tall, striking figure, Mrs. Campbell did not take part in the affairs of the parish, nor did she join in the local women’s clubs of the time. She spent much time in Toronto and London, England, and that brings us to her claim to fame.

In 1922, at age eighty-two, Elizabeth’s mother had deteriorated sufficiently that control of her estate was put in the hands of the Toronto General Trusts Corporation, with Elizabeth’s two older sisters appointed “committee” - guardians of a sort. When she died two years later, Elizabeth’s mother’s estate was valued at $17,450, much less than Elizabeth believed proper.

Here, Elizabeth Campbell began a long, dramatic battle to learn what had happened to her mother’s estate. Out of it came a book, Where Angels Fear to Tread, her story of her travails, and of the people she dealt with along the way. She was represented my multiple lawyers. At the time, this meant travel across the Atlantic to London, as Canada had not yet made its peaceful break with the United Kingdom as a subject state and join the British Commonwealth of Nations.

Mrs. Campbell’s two main opponents were William Drummond Hogg, her uncle and the manager of her mother’s estate following her father’s death, and the Toronto General Trusts Corporation. Hogg was a major figure in the legal world of Ontario - a world in which it seems social and familial connections lent an almost aristocratic air. Toronto General Trusts Corporation was founded by men of similar social and professional standing, pillars of the establishment of the time.

So far, we have the story of a woman of moneyed background and born into social position battling men taken from that same class. What makes Mrs. Campbell notable is that in 1930, she went before the Privy Court in London to argue her own case, and she won. Without being a barrister, and without even attending college, Mrs. Campbell became the first woman to argue a case before the Privy Court.

So Jamaica Plain has still another trailblazing woman to claim. Her trail took her out of Jamaica Plain, and indeed clear out of the United States, but she seems like a remarkable woman in any case. Whether she was uncovering and battling an injustice, or a money-driven monomaniac, is impossible to tell, but she was a trailblazer nonetheless. And all the while, her husband continued tending his flock at St. John‘s. Which just goes to show that not all the fascinating stories on Sumner Hill are found in the most architecturally impressive houses.


Resources:

Backhouse, Constance. "The Heiress versus the Establishment: The First Female Litigator Before the Privy Council."

William D. Ticknor - Publisher

Offices of Ticknor and Fields (Old Corner Book Store).





William D. Ticknor was born in Lebanon New Hampshire August 6, 1810 on the family farm. In 1827 he left for Boston to work in the brokerage house of his uncle Benjamin. By 1832, he had partnered with John Allen to form the publishing company Allen and Ticknor, which was housed in the now-famous Old Corner Book Store building.

As partners came and went, the company named changed, with Ticknor and Fields being perhaps the best remembered. From the Old Corner Book Store, they published many of the leading literary lights of New England, such as Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., as well as Mark Twain, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Horatio Alger. At a time when international copyright was not upheld, in 1842 they paid Alfred, Lord Tennyson a royalty for publishing his work, an early act of fair play in a business in which pirating of books was a common complaint on both sides of the Atlantic. While at the Old Corner Book Store, they also published the Atlantic Monthly. (For an extra credit nugget, I found a single sentence 1841 newspaper advertisement for De Quincey's Confessions of an Opium Addict). Eventually, the outgrew the location and moved to Tremont street. Over time, partners and name changes came and went, and the company eventually became part of Houghton, Osgood and Company, which later became Houghton Mifflin.

Burroughs street, 1874.


Ticknor house, Burroughs street.


In 1854, Ticknor bought land between Pond and Burroughs streets in Jamaica Plain, and built a house on the Burroughs street side. We can imagine friends like Hawthorne traveling out of the city and visiting the Ticknor home over the next decade. When Dickens came to America for a speaking tour, Ticknor was his host, and perhaps he might have visited Burroughs street as well.

[Note: I've just learned that Caroline Ticknor related a story of Dickens visiting the Ticknor house in Jamaica Plain. After the great man left the house, a shy relative followed him outside, and made a copy of the impression his foot left in the soft gravel.]

In 1862, William Ticknor journeyed south to Washington D.C. with his friend Nathaniel Hawthorne, where they met President Lincoln. In March of 1864, they set out to Washington again, in hopes that the milder weather would aid Hawthorne’s poor health. During the trip, it was Ticknor’s health that took a turn for the worse, and he died at the Continental Hotel in Philadelphia with his friend by his side. Hawthorne returned to Concord, but in a month he would be dead as well.

Ticknor and his wife, Emeline Staniford Holt had five surviving children, including three sons who went to Harvard. Howard Malcolm, Benjamin Holt and Thomas Baldwin Ticknor all went into the business. Before joining the firm, Benjamin first enlisted in the army during the Civil war, and at one time was in charge of recruiting at the Readville training camp.

Howard Ticknor lived in the family house through at least the 1880s . The 1874 map above shows the house still owned by the estate of William D. Ticknor. Son Benjamin stayed in Jamaica Plain as well, buying a lot on Harris avenue from Captain Charles Brewer. The 1874 map shows Benjamin H. Ticknor at 13 Harris avenue. Unlike his father’s house, Benjamin’s home still stands today as number 15. The small, twentieth century house that sits to the right of it was added to the same property, and now carries the address 13A.

Harris avenue, 1874.

Benjamin’s household was in interesting one. The 1880 census lists his wife, Caroline daughters Caroline, aged 13, and Edith, aged 11, as well has sister Elinor, aged 35 and brother Thomas, aged 30. To that, we can add four female domestics and one coachman. Although only two of five servants were Irish-born, two others had Irish parents, the other woman being from Newfoundland. So four women to care for six people, including the woman of the house. I think we can say that the Irish were nineteenth-century Jamaica Plain’s version of labor-saving devices.

Benjamin's daughter Caroline went on to have a career as a writer and editor. She wrote Hawthorne and His Friend (the friend being her grandfather William D. Ticknor), May Alcott, A Memoir, and Glimpses of Authors (cited above), and edited Holmes's Boston, with Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., and numerous books. In 1925, Caroline and sister Edith were still living at the house on Harris avenue.

Thanksgiving At The Zoo

Boston Daily Globe November 30, 1923


Animals in Zoo Given Thanksgiving Dinner

Codliver oil and garlic may not sound like the average person’s idea of a real Thanksgiving dinner, but they were two of the most popular dishes at the Franklin Park Zoo yesterday. Deputy Park Commissioner William P. Long, following the custom of some years, ordered a Thanksgiving dinner for the birds and beasts at the Jamaica Plain institution, and last night every one was happy, even Mutt, the hyena.

The codliver oil was for the two Polar bears, Pasha and Fatima, and the big beasts lapped the dishes dry and begged for more. As for the garlic it is Tony’s, the youngest elephant’s idea of white meat and fixin’s. Curiously enough Waddy, the other elephant, will not touch garlic, but ate the regular dinner of hay, bread and carrots with relish.

The other inmates received the “eats” which they love best. There was fruit of various sorts for the monkeys, mutton for the brown, black and grizzly bears, and so on down the long list.

Thanksgiving 1898.

Along with this somewhat pedestrian report from 1898, I'll at a link to an earlier entry - A Tale of a Turkeyless Thanksgiving.


Boston Daily Globe Nov. 25, 1898.

Thanksgiving Services of Protestant Churches at Jamaica Plain.

A union Thanksgiving service was held yesterday morning in the Universalist church on Rockview st, Jamaica Plain. It was attended by members of all the Protestant churches of Jamaica Plain, and held under the auspices of the Fraternal Council. All the members of the council - ministers of the various churches - assisted at the service, with the exception of Rev Mr Grose of the Methodist church, who was unavoidably prevented from being present.

Rev R.M. Hunt of the Baptist church read the opening responsive service. The offertory and hymn were given by Rev Mr S. Learman of the Episcopal church. Prayer was offered by Rev C.F. Dole of the Unitarian church and Rev C.L. Morgan read passages from the scriptures. Rev Mr Hildreth of the Episcopal mission of Boston read the Thanksgiving proclamation.

The sermon was preached by Rev W.R. Libby, pastor of the church. He took for his subject “Prosperity, Patriotism and Religion,” embodied in the proclamation, and said we should be thankful for the present prosperity, the genuine patriotism in the heart of the nation and the universal religion which seems to minister to our spiritual needs.

Wednesday, in response to the call of the Fraternal council, contributions of food were received by a committee appointed by the council, and yesterday more than 40 families in Jamaica Plain were provided for from the amount received.

Soldier's Memorials of Jamaica Plain

I finally got around to doing something I've been planning for a long time. I've put the soldier's memorials of Jamaica Plain on to a Google map to show their locations. Photos of the memorials can still be seen here. You'll need to zoom in to see the markers - at least until I figure out why I can't get a map of Jamaica Plain to show up here.



View Jamaica Plain Veteran's Memorials in a larger map

Veteran's Day Addition

William E. Canary Memorial, Centre street and South Huntington Avenue.




I just found another veteran memorial today, and since Veteran's Day has just passed, I figured I'd feature it rather than just add it to the existing veteran's memorial entry. I'll add these photos there as well. William E Canary served in the 101st Infantry Division, and lost his life at St. Mihiel, France, September 12th, 1918.

Colonial Megabucks!

Boston Evening Post July 20, 1761.

These are to inform the Publick

That the managers of the Roxbury lottery are now rolling the sixth class in order to draw the same on Wednesday the Fifth Day of August next; at which time they propose the Drawing said Class shall commence at the School House near Jamaica Plain in Roxbury; and such Persons as are desirous of being present at Drawing may give their Attendance at Time and Place accordingly. --- And as there are but few tickets remaining in the Managers Hands, those persons that incline to be Adventurers must buy speedily or they may be excluded. Tickets may be had of

Green & Russell in Boston

Roxbury, July 17, 1761.

Ward's Pond

Ward's Pond, Summer 2008 (click on photos to see larger images).

Ward’s Pond sits on the border of Jamaica Plain and Brookline, just north of Jamaica Pond and within Olmsted Park, one of the long links in Boston’s Emerald Necklace of parks. None of the surviving local histories or memoirs of Jamaica Plain we rely on mentions Ward’s Pond or its namesake. Perhaps the fame of Jamaica Pond overshadowed its much smaller neighbor, but as is so often the case in local history, once we start digging we unearth fascinating new stories.

First map showing Ward's Pond name - 1859.


J.Ward appears on 1852 map.

Ward’s Pond sits near the head of the Muddy River, so called, although the river was never more than a stream. It is now within a park along the Brookline Boston border, but for over 250 years was in private hands. The first map to show the name Ward’s Pond was published in 1859. The same map shows no Wards living near the pond, but two Wards are shown along Muddy River to the north. J.O. Ward is shown just south of today’s Riverway on the Brookline side, and H.S. Ward is to the east at the corner of what we now call Huntington and South Huntington avenues. An 1852 map shows a J. Ward living along Muddy River in the same area as well. With these initials go to by, we can begin to connect this Ward family to the pond that memorializes their name.

John Ward the first was born in 1626 in London and emigrated to this country. His son and grandson, Edward and Samuel the first, were born in Newton. John the second, son of Samuel, was born in 1748 in Natick, and in 1771 married Roxbury girl Martha Shed. In 1788, John – now a blacksmith – bought 44 acres of land along Muddy river from his brother-in-law James Shed. The deed gives us little to locate the precise boundaries of the lot, but it was bounded by the town line, and by land of Peleg Heath, which puts it somewhere between Muddy River and the Heath street/South Huntington avenue area. The deed also specifies that the sale is exclusive of the old mill, which may have been the old colonial grist mill that still, at that time, drew off Jamaica Pond water near Ward’s Pond to drive its wheel.

Portrait of John Ward. (Courtesy of Dean S. Bird)

Through 1805, John Ward would continue to buy land in the area from the Shed family. There are no mentions of a pond, but property boundaries on the Road to Worcester and the Road from Watertown tell us that he was buying land on the road where today’s Huntington avenue and Brookline’s Boylston street meet – we would also call it Route 9. This was the very edge of Roxbury, and directly adjacent to the old Brookline settlement of Punch Bowl, now known as Brookline Village. We can imagine that land near the village of Punch Bowl and along the busy road from Boston to the west would have made a good location for a blacksmith shop. In 1804 and 1805, John again enters the records, taking payment from the Boston Aqueduct Corporation for allowing them to lay pipe over his land. This would be the route that Jamaica Pond water would follow on its way to satisfy a thirsty Boston.

John and Martha Ward had eight children, Of those, only two daughters and one son are recorded as having survived to adulthood. Samuel, who would inherit the property, was born in September of 1772. Unlike his father, Samuel became a farmer. Samuel appears in an 1818 newspaper article reporting on a Brighton cattle show. In a plowing match on a fine October day, a yoke of oxen owned by Samuel Ward of Roxbury was awarded second prize. The story notes that farmer Ward’s team pulled the famous plow made by Jeffe Warren of Dedham. Roxbury farmers were leaders in the agricultural improvement movement of the time, so it should be no surprise that a Roxbury man was using the latest in plow technology. We also find Samuel Ward’s farming prowess cited in a history of Boston published in 1881. It states there that “The farm of Samuel Ward now belonging to the Brookline Land Company, was famous fifty years ago for its Roxbury Russet apples, often producing a thousand barrels a year; and also for cherries, of which he sent to market forty to fifty bushels daily in the season, and occasionally he dispatched a four-ox team to Providence with seventy-five bushels.”

Samuel Ward had married Joanna Bird in 1799. Joanna bore 14(!) children, few of whom are recorded to have survived to adulthood. Already mentioned are Henry Shed (H.S.) Ward and James Otis (J.O.) Ward, whose initialed names appear on the 1859 map discussed above. Henry actually died in New Hampshire at 37 in 1844. His share of the old estate would pass to his brother James, who survived him by 11 years.

James Otis Ward.

The life of James O. Ward takes us away from Jamaica Plain, but is worth remembering. As told by Dean S.Bird, a descendent on both the Ward and Bird side of the family, James Ward traveled to New York to sell the produce of his father’s farm. Remaining in New York, he became a successful businessman. After first running his own chandlery business, supplying ship owners and seaman with all their various needs, he then purchased his own ships and became a trader between New York and the West Indies. His son, James Edward Ward, founded the Ward Line, one of the largest steamship lines of its era.

Ward property plan, 1845.

When James O. Ward died in February of 1855, flags in New York harbor flew at half mast. In March of 1860, the executor of his estate sold 80 acres of land along Muddy River for $83,000 to the Brookline Land Company. The property plan shown here was drawn in 1845, and shows the Ward Farm at the time. Most of the estate at that time was in Brookline, but the name Ward’s Pond is recorded for the first time, and the pond itself sits inside the town of Roxbury. To the north, the farm extends to today’s Riverway at Brookline Village.

So now we know: the Wards lived on the old Roxbury/Brookline border, more Roxbury than Jamaica Plain residents. They did once own the land surrounding the eponymous pond, and left their name to one of Jamaica Plain’s small jewels on Boston’s Emerald Necklace.

Special thanks go out to Dean S. Bird for his many contributions to this article: family genealogy, stories, and portraits. The portrait of Samuel Ward shown here has been passed down through the Ward and Bird families, and is owned today by Dean.

Sources:

Massachusetts Spy, October 28, 1818. Brighton Cattle Show article.

The Memorial History of Boston; including Suffolk County, Massachusetts 1630-1880. Vol. 4. Samuel Ward farming citation.

Suffolk County Registry of Deeds:

162:16 – 1/8/1788. James Shed, 44 acres to John Ward.

Norfolk County Registry of Deeds:

22:61 – 7/27/1804; 22:196 – 1/7/1805. John Ward, rights to lay pipe to Boston Aqueduct Corporation.

285:1 – 3/1/1860. Estate of James O. Ward, 80 acres to John Wetherbee Jr., broker, for Brookline Land Company.