Rough pencil sketch with info and notations provided by Chet.
It was the basis for later drawings of the Grove.
The driveway goes in and turns and the tennis courts are on the right. That's about where the dance pavilion was... [The cookhouse was about at the backside of] Bartlett's house.
See, we came in here [off Claybrook Road] by the little ticket office. This is where Bartlett's house and garage is now. And see, we had the cookhouse right there. That's the pavilion.. this is the cookhouse here...
The opening where they used to play was about where Bartlett's garden is now with the hedge around it. When you come in the little driveway that was the open place..
They didn't take out too many big pine trees at the time. They stand pretty well.. I wouldn't think [there are any traces of that still there.] Not where they've built the tennis courts and all..
There was a old dutchman in South Natick named Fritz Bickman and he had a
steam boat .. run by a steam boiler like ... He used to come down to the
Grove and take people out ... like a concession.. Fritz was his first name..
Buchman... B-U-C-H-M-A-N... they spelled it.. but we called him Fritz Bickman
. And he'd come down there with the steamboat and he'd charge so much for
a ride up and down the river while the parties were going on at the Grove.
Oh, [it would carry] about a half a dozen. It wasn't a very big.. The steam
boiler was as big as the boat. Bring you up around the bend like to Dover
[Bakers] bridge and back again..
RV- Tell me about the Ice House..
The ice house belonged to Ben Sawin. He called it the Dover Ice Company.... and he peddled ice here around Dover ...
It was on Claybrook Road where the Holovak's house sets now. As you'd go in this upper end of Holovak's driveway, the ice house run practically parallel to Claybrook Road and it faced the river like. I think the walls were double walls and they were filled with sawdust in between.... It was a building bigger than my barn...... I think there were two doors on the front of it that they could get the ice out of. It was a big building.
Those days they used to use a steam boiler for power to operate the machine before the days of the gas engines. And he had a long platform on the front where the ice wagons would back up to and that was about wagon level so they could just bring the ice out of the house and put em right into the wagons. He used to keep it covered with sawdust from some of the local mills and with meadow hay that he cut in the meadows. ..That ice used to last well into summer. Practically until the new crop'd come in the winter.. the next winter they'd try to have it even..
NOTE:
Before I started tape recording my conversations with Chet I talked to him
several times at great length about old Dover. I always regretted that I
didn't have the foresight to tape those conversations too, but as they say...
Hindsight is 20/20. Fortunately I did keep detailed written notes and summarized
everything he told me. Usually I stopped in the car on the way home so I
could scribble it all down while everything was fresh in my mind. In retrospect,
I guess that was the next best thing to a tape recording.
Following is a summary of my written notes of what Chet told me about Ben Sawin:
Gow's house was the Sawin house. That was the only house around there except for Heinlein's and Cummer's house.
Sawin's ice house was where Holovak's house is.. extended from close to the edge of the river to about where present house entrance steps are. It was sited in about the same direction as the house. A ramp led down into the river and they used to pull the ice up this ramp with the aid of a steam powered engine and winch. There was a separate tool house shack about where they park the cars at the side rear of the house.
They could drive teams through this land to get to a meadow peninsula that extended into the river. The photo of Ben Sawin haying this meadow was taken by people who came to the meadow by canoe. The ice was cut in the part of the river where the current was not strong, in the lee of the meadow peninsula.
The entrance to Sawin's Grove was about where the break in the present stone wall is now adjacent to the river bank. There were no houses or formal gardens there at that time. The walls were just dry field stone walls all along the front of the Grove. The road was just a narrow dirt country road.
Horses and carriages entered and people walked in at an entrance near the river. Bought tickets at the ticket booth for a very little money and went on into the Grove. Tied up horses in a grove of white grey birch trees.
The Cookhouse or eating house was about 12' X 20' ("about the size of the white garage now (1975) on the opposite side of the road") This had an iron stove inside and was used for cooking food to be eaten at the Grove. There was a spring near the edge of the river nearby at the bottom of a steep bank between the cookhouse and the river. The spring was used for drinking water. Water bubbled out of the ground in dry weather when the river was low. At high water times the spring was flooded. Canoeists also stopped here for water.
There were cleared areas of country land used for playfields and games at picnics and outings. People made their own fun and games. He remembers going there with his family at annual Grange outings and that type of affair. He does not have any recollection of the Grove being used at night because they would have had no lights. He remembers it as being for daytime activities even the "dance pavilion". He was only eight or nine at the time, 1902 to 1903. Sawin died in 1905 so Chet thinks the Grove was discontinued about that time.
When Honeywell and Bartlett bought the land they built the houses and planted the gardens and cleared etc. The cookhouse was about at the back end of where Bartlett's house is now.
There was a big swing on a hickory tree by the river and another smaller
one for little kids a little farther away from the river.
Rough pencil sketch with info and notations provided by Chet.
It was the basis for later drawings of the Grove.
The Dance Pavilion was located endwise to Trout Brook. (We looked in the Bartlett's driveway and Chet thinks it was just beyond the end of the driveway and into the place where there are evergreen trees now.) He remembers the land where the pine grove is near the street as a sandy and gravelly hill.
The pavilion was about 25' X 50' with sides and ends open from window sill height. It was really just a roof over a floor. The lowere sides were boarded in but there were no shingles. There was a raised stage at one end (see sketch) and maybe there was a full height wall directly behind it.
He remembers that the Knowlton and Allen Orchestra from Natick played there. His father's first cousin Frank Heinlein played the base viol in that orchestra.
People came via street railway from Needham and Natick and got off at Turtle Lane/Main Street on Dover Road and walked from there up Main Street and around by Claybrook. There was a big tree in the triangle at Main and Claybrook at that time.
At Sawin's Grove food often was brought from home all cooked and was kept warm on the stove in the cookhouse. Ham, smoked shoulder, baked beans (farm grown) and frankforts. People ate outside on rough camp type tables and chairs or mostly on ground on blankets etc.
The photo of Ben Sawin in the river hay meadow came to him from the Sawin housekeeper after Ben died. She was friendly with the Heinleins and there were Heinlein relatives in the photo. Photo by canoeist. But how did the picture get to Sawin. Told Chet I plan to copy that picture as it captures the life of the times.
Songs of the day included:
'Goodnight Ladies'
'In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree'
'In the Good Old Summertime'
'Old Grey Bonnet'
Musical instruments he remembers:
Big drum, base viol with bow, fiddles.
Thinks they must have had a horn like a cornet.
Boats:
The canoes at that time were canvas on wood frames.
Colors were not as bright as today - more traditional dark greens and red
and blue
Clothing:
Men wore vest and loose fitting shirt with button cuffs and tie, farmer shirts
like mattress ticking ... color blue and white like milkman.... suspenders,
soft collar... dark colors suits.
Ladies wore long skirts and full petticoats with dark colors
Kids wore their Sunday best which was not that good.
Families came as groups. Kids were on good behavior.
Buildings were rough and unpainted. They were weathered wood. The Grove was near its end when he remembers it. The buildings stood for several years after Sawin died in April 1905. Chet thinks Ben was buried on Easter in 1905. Buildings were not used after Ben died. Estate went to the Historical Society. Bartlett bought it from the DHS. Chet not sure how long the buildings stood but they came down when Bartlett built his house.
He figures the Grove was used at least in the 1890's. As a kid he thought of them as old buildings in 1900.
The Ice house and Grove would have been built after Sawin moved into his house about 1847?.