Johnston Historical Society Newsletter
Vol. II, #2, November 1985
Shirley Beaune, president
Louis H. McGowan, editor

Bond Issues Pass
On November 5th Rhode Island voters went to the polls and overwhelmingly approved all bond issues that were on the ballot. This, of course, included three referenda that were particularly important to preservation in Rhode Island. Bond Issue #1, State House Renovations, Bond Issue #4, Heritage Capital Development Program, and Bond Issue #7, Agricultural Land Preservation. Thanks to Rhode Island voters for their support on these issues.

John Nanni, coordinator of the local campaign to win support for these bond issues, wishes to thank all members who gave their time passing out leaflets for this cause.

Graniteville Fire Station
On December 6, 1910, J. Fred Parker, Secretary of State for Rhode Island, signed the charter for the incorporation of "the Graniteville Volunteer Fire Association." The group was formed for "the purpose of the protection of life and property against fire, and for social benefits." The original people applying for incorporation were: George A. Carter, Timothy Rhodes, George H. Whipple, Albert Y. Thornton, John Wilding, Isaac W. Angell, Harry G. Davis, and Albert Shawcross. The early fire station (original one??) stood at the corner of Cottage St. and Putnam Pike. The existing station was erected in 1968. Permanent firemen are on duty during the day with call men handling problems after dark.
—from original charter at the Graniteville Fire Station.

(Thornton-Lafazia) House Lost
Johnston lost another old building in October: the two-story wooden dwelling at the northwest corner of Memorial Avenue and Atwood Avenue (near the library). The building may be that marked as "J. Thornton Est." on the 1870 Beers map. Last year the structure was advertised for sale in Yankee Magazine and local stories alleged it to be "17th century" and "300 years old."

The building was purchased by Stephen Mack Associates of Ashaway, R.I., who carefully dismantled and put into storage the major building components. The group expects to sell the house to someone wishing to live in an antique house, whereupon the pieces will be shipped to a new site and the building reconstructed. The company's card reads: "complete restoration services, dealer in eighteenth century houses and barns". Though Johnston has lost a house of possible historical or architectural significance, this may become one of the best researched and documented houses of the town. Mr. Mack's group had drawn a set of very detailed, professional blueprints, took many photos of the dismantling process, and wrote a six-page description of useful information concerning architecture and carpentry. Copies are being made available to the Johnston Historical Society (in return for thorough deed-chain and historical research by us); a major article will be forthcoming in this newsletter.

Executive Board
Shirley Beaune, president
Joseph Paquette, vice president
Rita Saccoccia, treasurer
Louis H. McGowan, recording secretary
Robert S. Burford, corresponding secretary

Committee Chairmen
Newsletter, Louis McGowan
House, Walter Beaune
Plaques, Joseph Paquette
Activities, Joseph Paquette and Louis McGowan
Publicity, Jean Dexter
Membership, Pat Macari
Sunshine, Gilda Perrotta

Wanted: You!
The Johnston Historical Society is a non-profit group devoted to preserving in all forms the history of the town. We are interested in the preservation of the written word, photographs, and other graphic artifacts, and historical buildings and sites. Our membership, which is open to all adults, costs $5 for an individual per year and $7 for a family. Payment of dues is expected by October 31st of each year. Our historical newsletter, which is printed every other month, is mailed to all active members. The general meeting is held monthly throughout the year at 7:30 p.m. on the fourth Monday of every month at the Farnum/Angell House, 101 Putnam Pike.

Editorial Policy
This publication is to provide: 1) timely information to the members of the Johnston Historical Society, while 2) fostering the study of local history by sharing data and reasonably researched articles about the town's heritage. Six issues will be published per year. Back issues are 75 cents per copy. The editor eagerly solicits manuscripts and notes of any length and grammatical quality (generally not to exceed 2000 words). Topics can range from history and preservation of old houses (general or specific buildings) through biographical sketches and genealogy of local families, to Johnston events, geography, archaeology, industries, clubs and organizations, to folklore and crafts of past decades. Documents and diaries of historical significance would be considered for reprinting.

Death And Funerary Art In New England: Part 1
by Robert S. Burford
In twentieth century America, death is treated differently than by our forefathers. To better understand this change in attitude toward death, it is beneficial to reflect upon how our ancestors regarded death and dying. Such understanding is useful in our interpretation of historical data. We easily forget that throughout most of history, life was hardship, poverty, disease, and starvation; death was a common occurrence in all households, rich or poor. Infant mortality was high and epidemics periodically decimated the population. Life expectancy in the early years of the New England colonies was about 35 years. Death was very much a part of everyday life, a fact with which even the youngest child was familiar. The ever-nearness of death was constantly brought home to Puritan children learning the alphabet from their New England Primer, which exhorted its readers to prepare:

G—As runs the Glass, Man's life doth pass...
T—Time cuts down all, Both great and small...
X—Xerxes the great did die, And so must you and I...
Y—Youth forward slips, Death soonest nips...

In the United States well into the nineteenth century, even burial was among the living—on farms, in town commons, in local church yards. Preparation of the body for burial was done by the family in the family's home. But about sixty years ago the practice of family members being immediately and directly responsible for the laying out of their dead stopped. As industrialization and mechanization came to all parts of American life, so too the undertaker became the specialist who came to take care of our dead. For this and other reasons, modern Americans have become removed and less touched by death physically and emotionally than earlier generations.¹

The earliest grave sites of white men in America do not come down to us well preserved. For several reasons, most graves were not adorned with permanent markers during the first years following Plymouth Rock. But gradually the idea of placing a cut stone marker over a burial site became widespread. In New England particularly, the craftsman learned to produce a headstone finely chiseled with artistic figures and cogent written thoughts. Scholars point out that these gravestones are almost our only extant examples of early colonial artwork.

Revolutionary change, quickly apparent to anyone who begins to look at New England graveyards, occurred in a very few years around 1800. Stones cut before 1800 may be portrait stones; they may show skulls and crossbones, skeletons, a winged soul, a body in a casket, idealized cherubim, or individualized cherubim; they may be decorated with symbols of mortality, symbols of fertility, vegetable symbols, hearts, flowers, vines, sunbursts, sunflowers, hourglasses, or clocks.

All of this vanished with surprising suddenness after 1800. The stereotyped urn-and-willow design is suddenly found all over New England. It was replaced in turn by the ubiquitous marble tablet bearing no pictorial decoration... An urn-and-willow design dated before 1795 is a great rarity, as is any of the old styles executed after 1805.

Thus Andrew Kull describes the three major periods of this American folk art in his useful 1975 guide, New England Cemeteries. Though Mr. Kull's comments are a good starting point, he greatly oversimplifies. Recent studies of gravestone art suggest that the simple and easy answers have been accepted too long, many being little better than guesses. Numerous stones can be found which do not fit into any of the three "periods" described.

Strangely neglected by real scholarship until just the past several decades, gravestone art is currently being reassessed by a new generation of workers who are reconsidering such points as the artistic influences on gravestone motifs, the possible religious and genealogical reliability of gravestone data, methods used by the stonecutters to produce particular effects, and biographical background of individual men casually or professionally involved in this art form. Recent research has questioned some old conclusions and is developing new interpretations. Take a fictitious example:

A particular gravestone, marking the burial of a make-believe person, "John Jones of Rehoboth, 1743-1811," had long been assumed to have been cut by a local stonecutter in 1811. But researchers studying documents like diaries, probate court records, etc., as well as physical evidence like the artisan's initials on the stone, pieced together another story. It seems that the stone was cut on Long Island in 1827 by a well-known family of stonecutters and was erected to Jones' memory by his children. The same avenues of research might just as well have shown that the stone was paid for and cut in 1798, by a Boston stonecutter using imported English stone; Jones' wife had just died that year and Jones ordered a matching pair, as he looked forward to his own death. (This illustrates "post-" and "pre-dating" of stones, so that data and motif can more correctly be evaluated.)

The symbolism of gravestone designs is an interesting topic, yet it is an elusive subject because the intended meanings can rarely be documented with hard evidence. A researcher almost never finds that a stonecutter has written that he cut a rocking chair because Smith found great peace when sitting in one, or that links of chain signify eternal life, that we are bound by life and death and life-after-death. But some comments can be made with reasonable assurance concerning the meaning of some motifs, in particular, the Willow Tree.

The symbolic connection of the Willow Tree design with Sorrow has been shown by some to come from the Bible, Psalm 137, which is a lament of the people of Israel who have been taken away into slavery.

By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down,
Yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion.
We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.
For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song;
And they that wasted us required of us mirth,
Saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.
How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?

Other cultures have also associated the willow with sorrow: "according to a (Greek) legend, Niobe at the loss of her children was so disconsolate that she was changed into a willow-tree."²

The willow-tree symbol may also have other happier connotations, such as life after death or eternal salvation. "The godly, says the psalmist, 'shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season' (Psalm I, 3). His soul shall be plentifully fed from heaven with the never-failing influences of grace and consolation, whereby he shall be made fruitful in every good word and work."³

In parts of Europe where ancient graves remain undisturbed, urns and trees are common. "Urns, now pots for growing plants, once served as burial receptacles for bones and ashes... Willow, cyress, and yew trees are thought appropriate for graveyards. The willow's pendent branches express sorrow..."⁴

1. "Historical Perspectives", Death and Dying: Challenge and Change, (Addison-Wesley, 1978), edited by Robert Fulton, et al.
2. Biren Bonnerjea, Dictionary of Superstitions and Mythology, (Singing Tree press, 1969 reprint of 1927 ed.).
3. Cruden's Explanations cited in G. A. Gaskell's Dictionary of All Scriptures and Myths, (Crown Publishers, 1960).
4. Funk and Wagnall's Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology, and Legend, (1949), v.I., p.464.

Bibliography

• Benes, Peter. Masks of Orthodoxy, (University of Massachusetts Press, 1977).
• Benes, Peter (editor) Puritan Gravestone Art: Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife Annual Proceedings, 1976. (Boston University, 1977).
• ---, Puritan Gravestone Art II: ...Annual Proceedings 1978.
• Coffin, Margaret. Death in Early America, (Thomas Nelson, 1976).
• Forbes, Harriette M. Gravestones of Early New England, (1927; several rpts).
• Gillon, Edmund V. Early New England Gravestone Rubbings, (Dover, 1966).
• Lord, Priscilla Folk Arts and Crafts of New England, (Chilton Books, 1965).
• Ludwig, Allan I. Graven Images, (Wesleyan University Press, 1966).
• Miner, George L. "Types of Early New England Gravestones", R.I. Historical Society Collections, XII, # 2, (April 1919), pages 32-45.
• Tashjian, Dickran and Ann, "Gravestones of Rhode Island", R.I. History, XXVII, #2, (April 1968(, pages 33-44.
• ---, Memorials to Children of Change, (Wesleyan Univ., 1974).

Historical Teasers
Answers to last month's questions

1. The landmark that Oliver Wendell Holmes described in "The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" was the Big Elm Tree that stood near Ochee Spring at the present intersection of Hartford Avenue and Killingly Street. Holmes called the tree "perhaps THE FIRST, of the first class New England Elms." Without a doubt it was one of the largest elms in Rhode Island. In 1858, its girth one foot from the ground was forty feet and its two major branches had girths of approximately fourteen feet. It was taken down in 1873, at an estimated age of 217 years.
2. Thomas Owens was Johnston's first Town Clerk. He was elected at the meeting of June 4, 1759, at the home of Capt. John Waterman. Owens also served as the moderator of the first town meeting on April 18, 1759, which was held at Benjamin Belknap's house. This latter house still stands on Greenville Avenue at the intersection of Pine Hill Road.
3. The second annexation of Johnston land to Providence took place on April 16, 1919. It involved about forty-five acres lying south-west of Neutaconkanut Hill, and it brought Providence to its present size.

This month's questions:

1. This company probably employed more people than any other firm in Johnston's history. In 1909 over 1,000 people worked at its plant. What was its name?
2. There have been five official post offices in Johnston (each possessing its own postmaster). Where were they, what dates were they open, and who were their first postmasters?
3. The present high school in Johnston was not the first one in town. There were two others erected before this one. Where were they and for what periods were they used?

News and Reviews
The exterior of our headquarters, the Farnum/Angell House, was painted during this past October. The painting contractor was selected on the basis of cost and references. Scrapings were taken to determine the earliest colors used on the house so that the new colors would match as much as is possible.

A society member, Mary Cerra, was instrumental in acquiring a donation which has enabled us to have the house painted. The money came from an account of the Bicentennial Farnum/Angell House Committee, which is no longer in existence.

Comments so far are that the job was well done and that our home is looking good!

The Executive Board of the Johnston Historical Society met for the first time on October 19th. The board is composed of the five elected officers and will meet monthly before the general meeting to discuss society business.

This past spring three society members collaborated on a video detailing the history of the textile industry in Thornton. The project was the brainchild of Joseph Paquette, who created the work as part of an Industrial Technology course he was enrolled in at Rhode Island College. Joe produced, edited, and directed the video which was filmed at the college's film studio. Robert Burford was host for the program and Louis McGowan was guest historian. The video was shown around the state this summer on Cable T.V.

We are collecting china cups and saucers which we will use at our various functions. If anyone has cups and saucers that they are willing to donate, please let us know. It is not necessary that the cups match.

Bids are being taken for removal of a white pine tree that is standing at the south-west corner of the Farnum/Angell House. The branches of the tree have grown over the corner of the house and the roots will eventually cause damage to the foundation.

Some electrical work is needed at the Farnum/Angell House. If any members or friends know of any electricians that might want the work please contact Shirley Beaune for details.

The following items were recently donated to our archives by the Marian J. Mohr Library:

• Public Education in Rhode Island, by Charles Carroll, 1918.
• 1972 Rhode Island Yearbook.
• "Know Rhode Island", 1931 (a guide book)

On Saturday, December 8th, the Johnston Historical Society will be taking a trip to old Sturbridge Village. Bring your admission fee ($8.50) to the November meeting if you are interested in going. We will leave from the Farnum/Angell House for Sturbridge at 9:00 a.m. Bring a lunch.

On Saturday, December 7th, there will a sale of Christmas greenery at the Farnum/Angell House.

At our October 28 general meeting, a small but enthusiastic group of members spent most of the evening washing and painting the kitchen and pantry at our headquarters. Thank you to all that showed up to work.

W.C. Gill minding the steam gauges in the boiler room of the Pocasset Worsted Mill in Thornton. Gill was mill superintendent ca. 1928-'30 and served as chairman of the Johnston School Committee.

Join Today!
THINK THIS IS A GOOD NEWSLETTER? Then get your membership check mailed so you'll get the NEXT ISSUE!

You will receive this bi-monthly newsletter, PLUS: programs about local history and old time ways * cemetery clean-up and study * Society archives/library * Angell House restoration planning * Membership Committee * historic research * Hospitality Committee * history tours and trips * Historic House Plaque Project.

The Johnston Historical Society continues to do bigger and better things. But we can't continue spreading thinner and thinner. We need your support. If you are not a member, please consider joining the organization working to save something of heritage.

Special Christmas Offer: give a friend a gift membership. Your friend will receive before Christmas this copy of the NEWSLETTER in a handsome cover announcing your thoughtful Holiday present, and he or she will continue to receive the benefits of membership for one full year.

Calendar Of Events
November 25 (Monday) Johnston Historical Society GENERAL MEETING, 7:30 p.m., Farnum House, 101 Putnam Pike.
December 7 (Saturday) Sale of Christmas greenery at Farnum/Angell House, 10 a.m.-4:00 p.m.
December 8 (Saturday) Field trip to Sturbridge Village. We will leave the Farnum/Angell House at 9:00 a.m.

1985-1986 Membership Renewal Time

Johnston Historical Society
101 Putnam Pike
Johnston, RI 02919

Membership for: ___________________________(name)
___________________________________________(address)
___________________________________________(town, state, zip)

__ Renewal
__ New
__ Gift

Type: __ Individual ($5) __ Family ($7) __ Company ($14)

Membership is tax-deductible as a contribution to a non-profit educational organization.

Enclosed please find check or money order payable to JOHNSTON HISTORICAL SOCIETY for $____________. For further information, call Membership Chairman Pat Macari, tel. XXX-XXXX.