There’s no feeling like stumbling onto a gold mine of historical information like the Item morgue folder stuffed with yellowed articles detailing the life and times of Harry N. Atwood. Historian Lou Gallo told me Atwood’s history-making story and his historic connection to Saugus and Swampscott.
By all accounts, Atwood was one of those aviation pioneers a century ago who had a personality to match his high-flying exploits. He is credited with making the first air mail delivery on May 30, 1912, when he flew from Franklin Field in Saugus bordering North Revere to over Lynn where he dropped a “mail packet” out of his airplane in the vicinity of the Lynn post office.
According to an Item story, the packet contained one letter addressed to E.L. Clark of Lynn. Atwood, who lived in Swampscott, set long distance flight records across the country, flying an aircraft built in the Wright Brothers’ Ohio shop, and flew a “death-defying” route over Manhattan, crossing just 80 feet above the Singer Building and “waving to spectators gathered on Wall Street.”
After crashing a plane into Lynn Harbor months before his mail exploit, Atwood asked for a cigar and later quipped, “It’s rather too chilly for sea bathing.” Quite the character.
Gallo said Atwood was also given rare permission to land on the White House lawn where he met President Taft, but managed to avoid carrying the corpulent Commander in Chief into the skies.
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Speaking of a lot of people crowded into one place, I’m always amazed by the stories of big local families, including my in-laws who grew up packed into a little house on Carnes Street or my friends, Frank and Helen Clements, who raised a small army of children in their diminutive Nahant home. Frank built beds for the kids and it’s no wonder John, after bunking his way through childhood, ended up in the Navy.
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The Porthole Restaurant’s demise has faded from the news but it is sad to see Lynn lose another family gathering place. Nandee’s, the Porthole and other locations were once gathering places for events marking the big moments in people’s lives ranging from weddings, to birthdays and graduations. A resident expert recalled how the former Hotel Edison hosted sports banquets in its basement and the Hawthorne, when it was a going concern on Oxford Street, hosted club and organization gatherings.
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Several informed sources urged me to recall in print such fine former establishments as Burger Boy and Lickin’ Chicken and the days when you could scoop crawfish out of Strawberry Brook off Boston Street. Speaking of Boston Street, anyone remember the former Volkswagen dealership located approximately where the Burger King is located today?
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Mentor and great Lynner Ralph Nelson reminds me that Oct. 28 marks the 40th anniversary of President Carter’s visit to Lynn. “It was quite a show,” he recalled, “There was a real who’s who of the Democratic establishment on the steps of City Hall.”
It’s hard to recall Carter and not remember (providing you are more than 40 years old) the nuclear-free movement and the intangible and frightening prospect of global nuclear war with the Soviet Union.
I can remember my dad talking about how my late Uncle Vince urged my grandmother to sandbag her basement during the Cuban Missile Crisis and Butchie Barnes will tell you how Civil Defense standard-issue supplies were in the Lynn City Hall sub basement until recent years.
Dr. Helen Caldicott, an international voice in the freeze movement, spoke in Swampscott in 1984 where the late great Nick Mavroules received an award from freeze advocates.
