CHESTER STREET, TRAINS AND HOBOS

I remember when I lived on Chester Street hobos would get off the trains down towards the river and would come up through the woods to ask for food. We always knew that they would come to our door and my mother would always give them something to eat. I don't know how long a period this encompassed but for quite a while. There were no other streets between us and the railroad tracks so they would get to our street first. My mother would usually give them a sandwich or just bread. They were always polite. As children my mother would tell us not to really talk with them and they never bothered us and we were never scared of them. If my mother was out for the afternoon she would tell us not to answer the door. We never called them bums, they were just guys who were hard up and starving. Jobs were hard to find and we were in a great spot for them to find us. I don't remember ever seeing them in town so they must have just gotten off the trains, come up to the houses and then gone back to the trains. It was a funny time. Those darned railroads would be going down to Boston. We had the Union Station down off Canal Street and there was another station somewhere south of that. I also remember a station somewhere around my father's office on Vine Street. I would sometimes take the train from Union Station to Boston but it was not a habit. I liked riding the train. We don't have any trains or train stations anymore. I think it is kinda sad that they are all gone. That was the time.

Chester Street was just being developed when I was growing up. My father built several of the nice houses on the street. He built the Shelton's house and the MacIdowly's. Several of the city's doctors lived up there. He also built the Clough's house - they were sorta family. They were a nice family except for Uncle Lowell who was a perfectly nice man but a drunk. All part of the Holt clan. Then they built the little brick mill houses up farther on the street. We used to scoff at them. They are really lovely little houses. There was another street somewhere with little brick mill houses. What we really didn't like about the houses on Chester Street was that they build 7 houses on six lots. In the first house lived a friend of mine who I also babysat for Betty Gautier. Her father was a manager in the mills. They were not exactly poor.