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Marion Jeannette Beaton Grant: The First 80 Years
Part 3: Hershey Bar Dreams |
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by Colin Edmund Grant
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10
As was the case for many people, things changed dramatically with the depression. The Beaton's problems began in 1929.
Albert (Marion's father) had been working in advertising and doing quite well at it. Unfortunately, it was a very demanding job, and he was working at least 60 hours a week, and seemed hardly ever to be home. Annie, with the growing family, needed him at home at least some of the time, and had some things around the house that needed a man's hand, so they agreed he would quit the advertising job, spend some time at home, and then get a new, less demanding job. Albert resigned and came home.
Soon thereafter, the stock market crashed, and decent jobs quickly became almost non-existent. It also turned out that Albert was not exactly gifted at fixing things around the house, so life became a real struggle as they tried to maintain a home and feed the growing family. Albert continued looking for work appropriate to a man of his station (he refused to take a menial job), but was essentially unemployed for the next ten years. The family was dirt poor, barely surviving on his veteran's pension and loans from Grandma.
Meanwhile, it was time for Marion to start school. She did not attend kindergarten because it was thought that the walk was too far and too dangerous (and it never occurred to anyone to walk her to school), so she went right into the first grade at the Ann Hutchinson Elementary School. Since the family moved around, she attended not only the Hutchinson School but the Stephen M. Weld School and the Longfellow School. She liked most of her teachers, especially Miss Hurley in the second grade. Oddly enough, her favorite teacher was one who was never actually HER teacher at all.
Miss Brennan, of the Longfellow School, had several of the Beaton children for students, but never Marion. By good fortune, Miss Brennan lived next door to Gram MacEachen, just a couple of blocks from the Beaton home. And Miss Brennan not only seemed to own every children's book ever printed, she was happy to lend them to Marion, a voracious reader. For years, Marion would visit Gram MacEachen and then Miss Brennan every Saturday, swapping books and enjoying wonderful talks with the kindly and nurturing Miss Brennan.
Marion seemed to have a new best friend each year, partly because it just developed that way, and partly because they moved fairly often. There was Virginia Burke in third grade, who she still lives on Seymour Street, and who was a close friend for many years. There was Marie Fralli, a blond Italian girl, who was considered to be positively exotic (An Italian! A blonde!). There was Peggy McCann and her sister Jane, who is friends with sister Adrienne even now. In fact, when Jane's daughter needed a heart transplant in 2005 at the same time that Marion's daughter Carolyn was dying from a brain tumor, Marion offered Carolyn's heart, but they could not take a heart from someone with cancer.
Marion liked elementary school. She had friends, and she loved to learn, and life was interesting, which has always been a high standard for and high praise from Marion. But not everything was rosy. She had occasional problems with certain kids, and especially remembers a girl named Marjorie Vangemmert. Marion had to pass Marjorie's house on the way to and from school, and Marjorie , although "half my size," used to regularly pound on Marion. Marjorie was obviously quite unhappy about something, and one day Marion asked, "What did I ever do to you?" To Marion's great surprise, Marjorie responded that Marion was tall and pretty and smart and had everything and therefore deserved to be beaten up. Marion was shocked, aware only that she was tall; that she had any other admirable qualities was news to her! But they managed to iron things out -- "I had to do SOMETHING since I had to pass her house twice every day" -- and they eventually became "tolerable friends."
And as nice as school was, and as much as she was happy with her brothers and sisters and mother and father, life was rough. They had enough to eat, but just barely. They had clothes, but not many or very nice ones. Marion's wildest fantasy was to have an entire Hershey bar to herself, rather than having to split it six ways.
This is a five pound Hershey bar (my wife's hands are
included to provide scale) that I gave to Ma for her
80th birthday. I thank my friend Dave, who, upon
hearing the Hershey bar anecdote, found the massive
chocolate and immediately contributed it to the cause.
Albert spent almost all of 1933 and 1934 in the Rutland Sanitarium with a relapse of TB, and the family scraped by on the veteran's pension. When Albert got out of the sanitarium and was well enough to work, he tried his hand at various jobs, but had little success. One job involved the selling of books door to door. The set of books was called Forward March, and they were about WWI. The Disabled American Veterans had created the books and made them available for veterans to sell as a way to make money. (The books were full of horrible pictures and the kids were not supposed to look in them.) He may have sold one or two books; it was not a big success. For 10 or 11 years, the Beatons were just dirt poor. Christmas seemed to rub it all in. Marion, born on Christmas Eve, seemed to always get gypped on presents, really getting only Christmas gifts, while her siblings got something on their birthdays and on Christmas. On some Christmases and on some birthdays, there was simply nothing. During one of the Sanitarium years, each child received a 5 cent harmonica and nothing else; there was not even a Christmas tree. After that, however, Gram MacEachen and her sisters, Aunt Kate and Aunt Mary, always made sure that there was some sort of Christmas for the kids. Marion remembers realizing as she grew up that "without them [Gram MacEachen, Aunt Kate and Aunt Mary], Christmas would never have been Christmas." The grandparents were constantly lending money so the family could survive, although every nickel had to be paid back. Aunt Kate, who had been a good and successful businesswoman, was also kind in lending money and support, and even made many of the clothes for the family. This was especially fortunate, since, as Marion's brother Hugh recently observed, "Mamma [Annie Beaton] had no more fashion sense than the trees." (Poor Aunt Kate had done very well, but had her savings in three banks, all of which went bankrupt during the Depression. She ended up living quite modestly with Gram MacEachen.) Despite the dire state of affairs, they managed to actually purchase their own home in 1934. It seems that the family who owned the home at 121 Walter Street in Roslindale had decided to put the house up for sale. Walter Street was nothing special, unpaved, without sidewalks, and hardly more than a dirt path, but the house itself was large, solid and pretty. The sellers were worried that the house might not sell at all, given the economy. They instructed the brokers to accept the first offer that included a down payment. Annie's mother (Marion's grandmother) lent Annie $10, and she made the down payment on an offer of $3,400. They qualified for a loan because Albert had the veteran's pension, and the family happily moved in. This (below) is 121 Walter Street on January 6, 2006.
The Beaton kids lived there until they grew up and moved on; Albert and Annie stayed there for almost their entire lives. Over time, Walter Street was paved, widened, had sidewalks added, became a stylish address, went out of style, and was gentrified. By the time Annie went into a nursing home in about 2001, and the family finally sold the house, it was again a beautiful home in a beautiful neighborhood. 121 Walter Street was a wonderful place. For all the worries about Daddy, and for all the lack of material goods, Marion found home to be safe, cozy, happy, and populated by her brothers and sisters, who were smart and funny and fun; it was a good place to be. The family always seemed to have some old car in which they'd take long drives on Sundays, even if they never could have an actual summer vacation away from home. Marion had clever and interesting friends, and lots to do, and could hop on the trolley for a major adventure in downtown Boston when she could scrape up a pair of nickels. Marion spent much of her time in those years as assistant mother. When one of her siblings had to learn a new bus route to a new school, Marion would show them the way. If there was trouble at school, Marion might well show up either in the role of threatening big sister (to accost a bully) or as adjunct mother (to speak with a teacher -- she knew them all, it seems). Marion was even trusted with such tasks as delivering the mortgage payment to the bank. In later years, it occurred to her that this role -- her brother Hugh calls it the "Little Mother Superior" role -- may have been a bit of an imposition by Annie, but Marion was quite happy with the job then. All in all, while some nice shoes and an occasional Hershey bar would have been nice, life was good. Click Part 4 below to continue. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 |
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