Calvin Coolidge and other things

September 30, 2024

I said goodbye to Troy, New York where I had spent the last three nights.   The Best Western is right on the river, downtown. They do a thriving business in weddings on the weekends since there is a large banquet hall/wedding venue across the street that also belongs to the hotel.   The bridesmaids and the bride have the hair done at the hotel and run up and down the halls, giggling and screaming, and then everybody goes across the street for the wedding.    The hotel also host a bus load of Danish electrician students two months out of the year as they come for the local junior college.   These young men are about as wholesome as you could possibly imagine.

I have never given it any thought, but in western Massachusetts I drove over the highest point on interstate 90, East of North Dakota! Approximately 1700 feet! Who knew?

My next stop was to the Calvin Coolidge Library and Museum, which should have meant a big whoop- de-doo.    In presidential things, the word library means the president's archives and personal papers.    What I found in North Hampton Massachusetts was a large room on the second floor of the Forbes Library,  It details a good bit of his life, but completely left out his ascension to the presidency after the death of Harding.   About the only souvenir they offered for sale is a T-shirt that says, “ I do not choose to run” Which apparently is what he said after his full term.   The library building itself is a public library.  The building would fit in very well as a Texas county courthouse.    Old, stone, very well maintained.   For an old Library, they offered jigsaw puzzles and musical instruments to check-out and they have an extensive collection of graphic novels and music on CD.   Northampton was chosen as the site as this is where he spent much of his political career, from mayor to state senator, to governor.  

From North Hampton I drove down into Connecticut and bought some gas and had lunch.   According to my personal rules, I can now say I have been to Connecticut.  I had pasta in a very nice Italian restaurant in Connecticut and would have liked to have stayed for dinner because the wine list included a German Riesling that the server said was very good.

I now pointed the car to the interstate and drove pretty much nonstop up and over Boston and into Maine.   I asked the gentleman at the visitor center to help me get a hotel. I told him my criteria was it had to be in Maine so that I could say I had been to Maine.  He liked that approach as he said he gets people who come in all the time, who walk into the visitor center, take a picture and get back in the car and go back into New Hampshire, telling themselves they’ve been to Maine.    He suggested a lighthouse and a decent restaurant where I could buy the requisite lobster roll.    I followed his instructions to the T and got a good picture of a lighthouse and a lobster roll with a very good cup of clam chowder.  The clam chowder met my Dad's standard, it was so thick my spoon almost stood up in the cup!    The lobster roll contained large chunks of tender meat.

I am back at the room, ready to go to bed, I’m pretty much intend to head from here, to Boston's Logan airport tomorrow.

I think I have gone to the Darkside as I have depended upon GPS for the last two weeks.   No paper maps, and even less idea of where I am at any given time.   I set my destination, it tells me where I currently am, and I tell it to go. It is rather scary if you think about it.

I have spent a lot of my life trying to understand electricity, television, how the heck a monarch can find my backyard; so I know I will never ever understand everything that goes into my iPhone. As far as I’m concerned, it is black magic.

Over the past two weeks I have purchased a lot of souvenir coffee mugs, and more than a couple of presidential history books.  Today I had to pay the piper! I took several bags of mugs and books into the UPS store and paid more to ship them than my hotel bill for the night! But it had to be done.  If you ever come to my house for breakfast, I will have your choice of coffee mugs and maybe even a cup of Teddy Roosevelt’s personal Bull Moose coffee!

Presidents Pierce and Coolidge

This happened September 26, 2024

I picked up the rental car from Logan airport. Another problem with third-party booking is that I’m stuck returning the car to Logan! I have changed my Southwest Airlines reservation from Hartford to Boston, but I would’ve really rather flown out of Hartford.    Sigh

Franklin Pierce’s Home is in Concord, New Hampshire.   This is the original house, but it has been moved to an historic area.   A group called the Pierce brigade, saved the house from destruction and rehabbed it to its former glory.    Pierce was our 14th president, a strict constitutionalist.  He believed slavery was wrong, but ticked off everybody in the country over the situation in Kansas, known forever more as “bleeding Kansas”  

The tree is a reminder that President Pierce had the first White House Christmas tree.

My tour guide was very knowledgeable and enthusiastic, even though by noon I was only the fifth visitor of the day. They have many interesting artifacts for the house.   President Pierce did not always have a happy life as none of his three children survived childhood.    He considered Jefferson Davis a friend since Davis had been his secretary of war and even wrote nice things to him after the war.   Peirce was not able to get nominated for reelection and saw James Buchanan take his place.  Boy, that was an improvement?!

Next, I drove forever to Plymouth, Vermont to see the birthplace and boyhood home of Calvin Coolidge.   I had planned to just wander through the visitor center, but the lady convinced me to take the walk a couple hundred feet to the village of Plymouth Notch that has been preserved, mostly.   Here I saw where he was born, grew up, was told he had just become president with the death of President Harding, and even saw the upper room over the general store, that is referred to as the summer White House.  Coolidge was a man a few words, but the visitor center has a number of his witty sayings in his own voice.   

I was very impressed with a quilt that Young Calvin made. It is still on his bed. The tour guide said it is very rare for a boy to be able to do the intricate sewing required of falling blocks.  I was impressed and intrigued because I have that quilt, with different material, that my grandmother made me many years ago.   

This is the room where Calvin‘s father administered the oath of office after Warren Harding passed away.  

I was a little late getting to Coolidge because I saw a wooden covered bridge and some foliage and a waterfall, so I just had to stop!

The Coolidge site is so remote that I had to drive about 10 miles before my GPS would reconnect and tell me how to get to Fairview, Vermont almost to the Canadian border.   You may know that I do not trust GPS, but this day I had to put my full faith in it.    Coming out of Boston, I would’ve killed myself if I had had to study a map and drive, but I just plugged it in to the car display and charged along.

I stayed the night at the Inn @ Buck Hollow Farms just a few minutes south of the president Arthur birthplace.    Very nice and cozy.   Breakfast included lemon poppy waffles with real Vermont maple syrup!

This was the view of foliage from my upstairs window.