Boggastow Bunch!

The Boggastow Bunch!

Who said history isn't fun?! Meet the Boggastow Bunch, a collaborative project between the Sherborn History Center & Museum and DSHS's art teacher extraordinaire, Darren Buck and his talented pupils, Mia Lasic-Ellis (below left - painted Edith Tidmarsh Hawes) and Emerson Hirsch (below center - painted Rebecca Howe Death).

The concept: take a few photos from the collection, transform them into animated depictions, blow them up to life-size proportions, bring them to plywood life, tell their stories.

Coming soon to an event near you: Rebecca (Howe) Death, Harold Hildreth, Captain Jacob Pratt, Joseph & Martha Dowse, and Edith (Tidmarsh) Hawes, the soon-to-be-famous posse of exhumed Sherbornites, who have returned to help us celebrate birthday #350!

Mini-bios below: Research: Town Historian Betsy Johnson; Writing: Kevin Delaney

REBECCA (HOWE) DEATH

We remember Rebecca Death for two primary reasons: (1) Her last name was Death! and (2) Her last name was Death!

Just kidding, of course (are we?), but really, her surname seems to match this picture, which perhaps captures her in mourning repose. Sherborn historian Betsy Johnson says of this shot, “Her picture looks very severe, partly because she has apparently lost many or all of her teeth.” Dentistry was not the forte of her era, a span that ran from July 11th, 1786 through January 19th, 1879 (so we’re pretty sure this pic was taken before 1879 😁).

Fun facts about Mrs. R. Death:

She was born in Northboro and married Ezra of Sherborn in 1807, who was later put under guardianship as a “spendthrift”. Translation: he wasted a ton of money and officials stepped in because his family was suffering. Not good.
She had seven children and six reached adulthood. Sadly, this was a good batting average for the 19th century.
She lived at 258 South Main St.
Her kids eventually changed their last name to Dearth or Howe… any theories why?!

Another Margo Powicki find!

Dr. Blanchard had some very kind

words for her upon her, ahem, Death. ->

HAROLD HILDRETH

To older Sherbornites today, Harold Hildreth was the very definition of a stout, hard-working, old-fashioned New England farmer. Indeed, town historian Betsy Johnson remembers her father saying that Harold was the hardest worker he had ever met. In order for his family to get by, he just HAD to be, as Harold was thrust into the head of the farm role at the tender age of 14, when his pop, Irving, died of tuberculosis.

Fun facts about Mr. H. Hildreth:

Born March 7th, 1903 and died November 15th, 1986. He’s now made a permanent home at Pine Hill Cemetery.
Married Leta (Meigs) Miett in 1926, had a stepson Lloyd, two other sons, Albert and Irving, and a daughter Evelyn, who died just after her first birthday.
Harold worked the lands of Pleasant View Farm (Pleasant St) and loved horses. In fact, he kept a working team through most of his life, and preferred them to a tractor (which he also used, especially for haying).
Raised dairy cows and sold milk & butter to local buyers, including Sunshine Dairy.
Late town historian Peg Buntin remembered that when she and Harold’s sisters were in grade school, they all brought their own lunches. The Hildreth girls had to eat sandwiches without butter – which Peg thought was very mean of Harold (Town Historian Johnson: “It’s likely that butter was one of the few products the family could raise that they could sell to get cash for paying necessary bills.”)
Harold and his family continued to use the 3-holer outhouse their entire lives—the only running water they had was the kitchen sink. Now THAT’S old school!!

CAPT. JACOB PRATT

Captain Jacob Pratt started breathing on April 25th, 1806, the offspring of Henry and Hannah (Whitney) Pratt. His parents had 13 total children, of which Jacob was #9 (or #8, his parents couldn’t keep track🧐). A sharp lad with an eye for the mechanical, later in life Jacob invented an improved, hand-held corn planter, and in 1852, devised a horseradish grater as well. So the next time you spoon out some horseradish, we ask that you take a moment and silently recall Jacob’s ingenuity.

Fun facts about Jacob (and many are decidedly un-fun…)

Married three times: #1 Mary Ann (Hooker) died 1840, age 34; #2 Phebe (Whitney) Hill, died 1874 age 71; #3 Mary Ann (Mann) Bullen Blish, died 1912 age 98.
Lived at #35 Farm Road
Had multiple children, several of whom died tragically young: Eleanor, Mary, Theodore P. Samuel L., Lorenzo (died young), Lorenzo, Phebe Ann (died young). Theodore (died in Civil War), Phebe Ann (died young), Jacob (died young). My goodness, it’s impossible to imagine the persistent heartache that Jacob and his family endured.
Owned a silk mill on his farm (very rare and very cool). Probably raised mulberry trees & silkworms and produced silk thread.
Served as a Captain in the 4th Regiment Infantry, 1st Brigade, third Company Massachusetts Militia (resigned 1832).
Designed the elaborate gardens at #8 Washington Street, and Pine Hill Cemetery, where he now rests with so many of his family.
Mentor to William Bradford Homer Dowse, one of Sherb’s most notable citizens. Said Dowse in his memoir: “[Capt. Pratt taught this] growing boy the valuable lesson which he never forgot that nothing came to one without a struggle and that whatever was worth doing or having required work.” Big hat-tip there.

JOSEPH JR. AND MARTHA (CHAMBERLAIN) DOWSE

Take a stroll through Pine Hill Cemetery and it seems everywhere you turn there’s a Dowse. And, of course, that’s a name that lives on at Dowse’s Orchards, purveyors of the very best sweet cider in the world (the author’s not-so-humble opinion 🍎). In addition to their famed name, Joseph and Martha have the distinction of being the earliest Sherbornites known captured by a newfangled imaging contraption called - wait for it - the CAMERA! Yes, the Sherborn History Center and Museum’s earliest photo, called a daguerreotype, dates to 1858 (and is the basis of this Boggastow Bunch likeness).

Fun facts about Joseph and Martha:

He was born in 1794, she, 1800. They married in 1819 and had six kids: Martha Ann, Joseph 3rd, Rebecca (who died young), Rebecca Perry, Charles Dort, and Emily Augusta.
He died in 1873, she in 1876. Both are in Plain Burial Ground, that small graveyard on the right as you drive towards Laurel Farm field on Rt. 27.
Joseph made stagecoach whips, the best early 19thC way to stylishly travel, which included the luxury of having an actual roof over your head (thick blankets served as the heating system, so [not] comfy).
Martha had a sister named Thankful! Martha was very thankful that Thankful married Joseph’s brother, Benjamin. Did they double date on long carriage rides to Farm Lake? We like to think so!

EDITH (TIDMARSH) HAWES

Edith definitely lived an interesting and unique life. Born in South Africa in 1868, she grew up 7,798 miles from Sherbs in Kimberley, where she met and later married Alfred Hawes in 1888.

With her husband, a Sherborn native who was 20 years her senior, the couple had a child named Alfred Arthur, in 1893. They soon decided to cross the Atlantic and set up a home in Sherborn, where they ran the town store, which doubled as the Post Office (it was located where the Peace Memorial is, and later across the street in the center of the V where routes 16 and 27 split).

When Edith’s husband took ill and died in 1906, she stepped up and became postmistress, a position she held for a Sherborn record-setting 32 years! Oral history suggests she was both highly competent and very well liked.

Edith died in 1938 and now spends most of her post-life in Pine Hill Cemetery.

Darren Buck, the mad scientist behind the BB's resurrection!