Last Saturday I was in New Hampshire. I felt like doing some meandering so thought I'd return to Gilmanton, the small town where Grace Metalious lived when Peyton Place was published. I stopped at a Rest Area/Information Center along Interstate 89 to check a map. There was an attendant but he was off to a side arranging brochures. I got a map of New Hampshire and spread it out on the counter. The attendant came over and asked if he could help
"I want to go to Gilmanton but I'm not sure what's the best way from here."
We studied the map together and decided that one way was as good as another. "What would take you to Gilmanton, if you don't mind me asking? You'll be going by both tracks!" He was a man of maybe forty-five or fifty, black hair, swarthy skin, surely of French descent, as are so many up that way; and, as for tracks, he was referring to the famous NASCAR track at Loudon and then a dog track further up the road.
"Gilmanton's the town where the woman who wrote Peyton Place lived ... Grace Metalious."
"Really? She was from Gilmanton?"
"Well, she wasn't from there but that's where she lived when she wrote the book. Her husband was the school principal ... at least until the book came out. A lot of the locals didn't appreciate how she'd portrayed the town, and her husband got fired."
"No, they wouldn't like an outlier."
"Well, she wasn't exactly what I'd call an outlier. She was born and grew up just down the road in Manchester."
"Oh, up here we don't even consider that to be part of New Hampshire. Anything below Concord is just part of Massachusetts as far as we're concerned."
He was serious. "You're kidding me!"
"Most of them are from Massachusetts anyway. And they're just different! For instance, my nearest neighbor is two-and-a-half miles way, and I wouldn't want one any closer. But them people down below Concord don't care; they'll build a house almost right on top of you. They don't appreciate independence and privacy."
"Oh." Part of the live free or die mentality maybe.
"By the way another author lived not far from here," he said. "Robert Frost's farm is down in Derry."
"I've been there before. It's nothing much to see. Frost wasn't even a published poet when he lived there. He moved from Derry to England and that's where he became famous. After four years or so he came back to the states as a famous poet and bought a farm up north in Plymouth."
"Really? He went to England to become famous? That's like Jimi Hendrix! He went to England to become famous too."
"Well, I don't think that connection ever crossed my mind, but I guess you're right."
I was enjoying chatting with him but thought I needed to get going. Then when I got going and was 5 or 10 miles down the road I had a bunch more questions for him and wished I'd stayed longer. But Gilmanton beckoned. I didn't feel like turning back.
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| Gated entrance to Smith Meeting House (S.M.H.) Cemetery. |
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| Grace's Grave, adorned with three pennies and a cheap pen. |
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| Grave near Grace's of Charles B. Roberts, "England's Youngest Boy Orator," 1892-1992. A Roberts family in Gilmanton is politically prominent in the state, but this fellow clearly was an outlier. |
S.M.H. is usually Sydney Morning Herald in this here neck of the woods ;-)
ReplyDeleteA bunch of questions...you'd ask them of a florist...bunch of ducks...bunch of deer...I love 'a fesnyng of ferrets'! 'a kettle of hawks'...'a bunch of waterfowl'..
http://robertfrostfarm.org
I love the sketch at the top of the page...I love knowing that Frost imagination lived there...his view...
George,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your blog segment on the Smith Meeting House cemetery. I haven't lived in NH since late 1981, but was raised in Belmont (once upon a time called "Lower Gilmanton" ...no joke).
Belmont didn't incorporate until 1869, when they cooked up some cheesy scheme to flatter Augustus Belmont of NYC. They figured Belmont would reward them by cutting a check, to thank them. No dice, really no joke, again.
Anyhoo, I know several people buried there at SMHC, the Stockbridge's, the Horan's, etc.
Very strange, you mentioned Grace Metalious. I was home on leave, and I asked my pop (then we'll into his 70's) where Mrs. Metalious was buried.
George, it was like I slapped a new battery in him! His eyes became animated and he actually started to pay attention to what I was saying.
He started by mentioning he knew her, and liked her a lot. They had things in common, like they were 1st Gen Americans; with lineage to Canada.
This old man opened up his mind, George. He told me about some of the people who conned her out of money (one ran a construction company in Gilmanton). In the book, the father was having sexual relations with his teenage daughter. I guess she finally had enough, and her and her brother beat him to death with fireplace tongs. They then buried the deceased in a sheep pen, or near it. My pop told me who was who, from the book. I really wished I'd recorded that conversation.
I jumped in his truck, and we drove exactly where Mrs. Metalious was buried. Again, I was stunned.
I later went back and dropped off flowers, and snapped a photo for Findagrave.
Again, George, very ironic. I listed Charles B. Roberts grave with pic to Findagrave (still there). I didn't know him, but the fact he made it to 100 and he had an above ground sarcophagus; impressed the heck out of me.
I've tried to find out more about him, with no luck. Was he some Brit with wanderlust? Was he some financier in Boston, who declared: "I want to lay in repose in the sticks!" Etc. Who knows?
George, thank you again for your interesting segment.
Cheers!
Mitch Ryder