Lillian Graves Smith’s memories of growing up in Cooksville
were written down by her son Marlowe G. Smith in an interview in 1973 that he titled
“Cooksville Vignettes.”
These may have been, as Smith
describes them, "random reminiscences…that relate the
simple day to day experiences as seen through the eyes of childhood,” but they are delightfully specific and personal from 25 years
of Lillian Graves’ early life in the village. And she lived almost to age 102.
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| Lillian Graves Smith |
Lillian Graves Smith (1875-1977) was the daughter of Anna
Brown Graves (1855-1920) and William Gardiner Graves (1825-1903). Her father
was a Civil War veteran and a prominent blacksmith in Cooksville with a large
family. They lived in several different houses
in the village, which was not uncommon in Cooksville.
Here are more excerpts from Lillian’s recollections:
“My first recollections are concerned with my home and
family on the Main Street of Cooksville adjacent to the Badfish Creek, and
across the road from Rice’s Mill [the Cooksville
Mill, 1842.Ed.] which is no longer standing…The fine old sugar maple trees
that were planted by my father are still flourishing, and I recall as a native
Vermonter, he always tapped the trees for their maple syrup…
“One of the more haunting experiences was the time that Mrs.
Towns took her own life by jumping into the mill pond. Her husband had passed
away, and she was left with three children and with little or nothing to live
on. She left a note on the table together with her wedding ring, and one dark
night she threw herself into the pond and was drowned. We all felt so badly for
the children, Annie, Jennie and Bennie. They were such nice children and bore
up bravely during this ordeal. The entire neighborhood, perhaps in tardy
fashion, felt great compassion for them, and each child was taken by friends
and neighbors. I recall that Bennie lived with the Mayo family and was brought
up as their own son. He was a very fine young man, and we all admired him.
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| McCarthy tombstone, St. Michael's Cemetery |
“A strange funeral episode is alleged to have occurred, but
I cannot substantiate it. The story was widely circulated in Cooksville when a
certain Mr. McCarthy passed away. A number of friends and relatives came to the
home for a wake, and a number of them imbibed too freely and became highly
inebriated. They insisted that the corpse must also celebrate the sad occasion,
and Mr. McCarthy’s remains were removed from the casket and two of his friends
stood him up against the wall while others poured whiskey down his throat. This
all occurred in the dead of winter with two feet of snow on the level. The
following morning, the funeral procession of horses and sleighs started on
their sad journey from the home to the church for the last rites. The coffin
occupied the lead sleigh, and for some unknown reason, the horses became
frightened and took off at an unseemly gallop and ran away. The sleigh was
tipped over, the casket dumped into the road, the corpse thrown out, and one of
the sleigh’s runners ran over the deceased. A number of people were alleged to
have witnessed this strange occurrence, but somehow, I always thought that this
truth had been more than slightly stretched in the telling.” [It is reported elsewhere that one witness
exclaimed, “He would have been killed if he weren’t already dead!” Ed.]
“The Fishers lived in the old house on Main Street now owned
by George and Eunice Mattakat, and where they operate an Antique Shop [the Cook House. Ed.] I cannot recall
Mr. Fisher who was a carpenter and millwright. We did know Mrs. Fisher some
time after her husband passed away. She was left without means and was cared
for by the Masonic Order of which her late husband was a member. There were
times when Mrs. Fisher probably went hungry, and my Mother would often send me
to her home at noon with a good dinner all prepared. I recall that Mrs. Fisher
would smack her lips, and could hardly wait until I left before eating her meal.
She was always so grateful for these little kindnesses.
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| The Red Door Antique Shop (the Cook House, built 1842) |
“I taught in Cooksville for one year when the school was so
large that it had to be divided, and I had my classes in the basement of the
church. I taught for the longest time in the Tupper District between Cooksville
and Evansville. Here I could board with my sister, Edith Searles. Even then I
had quite a distance to walk to school, and one recalls that the roads were not
paved in this days, and during winter, you had to wade through snowdrifts with
skirts that dragged on the ground. It was even worse after the spring thaw
because the road would be full of holes and mud was everywhere. I usually had
someone to build the fires in the schoolhouse during the winter, but
occasionally, I had to perform janitor services as well….some of the smaller
children would walk a great distance… in sub-zero weather and they would be
frost-bitten and chilled to the bone when they arrived. Then they would sit
close to the stove to thaw out, and soon chilblains would set in, and the poor
youngsters would cry out in pain.
“I usually received the magnificent sum of $20.00 per month
during the spring and fall terms, and if lucky, $30.00 per month during the
winter term. However, board and room averaged only $2.00 per week, so I did
manage to get along somehow. The older boys came to school during the winter
term only, as their help was required on the farm in spring and fall.
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| Ferris Wheel, Columbian Exposition, 1893 |
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| Anna Graves Witner, a sister of Lillian's |
“As I look back from my vantage point of nearly a century,
Cooksville seems a veritable oasis compared with present day urban
living…. Cooksville people were kind and considerate of others. Some would
probably call it “nosey-ness,” but there was a spirit of community and
neighborliness. There was integrity and square dealing on the part of almost
everyone. For so small an area, it is interesting to reflect that so many of
them were people of culture and refinement. Certainly, there was little or no class
distinction as I can recall. The Scandinavians came over in large numbers and
performed the hard manual labor in the fields, but we respected them for their
industry, and of course, later on, not a few of them owned the very farms where
they first worked as hired hands. . They very quickly melded into the general
population and made a major contribution to the area.
“One looks back to the Founders of Cooksville with genuine
gratitude. Here began a tradition that one only hopes extends to the present day.”
[Additional excerpts
from Lillian’s “Cooksville Vignettes” are contained in a Cooksville News Blog
story dated Dec. 7, 2016.]
