Happy Birthday Frank Waldo and Norma Mae

Mabelle's Story

 This story is signed and dated by Mabelle Davis on February 1, 1978. It was undoubtedly transcribed and typed by Frank.

"This story was told to me, Mabelle Willard Davis, by my grandmother, Nellie Crockett Willard, when I was a small child. My grandmother, if living, would be about 125 years old and this story is about Nellie's father Zephaniah Decrow Crockett."

Zephaniah Decrow Crockett was born 6/18/1837 on Deer Isle, Maine and died 1/5/1908 in South Portland, Maine. He is buried in Mount Plesant Cemetery in South Portland.

"My Great-grandfather lived on what is now called West High Street in South Portland. There were no paved streets then, just wheel tracks or tote roads. Whenever they were traveling anywhere, either on foot or by horse and wagon, the men always took along their muskets because of the Indians."

"It seemed that my Great-grandfather had had some trouble with an old Chief who had told him, "I will kill you if I ever get the chance."

"One day Great-grandfather Zephaniah was taking his corn to the mill to be ground into meal. As he walked along through the woods, he saw the old Chief asleep under a tree and realized that he had dozed off while waiting to ambush him. My Great-grandfather knew that if he did not take advantage of this chance to kill the old Chief, the Chief would surely kill him at the next opportunity. Realizing that firing his gun would alert the rest of the tribe, he sneaked up to the tree and hit him over the head with his musket. He put the Chief into his own canoe, filled it with rocks, pushed it out into deep water and sank it."

"About two days passed and when the Chief did not return to his tribe, they began a search for him, Great-Grandfather Zephaniah realized that if he did not join in the search, they would become suspicious of him so he went along with them and that is where the story ended."

"We have come a long way in the last one hundred and fifty years and I think we should all be very proud of this wonderful country. It is good to remember what our ancestors went through to make it a good place to live for all of us."

                                                                                        Maybelle Willard Davis                                                                                               February 1, 1978

I'm not saying this ever really happened. Sounds a bit contrived. But it is an interesting bit of folklore passed down through the generations. Hope you enjoy.

Morris and Mabelle Davis 1969 at my high school graduation.

Cap Willard

Captain Clarence Linwood Willard was my great grandfather. Yesterday was his 155th birthday. The day before, October 23rd, was his death day. I remember it well. I was 9 years old, it was 1960 and it was also my birthday. We lived in Sutton, Vermont and I found my mom crying, sitting near the phone. She sent me off to school and I spent the day confused about how I was supposed to feel and act. It was my first experience with death.

I have ended up the recipient of all of dad's genealogy papers, files and pictures. He had collected a lot of information on Clarence. I'm providing it here for our family. Part of our history. Much of the following is from an article written by John Willard of Billerica, MA and Sally Willard of Burlington, MA and was published in the Willard News Newsletter in Dec. 1993. Additionally, I incorporated some Portland newspaper articles, Navy records and dad's research,

Clarence was born in South Portland, Maine, in the house on the corner of Front and Stamford Streets on October 24, 1877. His father, Benjamine Upton Willard, was of English descent, beginning in the lineage of Major Simon Willard born in 1604 in Horsmonden, Kent, England. His mother, Nellie Etta Crocket, who was born in Sunshine, Maine, a small fishing village on the eastern shore of Deer Isle Maine below Blue Hill, was of English Irish decent. Her father. Zephaniah Decrowe Crockett, was English and her mother, Margaret Conary, came from Northern Ireland. (I will post an interesting story recorded by Grandmother Mabelle Willard Davis about Zephaniah later.). Nellie had one other child, Mabel, who died at 3 months.

Benjamin and Nellie

As a boy, Clarence went to Pleasant Street School in South Portland. His grandfather, Daniel Willard, owned the sailing vessel Nellie Sawyer and his father, Benjamin, sailed with him. The vessel made many trips from the quarries of Blue Hill to New York harbor. The granite used to build the Brooklyn Bridge was excavated there and the very first load was delivered by the Nellie Sawyer. It was also employed in transporting molasses from Barbados to New York,

Nellie Willard often accompanied Benjamin whenever he shipped out and Clarence usually went along. A good part of his younger life was spent at sea. On one trip to New York when he was nine years old, Clarence and his dog missed the sailing, and he was left to shift for himself until the return trip. He was befriended by a black family and a month later, although he had no idea where to look for him, his father spotted his black dog near the dock and following the dog, found Clarence.

 

Clarence on left

At age 20 Clarence enlisted in the US Navy and was assigned to the USS Montauk which was stationed to protect Portland Harbor during the Spanish American War. Clarence's account was published in the newspaper in the 50s. "We were on the USS Montauk, an old Civil War Monitor type. She was armored about like a tin can in comparison to what they are using now. I was a bosun's mate. We were in Portland Harbor for a long time and then they decided the Spanish would never get this far so they sent us down to the battle zone- the Philadelphia Navy Yard where we spent the rest of the war." That was a joke, of course, Clarence was fond of saying that he fought the battle of Trundy's Reef which is a well-known buoy marking the passage into Portland Harbor. 

His enlistment papers describe him as a Sailor by occupation, with blue eyes, light brown hair and a ruddy complexion. He was 5 ft 8 1/2 inches in height and weighed 155 pounds. He had burn scars on his right side and tattoo's on both arms. On September 13, 1998, after serving four months in the navy, he was honorably discharged at League Island, Pennsylvania.

Clarence and Abbie

Upon his return to South Portland, he continued to sail until he married Abbie Emma York, whom he had been courting since she was 15 years old (i.e., since 1894) on September 8, 1901. Abbie was born on Orrs Island, Maine on January 4, 1879, the daughter to William Merrill York and Harriet Drusella Webber. Clarence and Abbie resided in South Portland most of their married life with only a short residence on Edgewood Ave in Portland.

After marrying, Clarence came off the water for a time and worked for a short time at E.T. Barrows in Portland making screen doors and windows. He also worked one winter at the old Lovell Diamond Arms Co. in Portland making hubs, sprockets and wheel assemblies for their well-known bicycles of that period. But he soon returned to the sea, sailing yachting, fishing and as a Merchant Marine. He recalled, "One season I went sword fishing on the Fanny Bell. Hadn't been to sea for so long that I didn't have any gear left. Old Capt. Murphy wanted me to go as striker. He loaned me the money for boots and skins and we sailed for Georges. We got 43 fish in three weeks and shared $12.50 a man. My gear bill was $12.50 so that ended that. I was in the clear, but in no condition to kick up my heels ashore."

Clarence and Abbie had seven children: George Linwood 7/31/03- 9/28/68, Mabelle Christine 11/30/05-9/3/99, Martha Mae 3/24/10-4/18/72, Helen Iris 6/22/12- 8/24/2002, Paul Everett 11/13/13- 5/31/88, Natalie Eleine 1/12/16- 3/14/77, Robert Mencher 9/19/19- 4/9/94.

In 1916 just after Natalie was born, Clarence was seining for herring aboard the Go-Getum out of Portland for the Nichols Packing Company on Front Street in South Portland. On their way on September 23rd, they saw the Bay State- one of the Boston to Portland steamers- founder on the rocks off Cape Elizabeth. They alerted Mr. Nichols, who sent help to the vessel, and everyone was rescued. On that same night, the Go-Getum went ashore and was demolished. Clarence and his net tender swam ashore safely.

Shortly after that incident Clarence went to work for Nat Gordon, the only marine diver in the Portland area. It was here that he learned the trade that he is still widely remembered for on the Portland waterfront.  His first job was diving for cannon balls at the Fort Preble wharf. He'd been a tender for some time before that, but Nat had never let him go down. "Can't remember the year. Doesn't make a difference anyway. They'd shipped a load of cannon balls up from Fort Popham and a breeze of wind came up and the barge turned over spilling cannon balls all over the bottom of Fort Preble. T'wasn't much of a dive- 12 or 14 feet, but it was work. Those balls weighed 85 pounds apiece. There was also some great steakers left over from the Civil War that went 300 pounds apiece. Old Nat went down for them cause he was afraid they were too much for me." When Nat retired, Clarence bought his gear and went into business for himself.

With tenders Clark Corey and Christian Ritter and working off Walter Cloughs\'s barge, he laid waterlines and power lines to Peaks Island and South Portland, did the underwater work during the construction of the "Million Dollar Bridge" to South Portland, set the pilings for the State Pier in Portland and cleaned debris from dams in about every mill town in Maine. Salvage work and water line repair were their mainstays, but at times they were asked to retrieve lost objects. 

On one memorable occasion a $5,000 diamond ring was lost at White's Bridge in Windham. Clarence was amazed to spot the ring sparkling in the sun's rays while making his decent to hunt for it. He spent some time looking around the bottom at the rocks and bottles in order that it not appear too easy a task! In those days, Clarence got $45 per 5-hour day or $45 per dive if it did not take a day. This was good money because the average weekly wage was about $10.

Clarence never took a job requiring a dive more than 40 feet. This probably saved his life on many occasions, but on one in particular a vessel had sunk on a sand shelf with very deep water on both sides. A young diver named Irving Williams took the job of attaching a lifting cable to the vessel when Clarence had refused the job because it was too risky. Irving slipped off the edge of the sand shelf, parting his airline and losing his life.

Clarence was known on the waterfront as being an honest man and was respected as a man of his word.  At his funeral in 1960, his employer and friend Mr. Gould of the Gould Equipment Company wrote a eulogy that was published in the newspaper. He wrote:

"Cap did not come back to us from Togus- he succumbed to his ailments... Cap Willard came to us ten years ago along with his devoted wife. They occupied an apartment connected to our warehouse on Haskell Street in South Portland. Cap was the caretaker and never was there a better one. Cap was such an unobtrusive man. He was in the navy in the Spanish American War, was a deep-sea diver for over 40 years working from Eastport to Portsmouth and descending into most of the larger lakes and rivers in Maine and New Hampshire. He was a captain of a schooner and sailed all up and down the Atlantic...he loved to travel, in planes, trains, ships or buses. Cap liked to drink, liked to watch fights and wrestling matches. He had such good credit that he could walk the length of Commercial Street and borrow $5 from every other man he met- as they all knew he would be back with it in 48 hours... He was a good man. Cap was 82.

Clarence stopped diving when he was 70 years old although he continued to act on a consulting basis on repair projects for both the water and the power companies. He took excellent care of his diving gear. "Diving hasn't changed a bit since I was an apprentice, except that they've got young fellas doing it instead of old waterlogged birds like me. The stuff still weighs more that you'd want to lug around above water and the only improvement to my gear during the 35 years that I was diving was one time when the railroad banged my helmet around during shipment and sprung it a bit. It never fit quite right before that- like when you pick up someone else's hat at a restaurant. Well, the old pot was fine for years afterwards- just seemed to fit like an old pair of slippers.

He carried his air hose. head piece and shoes in a large woven wicker basket reinforced with iron strapping for additional strength. When he gave up diving, he took all of his gear to the Boyce Machine shop on Commerical Street in Portland to be sold. The end of an era- the end of a colorful segment of Portland waterfront life.

In 1949 Clarence and Abbie sold their home on Edgewood Avenue and moved to an apartment on 58 Haskell Ave in South Portland, as a caretaker for Gould Equipment Company. His employer, Ralph Gould and his manager, Bud Barrett enjoyed talking with him about his life and were very good to him. Clarence never lost his affection for the sea, and his happiness, even as an older man was walking from his home, 4 miles to the waterfront and talking about the daily happenings of the harbor with many who knew him. He was blessed with a wonderful wife and hardworking children who realized that his first love was the sea, He was a hardworking man who enjoyed listening more that talking. One of his greatest joys was his grandchildren of whom he saw 19 of 20 born. 

He died in Veteran's hospital in Togus, Maine on October 23rd, 1960, at the age of 82- one day before his 83rd birthday. According to his death certificate he died of carcinoma of the lung, metastatic from prostate.  He and Abbie are buried in Forest City Cemetery in South Portland in lots 396-397.

I remember taking a ride with him in an old Model T truck down to the Dairy Queen at Cash Corner for an ice cream.

There are stories about his heavy drinking back in the day. One was that Abbie in the early days would send the kids down to the docks when his ship was due to get money for groceries before he gave it or drank it all away.

Craig and I have memories of visiting Haskell Ave. It was very small. Great Gramps liked to chew plug tobacco and there were many small cans around the apartment always kept clean by Great Gram. Clarence would sit in his chair and had trouble standing up. One memory is when he had Craig help him onto his feet so he could go out in the warehouse for a nip. He got in trouble with Abbie for helping him up.

My mom bequeathed me with his basket. I don't remember it being around the house or at Morse Street. I think it came back from Peter Nappi when he passed. in NYC in 1992.  Mom was the executor of his estate. Wish we had his diving helmet.

And that's all we've got on this remarkable man.  Please let me know if you have additional information, real or anecdotal, about Clarence so we can include it in this writeup. Hope you enjoy.