World War II comes to northern Maine - CHILDREN'S WARTIME ADVENTURE NOVELS

New England locations are featured in several middle grade and young adult novels published during World War II.  My latest book, Children's Wartime Adventure Novels - The Silent Generation's Vicarious Experience of World War II explores these stories and how they inspired and indoctrinated a young generation too young to fight, but not too young to be affected by a global war. 

In the first of this three-post series, I wrote about locations in western Massachusetts -- Smith College and Mount Holyoke College -- that were settings for two books for girls on officers' training in the WAVES and Women Marines.

In the second post last week, I talked about two boys' novels that show us New London, Connecticut, locations, including the Naval Submarine Base, where young men train during World War II.

Today, in the third and last post in this three-part series, we have a look at a book for girls set in Maine that blends the war and the home front.

Carol Rogers in War Wings for Carol by Patricia O’Malley, is an administrative assistant in a regional airline in northern Maine.  The author worked for the Civil Aeronautics Association from 1938, for Transcontinental & Western Air, Inc. (TWA) and was employed by (its later incarnation) Trans World Airlines in the public relations department at the time of the book’s publication.  Ms. O’Malley brings the details of a career for young women as stewardesses and administrative staff to, in this case, a wartime setting

War Wings for Carol begins with her arrival in a rather isolated town in northern Maine where a small regional airport now shares its facilities with an Army Air Transport unit, which gives Carol and the reader a window on the mundane but very necessary non-combat military units which ferry supplies to the front.

Along with the nuts and bolts of airline administration, we are treated to Carol’s impressions of a part of the country with which she is not familiar, and the author describes New England in sometimes lyrical prose.

“The cities were built along the banks of rivers, and the rivers were lined with miles of red brick mills, chimneys belching tall columns of thick black smoke in defiance of an enemy which would reduce mankind to slavery.  For this was the heart of industrial New England, where thousands of men, women and machines had been mobilized into the unconquerable army of American production, where the wheels of democracy turned unceasingly, grinding out implements of victory.”

It is the dead of winter when she arrives on a connecting flight from Boston and Bangor.

“There were farms outside the villages, their red barns dark against the white earth.  In the distance, small hills rose against the western horizon and they flew across the icy Kennebec at Augusta, where the dome of the capitol rises in stately dignity above the very site where the men of the Massachusetts Bay Colony established the first trading post in America.”

She is to be assistant to Mr. Ingram, the Vice President of the fictional New England Airlines, and because he must travel a great deal, he leaves important duties in her lap, including the hiring and training of new air hostesses.  They are in northern Maine, close to the Canadian border, where they share the airfield with the Army Air Corps, and do some contract work for the military, carrying cargo and supplies along with its regular passengers.  Mr. Ingram hired Carol to take many details off his shoulders.  “‘It’s a big job for a girl and I thought a long time before I made up my mind to take you.  But women must shoulder men’s work, and I suppose we’ll see more of it before this thing ends.’

“After a few minutes of reflection, during which Carol sat quietly, he added, ‘And they always do it as well…or better.  It’s a sad commentary on the stronger sex, Miss Rogers, but it’s true.’” We can hope the young female readers took note of the praise.

The Army airfield is described without hyperbole:  “Two Flying Fortresses and their fighter escorts were making a spectacular showing against its backdrop. On the ground, squadrons of bombers were lining up for reconnaissance practice, and pursuit planes were waddling out of hangers into position for take-off.  Trucks, tractors, jeeps and station wagons sped in and out of the post gates.”

The small town nearby has changed with the war: “Men in uniform were everywhere.  They stood in doorways and they walked up and down, talking.  They filled the drug stores, drinking innumerable cokes and cups of hot coffee.  They jammed the movies and they patronized the shops and brought a wave of prosperity such as the little town had never known before.” Much could be said of many, many towns across the United States during the war.

Another loving passage on New England brings the story through the crisis and past a challenging winter.  “Spring in northern New England is not like spring anywhere else in the world.  She is not a hoyden here, who leaps at your throat and forces you to notice her presence.  She doesn’t hurl herself in your path.  Spring in New England is a perfect lady.  She has been taught how to enter a room and takes her time making an appearance.  She knows that winter lingers, loathe to leave the land on which he had such a long, secure hold.  But she also knows that victory is inevitably hers, so she walks softly and is gracious in her conquest.  She is all the more beautiful because of her good behavior. The snows melt, the hills turn green, the rivers break free from their bondage, and the waters sing as they carry the ice cakes down toward the sea.   The skies are washed, and crisply starched and ironed, and the chirp of the robin is heard in the early morning from the branches of trees that are giving promise of the gracious abundance which is to follow.”

Carol deals with wartime administrative problems, encounters a Nazi spy, and agonizes over one of their military supply planes lost in a winter storm somewhere over Maritime Canada.

Children's Wartime Adventure Novels is available in eBook directly from my online store here.

It is also available in eBook from Barnes & Noble, Apple, and a wide variety of online shops here.

It is also available in eBook, paperback, and hardcover from Amazon here.

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Jacqueline T. Lynch is the author of The Ames Manufacturing Company of Chicopee, Massachusetts - A Northern Factory Town's Perspective on the Civil War;   

Comedy and Tragedy on the Mountain: 70 Years of Summer Theatre on Mt. Tom, Holyoke, Massachusetts;

 States of Mind: New England, 

A Tragic Toast to Christmas -- The Infamous Wood Alcohol Deaths of 1919 in Chicopee, Mass.; as well as books on classic films and several novels.  Her Double V Mysteries series is set in New England in the early 1950s.  

TO JOIN HER READERS' GROUP - follow this link for a free book as a thank-you for joining.

A ride to Massasoit Spring -- West Springfield, Massachusetts

We salute the Town of West Springfield on its 250th anniversary with a postcard of bygone days, likely the turn of the twentieth century.  The reverse side describes the "primeval forest country" of West Springfield, about an hour from Springfield--and one can see that in a horse and carriage--or even a Model T Ford on rutted, dirt country roads such as this it could have very well taken an hour.

We don't know the name of the route in the picture, and in those days, it might not have had a formal name, but it could have been present-day Bear Hole Road or Great Plains Road.  The Massasoit Springs was a small, rustic enterprise, typical of nineteenth-century tourist sites, that provided a spot for lunch, hiking, and perhaps even the restoration of health by drinking the pure spring water.  If you weren't interested in the restaurant, perhaps the nearby cage in which a bear was kept could prompt you to make the drive.  From around the 1870s to just about the turn of the century, this was enough to bring at least a few tourists any lovely summer day.

In 1906, the area was taken over and turned into the Bearhole Reservoir, and still provides a nice place for hiking.  Any bears seen are likely not to be in cages, however.

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Jacqueline T. Lynch is the author of The Ames Manufacturing Company of Chicopee, Massachusetts - A Northern Factory Town's Perspective on the Civil War;   

Comedy and Tragedy on the Mountain: 70 Years of Summer Theatre on Mt. Tom, Holyoke, Massachusetts;

 States of Mind: New England, 

A Tragic Toast to Christmas -- The Infamous Wood Alcohol Deaths of 1919 in Chicopee, Mass.; as well as books on classic films and several novels.  Her Double V Mysteries series is set in New England in the early 1950s.  

TO JOIN HER READERS' GROUP - follow this link for a free book as a thank-you for joining.

Westfield River -- Agawam, Massachusetts

 

 

Here are three postcard views of the Westfield River in Agawam, Massachusetts.  They are all published by the Springfield News Company and printed in Germany, as was common in the early twentieth century.  The cards all date from around 1908, and are tinted.

You'll note that on the cards the river is called the Agawam River.  The earliest English settlers to the area named it that for the Agawam tribe that lived in the area, but eventually came to be called the Westfield River.  It begins in the Berkshires and ends in the Connecticut River, forming the boundary between the towns of Agawam and West Springfield.

Despite these idyllic scenes, by the mid-twentieth century the river became terribly polluted, as many of our rivers were through industrial contaminants, but today is clean for swimming, fishing, and its locally famous Westfield River Whitewater Races.

The small town of big practical jokes - MEET ME IN NUTHATCH

Here's a bit about my novel, Meet Me in Nuthatch:

A whimsical, poignant tale about a practical joke-turned publicity stunt that fires up the small town of Nuthatch, Massachusetts, in a desperate attempt to attract tourists.

Christmas tree farmer Everett Campbell proposes turning the clock back to 1904 and reviving the town’s cozy past, an idea he gets from watching his young daughter’s favorite classic movie, Meet Me in St. Louis. She is thrilled at being allowed to dress up and pretend, but not everyone in town is enchanted with the nostalgic promotion—including Everett’s moody teenage son.

The media, and the tourists, do come, but the scheme also attracts a large theme park corporation that wants to buy Nuthatch 1904.

Everett now stands to lose his town in a way he never imagined, and his neighbors are divided on which alternate future to choose.

A local drug dealer, Everett’s boyhood enemy, may hold the future of the entire town in his hands unless Everett can pull off one of his most spectacular, and dangerous, practical jokes.

Get your copy here at Amazon in print and eBook, or from Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple, and a variety of other online shops.
 

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Jacqueline T. Lynch is the author of The Ames Manufacturing Company of Chicopee, Massachusetts - A Northern Factory Town's Perspective on the Civil War;   Comedy and Tragedy on the Mountain: 70 Years of Summer Theatre on Mt. Tom, Holyoke, Massachusetts;   States of Mind: New England; as well as books on classic films and several novels. Her latest book is Christmas in Classic Films. TO JOIN HER READERS' GROUP - follow this link for a free book as a thank-you for joining.

A Celebration of Mt. Tom - at the MAP Gallery, Easthampton, Massachusetts

Join me in Easthampton at the MAP (Mill Arts Project) Gallery this Saturday, July 14th for a celebration of Mt. Tom in art, natural history, theatre...and ice cream.

I'll be there to meet and greet with my book on theatre on the mountain - Comedy and Tragedy on the Mountain: 70 Years of Summer Theatre on Mt. Tom, Holyoke, Massachusetts.

Join us for --

“The Mountain and Mother Nature”

A father and son exhibit of oil pastels by Ken Gagne and sculptures by Matt Gagne creating an entertaining and thought provoking experience traveling over Mt. Tom witnessing Mother Nature’s power to create, destroy and preserve the beauty of this local resource. 

Opening Reception

Saturday, July 14^th 2018

5:00 pm – 8:00 pm

@

The MAP Gallery

in

 The Eastworks Building in Easthampton

Also featuring:

·              Arcadia Sanctuary

·              Jacqueline T. Lynch – local author of  “Comedy and Tragedy on the Mountain”

·              Mt. Tom Ice Cream

MAP Gallery in the Eastworks building, 116 Pleasant Street, Easthampton, Massachusetts.

Easthampton City Arts / Easthampton Cultural Council

Save the Date! - Celebration of Mt. Tom in art, literature, science, and ice cream! - Easthampton, Massachusetts

Save the Date

The MAP Gallery shines a spotlight

on:

“The Mountain and Mother Nature”

A father and son exhibit of oil pastels by Ken Gagne and sculptures by Matt Gagne creating an entertaining and thought provoking experience traveling over Mt. Tom witnessing Mother Nature’s power to create, destroy and preserve the beauty of this local resource. 

Opening Reception

Saturday, July 14^th 2018

5:00 pm – 8:00 pm

@

The MAP Gallery

in

 The Eastworks Building in Easthampton

Also featuring:

·              Arcadia Sanctuary

·              Jacqueline T. Lynch – local author of  “Comedy and Tragedy on the Mountain”

·              Mt. Tom Ice Cream

Easthampton City Arts / Easthampton Cultural Council

Robert E. Barrett Fishway - Holyoke, Massachusetts

Robert E. Barret Fishway, photo by J.T. Lynch

The fish are on their way. 

The Robert E. Barrett Fishway at the Holyoke Dam, Holyoke, Massachusetts is open to the public to observe an annual phenomenon: the spring migration of fish up the Connecticut River.

Robert E. Barret Fishway, photo by J.T. Lynch

American Shad are most predominant species, joined by Sea Lamprey, Blueback Herring, Atlantic Salmon, Shortnose Sturgeon, Striped Bass and other fish.  Most adult fish return to spawn in the rivers where they were born.

A mechanical menagerie awaits the fish at the Holyoke Dam (a sprawling granite structure across the river.  It's first version in the mid-nineteenth century was responsible for the establishing of Holyoke, a planned industrial city).  The fish are lifted in large metal bins over the dam to continue their journey north. 

Robert E. Barret Fishway, Mt. Tom in the background, photo by J.T. Lynch

But first, they scoot past the observation room where the public can have a look at the marvel.  The fish population is monitored, and the Fishway along the dam is at least one instance of industry giving nature a helping hand and providing laudable stewardship of our environment.  For more on the Robert E. Barrett Fishway, have a look at this website.

The fish are clearly appreciative.  That's their happy face.

A last look at summer...Mystic Aquarium

A last look at summer, with a few of the outdoor residents of the Mystic Aquarium in Mystic, Connecticut.

 

 

The Dark Day - 1780

On another May 19th -- May 19, 1780, many New Englanders believed the end of the world was upon us. It was the so-called Dark Day. Not just a dark mood, but a really dark day. “A horror of great darkness,” the poet John Greenleaf Whittier called it, and compared it to “the twilight of the gods.”

Of course, the mood was dark, too. The Revolutionary War was dragging on to its fourth year. We’d just gotten through a terrifically cold winter. The Hudson River froze over, which allowed the British to drag their cannon across it. Reportedly, it was the coldest winter ever recorded in North America.

The Dark Day began as early as 10 a.m. in some areas, when the morning sun appeared reddish in the sky, and the sky appeared yellowish and grew dark by afternoon. At nightfall, the moon, too, appeared red, though some areas of New England had rain. With no ready explanation, many took it as an act of God to indicate the end of days. Many ran from their homes and places of business, and filled the churches and meeting houses in panic.

Whittier, in his 1868 poem “Abraham Davenport”, described the famous incident in the Connecticut legislature, when member Abraham Davenport decided in these politically dark days of the Revolutionary War, that Dark Day or not, he would meet his Maker whenever called. But in the meantime, duty called, so he exhorted that all his fellow politicos stay to task that day, and work by candlelight.

“Abraham Davenport”

In the old days (a custom laid aside
With breeches and cocked hats) the people sent
Their wisest men to make the public laws.
And so, from a brown homestead, where the Sound
Drinks the small tribute of the Mianus,
Waved over by the woods of Rippowams,
And hallowed by pure lives and tranquil deaths,
Stamford sent up to the councils of the State
Wisdom and grace in Abraham Davenport.

'Twas on a May-day of the far old year
Seventeen hundred eighty, that there fell
Over the bloom and sweet life of the Spring
Over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon,
A horror of great darkness, like the night
In day of which the Norland sagas tell,
The Twilight of the Gods. The low-hung sky
Was black with ominous clouds, save where its rim
Was fringed with a dull glow, like that which climbs
The crater's sides from the red hell below.
Birds ceased to sing, and all the barnyard fowls
Roosted; the cattle at the pasture bars
Lowed, and looked homeward; bats on leathern wings
Flitted abroad; the sounds of labor died;
Men prayed, and women wept; all ears grew sharp
To hear the doom-blast of the trumpet shatter
The black sky, that the dreadful face of Christ
Might look from the rent clouds, not as He looked
A loving guest at Bethany, but stern
As Justice and inexorable Law.

Meanwhile in the old State House, dim as ghosts,
Sat the lawgivers of Connecticut,
Trembling beneath their legislative robes.
"It is the Lord's Great Day! Let us adjourn,"
Some said; and then, as if with one accord,
All eyes were turned to Abraham Davenport.
He rose, slow cleaving with his steady voice
The intolerable hush. "This well may be
The Day of Judgment which the world awaits;
But be it so or not, I only know
My present duty, and my Lord's command
To occupy till He come. So at the post
Where He hast set me in His providence,
I choose, for one, to meet Him face to face,
No faithless servant frightened from my task,
But ready when the Lord of the harvest calls;
And therefore, with all reverence, I would say,
Let God do His work, we will see to ours.
Bring in the candles." And they brought them in.

Then by the flaring lights the Speaker read,
Albeit with husky voice and shaking hands,
An act to amend an act to regulate
The shad and alewive fisheries, Whereupon
Wisely and well spake Abraham Davenport,
Straight to the question, with no figures of speech
Save the ten Arab signs, yet not without
The shrewd dry humor natural to the man:
His awe-struck colleagues listening all the while,
Between the pauses of his argument,
To hear the thunder of the wrath of God
Break from the hollow trumpet of the cloud.

And there he stands in memory to this day,
Erect, self-poised, a rugged face, half seen
Against the background of unnatural dark,
A witness to the ages as they pass,
That simple duty hath no place for fear.

In 1934, another time of great darkness in terms of the economy and a lack of hope, artist Delos Palmer, who interestingly did a lot of dime novel illustrations, received a W.P.A. Federal Artists Project commission to paint a depiction of Abraham Davenport’s courage on the Dark Day. The painting, shown above, depicts Davenport standing before Governor Trumbull with a lit candle between them. The painting was meant to be more than just an homage to the past, but as Judge Charles Davenport remarked at the dedication ceremony, “should be an inspiration and a lesson during these days of hard times.”

In another era of political darkness Senator John F. Kennedy in his 1960 Presidential campaign recalled Abraham Davenport’s courage and devotion to duty, “I hope in a dark and uncertain period in our own country that we, too, may bring candles to help light our country’s way.”

In what must have been an especially moving ceremony, the 200th anniversary year of Davenport’s actions on the Dark Day was held at the Connecticut House of Representatives in Hartford in February of 1980. The curtains were drawn in the chamber, and then House speaker Ernest Abate of Stamford, Davenport’s home town, read Whittier’s poem. As he spoke, the lights were gradually dimmed in the chamber, and he when he finished, it was completely dark.

What seems likely to historians, especially researchers in weather and the environment, that massive forest fires caused excessive smoke, blotting out the sky. These fires were probably started as intentional burns to clear land in the new settlements of New Hampshire and in the Lake Champlain area.

Today in these dark days, at least economically, we might well take Abraham Davenport’s example once more and keep our shoulders to the wheel, our hands to the plow, and perhaps keep fixed our trust in what may be a higher purpose for our existence, that “simple duty hath no fear.” Bring in the candles.

For more on the Dark Day, have a look at this excellent article by John Horrigan. For more on Abraham Davenport and the Dark Day, have a look at this Stamford, Connecticut website.

Note: The painting above is display at Stamford’s Old Town Hall, and this digital photograph is by Steve Castagneto, Academy of Information Technology, Stamford.