Two men on a mill : $b The story of the restoration of Baxter's Mill — John Shaqi
Two men on a mill : $b The story of the restoration of Baxter's MillCastonguay, A. Harold
Philosophy
Two men on a mill : $b The story of the restoration of Baxter's Mill
Castonguay, A. Harold
Flour mills -- Conservation and restoration -- Massachusetts -- Cape Cod; Flour mills -- Massachusetts -- Cape Cod -- History
About six months before this project got underway, Harvey, who is
generally a quiet, peaceful soul, delivered an impassioned speech
at our annual Town Meeting, decrying the lack of interest by the
townspeople in the preservation of some of our own landmarks.
The building itself had to be raised by Bob Hayden and his crew, and
a new foundation completely made on the old. When this was done, new
sills put in and the building lowered, things looked a little better,
for at least the building sat upright.
Harvey gave concrete help, but although a good many people expressed
their admiration of the job we were doing and the task which we had
undertaken, we didn’t get too much actual help. It is always more fun
to watch work being done.
We did, however, among other people, receive help from a photogenic
barrister, Harold Hayes, who spent an afternoon in his boots with
a shovel helping us to disturb the mud of the centuries. One kind
gentleman, whom I do not know, was watching us one day as we were
trying to pry off some of the rusted bolts and nuts from the old
turbine. He showed up the next afternoon with a large, much-needed,
Stilson wrench which he donated to the cause.
Ben Baxter, one of the living heirs of the “Baxter boys”, and a
descendant of some of the best sea captains the Cape has ever produced,
gave much of his time and effort and loaned us considerable equipment.
Ben is an expert mariner, engaged in ferrying cargo back and forth to
Nantucket, virtually bring “oil to the lamps of China”. I don’t think
anyone knows Nantucket Sound better than Ben Baxter. Between his trips
to the island, Ben found time to be with us every Saturday. He is a
stout fellow.
My friend, John Doherty, who is engaged in the building of homes and
selling of real estate, has delivered to us many loads of loam, fill,
and sand.
Charles Cunningham, a local contractor and builder of large buildings,
was most generous in offering the use of his stock pile, where a
treasure was found of different sizes and shapes of all kinds of lumber
and materials. He told us to take anything we could use, and the offer
was music to our ears.
I do hope Mr. Cunningham didn’t feel too chagrined when he saw how much
we were taking, but nevertheless he grinned and said to go ahead and
take whatever we wanted.
The Hinckley Lumber Company of Hyannis graciously offered, and we
quickly accepted, lumber and supplies from their mill and warehouse.
Our busy surveyor of highways, Chris Marsh, loaned to us from time to
time a machine called a back hoe, which does marvelous things, and some
men to help with the hard digging.
One generous soul, Tom Powers, has given us several beautiful trees
which we are planting and hope will live to beautify the structure and
the landscaping. Tom is a director and officer of several banks, owns
most of the real estate on Cape Cod, and is a teller of tall tales in
any dialect you wish.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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