Morning Folks April 4 2007

Before I moved from Massachusetts last fall, I took a trip around town and took pictures of all the homes that I have lived in in Sudbury. I am just now getting around to posting them. Most of you won't remember these homes, but some of you might. Some of them don't look anything like they did when I lived there. Others are similar. When you consider that I lived within 8 miles of my first home up until I was into my 50s, I really didn't get very far away until Ed came and swept me off to TN.

This is the first house I ever lived in. It was my paternal grandparents' home. We lived in a room off the breezeway. The red section is the original house that I remember. It has been added on to over the years, but started out as the milk house for a farm on King Philip Road. A retired Sudbury teacher,Nancy Lewis, lives there now.

The second home I lived in was across the driveway from the first one, still on King Philip Road. I believe this was originally the farmhouse that went with the milkhouse. It was a two family house when we lived there. We lived on the bottom floor and the Baldwins lived upstairs. Stevie was their little boy, on whom I believe I had my first crush. I was only 3 when we moved out of this house, but I do remember his mother and Stevie with his cowboy hat. He is now in his 50s and his wife works with my sister Becky. After 50 years of wondering whatever happened to the Hall family and me wondering what happened to little Stevie Baldwin, it was a nice little bit of closure when Becky and his wife put 2 and 2 together. Becky arranged a meeting a few years ago at a concert.
This was also the house in which we lived when my crib caught on fire. So for my parents it probably brings up some difficult memories. I was only 5 months old so for me, except for the scars, it could have happened to a total stranger.

This is my Grandparent's second home on King Philip just down the driveway from the milkhouse. They built this house shortly after we moved from the two family house up to Pokonoket Ave. Growing up, I spent almost as much time here as at my own home. It was gray with black shutters then, and I think it was much prettier in those days.

Less than a quarter mile away is our third house, the house I really grew up in. It was 50 Pokonoket Avenue. Dad built this house,an expandable 2 bedroom cape in 1954. I remember visiting it while it was being built and bouncing up and down on the plank that spanned the trench around the foundation into the kitchen door. Later, Dad finished off 3 bedrooms and a bath upstairs and built a new kitchen and a 2 car garage with a family room above it.

Now it is still owned by the Melick family who bought it from Dad and Mom in 1969. Mr. Melick passed away a couple of years ago, but his son and his family live in the main house and the mother lives in a new mother-in-law apartment added onto the left end of the house. That apartment was built where we had a screened-in porch. When I was about 11, my cousin Liz and I were driving this 1/2 scale model Tin Lizzie. It had a gas powered engine and went pretty fast if you let it. Anyway, we drove right through one side of that porch and out the other, probably because I grabbed the wheel when I thought she was heading for the bushes. I still laugh thinking about that. But we did get into trouble. The house looks quite a bit different now, but the landscaping still has some of the elements I remember.
Dad built the stone walls and stairs. I remember the inside of this house like I lived there yesterday. I remember talking to Ed sitting right there on the stonewall when we were kids. It was the only time he came to Sudbury from the Cape. He had hitch hiked all the way there just to see his sweetheart. That was quite a feat for a kid back then. He was determined I guess. And 40 years later, I finally gave in!
My best friend Sue MacKinnon and her family lived just two houses up the hill from us in this house at 60 Pokonoket. She moved in when she was 3 or 4. (Sue just celebrated her birthday last week and I included her picture in my blog for March 31.)

My senior year in high school we moved to this house at 85 Pokonoket. I left this house when I got married for the first time in 1972. It still looks almost exactly as it did when my folks sold it in 1984. I lived there for about 3 years, I guess before getting married.




Sue and her family moved up the hill and across the street from us a year after we moved into this house at 86 Pokonoket. We both left home the same year when we were married just 3 weeks apart that summer of 72. We both came back to visit our families after being married and as adults whenever we were both visiting at the same time, we could just run across the street to show off our kids and catch up. I have a very clear recollection of bringing my babies across the street for Sue and her mother to meet.


This is the first house I ever owned, purchased in 1974 for $36,000. It was only a couple of streets away from Pokonoket on Massasoit Ave. When we lived there it was an adorable red cape with white trim and shutters. The outside yard was very pretty and the interior had lots of special touches. I brought both of my babies home to this house when they were born. Massasoit was a 2 bedroom expandable Cape. We sold it in 1986 having added 2 more bedrooms and a bath for $230,000!

(If any of you have read the book The Mayflower, you will recognize all of these street names as Indians and locations during that time in history.)


From Massasoit Ave we moved to a large 5 bedroom home on Moore Road. We put in a beautiful pool and enjoyed the outside of this house as much as the inside with its porch and deck and great perennial gardens. We lived here for 12 years and it was a wonderful neighborhood for the boys. Big yard, kids, cats, dog, you know, the whole American dream thing. It was a great house. These pictures of the back yard are taken from a blog the new owner has on blogspot.

The new owners have done extensive renovations and the fellow, Paul Greenspan, has a website showing the remodeling. http://picasaweb.google.com/pbgreenspan/OurHomeAddition20052006


If you go to the website, you can see the old kitchen. The pool is still there. But they did an extensive remodel and you'd never recognize the house. I don't know why I didn't take any pictures of the front of the house. If I was at home I could have found one in my archives.
And from there I moved to my house about 8 miles away on Vinal Street in Hudson. I thought it would be a temporary place on my way to 'I didn't know where' after my divorce. I hardly expected to stay there for 10 years, but it served me well while I was there.

Now my wonderful Ed and I are happy as clams in our new home in Ooltewah. It is only the 4th town I have ever lived in, kind of unusual in this day and age, I guess. Next, I will post some new pix of the interior of our new home. We have changed it quite a bit since I posted the last pictures. So, stay tuned...





If you have pictures of your homes you'd like to share with me, please feel free to send them along. I'd love to see them and post some of them here.

Have a great day,

Love,

Suz