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STATE
NAME OF WORKER
ADDRESS
SUBJECT
NAME ADDRESS OF
INFORMANT
DATE OF INTERVIEW
PLACE OF INTERVIEW
Massachusetts
Robert Wilder
Northfield, Massachusetts
Living Lore
George 0. Dunnell,
Northfield, Massachusetts
December 15, 1938
The office of George Dunnellis Hay,
Grain and Coal Company-, Northfield,
Massachusetts.
Mr. Dunnell's office is a small wooden shack close to
the station of the Central Vermont Railroad in Northfield.
His big warehouse filled with its stock of hay, grain and
feed is nearby. The day we called was gloomy with more
than a hint of snow in the air, and the comfortable warmth
of the shack was welcome after a long hike through the
snappy cold.
Name: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and Hurricanes
Mr. Dunnell was sitting in his shack near the Central Vermont
Railroad Station waiting for customers when we dropped in for a chat.
Usually ready and willing to gossip, Mr. Dunnell was quiet and rather
glum. His face was red and swollen Ana he was evidently not enjoying
his reliable old pipe.
"Don't mean to be unfriendly", was his apology,"but I been havin'
the damndest toothache. The last two nights --Jcan't get to sleep.
You wouldn't think I had enough of my own teeth left to do any achinl,
but they been kicking up an awful row. My mouth's so sore) I can't
seem to keep my pipe set. Makes me feel like hell."
We offered the usual suggestion in such cases. "Better go see
a dentist. He'll fix you up".
"That's what the folks been sayin' up to the house. Damned if
I want to go to a dentist. I been to one or two that don't hurt
much, but the others I been to made up for it. First time I ever
went to a dentist was up in Heath when I was young fellow. I had a
terrible toothache. It was the jumping toothache, and hurt me clear
to the top of my head. There was an old fellow up in Heath that was
a combination of tailor, harness maker and dentist. He made me a pair
of pants once and they were a damned good fit. He lived on the Adams-
ville road. Nothing but a cellar hole there now) all the fields grown
up to woods. But in those days there was a large square, white house
there. And I walked the two miles down there to have him pull out
my tooth.
Name: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and.HUrricanes
"The old fellow made me sit on the floor and stick my legs under
his chair. He held my head between his knees. He says to me that
seeing as he had only one set of dentist tools, it had to be done
that way. In case it was a tooth in the other jaw, he'd a let me
have the chair and he would a sat on the floor himself.
"This was all right with me, I only wanted the tooth out. But
when he stuck the forceps into my mouth I noticed he had the palsy.
His hand shook so that he rapped every tooth in my head. But he had
a darnea goou grip on my jaw, what with my head between his knees, and
all I could do was hope that when he finally clamped on, it would be
the right tooth and not a good one or my tongue or something.
"Well sir, he finally clamped on and out came the tooth, neat
as you please. And damned if it wasn't the right tooth, too, although
when I got out of sight of his house I sat down and took account of
stock for it seemed as if I had a worse toothache than when I came
down. But the acher had gone all right and I guess it was something
about the way he shook those forceps around in my mouth that made my
teeth feel as though they were still aching.
"Thomas, his name was, Doc Thomas they called him. He's been
dead a good fifty years. But I guess he was what you would call a
character.
"There used to be considerable teaming by his place. The hills
up that way gave him plenty to do in the harness mending department
of his business. I don't know how it happened, but one winter he
froze his toes. Pained him a lot afterwards. One day he called out
Name: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Bunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and Hurricanes
to a teamster that was going by and maybe owed him something for har-
ness repairing. 'Stop in when you come back, Joe, I want you to cut
a toe off for me.*
"Joe thought he was fooling, but he stopped in when he came back
as the Doc told him to. And that old fellow had everything all ready.
He had taken a block of wood and driven nails into it at the right
distance to hold his toes apart. He'd taken a b,ig chisel and honed
a razor edge on it. And he had a big wooden mallet lying there handy.
He took off nis shoe and sock and spread his toes out between the nails,
held the chisel just where he wanted, and told Joe to take the mallet
and hit it. Joe didn't see what else to do, he was so astonished, so
he took the mAllet and hit tne chisel a hell of a crack. Off dropped
Mr. Toe. Then Doc tied up his foot himself. It healed up, and he was
all right afterwards. Now, if he had been living today and have done
that, he'd a had seventeen different kinds of infection, and been in
the hospital paying doctor's bills for weeks. But in them days that's
all they was to it.
"The old Doc used to like to 'tend funerals. I can remember him
up at the old cemetery in Heath, dressed up in a black coat that was
pale green from wearint. He used to figger he was town cemetery tender,
I guess. Could weep at the drop of a hat, and then when the funeral
procession would be a -coming back from the cemetery he'd drop off and
have a swig of not stuff and be as jolly as you please. Say that re-
Fame: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and Hurricanes
minds me, have you ever been up at the cemetery in Heath? Well, tie
your hat on and button your clothes. It's way up ont op of a hill
guess you can see almost all over the world from there. Good place
for a cemetery, nearer to heaven than hell anyway. I don't know though,
guess it's as near heaven as some of the people buried in it will ever
get. The wind blows there like the devil
ONO .1•11.
"Must have been some place to get caught in the hurricane", I
interrupted, hoping to get Mr. Dunnell started on what I had heard was
a good yarn.
"By Chriamust Wasn't that hurricane a lulu? I was settin here
readin when I noticed it was gettin so damn dark. I couldn't see. I
lookeu at my watch and there it was after four, so I says 'Guess there's
nobody damn fool enough to come trading with me any more tonight, so I
might as well shut up and go home'. I had an umbrella, but I knew it
wa'n't no use to take that. If the darned thing didn't turn wrong side
out the first gust, I'de gone sailing up in the air like a parachute
feller. 'Course I wouldn't a minded that none if the wind had been
in the right direction. But it would a -taken me out over the medder,
and I was afraid the handle might come off and drop me down near those
flooded tobacco barns. So I remembered that I had an oilskin coat
around somewhere that I used when I used to peddle coal. Took MR some.
time to find it. Seems the boys had took it and folded it up to use for
a seat when they were playing cards in the shanty here, as they some-
-5
Name: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and Hurricanes
times do, and they had it inside an auto seat cover. Anyway, I found
it and it was about as hard and as solid as a piece of wood. Stuck
together for keeps. It must have taken me half an hour to get the
thing straightened out so I could get in it. Even then it felt as
though it was maae of tin or something. Guess I was damned funny
looking, like I had something wrong with my spine, and my arms weren't
put on just right. The coat used to come pretty Well dawn towards my
shoes, but I couldn't get it any farther than my knees. And it kind
a -bulged here and there where it wa'n't supposed to not round
bulges square ones. But 'twas getting dark, so I went as I was.
I forgot all about the coat when I got out in that wind. I pulled
down my hat and hugged the coat around me. Good thing I didn't meet
any ladies, for I found out when I got home that I couldn't a -lifted
my arms to tip my hat. The sleeves of that dumb coat stuck fast to
the belly of it, and the whole family had to work to get me out of it.
"After I got home and out of the coat and could see what was
going on, I looked out the winder and saw our big tree going over as
easy as you please not all at once) but little by little. I watched
it down and said that I bet the one in front wouldn't go for that was
stronger. Then I saw one of our garage doors spinning by the winder
and right across the street on to Doctor Brown's lawn. Somehow it got
going on its edge like one of them straw hats we used to wear, and it
was certainly making time. I thought I better see what else was about
Name: Robert Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and Hurricanes
to leave us out back. I went out, and there was my son Leon big
strapping feller, you know, tryipg to shut the big garage door. He
couldn't get anywhere with it. I got a block and a crow bar, and
neither of us could move it. And the wind was whooping it up inside
something terrible. I was afraid it would blow off a door, or the
plaster, or something and get into the house. If it had, it would -a
taken out all our winders, I expect. Leon hollered at me that our big
oil truck was in the yard, and if I could hold where I was with the bar
he would get it. He backed it against the door and it shut then all
right. I got back into the house just in time to see the tree I thought
was going to stand, go right over.
"Just then, I see a car coming up the street. They was a tree
down by Morgan's, or Mattoon's, or somewhere down that way so they
couldn't get by, so they went right over the common on to the sidewalk.
They come onthe sidewalk as far as Doctor Brown's where there was a
tree down across the sidewalk. Then they tried to get across the common
out into the road again. But the common was soft, because it had been
raining so much the past week or so, and they sunk down into it clear to
the hubs. 1Twa'n't so bad on my front piazza, it being in the lee of
the house, and my trees had gone down anyway so I went out there. The
big elms was thrashing about something lively, with a big brancn, or a
load of cord wood dropping off every now and then. The trees near that
car looked as if they were coming down. too. And when I saw that car
ariver try to back and then forward again, but only getting deeper in
the mud, I let out a yell, 'Get out of that you donned fool!. Come over
Name: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and Hurricanes
here before you get squashedt' The feller climbed out with a grin,
and I see that it was the high school principal, Mr. Cobb. He had
Mrs. Cobb with him, and they both ran over. Just as they got clear,
down came the trees. And they fenced that car in nice as you please.
But not a limb touched it just came down all 'round.
"I had to laugh. You know, Mrs. Brown who lives across the street?
well, she's one of the damndest nervous women yo ever saw. I guess
she ain't quite responsible anyway, so I shouldn't pay no attention to
what she says. But the next day after we got the Cobb's car choppe-a
out and it had been taken away, Mrs. Brown was out taking on. She called
to me to come over so over I went thinking she'd found something im-
portant. 'Look, Mr. Dunnellt, she says. I looked but I didn't see
nothing but the place where the Cobb's car had got stuck on the common
in front of the Brown's house. She says, 'Look at thati Our nice
common that we always take such good care oft Wouldn't you think that
people would have more consideration and decency than to drive their
cars on t ne grass when the ground is so soft I'
"I didn't tell her, as I suppose I might have, that the next time
we have a storm like that one we're a -going to pass a law that parents
shaln't try to get home to their kids to try to keep them from being
scared to death if it means mussing up anybody's lawn.
'Nother woman, too, Miss Dale, she's the old chick that lives
alone out School Street. A tree fell down in front of her house and the
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Name: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Pulling Teeth and Hurricanes
only way around it was across her lawn. She came out and gave every-
body hell that did it, including the ambulance and the hearse, so I
hear. Wonder what she expected them to do. Stay there 'till out
street department got around to cut up the tree? They couldn't turn
around even without going on her lawn.
"Never see such a bawl baby as that Doctor Brown is. He came over
in the morning with tears streaming down his face and asked me if I could
cash a fifteen dollar check. I tola him I could, and asked him what the
matter was, if someone was dead. 'Not, he said, 'but my trees are down
the roof is broken and I'm going to need all this for repairs. I was
keeping it for another purpose, but it will have to go'.
"Shucks, I says, 'Your trees are down? Your trees, hey? Take a
look up the street. Now look down the street. Look at m..2 yard. See
I've got the oil truck in here behind this d --d forest, I says. I
can't even start repairs to 11.„Ly roof. I got to get that truck out some
way, for if it turns cold, or even a little cool, Doctor Brown will
begin hollering for kerosene. He'll holler anyway, for he must have
kerosene in order to cook. He don't know enough to cook on a camp fire
with all the wood he could burn right in his yard all piled 'round for
him handy.'
"I said, 'You ain't hurt be yer? Nor Mrs. Brown, she ain't hurt,
is she? Remember when you fell down the attic stairs and smashed your-
self all up?'
Name: Robert Wilder
Title: Living Lore
too.,
Assignment: Northfield
Topic: Mr. Dunnell Talks About
Teeth and Hurricanes
'Yes') says he, 'And it cost me a hundred and ninety-six dollars,
"What are you going to do with a man like that? And him a doctor
of divinity. You know I went down to his church once. I kinda thought
I would like to hear him preach. He's a darned good preacher. He
preached from the text, 'Fear Not, The Lord Will Provide'. I just
happened to think about it when I was a-talkin to him.
'Doctor Brown', I says, 'What are you belly -aching about?
Doesn't it say somewhere, 'Fear not. The Lord will provide?'"
'Yes, it does, Dunnell. Yes it does. I forgot. I'm sorry. Yes,
I should have more faith.,
"That's him. Keeps his religion in one compartment and his busi-
ness sense in another. Well, guess we got a customer here. Have to
excuse me awhile. Don't hurry. I'll be right back. Damned if my
mouth don't feel better since I got to talkin. Guess you're good for
the toothache."