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  Old Men's Memories

from "Anecdotes and a Story or Two: Presence of Mind."
Detroit (MI) Free Press (1 August 1909, p. B4).

    The late Sarah Orne Jewett lived a great part of her life in South Berwick, and the quaint Maine characters of her native town interested her profoundly.

    Miss Jewett at the Mayflower club in Boston, once illustrated aptly the unreliable quality of old people's memories.

    "A young minister," she said, "born in South Berwick, was called in his maturity to one of the churches in the town. Everybody welcomed him. He had been away nearly 30 years. And the oldest inhabitant's welcome was the warmest of all.

    "The oldest inhabitant, leaning on his stick, said in a high, tremulous voice to the young man:

    "'And you're Master Johnny Greenough! 'ow time do fly! Why, it seems only yesterday I traipsed in to the courthouse to see your poor old grandfather hanged.'

    "Everybody looked shocked. So there was a blot on the Greenough family 'scutcheon, eh? But the young man said calmly:

    "My good old friend, your memory is partly right and partly wrong. My grandfather was murdered, not hanged. It was two brothers by the name of Alden who paid the penalty of his murder.'

    "'We.., that's what I said,' crowed the octogenarian. 'That's just what I said, ain't it?'"


Note

Mayflower club:  The Mayflower Club of Boston, Mass. (1893-1931), was "a private women's club founded in 1893 to provide a place in a central location in Boston where members could find comfortable rooms, a place for reading and writing, and a restaurant for lunch."

Edited by Terry Heller, Coe College.

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