“On Hemlock Brook” remembered after 50 years

By Linda CarmanPrint Story | Email Story
Although it was 50 years ago, Francis C. "Tank" Wilson still remembers the lines he spoke in Williamstown's bicentennial play, On Hemlock Brook. "I played Uriah Dace, a farmer turned soldier," Wilson said. "When Fred Stocking, playing Elisha Chapin, called for volunteers to go to Boston to bring back cannons, I had my big speech. "I answered, 'I will, I will,'" Wilson said. "I was the only fictitious character in the playÉIt was a good time, a very nice time." Wilson also recalled that his sister, Dorothy Reinke, "talked me into being in the play." The six performances - Sept. 28 through Oct. 3, 1953 - at the Adams Memorial Theatre at Williams College were "well-attended, naturally, with me in it," he quipped. "I remembered my lines, but I got tired walking over the mountain," he joked. He and the others were costumed in military garb that was "haphazard," he said. "A lot of people said it was the best part of the play. We were sitting on logs around a fireplace," he said. For Wilson, the theatrical experience was his first and last. Later, much later, he served on the Mount Greylock Regional School Committee, which was, he said, "enough drama." Ralph Renzi, who, with Henry N. Flynt Jr., is honorary co-chairman of this year's 250th anniversary celebration, both having served on the town's Bicentennial Committee in 1953, said, "Everybody was excited about it. It was a town affair, and everybody was caught up in the emotion of the time. It was the town's 200th anniversary, and we all thought, how great to be a part of the celebration." This Saturday, July 5 at noon on the Nikos Stage, the Williamstown Theatre Festival will give a special reading of On Hemlock Brook by Arnold Sundgaard. According to the WTF, the Hoosic River valley was the scene of a historical struggle, captured in the play. When a new fort needs to be built, Capt. Elisha Chapin rises to the challenge, giving all he has to protect the interests and welfare of his family and neighbors. On Hemlock Brook relates the tale of a community's struggle to build a united front in the face of adversity. The play, according to the WTF, commemorates the 150th anniversary of the founding of Williamstown and the triumph of the frontier spirit. The reading features William Duell, John Ellison Conlee and Jim Stanek. Amanda Charlton, who will direct the reading, has been coming to Williamstown now for three summers. "It was an educational read," Charlton said. "It's an interesting, sweet story about the founding of Fort Hoosac. It's interesting to learn about the founding of the area, what it took to survive. "I'm a huge fan of Williamstown, and it's nice to find out about the place. For me it's an honor do something to give back to the community, because this community is so supportive of the festival. I think it's going to be a fun reading." Arnold Sundgaard, the author of the play, taught at Bennington College for several years, until 1951 when he received a Guggenheim Fellowship. A Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, Sundgaard wrote a play for the state of Utah's centennial and wrote two operas, one of them with Kurt Weill. According to the program notes by Robert R.R. Brooks, the action of Hemlock Brook occurs in the spring of 1756, and most of the characters represent real people who actually settled in early Williamstown. The first act is set in Fort Massachusetts, and most of the second is set on the slopes of Hemlock Brook, which flows under West Main Street near Westlawn Cemetery, where several of the characters in the play are buried. Brooks wrote, "For two years before the curtain rises, undeclared war had been raging between French and Indians on one side, and the northern colonies on the other." For months, West Hoosac, as Williamstown had been known from its founding in the early 1750s until it was renamed for Col. Ephraim Williams, "had been more or less deserted - some settlers having fled eastward and others to Fort Massachusetts. There was tension between settlers from Massachusetts and those from Connecticut. The woods were full of hostile northern Indians. The local Scaticooks had gone over to the French. There had been burning, torture and scalping down the Hoosac," Brooks wrote. The first houses in West Hoosac were built in 1752 and 1753 chiefly by soldiers from Fort Massachusetts. On Dec. 5, 1753, the first organized meeting of the West Hoosac Proprietors was held in Seth Hudson's house near Hemlock Brook, a site marked by a plaque. Brooks, who also edited the town history Williamstown, the First Two Hundred Years, portrayed Seth Hudson in the play On Hemlock Brook. The program is an evocative glimpse into the past, when telephone numbers had only three digits and, according to advertisements, it was possible to buy a DeSoto car or a Reo truck at Brewer Bros.; a Studebaker at J.F. Farmer; a Kaiser, Frazer or Henry J at Frank's Motor Sales; or a Hudson Hornet at the Mohawk Garage, all in North Adams. Although Eddie's Market - "we deliver" - Vogue & Vanity, The Dinner Bell, Grundy's Garage and Cornish Wire Co. are long vanished, several businesses are still thriving. These include St. Pierre's Barber Shop, Connors Bros. Trucking, the Williamstown Savings Bank, Sweetbrook Nursing Home, Mt. Williams Greenhouses, Maple Terrace, Taconic Lumber and Hardware, and Mason Coal & Oil.
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Friends of Great Barrington Libraries Holiday Book Sale

GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass. — The Friends of Great Barrington Libraries invite the community to shop their annual Holiday Good-as-New Book Sale, happening now through the end of the year at the Mason Library, 231 Main Street. 
 
With hundreds of curated gently used books to choose from—fiction, nonfiction, children's favorites, gift-quality selections, cookbooks, and more—it's the perfect local stop for holiday gifting.
 
This year's sale is an addition to the Southern Berkshire Chamber of Commerce's Holiday Stroll on this Saturday, Dec. 13, 3–8 PM. Visitors can swing by the Mason Library for early parking, browse the sale until 3:00 PM, then meet Pete the Cat on the front lawn before heading downtown for the Stroll's shopping, music, and festive eats.
 
Can't make the Holiday Stroll? The book sale is open during regular Mason Library hours throughout December.
 
Proceeds support free library programming and events for all ages.
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