Gladys awoke from a night of fitful sleep. The house was quiet. Could it be that she was home alone? She was hungry and breakfast had not been brought to her. She rose cautiously, putting on her robe and slippers. She went to the kitchen, though it had been awhile since she’d felt well enough to prepare a meal. She craved a bowl of hot oatmeal, which was not in its usual place.

 

“My kitchen has been rearranged,” she thought to herself, a little agitated.

After eating what to her was a large breakfast of oatmeal, toast and tea she went into the bathroom, hung her robe on the back of the door and washed her hands. She suddenly felt exhausted and went back to bed.

It was the day before Easter. She eased into the bed. Her eyes closed into a deep sleep, though she heard her youngest son, Robert, come in. He sat quietly beside her bed, asking how she was. He’d always been her fair-haired baby, Bobby.

She could hear the voices calling her from “the other side.” Her work here had been done. She felt so weak that she just could not open her eyes. Her son could not hear what Gladys was hearing and seeing, so he left her to sleep.

Gladys had cancer. For the months before Christmas, she’d been so tired and weak, losing a great deal of weight. She’d never been one to complain. She said she would see a doctor after the holidays were over.

Christmas was her favorite holiday. All year long, whenever she was shopping, she picked up items to wrap for gifts, mostly useful, but many were just little gifts to express her love.

    The week following Christmas, she did as she had said, going to the doctor for a check-up. The prognosis was not good. She had cancer and it had progressed to the point of no return. The only thing that could be done was chemotherapy treatments to try to stop the cancer. The chemo was not helping, making her deathly ill. She told her family that she would not live to see Easter, another of her favorite holy days. Her life seemed like a vision, opening up for her and her God to review.

Gladys was the second child of the large family born in 1900 to Herbert and Millie (Boynton) Hannan. She had been born in her grandfather Boynton’s house, in Montville, where she lived for the most of her childhood.

Gladys remembered the cold day, when she was four years old, that Papa, Aunt Cad, and Uncle Dell brought Grandpapa Hannan to their home to live. He had given Mamma his royal blue Civil War coat with the brass buttons to make warm coats for Mildred and her. Both of the old grandfathers told the children stories of bygone days. It was a happy carefree time of their lives.  Grandpapa Hannan died in the old house in the spring of 1904, just seventy years previous.

Gladys vividly remembered the day when she was ten years old, that Papa came in from the cooper shop telling Mamma that he had an awful headache. Papa asked young Herbert to sit with him. Later in the day, Dr. Ramsay came with his black bag. He came out to tell the family that Papa was dead.

From that time, things seemed to happen quickly, and none of it seemed good. Mamma struggled on, working for neighbors and desperately trying to keep her family together. Gladys and Mildred tended the younger children, getting meals and washing the clothes in a washtub with a scrub board. Roy and Herbert, even though they were only eight and nine years old, did chores for some of the neighbors.

Baby Lester became ill, and he too died, only three months after Papa’s death. She still remembered the little box they put the baby in and took him away.

Then, on what seemed to her to have been a dark and foreboding day, men came and took eight year old Roy, five year old Bertha and four year old Daisy away. What had we done wrong? Mamma, when are they coming back? They didn’t come back. Mamma seemed to be walking in a daze. So much was happening. A year after Papa’s death, grandfather Boynton died at home in 1912.

Mamma married old man, Joe Chapman. He was a mean man, mean to Mamma, and to the children, especially mean to the boys. Baby brother, George was born when Gladys was twelve years old. Old Joe Chapman left, and no one in the house missed him at all. George was such a happy, chubby baby that all of the family just loved him. Mamma clung to him, and he clung to Mamma, Mildred and Gladys.

It was about this time, as if Mamma didn’t have enough problems, that Gladys became sick with a very bad sore throat. She awoke one morning and couldn’t see. Dr. Ramsay again came. He said that she had rheumatic fever, leaving her blind for some time.

Mildred, only thirteen, tended to Gladys, the other children and baby George while Mamma was working. One late winter afternoon, while Mamma was away doing housework for a neighbor woman, with a candle burning in the kitchen for light, Mildred saw a bright light with a vision of Jesus.

Gladys, in her blindness, called out to Mildred from the bedroom. She had seen the light also. Then they heard a tap-tap-tap at the door. No one was ever out in the night on the back roads of Montville where they lived. The girls were very frightened, as Mildred cautiously opened the door a crack. It was Aunt Bertha from down the road, coming to check on her favorite niece, Gladys. She, also had seen the light and vision. Mildred wooded the fire in the kitchen stove and made tea for the three of them. From that time forth, Gladys’ vision improved. For the rest of their lives, they believed they had seen an angel.

The children attended the Kingdom one-room schoolhouse. Gladys was a brilliant student. She loved to read and do crossword puzzles. She learned to knit and crochet, making mittens, hats, gloves, and sweaters from her youth — first for her siblings, and later for her own family. Gladys had many cousins in the neighborhood around Montville. Some were her best friends and schoolmates, among whom were cousins, Belva and Elmer Davis.

Montville and Liberty were busy towns, having much industry and mills on the waterways. Ira Cram’s mill had been sold to Carney Shure from Massachusetts in 1915. The Shure mill employed a number of the local men, including Herbert, Roy and David. The girls were only qualified to work at housekeeping jobs.

One day, the boys brought a handsome young Russian man home with them. Anthony Maresh, called Tony, came from Northern Maine to work in the mill. Tony and Gladys were married in October 1920. They first lived in the little house in the Kingdom called "The Camp," owned by Carney Shure.

At that time, in the early 1920s, there was a migration of young people moving to Massachusetts to make their fortune. Gladys and Tony moved to Massachusetts. Mildred, who had been left with three small children, moved with them.

Mamma married Charles Hubbard in Belfast. They, with the younger boys, followed the family to Massachusetts. Herbert chose to return to Maine, living in the family home in Liberty. Mamma got scarlet fever and died in Boston City Hospital in 1930. She was only fifty years old.

Tony worked at several jobs before becoming section foreman on the Boston and Albany Railroad, which was later bought out by New York Central. He spoke seven languages, making him a natural to oversee workers from many nationalities. The couple lived in Allston and Wellesley before buying a lot with two houses on Orchard Road in East Natick.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Their children, Antina, Frances, Alton and Anton were born in Massachusetts. In 1930, the three month old twins, Alton and Anton, became ill of pneumonia with high fever. Anton died of the fever. Alton survived but was left totally deaf.

Gladys was grief-stricken over the baby’s death, coming so soon after Mamma’s death. Baby Robert was born after the move to East Natick. He was her pride and joy, a towheaded child, asking endless questions, getting a ‘poon and a jar to play in the sand and picking dandelion "Flowters."

Alton was always called Buster. When he was six, Gladys was urged to send him to a private school. She had always been protective of her young son. It was a very hard decision for her to make to send him to a Catholic School for the Deaf in Randolph, Mass. For the ten years Buster attended school, it broke Gladys’ heart to leave him there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Maresh Family in East Natick, MA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gladys and Tony bought a farm in Searsmont to retire to, near the place of her birth. Their daughter and children moved to the farm. Gladys’ heart again broke to give her sons, Buster and Bob, permission to move to Maine also.

When Tony retired from the railroad, he and Gladys returned to the farm in Maine. Gladys enjoyed their retirement. Tony and Buster hunted and fished. She was content in her home, knitting, crocheting, sewing and cooking for all her family.

 

 

Her siblings and their families came to Maine for vacations. Gladys met some of her cousins who she had never known, and in 1960 they organized the Hannan Family Reunion, which was held annually for more than 10 years. Gladys enjoyed hosting the reunion and having relatives around. She also enjoyed having her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren around her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gladys’ mind came back to the present. Bob had gone home. The angels were waiting to carry her to her new home. So many of those who had gone on before were calling to her from Heaven saying it was time for her to come Home.

Just as she had said, on the day before Easter, April 1974, Gladys Nancy Maresh changed her address once more. She now dwells in Heaven. She didn’t need the robe hanging on the bathroom door. She had been given a shining new robe.

 

 

“Welcome home, well done, thou good and faithful servant!”