Under Mysterious Circumstances

On March 26^, I wrote an article for Danvers Patch titled featuring some tidbits I’d read that my mother, Barbara Liscomb, had written for the Danvers Herald back in the 1970s. I’m going to share more of those stories she left behind this week, some of which were notes in her journal. But first as a follow up to the March 26 article, here is some reader feedback that sparked quite a bit of curiosity amongst Danversites.

One comment from reader Dale Marino sparked a lot of interest in a mysterious scary place downtown. Dale told us that children were told “NEVER NEVER go down there.” The next week, I mentioned that I was dying to know what the place was. On April 7, Danvers Patch reader Doug solved the mystery.

Doug posted the following comment on my column :

“I think I found it through Google and Rat Hole in a book by our own Richard Trask. Try here and look at the picture caption for the Fossa Block on the bottom of page 98. http://bit.ly/gaL9d5 I am surely going to buy one of these books now!”

As it turns out, there’s a copy of Mr. Trask’s book right here in my personal library and sure enough, The Rat Hole was a small bowling alley located on the Fossa Block. Thank you to Doug for solving the mystery and to Dale for bringing it up. Now we just have to speculate about exactly why children were forbidden to go near a bowling alley!

And now on to tales from intrepid reporter B. Liscomb, intermingled with my own memories.

The late Dr. Dexter Gilligan was our family doctor for many years. I clearly remember him coming to the house to check my chronic sore throats. He’d arrive shortly after 4 p.m., ring the bell and come in saying, “Dr. Gilligan,” in the same tone of voice he always used on the telephone (back when you could call a doctor’s office and actually speak with one). Well, it seems Mom mined him for stories, but of course he wouldn’t discuss his patients. What he told her about instead was the ongoing saga of an owl who lived in a Linden tree on the property where his home office was on Peabody Avenue. Yes, I know that sentence should have said an owl “that” lived etc, but isn’t “who” more appropriate?

It seems that he told Mom in September 1970 that at least two owlets were born, but there was speculation there were more because there was so much hooting it up going on. The mother owl was named Hootenanny, but the babies had not been seen around enough to decide on appropriate names.

Decades later, I would drive Mom to her appointments at Dr. Gilligan’s office. He no longer made house calls. We’d park and I’d escort her into the ivy covered house and then I would take my leave and head across the street to the . Since it was daylight, I never did see an owl there for myself, but the Linden tree still grew proud and strong, and always, winter, spring, summer or fall, there was a cacophony of bird calls to let me know that nature really did thrive in the doctor’s outdoor environment. The same could be said for the patients who visited inside; under Dr. Gilligan’s care his patients thrived.

The mystery of this story, in case you are wondering, is why were baby owlets born in September? The answer: they aren’t! They are born in late spring or early summer and remain in the nest for about two months, being most active and vocal as their time to leave arrives.

Evidently, quite a few Danvers folks had birds on the brain at the time. There was a spate of questions about where the white ducks at the Mill Pond were in late May 1970. Usually, they were put into the pond weeks earlier, but that year the new ducks were slow to mature so their appearance was delayed causing much consternation around town.

This mystery was on the lips of the young and old alike. Mom set out to solve it and found out through her sources the anonymous men who donated the ducks reported that the baby ducks did not have a mother and had not been waterproofed as mother ducks do by greasing them with oil from their own wings. There was one adult male duck left from the previous year and his name was Red. He was said to have quacked his approval when told he would soon have a new lady duck to court. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not think about what might have happened to the first lady duck, mother to said sinkable ducklings, so we’ll leave that part of the mystery unresolved.

Popping into neighborhood pharmacies seemed to provide some fun stories too. Once at the Danvers Pharmacy on Elm Street, a lady presented a prescription that had been permeated by perfume in her purse, wearing away everything but the doctor’s signature. This prompted the pharmacist to post a sign saying, “What  do you mean you can’t fill my prescription?” with a clipboard underneath for people to list their own tales of woe about what happened to their RXs, such as the classic homework excuse, “My dog ate it.” Wouldn’t it be a hoot to find that old clipboard and read some of the reasons listed? I bet there were some doozies.

The mystery: just how do pharmacists actually manage to read doctors' handwriting anyway?

 Once, Police Officer Walter Roberts (who Mom noted was not only handsome but quick-witted) stopped in at another pharmacy in the square, Lloyd’s Drugstore, to chat with the pharmacist James Gagnon. The conversation is alleged to have been as follows:

Gagnon: “Hi Walter, what are you doing?”

Roberts: “Just watching the drug traffic.”

The only real mystery here is whether this actually happened or someone told Mom the story because it made for a good laugh!

One final pharmacy related note. In 1970, Woodman’s Drug Store at 31 Maple St. sold Russell Stover Chocolate Cream Eggs for Easter at the price of 75 cents. During the week of April 10, 2011, /pharmacy also on Maple St, sold Russell Stover single eggs or chocolate bunnies for 74 cents, and with a loyalty card you got that 74 cents back, making it free.

The mystery: why when the price of everything else is skyrocketing, has a Russell Stover egg dropped in price?

Here’s a new, but old, Danvers mystery. I remember driving on what was called “the dirt road,” but for the life of me I cannot recall where it was. It must still have existed after I got my driver’s license, so that puts it in the early 1980s era, but I think it was in use much earlier than that. Maybe it had (has) a name and we just called it the dirt road. Does anyone have any idea what street or road I’m thinking about?