Houses of Hartt Ancestors

The Beehive House
Home of Pioneer Thomas and Phebe Hartt
and 50 other families for 189 years

The house as it was

The house in modern times before it was torn down

(Pioneer Thomas, Thomas A, Jonathan, Samuel, Isaac)

Thomas and Phebe (Phillips) Hartt arrived from Gagetown, N.B. to Wabi Goub Skw meaning "The White Run" or "Silver Springs" in 1804. Thomas bought 900 acres from Ambrose Sherman, the governor of Nova Scotia. The deed was signed April 16, 1804. Included in this acreage was land on both sides of the North West Branch of the Oromocto River at a small falls. These falls proved to be a suitable site for the milldam.

Soon after arriving, he built a log cabin on this land near the river, which was the main route of transportation. Shortly after he started a sawmill and a gristmill on the North Branch of the Oromocto River. These mills were situated on each end of the dam and were in operation by 1810. This place was known as Hartt's Mills. Later, when the railway came through this area in 1869, the name changed to Fredericton Junction, N.B.

In 1815, Thomas built a large house in front of his original log cabin. It was the first house in the settlement with sawn lumber used in the construction. It got the name "Beehive" because people were always coming and going and it was always busy like a bee's hive. The Beehive was on the road from St. Andrews to present day Fredericton and served as a stop over for the stagecoach and other travelers.

The house was built from the lumber that Thomas hand made. There was a total of twelve rooms and an attic, which was used by travelers in early years for a place to sleep. Downstairs there were seven rooms and five rooms were upstairs, with nine bedrooms total. To get up stairs there were two stairways, one from the kitchen and the other from the hall in the other end of the house.

The chimney, which was very large, was built in the small dug out dirt cellar. This chimney was large enough to accommodate fireplaces in almost every room downstairs and up. The ceilings in the house were quite low. Later this chimney was taken down and four wood stoves were used to heat the house.

The first kitchen was also made over and a veranda built on the front. At the same time the hallway going through the house was blocked, so two families could live in the house. One of the sitting rooms then was converted to a kitchen. More than 50 families have lived in this house. The house was supplied with water hauled from a spring on the property.

Twenty five years ago, most if not all of the woodwork in the house was the original wood Thomas had laid down in 1813 but there were only a few of the first windows and window frames left. These windows have small panes of glass and were in the back of the house only. Besides having the forest near by the house had at one time great lilac bushes, cranberry bushes and also a few cherry trees.

Considerable acreage surrounding the homestead was cleared, barns and outbuildings were erected, stock was acquired and soon the Hartt farm because a prosperous one. There were many barns on the property to house the horses of travelers and the stagecoach, which stopped over. These barns were burned down once in a fire that started in a small sawmill, which was on one of the three springs that ran through the Hartt property.

In the Miramichi Fire of 1825 the Beehive was one of the few houses to escape destruction due to the earnest prayers of Phebe Hartt. During the fire the people went down to Hartt's dam and stayed there until a bit of luck came their way and the wind changed. The fire stopped within a quarter mile of the Beehive.

Thomas and Phebe had a large family, eight daughters and three sons. As each grew older and married, their father Thomas would give each one some land and help them build a home. While Thomas and his sons were farming, lumbering and running the mills, his daughters taught school in different houses in the community until the first school was built in 1862 which was called Mount Bleak Academy. Thomas's children married local people of the area. The lumbering and milling business flourished so that by October 13, 1851, when Thomas Hartt's will was drawn, he owned a considerable estate. As beneficiaries he named his wife and each of his eleven children, dividing his possessions in varying amounts among them. (You can read his will in "Hart to Hartt" book page 266)

Included in the real estate were two lots at the mouth of the Yoho Stream, a lot at Hardwood Creek, six lots all on the Upper river, the grist mill, the sawmill and the homestead farm. The total consisted of several thousand
acres.

The first time the Beehive had not been owned by a member of the Hartt family was in 1974 when a great- great grandson, Harold Nason, sold it to Mr. Seabrooks from Newfoundland, Canada. The house was torn down in 2003 and the fire department burned the lumber that was left for fire practice.

In the early days, the community had, besides a sawmill, gristmill, and a stop over for the stagecoach, a blacksmith shop, tanneries, pubs, shipyards, and even the Oromocto Coal Company. The first post office and general store was built in 1813. The store got its supplies by ship from Oromocto, Saint John landings and the Prides Landing about one and a half miles away.

Information gleaned from the essay of Alice (Duplisea) Deschenes and "Days of Old"

The George & Bessie Hart House in Essex, MA

Around 1930
(George and Bessie's three daughters are in the buggy)

Today

(George, Henry, Joseph, Joseph, John, John, Samuel, Isaac)

George Albert Hart (1864-1938) wife Bessie (1869-1951) and their three children Grace (1897-1969), Dorothy (1900-1993) and Mary (1908-1978) lived in this small town of Essex, Massachusetts. It was a peaceful place, a little town on the Essex River, not far from the famous old port of Gloucester. Everybody knew everybody else in Essex and everybody else's business. I remember when we got our telephone. If someone called you and you didn't answer, the telephone operator usually knew where you had gone and when you would return, and she would relate this information to the person who had phoned you.

We lived in the last house at the end of a dead end street. Besides the house, there were two storage buildings that my father used in his provision business and a small barn, which housed a horse and a carriage, called a Democrat. Later it was used as a garage, although garden tools and odds and ends could be found there also. All these structures were connected to the house by a porch-like covered walkway.

The street was called Spring Street because, at the corner, there was a clear spring of water where townspeople came with jugs and pails to get drinking water. There was no "town water" yet and pump water was usually hard, had a rusty taste, and wasn't safe to drink anyway. It was cool by the spring - cool and wet - and willow-shaded. The door to it was slanted, like a bulkhead door, and screened so that leaves and debris would not sully the water. When you opened the door, you would always hear "splash, splash" as one frog after another jumped off the brick ledge into the water.

Then there was the trip home with the cool pail bumping your leg, and occasional splashes of water drenching your hot skin. We made lemonade with it and strawberry-aide (with crushed wild berries, sweeter than sugar, with the tang of hot sun in them). In the winter we went for water only on special occasions when there was City Company who might expect it on the table. Thanksgiving and Christmas we went to the spring for water. Otherwise we drank cocoa or tea or coffee, all made with boiled water from the well, pump water. I guess I never liked plain water, and I still don't. Maybe it was because of those frogs!

To get to town was a long way by the road. But we had a short cut. We called it "going across the fields." In front of our house was a large field that had a small hill in it. It was an apple orchard and hay field combined and it opened directly into our lane. On the other side of the road, at the base of Cap'n Sam's Hill, was the shipyard where wooden ships were built. It belonged to Arthur Dana Storey at that time. This was a wonderful and fascinated place. Long planks were piled high and where one protruded beyond his fellows, it became a springboard where we could bounce up and down endlessly.

From our house we could always hear the pounding and hammering as a boat was under construction. These were fishing boats that would, when completed, be launched into the Essex River and then go down to Gloucester to have the masts steeped and the rigging put on. A launching was always attended by many townspeople.

Contributed by Mary (Hart) Pletsch

Old Nason Hart Homestead
on the Gore Road Fredericton Junction, New Brunswick

That house on the Gore Road overlooking Gullison Brook, which I fished in for trout many times as a kid, was the old Nason Homestead. I went all through that house during the family reunions we had when I was between 7 and 10 years old. There were 2 staircases going up to the second story and I think more stairs going up to the attic. Vandals burned it down in the early 70's on the day before Halloween. It was vacant at the time. What a shame!

Taken for the Nason Chronicles -- written by Marshall Nason

The old Nason house was built about 1876. It was planned that two families should occupy it and so was spacious above average. Apart from numerous closets, entries and large attic, there were eighteen rooms in it. The upstairs was nearly altogether given up to bedrooms. There were bedrooms for the girls, for the boys, for the hired men, for my grandmother, for guests. The last were in the front part of the house; the others in the rear part know as the "L", a characteristic feature of many houses in the region. Downstairs were the bedrooms of my parents and the younger children. The main rooms downstairs however were in succession from front to rear-front entry, large hall, sitting room, dining room, kitchen, and porch. The distance from the front door to the porch must have been about thirty yards or more. Two pantries, one called the "china pantry" off the dining room, and the "kitchen pantry" off the kitchen. A sliding panel connected the two, the former, however, being used chiefly when company came. A sink room or washroom made possible the doing of washings in winter time without too much exposure on the part of the women folk.

Of course, the parlor was the most carefully furnished room in the house, through in the light of modern taste it would not be considered very artistic. I could not have been more than seven or eight years old when my mother, with an air mystery, took me in one morning to see the new parlor furniture. I know now she must have been almost as pleased as a girl, and she was indeed, little more that a girl; probably in her middle twenties. That suite was the only one ever purchased for our parlor in my time. The wood was oak, and was covered by upholstery of golden-yellow plush, into which a design was worked.

My favorite piece of furniture was the rocking chair. One arc of a circle rocked on a lower, stationary arc, instead of on the floor, and springs held the two in place.

Another piece of parlor furniture purchased a little after the suite I shall never forget. It was a central hanging lamp that my father bought from a neighbor who was selling his furniture preparatory to moving to the states. Some cousins of my mother, also from "the States" were visiting us. One evening we were all seated in the parlor talking and in the course of the conversation my grandmother told one of the visiting cousins that the lamp had been bought by father when Mr. M. was auctioning off his furniture. It was somewhat humiliating to my young mother, and I think she felt that grandmother was telling family secrets with a frankness hardly warranted.

Among the furniture were several pieces that for some time have been in the "Relic" class. A long mantel mirror was old when I first saw it. As a child I used to look at the top frame with acorn-like decorations, and painted just below it in high colors a dancing girl. Mahogany center tables with heavy supports, spool beds and other articles lured buyers of antiques to our home but my mother could never be persuaded to part with any of them, even tho' at times ready money was by no means plentiful. They were still there when she went to join those to whom the heirlooms had first belonged.

Newton and Addie Hartt House (The Willows)
Alberta Home of Newton Henry and Addie (Way) Hartt

(Newton, Samuel E, Samuel Jr., Samuel Sr. Jonathan, Samuel, Isaac)

Newton and Addie Hartt left Campbell Settlement, New Brunswick for Montana in 1891 to help Judah Hartt with his farming. Upon returning to Canada from Montana in 1904 Newton and Addie lived in several Alberta communities: High River, Calgary then on to Hanna area in 1910 living in Lone Butte, Mossleigh and Watts, Alberta.

I’d like to tell you about "The Willows" which was located seven miles west and five miles north of Hanna, Alberta. At the time when my grandparents lived there, their Post Office was Watts, which was four miles north. Watts no longer exists.

Their farm buildings could be seen from a mile away when approaching from the south, as they were on a rise. Their home was fairly typical of the time. It was a good solid house with a partial cement basement. The back door was used exclusively. This led into the side porch, which was used as a wash-up area, laundry room and also housed the milk/cream separator.

A door on the left led into the kitchen with the cook stove where grandma turned out great ginger snaps and pies of the season, apple, rhubarb and pumpkin. A small kitchen table took up one wall and cupboards another. There was a large tin on the cupboard, which always seemed to be full of ginger snaps for a hungry young boy.

On a shelf mounted on the wall sat an ornate clock with a gong to strike the hours. This could be heard throughout the barnyard. Newton purchased the clock as a gift for Addie in Butte, Montana. It cost $5.00, a pricey sum at the time. The clock came down to me and now resides with my daughter Donna Morse in Vancouver. She had the clock professionally restored, but the chime is too noisy for modern city life.

Grandma had a rocking chair in the kitchen where I spent many hours listening to old stories.

The dining room was raised one step from the kitchen level, and contained the piano, a dining room table and lots of garden plants. There was also a small sewing room in the corner on the same level. Stairs at the front of the house led up to two bedrooms and gave access to the basement as well.

The house was situated next to a slough that had willows and poplars. The long driveway from the main road to their house was lined with poplars. The barn was located approximately 300 feet from the back of the house, and could hold about twelve animals. There was also a garage for their 1929 Model "A" Ford. The well out back produced the BEST drinking water for miles around. After Grandma died in 1937, my parents took over the farm in 1938 and then Dad bought a tractor. It was probably the first time a tractor was on those two quarters.

Theirs was a happy home and I spent countless hours there with my grandparents - quality time in their house that had been built around the time of the First World War.

My parents Spencer Burns and Lorraine Hartt had a farm directly across the road from my grand parents. This house was built about 1921. The house design was similar to Newton and Addie's except that there was only one large room upstairs. Our farm did not have the nice trees either, and the well water was not good drinking water. Lorraine and Spencer moved from the area in 1945. But we had a happy home, too, and I was very fortunate to have had great parents and grandparents.

Submitted by Robert Whitfield Burns, son of Spencer and Lorraine

William Charles Hartt Home

(William C., Aaron Samuel , Aaron, Samuel Sr. , Jonathan, Samuel, Isaac)

5616 South Warner St.
Tacoma, Washington

Here is the general layout of the rooms when we walked in the front door.

There was a hall that led left upstairs, and to the right was a rather large parlor where we had the communion service when I was little. Next was a large dining room where we had many a big meal. Off to the left was Grandmother and Grandfather's bedroom and straight through was a huge kitchen and pantry. A bath was to the left of the kitchen and right was a small enclosed porch and it led to the neat back yard where Aunt Katherine grew lots of GOOD vegetables and wonderful raspberries from which she made what she called "red drink" Also she made her own recipe of mayonnaise, which was DELICIOUS and made me a life long veggie dipper in mayo, only now it has to be Best Foods! Can't remember if there were 3 or 4 bedrooms upstairs.

Later Aunt Katherine made the front parlor into a little apartment walled off from the dining room to rent. When she sold the family home after she married Arthur Hughes who had rented a room from her, she moved out to a dear little house on Vickery Road in Tacoma where my parents lived close by.

Contributed by Isobel McCoy

Home of Squire Thomas E. Hartt and Edward Hartt
in Fredericton Junction, New Brunswick

(Edward, Thomas E, Pioneer Thomas, Thomas A., Jonathan, Samuel, Isaac)

The Hartt family obtained the property between McKillops Hill and Gullison Brook near Fredericton Junction, N.B. Here in the early 1840's Pioneer Thomas Hartt's son, Squire Thomas E. Hartt, a magistrate who had married Adeline Perley from Maugerville, built his home. Their son Edward later inherited the home. Edward married Susan Mary Duchesnay and they had six daughters and four sons. The oldest son was Harold (Hal) who eventually took over the property.

The old highway ran about thirty feet in front of the Hartt house and continued down to Gullison Brook. Hal built a saw mill, run by gasoline engine, on the bank of the brook. He did a small amount of custom sawing but chiefly the lumber sawn was for his own requirements. The farm remained in the Hartt family until the spring of 1964 when Charles Burtt became the owner. His son George followed him. It was demolished in middle 1980's. Taken from "Days of Old"

Bunny (Hartt) Messer recalls:

From what I remember there was a huge kitchen, a dining room, large living room and a huge bedroom downstairs and that is where the fireplace was that the mantle came from. I remember the kitchen had a big separator for doing the milk after it was collected from the cows. I don't remember much about too many cupboards but I know there was an old sink, I suppose there was some sort of a cupboard where she cooked. There was a large wood cook stove in the kitchen and I remember there being a cot beside the stove. The floor was covered with black tar paper and I can remember sitting on that couch in the kitchen thinking poor Grammy trying to keep that floor clean. I can remember her sweeping it. She was always jolly and always laughing. She wore a house dress and an apron over it. Her shoes seem to be old moccasins of some sort or old boots. The dining room was just a normal room with a table and chairs and Buffet, which was always loaded with stuff. The living room was big and it had a heater stove in it. Linoleum on the floor and some chairs around .I don't think there was a couch. The hallway where the stairs went up separated the bedroom from the living room. The bedroom was also behind the kitchen. It was like a square house. I think there were 4 bedrooms upstairs. I was born in one of them. The upstairs rooms seemed smaller than the down stair rooms. But that's all I remember about upstairs. Mum (Eileen Hartt) would know what they looked like as she lived there for a while.

Syson Homestead

Caroline H. Hartt ( 1873-1945)
(Caroline, Henry, Samuel Jr., Samuel Sr., Jonathan, Samuel, Isaac)

Caroline Hartt of Jacksontown, N.B. came west to teach school in 1903. She married in 1907, Richard Mackley Syson, an Englishman, who knew very little about farming. His first English wife died in childbirth shortly after they came from England leaving Richard with a 2-year-old son, Thurston. She continued to teach and help with the farm chores while Richard worked in the coal mines

(Read more on page 160 in Hart to Hartt book)

Caroline and Richard’s first house was located 6 miles north of Stettler, Alberta

The first house on the homestead burned down one night in January 1910. Mother, Dad and 8-year-old Thur escaped in their nightclothes and one trunk near a door was pulled out. It was fortunate that mother had left the blinds open that night or they would not have seen the flames outside their bedroom window. Mother wanted to go back in to save the Hartt photo album but Dad held her back. They took shelter in the barn made out of straw and poles while the neighbors poked around in the ashes thinking they had all perished in their beds. Mother was so embarrassed to be caught in her night attire but thankful to be alive. Neighbors invited them to stay at their place until another two-room house was built. They figured the house caught fire by hot ashes nearby carried over by the wind to the manure and straw, which was piled against the house to keep out the cold (all homestead houses were winterized that way).

In 1922, was an exciting time for this 9 year old, as mother spent $1500 to buy a year old house, horse barn and a carpenter shop in Stettler and had them moved to another quarter a mile away. It took 12 horses and 2 tractors to get the house moved on top of the hill. Included in the package deal was a back house (outside toilet), fence, 2 steel gates, sewer pipe and a wooden sidewalk. I can remember it vividly. Our old homestead house was as long as the new one was wide and it was attached to give us 3 bedrooms, kitchen, dining room and living room. A back porch with a milk/cream separator room was added. Later, an extra bedroom was added when the bathroom was installed. The new portion of the house had 9 foot ceilings with a narrow dark molding 1 foot from the ceiling, which made it quite classy. Early years pictures were hung by wire attached to his molding. All the rooms were wall papered. Once mom counted 7 layers of wallpaper in one of the bedrooms. Good insulation! My mother bought some nice pieces of furniture in the 1920’s. Today the big dining room table (sits 12 people) and an old secretary (desk-bookshelf) are at my grand daughters homes. A large piano sat in the living room which I enjoyed playing. The house had a partial dug out basement where a pipe less furnace was installed. The heat came up a big grate between the dining room and living room. One of our first visitors were Aunt Flora and Gt. Aunt Olive Smith from New Brunswick.

In 1976, my husband, Don decided to put new windows in the older part of the house, I told him to watch out for a little “sad” iron. I remembered as a preschooler I had let it fall between the walls. Sure enough there it was. It is now kept safe in my daughter's home. The iron had gone through the fire in 1910 and had the wood burned out of the handle. We found oilcloth, tarpaper and 6 inches of 1930’s silt in between the walls. No wonder that part of the house was so cold during the winter months.

As the years went by we got running water, electricity and a bathroom in the house. In this house we raised our three children. My dad lived with us for 15 years following my mother’s death in 1945. For a few years our son, John, and family lived there when Don and I moved to town in 1986. It became unsafe to live in because of dry rot. One sad day it was demolished so a new house for John’s family could be built in its place. The house was my home for 64 years and the old part for 77 years. I have many fond memories of the years spent living there.

Contributed by Florence (Syson) Clark

Rev. Samuel Hartt Jr. Homestead
Jacksontown, Carleton Co. New Brunswick

Rev. Samuel Hartt Jr. had a homestead near Jacksontown, Carleton Co. N.B. in the early 1800’s. He gave it to his youngest son Rev. Henry Hartt after his passing in 1867 then it was passed down to his son Bedford and then on to his son Reginald. We do not know when the house/barn complex was built. We know the land was in the Hartt name for 100 years. The house burned down in the 1920’s.

Here is the description of the place remembered by 6 year-old Florence (Syson) Clark when she visited the Hartt Homestead in 1920 and stayed for 7 months.

All the buildings were attached, house, horse barn, implement shed, cooker room, wood shed, hen house, toilet, ash pit.

The homestead buildings were situated far in the quarter near the woods. As we approached the homestead we came down a lane edged by zigzag rail fence with apple trees all ablaze with colorful blossoms.

Going into the house and down a short hall to the left was a parlor reserved for special company. It had two big pictures on the wall of a big dog “Dignity” and a saucy little dog “Impudence.” Another larger picture was of Queen Alexandra and little son and daughter. The room had flowery deep pink wallpaper. There was a small black grand piano in this room, which I was allowed to play on. We are not sure where the piano went or if it was destroyed in the fire. My grandmother Phebe’s coffin was kept in the parlor until burial. I was taken to see her and I thought they had cut her in half as I could only see part of her. I remember grandmother when I was three years old. She was standing 6 ft tall in the living room dressed in a high collared black dress.

Across the hall way was the living room with 8 doors going out to other parts of the house. The big stove in the living room had glass in the windows of the door. Huge logs were kept behind the stove in a log closet with a door on it. My mother loved the huge gold mirror and fortunately, before the fire, it was shipped to Alberta. It now is in my son’s home. There were two kitchens, one being used as the summer kitchen as it was cooler during canning season. There was a pantry off the main kitchen. I remember the big table with beautiful condiments in the middle, which were very expensive even in that era. Upon thinking back, I believe they must have been a gift from the Smith family, up river (my grandmother’s family). The huge wooden table was used for entertaining visiting ministers, family members, friends and hired hands.

There was a bedroom off the parlor, one had to go through another bedroom to get to the other. In the one bedroom I remember a beautiful rose water pitcher and basin set. Uncle Bedford slept in the bedroom off the living room with a mountain of bedding over him. The next bedroom was where my mother was born in 1873. Forty years later she gave birth to me in the same room. I wonder if it was the same spool bed that I crawled under when I was three. Grandma Hartt was baby-sitting me during prayer meeting. I went under the bed and she couldn't get me out even with a broom. Wasn't I a naughty girl?

A staircase led up stairs from the living room. There were two bedrooms up there. It appeared that two different houses were pulled together. The attic was piled high with weaving looms, spinning wheel, oxen yoke and all kinds of ancient trunks. The trunks belonged to lonely relatives that came to be housekeepers for bachelor, Uncle Bedford. Aunt Olive Smith was among them. She believed in drowning young kittens put in a paper bag placed in a pail of water with me watching as a 6 year-old. Ugh! I found a guitar up there with a broken string. Aunt Olive said “NO” when I asked to play it. I remember in the attic there was a huge chimney which was surrounded by hanging bags of duck and goose feathers drying to be later made into feather ticks (mattresses) I also saw some apple rings hung up to dry.

I remember a veranda on the house, which had barn like doors on it to keep the snow out during the winter months. Under the house was a dug out cellar, which had a water well in it. Many barrels of apples and potatoes were stored down in this cellar. It kept Uncle Bedford busy picking them over during the winter when he wasn't working in the woods. He was down there in 1913 when he heard my first cry. He later helped me many years later to get my birth certificate as for some reason my birth was not registered.

In the implement shed was a “pung” or a cutter we call it out west. Grandfather would use it to go visit the church folk. I remember the big pot used for cooking up the turnips for the farm animals also a few hens were in the barn area along with the cows and horses. Uncle Bedford bought a couple of horses from Alberta and put them in the barn during the cold New Brunswick winter. The horses got sick because they were confined to barn living when they were out door horses in Western Canada where the climate consists of dry cold.

The ash pit was inside the building complex. It was deep and was cleaned out come spring. Unfortunately, it was the cause of the entire Hartt Homestead complex to burn down in the 1920’s. Bedford then built his farm buildings further up the hill. Some of the buildings are still being used today.

The winter was a fun time as I could coast down a long hill near by with my Mother and enjoy the novelty of getting mail from a mailbox. R.R. #6. I often watched the horses working a treadmill for sawing logs. My playmates were May Alexander across the road, Cora Kitchen who lived across the brook and Myrna Smith up the road near the Baptist church.

My mother Caroline planted a maple tree in 1881 which still stands by the now Trans-Canada Highway. My daughter Carole and I had our pictures taken beside it June 2004. It was a joy to show Carole where I was born. My husband and I took a trip back in 1967 after we visited the Expo in Montreal.

I have many fond memories of my visits back to my birthplace in Jacksontown, New Brunswick. In the good old days it was a 5-day train ride across Canada.

Contributed by Florence (Syson) Clark

Sylvester and Relief (Baldwin) Hart House

Among the early settlers and good, practical farmers of Carlisle township who have passed away, none left a fairer record for personal integrity and high moral worth than he whose life and character forms the basis of these lines. Reared amid the Green Mountains of Vermont, and at an early period of his existence being inculcated with the importance of industry and self-reliance, he was admirably qualified for the life of a pioneer in the western country where forty-five years ago he effected a permanent settlement.

Sylvester Hart was born at Weston, Vermont, on the 27th of March 1806. His father, George Hart, was a native of Massachusetts; his mother, Polly Lawrence, a Vermonter. In the days of his youth, educational advantages were quite limited, and what little of scholastic learning he obtained was in the common schools of the place of his birth. By subsequent self-study, and the application of knowledge gained by experience, he became a well-read man, and possessed intelligence above the average farmer. It was in the year 1834, when, imbued with a spirit of adventure, coupled with the desire to make a home for himself and family, he came to Lorain County, Ohio, and settled in Carlisle township, upon the farm now occupied by his son, Henry H. Some years prior to his removal from Vermont, however, he had become pretty thoroughly acquainted with and habituated in agricultural pursuits. At the age of seventeen years, he bought his "time" of his father, and subsequently purchased a small farm, which he sold preparatory to his departure to Ohio. All went well with him in his western home until 1840, when his residence and barn were totally destroyed by fire, a calamity under which a man of less indomitable energy and perseverance would have succumbed. Undaunted by this untoward event, he rebuilt on another part of his farm the house in which Henry H. Hart now resides. In December 1856, Mr. Hart removed to the village of Oberlin, intending to retire from the active, incessant labor of the farm. Here he resided a respected and honorable citizen until his death, which occurred Sept. 26, 1874.

In politics, Mr. Hart was formerly a Whig, and after the organization of the Republican Party affiliated with the latter. He was township trustee of Carlisle many years, and was elected to various other offices in that township. He was not a professor of religion, but the honesty of his life compared favorably with many of the most ardent church members. After a careful investigation of spiritualism, he became convinced of its genuineness, and espoused its teachings with a faith that lasted until his death. He became one of the largest landholders in the county, and was also extensively engaged in dairying. Those of his acquaintances and friends by whom he was best known, generally bear testimony to his uncompromising, personal integrity, his business rectitude, and the placidity of his domestic life. It was in the home circle where the serenity of his disposition was so highly appreciated. His benevolence was proverbial. Taken all in all, the career of Mr. Hart offers many excellent traits which afford alike a good example for future generations to follow, and an imperishable legacy to his estimable family.

Flavius Hart House

This two-and-a-half story brick house features a Mansard roof that has bracketed eaves and dormer windows. The house has tall, narrow windows set within segmental arched openings with stone sills and wood shutters. A shallow front porch with thin square porch posts spans the front of the house. It has a belled roof. A two-story rear wing, possibly a later addition, is brick on the first floor and wood frame on the second and has a flat roof. The house has an open porch on the west side and an additional one-story wing on the east side. The second addition along the rear has a gable roof and an off-center chimney.

This house was built in 1875 for Flavius Hart (Blodgett). Mr. Hart was listed in the 1877 city directory as a farmer at 108 East College. From 1883 through 1916, he was listed at this address as a furniture manufacturer and from 1894-1897 as postmaster. F.A. Hart's furniture store was at 29 South Main (24 before number conversion) from 1883-1895; it was Hart & Sperry furniture from 1894 to 1904; and Hart & Vincent from 1904 to 1907, when Mr. Hart sold the business to Mr. Vincent (Maddock). In 1891 Mrs. Olive Hart was listed for the first time, and in 1897 the children Bert, Merton and Eugene were listed. In 1920 Mrs. Jennie B. Hart was listed as resident; in 1931 Henry Hart and Mrs. J.B. Hart; and in 1935 Henry, Jennie, and Arthur Hart, a lineman, were listed as residents. In 1937 Floyd Barnard, farmer and James Worcester, retired farmer, were listed as residents; in 1939 and 1942 Paul Rogers was listed as resident. Then in 1956 Mrs. Anna L Laczko was listed as resident; her sons reside there today (City Directories). This house is significant for its association with a prosperous business family in Oberlin. The house was listed by the City of Oberlin as an Oberlin Historic Landmark in September of 1975.

Ohio Historical Society house historical information here.

Frederick Libby House

The Libby House Today

Left to Right: Mary Ethel (Mae), Nettie, Addison Samuel (Sam), Charles Frederick, Clara Louise, Caroline S. (Carrie), Frederick Ernest. Charles Frederick's wife Clarissa H. (Clara) (Hartt) Libby (1838-1901) is not pictured.

(Clarissa ,Samuel Jr., Samuel Sr., Jonathan, Samuel, Isaac)

Clarissa was born March 21, 1838 in Simonds, N.B.and died May 3, 1901. She married Charles Frederick Libby June 30, 1869. He was born Dec. 20, 1843. He was a farmer in Milford, MA, a son of Stephen and Mary Ann ( Stinchfield) Libby.

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October 19, 2002

Dear Mary Ann:

Today, I went to the Melrose Library and looked at old Street Directories. In the 1926 volume, I found: Libby, Frederick E. (Mary C.), Res. 42 Youle. There was nothing in the 1935 Directory. So, he probably died in between those years. I picked up a free map at the desk and found the street on it. (Yes, it's in a very nice area of the City.) I'll send you a map showing the house location.

As I was just around the corner at that moment in time, I went there. I just intended to take a photo of the house and one of the neighborhood. When I stopped, there was a man out front who wanted to know what I wanted. I asked him if his name was Libby. He said no but a man named Libby used to own the house. I told him that I was helping someone find her grandfather's house and that I was helping because she doesn't live around here.

He asked if you were the girl from Texas. He said that he had sent her "the papers". I told him that I believe that you live in North Carolina but I'm not sure as I only know you through the Internet. I asked him what papers he was talking about. He told me that he was working on the house about 8 years ago and found a lot of papers belonging to Mr. Libby. They dealt with Panama and Columbia.

THEN, about 4 years ago, his wife's sister was visiting. She went out front to have a cigarette and saw a girl looking over the house. She asked what she wanted and the girl replied that she was the grand-daughter of a previous occupant. Her first name was Libby!

They invited her in and had a wonderful time chatting with her. He couldn't find the papers then, but, found them later and mailed them to her.

He asked if I wanted her address. Of course I said, "Yes!". So he invited me in. His wife gave me the address. They had all of the info on a corkboard by the phone in case they came up with anything more for her. He was wrong - the girl was from California - it was her cousin who was from Texas. He had to leave. His wife wanted to talk to me.

I explained that the John Libby Family Association has two books available about the family and that we are working on another one. I informed her that I am on the Board of Directors for the Family

Association and that I am also on the Publications Committee and helping to work on the latest book. I also told her that, in those positions, I try to answer queries for Libby relatives and, in the process, also try to get some data in return. I told her that I had promised to try to get a picture of the house for you. I gave her my business card and my home address and phone number.

She re-iterated how the girl had visited and wanted to know if that was who I was helping. She was confused as she couldn't understand why you didn't know about the house if you had been there.I pointed out that the names she gave me aren't you. Then, she told me that the other girl was originally from Central America. She said that she really enjoyed talking to that girl and that if you ever came up this way she'd like to meet you and chat with you.

She told me that they had lived there for 25 years and that the outside of the house was the same except for an access ramp they were adding out front. However, the inside has been radically changed. (It's beautiful!) She told me again about the papers that they had found and mailed. She told me again that they dealt with Panama and Columbia.

Both of them invited me to come back anytime. They are very warm and friendly people. She was born and raised in Ireland - he's of Irish decent but born here.

Yes, I took some photos of the outside of the house. I'll send them.

Written by Allen Humphries