The Mangle Iron at Myrtle and Warren Southworth's home in Belfast Maine

I loved to visit Aunt Myrtle Dickey Southworth and her husband, my Uncle Warren Southworth in their Belfast Maine home.  They lived on the top floor of a two story duplex.  The home had a back room, like an attic room, but on the same level as the duplex apartment.  In the room was a mangle ironing machine for pressing sheets and such.  Fascinating!
Aunt Myrtle was a kind and caring woman to me and trips to her home were always a highlight of Belfast Maine visits (my home state).  Her husband was my great grandparents' son.  I do recall that the Mangle was large, but do not recall if it was this model.  

Aunt Myrtle E. Dickey and Uncle Ralph Warren Southworth were married on Saturday, November 10th in Belfast Maine. They had two children, a daughter and a son.  Myrtle died in Chula Vista California in 1982 at the age of 70. She was living near her daughter's area.  Uncle Warren died in Belfast Maine in 1970 at the age of 59.  In this picture, Warren is standing with his older brother Dana Southworth.  Dana died in 1971 at the age of 75.  Dana's second marriage was to Helen Devlin Southworth, who was a violinist in the Boston Pops Orchestra.

Ralph Dana Southworth - My Great Granddad's Haberdashery

For decades I heard about my dad's grandfather's haberdashery.  Knew it was so, but never could find anything pertinent to it other than family tradition.

FINALLY, GOT IT - 1913 Advertisement!

Ralph Dana Southworth, Grandfather of Robert Fuller (my dad) and Dad of Alice Southworth Fuller Healey.  Ralph also was or became the City Clerk for the City of Belfast Maine...for many years.

Ralph and Alvra and family lived at 3 Church Street in Belfast.  Short commute to the haberdashery and to city hall!

The Life and Tragedy of My Great Aunt Martha Evelyn Southworth

Martha Evelyn Southworth entered this world on March 16, 1901 in Belfast Maine, a welcomed and loved baby of her parents (my great grandparents), Alvra and Ralph Southworth.  Martha's sister Alice was my grandmother who also had the highest respect and love for her parents.

When my Great Aunt Martha was young, she is said to have looked a lot like me as a child.  I do not see this resemblance (she is the one sitting), but my Grandmother Alice Southworth (standing) swore to it.  Their brother Dana is standing behind his sisters.

Perhaps as I and she grew up, I began to resemble Martha more -- she is the one on the right; Alice on left in the photo below.

Regardless of outer appearances, Martha's life was filled with love and loneliness. 

On September 14 in 1921 Martha married when she was 20 years of age to Edward "Eddie" Thornton Sullivan.  She was so very in love with the blue-eyed Eddie (See photo) who was 10 years older than Martha.  Eddie was born on October 14, 1891 in Portland ME. He died on February 20, 1938 and is buried in the Southworth section of Grove Cemetery in Belfast ME.

 

Eddie was a stevedore and he served honorably in WWI for 6 months, but I do not know if he was injured while on duty.  Martha worked as a stenographer. By 1930 he was selling life insurance and she no longer worked outside their home at 27 Spring Street in Belfast.

Martha was devastated when Eddie died at the mere age of 46 from lobar pneumonia.  She suffered great melancholy. Martha returned to live with her parents at 55 High Street in Belfast. In 1940, for example, she lived with her parents Ralph and Alvra Southworth where her 20 year old sister Jane, her sister Alice and her then husband Stanley K Healy and Alice's son Robert Fuller (my dad) also lived.  She was surrounded by a family that loved her dearly. 

Martha came to believe that her grieving was adequately behind her so as to allow her to move forward with her life.  In July of 1941 she married Kenneth L. Young, a good man, whom she believed in her heart that she loved and that she would make Ken a good wife.  Love him, she did.  But her stricken spirit was not truly healed from her love and loss of Eddie.  She did not feel she was the good wife she had so wanted to be. 

Married to Ken for four years, Martha was still gripped with mourning which led her into a deep depression.  Eventually she shot herself in the head, instantly dying on July 2, 1945, just 26 days before I was born!  She was but 44 years old.  My family was stricken, as was Ken.

Vannie Cunningham - Her Way of "No"

My great great grandparents were Henry Bright Cunningham (Sr.) and Vannie Harriman Crocker of Belfast Maine.  They married in 1877 and when Vannie was 21, she gave birth to my great grandmother, Alvra "Allie" Cunningham.  So Scottish!

They moved in 1880 to Natick Massachusetts where Henry worked at a shoe factory.  In 1907 Henry died of the dreaded TB.   Vannie moved back to Belfast Maine.

My father was fortunate, as were my sister and I, to personally and lovingly know one of our great grandmothers.  We knew Alvra; Dad knew Vannie.



When my father knew Vannie she was a "Rackcliffe" and involved in the Rackcliffe Funeral Home business in Belfast Maine. She had married Samuel Nichols Rackliffe of Belfast Maine in 1910 in Searsport. He died in 1918 leaving her twice widowed.

My father told me that Vannie used an unusual expression of "Don't do so", which he occasionally heard from her..."Don't do so, Bobby!"

Vannie died sometime after 1940, in her 80s, when she came down with pneumonia and died within three days!

A Sparkler Bridges Heaven and Earth (Southworth)

My Great Aunt Jane Southworth was 1 year old when her niece sweet, sweet baby Ann Southworth was born. This aunt, her niece, and my Dad Bob Fuller played together as they grew up in Belfast Maine. Different generations so close in age!

Ann, though, lived only five years. When she died my father was 2 and my Aunt was 6. Ann got sick with respiratory diphtheria  a then common bacterial infection, prior to the DPT immunization against it. In 1925 there was no such shot. Diphtheria usually passed from person to person by coughing and sneezing. In olden days it had even been called the "strangling angel of children."

Approximately a year or two after Ann's death, my Great Aunt Jane was playing with a sparkler on the streets of Belfast. It caught her outfit on fire and severely burned her underarm and breast. Jane said then and always that Ann stood beside her and "told me to lay down and roll over", which is exactly what Jane did. The fire ceased, but Jane was ultimately scarred from the sparkler. Jane was forever thankful to sweet Ann, a child who had appeared to Jane as an angel to save her.

Sparklers were not allowed in my childhood.


For Ashley: Ann's parents with Dana and Hazel Southworth. After Ann died, they moved to Boston from Belfast. Hazel became a violinist with the Boston Pops Orchestra.

"...family is the link to our past, bridge to our future."

                                                             Alex Haley