MORE REMINISCENCES

By

META SCHOOLEY LAWS

              So “Oliver Underwood” cannot locate “The Basswood.”

             In the old days whose partial return is hoped for, or dreaded, according to the viewpoint of the individual, public houses, scarcely to be dignified by the term “hotel,” were situated every few miles along the main roads.

             Those were the days when hucksters were the main “middlemen” between the farm women and the consumers of the product of dairy or poultry yard.

             Buffalo was perhaps the chief market for these itinerant merchants in this section of the country and there were two routes. The Fort Erie road, through Port Colborne and “Stonebridge,” the present Humberstone village, Sherkston, Ridgeway and thence to the Garrison road, and the Forks road, whose eastern extension passed through Stevensville.

             These wayside inns each had its own distinctive name. For instance “The Travellers Rest,” “Grimm’s” and “The Come-in,” (pronounced as one word with the accent on the first syllable) were situated between Stonebridge and Ridgeway.

             The latter has been mentioned in a previous letter. The well, is, or was very recently still in use. The pump was on the wide platform of the old building which filled the angle where the two roads met.

             Just how many places of refreshment existed on the route a few miles north of this one, the writer cannot say, but “The Basswood” was one of them. It was situated in Humberstone township, half a mile, and half a quarter east of the Welland-Port Colborne county road, at the Wabash crossing.

             The first house was of logs, and was built on the corner; the “new house” built perhaps forty years ago is a little south.

             Some of the inns were famed for the excellence of their dining room fare. That section of the country was known as “The Basswood.”

             The last person to use the name was the late James R. House, whose widow and daughter carry on the little general store which he established, where the “Chippawa Road” crosses the Wabash railway.

             The “hotel” is, and has been for years a private dwelling.

             Fortunately those roadside places have ceased to function for many years.

             But they will not be forgotten. Some of them like the Black Horse, still doing business, The White Pigeon, long since flown away, had in those old days swinging signs, such as one reads of in old country stories, and took their title from those.

             The basswood trees in the vicinity gave the title to this particular one.

             Some of them had names which must have grated on sensitive ears: “Dogs’ Nest” on the old plank road to Port Dover, and “Dirty Corners” for example.

             However, they had their part to play in those days of indescribable roads, when the huckster needed a stopping place every few miles, for nearly, if not quite, seven months of the year.

             Speaking of these “merchants” of early times, reminds us of the days when E.E. Fortner, twice mentioned in recent “twenty years ago” columns, bought sheep, cattle and sometimes horses in “the West” which in those days did not mean Manitoba et al, but perhaps Norfolk, Elgin or at farthest Middlesex counties.

             Many a drove of sheep have he and W.F. Schooley driven for miles. The railways did not have the facilities for shipping which now exist.

             I see his genial face now. He always had a funny “that reminds me” story to tell and never did he fail to find a bit of blue sky, no matter how heavy life’s clouds hung above him.

             He loved horses, and in the last years of his life made a hobby of them. Not one but would race to him from the farthest side of the pasture at his call.

             How we children loved him, for no guest was more welcome than he and his good wife, who in a loneliness that those of us who knew him best can dimly understand, awaits the summons to join him in “the other room.”

The Welland Tribune and Telegraph

24 March 1927