YEARS AGO IN GLENVILLE

“The whole town was like a big
family. We shared each other’s joys and sorrows.” Frances Chmielowiec Geraghty, on three separate occasions in 1975/76,  was interviewed by Katherine Scanlon of the Greenwich Library Oral History Project to capture memories of a lifetime in Glenville. She had much to tell about a life that had its share of hardships and setbacks, but was remembered by the joy and comfort of a loving and large family.

Frances Chmielowiec Geraghty photo by Karl Gleeson
Courtesy of Oral History Project.

Frances was the third of ten children born in 1907 to Polish immigrants.  “They had such large families. Everybody had. I don’t think there was any with less than five.” According to Frances, “We were all Polish-speaking people. . . . There was a great crowd (of immigrants) that came at once; we were all growing up together.”

Glenville was largely a company town. “Almost every house in Glenville was owned by the American Felt Company.” Rent of a dollar a room was paid to the AFC. Families who managed to snare a house with multiple bedrooms would rent them out to boarders for extra cash. “I don’t know anyone in Glenville that started with my mother’s crowd that didn’t end up owning their own home . . . without asking anyone’s help.”

1908 photo of the Chmielowiec family with sisters Mary and Eleanor and adopted son, John. Frances is seated on a cushion on the floor.
Courtesy of Frances Geraghty.

There was a strong sense of community among these young immigrants. Families grew their own vegetables and many owned chickens and pigs. “There was always an exchange. If you didn’t have a good crop of one thing and the other did . . . you just didn’t refuse anyone. . . . People were closely knit in those days.” Frances remembered that her father would be asked by “the people from the country, upper King Street” to help fulfill their needs of a seamstress, a cook, or a milkmaid.   He would then investigate which ships were coming into the Port of New York, hitch up the horse and wagon, and ride down to the docks. As the passengers stepped off the ship, her father would shout, “Who can cook? Who can sew? Who can take care of horses?” Soon he would have a wagon-load of young people who stayed with them until they procured jobs. 

In those early days of her life, Frances remembered that there was no electricity. “Don’t forget there was no water in Glenville either . . . no water till after I was married (in 1930). . . . Every bit of water had to be brought into the house, pumped in. My mother with ten children on wash day was really something.” In addition, “Everybody had an outdoor privy; and you weren’t embarrassed about it because everyone else had one, too.” Proudly, she stated, “Well, we had the best one in town. We had a five-seater.”

The house, owned by the American Felt Company, in which Frances Geraghty was born in 1907. Her father’s general store occupied space in front of the building (not visible). Courtesy of Frances Geraghty.

News traveled in a different way in those days when people did not have telephones. “There was a very unusual way of gathering people.” Someone with “a very fancy bugle with tassels hanging” would stand in the center of town and blow it. “ . . . everybody came running from the hills or they sent the children out. ‘What’s the matter? What’s the matter?’” The bugle was blown when the First World War ended. It also announced when someone had died or if an important meeting was to take place.

As Frances reminisced, she said wistfully, “I don’t think anyone today can visualize or comprehend a life like this. . . . You have to remember the quietness of the town. . . . You heard nothing except the humming of the felt mill, and that would be down toward the river. There were no airplanes, no traffic, no cars. . . . You could hear crickets, locusts, maybe a cow mooing or a rooster crowing. Those were the only sounds we heard. The smells were beautiful. You could smell sweet hay and strawberries.”

Frances remembered making deliveries by horse and wagon with her father from his general store to customers on Porchuck Road, Round Hill Road, and Banksville. In the summer, they would leave at 4:30 in the morning. “I remember coming back home at dark, at night. Sometimes my father would fall asleep and the horse would bring us home.” In the 1930s, the A&P came to Glenville; her dad could not compete with their prices and eventually closed his store.

The onset of the Depression led to difficult and challenging times for Frances and her family. “Bill and I got married at the height of the Depression (1930). There were no jobs. There was nothing; no money. . . . My mother had seventeen people in the home. My father was making a dollar a day for the WPA (Works Progress Administration) building the Glenville School playground. . . . There was nothing to do but go and do domestic work. . . . I had dresses that were somebody else’s and coats that didn’t fit.” Frances and Bill, who was recovering from tuberculosis, lived with her parents for a time. Eventually, Bill got a job as a plumbing apprentice for eleven dollars a week and they were able to rent a tiny house near her parents. “It had no water, no lights, and, of course, no heat.” They preferred to call it their “honeymoon house.” “Yet, somehow,” Frances said, “through all that, you had your garden and you had a few chickens.  You survived. And we had each other which was the main thing.”

Economic circumstances improved for them with the onset of the Second World War when she and Bill obtained jobs with Electrolux in Old Greenwich. At the time of her interview, Frances worked at Town Hall. As she looked back on her life and times, Frances stated, “. . . they were rough times, but they were happy days. . . . Those were the good old days.”

The interview “Years Ago in Glenville – Frances Chmielowiec Geraghty” may be read in its entirety at Greenwich Library and is available for purchase at the OHP office. The OHP is sponsored by Friends of Greenwich Library. Visit the website at glohistory.org. Our narrator’s recollections are personal and have not been subject to factual scrutiny. Mary Jacobson serves as blog editor.