Today I took the Cabot Historical Society board members on a tour of some of Cabot's historic sites.  I used to take tourists to these sites during Fall Foliage every year, but I haven't done that for almost a decade, now, and while I do go by the markers on Cabot Plain frequently - the First Schoolhouse, the Smuggler's House, and the Bayley-Hazen Road marker, it had been a while since I've had occasion to go to some of the other spots.  

We started our tour at the big field stone set at the edge of a field at the junction of the Bayley-Hazen Road and Route 215, that memorializes the death of Nathaniel West, who died by a tree falling on him as he was helping Benjamin Webster clear land for his homestead in 1786, and young Aura Scott, 19 year old son of one of our first physicians, Dr. Parley Scott who lived near the Websters on the Plain.  There once was a marker for Aura, one of fieldstone, carefully lettered by some local craftsman as was the custom in those early days, but it was moved 40 or more years ago by the farmer who at that time owned the field.  He carefully set it up close to the stone wall on the east side of the old Bayley Hazen military road, supposing it would be out of harm's way so he could till the land without worrying about damaging it.  A few years later, it was missing - we've never located it.  As far as we know, Nathaniel West didn't have a marker, or if he did, it has long since decayed; but we thought they both deserved to be remembered.

From there we visited the marker designating where Ben Webster actually built his house a short distance up the hill, and then continued on the old military road to the Plains area where the first log school house was, and the Smugglers' House known also as the Yellow House tavern which was the first frame house in town, and I talked about the "old days" and the importance of the military road in opening up this area for settlement and how unimportant or even detrimental it turned out to be as a route to Canada, and we laughed that George Washington and Col. Jacab Bayley learned a lesson - a road goes both ways - when British soldiers began to make their way down the marked road from Canada. 

From the Plain we did a short stop at our camp so I could tell them a little about Joe's Pond, and then we continued on a loop that included Lovely Road along Molly's Falls Pond, and came back by way of Last Road off of Route 2 to connect to Danville Hill Road.  Last Road is a totally unimproved, almost trail sort of road.  Most of it isn't plowed in the winter and I doubt it has a road grader or hone go over it more than once a year, if that.  Narrow, stony, steep and we never should have taken it.  It's the sort of road that you simply cannot turn around on and if you meet someone, one of you will probably have to back up hopelessly to one of the few spots wide enough to pass another car.  Fortunately we didn't meet anyone.  Bonnie was driving, and was not happy that Jeannie and I had directed her onto this route.  Who would blame her?  We realized her car has unusually low clearance - and of course the middle of the road had ledges and ridges in the middle and was so narrow there was no turning out for them.  Thankfully, we made it ok with no apparent damage.

Our last stop was the Center of Town.  This spot is filled with history - the town fathers moved the business of the town to the Center from the Plain in about 1796, and for the next 20 years or so it was a bustling community with a meeting house, a pound, whipping post, and the first cemetery; but business gradually moved to where Cabot Village is now, to take advantage of the power afforded by the Winooski River and finally even the cemetery was deserted, the last burial there being Lieut. Fifield Lyford in 1846. 

Today it didn't look quite the way I remembered from my last visit, perhaps four or five years ago, pictured here.  I couldn't make out the pound, but that may be because it has once again become overgrown.  None of us wanted to beat our way through the underbrush to find it, but I'll go back another time. 

 This is the way I remembered the boulder that marks where the meeting house was.  That's Cabot teacher and historian Jenny Donaldson in this photo, taken some years ago.  The next photo is what we found there today.  The boulder has been moved and spray painted.  There was debris all around and a hole as if someone had dug - perhaps where the time capsule is buried - I can't be certain, but I know it is a mess and someone should be ashamed.  I can only imagine how shocked and saddened Jenny would be - or Velma Smith, who worked so hard to make the area a lovely spot to visit and kept it beautiful all the years she served as sexton.  I cannot imagine why anyone would be so destructive, and wonder what they expected to gain.



This last picture was taken in 1901 when the first capsule was buried under the boulder, to be opened in 50 years.  Since then every 50 years there has been a ceremony to open the capsule and return it with new items.    I believe this picture was taken with the people facing west on what would be the back side of the site.   Behind the people at the top of the ledge is the road that went from Danville Hill Road to Whittier Hill and that we walked up today.  Over the years vegetation has grown around the ledge so that huge trees tower overhead and bushes and tall ferns obscure the cliff, giving the place a quiet serenity that even this awful discovery of vandalism cannot destroy entirely.  I'm not sure the graffiti can be removed or the damage undone, and it makes me very sad that someone would do this.