Technician: Dick Haight and Erin Wilkinson

version of DVD

5 in

5 in

Barbara Eddy Crandell Interviewed 9-5-08 at Beech-Hurst in Douglas John & Charlaine Shack Barbara was waiting on the porch for our appointment as we arrived and graciously introduced us to her family’s historic home and archives. Her appearance, energy and mental acuity belied her 85 years. She had several legal pad sheets prepared for our interview which she used sparingly. With candor and humor Barbara shared an outline of her family history and a tour of the Beech Hurst farmhouse and grounds. Scott Eddy, Barbara’s grandfather, was born in 1843 in upstate New York. In 1844 the family moved to Indiana via covered wagon and Erie Canal boat. There are several pieces of furniture in the Beech Hurst house that were brought with on this journey, including a spinning flax wheel and small cabinet. Subsequently, Scott served in the Civil War, later began a farm and married Henrietta, his first wife who tragically died in 1888 while trying to extinguish a fire. Four years later Scott married Lillian Grimes, a teacher 20 years his junior (see” Lillian Grimes Eddy” by Esther P. Eddy (1997) and the Esther Eddy video recorded at Beech Hurst for more fascinating early family detail). At the time Lillian was teaching and later served as principal of the high school in Wayne, Michigan. She had teaching degrees from Michigan Normal College (Eastern Michigan University) at a time when women rarely completed high school. The couple moved to Ganges where Scott ran a general store and served as town postmaster. They built a house to the south of the store and gave birth to two boys, Raymond (1895) and Benjamin (1897). During an economic depression the upper floor of the general store was used as a private school where Lillian taught some Ganges high school graduates who could not afford to go to college because of the economic hard times, including Eugene Brunson, Lee and Harrison Hutchins, and Neil Goodrich all three of whom went on to achieve notoriety. In 1906, after Scott retired, and sold the store to Orin Wolbrink (see Janet Wolbrink’s story), they purchased a parcel of land in Douglas which Lillian called Beech-Hurst for its stand of old beech trees. From 1906-1911, Lillian was the principal of the old schoolhouse in Douglas where she also taught Latin and math. In 1906 she purchased Beech Hurst with her own money at a time when women very rarely did this. However, she had to pay a significantly higher interest rate on the mortgage than a male borrower would have been charged. Between 1911 and 1933 when Lillian retired, Beech-Hurst was primarily a summer home for the Eddy family. In 1913 Lillian moved with her two boys to Ypsilanti, Michigan to complete her A.B. in Pedagogy. In 1918 she went to Washington to work for the Office of Veteran’s Affairs and in 1922 she moved again to Grand Rapids to become the Chief Budget Clerk for the Veterans Administration. Scott died in 1930. In 1933 Lillian had the beech trees on her Beech-Hurst property evaluated and treated to strengthen their survival. She was not a homemaker but rather a scholar who read voraciously, wrote manuscripts (two published) and introduced her grandchildren to literature by reading Charles Dickens’s works among others to them around the cottage fireplace. Beech-Hurst house was, and still is, filled with books and interesting historical artifacts. Despite its present museum appearance, the house has a very warm and inviting feel. Barbara described the numerous ways in which Grandmother Lillian had influenced the lives of two generations of children directly and indirectly especially with her interest in natural history, classical literature, and as a model of achievement, independence and common-sense. Meanwhile, Benjamin and Raymond married sisters, Esther and Barbara Paton of Ann Arbor, Michigan where Ben graduated from the University of Michigan’s School of Engineering in 1923. When Lillian died in 1955, Esther and Benjamin Eddy took over the management of the Beech-Hurst property from their home in Ann Arbor. They had five children: --Elizabeth who married Louis Plummer in 1946; children Louis, Elizabeth, Andrew --Barbara who married John S. Crandell in 1944; children John, Joan --Joan who married Richard Brigham in 1947; children Ann (d.1978), David, Richard --Joyce who married Sanford Plummer in 1948; children Benjamin, Marde, Keith --Susan In 2006, six generations of this branch of the very large Eddy family celebrated 100 years of family ownership of Beech-Hurst. They shared years of photos and stories. It’s typical for extended family members to converge on Beech Hurst once or twice a year to paint, repair, garden and clean. When various family members use the house, the deal is to leave it as it was found. A large family photo album shows views of the Beech-Hurst house going back over 100 years and group family photos which appear to have been taken each year for many years, providing an opportunity to track the growth of family members. Over the years Ester and Benjamin’s children and grandchildren moved back to the Saugatuck-Douglas area, purchasing property of their own. Barbara estimates that the extended family currently own nine properties in the Saugatuck-Douglas area, many along Lakeshore Drive. Barbara took us on a detailed tour of the house pointing out furniture and objects of interest. The house “library” contains an amazing number of artifacts from and about the Eddy family including several historical accounts. Sister Joan Brigham’s son David compiled a bound six volume set of family stories and history. Nearby is the Beech-Hurst Heritage Cookbook created for the 100 years of ownership Beech-Hurst family celebration, a compendium of old family recipes with a second volume in preparation. This room also contains much of Grandmother Lillian’s book collection including some signed copies, century old elementary school reading and math texts. Many old family photos told the story of some of the family roots. Especially interesting among the displayed photos were those of Grandfather Scott and his brother taken during the Civil War as well as Scott’s postwar Federal Army discharge certificate. Next we visited “Grandma” Eddy’s dark wood paneled bedroom (referred to as the “Civil War Room”). It’s a tiny room by today’s bedroom standards with a small fireplace, her rocking chair and numerous other artifacts of interest, such as the rocking chair used by Grandmother Lillian and her original flax spinning wheel. An old horsehair trunk near the fireplace traveled from New York with Grandfather Scott. Apparent in this room is the early “post and hole” cloth-insulated electrical wiring on the outside of the ceiling and walls that was added when primary lighting went from kerosene lanterns to electric lights. Upstairs are two cozy bedrooms containing very old twin-sized spindle beds, one of which is reputed to have been slept in by Al Capone, but presumably not at Beech Hurst. The dresser used by Grandmother Lillian is located in the front bedroom. Barbara took us for a walk outside to see the barn, which provided sleeping rooms on the second floor, housed old machinery. Mostly she described the very old and beautiful stand of beech trees around the property. Grandmother Lillian had these trees serviced by foresters in the 1930s to help keep them healthy. Since then high winds, lightening strikes and boring insects have taken their toll on some of the trees, but the stand is largely still intact.