Scarlet fever broke out by the 24th, with Miss Ellen Duggan, public health nurse, and town physician Dr. William Sturgis urging precautions. Just a few years removed from what was then known as the Spanish Influenza epidemic, they wanted to ensure all would be safe for the holidays. Superintendent Nickerson closed the Village grammar school well in advance of Thanksgiving, declared for the fifth Thursday of November, the 29th, by President Coolidge. Days later, Nickerson would learn that the state had denied his petition for the formatting of a Hull cooperative bank on the grounds that “public interest did not call for it.” Another group would have more success decades later.
Football games became more common in the Village as November waned, with Hull and Hingham teams squaring off, representative squads from town neighborhoods facing each other and, ultimately, the annual tilt being contested between Hull’s married men and single men on Thanksgiving Day. This year’s contest featured a special guest referee, Chief of Police Frank M. Reynolds. Gregory Ketchum, John Reno, and Kenneth G. Mitchell led the way for the unmarried men in an 18-12 victory. With the culminating game of the football season then in the past, thoughts immediately turned to the new sensation: basketball. “A movement is under way to have basketball games played this winter in town by a local aggregation,” read the Hull column in The Boston Globe of November 30. “Prominent sportsmen and others are interesting themselves in the formation of a team. Permission will be asked of the board of selectmen to allow the games to be played in the Municipal Building, Atlantic Hill.”
The next day, December 1, Margaret Knowles smiled at a blooming American Beauty rose at her home on 125 Spring St. in the Village. Although the calendar said winter, nature said spring. So, too, did the pouring of the foundation for the new war memorial at Nantasket, the dedication of which would be celebrated the next Memorial Day.
December began and ended with touches of sorrow. William Sylvester, 83, passed away at Allerton on December 2. One of the earliest residents of that section of the town, he had served as lighthouse keeper of both Boston and Minot’s Light and then spent 18 years as Hull’s postmaster. Few could remember a Hull without him.
The Boy Scouts swelled to 40 members, meeting at the Service Club at Fort Revere. Smelt started running. Hull reopened its schools on December 5, confident that the scarlet fever scare had passed. The Father O’Brien Memorial Association held a benefit party for Charles Pitts at the Municipal Building, with various forms of entertainment, including an encore fancy dancing display by the Landrigans and their students, including a bunny dance, a skating dance, and a Scottish sword dance. On December 6, Pitts returned home from the hospital where the amputation was administered, swarmed by friends and well-wishers.
Parties filled the calendar: a chicken pie supper at the Pope Memorial Church Hall, a Christmas tree fund soiree at the Central Fire Station, and the senior ball of the Class of 1924 at the Municipal Building, in honor of pending graduates Estelle Skelton, Vera Waterhouse, Lillian M. Jacobs, and others. The Ladies Aid Society, as it had for decades, held its pre-Christmas sale of homemade goods at Gould Memorial Hall. Christmas was on its way, and there was no turning back.
The rule apparently didn’t apply for two men who found a novel way to get arrested in the final two weeks before Christmas. Late on December 11, residents of the Skull Head section of the bayside called Chief Reynolds and told him of a strange disturbance. Hull Police Officers Thomas Glawson and Francis Mitchell responded and found an automobile driving on the rocky shore. The driver – drunk as a skunk – made a wrong turn. “They were bound for Brockton from Boston,” said The Boston Globe the next day. “In proceeding along Nantasket Ave. they turned down A St. at Waveland, taking the outside road bordering on Hull Bay. Mistaking a small path leading to the beach for a highway they turned their car in and landed on a beach.” Cut across the face when their windshield exploded, they nevertheless pressed on, undaunted. “Thinking that they were on a rough road,” said the Globe, “they endeavored to proceed along the beach until apprehended by the police.”
On December 16, a fire broke out on Nantasket Road, the result of an iron left plugged in when the family was away. More concerning, though, was the false alarm pulled at Windermere a few hours later. Fire Chief Henry Stevens launched a quick investigation and apprehended a soldier from the 13th Infantry at Fort Revere. He delivered him to the commanding officer and told him that he would let the military decide what to do with him, wanting to spare him the stress of multiple court hearings and courts-martial.
On the 17th, the Hull Village Club met for the first seasonal gathering at the Nantasket House, next door to the Hull Public Library. A familiar face, Mike Burns, returned to his inn on the corner of Nantasket Avenue and Nantasket Road with his son Russell after a vacation to the Pacific coast. That Friday, the 21st, Hull students celebrated the beginning of the Christmas break with gifts for all and a noon release.
Over the weekend, the three Catholic churches in Hull – St. Mary’s of the Bay, St. Ann’s, and St. Mary’s at Green Hill – were visited by Santa Claus, or, Clauses. Priests at each church spoke on “The Origin of Santa Claus” and “The Spirit of Christmas.” Santas – Wallace Reddie, John E. Glawson, and Edward Gent – appeared in costume and handed out presents to all of the children in each church. In all, the church provided about 500 gifts to local kids.
On Christmas Eve day, James McLearn of X Street picked two pansies from his garden. John E. Rudderham, putting up his storm windows, just in case, heard two American Robins singing at Bayside.
On Christmas Day, Hull families gathered to feast and share time with loved ones. Captain Fred C. Neal of the U.S. Navy rushed home Christmas Day from Brooklyn for a quick meal before setting out for a six-month cruise to India on the 26th. The Mitchells, Vautrinots, McLearns, Jameses, Murphys, Taurasis, and more Hull families enjoyed the day. On the 26th, Albert Jacobs and James Melvin, standout Hingham High School athletes, enlisted with Company K of the 101st Infantry at the Hingham Armory. Joseph Stone of Paragon Park returned from a business trip in Chicago. Petty Officer Albert Chase of the Coast Guard Station, where he had worked for the past five years, received a transfer to Chatham. He waved his many friends farewell as he entered the next phase of his life.
With little left on the calendar, Hull, too, prepared to wave goodbye, to 1923. After a quick town meeting on December 28 to shuffle funds among town departments, all eyes turned toward New Year’s Eve. Then, the saddest note of all sounded.
When the call went out for young men to enlist to fight in the Civil War, 24 Hull men stepped forward, out of a full population of about 225 residents. George Augustus, born to harbor pilot Captain John Augustus and Adeline Mary Turner, was one of those men. Serving with Company E, 47th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment, he proudly wore the Union blue uniform. Returning home after the war, ne never left, working as a fisherman. As his comrades quietly vanished, one by one, he soon found himself the last remaining Hull Civil War veteran.
He wore the mantle proudly, leading Memorial Day exercises, marching through the Village to the cemetery where he would silently decorate the graves of his fallen comrades. When Hull’s young men enlisted to fight in the Great War, many claimed him as their inspiration. When they returned and formed the local American Legion Post, they invited him to be an honorary member, and never a party did he miss. Over the past few years, the younger veterans swelled his ranks and marched with him to the cemetery, as collectively they honored their brethren.
George had missed the 1923 Memorial Day exercises. He had left to visit his nephew in New Hampshire. Ultimately he stayed there. A week before Christmas, he took ill. Late on December 30, word reached Hull that he had passed away.
He took the rest of 1923 with him.
Hull was ready to turn the page and start afresh with 1924.
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