Transcript Episode 4: Langmaid, Part 1

NAME Ep 4 Pt 1 transcription.mp3 DATE June 11, 2020 DURATION 27m 39s 5 SPEAKERS Helen Hartness Flanders Mabel Wilson Tatro Narrator Gail in the field History Book VO START OF TRANSCRIPT [00:00:04] Helen Hartness Flanders This is December 18,1958. Mrs. George Tatro of Springfield, VT, is going to sing "I'll Hang my Harp on the Willow Tree". Weeping willow tree? On the Willow Tree. Right. [00:00:17] Mabel Wilson Tatro I'll hang my harp on the willow tree, I'm off to the wars again, my peaceful home has no charm for me, the battlefield has not pain... [00:00:28] Narrator You're listening to a recording from the Flanders Ballad Collection, performed as the introduction said by Mabel Wilson Tatro of Springfield, Vermont, in 1958. This recording was part of a decades long project sponsored by the Vermont Commission on Country Living and led by Helen Hartness Flanders to amass and document folk music throughout northern New England. Beginning in 1930, Flanders and her associates put an open letter in New England newspapers requesting anyone who knew folk music passed down in the oral tradition to share what they knew and consent to be recorded so that the songs and the music could be transcribed. No popular songs or copy written material was accepted into the archive. Only songs passed from one generation to the next by mouth. Most of the music has strong ties to the folk music traditions of the British Isles, to which the majority of the population of rural New England could trace at least one family line. Many themselves being first or second generation immigrants from Quebec or the Canadian Maritimes. The recording project, came about at a time when the face of life in New England was changing. Post-World War one, populations were moving. The economy was becoming ever more industrialised. And people were being pulled away from small towns to find work. As they became accustomed to the ways of life in larger towns and cities, hints of the modern began to seep into even the most far flung villages. Some places were being outfitted with electricity, which meant appliances like radios, providing a steady stream of outside entertainment. One that was less reliant on old fashioned homegrown ways,so the process of passing done music and stories by mouth was quickly fading. The Vermont Commission on Country Life wanted to get as much of this oral culture committed to the record before it was forgotten completely. The Flanders Ballad Collection catalogue has since been digitized and is available from the archives of the Special Collections at Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont. And it's with their very gracious permission that I play these samples here today. [00:03:05] Mabel Wilson Tatro ...I'm poisoned to my heart and I feign would lie down... [00:03:09] Narrator Within an oral culture, songs are a simple medium that serve a complex function. They were designed to preserve a people's history and were integral to how they socialized, as they were often shared among a group. They needed to be easy for the teller and the listener to remember. So to that end, writers often set their songs to well- known hymns and dance tunes. But their format was malleable. Keep the words, but use a different tune you liked better or was easier to sing. And while a song's main purpose might have been to pass on a history, there is nothing saying it couldn't also be entertaining. Often local place or family names were substituted to make the story resonate with the audience. But no matter the changes, there's always a core of truth to the stories these songs tell. Giving its people a sense of community identity and pride. And that's comforting, isn't it? Yet there is one song in the Flanders ballad collection that highlights the discomfort that also existed among all that continuity. It was performed by Mabel Wilson Tatro in this 1958 session, and it's called The Suncook Tragedy. It's about a murder that took place in 1875 in Suncook, New Hampshire, a village in the town of Pembroke, just east of Concord, the state capital. The song's sweet melody runs counter to the jarring lyrics detailing the abduction, rape, murder and decapitation of a 17 year old girl, Josie Langmaid, at the hands of one of the earliest known serial killers in the United States, Joseph La Page. [00:05:09] Mabel Wilson Tatro Come, all young people now drawn here, attend a while and you shall hear how a young person not renowned was murdered in fair Suncook town. It was in the morning, very cool when Josie started for her school and many times that road she'd passed. But little thought she it would be her last. It was at the foot of Pembroke Street, LaPage lay ambush with a stick. Long time ago his plans were laid, to take the life of this fair maid. The mother watched with eager care, hoping her daughter would appear, but when the shades on night drew near, her darling child did not appear. The weeping father and the son, all through the woods, their search begun. And found at last, to their surprise the murdered child before their eyes. Her head and from her body torn. Her clothes were all a crimson gore. And on her body marks did show some skillful hand had dealt the blow. This monster now so deep in crime, he thought the people's eye too blind, but found at last to his mistake, they had him fast behind the grate. It was at Concord, he was tried, until the last, his crime denied. But he was found to guilty be, and the judge said let death be your plea. And now Lapage, your work is done and like Eveuse, you will be hung, for we must all examples make, until crime shall cease in the Granite State. [00:07:05] Narrator I'm Gail Golec and this is the secret Life of Death episode for Langmaid, part one. [00:07:18] Helen Hartness Flanders Mrs Tatro is going to tell more about the, the man LaPage. [00:07:25] Mabel Wilson Tatro My father was a violinist and he played the violin at a, at a tavern in St Albans, Vermont. And he see this man sitting over in the corner and he asked the landlord, Who is this man? I've never seen him before. And the man told him his name was LaPage, and he was the one that killed this girl in Suncook Town. [00:07:53] Helen Hartness Flanders Well, why wasn't he punished for it? [00:07:57] Mabel Wilson Tatro Well, he had killed a girl in a, in a St. Albans, at what they call St. Albans hill. And nobody know who had done it until after he'd killed this girl in Suncook Town. And then his wife came out and said he was one that killed this girl in St. Albans. [00:08:18] Helen Hartness Flanders Well, why was he living? Why didn't they punish him after the after the two murders? [00:08:24] Mabel Wilson Tatro They did. [00:08:24] Helen Hartness Flanders Oh, they did. [00:08:25] Mabel Wilson Tatro I think it's down here. [00:08:27] Helen Hartness Flanders Yes. Yes. [00:08:27] Mabel Wilson Tatro I've been to Pembroke and Suncook Town, and there's a monument that has been put up for this, Josie Langmaid. [00:08:43] Gail in the field You don't have to really go that far off the beaten track to find it, to be close to it. [00:08:51] Narrator About 15 years ago, I was working in the town of Pembroke, New Hampshire, driving back and forth, doing a survey on Academy Road. It's a mostly rural stretch just off the main drag in town with patches of woods and wetland mixed with suburban homes every couple hundred feet. [00:09:12] Gail in the field Opps. Get my keys. And my hat? Maybe not. [00:09:22] Narrator And there, on the north side of the road, right across from the entrance to the Three Rivers school, was a lonely, out of place looking gray marble obelisk. Not a cemetery, I knew because, of course, I scouted the area ahead of time. But nerd of many hats that I am, I couldn't resist an out of place side of the road marker because you just know it's something weird and it's something good. This is where I first learned about Josie Langmaid. [00:09:59] Gail in the field The monument here says Langmaid and the front part of it has a shield carved into the face of it. And it said erected by the citizens of Pembroke and vicinity to commemorate the place of the tragic death in the memory of Josie A. Langmaid, a student of Pembroke Academy who was murdered here on her way to school on the fourth day of October 1875, age 17 years, 10 months and 27 days. And so it's actually a lovely spot off to the side of the road. And there's all sorts of, looks like there's a trail outback that may take us to the other parts, because it says on the, on another face of it, says the body found 90 feet north at stone Hub.

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