Winter 2005 Our Centennial Year The Newetowne Chronicle/ 1 IN THIS ISSUE P E O P L E A N D P L A C E S Winter 2005 The Remarkable John “Jack” Emerson: Volume V, Number 1 _________________________ Founder of the J. H. Emerson Company By Daphne Abeel P E O P L E A N D P L A C E S The Remarkable John ―Jack‖ Emerson When Will and George Emerson begin to talk about their family background cover story and their father, who founded the J. H. Emerson Company, they mention somewhat offhandedly that they are descended from a brother of Ralph Waldo The Lost Diners of Cambridge Emerson and that their paternal grandfather was related to the artist Maxfield page 8 Parrish. But it is only when they begin to describe their father, John ―Jack‖ F R O M T H E P R E S I D E N T Emerson, that their interesting and remarkable family legacy becomes clear. The First Century page 2 Today, the J. H. Emerson Company, now run by Will and George, is tucked away in a beautiful, well-lit, old brick warehouse on a dead-end street in F R O M T H E D I R E C T O R North Cambridge. When Jack Emerson started the company, in 1928, it was A Vision for the Second Century page 3 located at 15 Brattle Street, above what was once Woolworth’s. While two of his brothers had graduated from Harvard in the field of medicine, Jack was a S O C I E T Y N E W S high school dropout. At loose ends, the native New Yorker moved to Cam- Annual meeting reports bridge. He was inventive and mechanically oriented, and through his brothers’ page 4 connections at Harvard, he began to design and manufacture mechanical de- From NECCO to Novartis vices for the medical profession. page 6 (continued on page 8) F R O M T H E L I B R A R Y & A R C H I V E Mark Time Any Questions? page 7 C A L E N D A R O F E V E N T S page 9 ______________________ THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORICAL SOCIETY The Hooper-Lee-Nichols House 159 Brattle Street Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 Tel: 617/547-4252 Fax: 617/661-1623 Web site: www.cambridgehistory.org E-mail: [email protected] Jack Emerson, with his version of the iron lung A publication of the Cambridge Historical Society Winter 2005 Our Centennial Year The Newetowne Chronicle/ 2 F R O M T H E P R E S I D E N T thirds vote of the Council. The subscrib- OFFICERS ers elected 13 councilors, including The First Century Mary Isabella Gozzaldi, Alice Long- Theodore L. Hansen fellow, and Richard Henry Dana III, President Completing 100 years calls for a cele- Kathy Born who was elected president. A lawyer bration of the past and a look to the fu- Vice President and civil service reformer, he was the ture. The committee reports on pages Chandra Harrington son of the author of Two Years Before Vice President 4–6 describe accomplishments of the the Mast and the husband of Edith Maxwell D. Solet past year, and our executive director’s Longfellow, a daughter of Henry Vice President vision for the future is on page 3. I Andrew Leighton Wadsworth Longfellow. Treasurer will comment on our success in fund- Thomas Bracken raising and take a look at the founding Secretary of the CHS. Lindsay Leard Coolidge Curator Daphne Abeel I am pleased to report that in addition to Editor hosting our centennial celebra- tion,Novartis has pledged a leadership COUNCILORS gift of $10,000 to the Society. Karen Falb describes our plans on page 6. Charlie Allen Robert G. Crocker Thanks to the work of Bob Crocker and D. Eliot Klein his subcommittee, businesses through- Ellen G. Moot out Cambridge are contributing money Paula Paris to help us reach our goal of raising Susan S. Poverman $100,000 in our 100th year as the keep- ers of Cambridge history. Thanks also ADVISORS to Larry Nathanson, who made the ini- tial connection with Novartis and who Richard Henry Dana III, first president of the Cambridge M. Wyllis Bibbins has put together the program. Carol Cerf Historical Society Luise M. Erdmann Photo from Karen F. Falb We have also been seeking individuals Cambridge Historical Society Archive Shelagh Hadley and businesses to underwrite special George H. Hanford expenses. With pleasure I can report Swanee Hunt Dennis C. Marnon that the Cambridge Savings Bank has On October 30, 1905, the Society held Larry Nathanson pledged $20,000 to cover the estimated its second meeting, billed as the ―1st Brian Pfeiffer cost of publishing our centennial book, Annual Meeting.‖ After reelecting the Charles M. Sullivan edited by Daphne Abeel (see page 6). slate of councilors and officers, the Look for an invitation to our publication STAFF meeting was devoted to the reading of party in October, and thank Andy four papers on different aspects of Cam- Karen L. Davis Leighton for making the connection bridge history. The papers were pub- Executive Director with Cambridge Savings Bank. lished in the first of a series of books Lewis Bushnell Associate Director called Cambridge Historical Society Victoria Hickey It is interesting to look back to June 17, Proceedings. The Society published Assistant 1905, when 18 people, calling them- these books regularly until 1979 and as Mark J. Vassar selves ―the subscribers,‖ met to form the funding has permitted since then. The Resident Archivist Cambridge Historical Society. Richard Proceedings are our legacy and are truly Candice Allen Henry Dana III, the temporary chair- Todd Alström a treasure trove of Cambridge history. Shane LeGault man, appointed two committees, one to Ted Hansen Resident Fellows present a set of by-laws and the other to nominate a slate of councilors and offi- The Newetowne Chronicle is cers. The approved by-laws included the published three times annually by the Cambridge Historical provision that any Cambridge resident Society. could be nominated for membership and would become a member upon a two- A publication of the Cambridge Historical Society Winter 2005 Our Centennial Year The Newetowne Chronicle/ 3 F R O M T H E D I R E C T O R A Vision for the Second The Hooper-Lee-Nichols House is one of only two 17th-century houses in the city. Through Century tours of the building, we can tell the story of American architecture and the historic preser- The Cambridge Historical Society has come a vation movement. Through the people who long way since 1905, when it was founded to have lived in the house, we can explain how encourage research on Cambridge history and our community developed. Through our collec- to publish the results. While we continue that tions, we can tell stories about the history of tradition, we also present public programs, care our city as a whole, and using our new Cultural for the Hooper-Lee-Nichols House, and main- Landscape Report, we can begin to interpret tain the archives that have resulted from 100 the landscape history of the house and the vi- years of documenting Cambridge history. To cinity. I would like the interpretation of the do all of these things properly, the Society house to be at the level of the best house tours needs to be staffed by house museum, preser- in the country. The house could be a magnet vation, and archives professionals. for school field trips and should be a place that all of Cambridge knows about, has visited, and This year we made great strides in our archives is proud to support. because we created the position of resident ar- chivist for Mark Vassar. Mark manages the My vision for the archives, publications, and archives on the periphery of his full-time job at interpretation will take a lot of money. To be- the State Archives, and he donates many hours. gin with, we need to build our endowment We are fortunate to have a person with his tal- from its present level of approximately ent living in the house, but our future must in- $500,000 to well over $2 million. Ambitious? clude at least a half-time position for an experi- Yes indeed. But if ever there was a time to aim enced archivist. for the stars, this centennial year is certainly the perfect launch pad. Karen L. Davis This index to the CHS Proceedings is a 305-page oversized volume. I am greatly impressed by the quality of the papers presented to the Society in the last hun- dred years and by the publications that re- Volunteer Rory O’Connor, repairing the sulted. We have published Proceedings, not wooden model of the Hooper-Lee-Nichols because they will ever be best sellers, but be- House used in our interpretive programs cause we believe local history needs to be re- Photo by Lewis Bushnell corded for future generations. I hope that start- ing in 2005, with our centennial volume, we can publish a book on some aspect of Cam- bridge history every three years. A publication of the Cambridge Historical Society Winter 2005 Our Centennial Year The Newetowne Chronicle/ 4 A N N U A L M E E T I N G heavy snow. The terms of the grant require The Society Turns 100 $25,000 in matching funds from the CHS. We are grateful to Bill Bibbins for his advice On February 13, President Ted Hansen pre- and contributions to our fence project.