"OUR WOMEN OF SANDWICH"
(2020 Summer Exhibit)
LENA SMITH FORD
(1875 - 1959)
By D. Bruce Montgomery (Excerpts from the 2019 Excursion Bulletin)
Lena Smith Ford, to use one of her own quotes “ …was a woman of parts”. She is remembered as an historian, an artist in ink sketches, oils, water colors and colored pencil. Her annotated map of circa 1860 Center Sandwich town center buildings, with a border lined with ink sketches of a number of those homes and businesses, drawn in 1949, is still for sale at the Historical Society.
There were a number of “influencers” in her life, and she in turn influenced a number who followed her. This article outlines some of those backward looking and forward looking influencers.
Lena was born in North Sandwich on August 3, 1875, daughter of Elsie Locke and Frederick Lewis Smith. The family moved to Lakeport in 1887, to Franklin in 1893, and to Hartford, Connecticut in 1893. She married Nelson Ford in 1900 in Hartford and wintered in Hartford until her death in October 1, 1959 at age 84 years. She summered in Sandwich in her “Dale Farm” home on Dale Road for more than 60 years.
Lena graduated from the old Tilton Seminary in Tilton, but her early education was surely dominated by her mother who was a full-time school teacher. We have a unique opportunity to view the early influencers through an unpublished manuscript authored by Lena. The typed manuscript with her handwritten edits was in the family “shoebox” of material. Her manuscript follows:
Elsie Locke Smith (Lena’s Mother): “Elsie Locke was one of the ‘Locke Girls‘ school teachers. Her diploma from Beede’s Normal Institute was awarded her at the age of fifteen and was signed by the State Superintendent, who came from Concord to examine her. Her actual teaching career began on her sixteenth birthday, when she went to Long Island to teach Wentworth and Brown families, the main inhabitants, boat builders and lake captains. During her teaching she had every District school in Sandwich and Tamworth, and also the grade school at the Center Daniel G. Beede called her one of his star pupils and she was in constant demand.
Elsie Locke was married to Frederick Smith on her nineteenth birthday in 1873, after which her career was aided by her husband and four children. Her extra domestic activities were mainly church work. It was she who instigated the project of church building in Lakeport, personally begging the money for the land, and continuing ‘with sweat and tears if not “blood’, until the great day of dedication, when she sang in the choir, and I trust the angels heard her voice.
In her immediate family she was urged to better things, living in a small town where facilities for culture were few, she contrived to give her children music and art training and sent them all to the good Methodist school in Tilton.
Elsie Smith died in 1929 while on a visit to Sandwich, and she lies close to her family in the Rural Cemetery."
Dolly Betsy Smith (Lena’s Paternal Grandmother): “Dolly Smith, the wife of Col. Lew, was descended from another first settler Smith, Simeon, who built the Elijah Gilman house, having his deed of land directly from Gov. Gilman and signed by him. Dolly was a woman of parts, the work she accomplished in the course on one day seems astounding to us moderns. Her secret was that she was a happy woman, loved her home and family above all other things. She not only made butter and cheese, she raised bees and had honey, geese, turkeys and chickens, milked cows, and gave birth to eleven children. She found time for a flower garden which was fenced off from the yard. She raised flax and spun and wove linen for the house. She spun woolen from her own sheep and wove a pepper and salt mixture, which was made with her own hands, from cutting to the last button, into suits for her husband and two sons. Girls had dresses of linsey-woolsey.
As a cook Dolly was famous for miles around, and Notch people had a habit of dropping in on their way up or down, going to the village, at meal time if they could make it, and they were always invited to sit down and have a bite.
Dolly lived long after her husband died, but not at the old place. Too remote from neighbors, it was sold to Joseph Wentworth who gave it to his daughter Lydia Hoyt, who kept it for her grandaughter. Dolly died in 1886.
As Lena was influenced by her past, she in turn influenced those who followed her. Her son, Richard Ford, was an officer of the Society and author of several Bulletin articles. Richard’s daughter was the artistic Elli Ford whose pen and ink sketches can be found in several local publications. Lena’s daughter Mary Fenn carried on the family tradition as an amateur painter.
Lena had a strong influence on her grandaughter, Nancy Ford Fenn Montgomery. Nancy summered with Lena at Dale Farm until she was in her teens, both of them walking to town and staying to visit with Lena’s friends. Nancy recalled “ …as a child rambling around the center of Sandwich while my grandmother visited many old-timers. One of them was a relative – a very keen and witty old man, J. Alphonso Smith. Phon was the moving spirit back of three firsts in Sandwich: He brought the first telephone, the first electric power, and the first moving pictures, the latter being shown in the town hall by means of electrically generated by an ancient automobile engine set up outside. When Phon’s funeral was held, I amused myself in town while my grandmother attended the service. After a while I got bored and sought her at the cemetery. The mourners were gone, but I passed some time visiting with the diggers as they shoveled in Phon’s grave. When I later told my grandmother, she was horrified at what I had done.”
For the rest of story, read the 101st Excursion Bulletin (2019) - available in September 2020; free to members, $10 for non-members.
Lena Smith Ford, to use one of her own quotes “ …was a woman of parts”. She is remembered as an historian, an artist in ink sketches, oils, water colors and colored pencil. Her annotated map of circa 1860 Center Sandwich town center buildings, with a border lined with ink sketches of a number of those homes and businesses, drawn in 1949, is still for sale at the Historical Society.
There were a number of “influencers” in her life, and she in turn influenced a number who followed her. This article outlines some of those backward looking and forward looking influencers.
Lena was born in North Sandwich on August 3, 1875, daughter of Elsie Locke and Frederick Lewis Smith. The family moved to Lakeport in 1887, to Franklin in 1893, and to Hartford, Connecticut in 1893. She married Nelson Ford in 1900 in Hartford and wintered in Hartford until her death in October 1, 1959 at age 84 years. She summered in Sandwich in her “Dale Farm” home on Dale Road for more than 60 years.
Lena graduated from the old Tilton Seminary in Tilton, but her early education was surely dominated by her mother who was a full-time school teacher. We have a unique opportunity to view the early influencers through an unpublished manuscript authored by Lena. The typed manuscript with her handwritten edits was in the family “shoebox” of material. Her manuscript follows:
Elsie Locke Smith (Lena’s Mother): “Elsie Locke was one of the ‘Locke Girls‘ school teachers. Her diploma from Beede’s Normal Institute was awarded her at the age of fifteen and was signed by the State Superintendent, who came from Concord to examine her. Her actual teaching career began on her sixteenth birthday, when she went to Long Island to teach Wentworth and Brown families, the main inhabitants, boat builders and lake captains. During her teaching she had every District school in Sandwich and Tamworth, and also the grade school at the Center Daniel G. Beede called her one of his star pupils and she was in constant demand.
Elsie Locke was married to Frederick Smith on her nineteenth birthday in 1873, after which her career was aided by her husband and four children. Her extra domestic activities were mainly church work. It was she who instigated the project of church building in Lakeport, personally begging the money for the land, and continuing ‘with sweat and tears if not “blood’, until the great day of dedication, when she sang in the choir, and I trust the angels heard her voice.
In her immediate family she was urged to better things, living in a small town where facilities for culture were few, she contrived to give her children music and art training and sent them all to the good Methodist school in Tilton.
Elsie Smith died in 1929 while on a visit to Sandwich, and she lies close to her family in the Rural Cemetery."
Dolly Betsy Smith (Lena’s Paternal Grandmother): “Dolly Smith, the wife of Col. Lew, was descended from another first settler Smith, Simeon, who built the Elijah Gilman house, having his deed of land directly from Gov. Gilman and signed by him. Dolly was a woman of parts, the work she accomplished in the course on one day seems astounding to us moderns. Her secret was that she was a happy woman, loved her home and family above all other things. She not only made butter and cheese, she raised bees and had honey, geese, turkeys and chickens, milked cows, and gave birth to eleven children. She found time for a flower garden which was fenced off from the yard. She raised flax and spun and wove linen for the house. She spun woolen from her own sheep and wove a pepper and salt mixture, which was made with her own hands, from cutting to the last button, into suits for her husband and two sons. Girls had dresses of linsey-woolsey.
As a cook Dolly was famous for miles around, and Notch people had a habit of dropping in on their way up or down, going to the village, at meal time if they could make it, and they were always invited to sit down and have a bite.
Dolly lived long after her husband died, but not at the old place. Too remote from neighbors, it was sold to Joseph Wentworth who gave it to his daughter Lydia Hoyt, who kept it for her grandaughter. Dolly died in 1886.
As Lena was influenced by her past, she in turn influenced those who followed her. Her son, Richard Ford, was an officer of the Society and author of several Bulletin articles. Richard’s daughter was the artistic Elli Ford whose pen and ink sketches can be found in several local publications. Lena’s daughter Mary Fenn carried on the family tradition as an amateur painter.
Lena had a strong influence on her grandaughter, Nancy Ford Fenn Montgomery. Nancy summered with Lena at Dale Farm until she was in her teens, both of them walking to town and staying to visit with Lena’s friends. Nancy recalled “ …as a child rambling around the center of Sandwich while my grandmother visited many old-timers. One of them was a relative – a very keen and witty old man, J. Alphonso Smith. Phon was the moving spirit back of three firsts in Sandwich: He brought the first telephone, the first electric power, and the first moving pictures, the latter being shown in the town hall by means of electrically generated by an ancient automobile engine set up outside. When Phon’s funeral was held, I amused myself in town while my grandmother attended the service. After a while I got bored and sought her at the cemetery. The mourners were gone, but I passed some time visiting with the diggers as they shoveled in Phon’s grave. When I later told my grandmother, she was horrified at what I had done.”
For the rest of story, read the 101st Excursion Bulletin (2019) - available in September 2020; free to members, $10 for non-members.
