William Foster Painting

[Garth Gustafson]

Originally Posted by Dean Romig

Yes Garth, and so many others as well - Burt Spiller, Gorham "Grampa Grouse" Cross, and "Tap" Tapply to name a few.

Both of my daughters are married and live in Derry and my four grandkids attend school there. I wish they were in the part of town that would have allowed them to attend the West Running Brook School. Frost published a book of poems entitled "West Running Brook." The brook, just a short distance away, flows to the West rather than toward the sea in the East.

Truth be told, I have a small lichen-covered stone on my desk I use as a paperweight that came from that wall. That stone wall, or "fence" to use the vernacular of the day, was the catalyst to Frost to pen the words "Good Fences Make Good Neighbors."
The reason they make good neighbors is because the farmers on either side of these "fences" would make a couple of days work of "mending fences" in the springtime after the winter's frost heaves would have toppled some of the rocks. They would talk of the weather, town politics, families, iron out differences of opinion and so on while doing the mindless work.

I can recite his poem "Stopping By the Woods on a Snowy Evening" word for word. It is one of my favorites - I read it as part of my mother's eulogy as it was one of her favorites too.



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Thanks for sharing that story. He sure had a way of making us feel like we were there.