The Ardent Writer Press
and Doris Posey
South Holyoke: One Legacy in Time
FROM THE AUTHOR
The idea for South Holyoke, One Legacy in Time, came to me years ago. I read every book, article and essay I could find about my hometown of Holyoke, Massachusetts, but none of them described life in the 1950s and 60s when I grew up there. Beyond the lineage of genealogy and family trees lies a deeper yearning to share where we came from and what our young lives were like in a previous generation.
My story is a sentimental journey back in time when life was simple, in a city along the Connecticut River known throughout the world as the “Paper City.”
A tribute to my French Canadian heritage, where customs and languages sometimes clashed, in a town also known as the “First Planned City in the United States.”
Holyoke’s industrious past can be summarized into one word – water. From the mid 1800s, when an ingenious system of canals was created with pickaxes and shovels – water power brought factories, jobs, and hardworking immigrants from all over the world to Holyoke, contributing to its prosperity for over 100 years. From its self contained ethnic working class neighborhoods of tenement buildings to its New England picture perfect Victorian homes and tree lined streets, as “children of Holyoke” we all agree that it was a great time and a great place to grow up.
My story is not about me, but a quest for others to do the same. If we stop remembering, will we simply be forgotten? If so, will it mean that we never existed? Everyone has a story to be passed on to future generations and its time in history. I am honored and humbled to tell my story.
My story is a sentimental journey back in time when life was simple, in a city along the Connecticut River known throughout the world as the “Paper City.”
A tribute to my French Canadian heritage, where customs and languages sometimes clashed, in a town also known as the “First Planned City in the United States.”
Holyoke’s industrious past can be summarized into one word – water. From the mid 1800s, when an ingenious system of canals was created with pickaxes and shovels – water power brought factories, jobs, and hardworking immigrants from all over the world to Holyoke, contributing to its prosperity for over 100 years. From its self contained ethnic working class neighborhoods of tenement buildings to its New England picture perfect Victorian homes and tree lined streets, as “children of Holyoke” we all agree that it was a great time and a great place to grow up.
My story is not about me, but a quest for others to do the same. If we stop remembering, will we simply be forgotten? If so, will it mean that we never existed? Everyone has a story to be passed on to future generations and its time in history. I am honored and humbled to tell my story.
