Grandpa Tom's visit, Part 2 (Senior citizen?)

Boy, Dad is suddenly a confirmed senior citizen. First, he took the senior fare on the train without protest. Then today, he told me what he most wanted to do was drive around the countryside in search of crumbling grave markers in search of obscure genealogy. Does that sound like an old retired guy, or what?

Actually, even I was surprised when all the kids said they would like to do that, too. (Based on their behavior on the trip, they liked the idea of it better than the actual trip, but a stop at Dunkin Donuts improved their attitudes a bit.)

So, we got the kids after school let out at 12:35 (early release day) and drove an hour up to Rowley, MA, where our good ancestors, brothers Joseph and Maximilian Jewett, set up home in 1639 (after a trip from Bradford, England to Salem, MA the year before). Dad found a town clerk in Rowley (population of about 6,000) who was both knowledgeable and talkative. We saw the grave marker in the town burial ground, although it was a memorial erected in 1912. The clerk explained that the first markers were wooden and are now long gone, so the earliest marker remaining is from the 1690s, once the colonists started using stone.

The clerk also provided a copy of the original town map, showing the plots for each settler. We drove to the two Jewett homesteads, side-by-side and a short distance off the Town Green. The plots are looking a bit decrepit, now. I wondered if one of the houses was the original building, 400 years old. Perhaps just in need of a bit more maintenance.

I enjoyed the drive - it was a pretty little town just north of Ipswich (where we had come to the beach in August without every realizing how close we were to the family seat). We drove through the salt marshes of Rowley, whence cometh the "good salt hay" (according to the town clerk) once sold in Boston's Haymarket Square. We actually passed a working tractor pulling a large load of that hay even today.

The kids posed for this photo a bit grudgingly. Perhaps in 50 years they will be glad to have it.

"Near this spot, their graves unmarked, lie buried
Maximilian and Joseph Jewett
sons of
Edward and Mary (Taylow) Jewett
of Bradford England

They came over in 1638 in the company led by
Rev. Ezekiel Rogers
which settled the town of Rowley in the spring of 1639.

1607 - Maximilian Jewett - 1684
Deacon of the church forty five years
Selectman,  Moderator of Town Meetings
Representative in the General Court twenty years

1609 - Joseph Jewett - 1660-61
A distinguished merchant
served the town on important committees
Representative in the General Court five years

Erected by the Jewett Family of America A.D. 1912"