Valley Falls, Rhode Island

My Dad's mother, F. Hazel Skinner was born in Valley Falls, RI and her family had lived there for at several generations by the time she was born in 1894. In old family scrapbooks, there are numerous pictures of the area, most taken before 1920 or so, after which time my grandparents moved to New Jersey. Here are a few that were identified.

Valley Falls Station

This station, built in 1883,  was located at the foot of Chapel Avenue in Valley Falls. I found another view of this station at Rhode Island Railroads. This station served the Providence and Worchester Railroad which opened in 1846. According to the Rhode Island Railroads website, there was another station in Valley Falls around 400 feet north of this station on Titus Street. This smaller station served the New York and New England RR.


The two other pictures in this collection show the bridge over the Blackstone River which separates the village of Valley Falls from the city of Central Falls just to the south.  The streetcar used to run across this bridge and continued south to Pawtucket and Providence.

Approach to Valley Falls Bridge

Valley Falls Bridge

Father's Day 2012 - Warren Westcott Grant

Warren W Grant

My father, Warren Westcott Grant was born on 11 January 1922 in Passaic New Jersey and died on 22 January 2005 in Pomptom Plains New Jersey at the age of 83.
I have many old photos of my father and mother taken before I was born and/or before I have my own memories of where the photos were taken and who was in them. This one is probably from the late 1940s. It may have been taken at his friend's 'ranch' in Cedar Grove, NJ. This friend was named Tex and my Dad (and Mom) used to ride there but I don't know anything else about the place except it was long gone before I could remember.

Dad once told me that Tex drove down to Amarillo, Texas to pick him up after he had been discharged from the Army Air Force in late November 1945. They had been planning to make a road trip of it back to New Jersey but Tex apparently started getting very anxious and needed to get back home as quickly as possible. Dad said he drove for as long as he could before he told Tex he couldn't drive any further. Now, I wonder why Tex couldn't drive part of the way back (he clearly drove down to Texas).  In any case, it was not the road trip my dad was expecting!