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Tue., Aug. 4, 2015: Ezra T. Gilliland, The Inventor of the Telephone Switchboard and Friend of Thomas Edison, Was a Pelham Manor Resident.
Fri., Feb. 13, 2015: A Magical Valentine's Day in Pelham Manor in 1895.
Although Ezra Gilliland died on May 13, 1903, Lillian Gilliland remained in Pelham for nearly the next four decades. In 1938 she gave a lengthy interview to a reporter from The Pelham Sun. She provided her recollections of her husband's extensive involvement with Thomas Edison in the 1870s and 1880s. She also recalled her and her husband's early days in Pelham Manor, shortly after the Village of Pelham Manor was created in 1891. The resultant article provides a quaint snapshot of a simpler llife in Peham Manor more than 120 years ago. The text of the article is transcribed below, followed by a citation to its source.
Mrs. Ezra T. Gilliland in 1938.
Source: Good Times Began At Home and
the Early Days of the Village, The Pelham Sun,
Sep. 9, 1938, p. 3, cols. 1-5.
NOTE: Click Image to Enlarge.
“Good Times Began At Home and Stayed There In The Old Days In The Manor
-----
Mrs.
Ezra T. Gilliland Who Will Celebrate 80th Birthday in December
Recalls Neighborhood Character of Social Life in Pelham Manor in the Early Days
of the Village.
-----
‘We
were just like one big family then,’ Mrs. Ezra T. Gilliland long-time resident
of Pelham Manor told a Pelham Sun reporter when questioned at her home on Boston
Post Road, about life in the old days of the village.
Speaking
of the old days on Secor Hill, Mrs. Gilliland who will
celebrate her 80th birthday on next December 13th, recalls
with relish and a slight nostalgic sorrow the joys of other days; days filled to
overflowing with gaiety and movement, joys in which many neighbors shared, both
summer and winter, joys in which the home was often both the beginning and the
end.
Mrs.
Gilliland, who is small and dainty, with the quick neat grace of a bird, has
weathered many changes in Pelham Manor since the days very early in the 90’s when she and her husband came from New York to make
their home here. Her husband, who died
in 1903 was widely known as a successful inventor. He was at one time associated with the
American Bell Telephone Company and with the late Thomas Alvah Edison. Much
of the apparatus designed by the late Mr. Gilliland is now in the Smithsonian
Institute. He served as president of the
Village of Pelham Manor and was an active and leading figure in the early days
of the community. He was also president
of the old Manor Club.
‘We
hunted around in Connecticut and had almost decided on Davenport Neck in New
Rochelle when we finally determined to come to Pelham Manor,’ Mrs. Gilliland
recalled. The branch line of the New
Haven railroad then active made commuting
a simple enough proposition.
About 1892 she and her husband built a home on Wolf’s Lane, the house now
occupied by the Ely family. Mr Gilliland soon built a laboratory for his experimental
work right next door.
Mrs.
Gilliland recalls the none too frequent houses that then stood in this section
of the Manor known as Secor Hill, among them the old
Secor house, now the residence of Mrs. Julius Manger
and also the home of Mr. James Secor on Boston Post
Road at Ely avenue. The playwright,
Joseph Arthur, author of ‘Blue Jeans,’ came to the Manor to live through
friendship with the Gillilands. The Geise family
then resided in what is now the residence of Mrs. John Clyde Oswald.
The
reporter walking up the Boston Post Road to Mrs. Gilliland’s residence
speculated on the changes that have taken place along the historic highway. The sweet smell of newly cut grass spoke of
the country but was rudely obliterated the second after by the nauseating fumes
from the exhaust of a passing truck. The
highways tell the story, thought the reporter.
Mrs.
Danforth Brown who for 17 years served as manager of the Manor Club starting at
the time when it became a women’s club in 1914, makes her home with Mrs.
Gilliland her sister in Pelham Manor.
She told with humorous appreciation of a day long ago when she remembers
Mr. Gilliland calling to his wife ‘Come to the window, here comes an
automobile.’ An automobile, if you
please, and on the Boston Post Road of all places! On another occasion, both Mrs. Gilliland and
Mrs. Brown recall Mr. Gilliland rushing out of the house, armed with whiskey to
help resuscitate a wretched horse that had been overcome as he toiled up the
hill on the Post Road on a terrifically hot summer day.
Speaking
of the Boston Post road and traffic, Mrs. Gilliland related with glee that when
there was some talk of extending the New Rochelle Trolley up the Post Road to
connect with the New York line, the old residents on Secor Hill strenuously objected on the grounds of too much
noise.
The
Gilliland family were long friends of the late Thomas A. Edison and in fact, it
was at their summer home in Winthrop, Mass., that Mr. Edison met Mina Miller who
was to become the second Mrs. Edison. A
pleasant interlude came into their life when they spent about a year abroad
while Mr. Gilliland was busy installing a factory in Antwerp. Mrs. Gilliland had an interesting experience
at that time while traveling in Italy when she went to use a telephone and saw
staring her in the face the words ‘Gilliland Patent.’ The old-fashioned bell for ringing the
operator was devised by Mr. Gilliland.
Way
back in 1885 when Mrs. Brown, then a Miss Johnson and a student at the
Conservatory of Music in Boston, recalls demonstrating the first wax records
made for the old-fashioned phonographs at the Boston Exposition. Mrs. Brown to the great interest of many
visitors at the Exposition, sang a song and a record was made so that her voice
could be heard again through the medium of the talking machine. She recalls the crowds but fails to remember
the title of the sond. Mr. Gilliland collaborated with Mr. Edison on
the phonography invention.
Returning
to memories of old Pelham Manor, Mrs. Gilliland volunteered casually the
startling information ‘We used to play golf here on the corner, at the
intersection of Highland avenue and Boston Post Road, on a small neighborhood
course.’ She recalled too annual summer
clambakes she and her husband used to have on their lawn, with preparations for
days beforehand and the chef from the New York Athletic Club presiding.
‘There
was no depression then, no President Roosevelt,’ Mrs. Brown interpolated with a
sigh for the good old days.
‘We
made our own pleasures at home,’ Mrs. Gilliland said. Young people, she added, know nothing of
those ‘primitive days.’ There were no
movies, no ubiquitous automobiles.
People were dependent on themselves and on their neighbors to make their
own good times.
Mrs.
Gilliland remembers bicycle parties of about eight persons who would pedal along
Split Rock Road down to the Clairmont Inn on Riverside
Drive where dinner had already been ordered.
After dining the party would bicycle over to the Grand Central Station
and stow their bikes in the baggage car, returning home by the ‘main
line.’
The
Winter with its snows and ice brought gay sleighing parties, merry with bells on
the frosty air. After gay rides the
parties would often wind up at the New York Athletic Club. Mr. Gilliland would have the tennis court
flooded for skating, providing fun for the entire neighborhood.
Music
too, played an important part in the social life of those more leisurely days of
the 90’s and early 1900’s. Both Mr. and
Mrs. Gilliland were actively fond of music and it was as their guest that the
Italian tenor, Campanini came to Pelham Manor and sang at the old Manor Club,
his last appearance in this country. The
noted tenor was accustomed to drink a pint of champagne before giving a
performance. The iron-clad rules of the
old Manor Club were lifted on this occasion in order that the tenor might quaff
his wine before lifting his voice in song.
With
particular enthusiasm and an obviously sincere admiration for her many fine
quantities, Mrs. Gilliland speaks of the late Mrs. Joan E. Secor, a brilliant, gracious and leading figure in the old
days of Pelham Manor. A leader of the
Tuesday Afternoon Club, Mrs. Secor was to carry on her
cultural activities in the Manor Club when it became a Woman’s Club.
Mrs.
Brown recalls the old Toonerville Trolley with
affectionate memory. She lived on Pelhamdale Avenue for some time and remembers one
particularly stormy Winter night when the car was stalled in front of her
home. She supplied the motorman with hot
coffee and food during the long night hours when he refused to leave the car,
hoping that help might come at any moment to dig him out of the
drifts.
Mrs.
Gilliland moves along with the times, keeping her club interests formed so many
years ago. She is an honorary member of
the Manor Club now and was the first chairman of the club house committee. Mrs. Gilliland was honored last Spring for
long association with the Pelham Home, having served as a board member since the
founding of the cardiac institution on Split Rock Road.”
Source: Good Times Began At Home and Stayed There In The Old Days In The Manor – Mrs. Ezra T. Gilliland Who Will Celebrate 80th Birthday in December Recalls Neighborhood Character of Social Life in Pelham Manor in the Early Days of the Village, The Pelham Sun, Sep. 9,
1938, p. 3, cols. 1-5.
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