| Submitted by Marty Kadel
One afternoon in the early 90’s
while working at the old Pine Tree Council Office on Auburn St., an older
man came in. He was dressed in dirty work clothes and was himself pretty
dirty and scruffy looking. He had a picture of a little boy and he said,
'I thought you might like this picture of my brother.' My first thought
was that he was some sort of mentally ill homeless person, so I humored
him and said something like 'What a cute little boy, what was his name?'
The reply was 'Billy'. As I was busy, I did my best to politely walk him
out the door, but before he left, something caused me to ask the old man
his name. 'Hinds' he said, and everything instantly made sense.
He told me that his mother had
just passed away in a nursing home at over 100 years old, and he had been
cleaning out all her belongings (hence the dirty work clothes) and had
found the framed photograph. We then had quite a conversation. He told
me that his parents were vacationing in Mexico when Billy was killed in
Portland. They came back as soon as they could, not an easy feat in the
early 1920s.
As people of wealth they wanted
to leave a lasting memorial to William, and so made the gift of the Panther
Pond property to the local Boy Scouts who opened Camp Hinds the same year
that Lindbergh flew the Atlantic and Babe Ruth hit 60 home runs, 1927.
I no longer remember Mr. Hinds name, although I’m sure I passed it around
the council as I was promoted and left a short time afterwards. An ironic
side fact is that my wife, Lois, at the time a mobile x-ray technician,
visited Mrs. Hinds in the nursing home shortly before her death and took
a series of chest x-rays.
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Jim Hinds, nephew of William
B Hinds, added: The ''dirty and scruffy'' Hinds that gave the Scouts the
picture of William B. Hinds must have been either my father (Wadsworth)
or my Uncle Larry. I suspect it was Wadsworth, since Larry always
is dressed in dapper clothes, and in the early 90's I don't think he would
have been characterized as an ''old man'', whereas Wadsworth might have
been (he would have been in his late 70's then). Also, it would have
been more in character for Wadsworth to have been cleaning up Augusta's
belonging. He was, after all, the executor of her estate.
Note: The photograph now sits on the fireplace
mantle in the rec hall and is the one displayed at the top of this page. |
