CHAPTER XIII
TWO STAGE VETERANS OF MASSACHUSETTS
There still stands in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, at the junction of the Westborough road with the old “King’s Highway,” a weatherbeaten but dignified house, the Pease Tavern; it is shown on [page 292]. This house was for many years a popular resort for the teamsters and travellers who passed back and forth on what was then an important road. Behind the house was originally a large shed with roof and open sides for the protection from rain or snow of the great numbers of loaded wagons. In another covered shed at the side of the house were chairs and tables for the teamsters and shelves for any baggage they took from their wagons. This shed for the accommodation of the teamsters would indicate to me that they were not so unreservedly welcome at this tavern as at many others on the route. Miss Ward, in her entertaining book, Old Times in Shrewsbury, says that under this shed, in the side boards of the house, slight holes were cut one above the other to a window in the second story. These holes were large enough to hold on by, and to admit the toe of a man’s boot; by dexterous use of hands and feet the teamsters were expected to climb up the outside wall to the window, and thus reach their sleeping apartments without passing through the hall and interior of the house. This was, it was asserted, for the convenience both of the family and the travellers. In the Wayside Inn at Sudbury a small special staircase winding in the corner of the taproom led to the four “drivers’ bedrooms” above. One of the upper rooms in the Pease Tavern was a dancing hall. Across this hall from wall to wall was a swing partition which could be hooked up to the ceiling when a dance was given, but at other times divided the hall into two large bedrooms. This was a common appurtenance of the old-time tavern.
Pease Tavern.
Major John Farrar, an officer in the Revolution, first kept this Shrewsbury inn, and greatly rejoiced when Washington visited it in his triumphal journey through the country. His successor as landlord, Levi Pease, was a man of note in the history of travel and transportation systems in Massachusetts. He was a Shrewsbury blacksmith who served through the entire Revolutionary War in a special function—which might be entitled a confidential transportation agent: he transferred important papers, carried special news, purchased horses and stores, foraged for the army, and enjoyed the full confidence of the leaders, especially of Lafayette. In 1783, when peace was established, he planned to establish a line of stages between Boston and Hartford, and thus turn his knowledge of roads and transportation to account. Wholly without funds, he found no one ready to embark in the daring project and work with him, save one young stage-driver, Reuben Sykes or Sikes, who braved parental opposition, as well as universal discouragement, and started with a stage-wagon from Hartford to Boston at the same hour that Captain Pease set out from Boston to Hartford. Each made the allotted trip in four days. The fare was ten dollars a trip. Empty stages were soon succeeded by prosperous trips, and in two years the penniless stage agent owned the Boston Inn opposite the Common, in Boston, on the spot where St. Paul’s Church now stands. The line was soon extended to New York.
Old Arcade, Shrewsbury, Massachusetts.