Land of the Lost

Unfortunately - history does get 'lost'. Perhaps one of my fondest goals is to somehow bring that knowledge back to the present day. Let us examine one such case. And perhaps someone out there just might have that lost bit of knowledge.

About ten years ago a set of postcards surfaced. They portray a group of Boy Scouts on a outing. Certain information is written upon the cards including landmarks as Halls Peak, Johnson Mtn, Halls Bee Hive Cave, Hyde Park Mass, the Stony Brook Woods, and the Blue Hills. They also identify themselves as Troop 13 from the Tabernacle Church. Also of interest is the mention of a "doner" [sic] that was presenting the estate to the Hyde Park Boy Scouts.

Certainly all clues would point to a BSA troop from the Boston suburbs. But NO information has ever surfaced on any such troop - or any such land - ever being part of the Boy Scouts.

A Tale of Two Pulpits

Imagine my surprise some years ago when I arrived at Purgatory Chasm in Sutton, MA: armed with my usual bunch of antique image printouts, I began to scour the rocky rift for sites that carried a name from long ago. At that time, the Park had put up several signs, signs that that have since mostly disappeared, to mark features within the Chasm.

I was successful in locating a little know formation known as the Devil's Stairway but when it came to my image of the Devil's Pulpit - I was not so successful. Oh - there was a section of rock wall marked with a sign called Devil's Pulpit, but not the large, isolated boulder that my postcard portrayed.

Well, on a subsequent visit I did finally locate that boulder. And notice that the Park sign for 'their' Devil's Pulpit had disappeared from the rock wall. More of a surprise was that eventually another postcard of Devil's Pulpit in Purgatory Chasm came into my possession. And this one showed the site that the Park had originally marked with a sign!