Deedy.com Blog

In an old and fragile scrapbook my great-grandmother (Susan Austin Sullivan) had created, I found an article which quotes her Father (my great-great-grandfather) William Austin. You can click on the image of the article to see a larger image and read the full story, but here is the bit I found most interesting:

Mr. Austin said to a Post reporter yesterday: "I came to East Boston 40 years ago just after the completion of the present St. Mary's Church. There was at that time only two churches in all of East Boston. St. Mary's Church and the Holy Redeemer. In those days we only had one mass on Sunday.

At that time Bennington street was not cut through and from Saratoga street down to the narrow gauge railroad was a muddy swamp. It is all changed now. Since then the parish has built a fine rectory, school and convent. Now there are four Catholic churches in East Boston, and I have assisted at the breaking of ground of the three erected in my time.

"I came from Montreal and had 11 children, nine of whom are living, all in East Boston."

I will have to trace his children another day, but for now I am more intrigued by his description of East Boston. While the article does not have any source information, it does give me some clues to date it. The church he is helping to dedicate still stands in East Boston and the corner stone has the date 1910 marked on it. So the article likely dates from that year. Meaning William Austin arrived in East Boston in 1870.

I found this map of East Boston from 1879. On it I can find Bennington street and the tracks for that narrow gauge railroad. The close-up on the map is the section where the church now stands that he was dedicating and likely the area where William Austin lived.

As always, you can click on any image to view larger.

Labels: Austin