It's Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ, Boston's news radio.
Thank you, Emma. My name is Morgan White Junior. I'm here for the rest of this week and Monday and Tuesday of next week. While Dan takes a well earned vacation, I'm gonna be speaking with at ten o'clock Boston sports anchor at Channel four. Back in the day, he's went on the bigger and better things of the cities New York. I'm trying to think if there are another city besides New York that Jimmy Myrius went to. Well, Jimmy Myriers will be here and the next two hours between now
and ten o'clock. I've got a gentleman, believe it or not. He's written almost ninety books, and I'm gonna mention a book did a book on the Christmas tree shops, and I don't know if that was number eighty nine or number ninety, but he is an extremely knowledgeable man. When it comes to Boston, it's neighborhoods and it's environs. So please get comfy, scooch up next to the radio and be prepared to welcome my friend mister Anthony San Marco. Anthony, Happy Holidays to you.
Happy holidays to you, Morgan. How are you.
I'm doing very very well, and I was looking forward to this because there's some things that we didn't cover the last time in regards to the Christmas Tree Shops that I will cover tonight. And by the way, any of you out there who were fans of the old Christmas Tree Shops, how many of them were? They're in Massachusetts back in the day, the.
Mill Ezekans who founded the company, by two thousand and three had twenty three, but throughout New England they were over forty five, but bedboth and beyond between two thousand and three and twenty twenty would expand it to the point that they were in sixteen states and they were close to ninety. So it was really quite an expanse of growth in the early twentieth century.
And both stores were under the same umbrella.
Correct, correct, And the thing was in that instance, the Christmas Tree Shops in some ways was something that not only had the name, but it was also something that had the prototype that basically became a cookie cutter. But these places were so intriguing. The architecture was incredible.
And one thing I noticed, as you would pass one, and I guess this is the same for every store circumstance. Their look was identical, that little slay for their brand no matter where you were, you down in the Cape, you were up in the North Shore. And were they one of the first stores to do that?
Well, well, the funny thing was when you say they were identical, the logo was identical. But many of these buildings were iconic. When you think of the Sagamore Bridge Store, it not only was an Irish cottage, but it had the largest fatue for the world. The store in Linfield had a wonderful lighthouse. Orlean's Massachusetts had a sea captain's house. So in a lot of ways they looked similar, but
they weren't. They were individual stores. And one of the aspects was that Chuck Blazike and who with his wife Doreen Belazikian, founded in nineteen seventy trying to make each door unique and in that instance not only architecturally intriguing, but in a lot of ways what the Washington Post called disney Esque architecture. I agree. I used to say to myself when I read that first time, I said, Wow,
that's incredible. I mean, but it was. It was something that was not only unique but attractive, and it was more than just a store to shop in. It was iconic.
And you mentioned nineteen seventy, so that was the first year they opened.
Correct, They had bought a company in Yarmouthport that was known as the Christmas Tree Shop. They have been founded in nineteen forty six by the Matthews family. They went bankrupt and in nineteen sixty one a man by the name of Dawn Winner bought it at auction and was running it when Chuck Bilerzekean met with him on July fourth weekend of nineteen seven. At that point, after a meeting, he casually asked, would you like to buy a store?
And in that instance, not only did they, but they went into debt, sold their house in Newton, went to Yamouthorte lived above the store. And what they did was, over the next five years, continually work in such a way that with hard work, drive, the termination and reinvestment of capital, they were able to make a go of a business that was a remainder and wholesaler.
Now, if I'm mistaken, they spread out all over New England and beyond. Correct, but they had a new England Seal. How was that go ahead?
Well, for the first thirty years they were primarily just New England. They had stores all over the Cape, and then beginning in the period of the late nineteen seventies, they opened their first off Cape store in Pembroke, Massachusetts. But during the period between nineteen seventy and two thousand they were basically expanding it in such a way by asking people when they checked out at the cash register, what is your zip code? And they use that information
to actually gauge where are people coming from. You know, they're on Cape cod By, they native Cape Corners, Are they summer people or are they basically for the day. And by the period of twenty two thousand, which was the turn of the twenty first century, they were opening in South Portland, Maine, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York. And they weren't truly something that not only many people looked at as a place to shop in, but it was something that you never knew what you were going to
find and people loved it. I mean the type of a thing when you arrived at the parking lot, here was a building that was unlike any other retail establishment. It was a gift shop wrapped up in thatch or a lighthouse or something that was unusual, and it was fun to not only walk through the door, but everything seemed to hit you. Not only were they beautiful displays, all sorts of things to purchase, but the century sensory aroma,
especially of cinnamon, seemed to be pervasive. So when you walked into these doors, it was something that hit you all at once. And I think people really really really enjoyed this, and it was something that became not only popular, but tremendously successful.
All Right, I have to take a break. I'm going to open up the phone line six thirty eight, eight nine, ten thirty. This is Nightside. Dan is off. My name is Morgan. I'll be here until midnight. And if you want to call in to speak to Anthony San Marco, you can, and do me a favor when you call in. If you're calling in from Boston, don't just say Boston. Boston is split into eighteen nineteen twenty different neighborhoods sections. Tell Anthony what area you are, Jamaica, Plane, the North
End East. Let him know so he can give you a little thumbnails sketch about your neighborhood. During the holidays because he will know about it. I guarantee time and temperature here on Night side eight, sixteen thirty degrees.
Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World, Night six Studios on WBZ News Radio.
I hope you're enjoying your Christmas Eve. I hope you can got all the things done, the shopping, the food prep, the gifts all wrapped, all of that needed to be completed, hopefully by the day, if definitely not by this evening, so you'll be ready for Christmas morning. And on Aka morning they overlapped this year. You know, Anthony Sarah Marco is here. He's my guest. And Anthony is there within Boston,
within Boston's communities. Is there a way that's traditional to the North End for celebrating Christmas versus Jamaica Plane for celebrating Christmas, versus Roxbury for celebrating Christmas or is it all kind of just one unified look at the holiday.
Well, if you were going to ask me, and I did write a book called Christmas Traditions, you have to realize. Initially, in the seventeenth century, Boston was settled by Puritans. Puritans were basically englishmen and women and they came to this country to celebrate and worship in their own manner. It was something in a lot of ways that was very different.
But you have to realize they banned Christmas in sixteen fifty nine, and a lot of times when I teach this I used to teach at Boston University, I was always intrigued that a lot of people had no idea that the Puritans were so strict and adhere to what was basically the Bible Commonwealth and by not only creating an aspect of banning Christmas, nobody could feast, nobody could
actually enjoy a day off. Everybody had to work, and it was something and in that instance it was probably to hold off not only throughout the seventeenth but throughout the eighteenth century. Really wasn't until the time of the nineteenth century when immigrants were coming from Western Europe and they were bringing their Christmas traditions with them, and we'd see not only people from the British Isles in Ireland
and Germany and France and eventually even Middle Europe. But it was something that each person representing a distinct culture under so to speak, Christianity, might celebrate Christmas, but in a different way than everyone else. I am half Italian, So this evening we actually had the Feast of the Seven Fish. It's a little bit peculiar. It was a lot of food, but I started this afternoon and I had not only shrimp and scallops. I had stuffed scallops.
I had a lobster pie. I made linguini with clam sauce. There were things that just typical of what I would have had as a child, but a little bit different. And it was fun to do because in that instance it was a tradition for my past. But it doesn't matter where we come from. These are things, in some ways that come down to us through our grandparents are great grandparents, and it's a great and important way to
maintain that tradition. So whether one might have the Feast of the Seven Fish, and of course my family had lived in the North End of the turn of the twentieth century, or they lived at Jamaica Plain or Roxbury, we have to realize it is celebrated somewhat differently, but there's a reason for celebrating. It's a birth of Jesus Christ and many many people in Boston, and we actually
may come from different cultures, different religions, different ethnicities. But we've woven this thriving nexus of cultures that we call the City of Boston, and we do things like decorate the Boston Common Department stores with beautiful lights and decorations, and our places of worship, whatever it might be, is a great way to see music and singing, and of
course the wonderful aspect of community. So yeah, sometimes it is different, but it all represents the same thing, and Christmas is a special time in Boston.
The Puritans had such a stranglehold on what you can and cannot do in Boston for decades.
Beyond exactly exactly is there.
A pinpoint moment you mentioned the different immigrants that came to our city from places in Europe. Is there a pinpoint moment when that grip by the Puritans loose and allow people to relax on Christmas or allowed people to give gifts on Christmas?
Well, the very first instance was when King William the Third and Queen Mary the Second, they were joint rulers of England, began the Glorious Revolution by accepting people for who they were, whatever religion they were, would actually establish a place of worship in Boston. That was the Anglican church that was King's Chapel. It's at the corner of
Tremont and School Street. At that point, not only did they have their own chapel, but they sent silver a Bible, and it was the first instance of non traditional Puritan worship. So you began to see a slight change. And during that period of time, there were many people, you know, that looked at that as something that was not only horrible, but it something in some ways that people couldn't understand.
And the Reverend Cotton Mather, who was a minister in Boston, he had realized his father had been increased Mather or President of Harvard, but also a well known minister, and his grandfather was not only Reverend John Cotton, but the Reverend Richard Mather. He would say in seventeen twelve that the feast of Christ's Nativity is spent in revelry, dicing, carding, masking, and all licentious liberty, by mad mirth, by long eating,
by hard drinking, by leude gaming, by rude reveling. Well, in that instance, many people began to realize the way Christmas had been celebrated under King Henry the eighth was now being in some ways reinstituted, and that would continue, but it would really be in the period of the eighteen forties, with the beginning of the Irish coming to Boston because of the Great Famine, they themselves would see Roman Catholicism of something that not only they worshiped, but
also would create a place of worship that the whole aspect of Christmas, with not just Christmas Eve, but Christmas Day, in the feast of the Epiphany and Little Christmas would all come to the point where now Boston was beginning to celebrate in a very different way. And in that nineteenth century it wasn't just Roman Catholics, but people would begin to write books. And you probably know Charles Dickens, and in eighteen forty two he came to Boston to
do readings from his book A Christmas Carol. Now Dickens was Anglican, and he talked about Christmas past, present, and future. And people had to look at that and say to themselves, Wow, this is something that's not only a literary class, but it was also something a lot of ways that really did chronicle what people were thinking in the period before the Civil War.
And see I didn't know Dickens did that. And he came to Boston. Obviously, I'm familiar with the Book of Christmas cow I think we in my fifth grade had to read that.
Yeah, well, he came and he lived at the Parker House, and the Parker House was one of those I know. I'd stay there in the bar. So long as I could have Parker House rolls and butter, I'd be happy. But that was the thing. And I mean during that period you also had people like Lydia Mariah Child, who a well known writer from Medford, Massachusetts, and I'm talking
to eighteen thirty eighteen forty period. She wrote, over the bridge and through the woods to Grandfather's house we go, and everyone knows.
The horse knows the way to carry the slave to the white and crispy snow. Oh Ma, thank you. I'm going to stop here, take my bottom of the hour news hit, and when we come back, hopefully we'll be joined by college. But I find this fascinating, and I could talk to you about this for the next three days, but we only have ninety minutes of show to go with Anthony. If you want to call in six, one, seven, two, five, four, ten,
thirty eight eight eight, nine to nine ten thirty. Time here on night Side is eight thirty temperature thirty degrees.
You're on night Side with Dan Ray. I'm WBZ Boston's news Radio.
Good evening, I should say, good Christmas Eve evening. My name is Morgan White Junior. I'm gonna be here and Dan instead, he'll be off and until the first of the year twenty twenty five. I'm going to be here on night Side until then. And my guests this evening, mister Anthony San Marco and Anthony. How many books? Is it eighty nine ninety?
It's Sadie nine. I think at this point I'm working on one called The Prince Spaghetti Company.
Hey, Anthony, I heard that if I.
Could run that far, it might have been. But it wasn't the four. It was Anthony Montyetti.
Yes, all right, Well you've gotten a phone call. It's a gentleman. I know. He's been actually on the radio with me a number of times. He and his brother Bill Winnakers called in to speak to you.
Well, how are you, Bill, Anthony?
I'm so good. You know, when you're on Morgan's show, I always learned so much. I'm Morgan, I appreciate you having Anthony on because it's you know, Anthe you're a Boston treasure, and.
I think that's a good way of putting it.
Yeah, well you're a Boston treasure too, You're you're both Boston treasures. And Morgan, your knowledge of the history of Boston is phenomenal as well. I mean, so to hear the two of you banter back and forth, I just learned a lot. And I grew up twenty miles south of Boston on a farm in Millics, but so I didn't get to hang around in the city like you two did. And you both know every nook and cranny of the city of Boston. And I came to college
here and was fascinated after living in the country. But Anthony, I've just learned so much from you all the time, and from you too, Morgan.
I love the best city of Boston, and I have been to every every major community in America. I've been to Philly, I've been to New York. I've been to a number of communities in Miami. I've been to Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, obviously, Las Vegas. And I love Boston, always have always will Ye I was.
I'm very lucky to stay here. I was lucky to stay here after college. I absolutely love it. And there's not a day that goes by that I don't do reading about Boston. I mean, tonight probably i'll read because some of my books just arrived this week on Boston. These are things that sometimes I've had copies, but I give them away and I buy new ones. But I think Boston is something at some point that it's just a very special place and it doesn't matter who you are.
You begin to realize in some ways, each family creates traditions, especially during the holiday season, whether it's Christmas or Kwansa or Hnagar, And people look at this and they say to themselves, I want my children and grandchildren to do what I and my grandparents had once done. And those are the traditions that we, you know, kind of pass on from a generation to another.
Absolutely, you know, this is one of the great cities of the world, and I love that we can walk. I often take the tea through Park Street and walk back to Brookline and walk in different directions. First I might go down to the waterfront and just explore all the different parts of the city. It's so walkable and accessible. It's just a thrill to liver here. There was college that brought me here and I've never left.
Well, it's funny you say that it is a walkable place, But there is a club that I belonged to on Beacon Hill and Vernon Street is probably one of the steeper hills of Boston. I have to admit I'm a little bit winded by the time I get there for my cocktail. I still get up a hill, believe me. But no, that's wonderful.
And gentlemen, let me tell you this. Wait, wait, Bill, let me tell you this. And I interviewed him on a number of occasions. This man loved to walk Boston before he was in office, while he was in office as the mayor of Boston. And yeah, well, Kevin White, but I'm talking about Ray Flynn.
Oh, Ray walked every way.
Lynn loved to walk all over this city.
He sure did.
Yeah, I haven't had the money. I haven't had the money in years. Maybe I'll see if I can get him for twenty five.
But he loved we love him, and we used to see him all the time. He was a close friend of the Duncee family at the Parker House, and we my folks lived in the Parker House for years.
There is that name again, the Parker House. So much of bost so much of Boston's history is woven in and through and around the Parker House.
Well yeah, well I was just going to say, it's the oldest continuously run hotel in America.
Yeah, and lived across the street from me in Milton, Is that right? Yeah? I mean it was so funny because I used to say to myself, take who lives in that house that I found out, and I was like, well, I mean, introduce myself. Now. I think in a lot of ways, this is the fun thing. I mean, it's not just a hotel. It's not just a place of worship. It's not the State House. All of these things combine into something that creates what we know of as Boston.
And it's not just during the holiday season. I mean, we have the public Garden, we have the back Bay mall leading from Arlington Street to Muddy River, beautiful tree shrubberies, green space, the Charles River. It's a place that is a very special one and I think when I write about it, I try to not only reinforce to those of us that are Bostonians, but also to those that might not necessarily know about the city as either tourists or recent arrivals. How very special Boston really is.
Anthony. You teach as you write these books, and when you worked at BU as a teacher, you inform you impart knowledge and your love of the city is so obvious when you flip through one of your books. The photos of the company accompany most of these books. When I have you on the radio, when I've heard you in the radio with other people and other circumstances, your love of Boston shines through it.
Sure does. Sure I appreciate it. I want to say one thing, Morgan. We had the extreme pleasure of working an event with Anthony, and that was really the first time we get to meet each other.
Let me hear about it before I let you go tell me about that event.
Yeah, I rather have Anthony tell you because all my mind is blankization.
Now, well, it was ironic earlier us here there was a wonderful group of people in Boston's North End that wanted to actually honor Nancy Schon, who was the sculptors. So they make way for ducklings in the Boston Public Garden. She was doing a new sculpture called a Noble Journey, which is a bronze gangplane from a ship leading from Italy to Boston, and it was footsteps and feet and it was to be installed at the entrance way to Saint Leonard of Port Maurice, which is actually at Prince
and Hanover Street of the North End. So I became involved in the fundraising and we were moving along, but I suggested we have a large party at the same Patop club. Would be a little bit more expensive than some of the other events, but it would be something in some ways that would be a very fitting tribute.
And I planned the party and I asked the Winnakers the Aus trio to come and play at the ballroom, and we had a lovely reception, copious wine, wonderful music, and Nancy Showan was somebody who's ninety six years of age, was somebody who not only was the principal guest, but she was something in some ways that surpassed what you could imagine. Her artistic skills, her linguistic skills, her family. She was just a lovely, lovely person. And it turned out that my father in law had worked for her
back in the nineteen fifties and sixties. Her father owned harry Quit Nurseries, so it was the type of a thing that it was, those very unusual connections. So I met Bill and Bo Winnaker for the first time. No, we've chatted, you know, and we've known each other, but not well. And we had about one hundred and twenty five hundred and forty people and it was the most wonderful event that we raised the money that was necessary to,
you know, have this piece installed. It's now part of the history of the North End.
Bill Well, that was one of the most special events I've ever intended. The camaraderie and everybody was so warm and friendly, and it was just an extraordinary night of bonding and friendship. And it's just I can't even describe how wonderful it was.
I stop a line too.
Had something to do. Guys. I got to stop here because they have a break to take. But Bill, I was showing your family a fantastic Christmas, your best year ever. Tell your brother and your mom. I said, Hi, I.
Will Bill, thank you, thank you so much. Good night.
Let's take our break. When we come back, we'll speak to Larry and reading here on night Side Time on night Side eight forty five thirty degrees.
Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World Nightside Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Let's immediately go back to the telephone. We have full lines, by the way, so as I take a call, that's when you time your darling. Let's go to reading and speak to Larry. Larry, Hello there right.
Uh, I just want to mention the same to you. Merry Christmas and a happy Honikah.
And I think you.
I wanted to mention the the old Jordan Marsha store used to was in half a dozen locations before it ended up where it is.
Yes, and also.
It was originally designed to be a twelve story building. I got less from in nineteen twenty eight the Guidebook of Boston.
And how come it was funny? Because go ahead?
No, My question simple, why didn't that happen?
Well?
Should I?
Well? The funny thing was Jordan marsh was something that did move quite a few times, and then it eventually settled at the corner of Washington Street in Avon Place. By nineteen twenty two they had bought out a Schumann company and they moved all the way to the edge
of Semeer Street. But for that centennial, which was going to be in nineteen fifty one, they hired a company by the name of Perry Sharon Hepburn, a well known company that had actually restored Colonial Williamsburg for the Rockefeller family, and they did a new plan to destroy the entire block and build a new eleven story building, nine above the ground and two below the ground. But it never happened.
And what they did was to build what was basically the part at the corner of Chauncey Street in Summer Street. And the reason was in some instances they didn't think that they were actually going to be able to afford this enormous new structure. But the new building, the part was radiant heat, sidewalks, escalators, electric elevators, central heating, air conditioning. It was the most modern department store in New England. But the whole thing was in a lot of ways.
It was actually in nineteen fifty that they actually had their first suburban store, and that was Shopper's World on Route nine at Framingham. And what they really felt at that point was why invest so much in downtown Boston when the population was moving north, south and west of
the city. And what they did was between nineteen fifty and you know nineteen ninety six when Macy's took them over, they had all these satellite stores and that was much more successful than the flagship store, which was in downtown Boston.
Is Jordan Marsh Great Warehouse sailed this Saturday out in Auburndale. I remember that jingle being played over and over.
Third you remember the one, And there was one in Squatham. There was a factory and a warehouse and Squantham that basically sold you know, very good furniture and lamps right for that sort. But you know, Jordan's was something in some ways. It was a department store and it had originally two hundred and twenty four departments under one roof. And by the period of say the nineteen fifties, they had the Bristol building, They had Jordan Marsh basement. These
buildings were all around that area. Not everyone was contiguous to the other. But my favorite was the annex that was at the corner of Avon Street of Washington Street across to the original store. And you know, the annex had the bakery, it had stamp collection, coin collections, records. It was something that was really a destination when I was a child.
And let's not forget in the mid sixties when some genius came up with the Enchanted Village, and.
I mean Edward Richardson Mitton, who was the president between nineteen thirty seven and nineteen sixty three, not only created the Enchanted Village, but he open trade with West Germany. And a lot of people don't realize these pieces the automatons were made in West Germany, and this was something only thirteen fourteen years after World War Two had ended, so it was something that he had petitioned the federal
government to continually do. But it wasn't until nineteen fifty eight that they actually allowed mitten to actually trade with Germany and they hired a company that actually produced the Enchanted Village of Saint Nicholas, and it was something I mean, nobody seemed to realize how impact of it was. And between that period and you know that period until nineteen ninety six, it brought in millions of people.
It was a big hit. The second they advertised come see it. I agree everybody. I'm guaranteeing everybody who was a kid at some time in the mid sixties and up, mom and dad or aunt and uncle or grandfather, grandmother or next door neighbor took you to see the enchanted village. And some of us went every.
Year, well some of us went many times each year. I loved it. But the funny thing was, you know, it was called a Tudor Revival village, and it was three quarters at scale, and you have these little tableaus, a bakery or an ice cream shop. You had a school mastershop, glass blower shop, the village jail, a barbershop. But it seemed like there were men, women, and children and animals that were these automatons, and they moved in unison. But it was also the fact it was live music.
There were three men who used to play at the sherry Biltball that was on Massachusetts Avenue. They dressed in Tyrolean hats and leader hose and played Germanic music and when they were on break, somebody played the organ with all sorts of Christmas jingles and sons. But it was something that the day had opened, which was the day after Thanksgiving in nineteen fifty nine, it was said to have attracted just that one winter season, over thirty five thousand people and.
That's a lot.
It's a huge amount.
That's a lot, Larry, Is there anything else you want to touch upon while you're here?
I think the favorite part of Jordan Marsh for me was the annex, which I what they made into the Hotel Lafayette. Yes, and there was the toy Department.
Well do you remember they called us toy Land. And toy Land was a destination for every young person under the age of sixteen because toy Land was something that had railroad sets, it had race car sets, it had dolls that had you know, Gi Joes, it had Johnny West, it had Barbie dolls. It was something that had something for every child. And when I did my book on Jeordan Marsh, I had these wonderful photographs that I had bought on eBay. I just couldn't believe they were on eBay.
But they showed the you know, the enchanted village. But they also showed toy Land, and whether you were buying it or not, a lot of children would go there on weekends just to take a peek at what was being offered. And it was something special.
Anthony, I got stop you here at Larry. I got to say goodbye as coming up, and thank you for your calling. Happy holidays to you all right and for Sandy and Jerry on hold. Will get to you afternoons and a few messages here on night side. Take care. Time and temperature eight fifty eight thirty degrees