Our Hometown
Berlin | Renney Morneau
Clip | 4m 19sVideo has Closed Captions
Renney tells a couple of great stories about growing up in Berlin.
Renney tells a couple of great stories about growing up in Berlin.
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Our Hometown is a local public television program presented by NHPBS
Our Hometown
Berlin | Renney Morneau
Clip | 4m 19sVideo has Closed Captions
Renney tells a couple of great stories about growing up in Berlin.
Problems with Closed Captions? Closed Captioning Feedback
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And winter sports were always a lot of fun.
Of course, the hockey traditions that we have in Berlin, the ski jumping and the Nordic skiing.
But there was also a lot of sliding and sledding going on.
And back then, kids had what they call springboards.
They all like these big toboggans on runners and they had brakes on them.
And of course, with all the hills in Berlin, the kids used to love to go out sledding and a lot of them would go up Hillside Avenue towards Cates Hill, anywhere from maybe 7 to 10 kids on one sled.
And there were very few cars back then, but just in case with cars coming, they'd have kids at the different intersections to ward off somebody.
They'd start the cars and say, you know one of the springboards are coming down the street.
So they'd have one heck of a ride.
God knows how fast they were going.
My mother in law also remembered that Doris LaChapelle Blanchette, and she said, I remember one day we were coming down on the springboard and she said, My brother, one of my brothers, was in the front.
She says, The five of us were on the sled and he was losing control of the springboard.
And when they got to the intersection of Hillside and Spring Street, there was a White House right there owned by the Carbonneau family.
And she said we could see that the springboard was heading right for the house.
So we all jumped off the springboard.
She said that springboard when went crashing into the side of the house, made this awful bang awful noise.
So poor Mrs. Carbonneau came out and said in French, Are you all okay?
So yeah, we jumped off the springboard before it hit your house.
And I guess it hit so hard that, you know, she was making a pot of soup on the stove.
And I guess it moved the stove a little bit because the impact was was so, so strong.
Yeah.
Back in 1972, we I remember going to the carnival at the community field next to the old community club, and you get there by crossing the community Club bridge.
At the time they had removed all the decking on the bridge, a large portion of the decking.
So if you get to the edge and you look down, you can see the Androscoggin River as a 14 inch water line that was under the bridge at four the east side.
So my friend and I didn't want to go by the East Mason Street Bridge by City Hall and walk all the way around.
So we kind of did something our mothers would have approved of, and we hopped on top of the the actual span of the bridge, the the railings that were up, I think, appraised 16 inch beams.
We walked across and went to the carnival.
And I used to be big into Bugs Bunny and all the Warner Brothers, the Looney Tunes characters.
And there was a Yosemite Sam, and that was one of the prizes.
And I don't remember if I did it with the darts or the balloons or what it was, but I won Yosemite Sam.
And of course, he had that scraggly red hair and he was about, maybe a foot tall.
So we wanted to get home before supper.
And I says, you know, we haven't got a lot of time as far as crossing on the East Mason Street Bridge.
Let's go back across Community FootBridge.
So he agreed and he says, I'll go first.
So he hopped on top of the beam and walked across and got to the other side.
And I said, I don't feel comfortable getting up with Yosemite Sam.
He still just chuck him across the hole.
So I grabbed him by the hair and I just threw him across and he caught him and then I got up on top of the span and I walked the rest of the way and I met him.
And all I could think of was if my mother had ever known, there would have been interesting.
Did you ever tell the story?
I never told her.
I never told her.
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