Western Avenue - Brattleboro Historical Society

Mary Wilkins, famous author

In 1867, shortly after the Civil War, Mary Wilkins’ family moved to Brattleboro. She was 15 years old. Her family had left Randolph, Massachusetts because her father was in the building trades and New England was suffering through a recession after the war. Many of New England’s agricultural and factory jobs were moving west with the railroads and people were moving with them. There was no demand for new housing. In fact, many New England communities lost population after the war. Warren Wilkins moved to Brattleboro to start a new profession. With a partner, he opened a dry goods store where the River Garden is presently located. The business was called, “The New York Store” and it focused on dry goods such as cloth and ready-made clothing. Unfortunately for the Wilkins’, many people in Brattleboro still made their own clothes, or had a local seamstress make them, so going to a store and purchasing already […]

Helen Dorr and the Carnegie Hero Medal (1915-1922)

In 1915 a little seven year old girl named Helen Dorr was recovering from a traumatic few months. In mid-November her father, Arthur Dorr, died from complications resulting from severe diabetes. He was thirty two years old and operated a machine that made stationary in a paper mill along the Whetstone Brook. As his health slowly failed, Helen’s dad had not been able to work for about a year before he passed away. Young Helen witnessed her father’s passing and was saddened by the experience. Helen’s mom was a seamstress and there was a younger daughter in the family as well. The family lived on Western Avenue and a week after Helen’s father had passed away Helen was accidently run over by a motorcycle. She had been on the side of Western Avenue, playing with friends, and the motorcycle lost control on the dirt road and ran into seven year old Helen. She was severely […]

Dr. Grace Burnett (1886-1963)

This week in Brattleboro History we are going to focus on the first female doctor in Brattleboro, Grace Burnett. Miss Burnett was born in West Dummerston in 1886. She grew up around animals and loved horses. She always wanted to be a doctor and was determined to find a way to make this happen. As a young girl she practiced on her pets and farm animals, making medicines and dressing their wounds. She attended a one room schoolhouse, about a half mile from her home, for grades 1 through 9. After 9th grade she then traveled to Brattleboro High School, on Main Street, where she graduated in 1905. In order to pay for medical school she began teaching and performing janitorial duties in the one room school house she had attended in West Dummerston. To make more money, she also worked at the Overall Factory in Brattleboro producing double stitched overalls very popular with the […]