Don, I'm unclear from your posting below exactly what facts in your family legend you're trying to confirm. I can tell you where Dr. Goddard fired at least some of his first rockets. (I don't know his career detail for detail.) The property is now the Packachoag Hill golf course, located on Upland Street in Auburn just over the Worcester-Auburn town line. There is a small monument there paying homage to his launch of the first liquid-fuel-fired rocket there, I think in 1926. The monument is close to the road. Back in that era, the property was a farm owned by Dr. Goddard's sister, sister-in-law or some female relative. Being on a hill might have made the site attractive for his purposes. There's a nice view there. I grew up within walking distance of the site, off of the Worcester end of Upland St., and used to walk there quite often when I was growing up. Incidentally, my father was an auto mechanic in the 1930s and a definite highlight of his early life was working on Dr. Goddard's car at his home. My dad said Dr. Goddard had a lift in his garage for working on cars, which he thought was pretty spiffy. (I think they're called lifts ...) You can probably identify the date of the historic launch and get the Worcester Telegram, Evening Gazette or Worcester Post through interlibrary loan for that date. Good luck! Barbara > Date: Thu, 4 Jul 2002 15:52:26 -0400 > From: Don Barnes <dbarnes6@triad.rr.com> > To: MAWORCES-L@rootsweb.com > Message-Id: <l03130300b94a579195de@[192.168.1.100]> > Subject: [MAWORCES] Family Legend > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > I have a Family Legend that I would like to check out. Before his death, > my father on several occasions said that he saw Dr Goddard fire his first > rockets and that I was with him at the time. It is possible, but I was only > two at the time and have no memory of this. > > Here are the facts. Dad's mother died when he was nine and her sister, > Bertha F. Albee, took in and raised his two sisters. I remember visiting my > great-aunt and my two aunts on many Sunday afternoons. > > Aunt Bertha had married Louis A Spaulding and they lived on a farm at 320 > or 322 Oxford Street in Auburn, Mass. > > Dad also said that Aunt Bertha has seen the liftoffs and as a stringer > (reporter) had filed a story with one of the Worcester newspapers > describing what she saw. > > I have tried, over the internet, to find out whose byline was on the > initial news report. No luck. If it was Bertha Spaulding that reported the > account of what happened at Dr. Goddard's aunt's farm it would remove any > doubt that Dad saw what he claimed he did. > > I live in North Carolina and my health will not let me travel to Worcester > to check the facts myself. Any volunteers? >