"Dean Remembered"

Dean Marshall was part of my childhood in Granby, Connecticut back in the 1950's. My mother had found a book of Dean's in the Granby library one day when I was around 7 years old, and she was so taken with it after reading it to me, that she asked the librarian who this man, this wonderful author was! She was amazed to learn that Clara Dean Marshall lived in Granby and moreover, that she worked at the Granby library! What a coincidence! Dean (always Dean, never Clara!) and my mother met and became lifelong friends.

My parents soon moved out of their rented apartment in Granby center and bought a log cabin at Lake Basile near Dean¹s cabin. We lived there for two years before moving to a larger house on North Granby Road. My mother found in Dean and her knowledge of nature, gardening and great books a fascinating friend. My Dad became great friends with Dean's father, "old Mr. Marshall". Her parents both lived with Dean in her log cabin. Her mother was an invalid and was confined to her bed in Dean's livingroom, where she had been, as I understood, for hundreds of years. Caring for her mother was a burden Dean bore with fortitude and good nature (I think). I believe she must have been very fond of her parents, as she dedicated two of her books to them.

Dean's house was the first house at Lake Basile. It truly was the house in "The Long White Month," she told us so. Later, other houses were built around the lake including ours, all of which had to be log cabins by order of the Lake Basile Association. Now, I doubt very much if Dean's house is still standing, but I could be wrong. It really was literally falling down. My father used to worry about her, especially after the time Dean fell through the floor while taking a shower! Her house, according to my father, was in alarming disrepair! I remember that house as if it were yesterday. All the walls were lined with book shelves. I used to wonder how she knew where anything was, but she always did. I have carried with me all my life the children's books which Dean gave me for birthdays and Christmases. They are all together on one shelf, many still bearing the little cards with glitter on them which she inscribed and pasted inside the covers. Most of these books are long since out of print, as are her own, of which I possess four, all first editions with inscriptions from her to me.

I was a "favorite child" of Dean's, as were Lila and Caroline. I believe their last name was Ross. They lived somewhere very remote, like Maine, and I only saw them a couple of times when they were visiting Dean. She dedicated "Wish on the Moon" to Lila and wrote that Caroline would "have to wait".

Dean would come over and stay with me when I was 9 or 10 when my parents had to go out for the evening. My Brownie troop went to her house for cookies and cocoa after ice-skating on the lake. Dean helped me with Girl Scout badges.

She swam across the lake in the summer every morning, side-stroke. She kept cats (I remember a yellow one called Taffy) and pet squirrels and knew all about mushrooms and all the other plants in the woods: laurel, arbutus, trilliums, lady slipper. And all about the birds: nuthatches, chickadees, bluejays, and bluebirds. I regret to this day that I have never, ever seen a bluebird. Now I look at the birds on this side of the Atlantic here in Switzerland and think that they must be cousins of those New England ones - so similar, yet just a tad different. Dean collected quarts and quarts of wild strawberries in the summertime and made delicious jam! She drove a very old car. It had a divider in the front windshield. She told me you say "Looaville", not "Looeyville".

Dean Marshall influenced me very deeply in many ways. At the age of ten, I was sure I would become a writer. But then I heard a cello, and became a cellist instead, albeit a garden-loving cellist. I wrote to Dean about 18 years ago, and she was still alive and well! We exchanged garden thoughts and experiences, and she sent me copies of her books, which, though out of print, she had found in recent garage sales! I am very indebted to her for making that effort.

I myself had a Silver Robin! "Peeper" had fallen from the nest during a storm, and with Dean's help, we raised him all one summer long to a full-grown robin, had him banded, and watched him fly south with the other birds in the fall. The whole process was so wonderful that Dean had intended to write a book about it, but, alas, never got around to it.

Dean was quite lame, I do not know why. One leg was significantly shorter than the other. Although this caused her quite a lot of difficulty in walking, it never seemed (to me!) to be much of a handicap. My mother was lame herself, from polio, so this probably caused her to experience Dean all the more as a kindred spirit. Dean was a heavy smoker until she had to have her vocal chords scraped (!). I (child that I was) was fascinated, because she could only whisper for ever so long afterwards. I suppose she gave up smoking then and there.

We used to wonder why Dean stopped writing, because she DID stop writing. My mother thought that Dean had perhaps simply "lost her touch", and she may have been right. Perhaps the long years of nursing her parents took their toll. Only Dean knew the reason. So be it.

I would like to remind the reader that these are the memoirs of a CHILD, aged about 8 to 11. It is my hope that members of Dean's family might come forward with their own stories and give us a much more complete and accurate picture of her life.