THRIVING CLUB OF "MERRY WIDOWS"

The town of Bartlett, N.H. has the distinction of
having more widows in proportion to its size than
any town in America yet heard from.
The population of the town is less than 1000, about
one-third of which are women.  At least
one-quarter of this number of women are widows,
and the most interesting thing about the Bartlett
widows is that they are all self-supporting.
Widows do every conceivable kind of work in
Bartlett.  They manage farms, milk cows, team,
raise strawberries, and in the berry season pick
blueberries and blackberries on the mountains for
sale in the large cities.  They crate their own
berries, do their own gardening, and work side by
side with men in the sawmill of the town bunching
shingles.  They form the majority of the workers in
the woodworkers mill, the largest of its kind in New
England.  They also do woman's own work, such as
dressmaking, millinery, nursing and school teaching,
while the Bartlett cooks are noted.
The summer boarding houses there, which during
the vacation are filled with city visitors, are run by
widows, and the boarding houses for the sawmill
men and the railroad men are managed by widows.
It is interesting to observe that few of the Bartlett
widows were widowed there, and it is rare indeed
that a widow marries in Bartlett.
A widow plays the church organ in the leading
church of the village.  A widow is the town school
principal.  All the choir singers are widows.  There
are widows on every street in Bartlett.  Every other
house on every street contains a widow.
In age these theoretically lone women vary from
the sunny side of 30 to the shady side of 60.
Widows are leaders of society in Bartlett, and the
majority of them can handle a six-footer like a man.
 Indeed, some compete with the men in shooting
matches.
Numerically so strong are the widows in Bartlett
that they have recently formed a novel society,
"The Merry Widows' Club."  This boasts nearly 100
members.
The president, Mrs. John Mersereau, is called "the
Queen of the Bartlett Widows," perhaps 50, as spry
and jolly as a girl, and famed through the country as
its best cook.  The secretary, Mrs. Lulu Wilson, is
the youngest widow of the society, and a school
teacher; the treasurer, Mrs. Susan Foster, is a nurse.
 At one time she managed a millinery store.  She is
a mother of a fine family of children, and has a
cozy home.
Mrs. Jane Stewart, chairman of the executive
committee and vice president of the Widow's
society, works in the woodworking mill, and owns a
pretty little cottage in the center of Bartlett.  She
has an adopted child, a waif she took from an
orphan asylum.  Mrs. Isabel Muir, another member of
the executive committee, boards railroad men, and
Mrs. Jane Wasson, another member, is a successful
nurse and housekeeper.
"Why shouldn't we be merry widow?" said Mrs.
Mersereau, the society president.  "We can take
care of ourselves; we are healthy, and have all the
work we need; we are a community where we
have plenty of honest admirers.  We have no reason
to be sorrowful, and every reason to be merry."
Our Ancestry
Bartlett Historical Society
Preserving the history of the villages of Bartlett, New Hampshire
PO Box 514, Bartlett, NH  03812
(603) 383-4110       info@bartletthistory.org