In some ways, it is no surprise that my brother became a newspaper reporter. My father also liked to follow up on noteworthy local events, often going to the scene and taking photos in the aftermath of something he heard about on the news or read about in the paper. He took slides, for instance, of the Wayside Inn shortly the big fire there in 1955 and as pictured here, of the Etrusco, a ship that ran aground in Scituate, Massachusetts during a late winter blizzard in 1956.
Apparently this was quite a dramatic event. The Coast Guard rescued the 30 Italian crew members by rope line and they were brought to the home of a local woman who spoke Italian. Many local residents turned out to feed, clothe, and shelter the foreign crewmen. It was the kind of story about bravery and hospitality that my father loved.
It took months for them to figure out how to refloat the ship and during that time, thousands of visitors (my parents among them) thronged to Scituate to see the Etrusco.