01907_Fall_2019

18 | 01907
Bygone rail line has its
share of tales to tell
Assistant Town Manager/Public
Works Director Gino Cresta cuts his
way through thick plant growth on
the former Swampscott-Marblehead
railroad right of way.
PHOTO | SPENSER HASAK
From door dings to major collision repair, we have you
covered this fall. We work closely with ALL insurance
companies. Visit us today for your free estimate!
Swampscott Collision
201 Essex St, Swampscott
781.595.5300
swampscottcollision.com
Marblehead Collision
218 Beacon St, Marblehead
781.631.2218
marbleheadcollision.com
Engage your
imagination and stand
on Walker Road or
Paradise Road by the
Public Works yard
and you just might
hear steel wheels click clacking along a
railroad track.
Abandoned in the early 1960s
and built in the late 19th century, the
former rail spur that ran just up from
the present site of the commuter rail
station on Pine Street across town to
Marblehead still leaves its imprint on
Swampscott.
The bridges are long gone but
their ghostly abutments still loom
over Stetson Avenue, Paradise Road
and Walker Road where 38-year
resident David Downes appreciates the
overgrown swath of land passing his
backyard where trains once chugged.
"There's a quietness to it," Downes
said.
After decades of existing as a
wooded and weed-choked reminder
BY THOR JOURGENSEN
of yesteryear, the rail spur became a
town debate topic in 2017 when Town
Meeting approved a plan for a local
bike and walking trail along the old
spur's path. The state gave Swampscott
$100,000 in June to pay to construct
the trail's first half-mile segment.
Resembling a jungle in late summer
with its shoulder-high overgrowth, the
trail during cooler weather has served
over the years as a shortcut for kids
walking home from school.
"A lot of kids enjoyed it. I always
hear them laughing and talking,"
Downes said.
Town native and Assistant Town
Manager and Public Works Director
Gino Cresta remembers when the
disused railbed was the place where
middle school disputes got settled.
"Someone would say, 'Meet you on
the tracks' and the whole school would
come out and watch," Cresta recalled.
As a boy, town historian Lou Gallo
rode the spur, rolling out of the main
station at Pine Street and making
stops at Phillips Beach station near
the intersection of Humphrey and
Salem streets and Beach Bluff near
Mostyn Street. The train crossed into
Marblehead with a stop in Clifton
before rolling into downtown.
"If we were going to go to
Marblehead, we would take it," Gallo
said.
He said the spur initially served
Swampscott and Marblehead
neighborhoods populated in part with
summer estate owners who walked
from their homes to the spur for a ride
down to the main rail line and a trip
into Boston.
"When automobiles became big, it
went out of fashion," Gallo said.
Once the rails and the bridges were
torn out, the spur became a ghost of
itself. The Paradise Road abutment
remains its most visible feature with a
weathered plaque commemorating the
Paradise Road bridge's completion in
1938 as part of a federal public works
project.
The abutment also has an infamous
past. Fifteen-year-old town resident Henry
E. Bedard Jr.'s murder remains unsolved
since his body was discovered under leaves
on Dec. 17, 1974 between the spur and the
end of nearby Suffolk Avenue.
The site where the body was found is
within easy shouting distance of Norfolk
Avenue homes. A coroner ruled Bedard
was bludgeoned to death probably on
Dec. 16 at the spot where his body was
found and police found a baseball bat
at the murder scene. Cresta said one of
the people to last see Bedard alive said
the teen cut through the Public Works
yard and climbed the embankment to the
spur. The Bedard murder remains a topic
of town speculation and Cresta recalled
how it struck fear in townspeople.
"There's a lot of stories out there. It
seems crazy in this day and age that it
hasn't been solved," Cresta said.
Carved through a high stone ledge,
the spur's Walker Road section has been
encroached upon by abutters over the
years. Downes hopes the flowering tree
growing along the spur abutment at
Walker Road by his property will not fall
to an axe or earth mover once rail trail
work begins.