New Boston Historical Society
New Boston, New Hampshire
Behind the Door: 99 Francestown Road
by Mary Atai (November 2019)
Elaine was very sweet and lovely. She passed on a few stories about her beloved historical home for posterity. We talked about all the displays and New Boston's growth, took pictures, and had a very nice time. Then, only 8 months later, she passed away on June 30, 2019, at age 88. That is a loss to New Boston.
The Hechtl's home, located on the western side of Francestown Road, with their large beautiful barn on the eastern side, has a long history. By the mid 1800s it was known as the Frank Richards farm. Then the Parker family owned it for many years until Asenath and John Henry McAlpine bought it in 1883.
The McAlpines worked hard at running the farm until their later years. About that time, Luther Colburn, who grew up on the Colburn Homestead on Colburn Road wanted to marry Alice Mansfield, who grew up on the Mansfield Homestead on Hooper Hill (which I now own). Luther tried to become a partner on his father's farm on Colburn Road, but his father, Charles Colburn only wanted to use him as a hired man. Luther and Alice did not like that arrangement, so Luther found a way to cobble together finances to buy Mr. McAlpine's farm. This included giving Asenath and John Henry life tenancy, so they could continue to live on the property until death. Also he worked out a yearly deal to give timber from the property to Mr. Langdell in exchange for a loan.
Alice and Luther worked extremely hard on the Francestown Road farm, as evidenced by the entries in Luther's diary. For example, this excerpt from May 3, 1918:
Luther wrote: "I helped John Henry furrow garden and then get on to team and get out four loads of horse manure and load up with Osborne's wood before dinner. In P.M. go down (to the village) with it. Then haul two loads of manure from Geo. Langdell's to Mr. Swanson’s garden. Then get a load from Dennison's for myself. Get it spread and last of Osborne's wood on down before supper."
They worked hard, yet they seemed happy and raised 6 children. Luther and Alice lived there for 29 years, when they sold the farm to their only son, Martin "Bud" Colburn in 1946.
Bud lived and worked here with his family and is remembered by some of the town's long-timers. He sold the farm in 1961 to the Sullivan family. Unfortunately, they experienced a house fire in November, 1964. The cause was unknown, but there was considerable damage to one side of the house, the upper partitions, and the roof.
This set the stage for the Hechtls, who moved here from Goffstown and bought the 100-acre property and 14-room house as a fire sale in 1965. The family lovingly restored the beautiful home. Richard was a professor of psychology and Elaine was a registered nurse. They were not farmers, but through trial and error, they became excellent stewards of the land. They planted 30 acres of vegetables every year and raised their 3 children, Patty, Tina, and Eric. Then, in 1987, Patty and her husband Dennis Kilar opened Colonial Acres Nursery behind the big barn, which became a great success. The family has record amounts of blue ribbons earned at the Hillsborough County Fair over many years.
Richard passed away in 2013, and now another sad loss with Elaine's passing.
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