Today is my father's Birthday

​​The photo shows yours truly at about age one with my grandfather, Rev. Alfred Rodman Hussey, standing in front of Pooh’s Corner in Barnstable, Massachusetts.
 
Today was my father's birthday, 12-28-1897.  Henry Carvill Haskell was born in Brunswick, Maine. He'd be 118 years old today. "Heini" (as my mother called dad) was a bright and independent thinker/doer.  I wonder what he'd say about the world today?
 
Dad grew up in Brunswick where he attended Brunswick high school and enrolled at Bowdoin College (also in Brunswick). The U.S. entered World War I in April of 1918 and my dad joined the U. S. Navy as a pilot-in-training in Plattsburgh, NY. The war ended on November 11, 1918 and all U.S. military were sent home.
 
HCH returned and finished up his third year at Bowdoin before transferring to Massachusetts Institute of Technology where he majored in aeronautical engineering.  In 1921 he received degrees from both MIT and Bowdoin and went to work for a Boston consulting firm. That firm sent him to Lancaster, Pennsylvania to set up a cost-system at the Conestoga Steam Cotton Mill. This large mill complex had operated in Lancaster since before the Civil War and during WWI more than 40% of their production was for the war effort. It was interesting when I researched this textile complex I discovered that Franklin and Marshall College (also in Lancaster) was founded by some of the original owners of this textile mill. My brother, the late Peter Carvill, was head librarian at F & M College in the 1980s.
 
After his Lancaster assignment, HCH moved back to New England and, at the age of 26, became superintendent of a group of mills in the Rhode Island area owned by the Sayles estate. He had 1,500 employees working for him (circa 1927) and decided he wanted to own his own business some day. Since he’d learned much about the textile industry, he concentrated on this once thriving New England business and decided on the worsted business. Worsted weaving is the name of a wool using process that produces fine fabrics of 100% wool. The wools used are called “merino” and come primarily from Australia.
 
On December 10, 1930 he founded Brunswick Worsted Mills, Incorporated in Central Falls, RI. He started with twelve used looms and bought the yarn to weave into Brunswick fabrics.
 
I joined my father after graduating from Bowdoin myself. We worked together for more than 30 years; moving our textile operation from Connecticut to South Carolina. My first book, “Brunswick’s Legacy, A Learned Man” was published in 1983.