This week I would like to share Part 1 of “If the Ground Could Talk” as prepared by James H. Boynton Jr.
The Georgetown town dump was located on East Main Street at the same spot that the now Transfer Station is located today (soon to be relocated up the road on Carleton Drive). The Town Dump had a fifty year history providing Georgetown residents with refuse disposal ability from 1931 to 1981.
According to Georgetown native “history buff” Charles E. Flanders’s article in the Georgetown Weekly Feb 21, 1980 he said in part the following: “Government, whether it be local, state or federal, has a habit of taking away anything private and substituting a public, regulated, costly political substitute. The dumps were no different, for around 1931 in Georgetown, the private dumps were outlawed and the Town Dump came into operation.
The land was owned by a Mr. Harry Adams who lived on East Main Street opposite the dump. The land commenced as a town dump in 1931 based on the 1932 Georgetown Town Report stating that $20 was spent for two years dump privileges at that location. The next year the town splurged with $10 for the dump rental and $2 for a sign.
It was open seven days a week with no gates and unsupervised. It was a junk dealer’s paradise as quite a few professional and amateur collectors picked out the valuable metals, etc. for a profit. Sometime after 1945 Roy C. Spaulding Sr. bought the dump land and he supervised the dumping operation and junk dealers were banned as Mr. Spaulding took over the junk department while continuing rental agreements to the town.
For years if the dump caught on fire it was left alone being a good way of disposing of some of the debris. At some point the complaints started reaching the town officials for the foul smoke that would engulf neighbor’s houses for days. After this when a fire accidentally started the fire department was called to put it out, sometimes in minutes, others ranging from several days to a week.
Weekends were a good place for politicians to make themselves known and for gathering signatures for a candidate or putting something on the town ballot. The dump also had its own wildlife consisting of the ever present cockroaches, the rats that lived in the dump and the cats that fed upon them as well as the seagulls that dined on the garbage.
In 1961 the town warrant had two articles on the dump: one to appropriate $3,500 to purchase the dump land (28 acres from Roy C. Spaulding Sr.) and second $4,000 to maintain it as recommended by the State Board of Health. The articles passed and the land was purchased and became the official dump now owned by the town of Georgetown and was opened as such. A custodian was put on the payroll to tell people where, what and when they could dump. In the seventies a new State Law required the dump to be operated as a sanitary landfill. The dump was bulldozed, leveled off and covered with several feet of gravel eliminating an area that had been a mess for years.”
From my research I found that the first appointed town dump custodian was Albert W. Griffin who served from 1961 till he retired in 1965. In July of 1963 the selectman had Albert write down the registration numbers of the unknown cars coming to the dump to be checked for non-residents. On one weekend he compiled 219 registrations to be checked into. His replacement was Ralph H. Fuller who served from May 1965 till he retired in Dec 1976. During Ralph’s tenure: In May of 1965 town resident windshield stickers were implemented to keep the out of towners out. In April of 1970 a water main was brought in for better fire control and in 1971 a very small donated shed with a little electric heater was brought in. It was actually not that much bigger than a telephone booth with a window in the door. This was done for the winter and inclement weather to eliminate Ralph from sitting in his car with the engine running to keep warm while on duty. At one juncture I brought my saber saw and cut a slot under the window so Ralph could communicate and take in any fees rather than keep opening the door and continually losing all the heat. His replacement was Joanne Fellows from 1977 to 1978. During Joan’s tenure the Board of Health initiated a fee of 25 cents for each tire brought in to the dump. Soon she had to make a rule that people showing up with large bills for a small payment would be prohibited from leaving their tires until they returned with the proper change. People dumping material outside the gates when closed was occurring more frequently as was vandalism at the dump. In the seventies there were some attempts at recycling to lessen the impact on the dump and help save space. People in general were not into recycling then. The board of health said in 1978 that most people do not bother to take their newspapers and magazines the few extra feet to the recycling truck at the dump.
Additionally I found that all the dump custodians were also appointed as special police at the dump to back up their instructions if needed.
The Board of Health assumed the responsibility for managing the town dump literally from 1979 till the dump was officially closed in 1981. To stay within their budget they reduced the operational hours at the dump and had the equipment operator also become the dump custodian, who must be on site when the dump is open to cover over material as it is deposited, as required by the state.
That closing began with a contract agreement in place between Georgetown and G. Mello Disposal Corp. who leased land (two acres) and built a transfer station at the dump site location. The G. Mello Disposal Corp. also agreed to run the dump during the transfer station’s construction and work around the contractor during the final capping phase of the Town Dump. The new transfer station officially opened on July 1, 1981 and began accepting trash at a cost of 50 cents per bag or barrel. The State mandated dump capping process of (3 phases) took around 15 years at a cost of over a million and a half dollars to completion.
When I was a young boy growing up at 9 Elm Street I used to go to the dump with my father when he took the ashes from our cellar that were generated from our central coal burning furnace. The ashes were in metal barrels with handles that he tied on to the front bumper of his 1936 Chevy. The road into the dump was straight but quite narrow and if there were no cars coming out my father would let me sit on his lap and steer the car to my delight. But when he saw a car coming out my father would take over th wheel until it passed. Over the years the dump kept moving around a hill to the right that had tall pine trees on it. As the dump kept expanding around that hill the dumping area got bigger and deeper.
I kind of knew the second town dump custodian Ralph Fuller from when I was growing up, mostly from him delivering ice from Elliott Bros. to our house for the ice box and to Camp Leslie in the summer. Ifl was at the truck watching he would always chip off a small piece of ice for me. He also delivered our coal on occasion from Elliott Bros. as well. Ralph also served four consecutive three year terms on the Georgetown Board of Public Welfare and in 1975 Ralph received one write in vote for selectman as a joke.
When I used to go to the dump Ralph Fuller was usually sitting in his car keeping an eye on things and I can assure you he didn’t miss much! He had a canny insight in poking around with a stick and finding hidden money in something that was forgotten about or that a parent didn’t know about and got thrown away.
I once recall siting in Ralph’s little red falcon car talking with him as he was waiting for his adult son “Joe the Gripper” to bring him a fried scallop dinner from Watson’s restaurant which he brought riding on his bicycle being his only mode of transportation.
Ralph had many interesting stories to tell, one of which when he was younger he would walk three miles over to Kelsey’s Nursery in Boxford, cut and split two cords of wood and then walk the three miles home. He told me how much he got paid but I don’t remember, although it did impress me as to how little it was. Ralph would talk of the depression days and how he put apple cider vinegar on his baked beans for taste. I tried it, liked it and still do it to this day.
At the dump when the bulldozer started pushing the trash around the Rats would come out scurrying all around and often you would see some twenty two rifles engaged in target practice – usually from the bed of their pickup trucks for a better vantage point.
The old Town Dump is gone, but only covered out of sight. Who knows what will be found there in the future, maybe some “obsolete” pennies that Ralph Fuller missed from the old “obsolete” Town Dump.
Content notes:
- Information taken from the Georgetown Peabody Library’s – Online Local History (1842-2012).
- Extracted information taken from the Charles E. Flanders article in the Georgetown Weekly Feb 21, 1980.
- Personal knowledge and experiences.
Tempus Fugit
James H. Boynton Jr.
2025
