Steve, Jeanne, Seth and Silas Eastman

    Steve's family moved to Chatham in 1796.  I married into Chatham.  Our boys were born here in our house.  Though the farm was out of the family from 1917 to 1966, our boys are the seventh generation of the family to have lived on this property.
    Some of my best memories include our neighbors who have helped us out over the years.  I remember when the boys were little, taking them to Cold River, where one of them got a leech attached to his leg.  I called Sandy Dorner, “What do I do?!?!?”  She calmly said, “Just sprinkle salt on it.”  Joe and Sandy milked our cow for us when we had to be away, when we had just one cow.  When we took a family cross-country trip in 2005, our last vacation, Bob Farnham and Susie Eastman volunteered to tend the farm and milk the cows.  Once we were haying up the road and had left a gate open by mistake.  Wanita Marquis somehow managed to shoo the cows off the road and back into the barnyard. I remember when the boys were little and Steve was away, Wayne McAllister helped me lug a new-born calf out of the woods, in a wheelbarrow.  And Mark Pitman - we always knew we could find him in his milking parlor early mornings and late afternoons if we wanted to ask him about any problem we were having with a cow.  I remember one cow, Pearl, had calved.  The next morning she wouldn't stand up in her stanchion.  In fact, I thought she might be dead – she felt cold.  I ran to get Steve.  “Go get Mark!”  Mark shut off his milking machines and left his cows in the parlor to come see how he could help with our cow.  Milk fever.  He gave her intravenous calcium,  shrugged his shoulders, said “I don't know”, and went back to his cows.  Another time, another cow, when this happened, I said to Mark, “This is our best cow!” He said, “It always happens to the best cows.”  But Pearl revived within the hour, was back to normal by the end of the day, and was a good cow for us for several more years.