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John Bearse

For forty years he had a passenger service between Hyannis and Craigville also carrying mail for the Craigville summer Post Office.

The Last Mile to Craigville
From The Craigville Visitor, August 1, 1926

How many of our readers remember John Bearse, I wonder? John Bearse, whom in the old days provided the only means of transportation between Hyannis and Craigville.

Arriving from the train at Hyannis for the first time, one naturally inquired how to get to Craigville, and the surprising answer came, “There’s the barge over there.” “Oh, no, we don’t go by water; we go the rest of the way by land,” explained we from New York. “Well, there’s the barge that ull git yer there,” was the insistent reply, and sure enough, there was the barge or “stage” as we called it, rejoicing in the name of “My Friends”. And who, after making the trip, could ever forget that barge, with its narrow seats pitched at an angle that every time we went over a bump, or a hole – it was all one on that wild journey – we were in danger of tumbling into the bottom of the vehicle? Only one thing prevented that, and that was the snug way in which we were fitted in, for when apparently packed to the limit, John would appear with three or four more passengers, and if some brave spirit protested that there wasn’t room, he would be silences by a squelching look and a shout, “Not room? Sure, there is – there’s room for five or six more if I am of a mind to bring ‘em”. And in there came, as few cared to argue with the owner of these piercing blue eyes, that quick tongue, and voluble manner of speech.

But, those who could read beneath the surface, or through long years if acquaintance had become acquainted with the men, knew that beneath that gruff exterior there was a kindly heart and a willingness to lend a helpful hand. Many is the barrel that John Bearse, in his mad rush through town, has halted to open for hands not strong enough for the task. In his busy day, he found little time for any display of sentiment, and if fond adieux were drawn out too long, he would shout out from the barge, “Come on, come on, no more kissin’. The train won’t wait for me, and I won’t wait for you, neither; come on; giddap.” But he always had a soft spot in his heart for children, and he would often lift them up into the driver’s seat and allow them to drive the barge through the street, while he kept a guiding hand on the reins. To one little girl, his special favorite, he presented a big bag of candy while she was riding around with him and allowed her to eat it completely up before he set her down again. Of course, the girl was violently ill as the result of such indulgence, and when John heard if it, he said, by way of  explanation, “Well, I made up my mind that she should have all the candy she wanted, and, by George, she did.”

In addition to his position as General Carrier, Bearse was also the constable – I believe the only one for some distance about, His gentle wife, realizing full well his hasty, wild manner, laughingly told me of a time when John was called to assist in taking an unruly lunatic to the asylum, AZs the party of men drove off, Mrs. Bearse said t them, “For pity sake, gentlemen, be sure you leave the right man at the asylum.”

John Bearse was hasty, and wasted little time on conversational forms, but he was possessed of a dynamic force which found no outlet on Cale Cid. In Wall Street, I think he would have become an authority on Big Business, or a Captain of Industry, but on Cape Cod he was doomed to carry the mail and passengers year after year. We often wish for his good sense, sound judgment, and quick action, that they might now be called upon to right some of the ab uses which have crept into our erstwhile simple life at Craigville

C.D. Wainright