“Are you saying my grandfather was an arsonist?”

No, Dad, I can’t image that’s the case. But this Boston Herald article from 1896 sure seems to stir the pot …

“Oh, boy! Ever since I was I kid, I’d hoped there was a criminal somewhere in our family tree! Not a murderer, of course. But maybe a stage-coach robber.”

Gosh, you think you know somebody.

I’d purposely held off telling Dad about the article in the Boston Herald‘s archives that seemed to point a suspicious finger toward George Vayo, my dad’s grandpa. Dad had just spent the better part of a socially-distanced week with some family members, so I waited until he was by himself for a day or two.

You know, just in case this article caused him any consternation:

What’s really strange is that the Bangor, Maine, newspaper did not run a news story about the fire and its aftermath. Nothing.

Dad and I have worked up a theory that George just needed to be alone to gather his thoughts after the fire. His partner, Mr. Puffer, seemed all too eager in the above article to throw George under the bus.

After several months of fruitless online research, I think we can safely say George Vayo (Dad’s paternal grandfather) was not a firebug.

But Wait! Here’s an update!

Nearly two years after posting this story, I came across another source for archival newspaper articles. Here’s a gossipy update from the Daily Kennebec Journal:

Two days later, George returned. The following update was published in the paper:

In 1896, George was a budding entrepreneur in Brewer, Maine. He was 20 years old. He was engaged to be married.

… and his grocery store had just burned to the ground.

A month later, the Bangor newspaper inferred the partnership of Vayo & Puffer was over, as they declared bankruptcy and went their separate ways. In more than 100 newspaper mentions I’ve clipped detailing George Vayo’s life, their names never appeared together again.

Meanwhile, George got a job as a clerk and married Alice Pooler that summer. The bride was 18 years old.

Their first few years of marriage were tough. George’s mom, Olive, died of peritonitis on January 1, 1897. She was 44 years old. All four of the newlyweds’ parents were now gone.

Another tragedy soon followed. George and Alice’s firstborn, Gladys, died of cholera at just 15 months old.

Little Gladys is buried next to her parents in Bangor’s Mount Pleasant Catholic Cemetery.

Their second child, my paternal grandfather, was born the following summer. Harold Edward Vayo was born July 13, 1899, in Brewer.

He looks to be around two years old in this portrait:

A few months after my grandfather’s birth, George Vayo made the papers again. This time it was to announce his family’s new digs.

George doesn’t get mentioned till toward the end, but the wording of this article is a hoot:

A year later, on November 3, 1900, another son – George Carter – was born. Known as Carter, the lad suffered a head injury during childhood and received special care for the rest of his life to help counter his developmental impairments.

Alice Evelyn was next, born October 10, 1903. She also went by her middle name.

Grandpa’s youngest sibling, Francis Brown Vayo, was born April 14, 1908.

George and Alice lived a busy life in Brewer. They were active in their church and community service groups. George worked as a food broker and was the Bangor branch manager for the John P. Squire & Company, a meat-packing firm that was eventually acquired by Swift. Although he was no longer a grocer, George worked to keep local stores well stocked with meat and fresh produce.

My brother Dave shared this story about Grandpa’s work: Dad has told me about his uncle Francis taking wee-small-hours trips to Faneuil Market in Boston, where he bought vegetables, loaded up the truck, and drove back to Maine. George stored the veggies in his cellar until it was time for Francis to deliver them. Once Dad got to go along on the deliveries and said all the cabbages in the basement had rotted. Eek!

George and Alice enjoyed getting together with friends to play the popular card game whist:

In December 1907, after a dozen years with Squire, George was transferred to the Boston area to continue his work.

Tragically, another fire took just about everything but their lives.

Poor Alice! Although this article doesn’t state the date of the fire, it was either right before or after the birth of her youngest child, Francis.

Three months later, John P. Squire & Company announced George would return to his former position in Bangor. The family moved back to Brewer.

George took to local politics for a few years, successfully running for the position of Alderman in Brewer in both 1909 and 1910. He declined to run again in 1911, and a Bangor Daily News article needled: “Mr. Vayo’s many friends are still hoping that he will consent to continue his excellent service for Ward 2.”

Local papers mention George Vayo on a regular basis during the 1910s, as his involvement in local organizations grew. The Knights of Columbus, Red Cross, YMCA, St. John’s Church, and an effort to sell “war savings stamps” during World War I. There’s also a blurb each summer as the family heads to their cottage at nearby Echo Park.

On June 12, 1923, George realized his dream of owning a grocery store when he opened Sunbeam Market.

Next we enter an exciting (and confusing, for me) time of their lives. George sells Sunbeam Market a year later to two successful businessmen in town. Was this a planned “flip”? I guess we’ll never know.

After completing the sale of Sunbeam Market, George and family packed up and moved to Pasadena, California.

Twice.

The family took two trips to California. Both were apparently meant to be permanent relocations, but the family returned to Brewer, Maine, each time.

The second trip included newlyweds Harold and Lucie Vayo, who returned to their home in Paducah, Kentucky, a few months later.

Dad remembers that the family’s connection with California, and Pasadena specifically, was a restaurant. There was an “Aunt Tilly” who found solid employment there and invited the family to join her. Aunt Tilly was Matilda Hurley, one of Lucie Vayo’s aunts on her mother’s side. Tilly remained in Pasadena for the rest of her days. A Canadian, she was nationalized in 1936, when she was 49.

The Vayos returned to Maine after each California trip. Maybe they missed the snow?

George next worked at the Bangor Egg Company. Then he and longtime friend B.N. Rowe started their own company in September of 1929.

Sadly, Alice died of peritonitis on July 2, 1939; she’d been ill for quite a while. Dad remembers an “Auntie Mac” helped care for her.

George continued in the wholesale grocer business until his passing in 1951.

There was a newspaper article about George’s funeral that brings up another topic for another day: Vayo is just one way of spelling my family’s last name. The French surname Veilleux had been changed (by some) to both Vayo and Veayo:

Years later, two of George and Alice’s sons visited their parents’ grave:

So as not to end on a sad note, here’s a quick story that tickled me no end last week.

I texted Dad this photo:

I was pretty sure that the gentleman on the left was George Vayo. And that the lady was George’s daughter Evelyn. And that there was some scrawny kid in the foreground who was probably a photo bomber well ahead of his time.

The next day, Dad reported back that once he examined the photo closely on his iPad, it all came back to him.

Yes, that’s his grandpa in the photo. And yes, that’s Aunt Evie. And – to my eternal delight – he’d even identified that scrawny kid!

I took the ’Pad with me upstairs and positioned two of Mom’s mirrors so I could see the back of my head. Then I compared it with the photo. The key is the ears – those are my ears – that’s me!

Dad went on to reminisce about that day. It all came back to him after more than 85 years.

There used to be picnic parks where you could pull off the roadway and there would be a picnic table or two for the public to use. I remember all those pine trees – they were huge and so fragrant! Gosh, I can still smell them.

But the best, for Dad, was yet to come. He continued:

That day was the first time I ever tasted deviled ham. We feasted on deviled ham sandwiches. I tell you, it was like nectar of the gods!

To this day, I believe there’s at least a tin or two of deviled ham in Dad’s pantry.

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