Here is a little history about the Scalzi home just over the town line. [on Freedom Street] My family on my mother's side (Curley) owned all the land from the Hopedale/Milford town line to Route 140. which included the land that the former Scalzi house sits on. Sometime during the 1930s the land was divided....members of the Curley family got their lots and few were sold. Two larger pieces of land were sold to the Scalzis and Izzos. At the time the Scalzi family lived on Maple Street and the Izzo family lived across from them. The Scalzi and Izzo families were related thru what would be our grandparents generation. As I'm sure you can remember during the 20s, 30s 40s and into the 50s many households had three generations living under one roof.
During the 30s and 40s both the Scalzi and Izzo families, as well as many other families in Hopedale and Milford had backyard gardens or "victory garden" during the war years. The Scalzi and Izzo family had rather large gardens on the land purchased from the Curleys. In fact Johnny Izzo had chickens, ducks, several cats, a few goats and two barnyard geese. When the Hill gang played ball in Scalzi's back yard and the ball was hit into Izzo's garden, he who went to get the ball was chased by the two geese. That was their job...to protect the barn yard. I think I have a few scars on my ass as a result of geese bites.
Anyway in the late 1950s, the Draper Family decided to sell all their house assets in Hopedale. The Scalzis lived on one side of the Maple Street duplex but were there after the occupants of the other side. Hence the Scalzis had to move since they were not able to buy their half. They decided to build a home on the Milford side of the line. In the late 1950s the sewer line on the Milford side did not extend from 140 down Freedom to the Hopedale line. Pal Scalzi did not want to install a septic system. He convinced the Town of Hopedale to allow him to tie-into the Hopedale sewer line on Maple via a right of way across the town line. How he managed that I do not know. But he did. The house between the Scalzi house and Maple Street sewer line may still be in operation. When the Scalzi family moved to Milford, it would follow that both Jowena and Bobby Scalzi would go to Milford schools. Again Pal convinced the Hopedale School System to allow his kids to go to Hopedale schools while living in Milford. Pal did pay the tuition to Hopedale for this service. This may have been the first case of "out of towners" going to Hopedale Schools. And from Milford no less. As a side note the Izzos also built a home on their garden lot in Milford. Al Marzetta, July 2006
In the 1950s, (or possibly the late '40s) the Scalzi family opened a little neighborhood store on the Milford side of the town line at Freedom Street. The house Al mentioned above, was built next to the store. Some time after the store closed, the building became the home of the Mother Goose Nursery School.
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