‘And so, this is the world I was born into.’

Polly Simmons Williams’ lively memoir of her childhood in North Bennington, Short Berry Cake, recounts family life in the village between the two wars. The chapter downloadable below (11 MB pdf) describes North Bennington in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
Above, North Bennington’s Upper Main Street in the summer of 1923. Proprietor Pete Panos stands in front of his store. Beyond the A&P, the striped barber pole marks Jack Clark’s Barber Shop. Below, Polly Simmons, cousins Art & Allen, and her brother Fred.