I clinched CT/MA/NH 32 on Saturday

[jon daly]

^That's probably what my coworker meant; blue laws were looser within 10 miles of NH.

[Rothman]

Calvin Coolidge Bridge back then was a bear and the MA 116 bridge wasn't redone until the late 1980s, if not early 1990s.  Drive up US 202 to Athol would have been nicer and more "discreet."

[Rothman]

A coworker mentioned that he's aware of Athol primarily due to beer runs from Umass 25 or so years ago. IIRC, he said the packies were open later there to compete with New Hampshire.

Huh?  I was in Amherst in 1993 and there were packies much closer than Athol (Shoot, Liquor 44 in Hadley, just for starters).  What a ways to go just for beer.  Weird.

I was at UMass in the 80s (graduated in 1986). Packies in Massachusetts weren't allowed to be open on Sundays, but an exception was granted if they were within a certain distance from the NH border. Thus, the nearest open packies were up around Athol.

I also remember a legend that there was a pharmacy in Northampton that was allowed to sell booze on Sundays if it was for "medicinal purposes".

Ah.  I see now.

I will file this under Things a Teetotaler in MA Does Not Realize.

[DRMan]

I was at UMass in the 80s (graduated in 1986). Packies in Massachusetts weren't allowed to be open on Sundays, but an exception was granted if they were within a certain distance from the NH border. Thus, the nearest open packies were up around Athol.

Isn't Greenfield closer (as well as the smaller towns of Montague, Gill, Northfield, and Bernardston)?

It was a matter of how close they were to New Hampshire specifically. Some of those small towns you mention may have been involved too. I didn't personally go on any of the packie runs, so my memory may be a bit off. After all, this was over 30 years ago!

[jon daly]

Sparker! Always good to see you.

I was looking into this a bit last night. Athol did lose a rail route to Springfield to the Quabbin; as well as MA-21.

I found MA-21 going up to Athol on this map. It was gravel 89 years ago:

http://gis.massdot.state.ma.us/Images/HistoricMaps/MassRoadMap_1929.pdf

[Conn. Roads]

I like that old school Connecticut plate. In the early 1980s they did away with the front plate. I remember people used to have those stupid fake plates. Somewhere in the late 1980s they started issuing front plates, but if you had previously discarded it, that was OK. The older plates said Constitution State, then the number, and Connecticut on the bottom. They changed is so Connecticut was on the top, along with the shape of the state, while Constitution State went on the bottom. If you had this style of plate, it required 2. I got my first set of plates soon after 2 plates came back. My number was 437 GMN.

We recently took a trip through Athol. Our purpose was to railfan Pan Am, and we followed the Mohawk Trail. We went from Williamstown to Ayer.