Next door to the big house on the hill was the Wilkerson Farm, which was nicknamed "Brightside" because of the blessing of the morning sun. Honestly, I worked the morning shift, which began at 6a.m. and I can not remember nary a morning sun. I think I learned early on to never enjoy the gifts of nature or humankind while I was a Brightside, because I really was at a darkspot on Earth.
In 1892, Bishop Beaven acquired this farm, and that is how Brightside was born. A labor of illuminated love mediated by God in which orphans and families were going to be cared for in the kingdom of Christianity. By 1915 the hillside had in residence about 165 of those hapless souls called orphans, having lost their parental people mostly due to poverty and the scourges this condition brings (like tb, typhoid fever, or other health epidemics that swept the impoverished, overcrowded, close-quarters places these people tended to live in).
How'd you like to have her for your teacher?
By the 1950's a devoted Bishop raised 1.5 mil. for Brightside and the cottages in view now came into being. The orphanage came under governmental aid in the 1960's with the beginnings of the State Division of Child Guardianship. In 1968, the Brightside for Families and Children branch was incorporated as a private, non-profit corp., from which I was employed. Above and below is Cottage 6, where I was employed. The children in residence
however, were not necessarily orphans, but children experiencing emotional, mental health, and/or behavioral problems- whatever all that meant. In essence they were kids kicked out of foster homes, or returned from adoption for being "damaged goods," or an even more awful term= deemed, "the throwaways." Their histories were horrid, their short lives scarred beyond recognition as "childhood," and their conscription was for a bid on the hill called "Brightside." The furnishings in the cottages were institutional, the bathrooms were like those found in schools or office building, the beds and bunks hard wood and metal springs w/ cheap mattresses (due to the excessively large numbers of bed-wetting incidents). There were hallways in the cottages like in a hospital, not a home. We, the staff carried clip-boards, and doled out "points" or "demerits," and our hapless charges lived their lives based on our tallies. It was awful then, it is awful now only back then I didn't realize how so.
however, were not necessarily orphans, but children experiencing emotional, mental health, and/or behavioral problems- whatever all that meant. In essence they were kids kicked out of foster homes, or returned from adoption for being "damaged goods," or an even more awful term= deemed, "the throwaways." Their histories were horrid, their short lives scarred beyond recognition as "childhood," and their conscription was for a bid on the hill called "Brightside." The furnishings in the cottages were institutional, the bathrooms were like those found in schools or office building, the beds and bunks hard wood and metal springs w/ cheap mattresses (due to the excessively large numbers of bed-wetting incidents). There were hallways in the cottages like in a hospital, not a home. We, the staff carried clip-boards, and doled out "points" or "demerits," and our hapless charges lived their lives based on our tallies. It was awful then, it is awful now only back then I didn't realize how so.
Some indications came early. The education was hard and fast. I went on a home visit with the Social Worker once (she knew I was applying to Grad School + wanted to give me a dose of REAL reality) to terminate the foster care placement. We arrived at the equivalent of an old mill neighborhood on the wrong side of the tracks in Worcester, MA and stepped into a gross and dirty apartment with a morbidly obese woman at a small kitichenette table smoking cigarettes. The Social Worker did all the talking, I sat hugging my charge, and continued to do so through the entire ride back in the back seat while this young woman sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. It was so hard to understand. Tears for that gross disgusting place? Unless you knew her other history, which I don't feel compelled to share here. I don't care that the Sisters ran it, and they were indeed caring and devine and all, but BULLSHIT on the God part, just BULLSHIT! The things I saw, the things I learned- THERE WAS NO GOD HERE. This was no Brightside, it was a Darkspot on Earth.
Instead I made up fun games to play every day, like backwards day. Or all green clothes day. I taught them every childhood game I knew, every camp song I remembered and I brought them little treats. 
I loved them all up as only I could in the so so short time I stayed.
By Tom Shea, Suzanne Strempek Shea, and Michele P. Barker
Click here for purchasing information.
140 Years of Providential Caring was a collaborative effort with Pulitzer-nominated journalist and columnist Tom Shea of theSpringfield Republican and Abu DhabiNational newspapers and New England Book Award-winning author Suzanne Strempek Shea. Somewhere in this book I'm sure it says a few words about the orphanage. I didn't buy it, nor will I read it. I have no need to, I know my own truth.
Finally, here are a few links to the current (relative term I guess) state of affairs:http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2010/02/133_employees_will_lose_jobs_w.html
see the playset beside Cottage 6?
