PEMBROKE /Blueberry Lane-Stetson Pond
Tiny lakeside neighborhood has deep roots

By EDWARD B. COLBY
For The Patriot Ledger Area: 23.47 square miles

POPULATION
2000: 16,927
2006: 18,179

Density: 832 res./square mile
Median age: 38
Median household income: $75,153

FINANCES
Tax rate: $10.41
Town budget: $49.9 million
Avg. water bill: $450/year

HOUSING
Median home price
2006: $344,000
2007: $309,875 (through Dec.)
Median condo price
2006: $312,641
2007: $292,000 (through Dec.)

SCHOOLS
Number of students: 3,353
Number of teachers: 203
H.S. grads to 4-yr. college: 67%
H.S. grads to 2-yr. college: 17%
Median SAT score (2006): 1513

Fred “Skip” Baker has summered on Blueberry Lane on the northern shore of Stetson Pond for his entire life. Baker, 59, remembers when he and his mother were trapped on the lane by downed pine trees during Hurricane Carol in 1954, and the fun times he had in the Great Indian Water Ski Club in the 1960s.

He also recalls the plentiful blueberry bushes of the pine forest behind the 13 cottages that lined the lane.

“At one time, when I was growing up, there was a forest out there, and blueberries were running through it,” said the West Bridgewater resident.

Baker is a fount of history on the neighborhood – a small, somewhat hidden lane off Elmer Street. Its cottages, which stand in cozy closeness to one another, were all once summer homes. Many have been converted to year-round residences.

John Cummings and his wife, Betty, bought their cottage in 1972. The place was originally built in the late 1800s as a duck hunter’s lean-to, he said.

After Cummings working six years of on the cottage, two kids broke into their summer home in 1978 and burned it to the ground. “We thought it was the worst thing that could happen to us,” Cummings said.

But the Cummings did not leave.

“We rebuilt, and we’ve been here, and we love it here,” said Cummings, 70, He and his wife now live year-round on Blueberry Lane.

The neighbors are great, and the little, clean pond in front is where his children and grandchildren learned to swim, Cummings said.

“It’s great for everybody who lives there. They love it,” said Joan Ulich, a real estate agent with Jack Conway Realty in Pembroke.

The lane’s homes are valued at $204,000 to $329,000, according to the latest town property assessments. Most residents are retired.

Dave Litchfield, 49, bought a house in the neighborhood six years ago. He owns a sign shop in town and also plays in a band called “Red White & Blues,” whose third CD was titled “Blueberry Lane.”

Litchfield likes the neighborhood because it is small, quiet and all the neighbors get along. He is a big fan of the Blueberry Lane Association, the all-inclusive neighborhood group formed in 1984 that had Cummings as its first president.

Summer resident John Vallen describes the association succinctly: “We meet once a year and if we have any problems, we discuss them and vote on them,” he said.

Stetson Pond has become more cloudy and overgrown with weeds due to increased algae and phosphorus, Baker said. The pond’s residents consequently became involved in the Pembroke Watershed Association and its pond cleanup efforts, he said.

Bogs or not, Vallen is enjoying another summer on Blueberry Lane, just as he has since 1962.

Vallen, 92, who lives in Bridgewater the rest of the year, said he is still only perhaps the second- or third-oldest person on the lane.

Occasionally someone will knock on his door wanting to buy the place, he said. Last fall somebody put a letter in his box making such an overture.

“They said if you’re interested call ...,” Vallen said. “I never bothered because I’m going to give the place to my daughter. Let her enjoy it.”