Milo Grow’s Autograph Book

The Autograph Book of
Milo Walbridge Grow

“May all your days be of Peace
And all your eggs be fried in Grease.”

Milo Grow, and later his son Roy W. Grow, apparently used this little book to collect signatures and sayings from their friends and visitors.

Most of the signatures date from Dartmouth College, 1851, interspersed with others from Colquitt, Georgia, 1883, 1887. The book passed from Milo Walbridge Grow to his son, Roy Walbridge Grow, to his great-grandson, Will Smiley Grow of Colquitt, Ga., to Milo’s great-grandson Gerald Grow. 

Photo Wentworth Hall, Dartmouth

Wentworth Hall — a building Milo would have known when he was at Dartmouth.


The Autograph Book’s Contents

Inscription: For Roy W. Grow on his 1st birthday. From his affectionate father. M.W. Grow. June 1st, 1863.

At the time, as far as we know, Milo was at the Battle of Fredericksburg. A month later, Milo was wounded and taken prisoner at Gettysburg, and died in the Union prison at Point Lookout, Maryland, Jan. 24, 1864.

Keep pure my son, in all thy ways. M.W.G.

M.W. Grow. Dartmouth College. 1849

N. Lord. Dartmouth College, July 29, 1851 [This is Nathan Lord, president of Dartmouth College 1828-1863.]

Ira Young, Dartmouth College, Aug. 1851

H.L.L.Bodiford. (Colquitt, Ga.)

“A good name is rather to be chosen than many riches. The Bible.”

April 17th 1883.

[Possibly a relative of the Bodiford who married Milo’s widow, Kate Baughn Grow, known later in life as “Mother Bodiford.”]

Sam’l G. Brown. D.C. July 1851

E.D. Sanborn. A long Latin inscription.

David J. Noyes. Dartmouth College, July 29, 1851. Virtuous and honourable conduct is worth far more than it costs.

Friend Roy–

The large are not the sweetest flowers,
The long are not the loveliest hours,
Much talk does ot true friendship tell,
Few words are best–I love thee well.
Your everlasting friend

G. O. Loving
Colquitt, Ga. 8/20/87

 To a friend
‘Tis not the fairest form tht holds
The mildest, purest soul within;
‘Tis not the richest plant that folds
The sweetest breath of fragrence in.

Your true friend,

J. M. Cowart

Colquitt, Ga. August 22, 1887.

 

Mr. R.W. Grow

May no presuming person

Write aught but faultless

Upon a page of this fair book

Sacred to Innocence and Truth

Your friend

Emma Cowart

Colquitt, Ga

August 22nd/ 87

 

May all your days be of Peace

And all your eggs be fried in Grease.

Your friend

M.D.Roberts

Colquitt, Ga

Oct. 31, 87

[Some of the residents of Colquitt did not cotton to the sophistication of Dartmouth graduates! This inscription was written on the day Milo’s son turned 25.]

 

Edward Aiken

Born April 10 1839, Rutland, Vt.

They who know the most

Must mourn the deepest o’er the fatal truth;

The tree of knowledge is not that of life.

Byron

 

Josiah Bartlett, Jr.

Born Jan 1, 1830, Waltham, N.H.

“The present time is big with the future.”

 

George Sullivan Burton.

Born 1831. Concord N.H.

“Vule, vule, longam formosa.”

 

Don Carlos Baxter.

Barton, Vt.

 

Geo. Bell

Chester, N.H.

Born June 1829

“For forms of faith, let furious zealots fight

His can’t be wrong whose life is in the right.

 

E. R. Chamberlain

Shady Dale [Ga.]

Natus Oct. 18, 1831, Georgia

“Manners make the man.”

 

Saml H. Folsom

Born Feb. 23, 1826

Hopkinton, N.H.

“Perseverace keeps honor bright.”

 

Chandler Freeman

Born Jan. 18, 1824. Hebron, Maine.

Reason’s whole pleasure, all the joys of sense

Lie in three words, health, peace, and competence.

 

David B. French

Born Jan. 24th 1830, Bedford N.H.

“Be sure you’re right, and then go ahead.”
When any great designs thou dost intent
Think on the means, the manner, and the end.”

 

Wm. Cutting Grant

Natus Oct 1826 Chelsea, Vt.

 

Joshua G. Hall, Jr.

Natus Nov. 5th 1828 Wakefield, N. H.

“Honor seldom but winds a scar
As oft it loses all.”

 

John M. Hayes

Sanbornton, N.H.

Born Jan. 10. 1830

 

Chas. Hitchcock

Natus April 1827. Hanover, N.H.

“Nil reputans actuum, si quid
Imperirret agendum”

 

Yours truly,

Homer O Hitchcock

[Born] Westminister, Vt.

Jan 28, 1827

 

“Earn if you want; if you abound, import.”

J. D. Hobart

Born Dec. 29, 1826 Berlin, N.H.

 

“Virtue is the best epitaph.”

Gilbert E. Hood

Born Nov 21. 1824, Chelsea, Vt.

 

“Be prudent, firm, and bold

E. G. Cooke

 

A. G. Hopkinson

Nat. 1824.

“Let me take the instant by the forward top.”

Linnington, Me.

 

M. Lamprey

Dartmouth Coll. 1853. Natus Dec 9. 1827

“Pitch thy behavior low; thy projects high;
So shalt thou humble & magnanimous be.”

Bethune

N. Lorde Jr. [This is N. Lord Jr., son of Nathan Lord above, who was Lieutenant Colonel, 5th Vermont and Colonel, 6th Vermont Infantry from September 1861 to December 1862.]

Born July 1831. Dartmouth Coll.

“Tis greatly wise to talk with our past hours
And ask them what affront they bear to Heaven.”

 

John J. Pierce

Born Feb 2. 1828. Strafford, Vt.

“Life is a poor player.”

Byron

E. J. Quimby

Natus July 17. 1826 Hopkinton, N.H.

“Judge not of Kings by their (?) events.”

 

B. L. Ray

“Know that this dark earth is not thy home.”

1824 [born]

 

John Richards

Born Aug. 16. 1830

“The greatest truths are the simplest; so are the greatest men.”

 

James Rogers

Oct. 1828 Bradford, Vermont July 1851

“Nil Desperandum”

 

Edward Ashton Rollins

Born Wakefield. Dec 8th 1828. Great Falls

“Happy is the man that findeth wisdom
and the man that getteth understanding.”

 

Jonathan Ross

Natus Apr. 30th. 1826. Waterford, NH

“Death cannot come
To him untimely who is fit to die
The briefer life, the earlier immortality.”

 

Henry E. Sawyer

Manchester, N.H.

Born Warner N.H. July 14, 1826

“The life of man is summed in birthdays and in sepulchers;
But the Eternal God hath no beginning, He hath no end.”

H. H. White

 

Luther E. Shepard

Natus Dec. 28. 1820. Raymond, N.H.

“Tis vain to seek in men for more than man.”

 

J.A. Shores

Born Acton Me. Nov 23. 1827

“Life is a vision shadowy of truth;
And pain an anguish and the wormy grave
Shapes of a dream”

 

“There is a feeling within us tht loves to revert
To the merry old times that are gone.”

D. L. Shorey. Lynn, MassNatus 1824

 

Isaac Coffin

Born Oct. 28th. 1829. Haverhill, Mass.

1851

“To thine own self be true.”

 

S. D. Storrs

Lapur, N.Y.

Dart. Coll. July 1831

 

Joseph H. Tyler

Natus Feb 11th 1825

Pelham N.H.

“Blest are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled,
That they are not a pipe for Fortune’s finger
To sound what stop she please.” [Hamlet]

 

C. W. Willard

Natus June, 1827. Lyndon Centre, Vt.

 

Henry Willard

Natus Sept. 11, 1830. Troy N.Y.

“‘Tis not in mortals to commend success;
But we’ll do more, Semfronius, we’ll deserve it.”

 

R. W. Grow

Colquitt Ga.

Age 72. Aug. 20, 1932.

Born Colquitt Ga.

Oct. 22, [18]62

[Roy Walbridge Grow. Oct. 31, 1861 – Nov. 27, 1938. Son of Milo Walbridge Grow and Sarah Catherine Baughn. Husband to Lou Bush Grow.]

 

Charles Bell

Chester, N.H.

Born 1833

 

John H. Buttrick

Lowell

Dart. College. 1837

[On a page by itself, in pencil:]

“Bird of Paradise feathers”

 


The book concludes with two pages of signatures from all the members of the family present at a reunion, Thanksgiving, 1989.

Gerald Grow’s Home Page

Articles and Creative Work