106 Fourth Street, Watervliet

After a short time living in Troy, my grandparents, Schuyler Beattie and his wife Rosamond Keenan Beattie, moved into an apartment in this house in the early 1940s. Just around the corner from the Flatts, it was a convenient place to begin a family. With them was their daughter, Rosamond Beattie (my mom).

They spent the summers in this apartment, but moved back into the Flatts during the winters to take care of Donald Atkins while Schuyler’s parents were in Florida. (Donald Atkins was Kathryn Beattie Atkins’ son; she died in 1936 at the age of 37, so Donald was raised by his grandparents, Guy and Mary Beattie.)

Once Schuyler accepted a job in Illinois, they all moved back into the Flatts while they searched for a house in Illinois. But, Hugh Killough, Schuyler’s uncle, who also lived at the Flatts, came down with tuberculosis, so they all moved into Troy for a few months. (The house in Troy, which was Bill and Beth Keenan’s house at 751 Jacob Street, was razed.) Eventually, they found a house in Downers Grove, Illinois and moved out there in 1949.

Remarkably, the houses in this area have changed very little since the 1940s. The house at 106 has added a couple doors on the side of the house, but overall the house is the same and, remarkably, the fence surrounding the front and side of the property is exactly the same except for the front gate, which was replaced.

The Back Yard

The first three color photos below form a loose panorama of the backyard taken from the alley behind the house. The neighboring garage and the corner of the house leads into the entire rear of the house, and then toward the side yard looking toward the street at the front of the house.

The trio of black and white photos show similar scenes. Rosamond on her tricycle beside the garage wall, family members posing at the back door of the apartment (a door now closes off the back staircase), and Ros again on her tricycle with the greenish house next door behind her (the pipe curving out of the foundation is still present on the house today).

The Front Fence

The front yard is pretty small, and the fence is the exact same fence that was there in the 1940s (except for the gate). At that time, the street had yet to be paved, but appeared to be well-graded dirt.

The Side Yard

The side yard was pretty overgrown back then. Here we have some shots of Schuyler Beattie in his World War II navy uniform. He thought he was too old to be drafted, but he was called to serve in his early 30s. Compare these to the first photo on this page.