NH-NJ Friends Meet Up

There's no doubt fact that we enjoy road trips. Since relocating to NH, we've taken in state getaways and to neighboring New England states, our own best company. Recently, on a return trip to North Conway, NH, we met up with long-time friends from our home state of NJ and shared good times. And, they introduced us to a popular New England form of bowling.

Friends & us at Peach's

If you ever visit this area of the White Mountains, be sure to make a breakfast or lunch stop at Peach's Restaurant, easily to recognize in a peach colored former cottage on Main St. This is a very popular eatery for local and visitors. If you get there in later morning, there's always a wait line, so we arrived right after the 8 am opening.

It's that good, especially the fruit pancakes and omelettes. Breakfast is available anytime. We checked the open hours because while Peach's opens for breakfast and lunch five days, not on Tuesday and Wednesday,

While this North Conway roadtrip wasn't a first for us or friends, Jill and Art, it was a first for meeting in NH and staying at the same accommodation, the Eastern Slope Inn. Our friends stayed in a time-share condo and we stayed at the historic inn.

Eastern Slope Inn, North Conway, NH, and it snowed during our visit

This impressive 200-room inn has a long history with several predecessors on the same site. Two were destroyed by fire. This was the same fate that felled many stick-built White Mountain hotels years ago with no fire safety features included in construction. 

In 1854, James Randall bought a boarding house on Main Street and renamed it the Randall House. It did very well until burning down in November 1902. His son, Henry Randall, who had assumed ownership after his father's 1898 death, rebuilt what became the second Hotel Randall, opening in July 1903. A 1916 addition brought the room total to 50 and 33 had private baths; features included telephones, electric lights and bells, steam heat. Centrally located, the Hotel Randall was a fashionable lodging. A 1921 expansion brought capacity to 150 guests. But, in November 1925, almost 23 years to the day, the hotel burned down again in under 3 hours. 

Construction on the third Hotel Randall soon followed. This one was built with fire stops in every wall, cement floors in the kitchen and basement, boilers outside the building, wiring in protective cable, and a sprinkler system. The new hotel opened in July 1926, but its success was short lived. Within three years, the economy turned as the 1929, the stock market crash led to the great Depression. Vacations were less affordable; travel changed with the arrival of the auto; guest cabins and motels replaced grand hotels. Hard-hit, the Randall family mortgaged the hotel to the hilt, basically managing it for the bank.

1950s Vintage ad (online source)

Enter North Conway native and businessman, Harvey Gibson, president of Manufacturers Trust Company in NYC. On a winter trip to the area, he saw that skiing and other winter sports could be a lucrative enterprise and bought the by then foreclosed Hotel Randall in 1937. 

Gibson updated the hotel for year-round use, renaming it The Eastern Slope Inn. Business thrived with snow trains bringing skiers to the area. A savy businessman, Gibson is credited with the growth of his home town as a nationally recognized ski center, success which continued after his 1950 death.

The inn fell on hard times and closed in 1975. Soon after Eastern Mountain Sports bought the property for use as a retail store and continued a ground floor restaurant. The rest of the building was unused. The business was short lived and, within a few years, the inn closed again.

In 1980, Eastern Slope Inn Associates, bought the closed resort. After extensive remodeling and added safety updates, the inn reopened in July 1881. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. 

Lobby of the Eastern Slope Inn; fireplace was kept lit

No visit to North Conway is complete without a stop at the North Conway 5 and 10 Cent Store on Main Street, which lives up to its slogan: It's Not Just A Store—It's An Experience. The Main Street store is North Conway's oldest continually operating business.

5&10 cent store, North Conway, NH, circa 1940 (online source)

Years ago, the store was the site of a general store, that was built around 1840, and continued in operation through various owners. In May 1939, it became a traditional 5&10 cent store when Sidney and Lillian Sweeney opened for business selling everything, practical and impractical. The store has been in continuous operation for over 80 years under several different owners. 

Interior views of 5&10 cent store, North Conway, NH

A walk through the store's interior shows that little has changed since the 1940s, aside from what's for sale inside. There's still the original tin ceiling, creaking maple floors and antique wooden counters displays made of glass and wood. The vintage cash register, while still there, is for display only. There's a definite atmosphere of vintage nostalgia here.

North Conway, NH, 5&10 cent store

When the North Conway store was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2004, it was one of only two known 5&10 stores in NH (now, the only one). Its current owners purchased the business in 1977. While, there's hardly anything for 5&10 cents in stock now, there's always something and purchase. We never leave empty-handed.

From their start in the late 1800s and early 1900s, the 5&10 cent store was where shoppers could purchase what was needed on a daily basis.

In 1880, Frank Winfield Woolworth opened the first 5&10 store in Lancaster, PA. By 1911, he ran 319 stores across the Northeast. The pricing policy was that a nickel or dime would buy anything. Most stores prospered when in the Great Depression people could afford to shop there. In the 1930s, inflation led to a top price of 20 cents. By the 1950s arrival of big discount stores, many independent dime stores closed. The 5&10 cent store basically left the American scene in 1997 when the F. W. Woolworth Company ended 118 years in the discount retail business.

Candy is no longer 1 cent

There is a lot of candy for sale here and with good reason. I read that years ago stores would keep shelves just as well stocked as (back then) penny candy sales were crucial to Woolworth’s success. 

He believed that confection, alone, would pay the store's rent. Another reason for his success was a model that still works: importing goods from foreign markets with cheap labor which in the 1880s was Europe, today it's China. 

The 5&10 cent store is gone, but its principle continues. In today's marketplace, the 5&10 cents of 1935 has the purchasing power of $1 and more, keeping hundreds of  dollar stores in operation.

Saco Valley Lanes, Fryeburg ME

Now, about that new to us sport we tried on this road trip.

Unless you're a New Englander, you may not know about candlepin bowling, which includes ourselves as natives of NJ, we only played 10-pin bowling. 

Our visiting NJ friends were very familiar with this game, despite having never lived here. As avid skiers, they visited New England for years with their now adult children and bowled at Saco Valley Lanes in Fryeburg, ME. They showed these first-timers how to play, it was challenging we found out. 

No, the game isn't played with candles, but the pins look like them, which is how it got the name. Candlepin bowling is a popular indoor sport in New England states of NH, MA, ME and also Eastern Canada.

Differences, of course, there's several between candlepin and standard 10-pin bowling: pins are tall and thin, balls are smaller, handheld without finger holds, players roll three balls per frame instead of two. Many candlepin bowlers maintain the sport is harder. (We agree.)

Candlepins, balls, electronic scoresheet

In 10-pin, bowlers throw one frame at a time, two balls per frame. In candlepin, it's two frames, (called boxes) three balls per box, scored by bowling 12 strikes: one in each box, and a strike with both bonus balls in the 10th box. Even if you knock pins over, they’re not cleared until your three-roll turn is up. Unlike in 10-pin bowling, no one has bowled a perfect 300 game; the highest sanctioned candlepin score is 245.

According to the International Candlepin Bowling Association (ICBA) website, candlepin bowling dates to 1880 and is credited to Justin White, owner of a Worcester, MA, billiards and bowling hall. Years ago, pins were inch-thick dowels, resembling candles. In the late 1960s, plastic candlepins began replacing wood candlepins. 

Nashua, NH, has a candlepin bowling center. We plan to practice for a re-match the next time our friends visit. That's because while it was a fun afternoon in Maine, we definitely need a lot more practice. 

Art, Jill, Dorothy (Beatrice) and Patrick (Grenville)

Yes, there was ❄️, both on the way to North Conway and during our stay. Our friends went skiing at nearby Cranmore Mountain and we snowshoed on the trail system near the inn. 

Snowshoeing on trails behind the Eastern Slope Inn

This was the first time we had used our snowshoes in several years, but the good thing is that we had not forgotten how — just keep walking.