The Mysteries of 18 Klaus Anderson Road
— A Southwick Time Machine Original | Biographical Reconstruction
Inside, it had five working fireplaces, a large blue braided rug she made herself, and a special cabinet in the front hall that prominently displayed a remarkable set of carved ivory chessmen.
The chess pieces were unlike the ordinary chessmen found on a game board, as she described them in her fifth novel, Murder Is Contagious:
“The pawns were little men on pedestals, holding daggers in their hands: the kings rode proudly on elephants; and the queens, with their ladies-in-waiting, sat erect on slightly smaller elephants protected by howdah.”
Many who visited her home said they had never seen such a set in a home, antique shop, or even a museum. Visitors also described the home as being very dignified.
A unique feature of the home was a small room off the kitchen that was the original birthing room, the 18th-century equivalent of a hospital delivery room.
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| A digitally altered photograph of the historic home, adjusted to reflect its late-19th-century appearance. |
She converted the old grain house into a museum of sorts for her massive button collection, consisting mostly of presidential buttons. By 1945, her collection represented every president except four. But her specialty was calico print buttons, which she arranged symmetrically on cards by pattern and color. She exhibited her extraordinary collection in New York City, Chicago, and other places. People from all over also traveled to Southwick to see it.
She also collected unusual dolls, which she sometimes exhibited. Like her button collection, her dolls were remarkable. Some of the more notable dolls in her eccentric collection were the characters from Alice in Wonderland.
The collector and mystery author was Marion A. Bramhall, wife of Eugene K. Bramhall, a men’s ready-to-wear salesman. The couple wed in Granby, Connecticut, on December 21, 1937.
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| Tragedy in Blue (1945) |
Around 1940, Eugene and Marion stopped at the Valley Inn Filling Station at Lambson’s Corner in Southwick, where College Highway meets Klaus Anderson Road. In the distance, they saw a historic farmhouse that John Root built around 1740. When Root built the home, all the upstairs rooms had fireplaces, and most of the downstairs rooms did, too, but some were boarded up over the years.
In 1792, the Root family sold the property, which contained about 300 acres, to Captain Reuben Clark, who converted the home into Clark’s Inn, also known as the Coffee House. (The deed was dated January 12, 1793.)
Captain Clark also co-owned a large powder works in Southwick. On October 8, 1813, the powder mill exploded. It is believed that while repairing the mortars, someone used a steel-headed hammer to drive an iron bolt directly over a pile of dust collected when the mill was swept. A spark from the hammer striking the bolt ignited the powder. Clark and two other men died shortly after the explosion.
Amos Webb acquired the property in 1838 or 1840. Captain Clark’s widow, Zerviah, remained on the property until her death, either on January 3 or 4, 1842.
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| The author's fifth published book (1949) |
Amos Webb had a deed dated 1843 that showed that the Clarks’ daughter, also named Zerviah, was entitled to 1/3 of the house and woodshed, the north front room, kitchen, bedroom, and buttery and back chamber over the kitchen; 1/3 of the garret and 1/3 of the cellar and the privileges of using the cellar stairs and flight of stairs leading to the chambers and garret and north part of the woodshed. (Daughter Zerviah never married. She died on October 25, 1867.)
For decades, the property owners grew tobacco and other crops in the fields around the home; animals grazed in the pasture. As a result, they built several more tobacco barns and outbuildings. By the time the Bramhalls purchased the property, only a handful of the original tobacco barns remained, along with some other outbuildings, including the aforementioned granary.
When Eugene and Marion saw the old house during that stop at the Valley Inn, Eugene instantly knew that he wanted it, and in September 1941 the farm was theirs.
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| Marion Bramhall with one of her dogs at her Southwick home, 1944 |
During the war years, the Bramhalls’ property included a large, profitable Victory garden. The Bramhalls would lease part of their estate to tobacco syndicates. In 1942, they leased land off today’s Fred Jackson Road along with three tobacco barns to Consolidated Cigar to grow the famous Connecticut River Valley “Made in the Shade” Tobacco.
Besides tobacco and colorful flowers, dogs were also a common sight on the Bramhall farm. Marion, known for her love of dogs, raised thoroughbreds there.
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The horse pasture in the early 1970s. (from the author's personal collection) |
By the late 1940s, the Bramhalls’ massive wartime vegetable gardens were gone. Instead, Marion planted herbs for a knot garden patterned after the famous knot garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden in New York. She created it specially for a Czech friend who was coming to America to live in Southwick with her and her husband.
The young man was an editor who had spent approximately six years in a Nazi concentration camp. When he finally escaped, he bundled some shirts around his typewriter and fled. Marion had long been known for writing letters and sending packages to people in war-torn Central Europe. In 1949 alone, she sent them to 27 people.
Today, the pasture sits empty and most of the barns and outbuildings are long gone, but the historic home still stands at the corner of what is now Klaus Anderson and Fred Jackson Road.
A Girl With an Idea
She was born Marion Westenberg in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1905.
She moved with her family to Uxbridge, Massachusetts, where she attended the local high school. In her first year there, she started the “Spotlight,” which became Uxbridge High School’s long-running, award-winning school newspaper. Marion graduated with honors.
She later attended the Teachers College of Worcester and became a teacher in Providence, Rhode Island. She continued teaching until about 1935.
Writing, however, would eventually become her better-known occupation.
Marion was already living in Southwick when her first mystery novel, Murder Solves a Problem, was published in 1944. During interviews to promote the book, however, Marion's enthusiasm for her Southwick home seemed to overshadow the novel itself. Rather than focusing solely on her new book, she spoke at length about her historic family home.
The book sold at retail for $2. Most book reviewers gave it favorable reviews, and the public wanted to know what the Southwick author would publish next.
They did not have to wait long.
Later in 1944, Marion published her second book, appropriately titled Button, Button.
In 1945, she released Tragedy in Blue.
She published her fourth novel, Murder Is an Evil Business, in 1948, followed by Murder Is Contagious in 1949.
Marion maintained that she had
received no formal training in writing novels, other than attending
writers’ conferences. She said she learned police terminology with the help of the Springfield Police Department.
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| One of the book's reviews. The critic rated the book: "Entertaining." |
Her Famous Father Comes to Southwick
Marion's father, Reverend Robert C. Westenberg, was a well-known and highly respected Congregational pastor.
He was born in Cleveland, Ohio, on October 20, 1872, and began preaching in 1895 after graduating from the Boston School of Theology.
In 1901, he received his doctor’s degree from Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut.
In 1912, he took charge of the First Presbyterian Church in Marshalltown, Iowa.
He eventually became pastor of a Congregational church in Uxbridge, where he served for about 24 years, until ill health forced his retirement. Dr. Westenberg was expected to retire on July 1, 1945, but his failing health worsened, and he was forced to leave in April. That June, he and his wife moved into the Bramhalls’ Southwick home.
On October 24, 1945, Dr. and Mrs. Westenberg celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary at Marion and Eugene’s Southwick home. They had been married in San Diego, California, on October 24, 1895. The bride was the former Miss Lee Dunte Taylor, a former teacher.
On the evening of February 22, 1946, just a few months after celebrating their anniversary, Dr. Westenberg passed away in the Bramhalls’ Southwick home.
Besides his wife, he left three daughters. Marion was the youngest.
More Than a Novelist
In 1952, the Bramhalls left Southwick for Coventry, Connecticut, where they purchased the historic home of Lorenzo Dow, the eccentric itinerant American evangelist who was one of the most famous people of his time. Another notable person who later owned and farmed the property was the late Robert R. Steiger, of the famed department store chain. Mr. Steiger died by suspected suicide in 1944. His body was found on the third floor of the home of his brother Ralph Steiger of Springfield, Massachusetts. A shotgun was by his side, and he had bullet wounds to the head. (One of his brothers, Albert E. Steiger, Jr., died in 1943, two days after reporting an altercation with a taxicab driver to the Boston police.)
While living in Connecticut, the Bramhalls still owned real estate in Southwick.
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| Illustration of Steiger's at the Westfield Shops in Westfield, Massachusetts |
The same year the Bramhalls purchased Robert Steiger’s former farm, the Pilgrim Guild of the Uxbridge Congregational Church released an attractive red-covered cookbook titled Our Daily Bread. At the guild president’s request, Marion wrote the book’s introduction.
Around 1959, Marion opened an antiques shop in Coventry. In 1963, the Eugene and Marion sold and acquired property in Coventry.
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| Marion Bramhall's second published book (1944) |
Marion began painting around 1966, after health problems kept her indoors. She developed a distinctive painting style, even though, like her writing, she had no formal training.
When Marion later sought painting lessons, an artist refused to teach her in the conventional sense because the artist wanted her to retain her primitive style. The artist did teach Marion the basics of mixing colors.
Marion painted mostly landscapes. Her paintings began appearing in exhibitions about 1967.
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| Marion Bramhall with one of her paintings, circa 1967 |
Eugene and Marion sold their Southwick real estate just before Eugene died on June 12, 1969, and a few months later, in November, Marion sold their Parker Bridge Road property in Coventry and moved into her Eastham home on Cape Cod. It was the summer home her parents owned for many years.(She apparently kept a home in Connecticut as well.)
Marion opened the Bramhall Galleries on Route 6 in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, in the summers of 1972 and 1973.
Over the years, a local antiques dealer donated a number of Marion’s paintings to the Coventry Historical Society.
In 1991, the Historical Society displayed approximately 70 of Marion’s watercolors and oil paintings. Because of renewed public interest in Marion’s paintings, they decided to sell some of her works, with the proceeds benefiting Project Graduation, a local organization arranging a drug-free graduation party for the local high school.
Marion Alice Bramhall died on July 13, 1983.
Today, her books are considered rare, with some mint-condition first editions carrying asking prices of more than $250.
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| Marion's fourth book (1948) |
— Researched, constructed, and preserved by the Southwick Time Machine
Marion Alice (Westenberg) (Bonner) Bramhall
August 9, 1905 — July 13, 1983
Eugene Kraetzer Bramhall
August 8, 1900 — June 12, 1969
Reverend Robert Campbell Westenberg
October 20, 1869 — February 22, 1946
Captain Reuben Clark
February 14, 1753 — October 8, 1813
Robert R. Steiger
June 4, 1896 — April 30, 1944
(Robert's father founded Steiger’s the same year he was born)
This article is based on original primary-source research, including official records and documents, census data, and period newspapers and directories.
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Photographs accompanying this story are authentic, unless
otherwise noted. In keeping with historical preservation standards, some
of the images may have been digitally enhanced for clarity and detail,
without
altering the original subjects.
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Edited Out/Author's Additional Research Notes
Albert F. Webb: 1825 - 1907. He married in 1851. He died at the old homestead.
Some sources say Reuben Clark was born on February 11, 1753. Some sources state he died on October 9. The explosion was on the 8th, and that’s when the two other men died. All three men reportedly died a few hours after the explosion. Reuben’s gravestone says October 9, but this doesn’t appear correct. The others who also died in the explosion died on the 8th.
In 1927, Marion was dating Douglas William Bonner of Westerly, Rhode Island. They wed on August 24, 1929. He started his career as a salesman in 1930. By 1934, they were divorced.
Douglas was very active in the Lions Club.
Sometimes Marion's name is incorrectly spelled Marian.
Marion once outbid Orson Wells on a rare chess set.
Kraetzer is sometimes spelled Kratzer and Kraltzer.
Marion and Eugene were both married prior.
Some sources say Eugene and Marion acquired the farm in 1938. This is not correct.
They called the granary the grain house.
Marion's favorite room in her Southwick home was what she called the 1760 bedroom, which featured an authentic time-period canopy bed.
The Button Box was an antique store in Southwick in the early 1940s. Mrs. P. H. Kleix operated the store. Betty Dufton lived at or next to the Button Box (???)
The Button Box Antiques, College Highway, Southwick (at Vining Hill Road).
In 1946, the Button Box offered the following: Beautiful Maple Table Six Leg Swing $225, fine four-piece carved Victorian Set $250, horse weathervane $60, cuckoo clock $45
The Button Box opened a second location in Springfield.
Reverend Westenberg’s brother was also a popular pastor.
Marion was a member of the Women’s Republican Club in Connecticut.
18 Klaus Anderson Road was listed for $124,500 in 1985. It was described as having five fireplaces, a stable, and a tennis court. Modern changes altered the historic home long after the Bramhalls sold the property.
Auctioneer Phil Jacquier purchased 18 Klaus Anderson Road. He was known for his ten-gallon cowboy hat. When Babb’s closed in 1996, he was the auctioneer. He conducted many auctions over the years. Some of Jacquier’s more notable auctions include Donald and Marion Hamberg’s Southwick farm in 1985, the Misischia Pig Farm in Southwick in 1987, and the Wing Dairy Farm in Westfield in 1989. Farmers were feeling the squeeze as grain prices outpaced milk prices. Sadly, like most New England dairy farms, the land became more profitable than the work. On April 15, 1989, at least 68 family farms in New England and New York were auctioned off.
Jacquier also did the Southwick school system’s surplus auction held at Powder Mill Middle School in 1990. Items auctioned included teacher and student desks, portable cafeteria tables, record players, folding chairs, an adding machine, sewing machines, an industrial-sized stainless steel kitchen counter, a cooker, cabinets, etc. Most of the items sold for less than $10. (Typewriter: $2; Sewing Machine: $2; Folding Chairs: $1 each; Adding Machine: $2)
Eugene and Marion sold property in Coventry in 1963. In 1969, the sold their Southwick property.
Marion spent about two months in Europe in 1950. She returned aboard a steamship.
Marion offered private writing services and conferences.
She started a sixth novel, but it’s unclear if she ever finished it.
Eugene was born in Dorchester. Some sources incorrectly state he was born in Southwick; others say Granby.
Marion Bramhall had five mystery books published:
Murder Solves a Problem (1944)
Button, Button (1944)
Tragedy in Blue (1945)
Murder is an Evil Business (1948)
Murder Is Contagious (1949)
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