In 1926, Caroline and A.L. LaFrance built a one room house on La Cresta Blvd. (located south of the present day fire station). They moved west from Massachusetts and this is where they settled. They had six children all grown when they homesteaded this property: Leon, Peter, Armoza, LeDora, Beatrice, and Ernest. As time went on they added rooms to their home. From 1937 on, the family celebrated all the holidays in that home. It was in the LaFrance family for 50 years.

Paula Toner, great-granddaughter of Caroline and A.L. wrote, “We had been coming to Crest as long as I could remember. We visited my elderly great aunts and uncles, their children and their children’s children, my cousins. The LaFrance family had built the one room house, but it was better than the tent they camped in regularly prior to building. It was a sad day when we had to sell it after Aunt Dora’s passing in 1980; she was the last of the children. The home still stands next door to the fire station.”

Paula went on to say, “My relatives led a fairly Victorian life, and so did we when we visited. We would sit for long hours, it seemed, waiting to run on the porch, sit in the Adirondack chairs my grandfather had made, or study the rock garden that Aunt Armosa scraped with a flat hoe each year. We lived on a block, but at Aunt Dora’s there was land to explore.

“My mother, Claire LaFrance, daughter of Pete and Dora, spent summers in Crest as a teenager beginning in 1946. When I questioned her as to what she did here, she responded ‘We hung out at my cousin, Bea and Eddie Dupuis’ general store drinking soda and eating ice cream to keep cool. Each morning started out with a walk from the LaFrance home to the general store and over to Dupuis’ to ride horses. They rode to the top of the old Suncrest grade and down through the valley.’

“Good times were at Mass where Aunt Bea played the piano with her husband, Dick Eacrett, on the fiddle. The same musical act was performed at pancake breakfasts at the park clubhouse. I remember the fresh smell of eucalyptus in the clean air. Walking and hiking were the pastimes while visiting the LaFrance relatives scattered throughout Crest. Ernest and Emily lived by the park, cousin Bea somewhere, old cousin Bea and Dick lived on North Lane, and Aunt Dora and Uncle Ernest were next door to the fire station. Many of the houses they lived in were built by my Uncle Ernie, Uncle Leon, and my great-grandfather Alphonse LaFrance.”

Jerry Schultz shared a few additional tidbits about the LaFrance family, “Ernie LaFrance and his father A.L. used auto tires to half-sole the kid’s shoes. I remember that in 1928-1929, the LaFrance’s house had drapes on the front porch made of eucalyptus pods – nice aroma.”