Biography of Harold F. Secord
Harold F Secord was born on November 14, 1902; He began his career in 1921 working with his dad and for Daniel Gage a prominent and wealthy ice dealer, and the owner of Gages Ice & Coal, in Lowell, Massachusetts. During the winter they would cut and harvest ice from the Merrimack River. In the summer they would deliver this ice to customers in the Lowell, Lawrence, Haverhill, area and all the small mill towns up and down the river.
Hal's grandfather’s sister-in-law, Rena (Orinal) Guerin was working at the local textile mill in the same town where Harold Secord worked cutting and delivering ice and coal. They met at the boarding house where they both ate dinner. They were married on June 7, 1930.
Harold and Rena saved their money together and in the early 1930’s he bought a second hand delivery truck. They moved to Newburyport, Massachusetts for the summer to peddle ice at Hampton beach on the New Hampshire sea coast. His route took him through a small town called Seabrook and was besieged by people wanting to buy ice from him. There were no ice or fuel companies in this small seacoast town just south of Hampton Beach.
He and Rena decided to start a business in this small town. They first rented a house in Smithtown next to the Goodwin house, off of Lafayette Road in Seabrook, New Hampshire.
Harold and Rena then bought some property on Folly Mill Road in Seabrook across Lafayette Road near the Salisbury, Massachusetts water works pump station. There was a brook running through the property with high sides. Harold and his father cut the trees, dynamited stumps, cleared the low land, and built a dam at the end of the property making a pond of about 3 acres. He built the ice house and coal sheds. They gradually grew into a business with delivery trucks for ice and coal and installed a large scale in front of their new office to weigh trucks coming in from all over to buy ice in the summer time. Most of the men in town who were fishermen and weren’t working in the winter would work with Harold Secord cutting ice and delivering coal during the winter months.
In 1934 Hal's Grandfather Ovila Lalime sent his youngest son, my dad Ray Lalime, from Lowell, Massachusetts to live with Harold and Rena Secord in Seabrook, New Hampshire to avoid all the soot, dirt, and bad air you would usually find in a mill town in the 30's. And if he was there, he was working. Through the course of time Secord switched from delivering ice and coal to delivered heating oil and propane gas, along with installing new hydronic heating systems in homes and business on the New England coast. He changed the name from Secord Ice & Coal to Secord Oil Company
In 1952 Harold Secord’s wife Rena became ill and Harold decided to move his wife to Florida. He sold this thriving business called Secord Oil Company to Raymond Lalime and his wife Virginia.
Harold Secord died on May 28, 1994 in Zephyrhills Florida. He was 91 years old.
