Roger Michaud, known to lots of local Boomers as keyboardist and lead singer with Moon Dawgs, can’t escape the pull of the Hill Mill.

Despite making millions in various successful business ventures, Michaud finds himself back at the 1854 mill, overseeing the rise of a building control system company called Innovex Technologies. It’s hardly the first time Michaud has seen potential profits in the former cotton mill.

Back when he was 11 and running with his future bandmate Bob Roy Jr., the buddies had a chance to earn some real money by washing the mill’s windows. The job – offered by Roy’s dad, Bob Sr. – meant washing scores of double-hung windows at the fetching wage of 35 cents per hour.

Ever the innovator, Michaud thought of a way to make it easier.

“Each floor had a fire hose, so we thought we’d use that and save ourselves some work,” said Michaud, smiling at the memory.

Not so. The boys turned the high-pressure hose on the sixth-floor windows. Almost 50 years later the outcome is still visible.

“That’s why the windows look like that,” said Michaud, chuckling as he pointed to many boarded- and bricked-up frames. “Oops.”

– Carol Coultas

Norlands roof has flagpole hole

Kathleen Beauregard, the new executive director of the Washburn-Norlands Living History Center in Livermore, learned something new about the museum while she was up in the attic recently as a new roof was being built.

A craftsman who had been at Norlands for decades, asked if she knew there used to be a flagpole that went right through the peak of the roof of the mansion. He showed her the base of a “giant” wooden pole in the attic and the braces that remained.

Beauregard held her hands about a foot apart to indicate the width of the pole.

“It extended 30 feet into the air,” she said. “The flag must have been the size of the one that flies over the White House.”

There are pictures of the flag flying over the mansion, she added.

Since her job is to oversee the rebuilding of the center after the attached farmer’s cottage and barn were destroyed by fire in April, the new roof has a hole in the top. It’s all water proof.

“So if any future directors want to erect this massive flagpole through the roof again, they can,” she said.

– Donna M. Perry