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Craig Wolfe on Hull:
Hull is a Place that Lets You Live Your Dreams

By Cindy Beth Bittker

I think you're really living in the fullest sense, when you live your dreams in the present moment, every moment. So many of us have a dream we tuck aside for the future, but how many of us live each day in accordance with our dreams? How many of us at any moment can look back on our lives and say we lived each day just as we wished we could and we don't wish for anything more.

Craig Wolfe is one of those people. Asked if there is something in his life that he wants to accomplish that he is not yet done, his answer is firmly "No." "I've never said to myself, I want to have three kids or grandkids. I didn't plan to go be an international rower. I didn't plan to change the textile company into a decorating company. It's just the spirit of the chase I like and I like the direction that my life is going. I come from an honest, honorable and caring family and my Dad's toast to everybody was "May all your dreams come true." He just wanted everybody to live happily ever after. That's how my parents lived their lives and that's the example they set. I think I do this with my kids and my company also."

"We have so many friends who don't talk to their families and our family always jokes about it. 'How can you yell at each other, if you don't talk to each other?'" 

Craig is the owner of Craig Textiles in Rockland, a family company that was started by his maternal grandfather, and was located in a six-story building in the textile district in Chinatown. That area became residential and Craig needed to find a new building and ultimately bought a former phone company building in Rockland where Craig Textiles now stands. Says Craig, "I had never crossed Route 3 in my whole life. It was like going to California. We were city guys and we took our own speedboat to work everyday. Sometimes I would even water-ski back home."

He tells a funny story of taking his Dad to see his new building in Rockland for the first time. "I'm driving with my Dad, and we were crossing Route 3, which for my Dad was kind of like going off the edge and looking for Indians. And I'm no more comfortable than he is. And he's lecturing me about how far away the building is and I'm driving and driving and driving and I can't find the building! Now my Dad is really giving it to me, saying "You think you're a big man? I send you to college and you think you're a big shot and you buy a building and you can't find it? He thinks is a big businessman and he doesn't even know where his own building is!" What I would give for a tape of that conversation!" 

Craig is fourth-generation Hull, dating back to his great-grandfather. Craig moved here as soon as he was out of school. He says he was "like a lemming. I just wanted to go to the sea all the time. It took me a few years to realize that if I just stayed by the water I wouldn't have to keep going to the water." (Craig is an ocean rower who has raced internationally for the past 20 years and still rows 12 months a year.)

"I came from a very open and honest non-conditionally loving family, so I learned to be straightforward and honest and to live my dreams. I do what makes me comfortable and what is comfortable for my family. I don't want to hurt anyone and I don't bother anyone, but certainly I have been unable to conform to a lot of street rules. All the way through school, I was never able to conform. I had a hell of a problem at school being hyper and dyslexic."

Asked "Where you see yourself as a nonconformist is there a difference between living somewhere like where you grew up in Newton and living here in Hull? Craig said yes. "Newton was a problem because everything was conforming and looking good superficially. That was my sense, and I had a problem with that. In Hull I was elected to be Park & Recreation Commissioner way back when I had a beard and long hair and wore T-shirts. And this was a screaming conservative town back then. Still, I probably got the most votes of any election because they appreciated two things that I was doing: One, everything was 100% for the kids. And two, I was going get it done no matter what. This is the kind of place where if they don't like what you're doing they tell you why. And there's no baloney. So I had the room to do what I wanted to do and be who I wanted to be here and that's great." 

They say it takes a village to raise a child and Craig feels that Hull was such a village. Craig was very involved in academic and athletic committees. "I went into the schools every day. Once my kids were in high school, I cut back to maybe two or three days a week. I felt it was wrong that the football player would get a 2 feet high trophy, but the kid who went from an F to a C got nothing. Those kids should have been given a trophy so big they couldn't even carry it home."

"When my kids were in school there was about 50 families that were heavily involved in the town. so I knew about 90% of people in the town because of my different involvements. My involvement in sports led to my involvement on the Park and Rec Commission, which led to my involvement in politics."

"This town really took care of the kids. I came home from work one day and my kids were not home and I panicked. Then I'd get a call from the school nurse that she had had taken the kids home to her house because they were sick and she knew I was working. That's the way the town was. Even in the cafeteria, I'd send my son with a sandwich and two lunch monies. The cafeteria workers would see that he was still hungry and so they would just give him more food." 

Another funny story is about a janitor in town who "is still mad at me to this day. He still hits me every time he sees me and this happened 15 years ago! My daughter, Dee, was a "Hull goon" playing Hull girls field hockey, which was a big deal in those days. These were tough girls and my daughter was no pussycat.

One day she decides that she wants to have colored hair, and I said, "absolutely." These are good kids just wanting to do stupid stuff. So the first time I dyed her hair green she turns into the Incredible Hulk. Green head to toe! The next time she wants red. I put the red in her hair and I didn't think anything of it. Now she's bright red, head to toe.

She's at a scrimmage and the janitor was there because he had a kid who was a friend of my daughters. They are out on the field and Dee is covered head to toe with bright red. This guy, the janitor, was a big guy and he sprints across the parking lot because he thought that Dee was in trouble. He scoops Dee up and he's about ready to give her mouth to mouth, and he says his heart almost stopped from the shock of seeing Dee down and from sprinting across the parking lot. You can't buy that. This town was really wonderful. It takes a village." 

"Everyone knew that I would get really upset if something happened to my children. My son Chad was playing in a game, and I wasn't there. He got hurt and an ambulance came on the field for him. For six months everyone in this town knew it happened, but nobody told me, because they knew I'd get too upset. When someone finally told me, they said that ambulance was on the field before Chad even hit the ground. You can't get that kind of stuff somewhere else. The town was really wonderful." 

"So, growing up in Hull was really nice. We really had backup. You know, the police were wonderful to the kids. They knew they weren't bad, but kids do some stupid stuff and the police would just take their names. But when they found out it was a Wolfe kid, they'd say "Do you want to keep doing it or do I tell your father?" And my kids would answer, "Take me to jail."  

"I'm not involved with the schools anymore, but I am involved with the Hull Lifesaving Museum rowing programs and designed all the original lifesaving programs for that. I'm on the Democratic town committee which is the new community involvement group. We put together voter registration and lectures."

Asked what his favorite spot is in Hull, Craig says "The Lifesaving Museum boathouse is the place that I always feel safest and happiest. And all the friendship rocks are there. Friendship rocks are the ones with the lines through it. I call them friendship rocks, and I give them to people for good luck. Almost all the politicians in Massachusetts have friendship rocks. I knew someone who was getting married and I wanted to give him a friendship rock and my kids thought it was stupid and told me not to give him a friendship rock. And then every person in the room goes into their pocket and pulls out their friendship rock!" 

Live your dreams -- or at least try really hard to!

 

 

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