A father's legacy on Apple Tree Hill.

Byline: Laura Porter

Jane Healey Fluharty was only 2 years old in 1968 when she, her parents and three older siblings moved into their new home on Apple Tree Hill.

High above the main streets of Fitchburg, the colonial-style home brought together all of her father's passions: family, land, the world of the past and the future of Fitchburg, the city he loved.

More than 40 years later, it is here that she and her husband, Timothy (T.J.) Fluharty, are raising their own four children, watching them sled in the backyard and hang Christmas stockings on the same chimney where Santa came when she was a child.

Last year, the Fluhartys' decision to open their home for the Fitchburg Historical Society's Holiday Tour was based, in part, on the opportunity to talk about the man who created it and the difference he made in the Fitchburg landscape.

Edward Charles John Healey, known as Ed or Eddie, loved working in the family hardware store, Greuner Hardware on Main Street. Turning to real estate as an adult, he bought Foster Real Estate in the 1970s to form Foster-Healey Real Estate, now run by his son, Rick Healey, who also lives on Apple Tree Hill with his family. (Jane and Rick's sister lives in Pennsylvania; another brother died last year in Ireland.)

An inveterate booster, Ed Healey tirelessly promoted his hometown, frequently giving slideshow tours at the Rotary Club about "what to do on a full tank of gas from Fitchburg," Jane Fluharty recalls. He served on the committee to make Fitchburg an All-American City and set a powerful example for other merchants, sweeping the sidewalk in front of his business every morning.

For advertising, he loved to pass out a card printed with the word "smile" in capital letters and a quotation proclaiming that "a SMILE costs nothing, but gives much," and urging, "Give them one of yours, as none needs a SMILE so much as he who has no more to give."

"He left a smile wherever he went," says Mrs. Fluharty. "I could always see where he had been, all over town, because they were taped to many cash registers around the city, and I'm sure many other places he went."

In 1982, Ed Healey died of a heart attack at the young age of 54. But his legacy remains.

When he wanted a colonial-style home in a colonial neighborhood and couldn't find one, "he built it himself," says his daughter.

Indeed, he built the whole neighborhood, buying much of the area that had been known as Apple Tree Hill in the 1700s and re-establishing the name. He also developed a large part of the adjacent road, Mount Vernon Street.

On Apple Tree Hill, he set deed restrictions on the lots he owned that still define the...