Dark green, glossy leaves points towards a modern shrub. Possibly Applejack.

Wish I could help, but I can't. However, I think it might help others if you listed the size of the rose (height and width) and the size of the bloom (diameter).

Good luck in your search.

Kate

Unfortunately pink is the most common color. I'm guessing that is most likely a hybrid tea or a floribunda because of the shiny leaves and rebloom. You can eliminate about half of the HTs and three quarters of the floribundas based on scent alone. There have always been some that were fragrant, but it was not a priority in these classes in the middle half of the 20th century. Still this leaves you with hundreds of roses.

This would be much easier with a picture, preferably several pictures. It would be helpful to see the rose itself, but also the canes and thorns, the leaves and their undersides (some are thorny there), and the part of the leaf that attaches to the cane. If you think the rose may still be there, and if you still know someone who lives in that area, perhaps that old friend might be willing to take some pictures and send them to you.

If the rose is gone -- and it may well be after thirty-plus years-- you could try searching online at Helpmefind Roses. Another excellent source would be the Vintage Gardens website. There you could search by date and color and year of introduction. Or, rather than page through all the years. simply go to their HT section. Vintage has a uniquely large selection of older modern roses, many with pictures and all with good descriptions. They may or may not have the rose you want currently in propagation, but it would be a good place to start looking.

Rosefolly

I cross posted with Rosefolly while doing what she suggested, using Help me find as a search engine. I used these parameters

introduced before 1978
glossy leaves
pink
damask fragrance

Only one rose appeared, Perfume Delight. I put the link below. It's not pale pink, but colors can change with weather, so maybe this is it. At any rate, good luck.

Here is a link that might be useful: Perfume delight

The glossy foliage and pale pink blooms make me think of New Dawn, but it doesn't have a Damask fragrance.

Good try by harborrose, but Perfume Delight's foliage is matte as can be.

HMF fail!

ooh, busted. I guess you grow this one, michaelg? The foliage does look matte in some of the pics. I did find a couple of rose references that spoke of shiny green foliage or glossy foliage, but some dark green, some olive green references. I guess color is in the eye of the beholder, too.

I tried again, changing the parameters a little

introduced before 1978
glossy foliage
pink
strong fragrance, rather than damask

I went through the page and a half of listings. Most were hybrid teas, rated to zone 6b, some by default. If it's hardy in New England, it probably needs to be hardier than 6b, anyway. Here's the list:

http://www.helpmefind.com/rose/plants.php?sbSearch=SEARCH&tab=5&qn=1&qc=1c

There was one hybrid perpetual though, rated zone 4b. It doesn't seem to be currently available here in the US, although there are pics from the San Jose garden. It was introduced by Conard Pyle in 1933; it is a German rose by Mathias Tantau, 1930, called Stammler

Maybe Conard Pyle stopped carrying it because of WWII.

anyway, for whatever that was worth, good luck. I had fun playing with it. Hope that helps a little and doesn't muddy any waters for you.

Here is a link that might be useful: Stammler

I tried playing around with the search parameters and probably came up with a wrong answer, but it was fun! So, could it possibly have been a Rugosa?

Here is a link that might be useful: Sarah Van Fleet

Thanks everyone! I am so impressed with all of your hard work. The rose was definitely quite pale pink. Leaves definitely dark green, glossy, and smooth underneath. Bloom size I'm guessing 2 - 2.5" diameter. As to the fragrance, I could be wrong about the damask, as harborrose guessed. Maybe it's another perfume, but it was most definitely a sweet, elegant, rose-like fragrance, not like a Rugosa. To harborrose - I will look at your list. Thank you! And thanks to many of you for the link to HMF. Krista - I used to have a New Dawn climber, and it is similar but not the same. My rose's fragrance and bloom shape are more elegant than ND, more like a hybrid tea. Mad Gallica - it is not Applejack though I see why you suggested it. But the bloom form is more 'modern', and is even paler pink.
One more hint: the yard where the rose lived was protected on all sides by high hedges, and it sported both a box hedge and a large mimosa tree. I believe mimosas are not supposed to be hardy here in Mass., and they are certainly rare. Box is, I think, on the edge of hardiness. So maybe this means we can relax the zone requirements?
I will explore more links and keep looking, thanks again to all of you. What a forum!

It is unfortunately not Stammler, nor Sarah Van Fleet.

More info: bushes were large but I doubt they had been pruned, and I didn't prune them much since at the time I knew nothing about roses. Probably about 4-5' high and easily that big around. Does this indicate a shrub rose? The bushes were also quite disease-free.

On the Vintage Gardens site (no luck there either) they list the color "blush pink". From the pictures, it does look like the color of my rose, ie a very pale pink. HTH.

The size and disease resistance strongly indicate something that isn't a hybrid tea or floribunda. The glossy foliage and repeat sounds like a shrub class rose. Though a small climber like Clair Matin wouldn't be out of the question.

Thank you, mad gallica, for introducing me to Clair Matin. It looks like a lovely rose, and it is very similar to the one I'm seeking. So maybe I'll get one!

Felicia has elegant blooms, and is very fragrant, but the blooms might be smaller than the rose that you are thinking of.

Strange. I was googling just now trying to find a rose that exactly matches what you've described. Very dark glossy leaves, palest pink blooms two to three inches wide, two or three to a stem, English rose style. I've seen them in gardens from East Tennessee to Cleveland Heights, Ohio for at least 15 years. The ones I remember smelled apple- ish, very fragrant. I gave my mother a cut bunch one year and her whole house smelled like sweet apples. The contrast between the oh- so dark leaves and the palest pink was mesmerizing. I, like you, wish I could find it.

I found it, at least the one I remembered.

http://www.oardc.ohio-state.edu/newsitem.asp?id=4568

It's an heirloom rose. The article doesn't give the rose's name. the photo is from Ohio State University's Garden of Roses of Legend and Romance, planted in 1970. The OARDC garden website has an original planting list under the "History" menu option: http://oardc.osu.edu/rosegarden. The list has hundreds of names. I googled about 20 of them before quitting for now.

My first thought was New Dawn which is a favorite of mine
-I hope you find the rose you remember.

Clair Matin is a great rose---I have two---they bloom most of the summer and they are delightful

Florence

Could it have been an overgrown Cecile Brunner/Sweetheart Rose? I've seen a few abandoned specimens at either abandoned or neglected properties that have not been lived in or used for a long time that are definitely this rose and definitely that size you are describing. What were the petals like when they first open?

Here is a link that might be useful: Cecile Brunner

Oath5: Cecile Brunner is a very good guess, the color and leaves look right, but the open blooms, as I recall them, don't quite match the web images; mine curve back more. Also Jackson and Perkins claims the blooms in CB are only 1 - 1 1/2" across and the bush is 'compact' whereas mine was not. New Dawn is close but is not it. TracyTraub: I believe that you and I may be looking for the same rose --the Ohio image you found matches what I remember perfectly, but then it is only one image. Please let me know if you find the name of it! As I recall, in my rose the open petals curve back - what is the term for that? recursive, reflexive? And it is not a double, ie when open the blooms are fairly flat and not dense with petals like many old roses are. I did download the list you mentioned and have been searching for each pale (or shell or blush) pink one starting at the end and working back, since you started at the top. No luck yet. I got as far back as page 3 Symphony before getting discouraged. I'll try writing to Ohio. Thanks to everyone.

I got an answer from Ohio state. Here it is:

"I am the person in charge of the Rose Garden here at the OARDC. I have been forwarded your message and I am happy to say that I can answer your question. The rose on the page that you sent is called �New Dawn.� It grows very well for us here and we have it on all the fences. I hope that helps and have a great day! Kelly King"

I was afraid of that. New Dawn DOES match the description of my rose very closely, as many have proposed in this forum. That's what prompted me to buy a New Dawn a few years ago, but it is not the same rose. New Dawn has a definite climbing habit, in fact it grew well all over our pergola, whereas the one I'm searching for had a bush habit, albeit with some arching canes suggesting that maybe it COULD be a climber. (My New Dawn was lovely but it didn't make it through one of our harsher winters, so I don't have it any more.) The fragrance of New Dawn, for one thing, does not match the fragrance of the one I'm searching for, for it had a much stronger fragrance. I'll try to come up with the other differences I found, as I can't remember them all right now. Perhaps I should pursue roses in the heritage/lineage of New Dawn? Ideas anyone?

truffle cat

You are right. The picture from Ohio State certainly looks like what I remembered, but what I saw was not a climber. It grew as an enormous shrub, flowering all the way to the bottom, stems arching downward and draping, but not rambling. It was a thick, dense shrub that grew with the strength of a weed, little else needed but a bit of pruning to keep it's shape. It's flowers were colored much like a David Austin Wedgwood Rose, but not as profusely petaled, not a double or a single but somewhere in between. Same dark foliage. Also, the blooms lasted as cuttings for a week or more.

It has to be an heirloom. If I go down to Tennessee anytime soon, I'll snap some pictures. It was a fabulous rose, great cuttings, extremely hardy.

TracyTaub:

Yes! Everything you say matches what I remember including the color similar to the Wedgwood rose, the semi-double (or so) petal arrangement, and the bush's habit. It would be wonderful if you did manage to get some shots of it in Tennessee. Unfortunately that's pretty far away for me. Good luck!