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MASSACHUSETTS
A GUIDE TO ITS PLACES AND PEOPLE
COPYRIGHT, 1937, BY GEORGE M. NUTTING, DIRECTOR OF PUBLICITY
COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO REPRODUCE
. THIS BOOK OR PARTS THEREOF IN ANY FORM
CtK &ibet0it>e ftt rse
CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS
PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
WORKS PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION
WALKER. JOMHSON BUILDING
1734 NEW YORK AVENUE NW
WASHINGTON, D. C
HARRY L. HOPKINS
ADMINISTRATOR
Massachusetts s A Guide to Its Places and People is one of the
volumes in the American Guide Series, written by members of the
Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration.
Designed primarily to give useful employment to needy unemployed
writers and research workers, this project has gradually
developed the ambitious objective of presenting to the American
people a portrait of America, its history, folklore, scenery,
cultural backgrounds, social and economic trends, and racial
factors. In one respect, at any rate, this undertaking is unique;
it represents a far-flung effort at cooperative research and
writing, drawing upon all the varied abilities of its personnel.
All the workers contribute according to their talents; the field
worker collects data in the field, the research worker burrows
in libraries, the art and literary critics cover material relevant
to their own specialties, architects describe notable historical
buildings and monuments; and the final editing of copy as it flows
in from all corners of a state is done by the more experienced
authors in the central offices. The ultimate product, whatever
its faults or merits, represents a blend of the work of the entire
personnel, aided by consultants, members of university faculties,
specialists, officers of learned societies, oldest residents, who
have volunteered their services everywhere most generously.
A great many books and brochures are being written for this series.
As they appear in increasing numbers we hope the American public
will come to appreciate more fully not only the unusual scope of
thi* undertaking, but also the devotion shown by the workers, from
the humblest field worker to the most accomplished editors engaged
in the final rewrite. The Federal Writers' Project, directed by
Henry G. Alsberg, is in the Division of Women's and Professional
Projects under Ellen S. Woodward, Assistant Administrator.
Harry L. Hopkins
Administrator
OOVEHNOB
Massachusetts; A Guide to Its Places and People
is the first major accomplishment of the Federal
Writers 1 Project for Massachusetts. More than
the conventional guide book, this volume attempts
to present the history and heritage of Massachu-
setts as well as Its numerous points of Interest
and the contemporary scene. Though designed to
portray Massachusetts to visitors. It Is also In-
tended, as It were, to present Massachusetts to
Massachusetts.
As Governor of the Commonwealth I am happy that
this valuable work Is being made available to the
citizens of Massachusetts and the nation.
Secretary of the Commonwealth
ONE MOMENT, PLEASE!
WHEN the Federal Writers' Project was set up in Massachusetts, and
the staff received its first instructions from the central office in Washing-
ton, the editors blithely embarked on a task of whose magnitude they
had little conception: the job of adequately describing the 316 towns and
39 cities of the Commonwealth, and of presenting, as concisely, accurately,
and simply as possible, the facts about the State, from its Architecture
to its Zoology, from the year ?oo,ooo,ooo B.C., when its geological history
began, to A.D., 1937 when its social history has by no means ended.
All over the Commonwealth, field workers began to interview local
historians, consult town records, talk with oldest inhabitants, tramp miles
of country roads. In district offices, research workers checked and re-
checked data against all available sources. Officials of State and local
governmental agencies were pressed into service ; volunteer consultants
geologists, architects, historians, anthropologists, travel experts, critics
read, criticized, and corrected copy. Photographers clicked cameras,
cartographers wrought maps, tour checkers clocked mileage.
In the State office, bulky parcels began to arrive. The mailman stag-
gered upstairs with piled envelopes of field copy, heavier each day.
Readers struggled desperately to keep up with incoming copy; typists
and copyreaders trod water in pools of manuscript. Batteries of steel
files became crammed; a hundred wooden file boxes hungered and were
fed. Meanwhile, a small administrative staff labored at the vital job of
keeping accounts straight and records accurate, and of seeing that each
worker received many of them for the first time in months his or
her weekly pay check.
Out of several millions of words there slowly grew a book nay, a
BOOK, some 650,000 words long. The editors, abandoning a momentarily
considered idea of publishing a volume of 2000 pages mounted on wheels
with a trailer attachment, sharpened a gross of blue pencils and attacked
the typescript to condense it to a portable size. Chapters became pages,
pages became paragraphs, paragraphs became sentences. Tempers wore
thin as cherished passages were cruelly blue-penciled, and editorial con-
ferences developed into pitched battles. But out of it all, writers of
One Moment, Please!
varied ability and training and of widely differing temperament, thrown
together on the common basis of need, shared a new experience an
adventure in co-operation.
Although comprehensive, this book is not an encyclopedia. Its purpose
is not to catalogue all the facts, but to present and preserve significant
facts. Designed to serve the needs of the tourist, this guide will be, it is
hoped, more than a manual for the casual traveler. Tours there are in
plenty, and thousands of points of interest are located and described.
But the adventurous-minded will discover herein other excursions, less
precisely marked, along highways of letters, history, art, and archi-
tecture.
In the midst of editing this book, the Federal Writers' Project of
Massachusetts compiled and edited other guides, brochures, bibliogra-
phies, etc., some of which have already been published, others of which
are still in preparation.
The editors are deeply obligated to many governmental agencies, Fed-
eral, State, and local, to commercial associations and travel agencies, to
historical societies, and to hundreds of individuals, for information and
assistance. They must content themselves, however, with brief and totally
inadequate acknowledgment to the State Planning Board, the State
Departments of Conservation and of Labor and Industries, to many local
planning boards, the New England Council, the New England Hotel
Association, the Boston and Albany, Boston and Maine-Central Ver-
mont, and New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroads, the Boston
Elevated Company, other transportation companies. Professor B. A.
Hooten, of the Department of Anthropology of Harvard University,
criticized the article ' First Americans'; Professor A. M. Schlesinger, of
the Department of History, Harvard, read 'Enough of Its History
to Explain Its People ' ; Professor Lawrence LaForge, of the Department
of Geology, Harvard, assisted in the preparation of 'Natural Setting,'
of which Professor David Potter, of the Department of Biology, Clark
University, reviewed the sections of flora and fauna. Professor Walter
Piston, of the Department of Music, Harvard, made suggestions for the
first section of the essay ' Music and the Theater'; and Mr. Leverett
Saltonstall contributed the major portion of the article 'Government.'
Miss Dorothy Adlow contributed the essay 'Art.' In addition, all the
above, as well as many others not named, were frequently consulted for
information and advice on matter lying within their several fields. The
American Antiquarian Society, the Massachusetts Historical Society, the
One Moment, Please! xi
State Library, the Bostonian Society, the Boston Athenaeum, and numer-
ous local historical societies and libraries generously made their collec-
tions available to research workers. Selectmen, town clerks, librarians,
and others freely lent their aid.
The four-line stanza by Emily Dickinson in the article 'Literature'
is quoted by special permission from 'Poems of Emily Dickinson,' 1937,
edited by Martha Dickinson Bianchi and Alfred Leote Hampson: Little,
Brown and Company, Boston.
This volume was prepared under the editorial direction of Joseph
Gaer, Editor-in-Chief of the New England Guides and Chief Field
Supervisor of the Federal Writers' Project.
RAY ALLEN BILLINGTON, State Director
BERT TAMES LOEWENBERG )
> Assistant state Directors
MERLE COLBY J
CONTE NTS
FOREWORD Photostat
By Harry L. Hopkins, Federal Administrator, Works Pro-
gress Administration
FOREWORD Photostat
By Charles F. Hurley, Governor of Massachusetts, and
Frederic W. Cook, Secretary of the Commonwealth
ONE MOMENT, PLEASE! ix
GENERAL INFORMATION xxi
Railroads Accommodations
Highways Climate and Equipment
Bus Lines Information Bureaus
Airlines Recreation
Waterways Transportation
Traffic Regulations
CALENDAR OF EVENTS xxxii
MASSACHUSETTS: THE GENERAL
BACKGROUND
CLUES TO ITS CHARACTER 3
NATURAL SETTING 9
FIRST AMERICANS 18
ENOUGH OF ITS HISTORY TO EXPLAIN ITS PEOPLE 28
GOVERNMENT 56
LABOR 65
ARCHITECTURE 79
LITERATURE 89
LITERARY GROUPS AND MOVEMENTS 100
MUSIC AND THE THEATER I IO
ART 117
xiv Contents
II. MAIN STREET AND VILLAGE GREEN
(City and Town Descriptions and City Tours)
Amherst: An Adventure in Quietude 127
Arlington : History and Homes 130
Boston: The Hub of the Universe 135
Brockton: City of Shoes 176
Brookline: Opulent Comfort 179
Cambridge: University City 183
Chelsea: City of Transformations 205
Chicopee: The Future-Minded 208
Concord: Golden-Age Haven 210
Dedham: The Sober-Minded 217
Deerfield: A Beautiful Ghost 223
Everett: Industrial Half-Sister 227
Fall River: City of Falling Water 229
Fitchburg: The Farmer Goes to Town 232
Gloucester-Rockport (Cape Ann) : Mother Ann's Children 235
Haverhill: From Hardscrabble to Hats and Shoes 244
Holyoke: The Power of Water 248
Lawrence : Warp and Woof 250
Lexington: A Town of Heroic Past 255
Lowell: Company Founders and City Fathers 260
Lynn: Machine City 266
Maiden: Neighbor of Boston 270
Marblehead: Where Tradition Lingers 273
Medford: Rum, Ships, and Homes 279
New Bedford: Thar She Blows! 284
Newburyport: City of Captains' Houses 291
Newton: Commuter's Haven 295
Northampton: From Jonathan Edwards to Sophia Smith 301
Northfield : A Prophet with Honor 306
Norton: Typical New England 308
Contents xv
Pittsfield: Power-Source and Playground 310
Plymouth: The Colony's First 'Main Street' 319
Provincetown : Way Up Along 326
Quincy: Iron Ships and Great Men 335
Revere : A Beach Beside a City 341
Salem: New England's Treasure-House 343
Somerville: Traditions of Trade 353
South Hadley: Milk, Butter, and Ideas 356
Springfield: The Metropolis of Western Massachusetts 359
Taunton: Largest City for Its Size 367
Waltham: City of Five-Score Industries 370
Watertown: Cradle of the Town Meeting 374
Wellesley: Town of Schools and a College 379
Weymouth: Aggregate of Villages 382
Williamstown : Buckwheat, Barley, and Gentlemen 386
Woburn: Home of a Yankee Count 389
Worcester: Heart of the Commonwealth 392
III. HIGH ROADS AND LOW ROADS
(Mile-by-Mile Description of the State's Highways)
TOUR i From New Hampshire (Portsmouth) to Rhode
Island (Providence). US 1 407
1 A From Newburyport to Everett. State 1A 415
iB From Dedham to North Attleborough. State 1A 426
iC From Beverly to Uxbridge. State 62 and 126 430
iD From Boston to Milford. State 109 439
2 From Boston to New York (Troy). State 2 (Mo-
hawk Trail) 442
2A From New Hampshire (Peterboro) to Littleton.
State 119 460
2B From Orange to New Hampshire (Keene) . State 78 463
3 From Boston to New Hampshire (Concord) . US 3 464
4 From Boston to New York (Albany). US 20 468
xvi Contents
TOUR 4 A From Woronoco to Great Barrington. State 17 483
46 From Huntington to Hinsdale. Sky Line Trail 487
5 From Boston to New Hampshire (Salem). State 28 488
6 From Orleans to Rhode Island (Providence) . US 6 494
6 A From Orleans to Province town. US 6 502
7 From New Hampshire (Seabrook) to Worcester.
State 110 and State 70 507
7 A From Newburyport to Haverhill. State 125 516
8 From Boston to Pittsfield. State 9 518
8A From Williamsburg to Hinsdale. State 143 532
9 From Vermont (Stamford) to Connecticut (Salis-
bury). (Appalachian Foot Trail) 534
10 From Plymouth to Rhode Island (E. Provi-
dence). US 44 535
11 From New Hampshire (Fitzwilliam) to Connec-
ticut (Thompson). State 12 540
nA From Westminster to Worcester. State64,31,122A 545
1 2 From Provincetown to Williamstown (Capes to the
Berkshires Bridle Trail) 546
13 From New Hampshire (Rindge) to Connecticut
(Granby). US 202 547
14 From New Bedford-Martha's Vineyard-Nan -
tucket 554
15 From Vermont (Guilford) to Connecticut (Thomp-
son ville). US 5 563
i5A From New Hampshire (Hinsdale) to Bernardston.
State 10 567
156 From Adams to Springfield. State 116 568
i5C From Northampton to Westfield. State 10 571
i5D From West Springfield to Connecticut (Suffield).
State 5A 573
17 From Vermont (Pownal) to Connecticut (North
I Canaan). US 7 574
iyA From Pittsfield to Connecticut (Salibury). State
41 580
Contents xvii
176 From Lanesborough to Summit of Mt. Greylock
(Rockwell Rd.) 584
19 From Boston to Bourne. State 28 586
igA From Orleans to Bourne. State 28 591
21 From Vermont (Stamford) to Connecticut (Win-
sted). State 8 595
23 FromAthol to Rhode Island (Providence). State
32 and 122 600
23 A From Barre to Connecticut (Willimantic) . State
32 606
236 From Grafton to New Bedford. State 140 609
25 From Boston to Rhode Island (Tiverton). State
138 614
27 From Boston to Bourne. State 3 618
2yA From Quincy to Kingston. State 3A 621
276 From Weymouth to East Bridgewater. State 18 626
CHRONOLOGY 631
FIFTY BOOKS ABOUT MASSACHUSETTS 637
INDEX 639
ILLUSTRATIONS
HISTORICAL LANDMARKS
The'Arbella,' Salem*
John Alden House, Duxbury
Paul Revere House, Boston
Commodore's Quarters, U.S. Frigate
'Constitution'
Historic American Buildings Survey
Minuteman Statue, Concord*
INDUSTRY EARLY AND LATE
Fore River Shipyard, Quincy*
Shipyard, Essex
New England Council
Hoisting Sail
Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Chains, Woods Hole Buoy Yard*
Old Mill, Sudbury*
' Charles W. Morgan,' New Bedford*
Seeding Clams
Commonwealth of Massachusetts
ARCHITECTURAL MILESTONES
Whipple House, Ipswich
Kitchen of John Ward House,
Haverhill
Essex Institute
Hartshorne House, Wakefield*
Hill of Churches, Truro*
Chestnut Street, Salem*
Assembly House, Salem*
Fierce-Nichols House, Salem
Essex Institute
Lee Mansion*
between 26 and 27
Old South Meeting House, Boston*
Leyden Street, Plymouth (first street
in Massachusetts*)
Old State House, Boston
John Quincy Adams House, Quincy
between 56 and 57
Cranberry Bog
Courtesy of George Gardner Barker
Sandwich Glass*
Nets Drying, Gloucester
Courtesy of F. J. Robinson
Herring Run, Wareham*
Weaving
Associated Industries of Massachusetts
Printing
between 86 and 87
Old State House (interior)*
House of the Seven Gables, Salem*
State House, Boston*
Holden Chapel, Harvard
Harvard Film Service
1 Connecticut Valley ' Doorway, Mis-
sion House, Stockbridge
Courtesy of Fletcher Steele
Public Library, Boston
Trinity Church, Boston
A FLASHBACK IN EARLY PRINTS
between 148 and 149
North Bridge, Concord, 1775!
Boston Common in 1768, showing
the Hancock House and the Old
Beaconf
The Old State House and the
'Bloody Massacre'f
The Old State House in 1801
The Old State House Fire, 1832!
The Old State House in 1876 with
Mansard Roof
Boston in 1743 from the Harborf
The City in 1848 from East Bostonf
Bird's-Eye View of Boston at about
Faneuil Hall and the Old Shorelinef
New State House and Bulfinch Bea-
conf
XX
Illustrations
LITERARY LANDMARKS
Elm wood (James Russell Lowell
House), Cambridge
Craigie-Longfellow House, Cam-
bridge
Custom House, Salem*
Emerson Room, Antiquarian House,
Concord
Concord Antiquarian Society
Wayside Inn, Sudbury*
MASSACHUSETTS: ONE OF THE
LEARNING
The Splash of a Drop of Milk
Associated Press
The Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
New England Council
Harvard College from the Air
Institute of Geographical Exploration
Bulfinch Hall, Andover Academy
Smith College Quadrangles, North-
ampton
Cur tiss-W right Flying Service
between 210 and 211
Fruitlands, Harvard
Orchard House, Concord
House of the Seven Gables, Salem*
Arrowhead (Bush-Melville House),
Pittsfield
Historic American Buildings Survey
Thoreau's House, Concord
Emily Dickinson House, Amherst
WORLD'S CENTERS OF
between 304 and 305
Japanese Garden, Museum of Fine
Arts
Boston Museum of Fine Arts
The Court of the Isabella Stewart
Gardner Museum, Boston
Powers Studios
The Court, Fogg Art Museum, Cam-
bridge
The Esplanade Symphony Orchestra
under Fiedler
Boston Chamber of Commerce
The Little Red Schoolhouse, Sudbury*
OLD HOUSES AND OLD CHURCHES
between 462 and 463
Benjamin Abbot House, Andover
Historic American Buildings Survey
Parson Capen House, Topsfield
Old Ship Church, Hingham*
Cape Cod Cottage: John Ken-
rick House, Orleans*
Wooden Quoins, Winslow House,
Marshfield*
Munroe Tavern, Lexington*
Fairbanks House, Dedham
Old Church in Concord*
Sparrow House, Plymouth*
Governor Gore House, Waltham
BY ROAD, BY TRAIL, AND BY
Street in Marblehead
Boston from the Air
Harvard Buildings on the Charles,
Cambridge
Boston Chamber of Commerce
Windmill, Cape Cod*
Marblehead Harbor
Commonwealth of Massachusetts
CHANNEL between 524 and 525
Orleans*
Highland Light, North Truro*
Connecticut Valley, near Northampton
Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Lexington Green*
Memorial Tower, top of Mount Grey-
lock
Courtesy of Arthur Palme
Illustrations marked * are by W. Lincoln High ton of the Works Progress
Administration; those marked f by courtesy of Goodspeed's BDok Shop,
Boston; all uncredited photographs are by the staff photographer of the
Federal Writers' Project of Massachusetts.
LARGE MAP OF MASSACHUSETTS Back Pocket
Reverse side: Large Map of Boston Winter Recreations Map
Summer Recreations Map
GENERAL INFORMATION
Railroads: Boston & Maine (B. & M.), Boston & Albany (B. & A.), New
York, New Haven & Hartford (N.Y., N.H. & H.), Central Vermont
(C.V.).
Highways: 101 State highways. 6 Federal highways, as follows: i, Fort
Kent, Maine, to Miami, Fla.; 3, Canada via Colebrook, N.H.; 5, Quebec
via Newport, Vt.; 6, Greely, Colo.; 7, Quebec via St. Albans, Vt.; 20,
Yellowstone Park. (For routes throughout State see folding map.)
Highway patrol to safeguard traffic and enforce traffic regulations.
Bus Lines: Intrastate: 155 lines connecting principal towns and cities.
Interstate: Boston & Maine Transportation Co. (Boston to Portland,
Me., Boston to White River Junction, Vt., Boston to Keene and Con-
cord, N.H.); New England Transportation Co. (Boston to Hartford,
Conn., Boston to Poughkeepsie, N.Y.); Berkshire Motor Coach Lines
(Boston to Poughkeepsie, N.Y., via Worcester, New Haven, and New
York City); Blue Line (Worcester to New York, via Springfield); Blue
Way Lines (Portland, Me., and Boston to New York, via Springfield and
Worcester); Eastern Greyhound Lines, Inc., of New England (Boston
and Portland, Boston and New York) ; Frontier Coach Lines (Boston and
Montreal) ; Greyhound Lines (national coverage) ; Interstate Busses Cor-
poration (Providence, R.I., to Schenectady, N.Y., via Springfield and
Pittsfield); I.R.T. Co., Inc. (Boston to Providence, R.I.); P.H.N. Lines,
Inc. (Boston and Norwich, Conn., via Worcester); Old Colony Coach
Lines, Inc. (Boston to Concord, N.H., Boston to Bar Harbor, Boston to
Montreal and Quebec) ; Short Line System (Springfield to Portland, New
York, Waterbury, Worcester, and Boston).
Airlines: Intrastate: Boston to Cape Cod and Nan tucket (summer serv-
ice). Interstate: American Airlines (Boston, Providence, Hartford, New
Haven and New York; Boston-Buffalo and all points west). Boston-
Maine-Central Vermont Airways (Portland, Augusta, Waterville, Ban-
gor, Bar Harbor during summer, Manchester, Concord, White River
Junction, Barre-Montpelier, Burlington).
Waterways: Regular service by steamship to New York and ports south
via Cape Cod Canal from Boston or Fall River. Many trans-Atlantic
liners call at Boston. Regular trips to Canada and the West Indies.
New England Steamship Co. (operated by N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.), New
Bedford to Martha's Vineyard [Dukes] and Nantucket. Cape Cod
Steamship Co. (Boston to Provincetown). (Summer service only by
both.)
xxii General Information
Traffic Regulations: Non-residents may operate motor-cars within the
State for 30 days without permit. Penalty for violation thereafter.
Speed: For State highways, regulations prescribe speed that is
' reasonable and proper ' : not to exceed 30 m. p. h. outside of a thickly
settled or business district. Within a thickly settled district or at any
place where operator's view of the road is obstructed, not in excess
of 20 m. p. h. Curves not to be negotiated in excess of 15 m. p. h.
Lights: ' Every automobile operated during the period from one
half an hour after sunset to one half an hour before sunrise shall dis-
play at least two white lights, or lights of yellow or amber tint, or if
parked within the limits of a way one white light nearer the center
of the way. And every motor vehicle shall display at least one red
light in the reverse direction. No spotlights to be used unless ap-
proved by the registrar of motor vehicles.'
Brakes: Brakes must be adequate to control the movement of
such vehicles, must conform to rules and regulations, and must be
in good working order.
Accommodations: State is well provided with hotel accommodations.
Accommodations in private houses are also available in nearly all towns:'
Tourist camps are located in all parts of the State. Municipal ordinances
require rigid enforcement of rules on sanitation and hygiene. Most of
these establishments are privately owned, but there is every evidence
of their being orderly and well regulated. As most of the camps are within
easy reach of trading centers, food supplies as well as emergency clothing
are quickly obtainable.
Climate and Equipment: State has variable climate with temperatures
ranging from the nineties in summer to sub-zero in winter. Visitors
should carry clothing such as sweater and topcoat for sudden changes in
summer, and in winter special heavy clothing for coasting, skiing, skating,
and other outdoor sports. In winter snow trains leave Boston regularly
for New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine, destinations depending some-
what on the conditions of ice and snow.
Fires: ' No person shall set, maintain or increase a fire in the open air at
any time unless the ground is substantially covered with snow, except by
written permission . . . granted by the forest warden or chief of the fire
department in cities and towns ... or the fire commissioner. Persons
above the age of eighteen may set or maintain a fire for a reasonable pur-
pose upon sandy land, or upon salt marshes or sandy or rocky beaches
bordering on tide-water, if the fire is enclosed within rocks, metal or other
non-inflammable material.' Consult local fire warden.
Poisonous Plants and Reptiles: Poison ivy grows somewhat profusely in
certain sections, generally along stone walls and fences in pasture and
woodland, and occasionally along the seashore. Antidotes obtainable at
any drugstore. Rattlesnakes at times are seen in certain sections of the
Blue Hills in the eastern part of the State and in the Berkshires in the West.
General Information xxiii
Information Bureaus: The New England Council, Statler Building,
20 Providence Street, Boston; the various chambers of commerce, hotels,
and railroads are equipped to give information on travel, resorts, recrea-
tional opportunities, and road conditions.
RECREATION
Golf: Massachusetts had the first golf course in America, the Country Club
of Brookline, founded in 1882, and courses are well distributed through-
out the State. On Cape Cod, on the adjacent islands of Nantucket and
Martha's Vineyard, and in many other ocean-front cities and towns,
courses overlook the sea. The eastern and central portions of the State
provide numerous 'sporty' courses on rolling and varied terrain. The
courses of western Massachusetts in the Berkshire Hills are set in the
midst of rugged hills and valleys. Distributed throughout the State are
approximately 215 courses, varying in size from six to thirty-six holes,
the majority of which are open to the general public. Tournaments and
special matches, both amateur and professional, are held during the
season on representative courses.
Tennis: Tennis courts are provided as part of the recreational develop-
ment of the Myles Standish State Forest in Plymouth, and on certain
Metropolitan District Commission reservations. Many courts, available
for public use for a fee, at specified times, are under the administration of
colleges, private schools, and private organizations.
Yachting: The ^State's hundreds of miles of coastline offer splendid oppor-
tunities for yachting. Large fleets of yachts and boats annually dot
Massachusetts waters, engaging in races, regattas, and general cruising.
There are approximately 130 yacht and boat clubs, including motor-boat
and dory clubs distributed among the nine eastern and southern counties
of the State. In the central and western portion there are four such clubs,
the primary interest of which is motor or speed boating. Most yacht and
boat clubs are, of course, in Essex County on the North Shore, in Suffolk
County on the Central Shore, and in Barnstable County on the South
Shore. Essex and Barnstable County clubs serve primarily the non-
resident yachtsman; Suffolk County clubs serve the resident.
Beaches: The Commonwealth has more than one thousand miles of ocean
front. Many towns which have acquired and developed ocean beaches
have restricted the use to their own residents. There are now eight State-
owned ocean beaches, one administered by the Department of Conserva-
tion, one in charge of the Department of Public Works, and six controlled
by the Metropolitan District Commission.
Picnicking: The State forests, which have been expanded both in -size and
in facilities, offer convenient provisions for picnicking. Of the sixty-nine
State forests, approximately thirty-nine have one or more developed pic-
xxiv General Information
nic areas equipped with tables, benches, fireplaces, and sanitary facilities,
and often have additional facilities for camping, such as tent sites, trailer
sites, and cabins, as well as swimming facilities. In the remaining thirty
State forests, picnicking is allowed, but there are few facilities, and fires
are prohibited.
There are numerous other opportunities for picnicking in the two State
parks, eleven State reservations, eight semi-public reservations, and
fourteen reservations controlled by the Metropolitan District Commis-
sion, all of which permit picnicking in some form and provide some of the
necessary facilities, such as tables and benches. Opportunity for picnick-
ing is not limited to the State-provided facilities. Many cities and towns
have large parks or lakeside reservations where non-residents may picnic.
There are also many commercial picnic grounds, camp-grounds, and
beaches.
Fairs: In 1935, approximately twenty outstanding fairs were held through-
out the State, attracting some 750,000 people. More than fifty per cent
of the attendance was at the two major fairs the Brockton Fair and
the Eastern States Exposition.
Horse and Dog Races: Horse and dog racing, under the pari-mutuel system
of betting, has become increasingly popular. In 1935, the first year of
operation of horse and dog racing under the pari-mutuel system, four flat
running-horse tracks, four harness-horse tracks, and three dog tracks
were licensed.
Auto Races: Auto racing is engaged in primarily as amateur competition
and as a feature event at certain of the major fairs. For amateur competi-
tion for midget cars, two dirt tracks have been built, one at Wayland and
one at Marstons Mills on Cape Cod. On these tracks several races are
scheduled during the summer and early fall. All types of cars are used,
and the usual length is fifty miles. Professional and semi-professional
auto racing is limited to the major fairs.
Winter Sports: The State Department of Conservation, in co-operation
with the National Park Service and the Civilian Conservation Corps, has
extended the winter-sports facilities in the State forests and reservations,
and is still developing them. Climatic conditions and natural topography
make certain sections of the State ideal for extensive winter-sports devel-
opments. The Berkshire Hills area is the best-developed section, but new
trails have been constructed in the Wachusett region, more favorably
located in relation to principal centers of population than the Berkshires.
There are approximately seventy-five areas devoted to skiing, with many
miles of trails and acres of open slopes. Jumps are few in number, only
thirteen being available. Probably more than 75 per cent of the skiing
facilities are concentrated in the four western counties, the major portion
of these being in Berkshire County. On the Mount Wachusett State
Reservation, two new downhill trails have been developed or improved.
In the eastern part of the State are a few facilities: Mount Hood Memorial
Park, Melrose, the two trails on the Metropolitan District Commission's
General Information xxv
Blue Hills Reservation, and a few small municipal or private open slopes
and jumps. Many golf clubs allow the use of open slopes on the courses
for skiing. ' Snow trains ' leave Boston regularly in winter.
There are seventeen ski and outing clubs, most of which are in central and
western Massachusetts. The Western Massachusetts Winter Sports
Council is the largest combined organization actively promoting winter
sports in the State. The Berkshire Hills Conference also encourages
winter sports.
Practically every city and town in Massachusetts has sufficient water area
for skating. Several ponds or lakes on State reservations and forests are
kept cleared during the season.
Tobogganing has a few facilities, widely scattered over the State. On
most State reservation lands, no constructed chutes are necessary because
natural conditions, dependent on suitable snow cover, are sufficient. The
same is true for most municipal parks.
Snowshoeing is dependent on the quality and condition of snow. Since it
requires no special areas or trails, there are adequate opportunities for it
in every section of the State when there is snow. Existing foot trails or
minor back roads may be used.
Hiking: Perhaps the best-known hiking route is the Appalachian Trail
(see Tour 9), extending from the Connecticut boundary to the Vermont
line and forming a link in the route from Georgia to Maine. There is also
the Wachusett-Watatic Trail (see Tour nA), covering a distance of more
than twenty miles from the Mount Wachusett Reservation to a point
near the New Hampshire line, where it connects with the Wapack Trail.
The State forests and reservations provide a total of 225 miles of local
trails, constructed by the Department of Conservation in co-operation
with the National Park Service and the Civilian Conservation Corps dur-
ing the past four years. The Metropolitan District Commission has de-
veloped a number of trails on its reservations, particularly the Blue Hills
(see Tour 25) and Middlesex Fells (see Tour 5).
Several organizations are actively engaged in the promotion and con-
struction of foot trails, preparation of guide books, and the establishment
of trail shelters. Prominent among these are the Berkshire Chapter of
the Appalachian Mountain Club, the Connecticut Valley Trails Confer-
ence, the Massachusetts Forest and Park Association, the outing clubs
of colleges and preparatory schools, the American Youth Hostel, Inc., the
New England Trails Conference, and the Massachusetts Department of
Conservation.
Riding: Bridle trails in Massachusetts consist of several local municipal
units, some few miles developed on the State forests and reservations, a
few miles developed by the Metropolitan District Commission on their
reservations and parkways, and the Capes-to-the-Berkshires Trail (see
Tour 12), a through trail 450 miles in length. Throughout the State there
are many miles of old wood roads and minor back roads which serve as
xxvi General Information
bridle paths. Excluding these roads, there are more than 500 miles of
existing bridle trails in Massachusetts. Eighty-six riding academies and
many local outing clubs are distributed throughout the State. Many of
these are on or near the Capes-to-the-Berkshires Trail, and offer shelter to
horse and rider.
Bicycling: There are no bicycle trails as such in Massachusetts. The
American Youth Hostel, Inc., has laid out a bicycle loop trip through
New England, utilizing back roads and portions of the Capes-to-the-
Berkshires Trail.
Hunting: Hunting is permitted in 64 State forests, comprising more than
1 50,000 acres. In thirty of these forests, hunting is strictly regulated by
permit; and portions- of ten forests, comprising approximately 3200 acres,
are set aside for game preserves, on which no hunting is allowed. Public
lands available for public hunting (State forest lands) are widely dis-
tributed throughout the State, with the largest percentage, both in num-
ber and acreage, in the central and western portions. The Division of
Fisheries and Game carries on extensive stocking of covers, particularly
with quail, pheasants, hares, and rabbits. Game preserves, under a vari-
ety of classifications and organizations, are numerous. The State con-
tains 33 or more preserves, varying in size from 12 to 8600 acres, and
representing a total of approximately 21,300 acres. Included in the total
are the various State reservations, under the control of County and
Special Commissioners, which unless otherwise specified are closed to
hunting. There are four game farms, varying in size from 23 to 132 acres,
and comprising a total of 364 acres. All are under the direct control of
the Division of Fisheries and Game of the Department of Conservation,
20 Somerset St., Boston. For hunting license consult the Division, or the
local game warden.
Fishing: While a large part of the brook fishing is still in private unposted
land, more and more streams seem destined to be closed to the public
by individuals and private clubs. However, opportunity for public fishing
is fairly extensive. Under the General Laws of Massachusetts, the Di-
rector of the Division of Fisheries and Game is permitted to acquire, by
gift or lease, fishing rights and privileges in any brook or stream in the
Commonwealth, with rights of ingress and egress, unless it is a source of
or tributary to a public water supply. There are eleven such areas in the
State, comprising some eighty miles of stream. In addition to these
streams, the ponds of the State, with the exception of those used for water
supply, are public for the purpose of fishing, hunting, and boating. There
are 1302 such ponds, of which approximately two hundred are used for
water-supply purposes. Certain others are controlled either by the Divi-
sion of Fisheries and Game for breeding purposes, or by cities and towns.
For fishing license, consult the Division, 20 Somerset St., Boston, or the
local game warden.
For salt-water fishing no license is required. At most harbors, boats
and equipment are available to parties for deep-sea fishing. During the
General Information xxvii
summer deep-sea fishing excursion boats leave T Wharf, Boston (foot of
State Street) daily. Surf-casting is increasing in popularity, and equip-
ment and instruction are available at many resorts.
TRANSPORTATION
JOSIAH QUINCY in his Journal thus describes a trip from Boston to
New York in 1773: 'I set out from Boston in the line of stages of an en-
terprising Yankee, Pease by name, considered a method of transportation
of wonderful expedition. The journey to New York took up a week. . . .
We reached our resting place for the night, if no accident intervened,
at 10 o'clock, and after a frugal supper, went to bed with a notice that
we should be called at three, which generally proved to be half past two,
and then, whether it snowed or rained, the traveler must rise and make
ready . . . and proceed on his way over bad roads, sometimes getting out
to help the coachman lift the coach out of a quagmire or rut, and arriving
in New York after a week's hard traveling, wondering at the ease, as well
as the expedition with which our journey was effected.'
At the time that Josiah made his memorable journey, little progress in
transportation methods had been made since the founding of the Plym-
outh Colony. Though primitive forms of wheeled vehicles were used as
early as 1650, the colonists usually traveled on horseback, and few at-
tempts were made by them to improve the condition of the roads. Action
taken at early town meetings to compel able-bodied men to work on the
roads or pay tax money to hire substitutes did not suffice to keep the
roads in good condition. Road-building in the early days was simply
not considered an important undertaking. The first settlements were
made on the coast, and the colonists maintained communication largely
by water because it was more convenient for them.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries more traveling by land
was done in the winter than during any other season of the year. Sleighs
drawn by oxen or horses were used on small streams and frozen rivers.
By the year 1683 a few private coaches began to appear in the larger
towns, like Boston and New York. The earliest were of three types: one
was patterned after the heavy two-horse family carriage used in England;
the others were better adapted to conditions in America, and drawn by
one horse. Road conditions did not permit their use outside the limits of
the towns.
Some of the wealthier inhabitants in the larger towns began to use
sedan chairs, but public opinion in the Colony decidedly frowned on the
use of such vehicles. Governor Winthrop had received a sedan chair as a
gift, but he did not dare to use it.
During the second half of the eighteenth century, stagecoach service
was established between a few of the larger communities along the New
England coasts, such as Boston and Providence.
xxviii General Information
The first stagecoaches were crude in form. They usually had four
wooden benches without any backs, seating a maximum of nine pas-
sengers. Baggage was placed either on the passengers' knees or under
their legs. The coach had a top usually made of some heavy woven
material, with leather curtains at the sides and rear. It had no springs,
and the traveler who had not to hobble when he arrived at his destination
was very fortunate and very rare.
The end of the Revolutionary War marked the opening of a new era.
People began at last to recognize the need of adequate transportation
facilities. New industries established in different sections of the State,
and expanding municipalities demanded better facilities for moving
people and freight overland.
The question was, however, who was to build the roads? The War had
impoverished the local communities and the State. Neither was finan-
cially able to undertake the construction of roads which demanded an
outlay of millions of dollars. Out of these difficulties grew a new method
of private financing and control, whereby the roads were built by private
companies incorporated under acts passed by the State Legislature.
These roads, called turnpikes, were constructed by private capital, pri-
vately owned, and operated for the revenue derived from the collection
of tolls.
Both the rates of toll and the number of gates that could be erected
were fixed in the charters granted to the various corporations. The gates
were erected at intervals of about ten miles, and rates had to be displayed
on large signs. Certain persons were exempt from paying toll: Any person
going to or from his usual place of public worship; any person passing
with his horses, team, or cattle to or from his farm, in connection with
work to be performed there; any person passing on military duty. If the
toll-gatherer were not present to receive the toll, the gate had to be left
open and everybody was permitted to pass without paying.
The opening of the turnpikes was followed by the establishment of
regular stagecoach lines between all sections of Massachusetts. In 1801,
one hundred and sixteen coaches arrived and departed from Boston each
week. There were twenty-six lines to as many different places. The run-
ning time to New York was then about forty hours, and some lines re-
duced the time between cities by traveling all night instead of stopping
at a tavern.
The improved type of stagecoach used between 1800 and 1840 was
built of wood and sole leather, and was shaped somewhat like a football.
It had no springs, but was swung on several thick strips of leather riveted
together and called thoroughbraces; the average coach seated nine pas-
sengers and was usually drawn by four horses. In these new coaches
strips of leather were nailed lengthwise to provide backs for the benches.
Meanwhile the top of the coach had assumed a flat shape, and, with the
installation of railings, baggage could be carried on the roof. The ' Con-
cord Coach,' first built in Concord, New Hampshire, about 1828, was
considered the acme of luxury. So highly were these coaches regarded by
the traveling public that the railroads used them mounted on railway
trucks, as their first passenger coaches.
General Information xxix
In the winter time, the stagecoach lines often placed their vehicles on
sled bodies instead of on wheels, and thus maintained their service with
but a small decrease in speed. On occasions when the coach was too
heavy to be drawn through the snow, its use was temporarily abandoned
in favor of small, open, boxlike conveyances, with the travelers exposed to
every inclemency of the weather.
Distances were commonly reckoned in miles intervening between
taverns, and not, as one would expect, between towns. Taverns were
the important landmarks of any journey. There the weary passengers
alighted to seek refreshment and stretch their cramped limbs while
assembled townsfolk pressed about them and questioned them eagerly
about the news from the outside world.
About 1800 a new and radically different method of transportation
was devised. This was the canal. The stagecoach was not adapted to
freight traffic. A number of surveys were made, but nothing was done.
Despite popular enthusiasm, only one large canal, the Middlesex, com-
pleted in 1808 and extending from the Merrimack River near Lowell to
the Charles River in Boston, was built in Massachusetts, and its period
of usefulness was very short. The rapid railroad development all over
the State from 1835 to 1850 solved the problem.
In spite of advantages which were obvious to the fo resign ted, Massa-
chusetts was slower than some other sections of the country in accepting
the new method of transportation. Just as the first coaches to appear on
the streets were severely censured, so were the first railroads. Puritanism
was always suspicious of anything that made for physical comfort.
Many people were sincerely convinced that the use of these iron highways
would lower the prevailing standards of morality.
During the building of the Western Railroad from Worcester to
Springfield in 1837, so much adverse criticism was directed against this
project that the owners of the road sent a letter to all the churches of the
State asking that sermons be preached on the beneficial moral effect of
railroads.
The first three important New England railroads were all completed
in 1835 in this State. They were the Boston and Lowell, the Boston and
Providence, and the Boston and Worcester.
The reaction of the people to the new method of transportation is
found in the newspapers of the day. In the issue of the Maine Farmer of
July 1 8, 1835, a newspaper published in Worcester, there is the following
comment concerning the trip between Boston and Worcester: 'The usual
passage is performed in two and a half or three hours, including stops
A few years ago, 14 miles an hour would have been considered rapid
traveling So great are the advantages gained, that already one of the
principal dealers here has offered to lay a side track from the road to his
own storehouse ... A person in business here informed me that he left
Worcester one day at 12 o'clock, arrived in Boston, had one and a quarter
hours to transact his business, returned by the four o'clock car, and ar-
rived here at seven o'clock in the evening thus traveling 88 miles in
eight and three quarter hours Some of the passenger cars on this
xxx General Information
road are very elegant, and will hold from twenty to thirty persons. The
motion of the cars upon the road is so easy that I saw a little child walking
from seat to seat, as if in a parlor.'
Parallel to the development of steam railroads was that of a similar
type of intercity transportation. The first street railway in Massachusetts
was built in Boston in 1836. Horse-car systems were replaced about 1890
by the use of electricity as a motive power. Then came the automobile,
and an entirely new and revolutionary method of transportation slowly
began to undermine both the street railways and the railroads, culminat-
ing in the employment of busses both for local and long-distance passenger
and freight service.
An integral part of the success of the new method was the development
of an improved highway system throughout the State. After the failure
in 1850 of most of the turnpikes, the roads had reverted to the control
of the cities and towns in which they were located. In 1893 the Legisla-
ture established the Massachusetts Highway Commission as the result
of an investigation which disclosed that the roads of the State were in a
deplorable condition. The Commission was authorized to take over, lay
out, and maintain roads, and to unite the more important cities by
trunk lines of large traffic capacity. The first State appropriation,
amounting to $300,000, was made in 1894. By 1916 a total of $11,767,000
had been spent. Obviously some portion of this gathering cost had to
be turned back in some way to those who benefited. The old turnpike
toll in a different form is paid by motorists of today. In 1925 the State
Legislature established the Highway Fund, whereby the proceeds of
motor- vehicle fees and fines and of the tax on gasoline are pledged to the
construction and maintenance of both State and local highways. During
the past twenty-five years the cost of new road construction in Massa-
chusetts has been approximately $105,000,000.
Today five types of transportation, all highly developed, are open to
the traveler in Massachusetts. The most expeditious is by air. Josiah
Quincy, who thought a week was a remarkably short time for the journey
from Boston to New York, would hardly have believed that a century
and a half later the traveler would board a plane at Boston and make a
happy landing at Newark Airport on the edge of New York City in
eighty-four minutes.
Besides Boston, thirty-six cities of Massachusetts have airplane landing
facilities, and seaplane landings can be made at Boston, Gloucester,
Squantum, and New Bedford. In 1937 recognized commercial air service
was provided by two large airlines, one of which connects Boston, via
New York and via Albany, with all the other important air routes of the
country, and the other of which reaches the cities of upper New England.
During the summer seaplanes fly between Boston, Provincetown, Hyan-
nis, Nantucket, and Martha's Vineyard.
Next in speed, but with certain superior elements of practicability,
come the railroads. At present three major lines serve Massachusetts
and link it with the south and southwest, the west, and the north; and
five others operate within the State.
General Information xxxi
Next in speed to the railroad but with more flexibility and usually at
less cost, passenger and freight service are given by bus and truck lines,
which cover the State with a fine network. Three main operators, con-
trolled by three railroads, and several lesser lines handle the long-distance
traffic, while about one hundred and sixty bus lines are engaged in intra-
state traffic.
The development of motor transportation has seriously curtailed the
operation of street railways, especially interurban and suburban lines.
The street railway mileage has been steadily decreasing since 1920.
Although the Boston Elevated Railway, the largest line in the State,
which serves the thickly settled Greater Boston district, has been able
to retain much of its suburban traffic through its tunnel lines, it also
operates an increasingly large number of motor coaches.
The private automobile began to be a factor in transportation following
the World War. In 1920, 223,112 automobiles were registered in Massa-
chusetts; the number has steadily increased, and the average during the
past few years has been near the 900,000 mark. For the automobile
traveler, as well as for bus and trucking companies, the interior road-
way system offers easy access to all important points. Four United
States highways (20, 3, i to the north, and i to the south) radiate from
Boston, besides a large number of other main roads. Routes i, 3, 202, 5,
and 7 are the major north and south arteries of the State; number 20 is the
main western line. The total highway mileage in 1935 was 18,802, in-
cluding 2400 miles of State highways. Inland water transportation is
negligible except that through the Cape Cod Canal, which considerably
reduces the time and increases the safety of the passage between Boston
and New York. Forty-one steamship lines give foreign service out of the
port of Boston, and twenty lines give domestic or coastwise service. A
steamship line operates daily between Fall River and New York ; another
plies between New Bedford, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket via
Woods Hole, and summer steamers run from New Bedford to New York
and from Boston to Province town. Passenger service by steamship be-
tween Boston and Portland was discontinued about 1935. The Common-
wealth has several smaller ports besides Boston, the most important in
volume of traffic being Fall River, followed by New Bedford, Beverly,
Salem, and Lynn, in this order. Boston has the largest drydock on the
continent, constructed by the Commonwealth and later sold to the
United States Government.
CALENDAR OF EVENTS
Events are arranged first by frequency of occurrence (A nnual,
Seasonal, Bi-Annual), and next by date within cities, which
are grouped together.
ANNUAL
(nfd = no fixed date)
Jan. last Sat. Boston
Jan. 20 to Feb. Boston
19 (i day)
Jan. nfd Springfield
Jan. i Stoughton
Feb. ist wk Boston
Feb. ist Sat. Boston
Feb. nfd Boston
Feb. last 2 wks Boston
Feb. 21-22 Boston
Feb. 22 Boston
Feb. 22 Boston
Feb. ist & last Melrose
week-ends
March last wk Boston
March 17 South Boston
March ist 2 wks Worcester
April 19
April last wk
Boston
Boston
Knights of Columbus Track Meet, Boston
Garden, North Station.
Chinese New Year.
Springfield Art League, exhibit at Museum
of Fine Arts.
Old Stoughton Musical Society Concert,
Town Hall.
N.E. Sportsmen's and Boat Show, Me-
chanics Bldg., Huntington Ave.
Boston Athletic Association Games, Bos-
ton Garden, North Station.
Boston Society of Independent Artists,
no-jury exhibit, Boston Art Club, 150
Newbury St.
Boston Society of Water Color Painters,
exhibit, Vose Galleries, 559 Boylston St.
Eastern Dog Club Show, Mechanics Bldg.,
Huntington Ave.
International Music Festival, Symphony
Hall, Huntington Ave.
'Handshake ceremony/ State House.
Winter Carnivals on Mt. Hood Reserva-
tion sponsored by National Ski Assn.
Spring Flower Show, Massachusetts
Horticultural Society, Mechanics Build-
ing, Huntington Ave.
Evacuation Day. Ceremonies and Parade.
Spring Flower Show, Worcester Horti-
cultural Society, Horticultural Hall, 30
Elm St.
Patriots' Day. Celebration and Mara-
thon.
Pension Fund Concert of Boston Sym-
phony Orchestra, Symphony Hall,
Huntington Ave.
Calendar of Events
XXXlll
April
April
May
nfd
5
Lexington
Provincetown
Boston
May
ist wk
Boston
May
ist Sun.
Boston
May
ist wk
Boston
May
May Day
Boston
May
last 3 wks
Boston
May
nfd
Boston
May
ist wk
Boston
May
ist Sat.
Cambridge
May
3 Sundays
Gloucester
May
nfd
Ipswich
May
3d wk
Lawrence
May
May
6th Sun.
after Easter
mid-May
New Bedford
Wellesley
May
June
nfd
(2 days)
ist Mon.
Westford
Boston
June
mid-June
Boston
June
nfd i wk
Boston
June
19
Brookline
June 16-26 Cambridge
June 2d Tues. Cambridge
Revolutionary Pageant on Common.
Portuguese festival in honor of Santo
Christo.
Opening of Boston Symphony ' Pops'
concerts continuing to July 3, at Sym-
phony Hall, Huntington Ave.
National Music Week celebrated by Bos-
ton Public Schools.
Annual Concert of Boston Music School
Settlement, Jordan Hall, Huntington
Ave.
Ford Hall Forum Banquet, Ford Hall,
Ashburton Place.
Labor groups and others celebrate with
music and speeches on Common.
'Paradise of Blossoms/ Arnold Arbore-
tum.
American Unitarian Associations' Con-
vention, 'May Meetings.'
Tournament sponsored by National Guild
of Piano Teachers, Steinert Hall,
Boylston St.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
Open House.
Portuguese Festival of Penticost at
Church of Our Lady of Good Voyage.
Rights for 'Alewife run' sold to highest
bidder.
Three Day Carnival sponsored by Inter-
national Institute. Fourteen or more
national groups appear in folk costumes
to re-enact native pageantry.
Portuguese religious celebration.
Wellesley College celebrates ' Float Night'
on Lake Waban.
Nashoba Apple Blossom Festival.
Installation of Officers and Drum Parade
of Ancient and Honorable Artillery
Company, on Common.
Peony and Rose Show, Horticultural
Hall, Massachusetts Ave.
Boston National Home Show, Mechanics
Building, Huntington Ave.
Opening of State Singles Tennis Champ-
ionship Tournament, Longwood Cricket
Club.
Harvard Commencement exercises, Har-
vard Yard, Cambridge; Class Day at
Harvard Stadium, Brighton.
Alumni Reunion at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.
XXXIV
Catena;
ir or Events
June
16
Charlestown
Bunker Hill Banquet, Armory, Bunker
Hill St.
June
J 7
Charlestown
Bunker Hill Day Celebration and Parade.
June
28 to July
Concord
Choral Programs by students of Concord
2 3
Summer School of Music, usually in
Unitarian Church.
June
near 15
Northampton
Gaily decorated floats on Paradise Pond,
stage for Smith College Glee Club Con-
cert, Class Day.
July
ist Sat.
Bridge water
Portuguese celebrate Holy Ghost Festival.
and Sun.
July
near ist
Dennis
Opening of two-month season of summer
stock company at Cape Playhouse.
July
Near ist
Boston
Esplanade concerts by members of Boston
to end of
Symphony Orchestra.
month
July
4-18
Wellesley
Wellesley College Summer Institute for
Social Progress, Wellesley College.
July
nfd
Gloucester
Italian religious festival, Old Fort section.
July
nfd to
Gloucester
North Shore Art Association, exhibits,
middle of
East Gloucester Sq.
Sept.
July
nfd to
Gloucester
Gloucester Society of Artists, exhibit of
middle of
members' work, near Hawthorne Inn.
Sept.
July
4 wks
Northfield
Conference of Ministers and Missionaries,
Northfield Seminary.
July
nfd
Provincetown
Beachcombers' Ball, costume affair, by
artists, writers and others.
July
4 to Labor
Provincetown
Art exhibits at galleries of Provincetown
Day
Art Association.
July
nfd
Rockport
North Shore Art Association opens three
months' exhibitions concurrent with
two months' showings of Rockport Art
Association.
Aug.
Falmouth
Sessions at Marine Biological Laboratory,
Woods Hole.
Aug.
Falmouth
Sessions at Oceanographic Institute,
Woods Hole.
Aug.
Falmouth
Sessions at United States Bureau of
Fisheries, Woods Hole.
Aug.
nfd
Beverly
Sam-Sam Carnival, midway, flower show
and fireworks.
Aug.
nfd
Boston
Mid-summer exhibition of Massachusetts
* **&
Horticultural Society, Horticultural
Hall, Massachusetts Ave.
Aug.
nfd
Boston
Products of Children's Gardens Exhibi-
A\_*j.
tion, Horticultural Hall, Massachusetts
Ave.
Aug.
23
Brookline
Beginning National Championship
* *-*o
Doubles and Mixed Doubles Tennis
Tournament, Longwood Cricket Club.
Calendar of Events
xxxv
Aug.
nfd
Gloucester
Gloucester Fishermen's Memorial Day
Services at the site of the Gloucester
Fisherman's Memorial.
Aug.
2d wk
Marblehead
Annual Cruise, Eastern Yacht Club.
Aug.
near 15
Marblehead
Marblehead Race Week, yachting.
Aug.
nfd
Marshfield
Marshfield Fair.
Aug.
10-28
Mattapoisett
Special events in connection with cruise
of New York and Eastern Yacht Clubs
in harbor.
Aug.
nfd
Provincetown
Art Association Ball, costume affair,
Town Hall.
Aug.
near 15
Rockport
Cape Ann-North Shore Music Festival,
(2 evgs)
Fort Park.
Aug.
3d wk
Rockport
Artists' Ball, Rockport Art Association.
Aug.
near 15
Stockbridge
Berkshire Symphonic Festival, three con-
certs by Boston Symphony Orchestra.
Sept.
2d wk
Boston
Late summer exhibition of Massachusetts
Horticultural Society, Horticultural
Hall, Massachusetts Ave.
Sept.
3d wk
Brockton
Brockton Fair, held annually since 1784.
Sept.
Fri. & Sat.
Middlefield
Middlefield Fair.
before
Labor Day
Sept.
3d wk
Springfield
Eastern States Exposition.
Sept.
Labor Day
Topsfield
Topsfield Fair, Tread well Farm.
week-end
Oct.
ist wk
Worcester
Worcester Music Festival, four concerts
including one oratorio.
Nov.
ist wk
Worcester
Worcester Horticultural Society, Chrys-
Dec.
Dec.
Dec.
Dec.
Dec.
Dec.
24 Boston
near 24 Boston
or Jan. Boston
21
last wk
Plymouth
Provincetown
Christmas Worcester
Sun.
anthemum Show, Horticultural Hall,
30 Elm St.
Christmas Eve Carol Singing on Beacon
Hill (principally in Louisburg Sq.).
'Open House' in many homes.
Handel's ' Messiah ' by Handel and Haydn
Society, Symphony Hall, Huntington
Ave.
National Winter Sports Exposition, in-
door skiing, skating, reproductions of
famous winter resorts, Boston Garden,
North Station.
Forefathers' Day, observance of landing
of Pilgrim Fathers.
Portuguese celebrate with open house,
oldtime parties and dances.
Handel's 'Messiah' by Worcester Ora-
torio Society, Memorial Auditorium.
XXXVI
Calendar of Events
SEASONAL
May June
June Sept.
Boston
Brookline
July 6 Aug. 10 Cambridge
Sept. i June Boston
Oct. Nov.
Oct. Nov.
Oct. May
Oct. April
Boston
Throughout
State
Cambridge
Boston
College Crew Races, Saturday afternoons,
Charles River.
Federal Music Project concerts, Tuesday
and Thursday evenings, Brookline
Shell, Dean Rd.
Free concerts, Tuesdays at 8.15 P.M.,
Longy School, 44 Church St.
Fenway Court Concerts, Sundays, 1-4
P.M., Isabella Stewart-Gardner Mu-
seum, Fenway.
Professional football games.
College football games.
Free concerts, Tuesdays at 8.15 P.M.,
Longy School, 44 Church St.
Boston Public Library Lectures and Con-
certs, Sundays at 3 P.M. and 8 P.M., and
Thursdays at 8 P.M., Lecture Hall,
Boston Public Library.
Community Church of Boston, Sundays
at 10.30 A.M., Symphony Hall, Hunting-
ton Ave.
Ford Hall Forum, Sundays at 8 P.M., Ash-
burton PL
Ford Hall Youth Forum, Mondays at
8 P.M., Ashburton PL
Old South Forum, Sundays at 3 P.M., Old
South Meeting House, Washington St.
Symphony Concerts, Saturday and Mon-
day evenings and Tuesday and Friday
afternoons, Symphony Hall, Hunting-
ton Ave.
BI-ANNUAL
Jan. i
June
Boston
(odd
years)
nfd (even years)
nfd (even years)
Inauguration of Governor, State House.
Democratic Convention.
Republican Convention.
i. MASSACHUSETTS: THE
GENERAL BACKGROUND
CLUES TO ITS CHARACTER
TO THE seeker of a clue to the character of Massachusetts people, the
rubric of the east wind may be useful. Time and again a salty breeze has
blown through this most conservative of commonwealths. It wafted the
first rebels to Cape Cod, dying down soon after. It burst forth again to
blow steadily through most of the eighteenth century, when victories
were won not only for political freedom but for education and religious
toleration. During the period of Federalism it abated, but by the i84o's
the faint whisper which had fanned the cheeks of mill girls in Lowell,
mechanics in Boston, and scholars in Cambridge and Concord was roaring
in a gale that shook the rafters of the nation. It blew fitfully throughout
the later nineteenth century, dying to a flat calm at the beginning of the
twentieth. From about 1909 to 1927 it let loose a window-rattling blast
or two before subsiding again.
Many symbols have been devised to explain the Bay Stater. He has
been pictured as a kind of dormant volcano, the red-hot lava from one
eruption hardening into a crater which impedes the next; as a river, with
two main currents of transcendental metaphysics and catchpenny op-
portunism running side by side; as an asocial discord consisting mainly
of overtones and undertones; as a petrified backbone, 'that unblossom-
ing stalk.' To these may be added the cartoonist's Bluenose, the de-
bunker's Puritan, the Gentleman with a Green Bag, Aunt Harriet with
her Boston Transcript, and the late unlamented Little Waldo of the
spectacles and painfully corrugated brow.
That so many symbols have been created for the State hints at the
complexity of its people. Any almanac or book of facts can inform the
clue-seeker that the population is roughly three-fifths native, one-eighth
from other states, and a quarter foreign-born or of mixed foreign-born
and native parentage; that half the land area consists of farms, yet only a
tiny proportion of the four and one- third million inhabitants are farmers;
that about half the residents are church members, of whom three-fifths
are Catholics; that an Indian boldly figures on the State seal, but only
874 residents today report themselves as descended from Massachusetts'
first families. Stumbling on the fact that the State has more public
libraries than any other save New York, and more volumes per capita
Massachusetts: The General Background
than any other, the seeker cries Aha! only to learn a few moments
later that Ohio, with one-third fewer library books, has at least as many
library readers. Told that no non-native resident ever feels at home for
his first twenty-five years, the seeker is surprised to discover that more
than a third of the State's residents were born outside its borders. At
long last he is likely to emerge from the almanac with the information
that citizens of the State live a little longer than the dromedary, rather
less than the ostrich, and for a much shorter span than the fresh- water
mussel; or that from the State came three Presidents, seven Secretaries
of the Navy, a host of cabinet officers, and the man who first went over
Horseshoe Falls in a rubber ball.
Clearly a symbol is necessary. Let it be, then, the east wind, and let
the east wind blow to these shores in the early i6oo's, not companies of
large-minded and open-handed gentlemen-adventurers, but small, close-
knit, compactly organized groups. 'God sifted a whole nation that he
might send choice grain over into this wilderness,' wrote William Stough-
ton in 1668, and this 'sober and judicial statement,' as Calvin Coolidge
called it, indicates how the first-comers viewed the rest of the world in
terms of themselves. The peculiar combination of individualism and
conformity which still marks the State was given divine sanction by the
theology brought by the first inhabitants. Calvinism, which had deposed
heaven's hierarchy of saints, increased the prestige of the individual; but
the doctrine of Providence, which taught that God's gifts must not be
used for selfish ends, permitted the individual to act only as the group
decreed. Individuals outside the group were feared and combated. Since
conformity breeds non-conformists, rebels appeared and split off from
the main group they in turn to conform and to breed rebellion.
With the expulsion of Anne Hutchinson, Roger Williams, and their
followers, the inhabitants of the Bay Colony proved, at least to them-
selves, their right to be winnowed grain. Succeeding Roger Williams at
Salem in 1636, however, came an even more radical minister, Hugh Peter.
Master Hugh, a member of the first Harvard Board of Overseers, while
still in London had advocated State employment relief, slum clearance,
and prison reform. In the New World he proposed the wholesale abolition
of English law and the substitution therefor of a new concise legal code
understandable by the common people. Perhaps it was as well for the
peace of mind of the colonists that he returned to England, where un-
fortunately he got himself beheaded for his plain speaking. But the east
wind blew; the Church of England was granted toleration, and a wider
freedom of worship slowly followed. Yet worshipers still sat in their
Clues to Its Character
pews strictly according to rank; democracy was highly limited; and a
large section of the people, including indentured servants, women, and
the propertyless, remained disenfranchised for more than a century.
The gale of pamphleteering, musketeering, committee organizing,
speech-making, and political scribbling which blew throughout the
eighteenth century ceased abruptly late in the lygo's. A lone voice rose
but was unheard, that of William Manning, Billerica farmer. 'I see,'
wrote this Jeffersonian radical, painfully forming his letters, ' almost the
first blood that was shed in Concord fite and scores of men dead, dying
and wounded in the Cause of Libberty I believed then and still be-
liev it is a good cause which we aught to defend to the very last.' The
editor of the Independent Chronicle of Boston, to whom Manning sent his
appeal, was jailed on the Federalist charge of 'seditious libel.' Meanwhile
Daniel Shays and his lieutenant Luke Day had armed their cohorts of
impoverished farmers near Worcester, and had been dispersed by a
militia subsidized by Boston merchants. A new cloud big with wind, the
rising of which farmers such as Manning and Shays could not foresee,
was bulking in the sky: the young 'mechanick' class of the industrial
towns.
Against the background of the demands of the skilled mechanics and
factory operatives for popular education, legislative reform, and political
representation which characterized the 1840*8, rose transcendentalism, a
kind of neo-puritanism which symbolized, on the plane of ideas, the
conflict going on in the real world between the Colonial system of small
self-sufficient industry and the new mode of factory production. On the
social field transcendentalism had a single watchword: harmony. Not
through hatred, collision, the war of class against class, transcendentalists
insisted, could come social adjustment, but only through the reconciling
of interests. In this belief the Unitarians founded Brook Farm and the
Universalists Hopedale. Josiah Warren was holding his 'parlor conver-
sations' and opening his 'time stores,' in which goods were paid for in
scrip representing labor-time. Brisbane, aided by Horace Greeley, was
moving his paper The Phalanx to Brook Farm and renaming it The
Harbinger. It was a time of optimism, of revolt against tradition and
convention, of faith in the infinite perfectibility of the human race
and the particular perfectibility of the Yankee. It was the glorious
adolescence of the most precocious of the states.
Throughout the three hundred years of the State's history the east
wind blew steadily among its women, producing such champions of
women's rights as Mary Lyon, Mary Livermore, Lucy Stone, Susan
Massachusetts: The General Background
Anthony, Lydia Maria Child, and Margaret Fuller. The first attempt
of women to exercise the right of free assembly was made by Anne
Hutchinson, who after being tried on a joint charge of sedition and
heresy was banished from Boston in 1638. Mary Dyer, twice banished,
returned to Boston in 1660 to test the legality of the law which sentenced
to death Quakers who visited the colony after being expelled, and was
publicly hanged. An early rebel against the discrimination suffered by
women in industry was Louisa Morton Green, who refused to do man's
work at a spindle in a Dedham woolen mill unless she was paid man's
wages. Working fourteen hours a day for two dollars a week and board,
she found time to study to be a school teacher, and later became active
in the anti-slavery cause, industrial reform, and woman suffrage. An
early organizer of the Red Cross, and its first president, was Clara
Barton. In medicine, religion, astronomy, physics, education, and the
arts, scores of Massachusetts women battled for their sex. Phillis Wheat-
ley was one of a long line of Negro women of Massachusetts who con-
tributed to the State's literature, art, and social movements.
Nowhere has the east wind blown so vigorously in the State as through
the schools. The spirit of the famous Act of 1647, which required each
township of fifty families to have a primary school and each township
of one hundred families to establish a grammar school, remained in force
for two hundred years. An early governor of the State, James Sullivan,
urged its citizens to throw off ' the trammels they had forged for us ' -
they, of course, being the English and called for an American system of
general public education, remarking, 'Where the mass of people are
ignorant, poor and miserable, there is no public opinion excepting what
is the offspring of fear.' As late as 1834 the Association of Farmers,
Mechanics, and Other Workingmen demanded at its convention a better
quality of instruction in the public schools. Not until Horace Mann
fought his bitter battle as Secretary of the Board of Education did the
State acquire a decent system of graded schools, with properly qualified,
trained, and compensated teachers.
For more than two centuries the State has been predominantly in-
dustrial and commercial. As early as 1699 Edward Ward complained:
* The Inhabitants seem very Religious, showing many outward and visible
signs of an inward and Spiritual Grace: But tho' they wear in their Faces
the Innocence of Doves, you will find them in their Dealings as Subtile
as Serpents. Interest is their Faith, Money their God, and Large Pos-
sessions the only Heaven they covet.' Although the nineteenth century,
with its wind of liberalism, proved these strictures one-sided, it is worth
Clues to Its Character
recalling that the Massachusetts Bay Company was a joint stock com-
pany organized solely for profit, that the State early became a centre
for the accumulation of capital employed in the South and West, and
that the first corporation as the term is understood today arose in the
State.
The essentially urban character of the people is emphasized by the
fact that every citizen literally lives 'in town,' as the 316 towns and 39
cities comprise the total area of the State. At the town meetings, still
held in ninety- three per cent of corporate communities in New England,
qualified voters elect their selectmen, the chairman or moderator, and
administrative officers. Under pressure from large and mixed popula-
tions, certain towns still unwilling to adopt representative city govern-
ment have devised the ' limited town meeting/ attended by elected
delegates chosen by vote according to precinct. Although the town
meeting is supposed to favor the perpetuation of what has been
called 'a sort of untitled squirarchy,' its champions maintain that this
method of government at least keeps public officials under constant
public scrutiny.
In spite of the 'town' character of its political life, there are farmers
in the State 163,219 of them. Regardless of their low birth rate and
in the face of no growth of the farming population in the United States
as a whole, they are increasing. The value of their holdings is slowly
going up, and most of them own their farms. Here the Massachusetts
tendency to smallness is manifest, as the farms are of few acres and well
distributed, just as the State Forests are more numerous and smaller
than in any other state.
When Boston was Tory, rural Massachusetts was Whig. When Boston
was Federalist, rural Massachusetts was Republican and radical. Even
today a rural resident of the State when not a Republican is a different
breed of Democrat. The hinterland's distrust of the political power of
the metropolis is apparent in the fact that the Boston police force is under
the control not of the mayor but of a commissioner appointed by the
Governor who, although he no longer need be certified as 'a Christian
worth 1000,' receives a lower salary than the Mayor of Boston. But
the farmer, with all his political difference, partakes of the racial ad-
mixture and the turn of mind of other residents of the State. He, too, is
very likely to be a trader, though he may do most of his trading with
'summer people' visiting the Berkshires or. the Cape.
Making a campaign speech for Lincoln at Philadelphia in 1860, Charles
Francis Adams of Massachusetts, facing what he termed ' the most con-
8 Massachusetts: The General Background
servative city in America/ half apologized for coming from 'a more
excitable community.' The State has always been full of stimulating
cross-winds. Life within its borders has never been conditioned by the
slow swing of the seasons, the easy tilling of an abundant earth. Ma-
rooned on a rocky soil, Massachusetts men had to be ingenious to survive,
and they early became skilled at devising shrewd 'notions,' commercial
and intellectual. Used to dealing with people, they learned to think in
small and individual terms rather than in broad geographical concepts.
The ideal supposed in Europe to be the tenet of all Americans, that be-
cause a thing is bigger it is somehow better, was never adopted by
Massachusetts.
Skillful of hand, sharp at a bargain, stubborn of mind, the Bay Stater
possesses a character which with its mixture of shrewdness and idealism
is often labeled hypocrisy. He exhibits a strong tendency to conform
provided he thinks conformity is his own idea. But let conformity be
thrust upon him, and the east wind again begins to thrum ! The blowing
of that wind brought to the State much early social legislation: the child
labor law in 1836, a law legalizing trade unions in 1842, the first State
board of health, the first minimum wage law for women and children,
and the first State tuberculosis sanatorium. Against general opposition,
first use was made of inoculation and of ether as an anesthetic within the
State.
Massachusetts is parochial, yet it is never long out of the main cur-
rents of American life. It is a State of tradition, but part of its tradition
is its history of revolt. Its people are fiercely individualistic, yet they
have fierce group loyalties. It is noted for conservatism, yet it exports
not only shoes and textiles but rebels to all corners of the earth. Its
sons and daughters live in small houses, worship in small churches,
work in small factories, produce small things, and vote in small political
units, yet time and again their largeness of spirit has burst beyond State
borders.
NATURAL SETTING
THE land of Massachusetts is a product of millions of years of wearing
down and building up; erosion by water, wind, and ice; lifting of plains
and seashore; filling in of valleys and troughs; eruption of volcanoes;
intrusions of lava; and the invasion of continental glaciers. Rocks that
must have had their origin thousands of feet below the surface may be
found cropping out all over the State. Formations that once were simple
and deposited on level planes are now complex and metamorphic rocks,
warped, truncated, and steeply dipped the results of physical and
chemical changes that could have taken place only under extreme heat
and at times of terrestrial cataclysms. Everywhere is the evidence that
once-lofty mountains have been worn down to plain-level, and that one-
time deep valleys have been filled in and raised to great heights.
At the beginning of known geologic time, three mountain masses of
granitic rock, alternating with sea channels, extended northeast across
the State. Strata were deposited on the shore of the Champlain Channel
west of the Hoosac Mountain, in the narrow gulf which ran from Gaspe
Point to Worcester, and in the trough from Rhode Island to the Bay of
Fundy. Then came the period of the making of the Appalachian Moun-
tains, of which the Hoosac Mountain and its continuation in the Green
Mountains represented the axis. As a result of this cataclysm, the older
Paleozoic elastics were metamorphized limestone into marble, muds
and gravels into slate and schist, and some of the sandstone into quart-
zite.
This raising of surface was followed by a renewed activity of the streams
in wearing down the land masses. By the carboniferous era, the whole
State had been reduced to a peneplain, and coal measures had been
deposited in the Rhode Island-Nova Scotia basin, and in the Gaspe-
Worcester trough.
In the next geologic era, the rock formations of the Connecticut
Valley region had slipped down, and the sea had inundated the latter up
to the northern boundary of the State. This twenty-mile-wide estuary
gradually filled from the higher levels with materials that later were to
become the sandstones, shales, and conglomerates of the valley. But
during the formation of these rocks there occurred great outflows of lava,
io Massachusetts: The General Background
which covered in some places the older weak formation and, forming the
traprock, resisted erosion so that they stand today as the prominent
elevations of the valley.
All New England in a later period was reduced by erosion to a base-
level, with the southeastern margin of Massachusetts submerged under
a shallow sea. But by the end of this geologic era, the whole of the Ap-
palachian region was uplifted, and Massachusetts was raised to a plateau
of moderate elevation. The rivers again appeared to repeat the process
of erosion, and the dissected topography of the uplands of the State is
a present indication of that activity.
In recent geologic time, the continental ice-sheet, originating in the
Laurentian region, crept down over New England, advancing as far
south as Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, and Long Island. During its
advance, it picked up rocks which became embedded in the ice, and with
these it scraped the soil and ground the mountains. It dammed rivers
and changed courses, formed lakes, and deeply altered the character of
the land. Upon its retreat, it left behind a terminal moraine which made
and shaped Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket. Over the
whole land it spread glacial debris of soil, rocks, and boulders.
The complex geologic history of Massachusetts has resulted in a
widely varied landscape patchwork. Within a small area, the State
offers a great variety of terrain rugged coasts, barren sand beaches,
wild mountains, green valleys, and upland plateaus.
The State as a whole, however, may be divided into four physiographic
types: coastal lowlands, interior lowlands, dissected uplands, and residuals
of ancient mountains.
The coastal lowlands spread out at Narragansett Bay, cutting through
the middle of Rhode Island and across Massachusetts to the New Hamp-
shire line near the Merrimack River. Thus they take in the eastern
part of the State, including the Cape Cod peninsula and the islands off
the mainland. The whole coastline of Massachusetts, with its rugged
mountainous shore and deep indentations, is evidence of an early sub-
mergence and a later uplift of the area. The submerged river mouths,
the many good harbors and bays of Boston, Buzzard, and Narragansett,
are prominent features of the topography of Massachusetts. Farther
inland, the effect of the lowering of the coastal plain is found in the falls
and rapids of the rivers.
In the northeastern section of this division the bed-rock is near the
surface, and rock-outcrops are found in many places. It is this out-
cropping along the coast that gives the North Shore of Massachusetts
Natural Setting 1 1
its rugged and picturesque character. This division is also characterized
by the many shallow troughs and basins that are eroded on the softer
rocks and enclosed by the higher lands of resistant formations. The two
largest and most important of these depressions are the Boston and
Narragansett Basins.
The most outstanding feature of the division is, without doubt, the
peninsula of Cape Cod, which extends for sixty-five miles in the form
of an arm bent upward at the elbow. This owes its origin to the glacier,
and was refashioned by the sea and wind. Near here are also many
islands of the same origin Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, and the
sixteen Elizabeth islands. The glacial outwash plains of Martha's Vine-
yard and Nantucket are now broad grassy heaths. The southern side
of the delta-like plain of Cape Cod has been cut along high cliffs by the
surf and waves. Here the plain is covered with a growth of pitch pine
and scrub oak. Much of the * forearm' of the Cape is a bleak grassy
country, while the outer end is a wild and desolate region with long
yellow beaches. Lacking land fit for farming, the Cape and Islands have
reared a distinctive type of hardy men who 'farm ' the sea.
In the interior of Massachusetts, there are two lowlands or valleys:
the Connecticut River Valley and the Berkshire Valley. Each of these
is enclosed by uplands. The Connecticut River Valley is a lens-shaped
trench extending from the northern boundary of the State to Long
Island Sound, and is drained throughout its length by the Connecticut
River. Its weak red sandstones give its soil a distinctive ruddy tint.
The landscape throughout the valley is dominated by curved wooded
ridges that run longitudinally and owe their origin to intrusive trap-
lava which resisted erosion after the weaker layers were worn away.
Some of these traprock elevations rise, in the southern part, high above
the valley, ranging from 954 feet to 1628 feet in Mounts Holyoke, Tom,
Toby, and Grace.
The Connecticut Valley, with its rich soil and mild climate, has be-
come a productive agricultural country, as well as the seat of many
prosperous and populous cities and towns. Its broad open meadows,
reddish soil, and tobacco and onion fields present an aspect somewhat
unusual in New England.
The Berkshire Valley, shut off by the Berkshire plateau in the east
and the Taconic Mountains in the west, is an isolated world of its own.
The northern part of the valley is watered by streams that cut through
the Taconics to the Hudson, and the southern part by the headwaters
of the Housatonic. From Pittsfield northward it is only six miles wide;
12 Massachusetts: The General Background
but southward it opens up into the meadowlands of Great Barrington,
Lenox, and Sheffield. The valley with its green meadows is largely
devoted to dairy farming, and lives a peaceful, isolated life.
The uplands of Massachusetts are two divisions separated by the Con-
necticut River, but joining north of the valley to form the great central
upland of northern New England.
The western uplands, or, as they are commonly known, the Berk-
shire Hills, are a continuation of the Vermont Green Mountains, deeply
dissected and composed of a number of ranges and small valleys. The
Taconic Range, on the extreme border of the State, attains its highest
elevation in Mount . Greylock at 3535 feet, and decreases to the south,
where Mount Washington in the southeastern corner of Massachusetts
rises 2624 feet. The Hoosac Range, farther east, varies in altitude from
1 200 to 1600 feet, with Spruce Hill at 2588 feet as its highest point.
In the Vermont Green Mountains, only the valleys are cultivated and
inhabited; but here in Massachusetts, farms and hamlets are found on
the tops of the elevations, often at high altitudes. This is the country
of the famous 'hill towns' of the Berkshires, which attract many visitors
during the summer to enjoy the health-giving atmosphere and surround-
ing scenic beauty. The best known of these hill towns are Florida and
Peru. East of these ranges, the uplands slope southeasterly toward the
Connecticut River Valley, and are deeply cut by such streams as the
Deerfield, Westfield, and Farmington Rivers. The most picturesque of
these rivers is the Deerfield, which has an impressive canyon-like valley
through the plateau.
The eastern uplands of Worcester County rise gradually from the
Connecticut River Valley eastward to an elevation of noo feet in the
middle of the State, then slope down toward the coast. This plateau
is an extension of the White Mountains of New Hampshire, which cross
Massachusetts into Connecticut. The outstanding features of the plateau
are the monadnocks of Mount Wachusett and Mount Watatic, solitary
remnants of once lofty mountains.
In general, the topography of Massachusetts is a varied patchwork
of physiographic features, the eroded remnants of once high mountains,
leveled to a plateau which has been deeply dissected by streams, and
scraped and reformed by glaciers. It affords, from its indented and rocky
coast in the east to its lofty hills in the extreme west, a cross-section of
the Appalachian Mountain system in its old age, when it was covered
by the continental ice-sheet. Moreover, this varied topography has had
a great influence upon the lives and occupations of its people the
Natural Setting 13
fishermen of the coast, the urban dwellers of eastern cities, the industrial
workers along the waterways of the mill towns, the suburban farmers,
the large-scale planters of the Connecticut Valley, and the Berkshire
natives, still somewhat isolated and provincial.
FLORA
Massachusetts lies in an area characterized by a forest cover composed
mainly of trees which shed their leaves yearly about the time of approach-
ing winter. Nevertheless, within the State are to be found well-defined
areas with quite different floristic makeup. These subdivisions might
be called: the Cape Cod region; the area of the sea margin extending
from Cape Cod to the New Hampshire line; the upland region of Central
Massachusetts; and the rugged area of the Berkshires in the western part
of the State. To the above might also be added the tops of the two high-
est points of land within the State, Mount Greylock and Mount Wa-
chusett.
In the morainal and outwash area characterizing Cape Cod is found a
floristic composition similar in certain respects to that of southern New
Jersey, since the Cape is really the only close approach to coastal plain
within the State.
Northward along the seacoast are many plants which do not stray far
from the influence of the sea. Exceptions range from the low-growing
beach plants to the marsh grasses, sedges, and rushes.
By far the largest area of the State is included in the upland region,
which is covered by a typical northern deciduous forest of maples, birches,
beeches, oaks, with a scattering of pine and an occasional stand of hem-
lock and larch. The forest floor is covered with a host of low-growing
herbs varying according to their particular habitat. In the low marshy
spots will be found many early spring plants such as skunk cabbage,
American white hellebore, marsh marigold, white and blue violets; while
on the drier slopes grow the false spikenard, Solomon's-seal, Canada
mayflower, wild oats, and various trilliums. From early spring to late
fall there is a constant parade of gorgeous color with such striking plants
as rhodora, azalea, mountain laurel, shad, dogwood, viburnum, aug-
mented by innumerable herbaceous types. The ferns add materially to
the charm of the landscape, from the low, delicate maidenhair spleenwort
to the large, graceful osmundas.
14 Massachusetts: The General Background
The Berkshires offer still another scenic and floristic type, much more
rugged than the last, and to some much more beautiful. The forest is
still of the deciduous type, but with a ground cover differing in certain
respects, for here will be found plants more often associated with cooler
regions of the North.
Space does not permit mention of the great variety of plants growing
within the State, but there 'are available at least three collections of
mounted plants. The herbarium of the New England Botanical Club,
located at the Gray Herbarium at Harvard University, has an excellent
representative collection. The herbarium of the Hadwen Botanical Club,
located at Clark University in Worcester, specializes in the flora of
Worcester County, which is of the general upland region; while that at
Amherst College in Amherst contains plants of the western region. All
three of these herbaria are available to the genuinely interested person.
Harvard University also maintains the famous Arnold Arboretum where
trees and shrubs are appropriately planted and labeled.
FAUNA
The effigy of a codfish hanging since 1784 in the assembly room of the
State House on Beacon Hill, and the fact that early settlers used beaver
skins as currency, testify to the firmness with which the existence of early
Massachusetts men was rooted in the abundance of wild life. Fishing
has maintained its economic importance through three centuries, but
when in 1636 William Pynchon removed to the wilderness of Springfield
to trade in beaver, he signified the beginning of a process of extinction
of Massachusetts fauna halted only in recent years.
The forests preserve today a much narrower range of wild life. The
gray wolf and the black bear have been extirpated. The lynx, once com-
mon, only accidentally finds its way into the mountainous portions of
the State at long intervals. The beaver is gone. The northern Virginia
deer, almost driven out during the nineteenth century, has appeared in
larger numbers in late years, but is scarce. Of the larger forms of wild
life, only the fox holds its own. In spite of hunters, the red fox, cross fox,
and black fox are still commonly seen.
Of the family Leporidae, the eastern varying hare or white rabbit is
occasionally seen. The northern cottontail or gray rabbit is more un-
common. The family Muridae is represented by many varieties of mice
Natural Setting 15
and rats and by the muskrat. The skunk is very common in open wood-
lands and fields. There are two varieties of weasels: the little brown
weasel, often seen in stony places, and the New York weasel, which is
not very common and usually lives in the woods. The large brown mink is
sometimes found along the coast. Shrews and moles exist in numbers,
and several varieties of bat are common. Especially large is the family
of Rodentia, whose members are the northern gray squirrel and the
southern red squirrel, the chipmunk or ground squirrel, the woodchuck
or groundhog, the rare Canadian flying squirrel, and the more common
southern flying squirrel. A most remarkable creature, the one member
in the State of the family Zapodidae, is the Hudson Bay jumping mouse.
Whales, though no longer numerous, are sometimes sighted off the
coast or washed up on the beach. Many varieties of snakes are found, as
are lizards, tortoises, and toads, frogs, and salamanders.
The seacoast and secluded streams and ponds inland are the home of
a large variety of water, marsh, and shore birds, including the diving
birds, the grebe, the puflin, guillemot, murre, razor-billed auk, little auk,
and loon. The great northern loon and the red- throated loon visit the
State during part of the year.
The gulls and terns are the best-known members of the long-winged
swimmers. In this same class are the skuas and jaegers, virtually sea-
hawks, with powerful wings, beaks, and claws.
The tube-nosed swimmers, having tubular nostrils and exceptional
powers of flight, are represented by fulmars, shearwaters, and petrels.
The four-toed, fully-webbed, Totipolmate order of water birds includes
gannets, cormorants, and man-o'-war birds.
Among the better-known river ducks are the black, red-legged black,
baldpate, and wood ducks. Rarer varieties include the mallard, European
widgeon, golden teal, blue-winged teal, and American pintail. The sea
ducks are the canvasback scaup, lesser scaup, golden-eye, bufflehead,
old-squaw, eider, and scoter ducks, as well as the rare ring-necked and
harlequin varieties. The Canada and brant goose visit the State during
part of the year, though not in great numbers, and the whistling swan is
a rare migrant.
Of Herodiones are the great blue heron, little blue heron, green heron,
black-crowned night heron, bittern, and the rare least bittern. A few
examples of the order Paludicolae still remain, chiefly the sora and yellow
rail ; gallimulea and coots are rare, and the crane is merely an accidental
visitor.
The shore birds are waders differing from herons and marsh birds in
1 6 Massachusetts: The General Background
having a body rounded or slightly depressed rather than narrow and
compressed. Body and bill are small, and these birds build no regular
nest.
The ground-dwelling, scratching game birds are found in diminishing
numbers. Probably the ring-necked pheasant is the most common.
Bobwhites, which flourished locally when introduced and protected, are
now uncommon. The ruffed and Witlow grouse and the heath hen re-
main in only a few places. The domestic dove or pigeon is found in the
larger cities, less commonly in rural districts; and the mourning dove is
frequently seen.
Among the birds of prey are such accidental visitors as the turkey
vulture and the eagle. The hawk family has many members in the
State, as has the owl family.
The cuckoos and the belted kingfisher comprise an order by themselves.
Another order includes the woodpeckers. The Macrochire family, with
peculiar wing development and frail feet, has for members the whip-
poor-will, nighthawk, chimney swift, ruby-throated hummingbird, and
the very rare goatsucker.
The Passeres, or perching birds, are the largest of all orders. Of the
songless perching birds the tyrant flycatcher is typical. The songbirds
of the Passeres are very numerous, including the larks and starlings, the
blue jay, bobolink, cowbird, blackbird, meadowlark, oriole, rusty black-
bird, and grackle. Of the family Fringillidae, the largest family of perch-
ing songbirds, the most numerous group is the sparrow with twenty
varieties.
Fish caught in the lakes and rivers and along the coast of Massachu-
setts include alewives, bass, rockbass, bluefish, bonito, butterfish, carp,
catfish, cod, cunners, cusk, eels, flounders, haddock, hake, halibut, her-
ring, kingfish, mackerel, Spanish mackerel, perch, pickerel, pollock,
salmon, scup, shad, skate, smelt, sturgeon, swordfish, tautog, torn-cod,
trout, turbot, and weakfish. The State is well known for its shellfish:
clams, lobsters, oysters, scallops, and shrimp.
By a not unusual human phenomenon, as wild life has declined, in-
terest in natural history has increased. In the mid-nineteenth century
Agassiz laid the basis for a pre-eminence in the field of biology retained
by Massachusetts institutions to this day. Agassiz 's pioneer work in
classification was carried on by his son, and his students became foremost
scientists Jeffries Wyman, Nathaniel Southgate Shaler, Burt G.
Wilder, among others. The biological museum at Harvard bears Agas-
siz's name, and he founded the Marine Biological Institute at Woods
Natural Setting 17
Hole. The splendid theoretical and practical work being done by the
Massachusetts Bureau of Fisheries, the biological departments of Massa-
chusetts universities, the Boston Society of Natural History, the State
Department of Conservation may be properly said to owe much to the
pioneer labors of the Swiss-American scientist.
Massachusetts philosophers and naturalists from Thoreau to Dallas
Lore Sharp have drawn much of their inspiration from native wild life.
Artists, too, have turned to birds and animals for their subjects, notably
Frank W. Benson, the well-known painter and etcher of waterfowl, whose
work may be seen in many private galleries and in the Boston Museum
of Fine Arts, as well as Charles Heil, whose studies of birds in water-
colors are exceptional.
Of the organizations which foster the study of nature in a broader sense,
the Boston Society of Natural History, founded in 1830, itself the out-
growth of the Linnaean Society dating back to 1814, is evidence of the
early interest in the subject. The Audubon Society, the Field and Forest
Club, the Appalachian Mountain Club, the Green Mountain Club, and
numerous bird clubs throughout the State serve to center the interest of
nature-lovers today.
FIRST AMERICANS
THE remote ancestors of the Indian tribes in Massachusetts were a
hunting and fishing people without agriculture. They had learned to
fashion several varieties of stone implements, but did not use either
tobacco, pottery, or axes. These early people were probably related to
the Beothuk red Indians of Newfoundland, and burial places belonging
to their culture have been unearthed at Marblehead and near Fresh
Pond in Cambridge. Excavations at Grassy Island in Berkley on the
Taunton River indicate the presence of an ancient village, established
by the depth of the salt peat overlay as being at least one thousand years
old.
The Indians encountered by the first Europeans in Massachusetts
belonged to the Algonquin linguistic stock, and occupied the large area
ranging from the Maritime Provinces of Canada to the Gulf of Florida
and as far west as the Mississippi. The old Algonquins of Massachusetts
came from the west, gradually pushing the pre-Algonquin inhabitants
to the coast, where they were finally assimilated or wiped out. Favorite
camping places were the areas near the falls of the larger rivers, which
were later picked by the white men as sites for dams and factories.
Roger Williams has preserved the legend that a crow brought a grain
of corn in one ear and a bean in the other from the field of the great god
Kauntantouwit in the southwest. This fable assumes historical im-
portance in view of the fact that it was precisely the old Algonquins,
coming from the west and south, who introduced agriculture. They also
brought with them the art of pottery-making, although its forms were
restricted to tobacco pipes and cooking vessels. Many of the vessels had
pointed bases, made to be supported by hearthstones and not suspended
over the fire. Ornamentation consisted largely of lines and dots arranged
in zones or other patterns, one of the most persistent of which was a
zigzag design commonly found in pottery from the mound groups of the
Ohio region.
Like their white successors, the earliest Massachusetts Indians got
much of their food from the sea. Some of the tribes made desultory visits
to the salt water; others lived permanently near the shore. Clams,
quahogs, scallops, and oysters formed an important addition to their
First Americans 19
food supply, and the shells heaped up in the course of many years have
aided in preserving fragments of their pottery and the more perishable
implements used in their rude arts. An invasion of the Iroquois separated
the old Algonquin and later Algonquin cultures. Shell beads belong almost
invariably to the later Algonquin period. Pottery vessels shaped in globu-
lar form for suspension over the fire and terra cotta pipes of the later
Algonquins show Iroquois influence. The purple quahog shell wam-
pum and the white wampum were borrowed from the Dutch of Long
Island.
The occasional presence in early Indian graves of porcelain and glass
beads and of copper and brass ornaments emphasizes the fact that early
contact of Europeans with Massachusetts Indians did not begin at
Plymouth. In the year 1578, for example, no fewer than four hundred
European vessels were engaged in whaling and fishing along the New
England coast, and most of these traded with the Indians. The ' Skeleton
in Armor' found at Fall River in 1831 wore a brass breastplate about
fourteen inches long, and around his lower torso was a belt of brass tubes
closed together lengthwise. The fact that similar tubes arranged in like
manner had been found in Denmark made Longfellow believe that the
grave was that of a Norseman, and in this belief he wrote his poem. Later
examination showed that the skeleton was that of an Indian not ante-
dating 1650, and as no Indian could have manufactured brass, the
* armor ' was probably hammered from a brass kettle received in trade.
On Dighton Rock, a sandstone boulder, eleven feet high, on Assonet
Neck in Berkley, appear pecked incisions of questionable origin, some ap-
parently alphabetical and some pictorial. Certain authorities have read
among them a Latin record of a visit of the Portuguese Miguel Cortereal
some years after he and his ship disappeared from history on the rocky
coast of Newfoundland in 1502, supporting their case by recalling a local
Indian legend that strange men in a wooden house came up the river and
fought with the natives.
However vague pre-Colonial history of the Indians must remain, we
know that during the early Colonial period seven tribes inhabited
Massachusetts: the Massachusetts, the Wampanoags, the Nausets, the
Pennacooks, the Nipmucks, the Pocumtucs, and the Mohicans.
The Massachusetts dominated the territory enclosed in a circle drawn
through Boston and Charlestown harbors, Maiden, Nantucket, Hingham,
Weymouth, Braintree, and Dorchester. Before the arrival of the first
settlers the Massachusetts had reached the height of their importance.
The plague of 1616-17 wrecked their power, and by 1631 they numbered
2O Massachusetts: The General Background
only about five hundred. Ultimately they were gathered into the villages
of the Christianized or Praying Indians almost the last act of a tragic
drama.
The Wampanoags held sovereignty over the whole tract from Cape
Cod to Massachusetts Bay, with some control over the petty tribes of
the interior.
The Nausets, a friendly tribe who accepted the white man as a brother,
occupied Cape Cod and the adjacent islands under the dominion of the
Wampanoags. Most of them became Christianized before King Philip's
War. Nauset Light at Truro commemorates these gentle red men.
The Pennacooks, allied with the quarrelsome Abanaki of Maine who
continually raided the lands of the Massachusetts, originally inhabited
northern Massachusetts. At the close of King Philip's War in 1676 the
remnant of the Pennacooks migrated to Canada.
The Nipmucks roamed the eastern interior of Massachusetts from
Boston on the east to Bennington, Vermont, on the west. Concord, New
Hampshire, on the north, and Connecticut and Rhode Island on the
south bounded their territory, which centered in Worcester County.
The Pocumtucs, whose chief village was near the present town of
Deerfield, dominated all the Indians of the Connecticut Valley in Massa-
chusetts.
Like the Massachusetts, the Mohicans, popularly memorialized in
Cooper's novel, were decimated by the plague of 1616-17. This tribe
had originally ranged from New York into the upper portions of the
Housa tonic Valley. In 1664 their Council moved its fire from Albany to
Stockbridge, Massachusetts. From Stockbridge some of the Mohicans
migrated to the Susquehanna River, but the remnants of this picturesque
people were gathered into a mission at Stockbridge a forlorn hope for
perpetuation.
All these Indians were typical long-headed Algonquins, with smooth
skins, swarthy complexions, black hair and eyes, and high foreheads.
They had broad shoulders and brawny arms, but lean bellies, flat knees,
and small hands and feet. Their skins were redder and less coppery than
those of their western relations.
The men wore in winter a costume later adopted by white hunters
leggings, dressed buckskin shirts, breech clouts and moccasins, and
sometimes fur caps. In summer the breech clouts and moccasins formed
a complete costume. Women wore leggings and long gowns. Garments
were decorated with fringes and sometimes painted with simple designs.
Both sexes painted their faces. Tattooing was confined to the cheeks,
First Americans 21
upon which totemic figures were permanently placed by the insertion of
black pigment beneath the surface of the skin. The men plucked their
beards, and hair was dressed in various styles according to the sex, age,
and station of the individual.
The primary weapon was the wooden bow strung with moose sinew,
and wooden arrows tipped with stone or bone and carried in quivers of
otter skin. In warfare the usual offensive weapon was the tomahawk,
with bark shields serving to some extent for defense.
Communities were built on hunting and agriculture. The members of
the tribes or communities were the recognized proprietors of certain
hunting, fishing, and agricultural lands, held as a rule in common. The
winter villages were usually situated in warm, thickly wooded valleys
near a lake or river. The early spring was spent on the fishing grounds,
and when the planting season arrived the tribe moved to its summer
fields. Each family had its garden of corn, beans, pumpkins, squash,
artichokes, and tobacco, cultivated with hoes of stone, wood, or clam
shells and fertilized by herring and shad. Wild berries, roots, and nuts
furnished other sources of food, supplemented by fish and by the meat of
the larger mammals preserved by cutting in strips and smoke-drying.
The Indians divided themselves very strictly into three social classes:
those of royal blood, including the sachems, shamans, elders of the council,
and subordinate chiefs; commoners or freemen with rights to the tribal
lands; and 'outsiders' of alien blood, usually captives, with no tribal
rights. Descent was commonly reckoned through the female line, and the
office of head chief or sachem was hereditary. If tribes were large and
important they might be governed by several under-chiefs, and each
tribe had a council of elders of noble blood. The shamans or pow-wows
possessed great influence. They were partly seers, partly wizards, and
partly physicians. When, as occasionally happened, the offices of sachem
and shaman were combined, the person vested with this dual authority
held tremendous power.
Polygamy was fairly common, and divorce was approved and frequent,
the right being exercised as freely by women as by men. Justice was a
simple matter. If any tribesman was wronged, all related to him were
bound to see that proper restitution was made. Murder was avenged or
suitably punished by the kinsmen of the victim.
The Algonquins believed that Manitou, a supernatural power, was
inherent in all things. An evil power personified as Mattand was feared
and placated. Elaborate communal ceremonies celebrated the harvest,
and rituals concerned with sun, rainfall, and a plenitude of game were
22 Massachusetts: The General Background
performed religiously. In all these ceremonies, as in secular matters,
smoking had definite significance.
On a day in March, 1621, a flurry was created among the citizens of
Plymouth when a strange Indian suddenly appeared, quite alone, in the
middle of Leyden Street. He caused even greater excitement when, with
an air of grave friendliness, he spoke two words in English: 'Welcome,
Englishmen!' The stranger was Saihoset, a member of one of Massa-
chusetts' first families come to offer aid to these white aliens. He had
learned a few words of English from casual fishermen at Monhegan, and
he spoke them with unconscious drama, unaware that they spelled the
doom of his race. .
When the Pilgrims first arrived in the new country, they settled on
lands belonging to Massasoit, chief of the Wampanoags, whose favorite
residence was at Pokanoket (Mount Hope, Bristol, Rhode Island), a spot
which was to witness the death not only of his son Philip but of the hopes
of his race. On April i, 1621, on Strawberry Hill, Plymouth, Massasoit
in solemn council ratified the first treaty between Indian and white man.
The treaty, effected by the good offices of Samoset, was faithfully sup-
ported by Massasoit, and lasted the fifty-four years of his lifetime.
Massasoit was never converted to Christianity, but without his generous
help the settlement of Massachusetts would have been infinitely more
difficult and perhaps impossible.
Another Indian who gave the Pilgrims much practical aid in their
adjustment to the conditions of life in a wild country among savage
peoples was Squanto, who served as an interpreter. He was one of five
Indians carried to London in 1605 by Captain George Weymouth. In
1614 he was brought back to Cape Cod by John Smith, but in the same
year he again visited England this time with Captain Thomas Dernier.
Returning to America in 1619, he fell in with the Pilgrims at Plymouth.
He is supposed to have been the only Indian to escape the Patuxet
(Plymouth) plague.
Not all tribes, of course, were friendly to the first settlers. Before the
arrival of the Pilgrims the savage Pequot (destroyer) Indians had fought
their way through from the west and settled in what is now eastern Con-
necticut. In 1636 Boston joined the towns of Hartford, Wethersfield,
and Windsor in a concerted attack against the Pequots with the aid of
the Mohicans. The remnants of the tribe were sold to the Bermudans,
who purchased no bargain, as the Indians proved to be 'sullen and
treacherous.' They were poor laborers in the fields, but as whalers and
sailors they developed considerable skill and daring.
First Americans 23
One of the most determined foes of the white settlers was King Philip,
who believed that the continued encroachment of the white men must
end in the extermination of the red men, and that the colonists were
consciously working toward this end. The gradual extension of the
colonists for two generations brought about a condition in which Indian
and white land claims conflicted. Roger Williams had once in a letter to
Governor Bradford hotly protested the validity of the land titles of the
colonists. 'Why lay such stress,' he demanded, 'upon your patent from
King James? Tis but idle parchment. James has no more right to give
away or sell Massasoit's lands and cut and carve his country than Mas-
sasoit has to sell King James' kingdom or to send Indians to colonize
Warwickshire.' In addition, the colonists had gained presumption with
power, and insisted on administering justice to everybody. To the
Indians this not only seemed an unwarrantable interference with their
rights, but also made it difficult, if not impossible, for them to obtain fair
'hearings in the English courts.
Along with his belief that the Indian must drive out the intruder or be
exterminated, Philip had perhaps a personal reason for his hatred of the
whites a belief that his brother Wamsutta had been murdered. At all
events, he prepared for war secretly and with intelligence. Shortly before
the outbreak of hostilities in 1675 the Governor of Massachusetts sent
an ambassador to Philip asking him to pledge peace. Philip returned a
proud but not undiplomatic reply: 'Your governor is but a subject of
King Charles of England. I shall not treat with a subject. I shall treat
of peace only with the King, my brother. When he comes, I am ready.'
Philip undoubtedly intended a simultaneous movement of all the
tribes on the North Atlantic seaboard against the white men. An un-
expected event, however, precipitated war a year sooner than he had
intended and destroyed his plans: the treachery of Sassamon.
The latter, one of Philip's tribe, had been converted to Christianity,
had lived at Harvard College for a short time, and was a school teacher
in the Praying Town of Natick. He became Philip's secretary, and it
was he who imparted news of Philip's plans to the Governor at Plymouth.
Philip learned of the treachery, and Sassamon's body was found in
Assawompsett Pond in Middleborough. The implication was obvious,
and the English authorities promptly apprehended three of Philip's
tribesmen and brought them to trial.
In order to give a semblance of fairness to the trial, six Indians were
included on the jury. The concurrence of the six in a verdict of guilty
could reasonably be counted on. But the court took no chances. Before
24 Massachusetts: The General Background
the six Indians were empaneled, a legal jury of twelve good (white) men
and true had been drawn. In case of a 'bolt' by the Indians, a legal
conviction was still assured. The Indians were executed in June, 1675,
creating the overt act which forced Philip's hand. Before this event no
hostilities had been undertaken by Philip or his warriors against the
whites: now he immediately attacked Swansea.
Town after town fell before him. While the English forces were march-
ing in one direction, the Indians were burning and laying waste in an-
other. The Narragansetts had not yet heartily engaged in the campaign,
though there is no doubt that they stood pledged to it. In order to secure
their strong support, Philip went to their country. This tactical necessity,
forced upon him by the precipitation of war, turned out to be fatal. In
December an army of fifteen hundred English concentrated upon this
region where Philip was known to be. The whole Narragansett Nation
was trapped in an immense swamp at South Kingston, Rhode Island, and
Philip was overwhelmingly defeated.
This was the turning-point of the war. When success in Massachusetts
no longer attended Philip's cause, his southern allies began to desert him.
He was driven from place to place, losing more and more of his warriors.
His wife and son were captured and sold into slavery; his heart and cour-
age were broken. He took shelter at last in his ancient seat at Pokanoket,
but even here there was no longer any refuge. He was driven out and
slain by one of his own men, in vengeance, according to the English report,
for the life of a brother who had been shot by Philip.
A few miles south of Kingston, a stone shaft by the railroad track
marks the grave of the Narragansett Nation. The barrel of the gun with
which Philip was killed is now in Pilgrim Hall, Plymouth, and its lock is
in the keeping of the Massachusetts Historical Society of Boston.
With the death of King Philip the power of the tribes of southern New
England was completely destroyed. The war dragged on for two years
more, until 1678. After Philip's rout, however, there was never any
doubt as to its outcome. During its course the Wampanoags and their
lesser allies, as well as the Narragansetts, were all but wiped out. The
few survivors fled northward or westward beyond the Hudson.
The extermination of the red men was not accomplished without dread-
ful casualties among the English. One in every ten of the five thousand
Englishmen of military age in the Massachusetts and Plymouth colonies
is estimated to have been killed or captured. It was forty years before
the devastated frontiers were reoccupied.
Not only among the Indians were there idealists who, like Samoset
First Americans 25
and Massasoit, believed that there could be brotherhood between red
men and white. Such idealists existed also among the colonists. One of
the most active of these was John Eliot, the 'Apostle to the Indians.'
Eliot was a sincere evangelist and a man of tremendous industry. He
mastered the Algonquin language and translated the Bible into this
tongue so that his converts might read it for themselves. He believed
that before the Indians could be converted they must first be civilized,
and in that belief the famous Praying Towns were conceived.
In founding these centers of Christian education, Eliot associated with
himself Gookin, Mayhew, and other men of intelligence and altruism.
They established some thirty Praying Towns with schools and a teacher
in each. The first was at Natick in 1651. A set of by-laws was formulated
and an Indian named Waban was appointed justice of the peace. In the
following year another Praying Town was established at Concord, and
soon there were others sprinkled over the territory from Cape Cod to
Narragansett Bay. Eliot traveled from one to another, preaching, teach-
ing, and supervising. At first he was violently opposed by the local chiefs
and priests, who feared the undermining of their power, but behind
Eliot's gospel teachings loomed the heavy shadow of the English au-
thorities, and gradually opposition was emptied of force. By 1674 there
were eleven hundred converts in Massachusetts five hundred in
Plymouth and the rest in Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard. Many of
these conversions were no doubt genuine, but whether they were due
more to religious conviction than to friendship for the white teachers is
problematical.
Eliot's plan embraced the possibility of higher education for his
proteges. The first brick building at Harvard College was erected for
Indian students, but they did not make use of it in numbers sufficient to
justify the building, and it was transformed into a printing shop. One
Indian, Caleb Cheeshahteamuck, was graduated from Harvard in the
class of 1665; at least three others studied at the college but did not
graduate.
The Indians on Cape Cod and the adjacent islands had been in large
part Christianized before the outbreak of King Philip's War. It is
probable that some of them left the Praying Towns to join Philip, as did
many from the Praying Towns around Boston.
It was the undeserved fate of the Christian Indians to be treated by
Philip as allies of the English and to be suspected by the English of
treacherous commerce with Philip. One of the blacker pages in the
history of the relations of the colonists and the Indians is the chronicle
26 Massachusetts : The General Background
of English treatment of the Christianized Naticks. Without overt act
on the part of the latter to justify any suspicion of their loyalty, they
were ordered to emigrate in the dead of winter. The Praying Town at
Wamesit (Tewksbury) was broken up, and its inhabitants driven out to
Long Island and Deer Island. The Indians suffered terribly in their con-
finement at such a season to an area where they had neither shelter nor
stores. After several weeks the General Court, yielding to adverse public
opinion, gave permission for their removal from the islands providing,
however, that this must be done without expense to the colony. Those
who had survived were taken to Cambridge, where a humane citizen,
Thomas Oliver, gave them refuge on his lands along the Charles River
until spring, when most of them returned to the ruins of their homes.
Ill, weakened by exposure and hunger, they were too feeble to maintain
many towns, and the remoter ones were abandoned.
This setback dealt a death blow to any further attempts to Christianize
the Indians. The ' Apostle to the Indians ' strove in vain. Six years after
the conclusion of King Philip's War, only four Praying Towns remained
out of some thirty thriving centers which John Eliot had established.
His life work had been undone.
The Indians at Natick, who at one time held all the town offices, were
gradually replaced by white men, and their land titles extinguished. At
various times and places Indian reservations were established. In 1861
there were reservations at Chappequiddick, Christiantown, Gay Head,
Herring Pond, Natick, and Ponkapog. But this restricted life was not
favorable to the red man. Mentally and physically, the Indians de-
generated with the taking on of the white men's vices.
Today there are only two places in Massachusetts where the Indians
have been able to preserve a semblance of their ethnic identity: Mashpee
and Gay Head. The former town, incorporated in 1871, comprises
Mashpee, South Mashpee, and a part of Wakeby. It has a public library,
a town hall, and two churches; one of the latter, the Indian Mission
Church, founded in 1684, is of interest to visitors. But the real sight in
Mashpee is the cranberry bogs, the principal support of the town, which
belong mostly to the white non-residents who employ the Indians as
pickers. In the season, bending their backs over the bog, can be seen the
half-breed descendants of the proud and friendly savages who once
roamed the windswept dunes of Cape Cod.
On the farthest tip of Martha's Vineyard, across Menemsha Pond,
rises a peninsula that ends in cliffs composed of strata of incredibly varie-
gated clays red, blue, orange, tan, and black alternating with a
HISTORICAL LANDMARKS
A GOOD many landmarks in the history of Massachusetts
are still standing. The pictures of some of these landmarks
are reproduced here: the house of John Alden, who was one
of the heroes of Longfellow's poem, 'Miles Standish'; the
Paul Revere House; the Old South Meeting-House; the Old
State House, which saw the Boston Massacre take place be-
neath the stately carvings of the Lion and the Unicorn which
adorn its roof".
Also included among the pictures are two ships, for the sea
has always been important in the making of Massachusetts.
First is the ' Arbella ' a reconstruction which floats on
the waters of the Salem Harbor not far from the spot where
the original vessel dropped anchor in 1630. And there is the
frigate l Constitution,' famous for its victories in the War of
1812, and the subject of Holmes's poem, 'Old Ironsides.'
THE ARBELLA, SALEM
JOHN ALDEN HOUSE, DUXBURY
PAUL REVERE HOUSE, BOSTON
COMMODORE'S QUARTERS, u.s. FRIGATE CONSTITU
nCETHAT
' HED THE TLOOD,
fP. FLA
BRET r <LED r
FARMER'
FIRED THE SHOT HEAKD
ROUND Tiff: WORLD.
THE MINUTEMAN STATUE, CONCORD
I
OLD SOUTH MEETING HOUSE, BOSTON
LEYDEN ST., PLYMOUTH, FIRST STREET IN MASSACHUSETTS
OLD STATE HOUSE, BOSTON
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS HOUSE, UiNCY
First Americans 27
dazzling white sandy substance. This is Gay Head. From these bright
clays the Indians, who have kept their racial stock more nearly pure here
than elsewhere, fashion small vases and jars which preserve the designs
and patterns inherited from remote ancestors. The sale of these souvenirs
by silent Indian children waiting by the roadside for the hordes of sum-
mer tourists is the last reminder of a primitive culture that could not
survive the rape of its free forests and wide lands.
ENOUGH OF ITS HISTORY
TO EXPLAIN ITS PEOPLE
MASSACHUSETTS (mas-sa-chu'sets) 190 miles long, 60 to 100 miles broad,
8266 square miles in area; bounded northerly by New Hampshire and Vermont,
westerly by New York, southerly by Connecticut, Rhode Island, and the At-
lantic, easterly by Massachusetts Bay and the Atlantic, lies between the
parallels of 41 10' and 42 53' north latitude and between 69 57' and 73
30' west latitude. Its name is a combination of three Algonquin words mean-
ing 'near the great mountain': adchu (mountain or hill), set (location near or in
the vicinity of), massu (great).
MASSACHUSETTS' history begins not with the landing of the Pilgrims
at Plymouth but when Martin Luther dramatically nailed his ninety-five
theses to the church door at Wittenberg. The Protestant Reformation
from which the religious dissension of the reign of Henry VIII may be
traced drove Pilgrim and Puritan to Massachusetts in quest of theological
freedom for themselves if not for other religious and social dissenters.
Before religious nonconformists became the first permanent settlers, the
coast of the Bay Colony had been well explored by hardy adventurers.
Leif, son of Eric the Red, may have touched Massachusetts with his
Norsemen in the year 1000; it is probable, too, that French and Spanish
fishermen cast their nets on the Grand Banks off Newfoundland in the
middle of the fifteenth century and that many of them touched Cape Cod,
lured by the fish from which the sickle-shaped promontory takes its name.
The first voyage definitely recorded was that of John Cabot, Venetian
navigator, whose exploration in 1497 and 1498 gave England her claim
to the region of North America. During the next century scattered ex-
plorers slowly added to Europe's meager knowledge of the region: John
Rut, a shipmaster of the English Royal Navy, Verrazzano under the
fleur de Us, Gomez under the flag of Spain, all sought a route to the fabled
riches of Zipangu and Cathay. Unsung fishermen, too, contented with the
less romantic cod of Massachusetts' shores, looked for shelter from the
North Atlantic's storms in the snug harbors of the coast.
Commercial enterprise and the search for exotic Eastern treasure
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 29
motivated these early voyages, and similar motives were responsible for
the first attempts to settle Massachusetts. The patent for the coloniza-
tion of southern New England which Sir Humphrey Gilbert obtained
from Elizabeth in 1578, recognizing that permanent population must
precede trade, authorized the planting of an English community beyond
the seas. Sir Humphrey unfortunately died before this was accomplished;
returning from his first exploratory voyage, his frail ten- ton vessel was
^swamped by the huge waves of an Atlantic storm, and his seamen on
an accompanying ship had a last glimpse of their commander standing
on the af terdeck, waving a book and shouting, ' We are as near to heaven
by sea as by land.' Gilbert's patent descended to his half brother, Sir
Walter Raleigh, but England, bent on harrying Spain, was too much
concerned with the success of her marauding sea dogs to be interested in
colony planting. A few attempts at settlement followed, but they were
made in violation of the Raleigh patent. In 1602 Bartholomew Gosnold
explored Massachusetts Bay, christened Cape Cod, built a fort on the
island of Cuttyhunk in Buzzard's Bay, and finally returned to England
with his ships loaded with sassafras.
Raleigh's waning power ended with the death of Elizabeth, and James
I, the new Stuart monarch, assigned the land to a group of Plymouth
merchants and adventurers known as the Plymouth Company. Com-
merce and profits stimulated Sir Ferdinando Gorges, Sir John Popham,
and the other gentlemen who managed the destinies of this new company.
Learning of the richness of the New England coast from George Wey-
mouth, a private explorer, the Plymouth Company attempted to found
the colony of Sagadahoc on the Kennebec River in what is now Maine
(1607), at the time that the first permanent English colony was being
established in Virginia. This venture failed completely and the company
lapsed into inactivity, although lands were granted to a number of small
fishing and trading colonies that sprang up along the Massachusetts coast
in the early seventeenth century, inspired by John Smith's glowing ac-
counts of the region. One visionary explorer, licensed by the company,
devoted a season to gold-digging on Martha's Vineyard, but only ' spent
his victuall and returned with nothing.'
The lust for trade failed to entice a population sufficient to make
Massachusetts important, but where desire for gain failed the Reforma-
tion succeeded. Introduced to England by the oft- wedded Henry VIII,
it had barely taken root when his successor, Mary, returned the land to
Catholicism and sent Protestant leaders scurrying for their lives. Eliza-
beth attempted a compromise settlement that satisfied neither extreme
30 Massachusetts: The General Background
Catholics nor extreme Protestants, although the compromise laid the
basis for the Church of England. The Elizabethan settlement was par-
ticularly distasteful to Protestants who had fled from England during
the reign of 'Bloody Mary,' and had imbibed the radical teaching of
Luther and Calvin while sojourning on the Continent. It was from this
group that Massachusetts received its first wave of settlement.
First among these enthusiastic Protestants to reach the New World
were the Separatists or Pilgrims. They believed each congregation should'
be entirely independent of all other congregations, and the compromise
establishing the Church of England was particularly unacceptable to
them. A small band of these people had been driven by the uncongenial
atmosphere of their native Scrooby to seek a haven for their beliefs in
Holland early in the seventeenth century, but the industrialism of
Ley den displeased sons of English soil, who determined to turn instead
to the New World. After securing support from London financiers they
obtained a grant (1619) to settle on the James River in Virginia, and it
was for that point that the 'Mayflower' set sail in 1620. Storms drove
them off their course, however, and it was in Provincetown harbor that
the small ship cast anchor on a bleak November day. The appearance of
the countryside disturbed them: 'For sumer being done, all things stand
upon them with a weatherbeaten face; and ye whole countrie, full of
woods and thickets, represented a wild and savage heiw.' Disheartened
at the prospects, the Pilgrims spent some time looking for more hospitable
surroundings. Plymouth harbor was finally selected, and on the day
after Christmas, 1620, they began to erect their first common house for
themselves and their goods.
In founding their colony at Plymouth, the Pilgrims were on land to
which they had no right; they were, in a sense, beyond the pale of English
law which would have followed them had they reached their destination
in Virginia. To protect themselves until governmental control could be
made to include them, they drew up the 'Mayflower Compact' while
their ship was still anchored in Provincetown harbor. By this agreement,
based upon Calvinistic principles, all agreed to abide by the majority
will. A pattern of democracy was cast for this first Massachusetts colony
which served throughout the trying winter and allowed the colony to
enter upon a period of slow but steady growth. Within a comparatively
short time the London backers were paid in full and Plymouth became
economically sound and independent. In this the Pilgrims made their
greatest contribution: they demonstrated that a colony could be self-
supporting and encouraged others to attempt the experiment.
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 31
A number of small communities were founded along the Massachusetts
coast during the next decade. Nearly all were villages or posts dedicated
to fishing and trade, and all secured their grants from the Council for
New England, which had by this time taken over the claims of the Ply-
mouth Company. Most famous among these early settlements was one
sent out in 1622 by Thomas Weston, a London merchant who had aided
the Pilgrims, at Wessagusset, now Weymouth. When abandoned by
Weston, the post built by his men was taken over by Captain Robert
Gorges and became a dispersing point for isolated settlements. From this
point the militant churchman, Thomas Walford, commenced his trek to
Mishawum, now Charlestown; Samuel Maverick, a gentleman- trader,
established himself in what is now East Boston; the Reverend William
Blaxton (or Blackstone), a rebel Anglican clergyman, sought solitude in
what was later to be known as Beacon Hill; and David Thompson re-
moved to the island in Boston harbor that still bears his name. The re-
ligious-minded Pilgrims had little in common with most of these adven-
turers, but they objected particularly to the settlement of a group of in-
dentured servants led by Captain Thomas Wollaston and Thomas Morton
at Quincy in 1625. Morton and his fellows were jolly sportsmen, and while
they traded with the Indians they reserved time enough to frolic. * They
also set up a Maypole,' wrote the horrified Bradford, Governor of Ply-
mouth, 'drinking and dancing aboute in many days togeather, inviting
the Indian women for their consorts, dancing and frisking togeather like
so many fairies or furies.' These 'beastley practicses of the madd Bac-
chinalians' did not cease until the Pilgrims sent Miles Standish to cap-
ture the post and deport Morton to England. A fishing post under the
command of Roger Conant had also been established at Cape Ann in
1623 by an English trading concern called the Dorchester Company.
These villages were all small and could not, unaided, have expanded into
a united colony, but they gave Englishmen a foothold and an interest
which, when the time was ripe, attracted migration and laid the founda-
tions of the Commonwealth.
The later migration evolved from this insignificant Dorchester fishing
enterprise on Cape Ann. Conant's failure left many of his English backers
dissatisfied but still anxious to experiment in empire-building. The
Reverend John White, John Endicott, and John Humphrey were the
most restive spirits in this group. These men were Puritans who, unwilling
to separate from the Established Church, believed that the Church
might be purified from within; they hoped that a colony in America
would provide an opportunity for the free exercise of their beliefs and
32 Massachusetts: The General Background
would serve as a 'bulwark against the kingdom of Antichrist.' The
Council for New England was respectfully petitioned for a grant of land,
which was approved in March, 1628. The petitioners were given control
of the territory between a point three miles south of the Charles River
and another three miles north of the Merrimack, running from sea to sea.
Armed with this grant, a shipload of settlers under Endicott set sail for
Salem in 1628, where Conant and his band had moved two years before.
Meanwhile royal sanction was sought and obtained, and in 1629 their
* dread sovereign ' issued a charter confirming the grant from the Council
of New England.
This royal act created the Massachusetts Bay Company, and it was
upon the basis of this charter that the democracy and expansion of the
Massachusetts Bay Colony developed. The colony was to be admin-
istered by two general courts; the first was to be made up of all the stock-
holders or freemen and was to hold quarterly sessions, at one of which
the members of the other court were to be selected in the form of a
governor, deputy governor, and eighteen assistants. The use of the term
'freemen' as a designation for members of the General Court laid the
basis for the representative system as it later emerged in Massachusetts.
Equally important was the failure of the charter to state that meetings
of the Court must be held in England. This made it possible for the
charter and the entire government of the colony to be transferred to
America.
Certain prominent Puritan leaders in England, notably John Winthrop,
recognized this vital fact. They perceived that if the charter was removed
to America the colony would virtually be free of English control and
could, therefore, become a Puritan commonwealth governed by Biblical
principles. Winthrop's arguments prevailed, and the company resolved
to move entirely to Massachusetts and to change from a trading company
with Puritan sympathies to a Puritan colony. In return, Winthrop
agreed to emigrate with his considerable group of followers. In March,
1630, they set out confidently, and with them went the charter. A new
type of English colony was automatically established, and Massachusetts
became a self-contained corporate colony markedly different from earlier
proprietary colonies like Virginia.
Salem, which had pleased Roger Conant, did not please Winthrop,
who had become the colony's first governor, and he moved first to
Charlestown and then to Boston, leaving the other communities as
towns to join those that grew up around Boston harbor. A period of
almost unprecedented growth followed, and by 1640 sixteen thousand
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 3.3
people had joined in the Great Migration to Massachusetts, for which
English religious and economic conditions were largely responsible. The
Puritans had joined forces with the Parliamentary Party, which opposed
James I and had lost. Charles I dissolved his third Parliament in 1629,
and entered upon an eleven-year period of personal rule designed partly
to stamp out dissent and entrench the Anglican Church. Puritan dis-
satisfaction was aggravated by economic distress, particularly in the
eastern and southeastern counties, the principal sources of emigration to
America. Puritan discontent was reflected in the number of settlements
Medford, Roxbury, Dorchester, Lynn, Cambridge which were
made on the Bay Company's land during the era of Jacobin dictator-
ship.
While the Massachusetts Bay charter contained intimations of de-
mocracy, growth was slow. The leaders of the colony planned a social
order in which individual freedom was to be sublimated to the will of
God as interpreted by His clergy. The Governor and his assistants de-
voted themselves to this end. They refused to summon a meeting of the
General Court until one hundred and nine freemen, insisting on their
charter right, demanded that this be done. So firmly did Winthrop and
his clerical allies believe that they alone were the proper interpreters of
the Divine will that they illegally vested nearly all governmental powers
within themselves before succumbing to this popular pressure by pro-
viding that only church members could sit in the General Court. This
occasioned a growing discontent which culminated in 1634, when the
freemen demanded to see the charter. The Governor dared not refuse,
and the indignant members of the General Court, realizing that their
rights had been infringed, hastily passed legislation which would vest
governmental authority for all time in their own hands.
Discontent bred of these struggles accelerated the settlement of
Massachusetts and the rest of New England. As long as the magistrates
could direct the course of this westward movement they approved, if
only for the reason that God's word was planted in the wilderness. Land
was granted freely to any group of town proprietors who were church
members, and tier upon tier of frontier towns were created as population
flowed westward from England through Boston. On the south shore were
founded Duxbury (1632), Scituate (1633), Hingham (1636), Barnstable
(1638), Yarmouth (1639), Marshfield (1640), and Eastham (1649); on
the broad fields of the north shore Saugus, later named Lynn (1631),
Ipswich (1634), Marblehead (1635), Newbury (1635), Rowley (1639),
and Salisbury (1640), while to the west Cambridge or Newtowne (1631),
34 Massachusetts: The General Background
Dedham (1636), Braintree (1640), Concord or Musketequid (1635), and
Sudbury (1639) steadily advanced the course of settlement.
While the peopling of Massachusetts continued, Boston was sending
out its inhabitants to settle other New England colonies. In 1635 the
Reverend Thomas Hooker's congregation at Cambridge, dissatisfied
with the ruling hand of John Cotton and other Boston clergy, and
moved by 'a strong bent of their spirits for change,' gave Connecticut its
first English inhabitants by founding Hartford. In the same year
Wethersfield and Windsor, Connecticut, were established by mass
migrations from Watertown and Dorchester, and in 1636 a group from
Roxbury laid out the first fields of Springfield. From Massachusetts
Bay, too, went Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson, expelled for their
principles, to found Providence and Newport in Rhode Island; John
Wheelwright, likewise banished, made the weary journey to Exeter,
New Hampshire, to establish a more democratic church. The same
spirit of revolt against the established order that had sent Puritans to
America thus led to a dispersion of their numbers and ideas in the
wilderness.
The social, economic, and spiritual influences which have distinguished
Massachusetts from the other States were implanted in these towns.
Nature ordained small-scale agriculture as the basis of Colonial economic
life in Massachusetts. Rough, rocky soil made the clearing and cultiva-
tion of large plots of land impossible, and only interested labor could
make it reasonably productive. Slavery was tried during Colonial days,
but when found to be unprofitable was soon abandoned. The cold winters
of Massachusetts made a compact form of settlement imperative; homes
were clustered about a central green or common and the fields scattered
nearby. Even though this encouraged sociability, the Puritan farmer
preferred to utilize the long winter months in making furniture, harnesses,
and the many other things needed by his family that his meagre income
from the soil would not permit him to buy. Thus developed the fabled
New England jack-of-all-trades whose descendants were equipped to
take over mechanical tasks when mills began to invade Massachusetts
early in the nineteenth century.
Situated on the village common in the center of the towns was the
church. A closely knit settlement mitigated the influence of the frontier,
which might have arrested the formal observance of religion. Long
winter evenings afforded ample opportunity for introspection and made
the Puritans more righteous and godly than their English brethren. In
such society the minister became an outstanding figure; he was each
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 35
town's acknowledged leader and frequently, in addition, its lawyer,
doctor, and schoolmaster. His rule was not absolute, however, for each
community was governed by a town meeting, in which every church
member had an equal voice. This essentially democratic institution was
one of the most enduring contributions of Massachusetts, through which
its people received the training necessary to provide political leadership
in the Revolution.
These town meetings not only managed ordinary governmental func-
tions, but the life of each inhabitant was carefully regulated. Individual
liberty was sacrificed to detailed legislation regulating habits and social
conduct. Even dress was regarded as a legitimate field for official scrutiny.
These 'blue laws/ as they have since been called, represented a desire for
simplicity natural to a group that had rebelled against the ceremony of
the Established Church; they reflected, too, the realization that hard
work was necessary to conquer a wilderness. The shiftless were 'warned
out' of Massachusetts towns, holidays such as Christmas were forbidden,
Maypoles and similar frivolities were discouraged. There was work to
be done, and the town fathers were determined to see that no one shirked.
The Sabbath alone was exempted, not solely because of Biblical injunc-
tion but because a day of rest was required by hard-working colonizers.
The Church gave Massachusetts more than blue laws. It initiated,
among other things, the educational development of America. Puri-
tanism presupposed an intelligent clergy capable of interpreting Scrip-
ture, and literate worshipers who could understand the Bible and the long
sermons to which they were subjected. Schools, therefore, were essential
for the training of clergymen as well as their congregations. In 1636 the
General Court appropriated a sum of money to start the College of New-
towne or Cambridge, a college endowed by John Harvard with his books,
his money, and his name. Popular education, however, dates from 1647,
when a law requiring elementary schools in towns of fifty families and
secondary schools in those double that size or larger was enacted. Al-
though not free, these schools were open to all, and laid the foundation
of the American educational system.
Massachusetts was permitted to develop its peculiar social and religious
institutions because of the preoccupation of the mother country. From
the time of its founding until 1660 the colony was virtually independent
of England, then engrossed in civil war and the Cromwellian Protectorate.
The Puritan colonies were able in 1643 to form the New England Con-
federation as a bulwark of defense against the Indians and the Dutch of
New York. With the restoration of Charles II in 1660, however, Massa-
36 Massachusetts: The General Background
chusetts entered upon a new era which saw the Bible Commonwealth
gradually evolve into an orderly crown colony, similar to Virginia or
the other English outposts along the coast.
This change was possible partly because Puritan excesses had led to a
declining interest in religion in Massachusetts. In the i65o's, for example,
all of the forces of Puritanism were focused on a few troublesome
Quakers who had made their way into the colony. They were beaten and
banished, only to return in quest of martyrdom, with which the magis-
trates unwittingly provided them. Such willful persecution turned the
people against the clergy and magistrates who had for so long dominated
Massachusetts. The younger people who had not suffered for their
religion as had their parents and the rising secular commercial class
demanded a government less completely dominated by the Church.
They won their first victory in 1657 with the adoption of the Half Way
Covenant, which allowed baptized as well as converted church members
to exercise the franchise, but it was not until the overthrow of the
Massachusetts charter in 1684 that the Bible Commonwealth completely
vanished.
The withdrawal of the charter on which the Bay Colony had rested its
early governmental system was a natural result of the Stuart Restoration.
The tendency throughout the Empire after 1660 was toward tightening
imperial control and drawing the colonies closer together that they might
be useful to the mother country. This the Massachusetts leaders, un-
disciplined by twenty years of imperial inefficiency, resisted vigorously,
refusing to grant liberty of conscience or citizenship to members of the
Church of England, openly snubbing royal commissions or agents sent
to investigate conditions, and flagrantly violating the laws with which
Parliament was attempting to regulate the Empire's trade. Justly in-
dignant, the English Government began court proceedings against
Massachusetts that culminated in 1684 in a decree cancelling the Massa-
chusetts charter.
A new government known as the Dominion of New England was
provided for Massachusetts. This was an attempt to centralize all the
northern colonies so that royal control could be effected. Massachusetts,
Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Maine and later New
York and New Jersey were united into a single governmental unit under
the control of Sir Edmund Andros. Although an able administrator, he
immediately provoked colonial wrath by what were considered tyrannical
acts. For a time Massachusetts resisted his orders in every conceivable
way and the Reverend Increase Mather, President of Harvard College,
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 37
was sent to England to protest directly to James II. When the news of the
Glorious Revolution in England (1688) which toppled the last of the
Stuart monarchs from the throne and elevated William and Mary in their
stead reached the colony, the Puritans seized the opportunity to stage
their own revolt against Andros. The Dominion of New England was
overthrown, and a provisional government was set up until the will of the
new rulers could be learned.
Massachusetts hoped for a restoration of its old charter, but this was
not in conformity with the new Colonial policy. The new instrument of
government issued by William and Mary in 1691 created a royal colony
similar to Virginia or Maryland, established boundaries, and solidified
institutions in a form that was to endure until the Revolution. During its
period of independence Massachusetts had launched an imperialistic
policy of its own and had annexed Maine and New Hampshire; now
New Hampshire was taken away, but Massachusetts was given juris-
diction over Plymouth and the islands south of Cape Cod. The Governor
of the Bay Colony was henceforth to be appointed by the Crown, and the
old assistants became the Governor's Council, elected by the Assembly.
Two legislative houses (which had actually existed in Massachusetts
since 1644, when a dispute between the assistants and freemen over the
ownership of a stray sow drew them to separate chambers) were recog-
nized by the new charter. One of the most important provisions of the
new charter abolished church membership as a prerequisite for voting;
Massachusetts was to be a civil rather than a Bible Commonwealth.
The changed governmental structure embodied in the charter of 1691
initiated the forces which almost a century later were to lead Massa-
chusetts and the other colonies to the brink of revolt. Massachusetts
farmers, accustomed to virtual freedom since 1630, resented the inter-
ference of a governor appointed by the Crown. The charter gave the
Governor the right to veto laws passed by the Assembly, but this ad-
vantage was balanced by the Assembly's right to vote the Governor's
salary. Conflict between these two branches of government, one repre-
senting the Crown, the other representing the settlers, who were jealous
of what they had come to regard as then* rights, was continual after 1717.
England's efforts to control the trade of her increasingly rebellious colony
was the crux of the controversy.
The people of Massachusetts were peculiarly sensitive to commercial
regulation, for by the beginning of the eighteenth century they were
finding in the sea the riches which nature had denied them elsewhere.
Starting with scattered fishing ventures, their trade had become in-
38 Massachusetts: The General Background
creasingly profitable as Yankee shippers used the abundant harbors and
the plentiful supply of lumber for the construction of ships which scoured
the seven seas in search of profits. Massachusetts gradually emerged as
the carrier for America; her ships hauled the sugar of the West Indies and
the tobacco of Virginia to the mother country, and returned laden with
manufactured goods and luxuries for Colonial planter and merchant.
Engaged largely in trade, Massachusetts felt the effect of commercial
regulation more than any other colony. Under the restrictions of the
Restoration and the eighteenth century the market for many of the
essential products of Colonial enterprise was confined to England, and
the colonists were forbidden to secure their manufactured goods except
through the mother country. These laws did little harm to the staple-
producing colonies. Virginia could exchange her tobacco for the luxuries
available in England, and Barbadoes could do the same with her sugar.
But Massachusetts produced nothing that the mother country desired,
her fish competed with those of Britain's fleets, and her agricultural goods
found little market in a country still predominately rural. Yet the Bay
Colony's growing population needed the products of English mills and
factories, and Massachusetts in order to circumvent these commercial
restrictions developed the famous Triangular Trade. Sugar and mo-
lasses were brought from the West Indies in return for foodstuffs, lumber,
livestock, and codfish. Molasses was transformed into rum, which was
traded in Africa for slaves, who were then sold in the sugar-growing West
Indian islands to obtain the gold required for English luxuries. While
England had numerous possessions in the Caribbean region, the British
islands were not large enough to absorb so great a volume of trade. The
continued economic existence of the colony depended on an uninter-
rupted trade with French, Spanish, and Dutch sugar islands, a trade
made illegal by English commercial legislation.
Massachusetts did not feel the full weight of these burdensome laws for
some time. England made few attempts to enforce them, and smuggling
went on with the open connivance of royal governors and their agents,
many of the colony's great fortunes being founded in this illegal but
respectable trade. It was not until the close of the long series of wars
with France which filled much of the eighteenth century that the mother
country realized the full extent of commercial laxity. This conflict be-
tween the two great colonial powers, which lasted for more than half
a century, reached its culmination in the Seven Years' War (1756-63),
which was touched off in America and offered a true test of the colony's
loyalty to Crown and Empire. As in the previous contests, the Massa-
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 39
chusetts back country was subjected to a series of raids by French and
Indians who swept down the Champlain Valley from Canada. Eastern
shippers, impervious to barbarities on the frontier, blithely continued
their illicit traffic with the French sugar islands and with Canada. The
French armies were supplied by this means with the foodstuffs necessary
to ravage the Massachusetts hinterland. Enticed by the greater profits
of wartime, thrifty Yankee captains carried on this trade with the enemy
so extensively that England's superior navy was completely unable to
starve the French West Indian possessions into submission; in fact,
foodstuffs sold there more cheaply than in British islands. British officers
found it cheaper to import grain from England than to compete in
America's markets with traders who were anxious to sell to the enemy.
Massachusetts, along with the other colonies, refused to provide ade-
quately for its own defense or to bear what the home government con-
sidered a just share of the war's expenses.
This scandalous conduct convinced England that her whole Colonial
administration needed reform, but it was this reform which finally led to
America's successful struggle for independence. In that clash of mother
country and colony Massachusetts played a leading part, not only be-
cause a democratic tradition had been bred in her citizens for generations,
but also because she, more than any other colony, was adversely affected
by the new imperial policy. The first of these measures, the Sugar Act of
1764, made effective earlier prohibitions on trade with French or Spanish
possessions; the second, the Stamp Act enacted a year later, provided for
revenue stamps which were to be affixed to publications and to legal and
commercial papers. Through these two measures the Crown hoped to
raise a part of the revenue to maintain a body of troops in America neces-
sary for the protection of the colonists against Indian attack, made im-
minent in 1763 by the serious outbreak of border warfare known as
Pontiac's Rebellion.
These two measures actually did much harm to Massachusetts. The
Sugar Act practically ended the foreign trade on which the colony de-
pended for its currency supply, while the Stamp Act drained the little
money remaining away from Boston. Furthermore, Massachusetts was
undergoing the usual post-war depression, which magnified the effects of
the new acts. It is little wonder that Boston merchants, hurriedly re-
trenching, agreed to wear no more lace and ruffles or that Boston trades-
men were willing to appear only in American-made leather clothes. It is
easy to understand, too, why Sam Adams and the little group of political
leaders who gathered with him at the picturesque Boston tavern, the
40 Massachusetts: The General Background
Green Dragon, could stir up mobs which forced the resignation of the
Massachusetts stamp collector and despoiled the house of Lieutenant
Governor Thomas Hutchinson. Amidst this popular discontent a general
boycott of English goods, in which Boston merchants joined with those
of Philadelphia and New York, was easily accomplished, and it was this
boycott, seriously injuring British manufacturers, who were already
suffering from a depression similar to that being felt in America, that
caused the repeal of the Stamp Act and the revision of the Sugar Act
in 1766.
Peace, however, was not for long. In 1767 a series of revenue measures,
the Townshend Acts, which levied duties on paint, glass, tea, and other
products imported into the colonies, again stirred Massachusetts to a
fever of resentment. Boston shippers were particularly alarmed by re-
forms in the customs service that accompanied the Townshend Acts.
A Board of Customs Commissioners was placed in the Bay Colony, and
that threatened to bring to a complete end the little smuggling which was
carried on after the passage of the Sugar Act. Again merchants, those of
Boston this time taking the lead, protested by refusing to import English
goods; again mobs roamed the Boston streets, harrying before them luck-
less agents of the Crown. Mob rule reached its height when an angry
crowd tried to prevent a customs agent from collecting duty on a cargo
of wine that was about to be landed by John Hancock. The agent was,
as he expressed it, ' hoved down ' into the hold while the patriots gleefully
carried the wine ashore. Protests such as these, together with a shifting
point of view in England, finally led to the repeal of the Townshend Acts
in 1770, but they also led to the establishment of a garrison in Boston
that peace might be preserved in that turbulent city. The inevitable
clash between these soldiers and the overwrought citizenry of Boston
came on the night of March 5, 1770, when a mob that was taunting a
sentry at the customs house was fired upon, giving first blood to the
revolution not yet formally begun, and to history the 'Boston Massacre.'
For three years after the repeal of the Townshend Acts the controversy
subsided. Prosperity returned and people everywhere forgot the few
years of turbulence. They forgot that England still taxed their tea and
molasses, and Sam Adams worked in vain to stir up sentiment against
the mother country. Even John Adams, staunch patriot though he was,
drank tea at John Hancock's home, and hoped it had been smuggled from
Holland but did not take the pains to inquire.
This calm was broken in 1773 with the passage of the Tea Act, which
gave the East India Company a monopoly for the sale of that beverage
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 41
in the colonies and lowered the duty until it could no longer be smuggled
profitably. Shippers who had illegally imported tea in the past were
swept from business, as well as the merchants who handled its shipping
and sale. The Tea Act alarmed Colonial business classes, who, fearing
Parliament might create similar monopolies on other products in the
future, were driven once more into the hands of the radicals. Sam
Adams was in his glory. In a series of carefully planned meetings he
worked Boston sentiment to a new height, then, at the climax of a great
gathering in the Old South Meeting House, sent a group of disguised
laborers and tradesmen to dump the tea on three East India Company
ships into Boston Harbor.
The reaction both in England and America to this wanton destruction
of property was one of instant revulsion, particularly among the merchant
group that had aided the patriots in the past ; nevertheless a wise handling
of the situation would probably have quieted revolutionary agitation for
some time to come. Instead, the British Ministry blundered badly. A
series of Coercive Acts were hurriedly passed by Parliament closing the
Port of Boston to trade, altering the charter, revising the legal system,
and inflicting penalties on Massachusetts which were to be removed only
when restitution for the destroyed tea should be made. Most of the
Colonial merchants, even in Boston, were willing to take this step, but
the Coercive Acts had put the radicals in control again. Unable to secure
merchant co-operation in a boycott of England, they determined to
attempt united political action, and from Massachusetts and other
colonies a call for a Continental Congress was issued. The Boston Tea
Party gave the patriot forces of the Revolution the unity required for
success.
The Massachusetts Assembly chose its delegates to this first Congress
with the door of the legislative chamber locked, and with Governor
Thomas Gage vainly shouting through the keyhole that the legislature
was dissolved and could transact no further business. Under these con-
ditions, duplicated in other colonies, the delegates selected were naturally
of the radical wing, and the Continental Congress quickly showed their
domination. They endorsed the Suffolk Resolves and enforced a general
boycott of English goods. As yet the members had no thought of inde-
pendence ; it remained for further developments in Massachusetts to lead
them to the point where relations with the mother country could be
severed.
Tension had been high in the Bay Colony ever since the arrival of
General Thomas Gage, who had been sent with a large force of troops to
42 Massachusetts: The General Background
enforce the Coercive Acts. Clashes between the soldiers and patriots were
narrowly averted on several occasions during the fall and winter of 1774-
75, and only served to hurry the process by which the colonists were
arming themselves, drilling their militia, and forming groups of Minute-
men who were ready to swing into action against the British at a moment's
notice. On April 19, 1775, the opportunity came. General Gage had re-
solved to send a detachment of troops to Concord to overawe the country-
side by a show of British strength and to secure the supplies accumulated
there by the colonists. The march began on the night of April 18, but
the patriots were prepared for such a step and immediately dispatched
two riders to warn their countrymen. One rider, Paul Revere, was cap-
tured before he could reach Concord; the other, William Dawes, suc-
ceeded in spreading the alarm. Minutemen began gathering immediately.
A small group assembled on the village Green at Lexington, where they
were met by the larger British force. In the scuffle that followed a shot
was fired the shot heard round the world. The troops then marched
on to Concord, destroyed the stores, and returned to Boston, with a
rising countryside following their steps and keeping up a steady fire that
lasted until the last British soldier was safe in Boston.
The siege of Boston followed naturally, for the English had retreated
to the safety of that city and it was inevitable that the colonists should
decide to keep them there. The city then lay at the tip of a narrow
peninsula, so that this could be accomplished easily if all avenues to the
mainland were properly guarded. One such avenue lay across Boston
Neck; this was carefully watched by the army of twenty thousand men
authorized by the Assembly, and commanded first by General Artemus
Ward and after July 2 by George Washington. Another possible route
was across Charlestown Neck, and to protect this the Americans had to
fortify Bunker Hill. This was done on the night of June 16. Actually it
was Breed's Hill that was fortified rather than Bunker Hill, and it was
there that the famous battle was fought the following day. The poorly
prepared American forces were driven slowly backward, but acquitted
themselves well, and demonstrated for the first time that the colonists
could cope successfully with the supposedly invincible British arms.
After Bunker Hill, the siege of Boston became one of quiet waiting until
the spring of 1776. Not until cannon which Ethan Allen had captured
at Ticonderoga were sledded to Boston was it possible for Washington
to attack. These new arms, mounted on Nooks Hill, Dorchester Heights,
commanded the entire city, and immediately began to throw shot upon
the helpless British. Finally General Howe, now in command, recognized
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 43
the inevitable. On March 17 the evacuation of Boston took place and the
entire British army, together with many Tory citizens, sailed away to
Nova Scotia. Massachusetts had not only launched the military phase
of the Revolution, but had given the patriot cause its first major victory.
For the remainder of the war, the State was free of hostile troops.
Independence was inevitable after this first clash of rival arms, and
with the separation of colonies from mother country Massachusetts was
faced with the problem of erecting a new governmental structure that
would perpetuate ideals of liberty and freedom. The last General Court
held under the old provincial charter convened in 1774, and from that
time on Massachusetts was governed by a Provincial Congress that had
no legal basis for existence and was not representative. Objections
naturally arose, particularly in Berkshire County, where the independent
farmers refused to allow courts to sit until they had been given a govern-
ment in which they had a voice. A constitution to meet this demand was
drafted by the Provincial Congress in 1777-79 an d submitted to the
people for ratification the first state constitution to be tested by pop-
ular vote but that constitution contained few provisions for separation
of powers and no Bill of Rights, and was promptly rejected. Finally in
September, 1778, a popularly elected Constitutional Convention met in
Cambridge, and after due consideration accepted a frame of government
drawn up largely by John Adams. This was submitted to the people on
March 2, 1780, and ratified on June 7. Massachusetts was the last of the
States to adopt a written constitution, yet so wisely had its framers
labored that today the same instrument still governs the Commonwealth,
a record of which no other state can boast. Moreover, that constitution
of 1780, drawn up by a popularly elected convention and submitted to
the people for ratification, set a pattern that was to be followed in the
framing of the Federal Constitution.
In Massachusetts, as in the other States, the Revolutionary period was
one of social and economic as well as political upheaval. Many of the
great commercial and governmental leaders of the past became Tories
and followed the retreating British armies to Canada or England. In
their place a new aristocracy arose which drew its wealth, as in Colonial
days, from the sea. More and more, as their operations increased, were
the financial resources of the Commonwealth concentrated along the
coast, leaving the dissatisfied farmers of the interior struggling vainly
against the stubborn soil. This dissatisfaction was fanned to open
rebellion by the economic depression which swept over the newly created
United States after the war. In the hilly country around Worcester and
44 Massachusetts: The General Background
in the Berkshires the farmers began to demand legislative relief in the
form of paper money and stay laws which would prevent mortgage fore-
closures. These discontented elements united under the leadership of
Daniel Shays, a Revolutionary war veteran. In 1786 he and his dis-
heveled followers closed the courts of Worcester and threatened to cap-
ture Boston until an army, hastily formed by Governor Bowdoin and
financed by Boston merchants, quelled the uprising.
This show of popular discontent alarmed the propertied classes of
Massachusetts. They were now more disposed to support the growing
movement for a new constitution to displace the Articles of Confedera-
tion, which had proved so useless in fostering trade, stabilizing finance,
and protecting the interests of property. Actually, Massachusetts became
the sixth State to ratify the Federal Constitution, but this was accom-
plished only after much adroit manipulation. A majority of the ratifying
convention which assembled in Boston was opposed to the new form of
government, with the farmers of the interior hilly region, the Berkshires
and Maine, then still a part of Massachusetts, most outspoken in their
opposition. Conservative leaders finally won over John Hancock, who,
as was usual when he had an important decision to make, had retired to
his home with an attack of gout until he determined the direction of
popular sentiment. This was accomplished only by offering him the
governorship of the State and, if Virginia did not ratify and make
Washington eligible, their support for the presidency; but it was effective,
for Hancock was the idol of the lower classes, and his support made
ratification possible. In taking this step, however, Massachusetts sub-
mitted a series of proposed amendments to the Constitution; this practice
was followed by the remaining States, and from them grew the first
ten amendments to our national Constitution, the so-called Bill of
Rights.
With the inauguration of the new government under Washington,
Massachusetts entered on a period of prosperity and peace. While her
old trade routes within the British Empire were now closed to her, new
ones were soon discovered, particularly that immensely profitable trade
with China which thrived unchecked until iron steamships supplanted
American sailing vessels. In every other corner of the world, too, ships
of daring Yankee masters began to appear, seeking cargoes and fortunes
for themselves and their State. After 1793, with England and France
locked in the first of the series of wars that followed the French Revolu-
tion, Massachusetts took over a large share of the carrying trade formerly
monopolized by those powers. From every quarter new wealth was
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 45
flowing into the Commonwealth; the depression that had given birth to
Shays' Rebellion was now only a fast dimming memory.
This prosperity naturally shaped the political bent of the people, and
when the shuffle of political fortunes which had gone on through Wash-
ington's two administrations finally ended, Massachusetts was firmly
wedded to the principles of the Federalist Party. This conviction was
strengthened while John Adams, one of the Commonwealth's own sons,
was Chief Executive. Many in the State even supported the Alien and
Sedition Acts through which the Federalists sought to solidify national
power during the French Naval War of 1798. Jefferson's election in 1800
was looked upon as a major calamity; pious Massachusetts ladies con-
cealed their Bibles lest that Francophile atheist burn them, and conserva-
tive merchants and shipowners prepared for a disaster which they thought
certain. Instead, the State's prosperity continued to increase, and by
1804 Massachusetts was ready to desert the Federalist column for the
first time and support Jefferson's re-election.
Those who had taken this step soon were ready to admit their mistake,
for the tangled foreign policy of Jefferson's second administration bore
harder on Massachusetts than on any other State. The Embargo with
which the President attempted to combat French and English inter-
ference with American shipping led the Commonwealth once more into
the slough of depression. The wealth of Massachusetts still came from
the sea, and its people still protested against interference with their trade,
as they had when burdened by English Navigation Acts. Those protests,
voiced first by newspaper editors who spelled Embargo backward as 'O
Grab Me,' swelled to a final chorus of rebellion when Jefferson's successor,
Madison, responded to demands of the expansionist West and carried
the United States into the War of 1812 against England. For the three
years of that war the trade of the Commonwealth was at a standstill,
driven from the seas by the superior British navy; and for those three
years the people gave vent to their resentment in every conceivable
manner. Massachusetts refused to allow her militia to be used outside
the state borders, she gave only lukewarm financial support to the na-
tional cause, she held celebrations to cheer English victories over Napo-
leon, and she was instrumental in calling the Hartford Convention of 1814,
where delegates from the several New England States talked vaguely of
secession from the Union and nullification of the Constitution.
With the close of the war in 1815, Massachusetts entered a new phase
of her history. It was during this period that the basis for her later
industrial development was laid, and the commercial aristocracy which
46 Massachusetts : The General Background
had shaped her destinies for so long was successfully challenged for the
first time. American manufacturing began with Jefferson's Embargo,
which stopped the importation of manufactured goods from England;
it grew steadily during the war that followed, when the United States,
cut off from European sources, was forced to become self-supporting; and
it was given a permanent basis by the protective tariff of 1816, designed
to insure the infant industries which had developed between 1807 and
1815. At first this manufacturing was scattered through the Eastern
States, but as time passed it concentrated more and more in New England
and particularly in Massachusetts. There the Yankee farmers, long ac-
customed to the production of household goods, had a training in handi-
craft that equipped them to organize and manage the mills that dotted
the countryside. The many streams that coursed the State's valleys
furnished a plentiful supply of water-power. Labor could be secured as
in no other section of the Union, for thousands of Massachusetts farmers
were ready to abandon their unequal struggle with a stubborn soil and
drift into industrial employment. Hence the Commonwealth was able
to take full advantage of Francis Cabot Lowell's perfection of the first
power loom which, originally installed at a mill in Waltham in 1814,
revolutionized the textile industry and turned Lowell, Lawrence, Fall
River, and other towns into manufacturing centers. By the time of the
Civil War, Irish immigrants were flocking in to perform the labor in
these factories and Massachusetts was fast assuming the appearance of
a modern industrial state.
The rise of manufacturing coincided with a decline in agriculture. This
was partly due to the greater opportunity for profit available in the infant
industries; more responsible, however, was the growth of Western agri-
culture, with which the farmers of Massachusetts could not compete.
Western farm products penetrated Eastern markets as soon as the Ohio
Valley frontier was established, but it was only after 1825, when the
opening of the Erie Canal allowed the cheap and rapid movement of
Western products to the East, that the full impact of this new competition
was felt. Grain from the Ohio Valley could now undersell grain from the
Berkshires in the Boston markets, and Massachusetts' farmers were
faced with the alternative of going to the cities to become workers in the
growing factories or of migrating westward themselves. Many of them
chose the latter course, moving in a constant stream across New York
to settle the northern tier of the Old Northwest States. Rural decay in
Massachusetts began. Cultivated fields were allowed to return to a state
of nature, and abandoned farms alone remained as dreary reminders of
former prosperity.
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 47
The flow of Massachusetts population to the West was not without its
effect on the Commonwealth. Leaders of the State, alarmed at the exodus
of their sons, engaged in a bit of Puritan self-scrutiny to discover the
cause. They agreed that one expelling force was the antiquated govern-
mental and religious system still in use, and that only a reform in that
system could stem the exodus. Politically, this reforming spirit found
expression in the release of Maine and in a Constitutional Convention of
1820. This convention yielded to the demand of the people for a greater
voice in their own government by drafting ten amendments to the Con-
stitution providing for the incorporation of cities, the abolition of property
qualifications for voting, the removal of religious tests for office-holders,
and other much needed reforms. The religious expression of this social
change reached its culmination in 1833, when another constitutional
amendment was adopted completely separating the Church and State
and placing Congregationalism, hitherto favored by governmental sup-
port, on the same plane as other sects. The last vestiges of aristocratic
Puritanism were swept from the statute books, and the ideals of demo-
cracy were brought nearer reality.
The reforming spirit in Massachusetts was not stilled by these concrete
gains. Unitarianism, begun in America at King's Chapel (Boston) just
after Independence, was sweeping through the Commonwealth under
the fostering guidance of William Ellery Channing. Its refreshingly lib-
eral doctrines threatened to bury the Congregational Church under an
avalanche of popular disapproval, and only the valiant efforts of the
Reverend Horace Bushnell, who sought to reconcile the old Calvinistic
theology with the gentle humanitarianism of the new era, saved Con-
gregational power and influence. In Concord, Emerson, Thoreau, and a
whole school of disciples began to feel the first vague resentment against
the machine, and preached the cult of individualism and the doctrine of
the nobility of man in immortal verse and prose. Dorothea L. Dix
shocked the state of Massachusetts into providing the first decent care
for the insane before beginning her country-wide crusade in behalf of
these little understood unfortunates. Horace Mann agitated valiantly
and successfully in behalf of the revolutionary doctrine of universal
education, and through his efforts elevated Massachusetts to a position
of leadership in this important sphere. Total abstinence societies, formed
first in Boston in 1826, were spreading like wildfire through the State
and nation, beginning that organized movement that was to end in the
Eighteenth (and Twenty-First) Amendments. At Brook Farm, near
Boston, at Fruitlands, near Harvard, and elsewhere bewildered idealists
48 Massachusetts: The General Background
like Hawthorne, Alcott, and Margaret Fuller sought refuge from a chang-
ing world in the simple life and communism an experiment gently
but effectively satirized by Hawthorne in 'The Blithedale Romance.'
From this mad, shifting world emanated the crusade against slavery,
centered in Boston and New York State, where the revivalism of the
Reverend Charles G. Finney whipped his disciples into action against
'the peculiar institution' of the South. It was in Boston that William
Lloyd Garrison established his newspaper The Liberator in 1831, com-
mitted to the immediate emancipation of all humans held in bondage
and vitriolic in the abuse which it heaped on slaveholders. It was in
Boston that the New England Anti-Slavery Society was formed in 1832,
which within a year became the American Anti-Slavery Society and
spread over the North, stirring sentiment everywhere in favor of uncom-
pensated emancipation. The movement that was to plunge the nation
into a civil war within two decades was launched in Massachusetts.
Garrison and his fellow reformers did not have an easy path to follow.
They were opposed by many milder men, led by William Ellery Chan-
ning, who favored legal and peaceful methods of freeing the slaves, and
by most of the respectable elements of society, who soon became alarmed
lest the agitation check the flow of cotton from the South, on which the
Massachusetts textile industry depended. Although Garrison's followers
were initially of little importance, the movement soon attracted such
men as John Quincy Adams, Wendell Phillips, and John Greenleaf
Whittier, and later included a large group of outstanding Massachusetts
men and women. These abolitionists strongly opposed the Fugitive Slave
Act, established 'Underground Railroad' stations to hurry escaping
slaves to freedom in Canada, and organized the New England Emigrant
Aid Company, through which Eli Thayer of Worcester vainly tried to
win Kansas for the North by peopling it with freedom-loving individuals
who would bar slavery from that territory.
The turbulence of those trying days was soon translated into Massa-
chusetts politics, where the reforming spirit was as clearly discernible as
in the idealism of Brook Farm or the fanaticism of Garrison. The Fed-
eralist Party had passed from existence by 1824, engulfed in a tide of
disapproval which followed its opposition to the War of 1812, and from
that time Massachusetts steadfastly supported either the Whig Party or
an independent candidate of its own. The reforming zeal of its people
was expressed first not against the slaveholders but against the foreigners,
for the i84o's and 1850*8 saw a steady stream of Irish immigrants pouring
into the Commonwealth until many of the larger cities were predomi-
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 49
nantly Celtic in composition. Alarmed by this alien invasion, Massa-
chusetts gave its vote in the state elections of 1854 and 1855 almost
solidly to the American or Know Nothing Party, which was pledged to
check immigration and combat the growing power of the Catholic Church.
By 1856, however, the Republican Party with its anti-slavery principles
invaded the Commonwealth, and the votes of Massachusetts went for its
candidate, John C. Fremont, and helped elect Abraham Lincoln to the
presidency in 1860.
Thus did Massachusetts, the birthplace of abolitionism, remain true
to its genius. Nor did this loyalty lessen when a panic of fear swept the
Southern States toward secession and plunged the nation into civil war.
When President Lincoln called the North to arms on April 15, 1861, the
first state to respond was Massachusetts, which within four days sent
fifteen hundred men to Fort Monroe. Massachusetts blood was also the
first to be shed in the Civil War when on April 19, 1861, just eighty-six
years to the day after the battles of Lexington and Concord, a mob
attacked the Sixth Regiment in Baltimore. The State was aroused, a
wave of patriotism in which factional differences were forgotten swept
Massachusetts, and support of the Union became the major issue. For
the four trying years of this sectional struggle the Bay State contributed
freely in men, money, and effort that the Union might be preserved.
Appomattox closed a chapter in American life, and the next scene in
the drama of American history was sketched against the background of
industrialism. With the acceleration of industry and the revolutions
which took place simultaneously in agriculture and mining, the medieval
period of America drew to a close.
The sea, upon which the fortunes of Massachusetts had been built, was
a factor of decreasing significance. Exports declined with monotonous
regularity, but imports continued to be a consideration of consequence;
for although Massachusetts did not serve as a distributor beyond the
confines of New England, her own industries required a growing volume
of raw materials. The great white sails which once cleared out of Salem
and New Bedford were never succeeded by the funnels of the steamship,
and only Boston remained a vital point in Massachusetts commerce.
Fishing alone continued to thrive, and although riches were still sought
in the traffic lanes of the Atlantic, a new economy had begun. Improved
methods of steel production and the development of the petroleum in-
dustry assured the success of the new industrialism, but it marked the
end, among other things, of the whalers. In 1869 the last whaler was
fitted out in New Bedford. The glamor of whaling boats like clipper
5O Massachusetts: The General Background
ships faded into history and legend, but a supply of fluid capital had been
created which poured into Western railroads as well as Massachusetts
industry.
The industrial evolution of Massachusetts is the economic history of
the United States in miniature. Manufacturing, like population, con-
tinued to be drawn by the magnetic attraction of the West, but in many
fields Massachusetts held undisputed pre-eminence until the end of the
century. More than one-third of all the woolens of the nation were
produced in this State, and in the eighties Fall River led the field in cotton
manufacture, Lawrence, Lowell, and New Bedford closely following.
Partly because of its climate New Bedford became famous for its fine
grade of cotton goods, while the northern New England mills developed
the heavier fabrics. By 1890 Lawrence had become the third most im-
portant city in America in the manufacture of woolens, and Lowell was
a close fourth.
The boot and shoe industry had already made considerable progress,
but as a result of technological advances in power manufacture the im-
portance of the industry increased tremendously. In 1866, for example,
Lynn possessed 220 factories whose annual output was $12,000,000,
while the State output was $53,000,000, increasing to $88,000,000 by
1870. In 1890 Lynn's industry alone was evaluated at $26,000,000, and
the extent to which the manufacture of boots and shoes was concentrated
in Massachusetts is evidenced by the fact that Brockton, Haverhill,
Marlborough, and Worcester were all leading shoe centers. Despite the
rivalry of New York and the Middle West, Massachusetts resisted serious
competition until 1900, by which date the State was producing almost
fifty per cent of the nation's output in this field.
Considerable success had been achieved in the manufacture of ma-
chinery, partly as a by-product of industrial eminence. Power looms to
feed its textile mills were locally produced. Shoe machinery was made at
an immense plant in Beverly and smaller ones at Boston and Waltham.
Paper mill machinery was constructed at Lowell, Pittsfield, Lawrence,
and Worcester. As competition developed at points nearer the source of
raw material, however, the metal industry underwent a radical change.
Lighter grades of machines, tools, and mechanical equipment were found
to be more profitable, and native Yankee ingenuity developed a fine skill
in their production.
Industry and the rise of cities attracted scores of workers who sought
peace and security in the New Canaan. The immigrant invasion which
resulted changed the social complexion of the State; sixty-six per cent
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 51
of all the white stock in Massachusetts contains a foreign strain. Before
the Civil War immigration was drawn largely from western Europe, but
beginning with the decade of the eighties the majority came from the
southern and eastern sections of the Continent, with the result that al-
most every racial group is represented in the population. The most rigid
type of immigration control was in effect up to 1849, and Massachusetts
contained a relatively small racial admixture ; today it has more foreigners
than any other State except New York. French-Canadians, Greeks,
Poles, Czechoslovakians, Russians, Finns, Letts, Lithuanians, and
Turks live side by side with the descendants of Bay Colony settlers. Many
new strands have been added to Anglo-Saxon culture. Slavic, Semitic,
and Celtic influences have permeated Massachusetts thought, enriching
folkways, enlivening speech, and giving a new perspective to graphic art,
music, and literature. The effect of immigration may also be traced in the
new direction of the labor movement, as well as in an increase of the Cath-
olic and Jewish religious groups.
The establishment of factories and the concentration of population
was paralleled by a growth in workers' organizations. Trade unions after
the Civil War grew from seventeen to forty-two in number, and in many
cases the State was the focal point of their growth. Organization of the
boot and shoe industry proceeded quickly, largely because labor and not
machinery was the important element. Organization of the textile in-
dustry was not so simple; here the lower skills demanded of the workers
retarded unionization. The National Cotton Mule Spinners were or-
ganized in 1889, but it was not until the United Textile Workers came
upon the scene in 1901 that any semblance of success was achieved.
American society was unprepared for such an economic revolution, social
relations were severely strained, and the latter nineteenth century was
marked by industrial strife. Illinois had its Haymarket, Pennsylvania
its Homestead, and Massachusetts its Lawrence (1912). To contem-
poraries it seemed as though the long-cherished ideals of American life
and institutions were disintegrating, but calmer reflection indicated that
this was merely another stage in the evolution of industrial society.
As a result of organized effort many gains accrued to labor and society
as a whole. A department of labor and industry was established (1912),
and legislation was adopted for the protection of health, the investigation
of industrial diseases, and the recognition of occupational hazards. Under
the new law (1933) a person might no longer be coerced into an agree-
ment not to join a union as a condition of employment. Massachusetts
law today requires that employers who advertise for labor during a strike
52 Massachusetts: The General Background
must state specifically that a state of strike exists. No woman or child
may be employed for more than forty-eight hours a week, and children
under fourteen are forbidden to work at all. Minors in the age group of
fourteen to sixteen years must complete the sixth grade of elementary
school, and may not work more than six days a week or eight hours a day.
By the beginning of the nineteenth century the influx of immigration
and the growing development of industry brought about corresponding
changes in government. The New England town meeting, generally
economical, simple, and efficient, did not lend itself to this hurried ex-
pansion and was found inadequate to meet the problems of urban life.
A constitutional amendment of 1820 had given the General Court the
right to charter cities, and by 1885 there were twenty- three cities con-
taining sixty per cent of the population. The commission form of gov-
ernment, which places all phases of city government in the hands of five
persons, though tried, was never successful: Gloucester, Haverhill, Lynn,
Lawrence, and Salem all attempted it at one time or another.
Education experienced a revival after the Civil War. The rise of the
cities, now the dominant factor in American life, presented new problems
which it was hoped education would solve. The movement initiated by
Horace Mann in the earlier decades of the nineteenth century was com-
pleted, and the scope of the public school system expanded, largely by
the increase in the number of free public high schools. But it was in the
upper levels of education that the results of economic maturity were most
apparent. Wealth created by industrialism supplied the endowments
necessary for the establishment of new institutions. In an era notable for
the founding of colleges and universities throughout the country many
as a result of State aid fifteen were founded in Massachusetts (1863-
1927). In an era in which American education achieved international
recognition because of its great educators and administrators, Andrew
Dixon White of Cornell, James McCosh of Princeton, John Bascomb of
Wisconsin, Noah Porter of Yale, Massachusetts produced four: Charles
William Eliot of Harvard, Granville Stanley Hall of Clark, Francis A.
Walker of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Alice Free-
man (Palmer) of Wellesley. The emancipation of women, quickened by
modern conditions, was furthered by opportunities for advanced study,
and the contribution of Massachusetts was distinguished. Wellesley
was founded in 1870, Smith College (Northampton) in 1871, Radcliffe
(Cambridge) in 1879, an d Simmons (Boston) in 1899. Facilities for
preparation in engineering and related subjects were provided by the
creation of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Boston) and the
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 53
Worcester Polytechnic Institute (Worcester), both established in 1865.
Responding to the demands of urban conditions, seventy-five cities and
towns established industrial schools. Latterly educational facilities have
been developed to reach people outside the public school system and the
universities. Many of the larger trade unions offer a variety of courses
for workers and their families, and the University Extension Division of
the Department of Education has supplied an increasing number with
vocational, technical, and cultural training.
An important adjunct of the educational system in Massachusetts is
the library. Not only is there a free public library in every city and town
(since 1926), but the State has many important special libraries and col-
lections. There are few places with more varied materials for the study
of American history; bibliophiles and historians, as well as others less
fervent, make use of its varied treasures. The American Antiquarian
Society (Worcester), rich in newspapers, periodicals, and manuscripts,
is amply supplemented by the Massachusetts Historical Society (Boston),
the Bostonian Society, the Boston Athenaeum, the Essex Institute
(Salem), and the Boston Public Library, the last possessing a significant
assortment of Americana, including the private libraries of Thomas
Prince, John Adams, Theodore Parker, and Thomas Wentworth Hig-
ginson. In addition, the college and university libraries with their
specialized interests, seldom duplicated, make Massachusetts a State
with unusual opportunities for research and study.
Simultaneously with industrialism came a renewal of intellectual
speculation; science was stimulated by fresh winds of doctrine from
Europe and endowments of industrialists. Education and science were
electrified by the concept of development which coursed through America
in the period after the Civil War. Darwin, Spencer, Tyndall, and Huxley
became symbols of scientific achievement here as well as abroad. Massa-
chusetts furnished one of the leading defenders of the disturbing views
of Darwin in the person of Asa Gray, Fisher Professor of Botany at
Harvard, and also its most eminent opponent, Louis Agassiz. Agassiz,
who taught geology and zoology at Harvard, stamped his personality
on every scientific movement, and like another Massachusetts man
Benjamin Franklin was the greatest popularizer of his time. The
doctrine of evolution initiated a scientific renaissance in which Massa-
chusetts shared. Modern research revived the colonial tradition of
scholarship currently typified by two distinguished scientists, James
Bryant Conant of Harvard and Karl Taylor Compton of the Massachu-
setts Institute of Technology.
54 Massachusetts: The General Background
The industrial trend was not without its effect upon organized religion.
European scholarship and the rapid rise of urban communities con-
fronted the churches with a changing world, and in this critical period of
religious history Massachusetts played a significant role. Christian
Science, founded by Mary Baker Eddy (Lynn, 1867), provided a refuge
for many who were dissatisfied with conventional theological forms.
Another vital aspect was the development of social Christianity, which
was partly a reaction to an increasing absorption in practical affairs. A
declining interest in doctrinal matters was the inevitable consequence of
secularism, but social Christianity arose because industrialism presented
America with new complexities. The churches tempered this transition
stage by a revival of the social gospel emphasizing the intimate relation
between religion and life. All denominations awakened to the realization
that there was a real connection between slums and morals, and a growing
concern with systematic relief was manifested by the clergy. Reform
became the current text which was preached with eloquence by many
Massachusetts men Francis G. Peabody, Professor of Christian
Morals at Harvard Divinity School, Phillips Brooks of Trinity Church,
Minot Judson Savage of the Church of the Unity, Octavius Brooks
Frothingham and William Joseph Potter, leading Unitarian radicals -
who successfully emulated such national leaders as Washington Gladden,
Lyman Abbott, Josiah Strong, and Cardinal Gibbons. Emphasis on
sociology rather than cosmology was a reflection of the scientific temper,
which soon became universal, enlisting the efforts of those outside
Christianity, notably two Jewish leaders, Charles Fleischer and Solomon
Schindler, both rabbis at Temple Israel in Boston. In 1889 the Society
of Christian Socialists was founded in Boston for the purpose of awaken-
ing 'members of the Christian churches to the fact that the teachings of
Jesus Christ lead directly to some specific form or forms of Socialism.'
The development of Massachusetts may be divided into three major
periods: from its founding until the election of Thomas Jefferson to the
presidency; from 1800 to the Civil War; and from 1865 to the present.
The destinies of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were moulded
by mighty forces, momentarily visible in Massachusetts, which during
the first period symbolized the development of the nation. Carver and
Bradford, Winthrop and Cotton, the Mathers, Samuel Sewall, and
Franklin belong to America; John and Samuel Adams, James Otis, Paul
Revere, and John Hancock were the patriots of the Revolution. During
the second period this situation slowly changed. Colonial radicals found
they had exchanged the interest of British imperialists for the interests of
Enough of Its History to Explain Its People 55
Federalist shipowners who, while flying a new flag, shared a like philo-
sophy. While the rest of America moved westward to cotton belt and
farmland, Massachusetts continued to devote herself to trade and de-
veloped a point of view peculiar to New England. A brief interlude of
nationalism followed the War of 1812, after which Massachusetts re-
verted to a spirit of sectionalism typified by the Hartford Convention
(1814), characteristic not only of New England but of the nation. Al-
though Federalism disappeared and industry took the place of commerce,
the National Republicans and later the Whigs gradually borrowed
Federalist doctrine to the end that Massachusetts and New England
might endure. The third period ushered in the economic revolution
which transformed the American scene. Currents of New England in-
dividualism still flow from Massachusetts, typified in recent years by such
men as Henry Cabot Lodge and Calvin Coolidge, but such currents are
simply tributaries to the main stream. Provincialisms have been dissi-
pated in the steam of locomotives and the blast of airplane propellers,
while iron and steel labor to bring forth a new nation.
GOVERNMENT
FOR three centuries Massachusetts has been carrying on an experiment
as old as human history: the effort of men to govern themselves. One
governmental form has succeeded another as each generation, with
population increasingly pressing and conditions of living continuously
changing, developed new solutions to its governmental problems.
The earliest form of government in Massachusetts was that of Plym-
outh Colony. Having no charter, the Pilgrims based their authority
upon a patent granted in 1621 to the Plymouth Company, and in 1636
definitely outlined the powers of their officials: the Governor was to be
elected annually by the people, and his assistants were to govern and to
act as a judiciary. Legislation, however, originated with the people, as
all freemen were admitted to the General Court, a condition which
existed until 1639, when, because of increased population and migration,
deputies were chosen.
The first Massachusetts Colonial charter was given by Charles I in
1628. Later he tried unsuccessfully to have it abrogated. The form of
government was different from that of Plymouth in that the first Gov-
ernor and assistants were appointed by the Crown. Matthew Craddock,
the first Governor, never came to America. Subsequent Governors,
however, were elected annually until James II appointed Joseph Dudley
in 1685. Sir Edmund Andros, Dudley's appointed successor, essayed to
be a vice-regal dictator and was promptly deposed. In the intercharter
period which followed, Simon Bradstreet headed the Colony.
The second, or Province Charter, a grant of King William and Queen
Mary, arrived in 1692. It brought Plymouth Colony, Maine, and a
portion of Nova Scotia under one jurisdiction. It was a far less liberal
charter than the first. The Governor, Lieutenant-Governor, and State
Secretary were appointed by the Crown. In 1726, King George sent over
an explanatory modifying charter which limited the Governor's authority
to adjourn the General Court, but made the election of the Speaker sub-
ject to the veto of the Governor. Control of money, bills, and the right
of electing the councillors curbed somewhat the Governor's immense
power. The last General Court held under the Provincial Charter was
in 1774.
INDUSTRY EARLY AND LATE
THE geography of Massachusetts is largely responsible for its
industry, for it combines water-power with good harborage.
Mills and the maritime trades consequently predominate.
Once established, the mills grew long after the need for local
water-power had disappeared. So, in the pictures that follow,
there is an old stone mill and a giant, modern weaving-room.
There is boat-building as it was done two hundred years ago
and still is done in Essex today. And also there is a picture
of the shipyards at Fore River with much modern equipment.
There are also pictures of fishermen and their varied crops,
cranberry bogs which need the level, sandy soil of the Cape,
clam beds, glass-making which was undertaken at Sandwich
where glass was made by a process now lost, and printing
which is not an inheritance from the geography of the State,
but a result of the solemn studiousness of Boston's earliest
settlers which left its mark in generously scattered colleges
and printing shops throughout the State.
FORE RIVER SHIPYARD, QUINCY
SHIPYARD, ESi
I
HOISTING SAIL
CHAINS
WOODS HOLE BUOY YARD
OLD MILL, SUDBURY
' CHARLES W. MORGAN/ NEW BEDFORD
SEEDING CLAMS
CRANBERRY
*iifr
MNDWICLGUSS
SANDWICH GLASS
NETS DRYING, GLOUCESTER
HERRING RUN, WAREI
m
7JH
AVING
PRINTING
Government 57
In the following period, before the State Constitution was accepted,
patriots and a Provincial Congress ran the affairs of State. James Bow-
doin and a Council were in charge. The government was the people's
own after June, 1774, but there was agitation, particularly from Berk-
shire County, to confirm this in a constitution. The General Court of
1777-78 drew up such an instrument making Massachusetts the first
State to submit a new constitution to the people, but it was rejected.
The citizens properly felt that such a momentous covenant should be
drawn by a body elected solely for that purpose and, moreover, the first
draft contained no bill of rights or separation of powers.
The people next voted in favor of a constitutional convention. It
convened at Cambridge in September, 1779. James Bowdoin was chosen
presiding officer. A sub-committee of prominent citizens eventually
turned over the task of drawing up the new instrument to John Adams,
indisputably the best-qualified man of his day. Adams, paying tribute
to the pioneer liberals, later said it was * Locke, Sidney, and Rousseau
and De Mabley reduced to practice.' The new Constitution was sub-
mitted March 2, 1780, and was ratified June 7. John Hancock was
elected Governor. Although Massachusetts had been the first of the
States to establish a government of its own, it was the last of the thirteen
Colonies to adopt a written constitution.
Massachusetts is today the only State in the Union still governed
under its original constitution. This has endured chiefly because of its
broad provisions and flexible character. It was the first such document
boldly to establish the principle of the separation of powers of the various
branches of government. It contains assurance of the protection of in-
alienable rights. Among its more important provisions were the right
of the Governor and Council or the Legislature to require opinions from
justices of the Supreme Judicial Court, the removal of judges by address,
and the inapplicability of martial laws to citizens except with the consent
of the Legislature.
There have been three constitutional conventions since 1779: in 1820,
1853, and 1917. More than seventy amendments have been made to the
Constitution, but the general plan of government it erected is still es-
sentially in operation. While power has been increasingly centralized in
the Chief Executive and the State Government, the Constitution is still
the bulwark of individual freedom and rights. As in the case of other
State constitutions, it is a more powerful instrument than the Federal
Constitution, because it has all powers not explicitly delegated to the
Federal Government, while the Federal Government enjoys only powers
specifically granted.
58 Massachusetts: The General Background
The town was the earliest unit of government. It was not for some
century and a half that there was a formal statute declaring the town
'a body politic and corporate,' capable of suing and being sued; yet it was
early in the history of the Colony that in practice the town became a
self-governing unit a miniature republic. The difficulties of travel,
the dangers of leaving frontier farms open to Indian pillage, and inveterate
distrust of arbitrary power acted jointly in favor of local independence.
The General Court at Boston among its first actions granted the scat-
tered infant towns incorporation and the right to make regulations, al-
though at first these were made to apply only to stray swine. Gradually
thereafter the townsmen assumed local authority.
In 1632 the Cambridge elders ruled that, under penalty of a fine,
every person must appear at the monthly town meeting within half
an hour of the sounding of the bell. Definite local officials began to ap-
pear. Dorchester was at first ruled by the clergy and magistrates. In
what is asserted to be the oldest self-rule document extant in the United
States, the Dorchester town meeting record of 1633, the citizens were
summoned by the rumble of a drum and twelve men acting as a ' steering
committee.' The next year, 1634, Charlestown organized the first Board
of Selectmen. This system, which provided a civil agency of government,
was promptly adopted by other towns. This spontaneous organization
of government within the towns, rather than any intention of the first
charter, in 1635 led the General Court, in recognition of an accomplished
fact, to make the first grant of local self-government in America. Given
at Newe Towne, March 3, it granted the towns the right to dispose of
common property, order civil affairs, and choose their own officers. By
1640, twenty town governments were in existence.
Expansion of the duties of the town officers and an increase in the
number of town officials followed. In 1642 the General Court directed
the 'chosen men' of each town to see to education, a humble act which
gave birth to the public school system in America. Ten years after, the
town of Cambridge vested the taxing power in their ' townsmen,' a
privilege exercised by the Selectmen of Dorchester since 1645. In ad-
dition to expanded duties for the Selectmen who were even directed
to remove oyster shells from the public highways so many duties were
heaped upon the town Constable among them taking charge of small-
pox funerals, levying fines, and catching Quakers that anyone declining
the job was assessed the sizable fine of 10. Until 1684 the officeholders
and town duties continued to grow. Gaugers, viewers of pipestaves,
cullers of brick, and measurers of salt appeared on the public rolls. Town
legislation multiplied.
Government 59
So vigorous was the growth of the towns that between the formal end
of the Colony and beginning of the Province, 1684-92, the town organiza-
tion and privileges were recognized. The efforts of Governor Andros to
tax tha towns, command public assemblies, and interfere with the town
meeting were no small factors in arousing the towns to depose him.
Convinced of the inalienability of their right of self-rule, the towns main-
tained it until the provincial charter from William and Mary arrived in
1691. When the new charter was found to be without a provision guaran-
teeing local self-government, the first act passed by the General Court
hastened to make that guaranty.
In the eighteenth century, growth of the towns was spasmodic because
of the unsettled times and perils of the frontier. Tax lists show 1 1 1 towns
in 1715; 156 in 1742; 161 in 1752; 199 in 1768; and 239 in 1780. At times
the frontier hazard was so acute that the General Court passed a law by
which persons abandoning a frontier town would forfeit their estates.
The same passion for self-rule, displayed at the time of Sir Edmund
Andros, prompted the towns to embrace the principles of the Revolution.
They voted to support the Declaration of Independence, provided sup-
plies and ammunition, and voted bounties to volunteers. The towns,
impelled by the ideals of the first settlers, were the backbone of the
revolt.
The Constitution of 1780, after one hundred and fifty years of doubt,
confirmed local autonomy. A General Act on towns, passed in 1786,
treated application of the principle at length. It named the officers to
be elected, the right to assess taxes, make by-laws, and punish offenders.
The people were guaranteed the right to place an article in a town war-
rant or even compel a Justice of the Peace to convoke a town meeting.
There were then about three hundred communities with about 400,000
population.
In 1820 a constitutional amendment gave the General Court the right
to charter cities. Two years later Boston, which had made five attempts
since 1784 to discard the town system, was incorporated. The genesis
of city government was in the chartered borough of Colonial times. New
York in 1686 had the first borough charter. It was modeled on the Eng-
lish Community corporation, with the Mayor and the Council or Alder-
men acting as opposing checks.
At first committees of the Council handled matters like public works
and water supply, but separate departments were finally created for such
purposes. Wherever a Mayor secured the veto power, the Council de-
clined in importance. Inefficiency in departments, laxity in enforcing
60 Massachusetts: The General Background
State laws, squandering of public funds, and poor policing led to increas-
ing State interference in the years preceding the Civil War. After the
Civil War, towns continued to shift to city government. In 1865 there
were 14 cities and in 1875 19, with more than fifty per cent of the popula-
tion. In 1885 there were 23 cities with sixty per cent of the popula-
tion.
As the tide of immigration rose, general optimism prevailed; and with
the population interested in business pursuits, public debts, inefficiency,
and the spoils system flourished. By the turn of the present century the
reform of city government was a major issue and, as a consequence,
many towns of increasing population were seeking to discover a modified
town system and avoid city organization with its maze of problems.
By a law passed in 1915, called the Optional Charter Law, the Massa-
chusetts Legislature, which has authority to grant or annul a city charter,
made four choices possible: Mayor and Council elected at-large; Mayor
and Council elected partially by wards and at-large; the Commission
form or City Manager form. In this State, the system of providing a
charter by special acts is followed, thus theoretically basing each charter
on the particular needs of the community.
However, the city form has not appealed to many large towns. In
1915 Brookline tried the limited or representative town meeting to
regulate its size. Any citizen may speak, but only duly elected citizens
may vote. Water town followed this example in 1919, Arlington in 1921,
and about twelve others up to the present date.
Although there is a belief that the traditional town meeting is to be
found only in small communities on the Cape or in the Berkshires, there
are still large communities which retain not only their town designation,
like Braintree, Plymouth, and Natick all over 12,000 in population
but also towns which, although larger than some cities, retain what has
been sometimes called the 'last refuge of pure democracy/ the unlimited
town meeting; among them is Framingham, a community of about 23,000.
The county system which developed in Massachusetts was at first
patterned after the English model familiar to the first settlers. Its or-
ganization here was chiefly for judicial purposes. In the West, as in the
English counties in Saxon days, the county has developed legislative
powers; but in the Bay State the towns and cities, some of whose officers
are today county commissioners, were too strong to permit it. The
first counties were organized in 1643 as Suffolk, Middlesex, Essex, and
Norfolk. By the time of the Revolution, 12 of the present 14 counties
were in existence. Franklin was organized in 1811 and Hampden, the
Government 61
last, in 1812. The early officers were appointed. After the Revolution,
most of them became elective.
Originally all malefactors were brought before the General Court at
Boston. This resulted in such congestions and delay that in 1635 the Gen-
eral Court established courts at Ipswich, Salem, Newtowne, and Boston
to handle all but capital cases. The General Court became a court of
appeal. As courts for various purposes developed, the General Court,
for convenience, located them in the four 'shires' organized in 1643.
Growth of the judicial and penal system from then on was rapid. In
1647 local magistrates were appointed for smaller cases. In 1655 each
county was ordered to establish a House of Correction. In 1685 came
the authority to probate wills and establish Chancery Courts for equity
cases. In 1699 the 'beadle' became the Sheriff, and as such was made
keeper of the House of Correction.
There were few changes in the Provincial period. Judges, sheriffs, and
justices were still appointed by the Governor and Council. In 1699 the
Inferior Courts for common pleas were established in each county (there
then being ten counties), and a Superior Court of Judicature was estab-
lished by the Province. The same year legislation making the Sheriff
general keeper of the jails was passed.
When the Commonwealth period began in 1780, the Superior Court
of Judicature became the Supreme Judicial Court. Two years later the
Inferior Courts became the Courts of Common Pleas, and in 1811 they
were succeeded by the Circuit Court of Common Pleas with a Chief
Justice and assistants, to be succeeded in 1859 by the Superior Courts.
The present Municipal Courts are successors of the old police courts or
courts of Justice of the Peace.
Although the courts, as organized in the counties, are creatures of the
General Court, they constitute one of the great trinity of independent
branches of our government. The independence of the courts is based
upon the Constitution, for it is within their power to void even legislation
when it is not consonant with constitutional provisions. Common law,
just as in Colonial times, is the basis of Massachusetts jurisprudence,
modified and developed, however, during the past three hundred years
in accordance with legislative enactments and judicial decisions.
The courts, when in session, are open to all citizens. There are two
chief divisions, for criminal and for civil business. Minor cases may be
disposed in the District Courts. Major matters are customarily con-
sidered in the Superior Courts, although litigants of even minor matters
have the right to carry their cases to the Superior bench. The Supreme
Judicial Court is the highest court of appeal in the Commonwealth.
62 Massachusetts: The General Background
In Massachusetts the Legislature is known as the General Court, al-
though it has long since created courts for the judicial affairs of the
State. Today the General Court is exclusively a lawmaking body. Bi-
cameral, it consists of a lower popular body, the House of Representatives,
over which the Speaker presides, and a smaller upper body, the State
Senate, over which the President presides.
The first General Court under the Constitution met in Boston October
25, 1780. The number of its members varied considerably. At times it
had more than 400. The establishment of Maine as a separate State
helped to reduce the number, but it was not until 1857 that a constitu-
tional amendment fixed it at the present membership of 240 for the
House and 40 for the Senate. The Acts of 1926, which established re-
presentative and senatorial districts, determined there should be one
Senator for every 103,000 persons and one Representative for every
17,000.
While most States have biennial sessions, Massachusetts retains
annual sessions. Under the right of free petition, any citizen of the
Commonwealth, by requesting either a Representative or Senator, may
introduce a petition to alter or abolish an old law, or establish a new one.
Although such petitions are pigeonholed in many States, in Massachusetts
a report has to be made on each one.
Similarly, if introduced in the Senate, such a petition is given a reading
in the Senate and is referred to the proper committee. Next it is printed
and a public hearing is given in order that both proponents and opponents
may be heard. The committee then reports on the petition. If the report
is favorable, the petition, now in the form of a bill, faces three readings
either in the Senate or House, depending on the officer who introduced it.
If it survives the third reading, there is then a vote to be engrossed. If
engrossed, it then goes to the other legislative body, and through the
same readings and engrossment. Differences between the branches may
be ironed out in a conference committee.
Theoretically the laws are supposed to be administered by the Gov-
ernor with the aid of his Council. In reality the Governor, having a dual
role because of his position as head of a political party, is the origin of
legislation. With this practice of inspiring legislation and with an enor-
mous amount of patronage under his control, the Governor's position is
no longer one merely of dignity and honor, but of constantly increasing
power.
Under the Colonial charter, all Governors save the first were elected
by the people for a one-year term. James II, before he was deposed,
Government 63
broke this procedure. Thereafter, under the charter of William and
Mary, the Governor was subject to appointment by the Crown. He
became vice-regal, a military figure with power to prorogue or dissolve
the General Court. Since 1780 the Governor has been elected at-large.
John Hancock, the first Constitutional Governor, was elected six terms.
A majority vote was required, resulting in 1855 ' m a change to a plurality
vote after the election had several times been forced into the General
Court for selection of the winner. Since 1917 the Governor's term has
been for two years instead of one.
The Governor is Commander-in- Chief of the State's Militia and
Naval forces. With advice of the Council he may prorogue the House
and Senate and appoint all judicial officers, may appoint and remove
State department heads, and exercises the power of pardon for every
verdict but impeachment.
Only Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts still have a Gov-
ernor's Council. The seven assistants of the Governor of Plymouth
Colony constitute the historical origin of the Council. The charter of
Charles I provided for the election of eighteen assistants. The charter
of William and Mary provided for the election of twenty-eight councillors.
The first draft of the State Constitution omitted them, but the instru-
ment of 1780 retained them, as did the Constitutional Convention of
1820, although their number was reduced to nine. These were elected
from the group of forty, who were elected jointly Senator-Councillor,
leaving a Senate of thirty-one members. It is an interesting fact that
many declined the councillorship, regarding the Senate seat as more
important.
In 1840 the thirteenth constitutional amendment was passed, providing
for the selection of the Councillors by the House and Senate from the
people-at-large. A committee of the Constitutional Convention of 1853
voted abolition of this measure, but the vote was rejected. Two years
later another amendment was passed providing for eight councillor
districts and direct election.
The Council has been attacked on the grounds that it is a dispensable
Colonial relic, that it makes impossible a concentration of responsibility,
that its pardon proceedings are secret, that its revision of sentences is
prejudicial to the courts, that its work could be performed by the Senate,
and on the grounds of economy. It has been defended as a check on the
power of the Governor, and for the reason that numerous duties now
performed by it would otherwise have to be delegated elsewhere.
In order to carry out the policies formulated by the Legislature, there
64 Massachusetts: The General Background
has developed and been placed under the supervision of the Governor a
number of State departments. These departments, with an ever- widening
scope in community activities, are distinct from such primary govern-
mental units as the departments of the Secretary of State, the State
Treasurer, and the Attorney-General.
With early industrialization came an increase in the number of public
welfare cases. Many of the towns and cities sought to evade their ob-
ligation toward these victims of the changing economy, with the result
that a State Board of Charity, forerunner of our present Department of
Public Welfare, was established by the Legislature.
Public health was another vital need which called for State interven-
tion. Boston in 1799 established its own Board of Health. In 1828
Salem, Marblehead, Plymouth, Charlestown, Lynn, and Cambridge had
similar boards. But in 1849, when there was a devastating epidemic of
cholera, these Boards of Health were not able to cope with the peril, with
the result that the State Board of Health was established.
In 1852 a law prohibiting the sale of alcoholic liquors was passed. Its
enforcement was extremely difficult. A special committee which in-
vestigated the situation in 1863 publicized the weaknesses of local en-
forcement. Two years later, despite the opposition of some localities,
the office of Constable of the Commonwealth was established. With his
deputies he was to regulate, not only the liquor shops, but also to suppress
gambling and vice. In 1875, when State prohibition of the sale of liquor
was repealed, the enforcement unit was reorganized into what is today
the Sta'te Police.
The development of the State Board of Education had similar small
beginnings. In 1826 each town was required to choose a school committee,
usually of five members, and give an annual report to the Secretary of
State. In 1834 a State School Fund was established from the sale of land
in Maine and from claims against the Federal Government. Three years
later the State Board of Education came into being.
Practically every phase of human activity came under supervision of
the State. New departments, some later consolidated, were organized:
in 1838, the State Banking Commission; in 1853, the Board of Agricul-
ture; in 1855, the Insurance Commission; in 1865, the Tax Commission;
in 1869, the Bureau of Labor Statistics; in 1870, the Corporation Com-
mission; in 1887, the first registration board. More recently, civil service,
elections, highways, bridges, and public metropolitan areas have come
under State supervision.
LABOR
BY 1830 the nearest geographical frontier had been pushed to about five
hundred miles west of Massachusetts. A new frontier, however, delineated
on no map, was arising the frontier of awakening labor. Frederick
Jackson Turner and a host of his disciples have told the story of the
Western frontier, and of the influence on the East of fresh currents of
democracy from the West. Quite as important, however, in its ultimate
effects is the story of the defense of democracy waged by these other
frontiersmen.
Hardly more than fifty years after they had won the Revolution, only
ten years after they had secured the vote, and seven years after the found-
ing of the first trade union in the State, Massachusetts workmen in 1830
raised a whole series of new demands. They asked for free public educa-
tion, for the abolition of monopolies, the end of imprisonment for debt,
the reform of the militia system, separation of religion and politics, sim-
plification of legal procedure, compulsory mandate for representatives,
and a graduated taxation of surplus property.
Through the panics of 1837 and 1857, the post-war depression of the
1870*5, the depression of 1884, the panics of 1893 and 1907, the post-war
depression of 1921, and the crisis beginning in 1929; in the face of depriva-
tion, discrimination, and armed force; with little support except from men
and women as poor as themselves, these pioneers were responsible for the
recognition by their State of the right to join a labor union, for the spread
of free education, for at least the partial freeing of women and children
from industrial slavery, and for the relaxation of laws that penalized a
man and his family for being poor. Most of these pioneers of Massachu-
setts democracy, like the majority of Western pioneers, remain anony-
mous, their names and deeds either lost altogether or buried in the files of
old newspapers, union journals, trade-union records, Labor Department
reports, ships' logs, and other obscure sources from which much of even so
brief an account as the present must be derived. A few outstanding names
emerge those of George McNeill, a weaver of Fall River, of Ira Steward,
a machinist of Boston, of the Lowell textile workers Sarah G. Bagley and
Lucy Larcom, the latter a poet and author of 'A New England Girlhood.'
Throughout the first half of the nineteenth century shipping was among
66 Massachusetts: The General Background
the most important industries in Massachusetts, the principal seafaring
State of the nation. Conditions of labor on the ships were far from ideal.
Aboard whaling vessels, especially, seamen risked their lives for little pay.
To constant danger was added harsh discipline. Whaling vessels were
floating factories, and coopers and smiths were necessary to their opera-
tions. These skilled mechanics soon discovered that what was a strike
on land was mutiny afloat. The cooper of the New Bedford vessel 'Har-
vest' who 'said he would not work no more than day's work on shore'
promptly found himself in irons aboard a sloop-of-wai . When the crew
of the ' Midas ' refused to take the vessel out of Upsala shorthanded and
appealed to the United States Consul, they were replaced with natives,
one man was discharged, three were put in irons, and three others were
flogged.
No matter how successful a whaling voyage might be, the 'fo'mast'
hand rarely came off with anything to bank. His 'lay' in the voyage was
generally on the books, his profits were book profits. Against these were
charged all his purchases, during a voyage of from three to five years,
from the slop-chest aboard ship clothes, tobacco, boots, etc. at
prices several times the value attaching to these goods elsewhere. If he
had any surplus when he came ashore, the 'sailors' boarding-houses' and
the 'land sharks' soon took care of that. The only thing that was dis-
pensed free to the old New Bedford whalemen was a Bible. A well-known
owner of one of that city's whaling fleets once described the Bible as the
best cheap investment a shipowner could make.
Speculative overexpansion and inflation of credit were already becom-
ing familiar phenomena to the workmen of the i82o's. The hard winter
of 1828-29 brought widespread misery and unemployment. Those who
were employed labored long hours at low wages in Lowell, for instance,
the working-day in the mills varied from i \]/2 to 13^ hours, and the wages
from $i to $5 a week. Three thousand poor were annually imprisoned for
debt in Massachusetts. Fluctuating currency and compulsory militia
service penalized the workingmen. Many strikes were treated as illegal
affairs that merited jail sentences for the participants, and not until
1842, in the case of Commonwealth v. John Hunt, were the courts to
establish the precedent that a trade union in this instance the Boston
Journeymen Bootmakers' Society was something other than a criminal
conspiracy against the State.
In the face of such conditions the New England Association of Farm-
ers, Mechanics, and Other Workingmen was formed in 1830. At the first
public meeting of this group in Boston a political party, the Working
Labor 67
Men of Boston, was founded. Meetings of the party were held in North-
ampton, Dedham, and Dorchester. By the following spring, the move-
ment was spreading to the western part of the State.
Immigrant laborers first began to appear in any considerable numbers
in the 1830*3, when many Irish entered the port of Boston. 'Riots' -
sometimes spontaneous and unorganized strikes, sometimes the result of
indignation of other workers against new and cheap labor occurred.
Union organization in Massachusetts began among skilled workers
shipwrights, calkers, and journeymen in the building trades in the
i82o's. The early 'trades' union' was a confederation of organizations in
the same industry; what corresponded to the modern trade union was
called an 'association' or 'society,' and often had charitable and benefit
provisions for its members. A very early, if not the earliest, trade union in
Massachusetts was that of the shipwrights and calkers of Boston and
Charlestown, who in 1823 secured a State charter as the 'Columbian
Charitable Society of Shipwrights and Calkers.'
In 1825, six hundred Boston journeymen carpenters struck for the ten-
hour day, but the strike was lost by the threatened blacklisting of the
journeymen on the part of ' the gentlemen engaged in building.' During
the i83o's many strikes for the ten-hour day occurred among machinists,
leather finishers, and stonecutters, and among building trades workers.
Most of these strikes were defeated either by the importation of strike-
breakers from other localities or by threats on the part of the employers
to reduce wages upon a reduction of hours.
Strikes for higher wages also occurred in the period of 1830-40. On
New Year's Day, 1834, one thousand women shoebinders of Lynn who
worked at home at piece-rates formed a society, held several meetings and
street parades, and resolved they would take no work until the rates were
raised. The strike was defeated by the employers' action in sending the
work elsewhere. In February, 1834, 'a brief disturbance occurred at
Lowell among the female factory operatives on account of a reduction in
wages.' Laborers on the Providence Railroad in Marshfield struck for
higher wages in the same year, and the strike was suppressed by a com-
pany of militia. In 1837, sailors in Boston struck for an advance from $14
to $16 a month.
The panic of 1837 halted the labor movement for several years. Cotton
mills closed down, whale ships lay idle at the New Bedford wharves, shoe
manufacturing in Haverhill and other 'shoe towns' ceased almost com-
pletely.
In the i84o's a new ten-hour movement developed, encouraged by Presi-
68 Massachusetts: The General Background
dent Van Buren's order in 1840 that 'all public establishments will here-
after be regulated, as to working hours, by the ten-hour system.' A peti-
tion of Lowell women textile operatives in 1842 asked the legislature for
a law to prevent mill-owners from employing women more than ten hours
per day. The first convention of the New England Working Men's Asso-
ciation (later the Labor Reform League) dedicated to securing the ten-
hour day, met at Boston in 1844; and in 1845, under the leadership of
Sarah G. Bagley, the Lowell Female Labor Reform Association was
founded for the same purpose. In response to this movement, a special
legislative committee began in 1845 the first State investigation of labor
conditions in the United States. It reported that hours for women in
Massachusetts industry averaged over twelve per day. 'The remedy/
said the committee, 'is not with us. We look for it in the progressive
improvement in art and science, in a higher appreciation of man's destiny,
in a less love for money,' etc. The legislative committees of 1846, 1850,
1852, 1855, 1866, and 1867 also failed to recommend a ten-hour law. How-
ever, by 1844, as the result of President Van Buren's regulation as applied
to the Charlestown Navy Yard and of effective organization among ship-
yard workers, the ten-hour day became general in most shipbuilding
establishments in the State.
In 1853, the House passed a bill limiting hours of women in industry.
But the Senate substituted for it an unenforceable bill. Not until 1874
was the first enforceable law limiting hours of work in factories placed
on the statute books in Massachusetts, and this applied only to women
and children.
In the i84o's immigration began again to rise. This period saw also the
growth of associative, co-operative, and communal movements in Massa-
chusetts. William H. Channing, George William Curtis, Henry James,
Sr., and George Ripley, among others, spread the co-operative gospel.
The humanitarians of the i84o's sought to supersede capitalism by de-
veloping alternative, and superior, forms of economic organization. The
wage-earners in capitalist enterprises, caught in the net of the wage
system, sought to improve their conditions within that system by strik-
ing. Methodical efforts of trade unions to investigate wages and conditions
and to better them on the basis of their findings, to make agreements with
their employers, and to enforce agreements with strikes, if necessary, dis-
sipated the last fogs of transcendentalism in the labor movement. Initia-
tion fees, dues, and fines were fixed, regular meeting-places rented, and
hiring-halls set up. Regulations limiting the number of apprentices and
protecting highly skilled workers were adopted, and the unions finally
Labor 69
and definitely expelled the few remaining employer-members from their
ranks.
As a result of Irish famine and German revolution, immigrants to the
State from 1845 to 1855 were averaging thirty thousand a year. With the
help, in many instances, of immigrants from Europe who were experienced
in workers' movements, many trade unions were organized. Few survived
the panic of 1857, with the exception of those in highly skilled trades with
a long tradition of militancy, such as the shipbuilders, or those which, in
danger of going under, affiliated to form national unions.
In the period 1859-79 local trade unions increased from seventeen to
forty-two, Massachusetts sharing with New York and Pennsylvania
sixty per cent of the total number of unions in the United States.
The first important strike in the shoe trade occurred in 1858-59 at Na-
tick, where six hundred shoe workers, after a fourteen weeks' struggle,
gained an increase in wages. One thousand shoemakers of Lynn formed a
union and struck in February, 1860. A hundred special police were ap-
pointed by the Lynn authorities, and a detachment of Boston police was
sent into the city. The strikers, announcing their peaceful intent, es-
corted the Boston police out of Lynn with jeers. The strike became gen-
eral throughout eastern Massachusetts, and was joined by women stitch-
ers, binders, and machine operators. Delegations from Marblehead,
Beverly, Salem, Danvers, and Woburn joined at Lynn on March 7, 1860,
in the largest labor demonstration ever held in Massachusetts up to that
time. Five thousand men and one thousand women paraded with over
one hundred banners and twenty-six American flags, enlivened by several
military and fire companies and five brass bands. Eventually, by import-
ing strikebreakers from Maine and New Hampshire, the factory owners
were able to end the strike.
The Order of the Knights of St. Crispin was founded by shoe workers
at Milwaukee in 1867 after a plan of Newell Daniels, formerly of Milford,
Massachusetts, and a Grand Lodge of that order was incorporated in
1870 in the State. In 1868 the 'Crispins' struck in Ashland to enforce the
discharge of non-union men. The employer secretly brought in one hun-
dred men from Maine, protected by State police. In North Adams man-
ufacturers imported men whom they forced to sign each month an agree-
ment not to join the Order. The men signed and joined the 'Crispins.'
Finding that supposedly 'loyal' workers were secretly joining the union,
and that imported labor was being met at the railroad station by union
men and warned against 'scabbing,' the factory owned by C. T. Sampson,
at North Adams, actually imported Chinese from California. The firm
7O Massachusetts: The General Background
of Stowe, Bills and Whitney, finding during a strike that workers refused
to respond to advertisements for men to replace the workers, set up a
school in 1875 an d trained raw youths to the trade, thus finally succeeding
in reopening the factory.
Largely through the demands of organized labor the first State Bureau
of Labor Statistics in the United States was formed in 1869, 'to collect
and publish statistical details relating to all departments of labor in the
Commonwealth, especially in its relations to the commercial, industrial,
social, educational and sanitary condition of the laboring classes, and to
the permanent prosperity of the productive industry of the Common-
wealth.'
In most trade unions, political discussion was not permitted at meetings.
Workingmen, however, were vitally interested in labor legislation, and
not only participated in but led many of the political movements of the
1870*5 and i88o's. Outside the trade unions were organized the Trades
Assemblies, where political and social questions were discussed. The
National Labor Union was created for this purpose in 1866, and continued
to function until 1874. In April, 1878, at a regular meeting of the Boston
Typographical Union, a motion was adopted to form a Central Union of
the Trades in Boston and the vicinity.
Labor also began to consider the larger question of the role of labor in
relation to production. Ira Steward, a machinist of Boston, developed
in the period of 1869-80 the theory that by a general eight-hour day and a
general increase of purchasing power the problems of capital and labor
could be solved. He set forth his ideas in a book which he left uncompleted
at his death in 1883. The manuscript was altered, added to, and com-
pleted by George Gunther, a weaver of Fall River, who brought it out un-
der the title of 'Wealth and Progress' in 1887. Later Gunther joined with
F. A. Sorge, for a time the representative of Karl Marx's International
Workingmen's Association hi America, and with J. P. McDonnell the
Fenian, to found the International Labor Union, which attempted to
organize unskilled workers.
George McNeil! also had a major part in labor's political movements of
this period. His father, John McNeill, had been associated with John
Greenleaf Whittier in the anti-slavery movement, and George himself
took part in the strike of 1852 in the woolen mills of Amesbury, which
was supported by WTiittier and Thomas Wentworth Higginson. Black-
listed in the textile trade, George McNeill learned the trade of shoemaker.
He was secretary (1863-64) of the Grand Eight-Hour League, president
(1869-74) of the Boston Eight-Hour League, and president (1867-69) of the
Labor 71
Workingmen's Institute. He drafted the first program for the Knights of
Labor Assembly in 1874. At first he was associated with Wendell Phillips,
but the theories of the eight-hour reformers and of greenbackism were
mutually incompatible, and the association ended. Phillips and McNeill
were partly responsible for the establishment of the Massachusetts Bureau
of Labor Statistics in 1869, and McNeill was appointed the first assistant
chief of the bureau in that year, but was discharged in 1873 on account of
his labor activities. McNeill resigned from the Knights of Labor to join
the newly formed American Federation of Labor in 1886. He wrote a
number of books on labor problems.
Wendell Phillips was largely responsible for the Greenback Movement of
1870-80, which, partly socialist and partly anarchist in inspiration, was
an effort to displace bankers and middlemen from their key places in the
economy of production. Currency and bonds, according to the green-
backists, should be interchangeable. The basic economic theory common
to socialism, anarchism, and greenbackism was that capital was solely the
product of labor. This was no new doctrine, of course Adam Smith and
Ricardo had already voiced it, while Marx had employed it as a weapon.
Its newness lay in its use by workingmen's political movements in Amer-
ica. Greenbackism, popularly supposed to be a currency reform move-
ment, was more than that it aimed, by a new system of credit and by
universal suffrage, at complete industrial reorganization.
Besides Wendell Phillips, Josiah Warren, the first American anarchist,
Ezra Heywood, Warren's follower, William H. Channing, Albert Bris-
bane, and John Orvis of Brook Farm were among the middle-class re-
formers participating in the unions' political movements. The Independ-
ent Party was formed in 1870, and in three weeks workingmen, without
newspaper support, succeeded in electing twenty-one State representatives
and one State senator, polling a vote of 13,000 in the State.
For more than twenty years after 1880, Massachusetts workers devoted
themselves to 'pure and simple' trade unionism. In the period of 1881-
1900 there were 1802 recorded strikes and lockouts, Massachusetts rank-
ing fourth among the States in strikes and third in number of lockouts.
Nearly one-third of these disputes was in the shoe industry, the next
largest number being in the cotton goods industry and the building trades.
In 1911, a labor law reduced women's working hours to fifty-four per
week. In retaliation, manufacturers reduced wages proportionately, and
this act precipitated the great Lawrence strike of 1912.
According to a report of the United States Commissioner of Labor,
'the average amount actually received [in Lawrence] by the 21,922 em-
72 Massachusetts : The General Background
ployees, during a week late in 1911, in which the mills were running full
time, was $8.76.' Most of the workers were unorganized the United
Textile Workers had twenty-five hundred members, and the Industrial
Workers of the World a few hundred. After three days, however, nearly
all the unskilled and semi-skilled operatives in the city were out. Joseph
Ettor, a member of the General Executive Board of the I.W.W., came to
Lawrence and assumed leadership of the strike. On January 15, strikers
picketed in mass, and the Mayor requisitioned four out-of-town troops of
militia in addition to the four local companies. On January 16, the mills
were reopened with the protection of police and the militia, and picketers
were driven back at the point of the bayonet. William M. Wood, president
of the American Woolen Company, refused to meet with a strike com-
mittee. On January 19, the skilled operatives joined the strike. Next day
several sticks of dynamite were ' discovered ' in the strike district, seven
strikers were arrested, and four additional companies of militia were
brought in. Subsequently a leading business man was tried, convicted,
and fined five hundred dollars for 'planting' the dynamite; President
Wood was exonerated in court after failing to explain a payment to the
purchaser of the dynamite. On the day of a huge demonstration, Janu-
ary 29, a woman striker was killed, and the city council voted to turn the
town over to the commander of the militia, which was reinforced by the
addition of ten more companies of infantry and two of cavalry. Ettor
and Arture Giovanitti, editor of // Proletario, were accused of the murder,
and later acquitted. While Ettor was in jail, William ('Big Bill') Hay-
wood took command of the strike. One hundred and nineteen strikers'
children were sent to New York, where they were greeted by a crowd of
five thousand. Later ninety-two more children were sent out of harm's
way. When once more a new group of 'refugee' children was ready to
board the train, fifty police and two companies of militia clubbed their
parents and dragged children and parents to jail. After the organization
of the largest picket line ever seen in Massachusetts, comprising twenty
thousand workers, the strike was won, with wage increases, time-and-a-
quarter for overtime, and guarantees of no discrimination against union
members.
During the strike the relief committee had raised a large sum, appealing
in a circular for ' bread ' for the striking workers. The Attorney General
of the State contended that this money should be spent only for bread,
whereas portions of the fund had been used for legal expenses, transporta-
tion of children, contributions to the national organization, etc. He se-
cured a court order compelling the strikers to turn over $15,379.85 to the
Labor 73
court to be expended for 'charitable purposes,' with an accounting for
sums already paid out.
In August, 1919, the Boston Social Club, an organization of 1290 Bos-
ton police, voted to join the American Federation of Labor in a body.
The patrolmen complained that their wages had failed to keep pace with
the cost of living, that the police stations were unsanitary, and that they
worked overtime without compensation. Police Commissioner Edwin U.
Curtis issued an order on August n forbidding members of the police
force to 'join any organization outside the department except posts of the
G.A.R., Spanish War Veterans, and American Legion.' Despite this or-
der, on August 15 the Boston Social Club was chartered as the Police-
men's Union under the A.F. of L., and the Boston Central Labor Union,
representing eighty thousand organized workers, assured the new union of
its support. Commissioner Curtis preferred charges against eight police-
men; as sole judge, he passed on the validity of the ruling he had issued,
and, declining to hear counsel for the policemen in rebuttal, found the men
guilty. The Policemen's Union thereupon called a strike, to become ef-
fective at the hour of the evening roll call on September 9. Only thirty of
the four hundred and twenty patrolmen due at that roll call appeared.
A citizens' committee, appointed as an arbitrating body, stated that * the
Boston Policemen's Union should not affiliate or be connected with any
labor organization,' but urged that 'the present wages, hours, and work-
ing conditions require material adjustment.'
The striking patrolmen placed twenty pickets at each police station.
Mayor Peters called on ' all citizens to do their part to assist the authori-
ties in maintaining order,' and Governor Calvin Coolidge called out one
hundred State police. President Lowell of Harvard appealed to students
1 to prepare themselves for such services as the Governor may call upon
them to render.' Dean Greenough organized an 'emergency committee,'
and Coach Fisher was reported by the press as having declared, ' To hell
with football if men are needed.' ' Come back from your vacations, young
men,' a press release credited Professor Hall of the Physics Department of
Harvard with saying, ' there is sport and diversion for you right here in
Boston.'
Sympathetic citizens of Boston gathered around police stations to cheer
the strikers and boo patrolmen who remained on duty. Guardsmen opened
fire with rifles and a machine gun on a cheering crowd of sympathizers in
South Boston, killing two boys and wounding several bystanders, and in
Scollay Square, cavalry charged on a crowd, shot a woman and killed a
man. Metropolitan Park (State) policemen thereafter refused to go on
74 Massachusetts: The General Background
further strike duty, were suspended, and joined the union. The possibility
of a sympathetic general strike neared. Hoodlums began pouring into
Boston from outside towns, and President Mclnnis of the Policemen's
Union placed responsibility for rioting and looting with Commissioner
Curtis. Mayor Peters placed the blame on Governor Coolidge, and the
Governor offered an 'implied rebuke' of the Mayor. Volunteer police-
men were called out on the morning of September 1 i, by which time seven
persons had been killed and some sixty injured. E. B. McGill was shot
by guardsmen on Howard Street 'as he was merely passing by,' according
to the press; Henry Grote was killed as he played 'craps' opposite the
Armory in Jamaica Plain; and Richard D. Reemts, a striking patrolman,
was killed as he attempted to disarm two special policemen.
President Wilson denounced the strike, and next day Samuel Gompers,
president of the A.F. of L., ordered the strikers back to work. With the
support of the Federation lost, the policemen were beaten, and their
union voted on September 1 2 to return to work. Next day, according to
the press, there ' was no recurrence of disorder except for the killing of one
man and the wounding of a woman.' Corporal Newton of the National
Guard was reported as killing a youth of twenty-two named Coist as he
ran across Tremont Street. The street was crowded with people, and Mrs.
Mary Jacques was about to cross the street when she screamed and fell,
shot through the leg. The people on the street began to crowd around, but
the guardsmen pushed them back, shouting, according to the newspaper
accounts, ' Get back or you'll get the same thing 1 '
Gompers appealed to Governor Coolidge to reinstate the strikers, at
the same time completely disavowing the strike. Coolidge disclaimed the
power of reinstatement, and added that he was opposed to 'the public
safety again being placed in the hands of these same policemen.'
The Boston police strike has always been considered a decisive factor
in the career of Calvin Coolidge. In 1920, he was elected to the Vice-
Presidency, and, upon the death of Warren G. Harding, in 1923, became
President of the United States.
The shoe industry today is second only to textiles in the State both as
to value of output and in the number of workers employed. One of the
most recent of many bitter struggles for organization in the shoe industry
occurred in 1929, when the shoe workers of Lynn, Boston, Chelsea, and
Salem struck with the major demand for the recognition of their union,
the United Shoe Workers of America, as opposed to the Boot and Shoe
Workers' Union, an A.F. of L. affiliate, with which they were dissatis-
fied. The strike lasted more than six months, but was broken by the Boot
Labor 75
and Shoe Union, which imported men from Maine and New Hampshire.
During this strike many 'runaway shops' left Massachusetts and moved
to non-union centers in Maine and New Hampshire. The frequency with
which these shops have moved has earned them the title of 'factories on
wheels.' .
In the summer of 1933, a movement started in Brockton for the amalga-
mation of all the independent shoe unions into one national union. A
new amalgamated union, the United Shoe and Leather Workers' Union,
was formed; the Brockton Brotherhood, however, refused to enter. This
new union, which included about fifty thousand workers, suffered from
internal dissensions, to say nothing of wholesale factory removals. In
1933-34 there were twenty-one shoe factories in Boston, employing some
seven thousand workers; by 1935-36 there remained only four factories,
employing about two thousand. Weakened by these conditions, the mem-
bership of the United Shoe and Leather Workers Union had dwindled to
fifteen thousand in 1936. In 1937, a movement again developed for
amalgamation, this time as an affiliate of the Committee for Industrial
Organization. The United and the Protective voted overwhelmingly for
amalgamation; but the Brotherhood defeated the proposal by nine
hundred votes.
In the fishing industry the ancient ' share ' or ' lay ' system still governs
the pay of all hands except the skipper, cook, and engineer. The foremast
hand gets only his share of the i stock ' (proceeds of the voyage after deduc-
tion of expenses) in lieu of a fixed wage. Theoretically, this workman thus
becomes a partner in the venture. He has no property investment at
stake, nor is he liable for financial losses involved in a 'broken voyage.'
He does speculate, however, with his time, his labor, often with his health
and not infrequently with his life.
All the old methods of fishing trawling as the Gloucestermen prac-
tice it, trap or weir fishing, hand-lining and seining are skilled labor,
and most of the work aboard the mechanized beam trawlers also requires
specialized knowledge. Risk, though considerably reduced from the days
of sail, is still large, especially in the use of dories for trawling. No regular
working hours are possible, and in the course of the usual voyage, work
never really ceases. When the men are not fishing, they have their gear
to mend, they must work ship, they must prepare the bait for trawl lines
and bait their hooks, and they must gut, clean, and stow the fish, and un-
load it when it is sold.
Fish are sold, at the principal ports, through a fish exchange, similar to
any commodity exchange save for one feature : the buyer is not held to his
76 Massachusetts: The General Background
price, even after the deal is closed. Should a number of vessels bring in
full loads of fish immediately following such a sale, thus increasing supply
and driving the price lower, the buyer may refuse to accept such fish as
have not been taken out of the hold. Usually he offers a lower price; and
as he has taken the freshest fish those on top, hence caught last the
skipper generally makes a concession. The chief burden of this sort of
dealing falls, of course, upon the crew the 'partners' in the voyage.
The only chance such men have to make an unusually large ' stock ' is to tie
up at a wharf with a full hold when no other vessel has one. And the
chances against this are large. For these reasons, mainly, the fisherman
is almost invariably poor. On account of the share system, fishermen have
remained largely unorganized.
In 1920, a fish peddler, Bartolomeo Vanzetti, and a shoe- worker, Nic-
cola Sacco, both members of the Galleani group of anarchists, were ar-
rested on the charge of murder and robbery in connection with the theft of
a $15,000 payroll. Despite their alibis, the highly circumstantial nature
of the evidence, and the commendations of previous employers, they were
ultimately both adjudged guilty. During the seven years that elapsed
between the murder and the execution of the sentence, protest demonstra-
tions were held throughout the world. President Lowell of Harvard, Pres-
ident Stratton of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Judge
Robert Grant were invited by Governor Fuller to weigh the evidence and
advise him. They upheld the finding of the court and Sacco and Vanzetti
were executed on August 23, 1927. It was widely believed that, although
legal forms were observed, the determining factor in the case from start
to finish was the affiliation of the two men with an unpopular minority
political group.
The Women's Trade Union League secured, in 1921, an extension of the
fifty-eight hour law for women to further industries. Employers of woman
labor in the textile industry were given power under the National Industrial
Recovery Act of 1933 to make codes of fair competition, and in that year
they secured the suspension of section 59 of chapter 149 of the General
Laws of Massachusetts which prohibited the employment of women in
textile mills after 6 P.M. This suspension was continued from year to year
after the collapse of the National Industrial Recovery Act.
Of the 122,389 workers in the textile mills of the State in 1937, forty per
cent were women. In the textile industry, women are a permanent labor
force. Most of them enter the mills at a very early age and remain there
for the greater part of their lives. Even marriage does not always take the
textile working girl out of the mill, for the earnings of her husband seldom
Labor 77
suffice to meet the family expenses. Weekly wages for women range from
$8 for ordinary workers to $27 for the most highly skilled spinners or
weavers. Since there are seasonal periods of unemployment, weekly
earnings over long periods naturally average considerably less. The
'speedup' and 'stretchout' systems, together with improvements in
machinery, have vastly increased the machine load per worker. Ten
years ago an operative commonly took care of a single loom, now he cares
for thirty or more. According to the May, 1937, issue of the Textile Worker
of New England, 'Within the past two months the textile mills, while
announcing a 10 per cent increase in wages, have actually increased the
work load of the operatives from 25 to 200 per cent.'
The same conditions and social philosophy that have permitted the
labor of women for long hours in industry have also permitted child-labor.
Edward Johnson, in ' Wonder- Working Providence' (1654), spoke of the
people of Rowley who ' caused their little ones to be very diligent in spin-
ning cotton wool,' and with the rise of the factory system children took
places beside their parents in the textile mills. An early memorandum by
the proprietor of a cotton mill in Lancaster records that in 1815 Dennis
Rier of Newburyport agreed to work with his family at the following
wages: Himself, $5 a week; a boy of sixteen, $2 a week; a boy of thirteen,
$1.50 a week; a girl of twelve, $1.25 a week; a boy of ten, 83 cents a week;
and a girl of eight, 75 cents a week. In 1825, according to the report of
that year by the Commissioner of Education, for children under sixteen
' the time of employment is generally twelve or thirteen hours each day,
excepting the Sabbath.' At Bridgewater children worked twelve hours
daily, and could not 'attend school and be employed.' In Duxbury chil-
dren under sixteen worked from 'sunrise to sunset.' This report dealt
with corporate establishments only in many others the conditions were
worse.
Hours of labor for children under twelve were limited to ten per day by
a law of 1842, and a law of 1858 stipulated that employed children must
have eighteen weeks' schooling each year. In 1913 was passed the first
enforceable eight-hour law for children in an important textile State.
In 1937, minors under fourteen could not work during the hours school
was in session, nor before 6.30 A.M. nor after 6 P.M. No boy under sixteen
could sell papers or 'exercise the trade of scavenger' after 9 P.M. or before
5 A.M. Minors might still be bound as apprentices or servants, although
above the age of fourteen only with the consent of the bound person.
Violations of child-labor laws are frequently reported. Uncontrolled
home work by women and children is also common.
78 Massachusetts: The General Background
According to the 1930 Census, there were 60,524 children from ten to
seventeen years of age gainfully employed in the State. Of this number
9824 were between the ages of ten and fifteen. In 1924, the United States
Congress accepted the so-called 'Child-Labor Amendment,' which is not
a child-labor law, but an act authorizing Congress to pass such laws. The
measure came up for ratification in Massachusetts in the same year.
A campaign against the amendment, led by the Massachusetts Associated
Industries, enlisted the aid of prominent citizens, including Cardinal
O'Connell, A. Lawrence Lowell, and others. The campaign for the
amendment was waged mainly by the State Federation of Labor and the
Massachusetts League of Women Voters. The referendum showed a ma-
jority against ratification of the amendment, and the General Court also
returned unfavorable votes on ratification in each year from 1933 to 1937.
At the 1937 legislative hearings on the amendment, the chairman abruptly
closed the proceedings, and his action was protested by the proponents
in a picket line before the State House, the first such since the Sacco-
Vanzetti case in 1927.
Several decisions of Massachusetts equity courts have had a bearing on
labor. In 1910, the courts handed down the important decision (Mariana
de Minico v. Daniel Craig) that it was within their jurisdiction to declare
whether or not a strike was ' legal ' ; and in the following year a strike for
the closed shop by the Boston Photo-Engravers' Union against all non-
union employers in Boston was enjoined as ' illegal.' Considered as illegal
in Massachusetts are picketing with banners (picketing without banners
is 'peaceful persuasion,' and legal), and sympathetic strikes. In 1937, a
law was passed making ' sit-down ' strikes illegal. Two important decisions
favorable to labor were that which upheld a law making blacklisting by
employers illegal (John Cornellier v. Haverhill Shoe Manufacturing As-
sociation, 1915), and the decision (Commonwealth v. Walter M. Libby)
upholding the constitutionality of a State law which makes it a criminal
offense for an employer, during a strike or lockout, to advertise for
employees without plainly and explicitly mentioning in the advertisement
that labor trouble exists.
ARCHITECTURE
FOR generations historians have been telling us that when the ' Mayflower '
dropped anchor off what is now Plymouth, our ancestors went ashore and
proceeded immediately to build log cabins. This would mean that, upon
the spur of the moment, these workmen invented a new type of building
a construction such as they had never seen in England, of a kind un-
known even to the Indians. A widely publicized painting illustrating this
fanciful theory pictures a double row of such log houses reaching up the
hillside of Leyden Street at Plymouth. Far from supporting this tradi-
tion, all accounts of day-by-day happenings following the settlement of
the coastal villages give ample proof that, so far as material and labor
permitted, the first settlers in New England reproduced the homes they
had left in Old England. The wooden versions of the English yeoman's
cottage were not the first to be built by the settlers. The exigency of
immediate shelter forced a direct retrogression to a type much earlier and
more primitive than those left behind. But as there were skilled artisans
and carpenters among the early settlers who were qualified by long ap-
prenticeships in England to construct permanent houses, there is no need
for giving more than a passing mention to the first temporary makeshift
structures. The common folk were first housed in conical huts constructed
of slanting poles covered with brush, reeds, and turf, sometimes with a low
wall of branches and wattle plastered with clay. These were the ' English
wigwams' referred to in chronicles, and were simply a transplantation of
a type then in use by charcoal-burners in England. Some of these tempo-
rary shelters were cellars built into the sides of banks, walled and roofed
with brush and sod. In Salem a * pioneer village' was built in 1930, and
reproductions of some of the early shelters and houses may be seen there.
Soon after landing, the colonists dug saw pits in the English manner
and began to produce boards in quantity suitable not only for the con-
struction of their own houses but for exportation as well. In the summer
of 1626, when the ship ' Fortune ' sailed from Plymouth, bound for England,
' clapboards and wainscott ' were listed as part of her lading. In the sum-
mer of 1623 Bradford mentions the building 'of great houses in pleasant
situations,' and later writes that 'they builte a forte with good timber.'
Isaac de Rasieres described the structure in 1627 as 'a large square house
80 Massachusetts: The General Background
made of thick sawn planks, stayed with oak beams.' When the fort was
taken down at the close of King Philip's War in 1676, the timber was
given to William Harlow, who built the Harlow House, which is still stand-
ing in Plymouth.
The usual type of permanent dwelling-house was a two-story structure,
the second story overhanging, with two rooms upstairs and down, a small
entry, and a mammoth chimney between. Lean-tos were often added
later. The Fairbanks House in Dedham (1636), solidly framed of oak,
rejoices in an unadorned simplicity lost in later and more academic struc-
tures. The Boardman House in Saugus (1651) combines two character-
istic features of the medieval Colonial: the overhang and the original
innovation of the lean-to. The long, unbroken slope of its roof is well
suited to stream-line the cold north wind. Ornament occurs in the Parson
Capen House at Topsfield (1683), where heavy carved pendrils or drops
depending from the bottom of the jetty or overhang lend an Elizabethan
flavor. As the overhang, however, had been evolved in England for the
purpose of gaining additional floor area above the street line, in a new and
spacious country it dwindled and soon disappeared.
The earliest ecclesiastical architecture was similarly influenced by
English medievalism. The only church building of the seventeenth cen-
tury still standing in the State, the Old Ship Church in Hingham, was
erected by ship carpenters in 1681. Its roof, built in the form of a trun-
cated pyramid, is surmounted by a belfry and lookout station. This early
church, constructed to fulfill the simple needs of its congregation, is de-
void of frivolity or pretense. Here, as frequently elsewhere in early Massa-
chusetts architecture, deliberate indifference to any esthetic concept
resulted in an effect of restraint and dignity.
The first indications of a more studied architecture came at the opening
of the eighteenth century with the adoption of less steep roofs, the use of
sash windows instead of casements, and a growing tendency to employ a
uniform cornice with a hip roof. William Price, a Boston print-seller, de-
signed Christ Church (the Old North Church) in 1723, adorning its simple
front with a lofty wooden steeple reminiscent of Wren. A more imposing
structure, the Old South Church, erected seven years later from plans by
Robert Twelve, is in this same style, which strongly influenced ecclesiasti-
cal architecture in the colonies during the entire century. The architec-
tural ambitions of the builders were satisfied by the steeple, little effort
at further adornment being made beyond an occasional elaboration of the
eaves into a classical cornice.
Independent of architectural pomposities of the mainland, the fisher-
Architecture 81
men along the bended elbow of the State were erecting their huddled
little ' Cape Codders.' Built on flat surfaces of the dunes, these one-and-a-
half-story cottages with lean-tos hugged the earth for warmth over shal-
low unfinished cellars. Entrance to the cellar was provided by a trapdoor
inside the house or by an outside bulkhead, its ungainliness hidden by a
lilac or other flowering shrub. Since the first story was usually not over
seven feet high, the half story used as a storeroom and as sleeping quarters
for the children provided little headroom. The typical Cape Codder had
a shingle roof, a large central chimney, a clapboarded front, sometimes
painted, and unpainted shingled sides which the salt air weathered to a
dull silver. The windmill, with its shingled walls and skeleton-like vanes
silhouetted against the dunes, is peculiar to the Cape and Nantucket.
The floors were of pine, wide-cut, painted or ' spattered.' The doors ordi-
narily had six panels and opened with a thumb latch. The first-floor win-
dows had four 'lights' each, those in the upper floor but three. Smaller
windows, set irregularly in the walls, provided light for closets. The
parlor, more carefully finished than the kitchen, contained a 'chair rail,'
a narrow moulding running around the wall about two and a half feet
from the floor. So simple a cottage made up for its bareness by the bright
polish of its window-panes and the gleam of its scrubbed floor.
The 'half-a-cape,' a plain dwelling with a chimney at one end, derived
its name from the fact that its owner always hoped the day would come
when he could add the other half and convert his cottage into a proper
house with a central chimney. The ' salt-box ' the origin of the name no
longer so apparent now that salt comes in cardboard containers has a
northerly lean-to roof. The ' rainbow roof ' rises in a convex curve to the
ridgepole, with the appearance of an inverted boat's hull. The familiar
roomy gambrel roof is occasionally but not often seen on the Cape.
As the seaboard towns grew in wealth, and tools and materials were
more easily secured, builders began to indulge in the free classic details
of the Queen Anne and the Georgian styles. The result was Georgian
colonial, which had a profound influence upon American domestic archi-
tecture along the eastern seaboard. In New England, Georgian colonial
buildings were almost invariably harmonious; details in most instances
were delicate and refined; errors were apt to be on the side not of coarseness,
but of smallness and reserve. The first phase of New England Georgian
occupied the period between 1720-25 and 1740-45, of which the Royall
House (1723) in Medford and the Dummer Mansion in Byfield are fine
examples. The second phase, from 1745 to 1775-80, is exemplified in the
Lee Mansion in Marblehead. The transition from Georgian to classicism,
82 Massachusetts: The General Background
showing a strong Adam influence, was dominant in the last phase, and
included some of the best work of Bulfinch and Mclntire.
In the absence of professional architects in Massachusetts during the
eighteenth century, cultivated amateurs turned to the drafting board.
Sir Francis Bernard, for nine years Colonial Governor of Massachusetts,
designed Harvard Hall (1765) in Harvard Yard. Near-by Massachusetts
Hall had been erected in 1720 from designs prepared by John Leverett,
president of the college, and Benjamin Wadsworth, later president.
John Smibert, portrait-painter, drew the plans for Faneuil Hall (1742) in
Boston, later enlarged and modified by Bulfinch. Peter Harrison, a con-
temporary of Smibert, although he had no professional training, became
the most distinguished architect of the Colonial era. In 1 749 he designed
King's Chapel in Boston, in which the influence of Wren and his successor
Gibbs can be seen. The exterior is dour, but the interior, with its rich
sobriety, repose, and studied suavity of proportion, remains one of the
finest in existence. Harrison also designed Christ Church (1761) in Cam-
bridge.
The first professional architect of the Republic began his career as a
cultivated amateur. Charles Bulfinch (1763-1844), born of a well-to-do
family, made an architectural ' grand tour ' of Europe. As a gentleman of
means and taste he designed houses for his friends. He planned the State
House on Beacon Hill in Boston, the original red brick core of which,
known as the Bulfinch Front, stands sandwiched between two white
annexes.
Bulfinch went bankrupt in 1796, and fortunately for architecture made
extended use of his talent to earn his living. In his handling of detail and
ornament the influence of Adam and Chambers is obvious, but in the
sterner matters of plan and composition Bulfinch struck out in new direc-
tions, and his designs, characterized by slender proportions, a delicacy
well suited to execution in wood, tall pilasters of slight projection, light
cornices and balustrades, slender columns, shallow surface arches, and
fan-lights and side-lights with tenuous tracery, were a departure in line
and detail. Bulfinch had studied to good effect Chambers's fine new
Somerset House in London, as is apparent from a comparison of his first
sketches for the State House, submitted in 1787, with the facade of the
English structure containing the Navy Office. A volume which Bulfinch
purchased abroad, *Le Vignole Moderne' (Paris, 1785), contains some of
the motives used on the portico of the State House, as well as a good
dome. His work in directing the completion of the Federal Capitol Build-
ing in Washington after 1817, when at President Monroe's invitation he
Architecture 83
replaced Latrobe as architect of the Capitol, indicates that his fresh and
bold approach had become somewhat restrained.
The Elias Hasket Derby Mansion in Salem profited by the combined ef-
forts of Bulfinch and Mclntire. Derby was so situated economically that
he could demand the best talent available, so Bulfinch, who was considered
the best, was asked to submit designs, which he did. Dissatisfied, Derby
called in Mclntire, the local master, and he carried the job to completion.
He designed the house almost independently, but incorporated in it some
of the features by Bulfinch.
As chairman of the board of selectmen of Boston, Bulfinch had much
to do with turning the Common from a meadow into a park, and during
this period he drew the plans for the warehouses on Boston's India Wharf.
Other buildings of significance by Bulfinch remaining today in Massa-
chusetts are Faneuil Hall (addition and revision, 1805), the Harrison
Gray Otis House (1796), the Sears House (second Harrison Gray Otis
House, 1800), Wadsworth House (third Harrison Gray Otis House,
1807), Bulfinch Building, Massachusetts General Hospital (1818) all
in Boston; University Hall, Harvard (1813-15); New North Church
(1806) in Hingham; Lancaster Church (1810); Meeting House, Taunton;
Pearson Hall (1818) and Bulfinch Hall (1818) at Phillips Academy in
Andover.
As the depression of the i78o's was succeeded by better times, Yankee
vessels began to pour wealth into Boston, Salem, and other seaboard
towns. Port towns soon were clustered with the square white houses of
shipowners and sea captains, their roofs crowned with roof decks known
as 'captain's walks' or 'widow's walks,' originally lookout places for
scanning the harbor. Many of the builders of these houses had been ship
carpenters, taught by the exacting demands of their craft economy of line
and material. As a result their houses possessed a fluidity of line seen at
its best in the work of Mclntire.
The work of Samuel Mclntire (1757-1811), carver-architect and con-
temporary of Bulfinch, shows the influence of European masters, notably
Robert Adam. But Mclntire possessed too much native genius to be
content with servile adaptation. 'He borrowed, but he repaid with in-
terest.'
Mclntire houses, many of which still line Chestnut Street in Salem,
had little exterior grace. They were big, four-square, three stories high.
Like their mistresses, the captains' ladies, these Salem houses guarded
themselves from the world by a prim, even prudish exterior. Within,
however, was amiability, charm, and finely studied and eloquently exe-
84 Massachusetts : The General Background
cuted detail, apparent in the broad staircases with their carved balusters
and twisted newels, the wooden mantels enriched with figured ornament,
the raised paneled dadoes, and delicate cornices with dentils and modil-
lions. The exteriors were usually flanked with great pilasters or quoins,
surmounted with cornices of well-proportioned members, and the houses
were not infrequently enclosed with elaborate wooden fences.
Mclntire's last houses, built from 1805 to 1811, were of brick. The
use of this less pliable material and a growing classical influence gave his
later work a more austere character. Outstanding examples of his archi-
tecture are the Pierce- Johonnot-Nichols House (1782), Samuel Cook
House (1804), John Gardner House (1805), David P. Waters House
(1805), Dudley L. Pickman House (1810), all in Salem; the Elias H.
Derby House (1799), and 'Oak Hill' (1800) in Peabody. Three complete
Mclntire rooms from 'Oak Hill' have been installed in the American
Wing of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.
Asher Benjamin, a contemporary of Mclntire, designed the Old West
Church (1806) and the Charles Street Church (1807) in Boston. Possessing
the native genius of neither Bulfinch nor Mclntire, Benjamin made an
important contribution to American architecture through his frequent
publications, from 'The Country Builder's Assistant' (1797) to 'The
Practical House Carpenter' (1830).
The Greek revival, started in the beginning of the nineteenth century
by Benjamin Henry Latrobe with his design for the Bank of Pennsylvania,
did not spread to New England until the second decade. Alexander
Parris and Solomon Willard, the planners of Bunker Hill Monument in
Charlestown (1825-42), were its chief exponents in Massachusetts, and
as such they designed Saint Paul's Cathedral (1820) in Boston. Later,
with Quincy Market (1825) in Boston and the Stone Temple in Quincy
(1828), Parris essayed other monuments to this revived style.
Long after the ebbing of the tide of Greek influence, one of the most
studied efforts in this style was built in Boston: the United States Custom
House (1847). Designed by Ammi B. Young and Isaiah Rogers, this
building was originally crowned with a dome. Later a tall shaft was
added, transforming it into Boston's first skyscraper and an apt tomb-
stone to the movement. The dome was not removed from the interior,
but the lower floors were allowed to hide it and form a shell about it.
Later examples of the Greek revival travestied the classic style rather
than copied it. It became common practice for the designers of com-
mercial buildings to make imitations of Greek porticoes and entries and
to attach them without discrimination to the facades of banks and
Architecture 85
markets. Allied to little in the Massachusetts tradition, the Greek revival
inevitably disintegrated.
After the Greek revival came experimentation in many directions.
Dwelling-houses took the form of Italian villas, or of mansard-roofed
boxes the shadows of English shadows. The result was a tedious
parade of mediocrity, punctuated here and there by an outstanding
atrocity. French influence fared somewhat better than English, and the
Athenaeum (1849), the Arlington Street Church, and the old Technology
building (now Rogers Hall) , all in Boston, were intelligent adaptations of
Renaissance motifs.
Up to the end of the Civil War no academic training of architects was
given in the State. In 1865, however, the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology established the first American school for architects, in which
something like the organized teaching of the Ecole des Beaux Arts was
attempted, with William R. Ware as its first director.
The period immediately following the Civil War was infected by
Ruskin's fervent advocacy of medievalism and his sweeping condemna-
tion of Renaissance architecture as 'immoral.' Ruskinian or Victorian
Gothic, derived by an adoption of Italian Gothic detail and characterized
by a confusion of aims frequently accompanied by mediocrity of achieve-
ment, has its monument in Memorial Hall (1878) at Harvard, William R.
Ware, architect. Probably the most severely condemned of its contem-
poraries, 'Mem Hall' shows the laboring of an architect of taste and
scholarship fatally hampered by a pernicious style. Boston's Copley
Square, originally a swamp dear to none but duck-hunters, was filled in,
and architects cast about for suitable designs for its new buildings. The
Old South Church (1876) was designed by Cummings and Sears, who
had obviously saturated themselves with Ruskin. A no less apparent
study of the work of Sir Gilbert Scott, however, makes this building one
of the more bearable examples of the Ruskinian episode in the United
States. The old Museum of Fine Arts, devotedly Ruskinian (1876, no
longer standing), built from designs by John Sturgis, was the first struc-
ture in which domestic terra cotta was used.
Just across the square Henry Hobson Richardson was burying the
corpse of Victorian Gothic and raising a splendid structure, Trinity
Church (1872-78). The bold individuality of Trinity, the most important
example of 'Richardson Romanesque,' can be fully appreciated, even by
trained eyes, only after detailed study. Taking as its point of departure
the Romanesque of southern France, Trinity is characterized by its
strong, vigorous and picturesque masses of rock-faced stonework and its
86 Massachusetts: The General Background
rich and individual ornament. John LaFarge's windows and interior
decorations are in keeping with the richness of the exterior.
Richardson was the second American to study at the Ecole des Beaux
Arts and in Paris he worked for Labrouste, the architect of that extraordi-
nary building, the Bibliotheque Sainte Genevieve in Paris. Trinity
Church, considered Richardson's most important work, is antedated by
the First Baptist Church of Boston (formerly New Brattle Square
Church, 1874), a failure acoustically, but notable for its tower. When
Richardson designed the tower he sent for Bartholdi, a fellow student at
the Beaux Arts, to execute the heavy frieze. Bartholdi became so en-
grossed in his new surroundings that he was moved to design his ' Light
of Liberty,' eventually reproduced in New York Harbor. Other note-
worthy examples of Richardson's work in the State are Sever Hall at
Harvard, the Woburn and North Easton public libraries. The Crane
Memorial Library in Quincy is probably Richardson's finest.
The Richardsonian Romanesque was widely imitated, but seldom
worthily adapted. An excellent adaptation of this style to a commercial
purpose, however, is the Ames Building (1891), one of Boston's first tall
office buildings and the last to employ all masonry instead of steel con-
struction, designed by Shepley, Rutan, and Coolidge, who carried on
Richardson's work.
The epochal achievement of the nineteenth century was the Albertian
Boston Public Library (1888-95). As his point of departure Charles
Follen McKim chose the bold, unbroken lines of Labrouste's Italian
Renaissance masterpiece, the Bibliotheque Sainte Genevieve in Paris.
But he fused with this influence the more robust character of Alberti's
San Francesco at Rimini. It is monumental, yet chaste in ornament.
Everything is calculated to produce a feeling of dignity and restraint,
and the whole effect is one of severity without coldness.
The Wilbur Theater (1913) in Boston was the first auditorium to be
designed with the help of a pioneer in the field of acoustics, Professor
Sabine of Harvard.
In Henry Adams, Massachusetts produced a scholar who sought in
medieval architecture a key to the present; in Ralph Adams Cram the
State possesses an architect who turns from the present to the medieval
past, notably in the All Saints' Church in Ashmont; Saint Stephen's,
Cohasset; First Unitarian, West Newton; All Saints' and the Church of
Our Saviour in Brookline.
Up to the time of the Chicago Exposition in 1893, when the steel
skeleton and the elevator had definitely severed architectural practice
ARCHITECTURAL MILESTONES
WHEN the settlers first came to America, they built some-
thing very like an English charcoal burner's hut. Reproduc-
tions of these early huts can be seen at the Pioneer Village in
Salem. Thereafter, as soon as the people were established,
they built houses as much like the familiar houses of Eliza-
bethan England as their materials permitted. Many of these
houses were afterward enlarged by the building of a * lean-to '
on the northern side which protected the house from the pre-
vailing northerly winds. The interiors were spacious and
agreeable.
Later, in the time of Mclntire and Bulfinch, the architecture
in Massachusetts reached a second peak. Chestnut Street in
Salem shows the houses of this period at their best. On the
same page with the picture of Chestnut Street is a picture of
the Hill of Churches in Truro. It is included for contrast, for
architecture in Massachusetts, like the people, reaches ex-
tremes of barrenness as well as beauty.
Besides Chestnut Street, two other Salem houses are shown,
and several interiors and a doorway; also an early example of
church architecture; Bulfinch's masterpiece, the State House;
and finally two later examples of Massachusetts architecture.
K C
WHIPPLE HOUSE, IPSWICH
5BS
1 I U
n
i
KITCHEN OF JOHN WARD HOUSE, HAVERHILL
IIARTSHORNE HOUSE, WAKEFIELD
HILL OF CHURCHES, TRURO
CHESTNUT ST., SALE]
ASSEMBLY HOUSE, SALEM
FIERCE-NICHOLS HOUSE, SALEM
-J
i,;
'
i
till!
II
LEE MANSION
OLD STATE HOUSE
HOUSE OF SEVEN GABLES, SALEM
STATE HOUSE, BOSTON
IIOLDEN CHAPEL, HARVARD
*'
'CONNECTICUT VALLEY ' DOORWAY, MISSION HOUSE, STOCKBEIDGE
I
PUBLIC LIBRARY, BOSTON
TRINITY CHURCH, BOSTON
Architecture 87
from tradition, Massachusetts held its place in the forefront of American
architecture. But since the birth of the modern movement, architecture
here seems to be dormant, almost oblivious of the changes taking place
elsewhere. The development of a more modern style here has been
prejudiced by conditions, and these for the most part have been largely
sociological. In the desperate effort to keep alive her inherited British
culture, Massachusetts has kept her architecture steeped in the confines
of tradition and precedent. Yet in spite of this seeming retrogression,
Massachusetts' influence upon modern architecture has been great.
This was not in the manner of recently constructed buildings, but in the
sporadic strokes of genius that formed the roots of the radical school.
Paradoxical though it may seem, the contemporary movement in
architecture began in Boston; in Richardson's audacious use of element-
ary masonry forms, gestation of modern architecture began. Not since
Wren has an architect left such a profound impress of his own personality,
both through his work and that of his successors. With few exceptions,
Richardson's successors were a parade of puppet kings wielding the
monarch's scepter. Their work was bold, unabashed, and ugly, and its
manifestations were not joyous; nonetheless it had promise. Of this
work Montgomery Schuyler wrote, 'It is more feasible to tame exuber-
ances than to create a soul under the ribs of death. The emancipation
of American architecture is thus ultimately more hopeful than if it were
put under academic bonds to keep peace.'
A healthily pregnant architecture such as this was being designed in
the office of Furness and Hewitt at Philadelphia when a young Bostonian
fresh from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and bound for the
Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris began work there. Louis Henry Sullivan
is the internationally recognized father of the radical school of archi-
tecture. On Richardson's foundation he laid the cornerstone of modern
architecture. He was the link between two great masters, Richardson
and Frank Lloyd Wright. It is not unreasonable to believe that Richard-
son saw before him in Boston too much tradition to overcome and that
this influenced him to go West to start the radical school. In Sullivan's
work we see the transition from Richardson's masonry to the lighter
and more supple forms of steel construction. Yet Sullivan is probably
more significant as Frank Lloyd Wright's Liebermeister than for his own
designs. Sullivan's best ideas found expression in Wright more con-
vincingly than in his own work. It was in Wright's architecture that the
transition from old to new was completed. From it the world movement
evolved.
88 Massachusetts: The General Background
Of contemporary work in Massachusetts there are few strictly modern
buildings of merit. More significant is her work in keeping alive the
traditional New England Georgian architecture. Prominent in this im-
portant phase of American architecture has been the work of Coolidge,
Shepley, Bulfinch, and Abbott, with such superior designs as Lowell and
Dunster Houses at Harvard. The recently completed restoration at
Williamsburg, Virginia the largest project of this nature ever under-
taken in the country was done by Perry, Shaw and Hepburn, a
Boston firm. Recent buildings at Radcliffe College in Cambridge are
among other important works by the Boston architects. In these we
feel a strain of the Southern influence, absorbed by the designers, no
doubt, during their intimacy with this strain of Georgian at Williamsburg.
Strictly modern architecture in Massachusetts is negligible. The
Motor Mart Garage, in Boston, and Rindge Technical High School, in
Cambridge, by Ralph Harrington Deane are more truly functional than
others of the modern type. Boston has its share of mechanically good
structures, a few of which are even clothed in pseudo-modern shells.
Heading this group is the new Federal Building by Cram and Ferguson.
Credit, or blame according to one's taste is not wholly due to the
Boston firm, for its design was subjected to regimentation at the hands
of the Federal Architect's Office in Washington, as are designs for all
Federal Buildings. One is inclined to wonder, if the ardent medievalist
had been given a free hand to indulge his fancy, whether the resultant
structure would not have been more compatible with the functions
within.
Evidence that Boston architects have been able to lift themselves out
of their stultifying environment and do modern work elsewhere is seen
in the superior designs of the New York Hospital and Cornell Medical
School Building in New York, completed in 1932 by Coolidge, Shepley,
Bulfinch and Abbott. In this mammoth project, the Boston architects
demanded a frank and independent solution, with an inflexible insistence
upon adjustment of means to end. The result set a precedent in modern
hospital-design.
Thus the reactionary trend in Massachusetts architecture is attribut-
able not so much to poverty of thought on the part of its architects as
to a lack of fortunate opportunities and an intrenched conservatism on the
part of patrons.
LITERATURE
IT MUST have been with some astonishment, to put it mildly, that the
first settlers of Boston who of course actually, to begin with, had
planted themselves in Charlestown found Boston itself to be already
an English city, with a population of exactly one soul. This city, to be
precise, consisted of William Blackstone or Blaxton, B.A., a graduate of
Cambridge University, and one of the most curious and suggestive figures
in the whole early history of the colonization of America. A member of
the ill-starred Gorges expedition of 1625, Blackstone had spent two years
in Wessagussett, now Weymouth. It appears that he had cast in his lot
with Gorges not much more for reasons of Puritan conscience than be-
cause he simply wanted to be alone. At any rate, in what is now Boston,
in the year 1630, l William Blackstone, a solitary, bookish recluse, in his
thirty-fifth year, had a dwelling somewhere on the west slope of Beacon
Hill, not far from what are now Beacon and Spruce Streets, from which
he commanded the mouth of the Charles. Here he had lived ever since
his removal from Wessagussett, in 1625 or 1626, trading with the savages,
cultivating his garden, and watching the growth of some apple trees.'
Further, it is known that in 1634, reserving only six acres of land for
himself a parcel bounded roughly by Beacon, Charles, Mount Vernon,
and Spruce Streets he sold to the colonists the whole of Boston
peninsula, which he himself had previously bought from the Indians;
and 'being tired of the "lord brethren," as he had before his emigration
been wearied of the "lord bishops,'" he then removed himself to an
estate in Rhode Island, of which he was thus the first white inhabitant.
This estate to which he had presumably brought his books, as well
as seeds and cuttings from his garden he called Study Hill, and here
he was destined to spend the rest of his life. Just once did he reappear
in Boston, a good many years later, and then only for long enough to
acquire a wife. He took this lady off to the wilderness with him, and
Bostonians saw him no more.
It is an arresting and delightful figure, this young Cambridge graduate
with his books and his apple trees, his conscience, and his passionate
desire for privacy; and one cannot think of his perpetual centrifugal
retreat from civilization, whenever it managed to catch up with him,
9O Massachusetts: The General Background
without visualizing him as a symbol, or a charming figurehead, of the
individualism which was to be so striking a characteristic of New England
in the centuries to come. It was not that he was a misanthrope not in
the least. For it was at his own express invitation and because of his
real concern for their plight that the wretched half-starved settlers of
Charlestown were first brought across the river to the healthier slopes
and the better springs on his own land. No, he was simply the first
exemplar, the prototype of that profound individualism which has so
deeply marked the American character ever since, and of which Mass-
achusetts especially in the field of letters has been the most prodigal
and brilliant source.
Of that fact, surely, there can be little question. In any summary,
no matter how brief, of America's contribution to the world's literature,
Massachusetts would be seen to have contributed most, not only in
sheer quantity and quality, but and this is much more important
in that particular searching of the conscience and the soul, and of the
soul's relationship to the infinite, which has almost invariably been the
dominant feature of American literature at its best. Jonathan Edwards,
Benjamin Franklin, Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Longfellow, Lowell,
Melville, Holmes, Whittier, Emily Dickinson, Henry Adams, and the
brothers Henry and William James not to mention the historians
Parkman, Prescott, and Motley the mere recital of the names is
quite enough to prove that without the Massachusetts authors American
literature would amount to very little. It is a wonderful galaxy; and it
is no exaggeration to say that the only absentees from it who are of
comparable stature are Poe, Whitman, Mark Twain, and possibly
Howells and of these, Poe was himself at least a native of the State,
for he was born in Boston.
This amazing outburst fell almost wholly within the confines of the
nineteenth century; and in fact, within about a half of that, the years
from 1830 to 1880. But if the quality of it is even more astonishing than
the quantity and the range, what is more interesting, whether to the
historian of morals and customs or to the psychological student of the
origins and function of literature, is precisely the William Blackstone
motif, which, as was mentioned above, has so persistently given it its
character. New England individualism and that is tantamount, of
course, to saying Massachusetts individualism has often enough been
referred to, but one wonders whether it has ever been given quite its
due as the real mainspring of New England letters. One reason for this
has been the very widespread notion that it should simply be seen as
Literature 91
the natural obverse of the excessive Puritanism and Calvinism from
which it was in part a reaction; the individualists, in short, were nothing
but small boys who had managed to escape from a very strict school.
But this is a very superficial view of the individualist, and an equally
superficial view of the Puritan. It might be fruitful to consider whether
in point of fact the New England individualist was not just our old
friend the Puritan writ large; and conversely, whether also the Puritan
was not a good deal of an individualist.
The truth is, of course, that the two terms need not at all be mutually
exclusive, and that we are facing here one of those charming but mis-
leading over-simplifications with which the history books so constantly
regale us. It is so much easier, and so much more flattering to the nine-
teenth century and all its works, to ascribe everything, en bloc, to the
final overthrow of a sort of crippling Frankenstein monster, and to make
out Puritanism as one of the most diabolical repressive hypocrisies with
which a misguided mankind ever afflicted itself. Much can be said in
support of this point of view, and much has been said; and it would be
idle to deny that at its worst New England Puritanism became a dread-
ful thing; if the witch-hanging hysteria of the seventeenth century was
the most violent culmination of it, it brought also in its train other
forms of spiritual disaster which, if less conspicuous, were scarcely less
terrible. The free Protestantism which the Pilgrims had brought with
them from England had gradually hardened, under the influence of
John Cotton and his descendants the Mathers, into a theocracy. 'None
should be electors nor elected, . . . except such as were visible subjects of
our Lord Jesus Christ, personally confederated in our churches. In
those and many other ways, he propounded unto them an endeavor
after a theocracy, as near as might be, to that which was the glory of
Israel.' So remarks Cotton Mather of his grandfather, whose advice
had been asked as to a revision of the 'civil constitution' of the State.
But the fact is, that though the theocrats had their way a good deal,
they did not have it entirely: and this for the very simple reason that
the Protestantism of New England, as it had been based to begin with
on the passionate belief of the individual in his right to believe and
worship in his own way, still carried in itself these stubborn seeds of
freedom. Roger Williams, 'first rebel against the divine church-order
in the wilderness' (again to quote Cotton Mather), submitted to a charge
of heresy, and abandoned Salem, rather than surrender the tolerance
which had outraged the church fathers. Another William Blackstone,
he escaped to Rhode Island, and there wrote the first liberal document
92 Massachusetts: The General Background
in American history, 'The Bloody Tenent of Persecution for Cause of
Conscience, discussed in a Conference between Truth and Peace.' 'A
spiritual Crusoe, the most extreme and outcast soul in all America/
he was, like Blackstone, though for very different reasons, a direct fore-
bear of the great individualists of the nineteenth century. It is indeed
essential that we should bear in mind this passionate belief in the freedom
of conscience which underlay from the very beginning the foundations
of New England culture. Its defeats and obscurities at the hands of the
theocrats and zealots were at most only temporary; and there was never
a time, even in the darkest passages of Massachusetts history, when it
was not somewhere in evidence. It is as evident in Jonathan Edwards's
fierce conviction that the sacrament should be administered only to
those who had had a radical experience of conversion and who could
properly judge of this save the individual himself? as in the North-
ampton congregation which dismissed him, after twenty-three years, be-
cause it did not agree with him. And it is as evident again in the calm
fortitude with which Edwards accepted his exile, devoting the last six
years of his life to a mission among the Indians of Stockbridge the
years, incidentally, during which he somehow managed to write his
great philosophical treatise on the freedom of the will.
It was a period the years from 1620 until the end of the Revolu-
tion during which we must remember, in fact, that the congregation
never surrendered its power both to choose and to dismiss its minister:
it scrutinized his thought, and indeed his conduct, quite as closely as he
scrutinized theirs. He might be tyrannical in his pursuit of his particular
idea or ideal, but so, just as well, might they. Since God's grace was so
arbitrarily bestowed, might it not fall upon Smith and Jones? Smith
and Jones certainly thought so; and the result was a fierce co-operative
and communal search for absolute truth, with a powerful clergy some-
times leading, but almost as often led by a powerful Church. The
clergy might and did ally themselves and form a caste; but despite all
their efforts, the Church remained essentially democratic, and essentially
dictated even when most misguided by the original Puritan belief
in freedom of conscience.
Meanwhile, during this period of nearly two hundred years it is
scarcely an exaggeration to say that the liberal arts or anything even
remotely like a literature simply did not exist in Massachusetts; and
indeed it is difficult to conceive of their finding a place in a community
so passionately surrendered to religious and moral preoccupations. But
intellectual and spiritual and esthetic sinews were there, none the less;
Literature 93
the elements were ready; and it needed only the right catalyst, and the
right moment, to release them in forms which probably nobody could
have foreseen. The catalyst, or at any rate the most important of the
catalysts, was the gradual rise of Unitarianism during the latter half
of the eighteenth century, and then the phenomenal swiftness with
which, early in the nineteenth, it effected an almost complete social
conquest of Massachusetts. Here once more, but more clearly voiced
than ever, was the Puritan insistence on freedom of conscience; but along
with it also the revivifying force, almost impossible to gauge, of the
Unitarian discovery that man's nature was not inevitably evil and in-
evitably doomed, but actually perhaps contained in itself the seeds of
virtue. 'How mournfully the human mind may misrepresent the Deity/
wrote William Ellery Channing in 1809, in the course of a frontal assault
on Calvinism, and, 'We must start in religion from our own souls. In
these is the fountain of all divine truth. 7 What must have been the
effect of this all-liberating doctrine on the subtle-minded New Englander,
after his long winter of Calvinism? It was a blaze of sunlight, of course,
and such a warming and thawing and freeing of locked energies as from
this distance we perhaps cannot possibly conceive. And it was into this
sudden summer, this sudden blossoming of New England into something
almost like gaiety, with its wonderful discovery that virtue might go
hand in hand with happiness, that the group of children were born who
were destined to become the flower - and the end of Massachusetts
individualism. Prescott in 1796, Alcott in 1799, Emerson in 1803,
Hawthorne in 1804, Longfellow and Whittier in 1807, Holmes in 1809,
Motley in 1814, Dana in 1815, Thoreau in 1817, Melville in 1819, Emily
Dickinson in 1830 these great-grandchildren of the New England
genius were born by an inevitable conspiracy of time into just such an
air as they needed for their purpose. What had shaped them the
ghost of William Blackstone, the proud and frontier-seeking independence
of the Puritan conscience they would themselves turn and shape to
its final and beautiful mortal perfection.
The first quarter of the nineteenth century was for Massachusetts its
period of greatest prosperity nothing like it had been seen before, nothing
like it has been seen since. The shipping trade was at its height, Boston
and Salem had become great international ports, and in these and in
New Bedford, where the whale trade had become a thriving industry,
family fortunes were being founded almost overnight. Along miles of
Cape Cod roadside, almost every cottage or house contained a blue-
water sea captain, who knew St. Petersburg and Canton as well as he
94 Massachusetts: The General Background
knew India Wharf in Boston. Everybody began to travel, Massachusetts
had suddenly become cosmopolitan, and what for two centuries had been
a queerly isolated and in many respects an extraordinarily innocent
community on the way to nowhere, now began for the first time to feel
itself in very close contact with the rest of the world. A new and in-
finitely richer sense of background became the common property of the
people; the whole world was at Boston's door; new ideas were as common
and as exciting as the exotic spices brought from Java and China.
An immense advantage, this, for the young Emerson and the young
Hawthorne, who, if they were caught willy-nilly in the new liberalism
which was sweeping New England, were also caught in strange currents
of rumor and echo from abroad. From England, from France, from Ger-
many, came news of extraordinary developments in the literary world:
the great secondary wave of romanticism, which followed by a generation
the French Revolution, had begun to break in its thousand forms. What
Channing's bold religious teaching had begun, the riotous brilliance and
variety of the English romantic poets and the heady philosophy of Ger-
many, at its most metaphysical, were to complete. The New England
individualist who had first been a Puritan, and then a Unitarian, was
now to reach his logical end in the lovely transparent butterfly hues of
Transcendentalism .
When Emerson, who had been trained for the church and who preached
for three years at the Second Church in Boston, resigned his pastorate
in 1832 because he no longer believed in the communion and could not
bring himself to administer it even in the abbreviated form then in use
among the Unitarians remarking characteristically that he simply
' was not interested in it ' he was dedicating himself to the new wilder-
ness and the new freedom, exactly as Roger Williams had done before
him. Once more a frontier had been reached, but this one the most
perilous of all that frontier within man's consciousness where the
soul turns and looks fearlessly into itself, where the individual, like a
diver, plunges into his own depths to sound them, and in so doing believes
himself effectually to have sounded the world. Man, according to
Emerson, was to be self-sufficient, self-reliant, for his divinity was within
himself. He must trust his instincts and his intuitions absolutely, for these
were his direct communion with the Over-Soul, or God, with which he
was hi a sense identifiable. This direct knowledge of the divinity was not
through the senses not at all. It was a mode of apprehension that
transcended one's sensory knowledge of the phenomenal world and all
the experience of the senses, and it was this notion of a ' transcendental '
Literature 95
knowledge which gave its name to the little group which, after the pub-
lication of his first book 'Nature' in 1836, formed itself about Emerson
in Concord and Boston. * If the single man plant himself indomitably on
his instincts, and there abide, the huge world will come round to him.'
'For solace, the perspective of your own infinite life' this was almost
or could easily be, the reductio ad absurdum of individualism, for it im-
plied a negation of all authority, whether religious or social, and the
complete autonomy of the individual soul.
Patently, this doctrine with its ancillary notions bore within itself the
seeds of an intellectual and Utopian anarchy; and it is interesting to
notice, in this connection, how very flimsy and impractical, how absurdly
and charmingly innocent, were such ideas of social awareness as this
group entertained. It is hardly an exaggeration, in fact, to say that they
were none of them concerned with society as such at all. The passionate
search for a moral and religious center, a significance, a meaning, had
led them steadily inward, never outward; and if they thought of the social
problem at all, it was only to wave it away with the sublime assurance
that, as man was essentially good, the social problem would quite nicely
take care of itself. If the relationship of the Ego to God was satisfactory,
then everything else would follow of course. The experiment at Brook
Farm and Bronson Alcott's lesser adventure in a Utopia at Fruitlands
were the natural, if humiliating, outcome of such beliefs, quite as much
as Thoreau's attempt at a formal secession from society. Even the sole
apparent exception to this indifference toward social problems, the anti-
slavery agitation, in which practically without exception the tran-
scendentalist joined, turns out on inspection to be not quite all that it
purports to be. For here again the problem was looked at from the point
of view, not of society, but of the individual; even the Negro should bow
to no authority save God's, which was the authority within himself.
Emerson's influence, nevertheless, in spite of a good deal of misunder-
standing, not to mention occasional downright derision, was immense
and profoundly fructifying, both on his own generation and on that
which followed. He was the real center of his time, and his mark is
everywhere. Thoreau's ' Walden,' both the experiment and the book, were
but the carrying into practice of Emersonian self-sufficiency; and if they
add a literary and speculative genius which is Thoreau's, the spirit of
Emerson is indelibly in them. Not least, either, in the very conspicuous
indifference, not to say contempt, for form. The method could hardly be
more wayward; it is as wayward as Emerson's, who admittedly when he
wanted an essay or a lecture just ransacked his copious notebooks, ex-
96 Massachusetts: The General Background
tracted a random selection of observations and gnomic sayings, and
strung them together on a theme as best he could. And it is as well to
observe in this connection that a comparative indifference to form was a
perhaps inevitable attribute of vatic individualism everything must
be spontaneous, a direct and uncontrolled uprush from the divine well of
the soul; one was merely a medium for the divine voice, and in conse-
quence there could not logically be any such thing as a compromise with
so external and strictly phenomenal an affair as form or style. Com-
munication yes, but only such as came naturally. Nor need one bother
overmuch with consistency.
This individualist attitude to form is noticeable everywhere in the
literature of the Massachusetts renaissance, as much in the work of the
conservative Boston and Cambridge group Longfellow, Holmes, and
Lowell as in that of the Concord radicals. To consider a poem or an
essay or a novel as a work of art, was this not to yield oneself to a kind
of outside authority, and to compromise or adulterate the pure necessity
and virtue of revelation? Revelation was the thing; and everything de-
pended on the swiftness with which one brought it up from the depths of
one's awareness, so that not a spark of the light should be lost. The
result was a kind of romantic mysticism which was at its most lucid in
Emerson, at its sunniest and serenest in Thoreau, at its profoundest in
Herman Melville, and at its most vapid and ridiculous in the orphic
sayings of Bronson Alcott. And the result also was a pervading looseness
and raggedness, a kind of rustic and innocent willfulness, whether in
prose or verse, in practically all the work of the Massachusetts galaxy.
It is evident in Emerson's crabbed and gnomic free verse and his home-
spun couplets quite as much as in his prose, where image follows image
and idea idea with little or no regard for nexus or pattern, to say nothing
of rhythm. It is evident again in that cryptic unintelligibility, the sibyl-
line phrase, which, if it has a meaning, sometimes guards it all too well
from the bewildered reader. The poor reader, indeed, was given no
quarter, he must simply shift for himself; and presumably it was Emer-
son's idea, as it was Alcott's and Thoreau's, that it was a sufficient privi-
lege for the reader that he thus overheard, as it were, the words of the
oracle at all. The words were the words of the divinity, and must not be
altered: all that was needed was that they should be received with an
understanding equally instinctive and divine.
The truth is, the glorification of the individual and of individualism
had reached such a pitch of egoism and self-absorption, accompanied by
such an entire indifference to the external world, that had they not been
Literature 97
geniuses, literary geniuses, none of these men would have escaped disaster.
Only a genius can be artless with impunity, and of all this wonderful
group only one was a genuine artist, Nathaniel Hawthorne. Hawthorne
listened carefully to everything the others had to say, he was himself
something of a transcendentalist, he even stayed for a while at Brook
Farm; but he remained always a little detached, he was essentially both
in his life and in his work a moral and social observer; and it was this
carefully kept moral and esthetic distance which enabled him alone of
his group to understand the necessity for form and to achieve an indi-
vidual mastery of it. Alone, too, was Hawthorne in having a quite
definite social awareness, and in seeing precisely to what sort of bank-
ruptcy the doctrine of uncontrolled individualism might lead. Emerson
may not have realized it, but 'The Scarlet Letter' was, among other
things, a very grim comment on the doctrine of self-reliance; and 'The
Blithedale Romance ' as well.
If in this sense Hawthorne was the only commentator on transcendental
individualism, and the one analyst and chronicler of the final phases of
the evolution of the Puritan passion for freedom of conscience, he was
also the only link between the Concord group and the writer who carried
farthest and deepest that perilous frontier of mystic consciousness which
had always been the Puritan's fiercest concern: Herman Melville. 'Moby
Dick ' was dedicated to Hawthorne, and it was written while Hawthorne
and Melville were neighbors in Pittsfield. Without any question the
greatest book which has come out of New England, and one of the very
greatest works of prose fiction ever written in any language, it is also the
final and perfect finial to the Puritan's desperate three-century-long
struggle with the problem of evil. Hunted from consciousness into the
unconscious, and in effect beyond space and time, magnificently sub-
limated so that it becomes not one issue but all issues, a superb and al-
most unanalyzable matrix of universal symbolism, the white whale is
the Puritan's central dream of delight and terror, the all-hating and all-
loving, all-creating and all-destroying implacable god, whose magnetism
none can escape, and who must be faced and fought with on the frontier
of awareness with the last shred of one's moral courage and one's moral
despair. Man against God? Is the principle of things, at last, to be seen
as essentially evil? And redeemable only by war a outrance? Impossible,
at any rate, to surrender; one's freedom to feel toward it what one will,
whether hatred or love, must be preciously preserved. One must grapple
with it, and alone, and in darkness, no matter whether it lead to a death
throe or to an all-consuming love.
98 Massachusetts: The General Background
Melville, writing to Hawthorne about this extraordinary book, which
was destined for half a century to be considered just a good romance for
boys, likened himself to one who strips off the layers of consciousness as
one might strip off the layers of an onion, and added that he had come at
last to the central core. And indeed to all intents he had; when a year
later, at the age of thirty-three, he published 'Pierre,' he had really
finished his voyage. And he had carried William Blackstone with him to
such strange borderlands as that bold explorer of Rhode Island never
dreamed of. Perhaps it is worth noting that Melville himself denied
that ' Moby Dick ' had any allegorical intention if only to point out
that the denial can really have no meaning. * Mardi ' was quite obviously
allegorical; allegory and parable came almost instinctively to the hands
of a group so vitally concerned with moral and religious matters, and as
a 'form' it very likely seemed no more artificial or unusual to Hawthorne
or Melville than that, say, of a poem: it was something which played with
meaning and which gave out meanings on many different levels, and that
was the end of it.
And indeed 'Moby Dick' may be said to have been the great poem,
the epic of the Puritan civilization, and to have marked a turning-point
in its evolution, if not quite its end. There could not again be any such
violent imaginative projection of the problem; the problem itself was
beginning to dissipate and break up, to disappear in the dishevelment of
analysis: individualism was to turn outward again. It could receive in
the hands of Henry James a fine symphonic abstraction, or in the hands
of William James a bold social and scientific externalization and analysis,
but the creative poisons were all but drained from it. The worlds around
were changing, new winds of doctrine brought new seeds and spores, and
in 'The Education of Henry Adams' one has almost the spectacle of a
dead civilization performing an autopsy on itself. The note of retrospect,
the backward-looking eye this could have only one meaning, that the
Puritan struggle was at last, in all important senses, over. One genius
remained yet to be heard from, and this the most exquisitely character-
istic of all Emily Dickinson. In her life of hushed and mystic and
self-absorbed sequestration, no less than in her work, where we watch
the lonely soul alembicating itself that it may test its own essence,
we have the very mayflower of the Puritan passion for privacy and
freedom. How strict was that soul with itself, when there was none to
watch ! Was it not her own epitaph that she wrote or can we say
that it was an epitaph for a whole phase of the human soul in the
lines:
Literature 99
Lay this laurel on the one
Too intrinsic for renown.
Laurel! veil your deathless tree
Him you chasten, that is he!
This wonderful pride and immense strength in solitude which could give
up as worth nothing any notion of fame or acclaim if only its soul's
house be in order and its accounts straight with heaven perfectly
content, and serenely self-sufficient, so long as the windows which looked
on the Eternal were kept clear this was the final rededication of the
spirit of William Blackstone, who had come to Boston when it was still
a wilderness, was found there by the first settlers ' watching the growth
of some apple trees,' and moved on to another wilderness and another
privacy when the 'lord brethren,' his neighbors, came too close.
Emily Dickinson was the last of her line, the last of the great Massa-
chusetts frontiersmen; and with her it may be said that the literature of
Puritanism, as a purely local phenomenon, came to an end. Henceforth
its heirs were to be sought farther afield, dispersed inconspicuously, but
perhaps none the less indestructibly, in the consciousness of the country
at large. Amy Lowell had little of this temper in her; and if in the con-
temporary scene it has any ambassadors, they are Robert Frost and
T. S. Eliot. But the movement itself is complete and at an end.
LITERARY GROUPS AND
MOVEMENTS
THE tendency among writers to form groups around political, social, or
literary ideas began very early in Massachusetts. The voluminous re-
ligious tracts of the seventeenth century concealed, under a garb of godly
language, the warring concepts of two opposed groups the advocates
of theocracy and the champions of democracy. The theocrats were vic-
torious, and for nearly one hundred years the clergy dominated the press.
Not until the founding of the Hell Fire Club and the publication of the
first number of The New England C our ant by James Franklin in 1721 did
secular ideas have currency. In the exciting decade of 1760-70 a battle
of the books took place between two political factions, a battle which
enlisted Tories like Thomas Hutchinson on one side and revolutionaries
such as James Otis on the other.
Even those ardent individualists, the writers of the literary renaissance
of the i84o's, betrayed a decided affinity for the society of their peers, and
together they organized literary clubs, publishing ventures, and Utopias.
The informal group generally known as the Transcendental Club in-
cluded at one time or another Emerson, James Freeman Clarke, Amos
Bronson Alcott, George Ripley, Theodore Parker, Margaret Fuller,
Orestes Brownson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Charles T. Follen, William
H. Channing, and that complete mystic and arch-individualist, Jones
Very. An early literary magazine, The Monthly Anthology (1803-11), was
carried on as the organ of 'a society of gentlemen,' the Anthology Club
of Boston. The North American Review was established by a group which
had for its purpose the emancipation of American literature from sub-
servience to England. The Dial (1840-44), although proclaiming itself
'A Magazine for Literature, Philosophy, and Religion,' was notable for
expressing, under the editorship of Margaret Fuller, the ideas of the
Transcendentalists, as The Harbinger (1845-49) expressed those of the
co-operativists. Such group expression was strongly characteristic of
early magazines: they were oriented, not as most magazines are today,
toward their readers or their advertisers, but toward their writers. Even
as late as the 1 850*5, Atlantic Monthly dinners ranked in importance with
Literary Groups and Movements 101
Atlantic pages, and younger writers outside New England bitterly accused
the magazine of being a kind of closed club. Hawthorne had founded the
'Potato Club,' a literary society, at Bowdoin while still an undergraduate.
Thoreau, so anti-social as to get himself jailed for non-payment of taxes,
may be said to have betrayed a certain longing for society when he re-
proached Emerson for not sharing his cell; and Whittier said flatly, 'I set
a higher value on my name as appended to the Anti-Slavery Declaration
of 1833 than on the title-page of any book.'
After the Civil War, literature in Massachusetts for the first tune since
the eighteenth century was motivated and reinforced by scientific method
and invigorated by new political currents. Realism and the Anti-Poverty
Society made a simultaneous appearance, and reading Boston was di-
vided into those who admired William Dean Howells's novels and those
who despised them. Again, during the brief renaissance of 1912-16, cut
short by the war, Massachusetts poets revolved around a brilliant if not
fixed star, Amy Lowell.
Certain distinguished authors remained aloof from their fellow writers
notably Herman Melville and Emily Dickinson. But with few excep-
tions it can be said that the history of literature in Massachusetts is the
history of its diverse and divergent literary groups and movements.
When the Puritans, who desired a theocratic hierarchy, arrived in
Massachusetts, they found the Plymouth congregation, a group of demo-
cratic dissenters, before them; and to their alarm the Salem church
shortly fell under this radical influence. In the resulting battle of words
the conservatives were represented by John Cotton; Nathaniel Ward,
author of 'The Simple Cobler of Aggawam' (1647); the ingenuous apos-
tle to the Indians, John Eliot; Samuel Sewall, the diarist; Cotton Mather,
harsh and dogmatic in religion, progressive in natural science and medi-
cine; and subtle-minded Increase Mather. The democrats counted fewer
but on the whole more trenchant writers: Hugh Peter, Nathaniel Morton,
Edward Johnson (author of ' Wonder- Working Providence,' 1654), Roger
Williams, John Wheelwright.
The first press to be set up in the new country was that of Stephen
Daye in Cambridge, under the control of clerical Harvard College. The
Daye press issued the 'Bay Psalm Book,' that monument to early print-
ing and bad rhyme, in 1640. Daye was succeeded by Samuel Green, who
printed John Eliot's Indian New Testament in 1661 and the entire Bible
in 1663. In 1669 Green issued Morton's 'New England's Memorial,'
noteworthy for having not only a printer but a publisher, ( H. Usher of
IO2 Massachusetts: The General Background
Boston,' the latter probably a bookseller, in the days when booksellers
combined the functions of importer and publisher. John Dunton, Scots
bookseller, remarked in 1686 that there were eight bookshops in 'Boston
village.' Not until 1675 was Boston's first press established, by John
Foster.
Not only theological tracts and sermons by Massachusetts writers
were published during the seventeenth century. Mary Rowlandson's
account of her captivity among the Indians, written in a vivid style
without literary pretense, appeared in a second edition in 1682 (no copy
of the first edition has survived). The anonymous * Relation,' descriptive
of Plymouth and its settlement, appeared in 1622; and two years later
was published Edward Winslow's 'Good News from New England,'
simply written, like a letter home describing the wonders of the new
country. William Bradford, governor from 1621 to 1657 save for five
years, wrote a 'History of Plymouth Plantation' in 1630-46, the manu-
script of which was lost for two hundred years, finally turning up to be
published by the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1856. But Captain
Nathaniel Morton had access to the manuscript, for he used much of it in
his 'New England's Memorial' (1669). Verse flourished no less than
prose: Peter Folger's satire, 'A Looking-Glass for the Times,' appeared
in 1677; Benjamin Tompson's 650-line epic on King Philip's War, 'New
England's Crisis,' in 1676; Anne Bradstreet's 'The Tenth Muse, Lately
Sprung up in America,' in London in 1650 and in Boston in 1678; and
Michael Wigglesworth's 'Day of Doom' (1662), an epic of the last judg-
ment, was widely read for a hundred years.
Many of the products of these first presses, as well as some priceless
manuscripts, were in the library of the Reverend Thomas Prince of Bos-
ton, which, stored in the tower of the Old South Church, was dispersed
and partly destroyed when British troops were quartered in the church
during the American Revolution. Among these manuscripts was William
Bradford's 'History of Plymouth Plantation.' Prince published in 1736
the first volume of his 'Chronological History of New England in the
Form of Annals,' which he unsuccessfully endeavored to continue in six-
penny serial parts. His careful use of sources makes him the first trust-
worthy American historian: 'I cite my vouchers to every passage,' he
said and did.
For almost one hundred years, before a Massachusetts printer dared
publish a book he had to secure what practically amounted to an im-
primatur; and if an author wrote a book with an heretical taint, he pub-
lished it, if at all, in England. This condition existed until the first quar-
Literary Groups and Movements 103
ter of the eighteenth century, when Benjamin Franklin's brother James
founded the lively New England C our ant (1721) with the aid of the Hell
Fire Club, hardly a clerical organization. Benjamin Franklin, while em-
ployed in his brother's printshop, contributed the satiric ' Silence Dog-
wood' papers to the C our ant, slipping the first of them anonymously
under the door. The Courant was a sort of American Spectator, differing
in its liveliness and its literary tone from the Boston Gazette, already estab-
lished in 1719. Two years after the Courant first appeared, Benjamin
went to Philadelphia, and his direct connection with Massachusetts
ended.
The editors of the Courant continually jeered at the dullness of its
contemporaries, their staleness, their lack of American news and political
comment. In self-defense, perhaps, The New England Weekly Journal
was founded by a more sober group. The Journal had something of the
liveliness of the Courant, but it was conservative in tone, and endeavored
to offset the damage to faith, morals, and politics being worked by the
Franklins' paper.
During the brave times of 1770-76 Isaiah Thomas published The
Massachusetts Spy, which pleaded the cause of revolution. This enter-
prising publisher, founder of the American Antiquarian Society, later
became the publisher of The Royal American Magazine (1774-75), chiefly
remembered for containing engravings by Paul Revere; The Worcester
Magazine (1786-88); and The Massachusetts Magazine (1789-96). Other
early Massachusetts magazines were The American Magazine and His-
torical Chronicle (1743-46) and The New England Magazine (1758-60).
During this period of political pamphleteering, every agitator was an
author and every author an agitator. James Otis the younger, advocate-
general, was the most brilliant of these; 'The Rights of the British Colo-
nies Asserted and Proved' (1764) and the 'Letter to a Noble Lord' (1765)
are perhaps the best known of his writings. Oxenbridge Thacher, John
Adams, and Josiah Quincy all produced political pamphlets, as did Noah
Webster, author of the dictionary and the blue-backed speller, who
proved to be as radical in politics as he was later to be in spelling. Samuel
Adams, with his Committees of Correspondence, his 'Massachusetts
Circular Letter' (1768), is the prototype of them all.
A new note among Colonial historians appeared with the publication
of the first volume of the * History of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay '
in 1764. Its author, Thomas Hutchinson, was a descendant of Anne, and
as unpopular as the latter, though for different reasons. He was a mer-
chant, with conservative leanings, and the rising revolutionary temper of
104 Massachusetts: The General Background
the people made Bostonians actively mistrust him as a Tory. His history
was the first account of the Colony to be written without theological bias,
and notwithstanding its conservative tone, it displays a considerable
political sense. The Reverend William Gordon of Roxbury wrote a his-
tory of the Revolution in 1788; and Mercy Otis Warren, sister of James
Otis, produced a popular history of the same period in 1805. George
Richard Minot's 'History of the Insurrection in Massachusetts' (1788)
dealt with Shays's Rebellion of 1786, and Minot also continued Hutchin-
son's history.
The North American Review was founded in 1815. The short-lived
Pioneer, whose three issues included contributions by Poe and Haw-
thorne, was published in 1843 by James Russell Lowell, who became the
first editor of The Atlantic Monthly in 1857. With the establishing of The
North American Review and of two great publishing houses, Ticknor and
Company (1833), later Ticknor and Fields, the direct predecessors of
Hough ton Mifnin Company and of Little and Brown (1837), literature
in Massachusetts had a firm underpinning. In 1837, the year in which
Charles C. Little and James Brown put up their sign, William Lloyd
Garrison was publishing The Liberator (1831-65). 'Poems' by William
Cullen Bryant had appeared sixteen years before; Ralph Waldo Emerson
had recently moved to Concord and had just published 'The American
Scholar'; Whittier was an agent of the Anti-Slavery Society; R. H. Dana,
Jr., and Henry David Thoreau had just graduated from Harvard, where
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow had begun to teach and James Russell
Lowell was an unruly undergraduate; Hawthorne was struggling at Con-
cord; Oliver Wendell Holmes had just begun to practice medicine; Pres-
cott was about to publish his 'Ferdinand and Isabella'; the Saturday
Club was eleven months old; Ticknor's Old Corner Bookstore was a liter-
ary gathering place; and Annie Fields's literary salon had not yet begun.
Until the first third of the nineteenth century, authorship was the
avocation of amateurs and gentlemen of means. As late as 1842 Chan-
ning remarked that Hawthorne was the only American who supported
himself by writing. Channing was mistaken, although not very much so.
Jedidiah Morse (1761-1826) of Charlestown, America's first geographer,
had been one of the few writers in America to make writing pay, al-
though his school geographies and gazetteers scarcely rank as literature.
In 1790, Congress passed a law designed to protect literary property.
But in the absence of substantial publishing houses or magazines that
paid for contributions, and in view of the continual pirating of books by
English and American authors on both sides of the Atlantic, authorship
Literary Groups and Movements 105
was a poor enough business. Even after the great Boston magazines and
publishing houses were established, Bryant had to edit anthologies and a
newspaper; Whittier struggled desperately until the publication of
'Snow-Bound'; Mrs. Stowe made less than a living from her books until
the phenomenal success of ' Uncle Tom's Cabin'; and Prescott was the
first historian to achieve financial success from his writings. None of these
authors received any income from the European editions of their works.
It was not until writers organized in the American Copyright League
(1883) and publishers in the American Publishers' Copyright League
(1887) that international piracy was halted by the copyright agreement
of 1891.
Mrs. Fields tells the story of Dr. Holmes's indignant exclamation, one
morning when hearing the doorbell ring, that he was afraid it was 'the
man Emerson.' Holmes, driving the twin horses of medicine and essay-
writing, had learned to guard himself from intrusion. But it is significant
that most of the writers responsible for the New England renaissance of
the i84o's and i85o's not only called upon one another, but formed inter-
locking circles of friendship, and embarked together in publishing
schemes, in literary cenacles, and in such ventures as Fruitlands and the
Brook Farm Institute of Agriculture and Education. Amos Bronson
Alcott, ostracized by proper folk for teaching young children in his school
the plain facts about birth and for refusing to dismiss a Negro pupil, was
stoutly defended by his fellow transcendentalists, who, tolerating his
orphic doings and sayings, yet recognized his progressive attempt to
bring modern educational methods to New England. One of the sources
of strength of the New England movement, in fact, was its awareness of
contemporary European culture. Emerson, for example, brought Car-
lyle, and through him German currents of thought, to American atten-
tion; Prescott and Motley made Spain and the Netherlands homegrounds
to Yankees; and Longfellow devotedly presented to his contemporaries
the best of European literature, from the Finnish saga through Dante to
Lamartine and Victor Hugo. In addition, established writers encouraged
younger writers. Two of many examples are familiar: Whittier's encour-
agement of a Lowell mill operative, Lucy Larcom, whose poetry is prop-
erly forgotten, but whose 'A New England Girlhood' survives as a valua-
ble social document; and Thomas Wentworth Higginson's careful foster-
ing, however inept, of Emily Dickinson's brittle genius.
With Richard Hildreth (1807-65) and his 'History of the United
States, 1492-1821,' nineteenth-century historical writing began. Hildreth
was followed by John Gorham Palfrey (1798-1881), one of the editors of
io6 Massachusetts: The General Background
the North American Review, who defended the old regime in his 'History
of New England.' George Bancroft (1800-91), an historian of enormous
patience and learning despite his bias, made careful use of sources now
available in the Massachusetts Historical Society, founded by Jeremy
Belknap, an historian of New Hampshire, in 1791. Jared Sparks (1789-
1866), also an editor of the North American Review, edited Franklin's and
Washington's writings, and inaugurated the 'American Biography Se-
ries.' In preparing Washington's letters for the press, Sparks altered them,
as he thought for the better, and the resulting hot discussion among
scholars as to the necessity for accurate textual presentation of docu-
ments probably had a wholesome effect on contemporary historical edit-
ing.
William Hickling Prescott (1796-1859), published his 'Ferdinand and
Isabella' in 1838, his 'Conquest of Mexico' in 1843, and his 'Conquest of
Peru' in 1847; John Lothrop Motley (1814-77) made the United Nether-
lands his life study; and Francis Parkman (1823-93) concentrated on the
history of Colonial United States. With these three authors, American
historical writing came of age. Justin Winsor (1831-97), in his 'Narrative
and Critical History of America,' published 1886-89, was the first to offer
full bibliographical and source material to the reader of American history.
Francis Parkman and John Fiske (1842-1901) belonged to a youngei
generation, as did Charles Francis Adams's three sons, all historians
Charles Francis, Jr., Brooks, and the brilliant Henry.
Four bright philosophical planets had orbits which centered in Harvard
University. Two of these were Massachusetts men, William James (1842-
1910), psychologist and stylist, and Charles S. Pierce (1840-1914), a re-
markable scientific realist. Two others were not Yankees, but have come
to be identified with Massachusetts: Josiah Royce (1855-1916) and
George Santayana (b. 1863). Louis Agassiz (1807-73), nourished on
idealistic philosophy, remained during twenty-five professorial years at
Harvard the storm center of opposition to the shockingly novel ideas of
Darwin, and was accused by his skeptical European contemporaries of
trading his scientific birthright for a mess of Puritan pottage. His stu-
dents became evolutionists to a man.
After the Civil War and the economic depression which followed, a
different tone came into Massachusetts letters. The precursors of this
new spirit were perhaps Harriet Beecher Stowe's 'Uncle Tom's Cabin,'
the poems of Whittier and of Lucy Larcom, and the novels and tales of
Herman Melville that powerful realist who warned himself of the fate
of those who 'fell into Plato's honey head and sweetly perished there.'
Literary Groups and Movements 107
Barrett Wendell, lecturing on literature at Harvard, and popularly sup-
posed to base his critical estimates on the family trees of authors rather
than on their writings, solemnly warned a generation of Harvard students
against 'democracy overpowering excellence.' Yet, despite Wendell, cur-
rents of the Populist movement, of industrial unrest, of new social doc-
trines, were flowing into Massachusetts.
In 1885 a shabby traveler emerged from the old Hoosac Station in
Boston and, clutching an imitation-leather valise, turned his face, brown
from the Dakota sun, toward the Common. This was Hamlin Garland,
come (like Ravignac to another city) to capture Boston, the cradle of
liberty, the home of literature. Alas, Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne
were dead, and the Reverend Doctor Cyrus Augustus Bartol, of the
old West Meeting House, remained the sole survivor of the Concord
school. Undaunted, young Garland sought out the literary giants of
the day. Holmes, Whittier, and Lowell were still living, but none of
these did he contrive to meet. Living on forty cents a day, battling the
cockroaches in his six-dollar-a-month room, he consoled himself with
reading 'Progress and Poverty,' 'at times experiencing a feeling that was
almost despair.'
Garland's ingenuous narrative, 'A Son of the Middle Border,' contains
many valuable indications of intellectual currents of the i88o's in Mas-
sachusetts. He soaked himself in the writings of the evolutionists
Darwin, Spencer, Fiske, Haeckel. In the reading-room of the Boston
Public Library the universe resolved itself into harmony and secular
order, as it had done a generation before for the European realists, as
it was doing for the new generation of American writers. Literature in
Massachusetts during the i88o's, for the first time since the eighteenth
century, was motivated by science and invigorated by political revolt.
This new temper was expressed directly and artlessly by Edward Bellamy
in 'Looking Backward,' which, published in 1888, had sold more than
370,000 copies by 1891; realistically by William Dean Howells; triply-
distilled in Henry James's cerebral novels.
Howells was a transplanted Bostonian, born in Ohio in 1837. 'The most
vital literary man in all America at this time,' Garland thought him,
adding that Boston was divided as to the worth of this American disciple
of Balzac, Zola, and Tolstoi. Howells turned the minds of his contem-
poraries from Europe back upon America, satirizing the worship of
European places and ideas so common among the middle class, indicating
in his novels that America was a land of new hopes a country with
a greater future than Europe. He cut through the sentimental treacle
io8 Massachusetts: The General Background
in which the 'golden age' was now immersed, turning Massachusetts
into the stream of the new realism which answered the readers' sudden
cry, 'Give us people and places as they are!' Half of Boston stood
aghast at this coarse new literature, but the other half applauded. The
West was coming East, and the old traditions were finally shattered
when in 1871 Howells became editor-in-chief of the organ of New Eng-
land Brahmanism, The Atlantic Monthly. Yet with all his democratic
ideas, Howells stood for careful art, and his own style was finished and
pure.
Realism brought forth regionalism which again Mrs. Stowe had
foreshadowed, in 'Poganuc People' and 'Old town Folks.' Her approach
was sentimental, however, while the regionalist's was scientific. Bred
in a generation which exalted scientific method, the regionalists applied
science in a special way. The novel was conceived of, though not always
consciously, as a scientific experiment, and an experiment to be scien-
tific must be controlled in all its particulars. Hence the deliberate
narrowness of range, the careful naturalism of style, the absence of
vagueness, fancy, or mysticism, the conscientious documentation. A
regionalist chooses a narrow geographical sector, as Henry James chose a
narrow stratum of society; he revives his memories of that sector, checks
his memories with facts, employs real characters rather than invented
ones, and never once allows his tale to stray from under the bell-glass.
Mary E. Wilkins (1852-1930), Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909), and Alice
Brown (b. 1857), are representatives of this school in the novel, as James
Herne (1839-1901), the author of 'Shore Acres,' is its representative in
the drama. All of them were careful recorders of New England's decline.
The rather large body of persons who have always believed, in the face
of much evidence to the contrary, that virtue is inevitably rewarded
and that poverty can always be conquered, found an exponent in one
of Massachusetts' most widely read authors. Horatio Alger, Jr., born
in 1834, the son of a clergyman of Revere, was known throughout his
boyhood as 'holy Horatio.' After attending Harvard Divinity School
he spent a season in Paris, where he performed some naughty deed,
never divulged, for which he was sorry all his life. He never married.
In all, he produced some one hundred and nineteen boys' books, among
them 'Ragged Dick,' 'Luck and Pluck,' 'Tattered Tom,' 'From Canal
Boy to President,' 'From Farm Boy to Senator.' Like the heroes of
his books, he acquired riches; unlike them, he died in poverty.
The revolt against the genteel tradition, 1912-16, had its seeds in the
'muck-raking era.' Massachusetts furnished one muck-raker Thomas
Literary Groups and Movements 109
W. Lawson, who made and lost a fortune on the stock market, then
pilloried the market in ' Frenzied Finance' (1902). To the poetry renais-
sance which began in Chicago about 1912 Massachusetts contributed
several poets T. S. Eliot, S. Foster Damon, Conrad Aiken, Robert
Hillyer, among others who were at first encouraged by Amy Lowell
(1874-1925) and then satirized in 'A Critical Fable/ patterned after
her great-uncle James Russell Lowell's satire. Miss Lowell introduced
to young American poets the French symbolists and impressionists of
the i89o's along with the Imagists, and her free verse and polyphonic
prose forms had direct influence on many of them. The entire move-
ment of 1912-16, so promising in its inception, was fatally cut off by the
World War.
In 1937, literary prognosticators in Massachusetts were wetting their
fingers and testing the wind. Some faint signs of a literary revival were
evident in the air. Massachusetts writers again began to preoccupy
themselves with contemporary Massachusetts material an encourag-
ing sign. Impressive gains of organization among industrial workers
offered a hint of a new audience of hundreds of thousands. The New
England renaissance of the i84o's had coincided with an upsurge of
organization among workers, and in the social, economic, and political
ferment of that decade many writers of the 'golden age' were directly
concerned. The direction of the Massachusetts labor movement in 1937
was perhaps symptomatic of what might occur in literature not as
cause and effect, but as twin manifestations of the same forces. Critics
dared predict a new literary renaissance in New England unless war
again intervened to blast it at the roots.
MUSIC AND THE THEATER
WHEN one considers the early evolution of the fine arts in New England
and especially music and the drama it is essential to remember that
whereas in England Puritanism was never wholly without opposition,
in the New England Colonies it very early established a pseudo-theocracy
which in its fundamentals was to remain unshaken for nearly two hundred
years. With the Restoration, the opposition came back to power in
England, and with it the enormous release of energies which was to pro-
duce the second great period of English drama. In Massachusetts, on
the other hand, no such development was even remotely possible. When
Henry Vane failed of re-election as Governor in 1637 and returned to
England, defeated in his struggle with Winthrop and the town fathers for
a more liberal policy, it was really the end of any chances there might still
have been for a gentler and more humanistic New England culture. The
decision of the General Court in the same year l that none should be re-
ceived to inhabite within this Jurisdiction but such as should be allowed
by some of the magistrates ' which was tantamount to saying that
they could exclude or banish anyone whose customs or opinions they dis-
liked became exactly what it was intended to be : a drastically effective
social filter. The little Puritan community was henceforth to be on one
pattern, heresy was to be a crime, and liberalism was to go underground
for a hundred and fifty years.
Small wonder, therefore, that the Restoration could export little of its
brilliance and gaiety to a shore so inhospitable. Music, the theater
these reached the ears of the Bostonians only as rumors of dreadful un-
bridled license. In 1686, Increase Mather, stern upholder of the pro-
prieties and decorums, published a ' Testimony Against Profane and
Superstitious Customs,' in the course of which he bemoaned the fact that
there 'is much discourse now of beginning Stage Plays in New England/
He need not have worried; the 'much discourse' came to nothing; and
the drama, like music and dancing ' gynecandrial' dancing was their
wonderfully contemptuous word for dancing between the sexes re-
mained an alien and unknown quantity. The truth is, of course, that our
admirable forefathers knew nothing whatever about the arts, cared little
for them, and brought into the world children who 'had but an imperfect
Music and the Theater ill
idea of their bearing, and in their ignorance deemed the theater the abode
of a species of devil, who, if once allowed to exist, would speedily make
converts.' In such a situation, any liberalizing influences from without
had perforce to wait on the Puritans' gradual self-liberalization from
within; and the few early attempts to import stage plays into Massa-
chusetts even after the theater had begun to make headway in New
York, Philadelphia, and Providence served only to enforce the re-
strictions against them. Plays were occasionally given in the first half
of the eighteenth century, but only privately, and seldom; and perhaps
with a fear that they might, if indulged in too often, lead to the building
of a playhouse an outcome too terrible to think of.
It was probably some such consideration which led, in 1750, to the
passage of 'An Act to Prevent Stage Plays and Other Theatrical Enter-
tainments,' as likely to 'occasion great and unnecessary expense, and
discourage industry and frugality,' and as also tending to 'increase im-
morality, impiety, and a contempt for religion.' The occasion for this
was a performance of Otway's 'Orphan, or Unhappy Marriage' at a
coffee house in State Street, Boston, by two enterprising young English
actors, 'assisted by some volunteer comrades from the town.' The
General Court, fearing this might be the entering wedge, made the
provisions of the act extremely stringent. Twenty pounds was the fine
to be paid by anyone who let or permitted the use of his premises for
such a purpose. And any actor or spectator present 'where a greater
number of persons than twenty shall be assembled together ' was subject
to a fine of five pounds. The law was effective, and effectively enforced;
and on the whole it was supported by public sentiment. The more so,
perhaps, as it did not make strictly 'private' performances, or very un-
remunerative ones, absolutely impossible.
But the tide of public opinion was steadily if imperceptibly rising.
The more liberal elements in the community, and those whose business
took them occasionally to New York, where the theater was already well
established, pressed for the repeal of the act many times in the latter half
of the eighteenth century. Such an attempt failed in 1767; and more
daunting still was the resolve of the Continental Congress, in 1778, that
any officeholder under the United States who should be so neglectful of
his duties as to attend a play should at once lose his position. Despite
this, however, and despite the fact that in 1784 the an ti- theater act of
1750 was re-enacted in Massachusetts, the moment was at hand when
the law was simply to be allowed to become a dead letter. As a test case,
the New Exhibition Room a theater in everything but name was
112 Massachusetts: The General Background
opened in what is now Hawley Street, Boston, in 1792, with a performance
in the nature of a variety show. ' Monsieur Placide will dance a hornpipe
on a Tight-Rope, play the Violin in various attitudes, and jump over a
cane backwards and forwards.' This was followed by Garrick's 'Lethe/
and that by Otway's 'Venice Preserved,' which was announced, with the
customary bland hypocrisy of the times, as 'A Moral Lecture in Five
Parts.' And subsequent performances were given likewise billed as
'moral lectures' of 'Romeo and Juliet,' 'Hamlet,' and 'Othello.'
Rhymed couplets, in the handbills, drove home the moral lessons, lest
they be missed: from the bill of 'Othello', for example:
Of jealousy, the being's bane,
Mark the small cause and the most dreaded pain.
With these performances, and with the consequent arrest and discharge
on a technicality of the manager, Joseph Harper, the real history
of the theater as such in Massachusetts may be said to have begun.
The worthy citizens of Boston were now well persuaded that the drama
was actually of great social benefit; and accordingly many of the most in-
fluential people took an active part in the financing, planning, and build-
ing with Bulfinch as architect of the Boston Theatre, which was
completed at the corner of Federal and Franklin Streets in 1794. They
must, presumably, have closed their eyes to such unedifying sights as
were billed at Mr. Bryant's Hall, a temporary theater during this period,
where one might see, for example, Mr. Manly ' balance his whole body on
the edge of a candlestick, pick up two pins with his eyes, and a dollar at
the same time with his mouth ' all the while, moreover, rolling like a
whale in the sea. Culture was to be the thing; and they pursued it with
characteristic zeal. Despite the bankruptcy of the Boston Theatre at
the end of its first season, a second theater, the Haymarket, was built a
year later; and until 1803, when the Haymarket was torn down, a lethal
competition made prosperity impossible for either.
And in fact it is hardly an exaggeration to say that the theater was
never destined, in Boston, to very great prosperity, and that in a sense
Boston has never been really a ' theater ' city. The Boston Theatre did
moderately well for a quarter of a century with a very fine stock
company to play around such visiting stars as Kean, Macready, Forrest,
and Junius Booth and later in the century, from 1860 to 1880, the
Boston Museum, in Tremont Street, maintained one of the finest stock
companies in the country. But the 'star' system, lamented as early as
1880 by William Clapp, one of the leading dramatic critics of the period,
Music and the Theater 113
was gradually to make Boston what it is today, a theatrical dependency
of New York. And attempts in the present century to run stock com-
panies in Boston, despite the temporary successes of John Craig and
Mary Young at the Castle Square, and of Leon Gordon, Edmund Clive,
and Henry Jewett, have invariably ended in failure. More interesting to
record, in an otherwise somewhat drab history, is the vigor of the Little
Theater movement in Massachusetts, with the famous Provincetown
Players and the People's Theater of Northampton conspicuous for their
contribution; and the very great influence of Professor George Pierce
Baker's '47 Workshop' on the American theater at large. Of Massachu-
setts playwrights, it is perhaps sufficient, if melancholy, to quote William
Clapp, who fifty years ago remarked that ' no Boston author has as yet
written a play which is likely to keep the stage.'
II
If music has fared better in Massachusetts and especially in the past
fifty years, when Boston has deservedly taken its place as one of the fore-
most musical centers of the world its early history in the State was
quite as humble as that of the drama, and if anything even more in-
conspicuous. Music had, and could have, no place in a strictly Puritan
community even its controversial value was less considerable than
that of the drama, for it was clearly less of a ' temptation.' Copies of
Henry Ainsworth's psalter, published in 1612, were aboard the ' May-
flower,' and the first book to be printed in America the 'Bay Psalm
Book' (Cambridge, 1640) was to go through eight editions before 1698;
but neither of these actually contained any music. The psalms were
sung by rote, to one of the five or six tunes then in use, the precentor
chanting the psalm line by line, the congregation echoing him a dreary
business at best. And this literally was all the music the Puritan
fathers knew.
So dreadful, however, did this rote-singing finally become that a move-
ment arose in the Church itself not without furious opposition to
introduce singing by note; and in 1698 the ninth edition of the 'Bay
Psalm Book ' contained thirteen tunes in two-part harmony the
'oldest existing music of American imprint.' A year later, 1699, the
Brattle Street Church voted unanimously 'that ye psalms in our public
Worship be sung without reading line by line.' In 1714 or 1715 appeared
what may be described as the first musical textbook to come out of
114 Massachusetts: The General Background
America ' A very plain and easy Introduction to the Art of Singing
Psalm Tunes: With the Cantus, or Trebles, of Twenty-eight Psalm Tunes
contrived in such a manner as that the Learner may attain the Skill of
Singing with the greatest Ease and Speed imaginable,' by the Reverend
John Tufts. This book was published in Boston; and ran through ten
editions by 1 744. It was the forerunner of other such instruction books,
and coincided with the formation of the first singing schools one such
is said to have existed as early as 1717.
Thus far, the psalm-singing was unaccompanied. But in 1714, when
the first pipe-organ in America was installed in King's Chapel, the
organist, Edward Enstone, just arrived from England, brought with him
a 'choice Collection, of Musickal Instruments, consisting of Flageolets,
Flutes, Hautboys, Bass- Viols, Violins, Bows, Strings, Reads for Haut-
boys, Books of Instruction for all these Instruments, Books of ruled
paper.' Clearly, there was already a definite interest in instrumental
music, and it was not long before the first concerts began to be given
usually for the benefit of the poor. The first advertisement of a concert
in America seems to have been that in the Boston News-Letter, December
16-23, I 73 i: 'There will be a Concert of Music on sundry instruments
at Mr. Pelham's great Room, being the House of the late Doctor Noyes
near the Sun Tavern.' In 1732 the New England Weekly Journal ad-
vertised 'Conserts of Musick performed on sundry instruments at the
Concert Room in Wing's Lane near the Town Dock ' a room in the
George Tavern, in what is now Elm Street. In 1744 a vocal and instru-
mental concert was given in the newly built Faneuil Hall; and from this
time on concerts became frequent, and instrumental music began to take
a natural place in the home.
Perhaps the opening of the theaters, in the last decade of the eighteenth
century, did much to stimulate the public interest in music, and to im-
prove its taste at all events, it is not without significance that there
was on the program for the opening night of the Boston Theatre, Feb-
ruary 3, 1794, 'to precede the drawing up of the curtain,' a 'grand sym-
phony by Signer Haydn,' amongst other pieces. Here, too, the custom
was introduced of 'allowing the audience to call upon the orchestra for
such pieces of music as suited the popular taste,' a custom which pre-
vailed for many years. Obviously, the Puritan terror of music had at last
broken down, music was beginning to come out of the church, and all
that now was needed was organization a creative discipline and
direction.
For this, some of the spade-work had already been done by the gradual
Music and the Theater 115
formation and training of the church choirs, the founding of singing
schools, partly to the same end, and the development of musical societies.
Among the latter may be mentioned one of the earliest, still in existence,
the Stoughton Musical Society, 1786, founded by America's first native
composer, William Billings. Billings's 'New England Psalm Singer'
(1770), and subsequent collections, may be said to be the beginning of
American composition; and his spirited 'fuguing' style did much to free
church music from the everlasting Puritan drone.
But these were modest beginnings at best, and it was really with the
nineteenth century that things began to happen. In 1808 a group of
students at Harvard founded the Pierian Sodality, and with it 'an un-
broken chain of cause and effect' which was to lead, via the Harvard
Musical Association founded by graduates of the Pierian in 1837 to
the Boston Symphony Orchestra. This little society, for the encourage-
ment of instrumental music, may be said to have been of the profoundest
significance in the development of music, not only at Harvard, but
throughout the country. Two years later came a similar venture, though
not so lasting, when Gottlieb Graupner, music publisher and engraver,
ex-oboist in Haydn's Orchestra in London, formed a group of professional
musicians, together with a few amateurs, for weekly concerts of an in-
formal character. This, the Philharmonic Society, lasted till 1824, thus
overlapping the Handel and Haydn Society, 1815, in the founding of
which Graupner again had a hand.
With the Philharmonic Society playing the symphonies of Haydn and
Mozart, and the Handel and Haydn giving a performance of the whole
of Handel's 'Messiah' as early as 1818, progress was clearly being made;
but the discipline and training for precision-playing was to come a good
deal later. A further step in this direction came with the establishment
of the Boston Academy of Music, in 1833, by Lowell Mason. This ad-
mirable institution long since defunct gave free vocal instruction
to upwards of a thousand children, and five hundred adults, a year; and
in 1837 it succeeded in introducing music into the Boston public schools.
Its services to the teaching of music were inestimable, but perhaps even
more fraught with consequence was its decision, in 1840, under the
leadership of Samuel A. Eliot, its president, then Mayor of Boston, to
give up teaching and l to engage the best orchestra it can afford and give
classical instrumental concerts.' The immediate result was the first
hearing of Beethoven in Boston, the First and Fifth Symphonies being
performed by the Academy of Music Orchestra in its first season of eight
concerts. The orchestra was small twenty-five to forty and by no
n6 Massachusetts: The General Background
means perfect; but its seven-year existence made the coming of the
Boston Symphony Orchestra inevitable.
Other stages were to intervene the visits of the Germania Orchestra,
from 1848 to 1854; the foundation of the Harvard Musical Association
in 1837, and its seventeen years of symphony concerts, from 1865 onward,
under Carl Zerrahn; the popularization of chamber music by the Men-
delssohn Quintette Club but everything now tended obviously to the
obvious thing, the foundation of a Boston Symphony Orchestra. This,
finally made possible by the generosity and unflagging devotion of Henry
Lee Higginson, began in 1881 the career which was to make it for many
years the finest orchestra in the United States, and to make Boston
famous for its music. Its history, under such leaders as Nikisch, Gericke,
Muck, Rabaud, Monteux, and Serge Koussevitzky, is a story in itself,
beyond the scope of these pages; it must be sufficient to note that out of
it have come such notable institutions as the Kneisel Quartet, the Longy
Club and Longy School of Music, and the Flute-Players' Club, and that
as a great orchestra it continues to give Boston precisely the creative
focus for music that it needs.
It remains simply to note that in the New England Conservatory of
Music founded in 1867 by Doctor Eben Tourjee Massachusetts
possesses one of the most famous schools of music in the country, and that
in the field of musical composition the State stands almost alone. Among
those born in the State or resident there have been such composers as
George Chad wick, C. M. Loefifler, F. S. Converse, Arthur Foote, Edward
Burlingame Hill, Walter Piston, Carl Ruggles, Bainbridge Crist, and
Roger Sessions, to mention but a few. As a creative musical center,
Boston is today in many respects unrivaled.
ART
MASSACHUSETTS is rich in the substance of the arts. It has a good
tradition in handicraft; it was once the stronghold of eminent Colonial
portrait-painters; it counts among its residents renowned scholars in art
and discerning collectors. Within its boundaries are treasures of enviable
importance. The number of art museums is exceptional, and the State
is honeycombed with historic houses fitted with Colonial furnishings.
The early history of Massachusetts was virtually the history of art in
the United States, for many of the outstanding painters and sculptors
were either born in the State or had a foothold here. The people of Mas-
sachusetts in their enthusiasm or indifference, their Puritanism or limited
taste, are as responsible for the peculiarities of native art as the crafts-
men themselves.
In the ways in which scholarly research can enrich understanding of
the arts, Massachusetts is at an advantage. Museums are outwitting
each other in acquisition of rarities and in publication of researches.
While museums show increasing range of interest, each in its way has a
splendid collection or a department in which it excels. The Boston
Museum of Fine Arts is particularly notable for superb Far Eastern
treasure, while the Worcester Art Museum draws attention by its mag-
nificent mosaics of the Middle Ages. The Smith College Art Museum has
concentrated on modern French pictures, and at the Fogg Art Museum,
Harvard, there is an exceptional display of Italian primitives. The
Addison Gallery of American Art at Andover is one of the most important
specialized collections of American art in the land. The latter and the
Germanic Museum at Harvard show a marked interest in living art
through exhibition and purchase. Other museums specialize in the
historic, remaining comparatively indifferent to the problems of the
living artist.
Since its earliest days, Massachusetts has not been a particularly
hospitable environment for the living artist. Restraints of economic
necessity and puritanic bias prevented a free expression in the arts from
the very beginning. Colonial handicraft was directed toward articles of
household use, furniture, utensils, pewter, silver, textiles, and in some
solemn likenesses of early worthies. Based upon English prototypes, the
Ii8 Massachusetts: The General Background
articles were made to conform to local needs and, viewed today in the
historic houses or museums, they show good taste and adaptation of
materials. Puritanism was opposed in principle to art, and there was
not the impulse of native taste or the urgency of demand to propel the
imagination of artists. Years later, it was personal pride, luxurious in-
dulgence, a, forgivable conceit which prompted Americans to have their
portraits painted, revealing unmistakably their forceful characteristics
and newly acquired finery. It was a painting of form and feature, flounce
and frill, with rarely a sidelong glance at nature, or critical observation
of society. The early limners held forth with reserve, as artisans who
had branched from the more useful calling of coach or sign painting, and
some, in the well-known matter-of-fact manner, peddled their wares from
house to house. They carried portraits painted completely except for
the face, to be bargained for by the impending client.
The early portraits are flat and descriptive, lacking the lifelike char-
acter and subtle handling of European portraiture of the time; possessing,
on the other hand, the decorative beauty which to present-day taste is so
appealing in provincial art. Some most interesting early portraits are to
be seen in the Worcester Art Museum. On loan for many years has been
' Mrs. Freake and Baby Jane/ one of the handsomest and most touching
of seventeenth-century portraits. 'John Freake' is there too, an imposing
likeness in which particular attention has been paid to ornate costume.
Not far from the Worcester Art Museum, in the American Antiquarian
Society, are portrayals of Samuel and Increase and Cotton Mather (the
latter painted by Peter Pelham about 1695-1751). Portraiture de-
veloped in the eighteenth century into a specialty. John Smibert (1688-
1751) came from Scotland to Boston to paint, and incidentally designed
Faneuil Hall in Boston. Joseph Blackburn (flourished 1753-1763),
Robert Feke (about 1705-1750), Ralph Earle (flourished 1751-1761)
were among the early exponents, and their portrayals are on exhibition
at Harvard University and in the museums in Boston, Worcester, and
Andover. The art of portraiture attained a notable height in the canvases
of John Singleton Copley (1738-1815). In the opinion of many, Copley
executed his finest pictures here at home, before he departed in what
was to become a too common practice among Massachusetts artists
to England to live. There was something in the native environment, in
the types of personages he portrayed, in the limited tradition out of
which his style developed that proved salutary to Copley. In England
he lost individuality, acquired suaver traits. Colonial personalities,
humble, smug, forceful, are clearly characterized in the Copleys shown
throughout Massachusetts.
Art 1 19
Gilbert Stuart (1755-1828) settled in Boston, where he painted out-
standing Americans of the early republican days. The Athenaeum por-
traits of George and Martha Washington hang in the Boston Museum
among other portraits by Stuart, which differ from the Copleys in the
swift summary handling and the emphasis upon facial features and ex-
pression, with comparative indifference to costume. Portraits in smaller
dimension are scattered throughout the State. Besides its three hundred
painted portraits, Essex Institute in Salem possesses a fine collection of
silhouettes. Miniatures by Edward Greene Malbone (1777-1807) are in
the Worcester and Boston Museums. W T ax miniatures are displayed here
and there in historic collections.
During the same period the household arts surpassed by far the pictorial
arts. Cotton Mather had written that within a dozen years after the
granting of the charter to the Massachusetts Bay, Colony 'artificers to
the number of some thousands came to New England.' Among early
silversmiths of Boston were such notables as Robert Sanderson (1608-
1693), who instructed many in the art, Jeremiah Dummer (1645-1718),
John Coney (1655-1722), and, in the eighteenth century, the versatile
Paul Revere (1735-1818), who, in addition to tankards, punchbowls, and
candlesticks, made silver dental plates which he advertised as 'of real
Use in Speaking and Eating.' The first articles of furniture of artistic
significance to be made in the State were carved oak chests, which slowly
evolved into highboys and writing-desks. John Goddard (1723-1785),
who produced stately pieces in Santo Domingo mahogany, was born in
Massachusetts but practiced his craft in Rhode Island. As early as 1638
crude glass lamps and bottles were being manufactured in Peabody, but
Deming Jarves (1790-1868), head of the Boston and Sandwich glass
works, revolutionized the glass industry with his new methods of furnace
construction, his rediscovery of the method of manufacturing red lead,
and his inventions in color-mixing. The Decorative Arts Wing of the
Boston Museum has many interesting period rooms. The historic houses
throughout the State give evidence of excellent handiwork, indicating
the changes in taste from the early days of rigorous thrift to later luxury
and finesse. Objects of folk-interest samplers, coverlets, mourning
pictures, painted Bible pictures reveal imaginative qualities which
painters in a more formidable craft lacked.
The art of carving found a particularly touching expression in grave-
stones, which apparently deserved special attention in the solemn judg-
ment of Colonials. Such memorials are extant in burying grounds of
Deerfield, Salem, Concord, Boston, and towns on Cape Cod. They bear
120 Massachusetts: The General Background
indications of an authentic talent for carving in decorative borders,
sacred symbols, and ruminative epitaphs. It was an original and ap-
propriate manner of commemoration, with far more vitality in design and
feeling for the craft than was revealed in native plastic art of later
date.
The demand for portraiture continued in the early days of the Re-
public. Painters went abroad for study and stimulus. Massachusetts,
which had such a favorable atmosphere for the ripening of Copley's style,
could not hold its painters. They would wander afar, to London and
Paris, and they were not shrewd enough to ally themselves with the best
teachers, but contented themselves with the guidance of lesser lights.
Benjamin West (1728-1820) took young Americans under his wing.
Samuel F. B. Morse (1791-1872), seeking instruction abroad, boasted of
having studied with Washington Allston (1779-1843), whose unfinished
masterpiece, ' Belshazzar's Feast,' is in the Boston Museum. Massachu-
setts artists were eager, but they lacked taste and tenacity. Abroad they
responded to the official and obvious, and when they painted compositions
they seemed to favor the literary and rhetorical. Morse gave up painting,
as there was no market, no recognition, and turned to inventing, where
his successes never consoled him for his failure as an artist. His 'Self
Portrait' hangs in the Addison Gallery in Andover. Chester Harding
(1792-1866) carried the portraiture tradition well into the nineteenth
century, when changes were taking place with the rapid growth of the
Republic and there were reverberations of political and industrial up-
heaval abroad.
James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) and Winslow Homer
(1836-1910) were both born in Massachusetts. There was little at home
to foster the talents of a painter. One escaped to the solace and enhance-
ment of European life; the other withdrew to solitude at Prout's Neck
on the coast of Maine. Whistler possessed skill and wit. He had far
better taste than most Americans, and his pictures are an odd mixture of
influences from Turner to Degas, from the Pre-Raphaelites to the Japa-
nese. Whistler did not follow his fellow countrymen to the academy;
not for him the sleek and photographic and artificial. He had a fine
decorative sense, and a taste for the diffuse and atmospheric. His etch-
ings give him rank with masters in that medium. Nevertheless he re-
mained a wanderer, lacked a mooring, and fell short of greatness as a
painter. Winslow Homer went abroad, but he did not stay for long. He
found water color a more responsive medium for his direct, decisive re-
action to the outdoors. He painted what he saw with the impact of the
Art 121
first fresh impression. It was straightforward, realistic portrayal, and it
marks him one of the first Massachusetts painters with a dynamic style.
Homer furnishes the moral to escaping artists. He helped to deliver the
artists of New England from a sense of inferiority, from the uncontro-
verted domination of foreign ideas which were not too well selected, not
too thoroughly assimilated. Homer has risen in esteem, especially in
recent years, for his peculiarly native qualities, and for the fact that he
found his vigorous style through self -disco very.
Albert Pinkham Ryder (1847-1917), born in New Bedford, also painted
the sea, but his portrayal was veiled in poetry, shaded with mysticism,
softened with sentiment. Ryder also avoided the American scene, not as
Homer or Whistler had chosen to do, but by withdrawing into himself,
painting from personal resource, inner feeling. In Deerfield dwelt an-
other native artist who painted in a gentle sentiment, George Fuller
(1822-1884). Boston-born Abbott H. Thayer (1849-1921) lavished
tenderness upon his canvases of womanhood.
William Morris Hunt (1824-1879) exercised considerable influence
upon Bostonians through his great interest in the Barbizon school in
France, especially F. D. Millet. The atmosphere at home seemed un-
sympathetic to him, too, and he longed for what was lacking: an impetus
to paint. An entire gallery of his paintings is in the Boston Museum. His
pupil and friend, John La Farge (1835-1910), was commissioned by
Henry Richardson, architect, to paint murals in Trinity Church on
Copley Square. On the same square stands the Boston Public Library,
where murals cover the walls on the second and third floors. There is
one series by the French neo-classicist, Puvis de Chavannes (1824-1898),
the illustrative 'Quest of the Holy Grail' series by Edwin Abbey (1852-
1911), and the elaborately wrought theological sequence by John Singer
Sargent (1856-1925), to some his greatest performance. The Boston
Public Library murals are very interesting and very provocative. All
three differ in treatment, color, effect; they also differ greatly from the
mural painting which has come rather suddenly into prominence in recent
years with emphasis on scenes in history, social forces, and daily life.
Sculptors of Massachusetts have worked under a handicap that is
more universal, for their special craft struggles to survive in a world
which seems to find no urgent need of it. That native Americans enjoyed
whittling and carving is apparent in their early houses, furniture, ship
figureheads, gravestones, weather-vanes, wild fowl decoys, scrimshaw
(there is an interesting collection in the Whaling Museum in New Bed-
ford) ; but when they applied their gift to the formal art of portraiture,
122 Massachusetts: The General Background
they showed little taste and insufficient vitality. Samuel Mclntire
(1757-1811) had a peculiar gift for carving portals and architectural
decorations with the wholesome application of craft to function. That
peculiar attribute of functionalism in style which is so often discussed
today is rooted in the craft of Massachusetts. The most classical example
is that of the Shaker workshops, which provided a variety of articles for
daily use, admonishing the maker to do the job as efficiently as possible,
with an eye to simplicity and usefulness.
Horatio Greenough (1805-1852) was one of the native sculptors who
went to Italy to assimilate neo-classical ideas. But such ideas could not
somehow be redirected with conviction by a native of Massachusetts.
The sculptors, like so many painters, possessed enthusiasm and eagerness,
but no commensurate creative imagination. Artistically they lacked
roots. There were sculptors like Henry Kirke Brown (1814-1886), Har-
riet Hosmer (1830-1908), Thomas Ball (1819-1911), who did an eques-
trian statue of George Washington that stands in the Public Garden in
Boston. Many pieces are on view throughout the State, generally Ital-
ianate or official in character. Most native are the diminutive groups ex-
ecuted by John Rogers (1829-1904) of Salem, ingenuous portrayals of
everyday life of Americans and realistic scenes of the Civil War, a de-
scriptive sculpture, illustrating life in America, and true to life and
aspirations in Massachusetts. At Essex Institute there is a very large
collection of Rogers groups.
Counted among outstanding sculptures in Massachusetts are the
'Shaw Memorial,' a high relief in bronze by Augustus Saint-Gaudens
opposite the State House in Boston, and 'Dean Chapin' by the same
sculptor in Springfield. The 'Minuteman' in Concord and 'John Har-
vard' in Cambridge were executed by Daniel Chester French, who had
studied sculpture under a Boston teacher. Cyrus Dallin, sympathetic
portray er of the American Indian, is the sculptor of 'Appeal to the Great
Spirit,' which stands in front of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.
In Massachusetts until recent years a conservatism has prevailed,
which resists stubbornly the experimental methods practiced in the
world of art. The arbiters of taste have clung to Victorianism, or have
released their energies in the study of art of remote times and remote
places. The State has avoided the rapids of the main stream of con-
temporary art, and has thus been safeguarded against the attendant risk
and deprived of the inevitable exhilaration. Exhibition places, such as
the Boston Art Club, the Copley Society, the Guild of Boston Artists,
have been rather inflexible, showing works of acceptable stamp, often
Art 123
capably wrought, depictions in a conventional or photographic manner,
softened renderings of Hals or Manet, with reminiscences of Munich,
Pre-Raphaelitism, and the French Academy. Pictures there are in
abundance of the pursuit of wild fowl, clippers at full sail, swelling surf,
flowers and fruits and bric-a-brac in a rose-gold ambience, the New Eng-
land countryside, woodland retreats, pools and freshets and marshlands,
and pleasant people. Boston has had its special style, its exponents.
Sargent set the pace in portraiture, brisk painting of texture, fleet, skillful
rendering of features. Among members of the Boston group may be
counted today Frank Benson, Edward Tarbell, Marian Sloane, Herman
D. Murphy, Laura Coombs Hills, John Lavalle, Margaret Fitzhugh
Browne.
Ideas are blowing across the boundaries. Resourceful and probing
performers have infused a new spirit into the atmosphere. Art schools are
altering their point of view; museums are enlivened by new and enter-
prising directors. During the summer American painters have gravitated
toward Provincetown and Gloucester, where the weather-beaten shacks
and fisheries and townsfolk and dunes and surf and old-fashioned gardens
provide choice subject matter. At Provincetown some talented artists
live throughout the winter, among whom are Karl Knaths, Oliver Chaffee,
Agnes Weinrich.
Among painters of the State, water color has been a popular medium.
Winslow Homer, John Singer Sargent, and Dodge Macknight are ad-
mired and emulated Homer for realism, Sargent for skilled grasp of
surface texture, Macknight for bold, translucent color. Macknight pro-
voked Bostonians to well-known vituperation when he sent his brightly
colored aquarelles from France in the 1890*5. The reaction paralleled
that of the French middle class at the Impressionist Exhibition of 1874
in Paris. There is a Bostonian water-color style based upon these fore-
bears, rarely, however, as powerful or as concentrated as the originals.
John Whorf is the most successful and most popular exponent of this
local inherited style. Other aquarellistes of more independent spirit
should be noted for peculiarly expressive handling of pigment, and for
some engaging theories which they have invented. Among them are
Carl Gordon Cutler, Harley Perkins, Katherine Sturgis, and Charles
Hopkinson. The latter is interesting as a sort of dual personality, for he
does able official portraits in a manner which is highly acceptable, then
turns to water color apparently as a release for his fancy, to indulge an
insatiable devotion to color, and to work out some tricky compositions.
The Boston Athenaeum, founded in 1807, initiated in the community
124 Massachusetts: The General Background
the policy of having annual exhibitions of pictures painted by local
artists, or borrowed from local collectors. An Athenaeum catalogue of
1831 lists with exceeding pride the 'Head of a Madonna' by Carlo Dolci.
Taste in Boston today runs to early rather than late Renaissance pictures.
In 1855 the Boston Art Club was organized with the purpose of promot-
ing social intercourse among artists and for the general advancement of art.
Today, there are many art centers and schools. There are clubs of hobby
artists; there is the Society of Independent Artists. There is furthermore
the energetic group of artists in the Federal Art Project. But the range
of interest in art is no longer a local matter. Some of our best craftsmen
are young and not yet known; some are newcomers to the State with
fresh points of view. The pace today is set by leadership elsewhere, in
sources which have been more harmonious with present-day tendencies.
Massachusetts is losing its peculiar qualifications, for better, for worse,
in the broadening scope of taste and of activity in cosmopolitan art
centers.
II. MAIN STREET AND
VILLAGE GREEN
Some cities and towns could not be conveniently described among the tours in
Section III because of the amount of historical matter and the number of
points of interest. For that reason, though appearing on the tours, they are
described here, as well as all municipalities of 35,000 population or over, all
seats of colleges, a number of historic shrines, and a few centers of varied
interest.
The altitude is usually that of the municipal center, sometimes, if the former
was not available, that of the railway station. Population is according to the
1935 State census. If you find a date of settlement twenty years earlier or
later than one given here, yours is probably right, too. The same dates
and data often dijfer in half-a-dozen reference books, and the Oldest In-
habitant's memory can rarely be trusted. When sources differed too widely to
be reconciled, the editors made a reasonable choice, or took refuge in such a
phrase as 'the mid-nineteenth century.'
Brief general information is listed at the beginning of each town: railroads,
inter-State bus service, piers and boat service, airports, accommodations, and
information centers. Local information centers, each happily situated, like
Anatole France 7 s dog, in the exact center of the universe, are equipped to
answer more specific questions.
A tour has been arranged for each city or town, starting at the municipal
center except where, as in Boston and Cambridge, some other starting point
was considered to be more convenient. Points of interest which are con-
centrated or easy to find are merely numbered and listed with street addresses;
otherwise driving directions are given. If the inordinate length of some of the
tours within towns or cities appals you (Pitts field's motor tour is over 30
miles long) , console yourself, as you halt on a country road to shoo a flock of
geese, that you are still 'in town,' as townships were abolished in Massachu-
setts by an Act of the General Court on August 23, 1775.
AMHERST.^w Adventure in Quietude
Town: Alt. 302, pop. 6473, sett. 1703, incorp. 1775.
Railroad Station: Main St., opposite Gray St., for Central Vermont R.R.
Accommodations: Four hotels and several tourist houses.
Information: Hotel Lord Jeffrey, Bottwood Ave., cor. Spring St.
AMHERST, on its pleasant valley plateau within a circle of hills, is a
dignified college town, the seat of two institutions of higher learning.
Its quiet dwellings, elm-shaded streets, and general air of academic calm
make it attractive and individual. It was named for Lord Jeffrey Am-
herst, a British general in the French and Indian War. The town was
originally a part of Hadley. Farming was the exclusive occupation of the
community for three quarters of a century.
Later its two streams furnished water-power for a diversity of small and
in general ephemeral industries. Shortly after the Revolution, a paper
factory made its appearance, followed by three others in the next seventy
years. About 1809, an abortive effort was made to spin yarn by machin-
ery. Twenty-eight years later, improved processes made it possible to
operate two woolen mills successfully. The fabrication of palmleaf hats
and the temporarily popular ' Shaker ' hoods for women marked the
high-spot of Amherst's mass-production. Miscellaneous items such as
sleds, baby-carriages, and rifles complete the catalogue of the town's
manufactured goods.
The agrarian skill of the inhabitants and the lusty health of their
cattle as shown in annual fairs attracted State-wide interest which
culminated, in 1864, in the founding of Massachusetts Agricultural
College, which later, with a broadened curriculum, became Massachusetts
State College. The college was established as a result of the Morrill
Land Grant Act of 1862, which allotted to Massachusetts the sum of
$208,464 realized from the sale of 360,000 acres of land granted by the
Federal Government. From a perpetual fund set up for the promotion
of education in agriculture and the 'mechanic arts,' one third was
to be given to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and two thirds
to the Agricultural College.
Today this institution possesses a perfectly equipped dairy farm known
as the Flint Laboratory, a model for the whole country, and an out-
standing entomological collection. Since. 1882 the State Agricultural
Experiment Station has been located on forty-eight acres of land leased
from the college.
More than forty years before the founding of the Agricultural College,
a purely academic institution had chosen Amherst as its site. Founded
128 Main Street and Village Green
in 1821, with the simple ideal of educating 'promising but needy youths
who wished to enter the Ministry/ Amherst College had an initial
enrollment of forty-seven pupils, with a teaching staff of two professors
.and the president. For many years emphasis was placed on missionary
work and Amherst sent many graduates to the home and foreign fields.
Shortly after 1830, the slavery question nearly split its academic ranks.
.Financial stringency threatened to complete the ruin, but by heroic
effort the college weathered this crisis and succeeded in establishing
itself on a firm basis. Liberal education instead of mere vocational
training has been the steadfast aim. Amherst was the first institution
in the land to adopt student-government.
It is one of the most noted of the smaller colleges for men in the United
States^ and its standards of plain living and high thinking are well
illustrated by the characters of two of its best-known graduates, Henry
Ward freecher and Calvin Coolidge. Noah Webster, Helen Hunt Jackson,
Emily Dickinson, Eugene Field, and Ray Stannard Baker ('David
Gray-son') all lived at one time or another in Amherst. Their presence
fostered a literary atmosphere very congenial to the college, enhanced
in later years by the addition of Robert Frost, the poet, to its faculty.
TOUR 3 m.
S.from Amherst Common on Pleasant St. (State 116).
i. The Amherst College Campus crowns an elm-shaded knoll at the center
of the town. The college buildings are of brick, stone, or wood, in a variety
of architectural modes reflecting its growth. Their grouping is spacious
.and dignified, and considerable beauty is achieved by wide lawns shaded
by ancient trees and outlined by barberry hedges.
College Hall (open), at the west end of the Common, resembles a New England
Colonial church, with yellow-painted brick walls, a white-pillared portico, and
a low octagonal belfry.
North aiid South College (private), are the oldest dormitories, resembling army
barracks, but much beloved by reason of tradition and long, honorable service.
Between these two dormitories stands the brick Johnson Chapel (open}, another
time-honored landmark, with three-story white-pillared portico and square white
belfry.
Morgan Library (open), next door to College Hall, is a gray-stone building now
an Art and Historical Museum. Exhibits include an exquisite Delia Robbia
Madonna from the study of Clyde Fitch, noted playwright, Class of 1886; Henry
Ward Beecher's Chair; Lord Jeffrey Amherst's Chair; and the immortal 'Sabrina,'
a semi-nude statue donated to the college in 1857 to adorn a fountain, and for
many years the prize of the Freshman and Sophomore battle. The trustees, at
length wearying of these Homeric contests, fastened Sabrina into the structural
walls of Morgan Library with such heavy masonry that only dynamite could now
dislodge her.
The Babbott Room (open), occupies the tower of The Octagon, a stucco building
on the campus. In this room Robert Frost talks informally to the students.
Amherst 129
The Natural Science Museum designed by McKim, Mead and White, houses the
biological and geological laboratories in a large building on the southern end of
the campus overlooking Hitchcock Field. In the Biological Museum is a large
collection of shells and a celebrated Audubon Collection of birds. The Geological
Museum contains minerals collected throughout Europe and America and a col-
lection of fossils and vertebrates. Adjoining is a large room containing the famous
Hitchcock ichthyological collection of fossil footprints.
2. The Helen Hunt Jackson House (private), 83 Pleasant St., a two-and-a-
half-story yellow frame dwelling with white pilasters and a gabled roof,
was the home of 'H. H.,' the pseudonym under which Mrs. Jackson wrote
* Ramona ' and other popular novels.
Retrace Pleasant St.; R. from Pleasant St. on Spring St. at the Common.
3 . The Lord Jeffrey Inn (open) , is a charming replica of a Colonial brick
tavern, white-painted, with 4o-paned windows on the lower story. It
houses the Plimpton Collection of French and Indian War prints, maps,
and autographed letters and papers of Jeffrey Amherst, George Washing-
ton, William Pitt, General Wolfe, George II and Louis XV.
L. from Spring St. on College Ave.; R. from College Ave. on Main St.
4. The Home of Emily Dickinson (not open for public inspection; those
interested in Emily Dickinson memorabilia may consult the collection next
door) stands above Main Street, behind a high evergreen hedge. It was
the first brick dwelling-house in Amherst, and was built about 1813 by
her grandfather, Samuel Fowler Dickinson, one of the chief founders of
Amherst College. Here was born in 1830, lived her life apart, and died in
1886, the poet and mystic who, after her death, was acclaimed as one of
the very few great American poets and one of the leading women poets
of all time. Her gradual withdrawal from the world, following a youthful
renunciation of love, became almost complete during her later years as
she devoted herself to a life of thought and the writing of the hundreds
of poems she was to leave to the world. With the exception of two or
three, none of these was published during her lifetime, it remaining for
her sister Lavinia, and then for her niece and heir, Martha Dickinson
Bianchi, to make her work available to the public. More than nine hun-
dred of her poems are now collected in one volume. Nothing relating to
the Dickinsons now remains in the old family mansion, but the Emily
Dickinson memorabilia are preserved at The Evergreens, the home of the
poet's only brother, the late William Austin Dickinson, just across the
lawn, which is now the home of her niece and biographer, where during
the summer months they may be seen by those especially interested in
Emily Dickinson's work.
Retrace on Main St.; straight ahead on Amity St.
5. Jones Library (open: summer, weekdays 9-6; winter, Tues., Thurs.,
Sat. afternoons and evenings. Sun. afternoons) is a gambrel-roofed field-
stone building recognized as one of the most luxurious small public
libraries in the United States. The interior is divided into twelve large
rooms and sixteen smaller ones in the manner of a private mansion. All
are paneled in Philippine white mahogany or walnut. Many have Oriental
130 Main Street and Village Green
rugs and comfortable chairs and divans; many are hung with valuable
paintings. In the Room of Amherst Authors are representative and exten-
sive editions of the works of Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, Eugene
Field, Helen Hunt Jackson, Noah Webster, and others.
6. The Strong House (open Tues. and Sat. 2-5; adm. free), corner of
Amity and North Prospect Sts., is a three-and-a-half-story gambrel-
roofed brownish frame dwelling of 1744, now the home of the Amherst
Historical Society. It is the oldest house in town, and was built by local
craftsmen of entirely hand-hewn timber and hand-wrought hardware.
Retrace Amity St.; L. from Amity on N. Pleasant St.
7. Massachusetts State College, fondly known as ' Aggie,' a contraction of
its former title of Massachusetts Agricultural School, occupies a large
open campus, on the edge of farming country. Its brick buildings, utili-
tarian rather than decorative, are grouped in a long semicircle, at the
center of which stands Goodell Library (open}, with high white Ionic
portico, giving access to 100,000 reference works.
The State College Science Museum in Fernald Hall, headquarters of the geology
and entomology departments, contains unusual specimens of insect life, and one
of the most interesting existing collections of insects injurious to cultivated plants
and trees. It was started early in the history of the college by Professor Fernald,
one of the first presidents and head of this department.
The Veterinary Science Museum is in the Veterinary Science Building on the
western side of the campus. It contains interesting specimens of abnormal animal
growth.
ARLINGTON. History and Homes
Town: Alt. 30, pop. 38,539, sett, about 1630, incorp. 1867.
Railroad Station: B. & M. R.R., Mystic and Mass. Ave.
Bus Station: Arlington Center for B. & M. Transportation Co., Champ lain
Coach Lines, and Frontier Coach Lines.
Accommodations: Boarding and rooming houses.
Information: Robbins Memorial (Town) Hall, Mass. Ave.
VICTIM of a series of industrial and agricultural frustrations, never
quite fulfilling its destiny as a producing center, Arlington is a residential
suburb.
The story of Arlington begins just after the Revolution. Industrial
development started with the establishment of William Whittemore and
Company (1799), card manufacturers, founded on the invention of Amos
Whittemore of a machine for the manufacture of cotton and wool cards.
Arlington 131
Prosperity was blighted in 1812 by the general wartime depression,
culminating in the sale of the Whittemore plant to a New York firm,
and Arlington lost its main industry. In 1827, after the expiration of the
original patents, card manufacturing was revived, but never regained its
vigor, and when the factory burned down in 1862, it was never rebuilt.
In 1832, James Schouler, a calico printer, moved from Lynn to Arlington.
Other lesser enterprises combined to give the town a sense of industrial
importance which temporarily seemed justified. By 1850 the Wood Ice
Tool Company and Gage, Hittinger and Company, ice-cutters who
shipped Spy Pond Ice to various parts of the world, were established.
Arlington's industrial importance was at its crest.
Agriculture developed parallel to industry, but was accompanied by far
less acclaim. Natural conditions and proximity to Boston markets made
truck gardening the chief gainful occupation, and by 1850 Arlington
produce became famous along the North Atlantic seaboard.
Just as industrial development reached a climax and then declined, so
did agriculture. Farms were broken up into house lots as the increasing
residential value of the land, coupled with proportionate increases in tax
assessments, made it unprofitable for market-gardening.
The early city fathers had been faced with such knotty problems as the
purchase of a town hearse, or the installation of a public bathtub 'for
the use of the inhabitants, but to be in the custody of the treasurer/
Their successors had to gird themselves for a different sort of task
a struggle against outside turnpike companies seeking franchises through
Arlington along routes considered inimical to the town. Hardly was the
battle won, and hardly were the roads established along routes agreeable
to all, when the victory crumbled to dust. Business men of Arlington
and Lexington built a railroad to Cambridge in 1846 and turnpikes lost
their significance. Horsecar lines (1859) and electric lines (1897) followed,
and Arlington developed into a residential suburb.
TOUR 6 m.
S. from Massachusetts Ave. into Pleasant St.
1. The Ancient Burying Ground is at the rear of the Unitarian Church.
Toward the farther side of the cemetery, close to the main path, is a
Monument over the graves of 12 Americans killed on the retreat from
Concord and Lexington, and buried 'without coffins, in the clothes they
had worn when they fell.'
2. Spy Pond was so christened, says tradition, when a company of white
men, seeking Fresh Pond to procure water, 'spied' this instead. It
acquired some reflected glory later on from the fact that old Mother
Batherick was digging dandelions on its bank on April 19, 1775, when six
British grenadiers came along, fleeing from the 'old men of Menotomy,'
ARLINGTON
TOUR
Arlington 133
as Arlington was originally (1637-1732) called. The brave old woman
took them off guard, captured them, and marched them to prison.
Retrace Pleasant St.; R. from Pleasant St. into Massachusetts Ave.
3. The Site of Cooper Tavern, corner of Medford St., Arlington Center, is
identified by a tablet. In the Tavern, two aged men, Jabez Wyman and
Jason Winship, sitting over their toddy, were killed on April 19, when the
Redcoats, rushing through the town, fired blindly through the windows.
4. The Site of the Black Horse Tavern is opposite Linwood St. Here the
Committee of Safety and Supplies of the Provincial Congress convened
on April 18, 1775. The following day a British searching party surprised
Vice-President Gerry and Colonels Leo and Orne, who escaped by making
a hasty exit and concealing themselves in a near-by field.
Retrace on Massachusetts Ave.; R.from Massachusetts Ave. on Medford St.;
L. from Medford St. into Mystic Valley Parkway.
5. The Mystic Lakes are popular as a resort for swimming and boating in
summer and skating and ice-boating in winter.
L. from the Parkway on Mystic St.
6. Russell Park is one of the recreational areas of Arlington. A tablet at
the rear of the school records the exploits and longevity of Samuel Whitte-
more, the hero who survived a bullet and a bayonet wound and very
nearly lived to see his hundredth birthday.
R. from Mystic St. into Massachusetts Ave.
7. A marker on the Green identifies the Site of the John Adams House
(1652), which served as a hospital for the Provincial soldiers during the
siege of Boston.
8. In front of the Unitarian Church (L) is a tablet which recalls the
Arlington Minutemen. It reads as follows: 'At this spot, April 19, 1775,
the old men of Menotomy captured a convoy of 18 men with supplies
on the way to join the British at Lexington.' When word came that
a British supply train was coming through with only a small guard, the
' old men ' made ready for its capture. Crouching behind a wall, they arose
as the British approached, covered them with leveled muskets, and forced
a surrender; the contents of the supply wagon were distributed to the
farmers.
ARLINGTON MAP INDEX
1. Ancient Burying Ground 9. Arlington Public Library
2. Spy Pond 10. Whittemore-Robbins Mansion
3. Site of Cooper Tavern n. Arlington Town Hall
4. Site of Black Horse Tavern 12. Jason Russell House
5. Mystic Lakes 13. Site of Deacon Joseph Adams
6. Russell Park House
7. Site of John Adams House 14. Benjamin Locke House
8. Minute Men Tablet
134 Main Street and Village Green
9. The Arlington Public Library (open weekdays 10-9), known as the
Robbins Memorial Library, erected in 1892 from the designs of Gay
6 Proctor, is constructed of Ohio limestone in Italian Renaissance style.
Engaged Corinthian columns support the arches over the windows. The
entrance is similar in style to the main door of the Cancellaria Palace in
Rome.
The Indian Hunter, by Cyrus E. Dallin (see below), stands in the park
between the library and the Town Hall.
10. The Whittemore-Robbins Mansion, behind the library, is a Federal
three-story building with a hip roof, a cupola or watch-tower, and four
chimneys.
n. The Town Hall designed by R. Clipston Sturgis and built about 1914,
is a contemporary adaptation of Colonial design. Two stories in height,
the 'great hall' is surrounded on three sides by administrative offices.
L. from Massachusetts Ave. on Jason St.
12. The Jason Russell House (open weekdays except Mon. 2-5, Apr. -Oct.),
7 Jason St., a wooden two-story dwelling with pitched roof and central
chimney, was built in 1680. A number of Minutemen, almost surrounded
by the British on that memorable April 19, dashed into it for cover. A few
who fled to the cellar were unharmed, but Jason Russell and 1 1 others who
hid upstairs were killed. The house was occupied by descendants of the
Russell family until 1890. It is now the headquarters of the Arlington
Historical Society.
Retrace Jason St.; L. from Jason St. on Massachusetts Ave.
13. A tablet at 840 Massachusetts Ave. identifies the Site of the Deacon
Joseph Adams House, from which British soldiers stole the communion
service of the First Parish during their retreat from Lexington and
Concord.
L. from Massachusetts Ave. on Appleton St.
14. The Benjamin Locke House (private), 21 Appleton St., was built
(1726) by a captain of the militia. When the British passed by, about
two o'clock on the morning of April 19, Captain Locke was awakened
and rushed out to arouse his neighbors. In a short time he was able
to muster 26 men. By the afternoon the band grew to 52, which, with
companies from surrounding towns, joined in harassing the rear of Percy's
retreating column.
15. St. Anne's Chapel (open), between Hillside and Claremont Aves., was
designed by Cram and Ferguson and completed in 1916. It is built in
Romanesque style, the interior and exterior being of local field-stone.
It is furnished with ancient ecclesiastical furniture, most of which came
from Spain and Italy.
L. from Appleton St. into Claremont Ave.; L. from Claremont Ave. into
Florence Ave.; R. from Florence Ave. into Cliff St.; R. from Cliff St. into
Oakland Ave.
Boston 135
1 6. The Home of Cyrus E. Dallin (private), 69 Oakland Ave., also serves
as the eminent sculptor's studio. Mr. Dallin (1861- ), a native of
Utah, is well known for his understanding portrayals of the American
Indian. Among his most noted works are i Appeal to the Great Spirit,'
which stands before the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and ' Medicine
Man,' in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia.
L. from Oakland Ave. into Park Ave.
17. The Water Stand pipe (open to visitors each second Sun.) rises 50 feet
above the loftiest point on Arlington Heights, emphasizing the great
difference between the lowest and highest altitude of this town. From
a balcony near the top, Boston and the harbor are visible to the east; to
the west Mt. Monadnock and Mt. Wachusett are dim blue shapes on the
horizon.
B O S T O N . The Hub of the Universe
City: Alt. 8, pop. 781,188, sett. 1625, incorp. town 1630, city 1822.
Railroad Stations: North Station, 120 Causeway St., for B. & M. R.R., Rutland,
Central Vermont, and Canadian Pacific R.R.s.; South Station, Atlantic Ave.
corner of Summer St., for N.Y., N.H. & H. and B. & A. R.R.s.; Back Bay Sta-
tion, 145 Dartmouth St., for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.; Trinity Place Station,
Trinity Place and Dartmouth St., for B. & A. R.R.
Bus Stations: 8 Broadway for Berkshire Motor Coach Lines, Inc., and Victoria
Coach Line, Inc.; 2 Park Square for Blue Way Trail Ways, Inc., Granite Stages,
and Quaker Stages Co.; Hotel Brunswick, 520 Boylston St., for Gray Line Inc.
and Royal Blue Line, Inc.; 51 Scollay Square for Black Hawk Lines, Inc.; 36
Park Square for B. & M. Transportation Co. and New England Transportation
Co.; 222 Boylston St. for Greyhound Lines; 30 Boylston St. for I. R.R. Co., Inc.;
620 Atlantic Ave. for Rawding Lines, Inc.; 10 Park Square for Capitol Stages.
Piers: Commonwealth Pier No. 5, South Boston; B. & A. Docks, East Boston;
Pier 3 for Cunard-White Star Line; Pier 4 for Anchor and U.S. Lines; N.Y.,
N.H. & H. Piers, South Boston; Pier 2 for M.M.T. Co.; Hoosac Docks, Charles-
town; Pier 42 for Ocean S.S. Line and Pier 44 for Dollar Line; Mystic Docks,
Charlestown; Pier 46 for Furness-Withy Line; India Wharf and Central Wharf,
Atlantic Ave., Boston, for Eastern S.S. Co. ; Long Wharf, Atlantic Ave., Boston,
for United Fruit Co. and Cape Cod S.S. Co.
Airports: Boston Airport, East Boston, 2 m. from city; American Air Lines,
B. & M. Airways, Mayflower Line (Boston & Cape Cod, summers); taxi fare
85^, plus 15^f toll fare for East Boston Tunnel.
Accommodations: Thirteen large hotels and many small ones.
Information Service: Chamber of Commerce, 80 Federal St.; New England
Council, Statler Bldg., 20 Providence St.
136 Main Street and Village Green
BOSTON during its three hundred-odd years of existence has become so
encrusted with legends that the true Boston of today is almost completely
obscured by them. According to time-honored tradition, this city is the
Hub of the Universe, its intellectual center, its cultural center, populated
by superior persons all of whom have at least one ancestor who came over
in the 'Mayflower' or the 'Arabella,' a closed society of 'Brahmins. '
Visitors arriving in Boston with such preconceived notions are likely to
have them confirmed for all time by the sight of a gentleman crossing the
Common carrying a green bag, or a lady emerging from the New England
Historical and Genealogical Society with her Transcript under her arm.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. Boston has its share of intellec-
tuals, its share of culture, its share of 'old families'; it still plays its part
in world affairs and fills an important role in national politics. By no
means do all its citizens, however, live serenely on the waterside of
Beacon Street or the sunny side of Commonwealth Avenue, nor do they
all read the Atlantic Monthly, or spend their summers with relatives on the
North Shore and eternity with their ancestors in Mount Auburn Cem-
etery.
As for the legend of ethnic homogeneity, that is so much pernicious
twaddle. Boston has greatly changed from the city of which President
Timothy Dwight of Yale wrote in 1796: 'The Bostonians, almost without
an exception, are derived from one country and a single stock. They are
all descendants of Englishmen and, of course, are united by all the great
bonds of society language, religion, government, manners and interest.'
Today five minutes' walk from the State House will take the visitor to
any one of several sections of the city where English is a foreign language.
A social statistician has said that every third person whom you meet on
the street in Boston today is foreign-born and three out of every four are
of other than English descent. The old New England stock still largely
controls leading banks, numerous business enterprises, museums, hos-
pitals, and universities, but numerically it is insignificant. The con-
temporary scene is decidedly more cosmopolitan than Calvinistic. The
' New Canaan ' of the English founders is now a political new Canaan for
the Irish. Celt outnumbers Saxon.
The modern fable, however, that Boston is an 'Irish city' is no better
founded than the Puritan myth. The largest number of Boston's 229,356
foreign-born come from Canada (45,558). Three groups closely follow the
Canadians: the Irish Free State (43,932), Italy (36,274), and Russia,
chiefly Jews (31,359). Great Britain and Ireland have contributed
22,653, an d Poland, Norway and Denmark, Germany and Lithuania have
sent sizable quotas in the order named, with many Jews in the Polish and
German groups. There are also in Boston 20,574 Negroes.
Equally without foundation is the frequent impression that Boston is
still the old peninsula plus the Back Bay; bounded on the north by the
North Station, on the south by the South Station, on the east by the
Boston 137
Atlantic Avenue wharves, and on the west by Copley Square with an
extension along the Esplanade. This area, which the visitor usually
thinks of as 'Boston' contains, it is true, Boston Common, the Public
Garden, Beacon Hill and both State Houses, the old graveyards, the
waterfront, the market, the business district, the main shopping area, and
most of Boston's historic houses and shrines, but it shelters actually less
than one-sixth of Boston's residents. Outside its confines Beacon Street
and Commonwealth Avenue stretch along parallel to the Charles River to
the vast Brighton- Allston area (annexed in 1874) in whose modern hive
of apartment houses and small homes live Boston's professional and
clerical workers to the number of 67,000 a fair-sized city in itself.
East Boston, an island across Boston Harbor to the northeast, has been a
part of the city since 1636 and houses about 62,000 persons. South
Boston has a population of more than 55,000. Charlestown, north across
the inlet where the Charles River and Boston Harbor meet (annexed in
1874), contains the United States Navy Yard, Mystic Wharves, Bunker
Hill, and the residences of about 30,000 Bostonians. Roxbury (annexed
in 1868), West Roxbury, Jamaica Plain (annexed in 1874), and Dorchester
to the south (annexed in 1874) have a combined population of approxi-
mately 450,000, a large majority of them Boston's less well-paid workers.
Hyde Park has over 25,000 and 'The Islands' have 2663 inhabitants.
Bearing these facts in mind, it is a mistake for the visitor to think of
Boston in any single term. Boston is a composite. It is a composite of
Silas Lapham's Boston southerly Beacon Hill, the Charles River Em-
bankment, Beacon Street and Commonwealth Avenue, all of which
William Dean Ho wells knew so well and the Boston symbolized by
what was once Ward 8, the kingdom of Boss Martin Lomasney, densely
populated, scornfully ignorant of the proprieties of the prunes-and-prisms
school, but vigorously alive. It is the paradoxical city which has inspired
twenty novels of the Boston scene in the past twenty-five years. It is the
Boston of wide streets overarched by spreading elms, of crooked narrow
streets called * quaint,'' of magnificent parks, fine public buildings, hand-
some residences, and a general air of well-scrubbed propriety and gracious
leisure. It is the Boston where acres of ugly wooden tenement houses
line the drab streets; where ten dollars a month rents a three-room flat
in a wooden fire trap without heat, lighting, running water, or indoor
toilet; where along Mile End Road, on the dump, are the melancholy
shacks of men who can pay no rent at all. It is the Boston of the music-
lovers, centered about Symphony Hall, the Opera House, the New Eng-
land Conservatory of Music; the Boston of the art-lovers, centered about
the Museum of Fine Arts, the Gardner Museum, the Public Library; the
Boston of the well-to-do churches and the prosperous universities. It is
the Boston that produces eighteen per cent of the total goods manu-
factured in Massachusetts by the toil of fourteen per cent of the workers in
the State; the Boston of 2104 manufacturing establishments (1934),
representing a capital investment of $227,315,188 and a total value of
manufactured products to the amount of $332,176,950; the Boston en-
grossed in printing and publishing, clothing manufacture, sugar refining,
138 Main Street and Village Green
boots and shoes, bread and pastries, confectionery, cutlery, foundry and
machine-shop products, malt liquors and wholesale meat-packing.
Note: Because of space limitations, duplication of statement has had to be
minimized. For a complete picture, the historical account of Boston which
follows should be read in conjunction with the essays in Section I, Massa-
chusetts: The General Background.
Boston's first settler was William Blackstone, a recluse of scholarly and
probably misanthropic mental cast, formerly a clergyman of the Church
of England. He had built himself a hut on the western slope of what is
now Beacon Hill, planting his orchard on what later became Boston
Common. At that time the wilderness occupied the peninsula, which was
about one-third the size of the present Boston peninsula. Almost an
island, it jutted out into the bay, joined to the mainland by a long narrow
neck like the handle of a ladle. It was a mile wide at its widest, three
miles long, and the neck was so narrow and so low that at times it was
submerged by the ocean. Blackstone 's realm was bounded on the west
by a mud flat (the Back Bay) ; on the north by a deep cove (later dammed
off to make a mill pond) ; on the east by a small river which cut off the
North End and made an island of it, and by a deep cove (later known as
the 'Town Cove'); and on the south by another deep cove. Here the
disillusioned clergyman read his books, farmed a little, traded a bit with
the Indians, and breathed air uncontaminated by any other white man.
His idyllic solitude was rudely shattered after four or five years, however,
by the arrival of John Winthrop with a company of some eight hundred
souls who settled in what is now Charlestown, just across from his para-
dise. Their miseries were many. The water at Charlestown was brackish ;
and their settlement could not easily be defended against Indian raids.
Blackstone visited them and was melted by the spectacle of their plight.
He invited them to come across to his peninsula and the company eagerly
accepted his hospitality.
Thus in 1630 Boston actually began. Winthrop's settlers called it 'Tri-
mountain,' possibly because of three hills later known as Beacon Hill,
Copp's Hill, and Fort Hill (now razed), or possibly because of the three
mounded peaks of Beacon Hill (later shaved down) .
The first year acquainted the Englishmen and their families with the
rigors of the New England climate, and as it was too late to plant crops,
more than two hundred died of starvation and exposure. The following
spring a ship laden with provisions, long overdue, dropped anchor in the
bay, and famine was averted. The freshly tilled soil later yielded a good
crop and the Colony survived and grew.
Fisheries were established. Fir and lumber created an export market.
The foundation of trade and agriculture were early laid. Within four
years more than four thousand Englishmen had emigrated to Boston
and its vicinity. Twenty villages ramified out of the peninsula town to
form a definite Puritan Commonwealth.
Boston 139
The early Bostonians spent their days in labor from which the Sabbath
alone released them. Women, with spinning, weaving, and all the family
clothes to make, with large numbers of children to rear, had little time to
cultivate the amenities of social intercourse. Pioneer life was hard, drab,
and offered few comforts. Wood, for example, was the only source of fuel,
and as late as 1720 Cotton Mather complained, ' Tis dredful cold, my ink
glass in my stand is froze.'
Divines were preoccupied with dismal theological abstractions, but the
statute books reveal the fact that there were secular souls who displayed
a wholesome proclivity for life. 'Tobacco drinking' (smoking) tippling,
card-playing, dancing, and bowling identified the colonists with their
Elizabethan forbears, but caused the town fathers much alarm. Sunday
strolls or street kissing even when legitimate were subject to heavy
fine, and an attempt was made to legislate 'sweets' out of existence.
Christmas, reminiscent of 'popery,' was immediately placed under the
ban and the elders often boasted that none of the holidays of old England
survived the Atlantic passage.
A breach of these regulations resulted in punishment which was based
upon the theory that ridicule was more effective than the isolation of
imprisonment. Market squares were embellished by the erection of
punitive apparatus bilboes, stocks, pillories, and ducking stools.
Public floggings were common and offenders were often forced to display
on their persons the initial letter of the crime committed.
Offenses against Puritan theology were severely punished. Boston,
dedicated to Calvin, neither understood nor admired toleration. Quakers
and other non-conformists were ruthlessly persecuted and martyrdom
became a commonplace in the Puritan town. Roger Williams was ban-
ished for having 'broached and divulged diverse new and dangerous
opinions against the authority of the magistrates.' Mistress Anne Hutch-
inson, a 'heretic,' followed Roger Williams into banishment. Mary Dyer,
a Quaker, was hanged on old Boston Common in 1660; Mary Jones, Mary
Parsons, and Ann Hibbins were hanged as witches. The town fathers
were content to sacrifice freedom in their attempt to achieve unity. The
Reverend Nathaniel Ward, speaking for all good Puritans, remarked,
' All Familists, Anabaptists, and other Enthusiasts shall have free liberty
to keepe away from us.'
In spite of a narrow religious and moral outlook, her commerce insured
Boston's future greatness. Scarcely a year after the Puritans had invaded
the splendid isolation of Mr. Blackstone, Governor Winthrop launched
the 'Blessing of the Bay.' The Puritan 'Rebecca' sailed to Narragansett
and purchased corn from the Indians. Vessels called at the Bermudas
and returned to Boston with cargoes of oranges, limes, and the equally
exotic potato. They traveled up the Delaware in search of pelts. Fre-
quently they put in at New Amsterdam to traffic with Dutch burghers,
and twelve years after the founding (1642) ships laden with pipe staves
and other products tied up safely at English docks. Thus began the
140 Main Street and Village Green
maritime history of Massachusetts with Boston as its center. Shipbuild-
ing, fishing, whaling, industry and exchange made the Colony a bustling
outpost of imperial Britain.
From 1630 to about 1680, Great Britain was so absorbed in troubles at
home that, notwithstanding the Navigation Act of 1651, she gave little
attention to regulating the enterprise of her infant Colonies. In 1691
a royal governor was sent; in 1733 the Molasses Act was passed; but the
Colonial merchants had virtually free trade until 1764 when Grenville
began the vigorous enforcement of the mercantilistic measures. From
then on friction increased rapidly and the Colonies developed a burning
sense of grievance.
The American Revolution resulted from a series of bewildering subtleties,
but many dramatic episodes, seemingly reflecting the broad issues of the
controversy but actually telescoping them, took place in Boston's crooked
streets. The Boston Massacre (1770) on King Street (now State) occurred
in the shadow of the Old State House. News of the British advance on
Lexington and Concord was semaphored to Paul Revere by the glimmer
of a lamp which swung from the belfry of the Old North Church. The
rafters of Faneuil Hall rang with the impassioned oratory of the champions
of liberty. The Old South Meeting House was the point from which fifty
men disguised as Indians rushed to Griffin's Wharf where British mer-
chantmen rocked idly in the harbor, their holds crammed with East
Indian tea (1773). It was the Boston Tea Party which confronted the
British Cabinet with the choice of capitulation or force, replied to by the
Port Act, which marked the beginning of a policy of coercion and led
swiftly to open warfare. The battle of Bunker Hill in near-by Charles-
town was one of the early engagements of the war. Boston was regarded
by the British as a most important objective, and the failure of the siege
and the evacuation of the city by the Redcoats was the first serious blow
to Tory confidence.
Commerce suffered a temporary eclipse in the depression of the post-war
years, but the discovery of new trading possibilities in the Orient offered
an opportunity which enterprising Yankee merchants were quick to
perceive. The development of the China trade and the exploitation of
the Oregon coast rich in sea otters restored Boston to its former eminence.
Wealth poured into the coffers of merchants, traders, and shipmasters.
In 1780, 455 ships from every quarter of the globe docked in Boston
Harbor, while 1200 vessels engaged in coastwise traffic out of Boston.
During a single year (1791), seventy Yankee merchantmen cleared Boston
for Europe, the Indies, and Canton.
Boston's maritime prosperity was stimulated by the wars between Eng-
land and France which followed the accession of Napoleon. In 1807 the
shipping of Boston totaled 310,309 tons or more than one-third of the
mercantile marine of the United States. The Jefferson Embargo and the
War of 1812 seriously crippled the city's maritime development. Al-
though she recovered, and although the era of the clipper made Massa-
Boston 141
chusetts famous throughout the world, and although the 'Sovereign of
the Seas,' built by Donald McKay in East Boston (1852), was the envy
of the British Admiralty, the War of 1812 really marked the beginning of
the end of Boston's maritime supremacy. Thereafter manufacturing and
industry gradually supplanted commercial interests.
In 1822, Boston became a city; railroads were being built from 1830 on
and played an important part in urban development; the first horsecar
line, connecting Cambridge and Boston, was built in 1853. Between 1824
and 1858, the Boston peninsula was enlarged from 783 acres to 1801 acres
by cutting down the hills and filling in the Back Bay and the great coves
with the excavated gravel as a basis for reclamation. The Neck, which
William Blackstone could not always cross on foot because of the tide-
water, was raised and broadened, so that what was once the narrowest
part of Boston proper is now the widest.
During the era between the War of Independence and the Civil War,
Boston ideas underwent a parallel transformation from the provincial
to the urban. Stimulated by European currents of thought and the
philosophy of the frontier, Boston began to revolt against the theology of
Calvin, a revolt typical of the democratic spirit of the nineteenth century.
Unitarianism under the leadership of William Ellery Channing threatened
to dissolve the entire system of Puritan Congregationalism (1825). The
new doctrines were embraced by Harvard and the fashion of Boston, but
hardly had the rebellion subsided when new dissension broke out within
Unitarian ranks. Ralph Waldo Emerson shocked his parishioners of the
Second Church (1832) by tendering his resignation and retiring to Concord
to ponder the mysteries of Transcendentalism. Theodore Parker, another
Unitarian minister, immersed in German philosophy, Biblical criticism,
and evolutionary geology, began to preach a new variety of natural
religion which rejected conventional theological forms and banished the
supernatural.
Coinciding with the democratic movement and partly as a result of it,
a flurry of philanthropy and reform arose. John Lowell, Jr., bequeathed
a fortune to establish Lowell Institute (1839) in order to provide the
people of Boston with free lectures by 'foremost scholars and thinkers of
the English-speaking world.' This democratization of education was
supplemented by the creation of the Boston Public Library (1852).
Horace Mann devoted his reforming spirit to the development of formal
education. Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe dedicated his efforts to the emanci-
pation of the deaf and blind. With the financial assistance of Thomas
H. Perkins, the Perkins Institution and Massachusetts School for the
Blind (first located in South Boston, later removed to Watertown) was
founded, a unique institution for its day (1832). The first public surgical
operation which made use of ether as an anesthetic was performed (1846)
at the Massachusetts General Hospital. A controversy between the two
claimants of discovery, William Thomas Green Morton and Charles
T. Jackson (the claim of a country doctor in Georgia had not yet been
advanced), was temporarily settled by a tactful verdict of the French
142 Main Street and Village Green
Academy which awarded each claimant a similar amount, one for the
discovery of ether and the other for its application.
Nowhere was the reforming spirit more active than in the anti-slavery
movement. William Lloyd Garrison had no respect for the interests of
cotton, whether expounded by planters or manufacturers. He invaded
Boston and founded the Liberator (1831) and was rewarded in 1835 with
physical violence at the hands of a mob partly composed of Boston
gentility. The development of cotton manufacture in Lawrence and
Lowell was not without its effect on State Street and Beacon Hill. Re-
spectable elements of society thought best to refrain from emotional
language or harsh criticism after Southern statesmen began to ask perti-
nent questions concerning workers in Lowell and Lawrence mills. Garri-
son attacked the Constitution because it recognized slavery as legal, and
Boston patriots could hardly suffer so sacred a document to be disparaged;
but Garrison's fervor attracted Wendell Phillips, a brilliant orator whose
lineage was almost as old as Boston, and he became an equally zealous
advocate of the cause. Other converts were enlisted Channing, Parker,
Lowell, Longfellow, Dana and under the championship of such ultra-
respectable persons, the anti-slavery crusade gained ground rapidly.
Boston played a less important role in the Civil War than in events
preceding it. Unable to meet the prescribed quota of soldiers by voluntary
enlistment, the city fathers first employed the draft in 1863, precipitating
the Boston Draft Riots. The poorer classes, irritated when their rich
neighbors purchased immunity from compulsory service for the sum of
three hundred dollars, objected so strenuously that the militia was called
out to quell the disorders. Among the regiments which did march South
to uphold the honor of Boston, one of the most famous was commanded
by Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, an abolitionist 'of gentle birth and breed-
ing. 3 Composed of Negroes, this regiment led the attack on Fort Wagner
where Colonel Shaw and nearly half of his followers fell.
Although some Bostonians had indicated a reluctance to support the
Northern cause during the war, the celebration of peace left little to be
desired. The moving spirit of the great Peace Jubilee held in June, 1869,
was Patrick S. Gilmore, an exuberant Irish bandmaster, whose grandiose
plans for this occasion made P. T. Barnum seem a novice by comparison.
A coliseum seating 30,000 people was erected near the site of the present
Copley Plaza Hotel housing an Angel of Peace, thirteen feet high, to-
gether with an extinguished torch of war, frescoes, doves and angels,
medallions, emblems and flags, as well as the largest bass drum in the
world, constructed for the occasion, and four organs that required relays
of twelve men to pump. Ten thousand choral singers combined with an
orchestra of 84 trombones, 83 tubas, 83 cornets, 75 drums, 330 strings, and
119 woodwinds, produced an awe-inspiring 'Niagara of harmony.' At
one stage of the celebration, a hundred members of the Fire Department,
clad in red shirts, blue pants, and white caps, suddenly appeared and beat
upon a hundred anvils in what was doubtless the loudest performance of
the Anvil Chorus from 'II Trovatore' ever given. President Ulysses S.
Boston H3
Grant, who attended, appeared unimpressed, and John S. D wight, fore-
most music critic of the day, fled to Nahant in order to escape the din.
This amazing exhibition reflected the American adoration of size as well
as the immaturity of the new wealth which the rise of industry was
bringing to Boston. The proud and graceful clippers that had sailed from
Boston Harbor had been displaced by smoke-belching steamships which
were largely of British ownership. Says Samuel Eliot Morison, in his
'Maritime History of Massachusetts':
The maritime history of Massachusetts . . . ends with the passing of the
clipper. 'Twas a glorious ending! Never, in these United States, has the
brain of man conceived, or the hand of man fashioned, so perfect a thing
as the clipper ship. In her, the long-suppressed artistic impulse of a practi-
cal, hard-worked race burst into flower. The 'Flying Cloud' was our
Rheims, the 'Sovereign of the Seas' our Parthenon, the 'Lightning' our
Amiens; but they were monuments carved from snow. For a few brief
moments of time they flashed their splendor around the world, then dis-
appeared with the sudden completeness of the wild pigeon. One by one
they sailed out of Boston, to return no more. A tragic or mysterious end
was the final privilege of many, favored by the gods. Others, with lofty
rig cut down to cautious dimensions, with glistening decks and topsides
scarred and neglected, limped about the seas under foreign flags, like faded
beauties forced upon the street.
Money formerly invested in shipping now flowed into the mills and
factories that sprang up in large numbers in Boston and its suburbs. The
shoe and textile industries, which had boomed with the artificial demand
of wartime conditions, continued their advance under the stimulus of
capital released from maritime pursuits. Other manufacturing estab-
lishments followed the trail to Boston, and by the turn of the twentieth
century, the intellectual 'Hub of the Universe ' had become the industrial
hub of New England.
A new commerce grew from this new industry. It was neither so ro-
mantic nor so important as that of pre-Civil War days, but it sufficed
to establish Boston as one of the leading ports on the Atlantic seaboard.
Shipping became an adjunct of manufacturing plants; raw materials,
such as cotton and wool for textiles and leather for shoes, were brought
to the factories and the finished products carried to the remotest markets
of the world. In 1901 ships sailing out of Boston Harbor carried goods
valued at $143, 708,000, while imports in that year amounted to $80,000,000.
By the end of the nineteenth century, Bostonians could (and did) boast
of other things in addition to a thriving industry and commerce. Boston
had at least two much-touted claims to fame: John L. Sullivan, the great-
est fighter of his time, and the first passenger-car subway in America,
a two-mile stretch from Arlington and Boylston Streets to the North
Station. The last horsecar was discarded in 1910, and while bicycles,
drays, and carriages were still dashing along at the reckless speed of eight
or ten miles an hour, electric surface lines were being built in every
section of the city. An elevated railroad (begun in 1909) pushed into
144 Main Street and Village Green
the suburb of Forest Hills; downtown Boston was transformed by steel,
cut stone, and marble; the National Shawmut Bank, the buildings of
William Filene's Sons Co., and Jordan Marsh Company, all erected
shortly after 1907, set a pattern of utilitarian beauty which changed the
external character of the city.
The growth of industry was paralleled by the growing consciousness of
labor. One of the most spectacular strikes in the history of the labor
movement was the Boston police strike of 1919, based on the formal
complaint of an organization of 1290 Boston patrolmen, that their wages
had failed to keep pace with living costs, that the police stations were
unsanitary, and that they worked overtime without compensation.
A number of factors defeated the policemen and they voted to return
to work. Governor Coolidge, however, disclaimed the power to reinstate
the strikers, stating that he was opposed to 'the public safety again
being placed in the hands of these same policemen.' Mayor Peters
worked all during September 1 5 on a revised wage scale for the new
policemen.
Hardly had the excitement of the police strike subsided when Boston
became the storm center of another crisis, concerning the arrest, trial,
conviction, and execution of two obscure Italian laborers. The affair
dragged out over seven years and was debated in every civilized quarter
of the globe. The entire machinery of justice was smeared with suspicion
and petitions flooded the office of Governor Alvan T. Fuller in an effort
to stay the execution and obtain a new trial. The men were executed
in Boston on August 23, 1927. The authorities no doubt breathed easier
when the affair was safely over though, as it turned out, the affair was
far from over; Sacco and Vanzetti had become, for a new generation to
whom ' Haymarket ' was scarcely more than a word, the classic example
of the administering of justice to members of unpopular political mi-
norities.
For twenty years Boston, stimulated by an exposition ambitiously an-
nouncing as its goal, 'Boston 1915 the Finest City in the World,' had
been consciously building its physical self into a fine, clean, and beautiful
city. Shortly before the nation-wide depression overtook it, it became
obsessed also by a desire to put its spiritual house in order. Celestial
roundsmen under the aegis of the 'New England Watch and Ward
Society' inaugurated a virulent campaign against 'lewd and indecent'
books and plays. What is salacity? It was like the time-honored stickler :
How old is Ann? Other cities indulged in loud guffaws over the antics
of the Boston censors as the latter grew hotter and hotter and more and
more bothered over the perplexing problem. 'Banned in Boston' came
to be the novelist's and dramatist's dream of successful publicity ' a
natural ' in advertising. The greatest furore was occasioned by the refusal
of the authorities to permit the Boston production of Eugene O'Neill's
'Strange Interlude.' The producers promptly moved their company to
Quincy, where the play had a tremendous run, playing to audiences
packed with Boston residents.
Boston 145
The Sacco and Vanzetti case, with its echoes still reverberating, censor-
ship with all its trail of Rabelaisian mirth, the police strike, though it
made Calvin Coolidge Vice-President and subsequently President all
were temporarily forgotten in the great Tercentenary Celebration which
ushered in the third decade of the century. Even the cloud of the ap-
proaching depression, considerably larger already on the horizon than a
man's hand, cast no shadow on gala preparations.
The Boston Tercentenary Committee, in conjunction with State- wide
subcommittees, mapped out a gigantic program. The ceremonies, con-
ducted with considerable pomp, were formally opened by a * Great
Meeting' held on Boston Common, where the chief address was delivered
by the Right Honorable H. A. L. Fisher, Warden of New College, Oxford.
1 Little did the founders reckon,' said Professor Fisher in his oration,
1 that a time would come when ... in the fullness of years, their New
England would be followed by a New Ireland, a New Italy, a New
Germany, a New Poland, and a New Greece, all destined to be merged
into a great and harmonious Commonwealth.'
The story of the economic collapse, which followed hard upon the very
celebration itself, is better not written except where it may be dissected
and analyzed. Boston, for all its rigidity of pattern and form, continues
to be a paradox. In spite of the depression, which affected it with the
utmost seriousness, it is today still the metropolis of New England, the
commercial, financial, and industrial center of a densely populated area,
second to none in the diversity of its manufactures and the skill of its
labor. And in spite of censorship it is still a cultural center, maintained
so by the perennial optimism and courage of its artists, and the warm
support of a great body of art-loving citizens. And in spite of its un-
deniable intolerance, it is still the home of militant liberalism. Here
Unitarianism and Universalism make their home; here liberal education
waged a spectacular fight against the Teachers' Oath Bill; and Boston
liberals picketed the very State House one dramatic afternoon in cham-
pionship of the Child Labor Law. Boston is still the Boston of the Lowells,
the Lodges, the Cabots, but it is from newer stocks that it derives much
of its color, its hope, and its unquenchable vitality.
FOOT TOUR 1 (Back Bay and Beacon Hill) 3m.
W. from Clarendon St. on Boylston St.
Copley Square is more photographed than any other plaza in Boston,
owing to the stately architectural beauty of two sides of its triangular
green, which is now marred by the contrasting stretch of shops, banks,
and offices on its third side.
i. Trinity Church (Episcopal) (open daily] faces west on Copley Square.
At the time it was built, in 1877, American architecture had for twenty
146 Main Street and Village Green
years languished in an unprecedented state of decadence. To the per-
versions of the then prevalent Victorian Gothic the genius of Henry
Hobson Richardson vigorously superimposed, and with his Trinity
Church began the emancipation of American architecture.
The shape of the lot, triangular in form, bounded by three streets, made
impossible the usual long nave and dominant entrance front, and invited
the defiance of tradition. Richardson found in the Romanesque of south-
ern France a medium well suited to the problem. He turned also to the
nth-century work of the cities of Auvergne in central France where the
central tower was developed to such proportion as to become the main
portion of the structure. The resultant plan was compact and cruciform
with all its limbs nearly equal apse, nave, transepts, and chapel form-
ing the base of the tower obelisk. The massive tower is the dominant
feature of the design and the composition as a whole is a romantic and
picturesque mass studied for its effectiveness from all angles. For the
tower design, Richardson was inspired by the cathedral of Salamanca,
in Spain.
The architect early decided that Trinity should be a 'color church.'
The walls are of yellowish Dedham granite laid up in rock-faced ashler
with trim of reddish-brown Longmeadow freestone. Cut stone, in alter-
nating patterns of light and dark, decorates some of the walls. Through-
out, the building is animated by rich and powerful carvings, the best
of which are seen in the West Porch, a posthumous work completed in
1897, from Richardson's designs, by Evans and Tombs of Boston.
Richardson entrusted the decoration of the interior to John La Farge
under whose direction the great barrel vaults came to glow with some of
the fire of San Marco. The dominant color of the interior walls is red,
the great piers a dark bronze green with gilded capitals and bases. The
best of the windows were by Sir Edward Burne- Jones, executed by Wil-
liam Morris, John La Farge, and by Clayton and Bill of London. Trinity
stands as the masterpiece of the ' Richardsonian Romanesque' which
gave rise to a new though short-lived school, which nevertheless formed
the first milestone in the radical school of architecture of today.
Adjoining the church outside, on the Huntington Avenue side, is the
Saint-Gaudens statue of Phillips Brooks and Christ, still adversely
criticized in Boston. By optical illusion the placing of the pastor in front
of a slender figure of Christ, and on a lower level, suggests a short, stocky
man, whereas Phillips Brooks was six feet four inches tall, a fact which
undoubtedly added to his singularly magnetic personality. The union
of symbolism and realism is also regarded as unhappy by many critics.
Ninety-five thousand dollars had poured in in voluntary public contribu-
tions for this statue, and the disappointment of the donors was keen.
2. The Boston Public Library (open weekdays 9-10; Sun. 2-9; June 15-
Sept. 15, 9-9; closed holidays) faces east on Copley Square. The strong
tide of classicism that emanated from the Chicago Exposition of 1893
found its first important expression in this Albertian building finished in
Boston 147
1895 from plans by McKim, Mead and White. For inspiration, Charles
Follen McKim turned to the bold lines of Labrouste's Italian Renais-
sance masterpiece, the Bibliotheque Sainte Genevieve in Paris. Not
content, he fused with this influence, the more robust character of Al-
berti's San Francesco at Rimini. The interior court, one of the finest
features, is an almost servile adaptation of the Palazzo delta Cancelleria
in Rome.
Situated at the west end of Copley Square the ' great palace of books'
stands upon a granite platform elevated by six broad steps above the
level of the Square. The facade consists of thirteen deep raked arches,
separated by massive piers. The entrance or central motif is composed
of three lofty and deeply revealed arches, above which are exquisitely
sculptured panels by Saint-Gaudens illustrating the seals of the Library,
the City, and the Commonwealth.
The structure's salient function being to house one of the largest collec-
tions of books in the world, its plan shows a directness and general sim-
plicity of arrangement. The walls of the vestibule are of unpolished Ten-
nessee marble. The three doorways leading into the Entrance Hall are
copies from the Erechtheum at Athens. The double bronze doors, which
contain graceful, allegorical figures in low relief, were designed by Daniel
Chester French. The Entrance Hall itself, with its low mosaic-covered
vaults and arches supported by walls and massive square columns of
Iowa sandstone, is Roman in design. The walls of the Stair Hall are of
rich-veined yellow Siena marble and the steps of French Echaillon
marble lead to the Main Corridor. The upper walls of the stair hall are
divided into eight arched panels and within these spaces and on one wall
of the Main Corridor are symbolic murals by Puvis de Chavannes. Bates
Hall, the main reading-room, has a rich barrel vault with half domes at
the ends, and stretches the full breadth of the facade, 218 feet. Abbey's
large frieze, ' The Quest of the Holy Grail, ' occupies the upper portion of
the walls of the Delivery Room. On the upper or special libraries floor is a
corridor known as Sargent Hall and on its walls are Sargent's murals
depicting 'The Triumph of Religion.'
Besides its vast collection of volumes for circulation or reference, the
Boston Public Library houses special collections of particular significance.
Outstanding among these is the Sabbatier collection, an unusual assort-
ment of books dealing with Saint Francis of Assisi. Likewise important is
its remarkable newspaper collection, covering every city of importance
in the world. Of note also are the libraries of John Adams, Nathaniel
Bowditch, George Ticknor, and the Reverend Thomas Prince (which
includes the first book printed in the English Colonies of America the
'Bay Psalm Book'); a comprehensive assortment of manuscript letters
relating to the anti-slavery movement in the United States; Webster's
'Reply to Hayne,' in manuscript; Bentley's collection of accounting
books before 1900; the Lewissohn collection of Washingtoniana; and a
collection of Benjamin Franklin's books and engravings. The unique
Trent Defoe collection and the collection of incunabula are especially
noteworthy.
148 Main Street and Village Green
3. The Old South Church (Third), 645 Boylston St., corner of Dartmouth
St., built in 1875 from the plans of Cummings and Sears, is probably the
least distressing example of the Ruskinian or Victorian Gothic trend that
corrupted taste in the late nineteenth century. The campanile, which
soars to a height of 248 feet, was for many years the 'leaning tower of
Copley Square.' Built on filled ground and entirely of massive masonry
work, the tower sank out of plumb. When, in 1932, it was in danger of
toppling, it was removed, each stone catalogued and stored away. In
1937, steel skeleton anchored to deep-sunk piles chased the superficial
form and the original masonry followed its course. So now, the ' leaning
tower ' its spine once more erect serves as an effective companion
piece to the Library Building.
4. Boston University, 688 Boylston St., founded in 1869 by Lee Claflin,
Isaac Rich, and Jacob Sleeper, with its first department the Boston
Theological Seminary, has grown to be one of the largest universities in
the United States. Despite its name, it is not a city college, but is sup-
ported, like any other private institution, by endowments and tuition
fees. Its present student body numbers about fifteen thousand, re-
presenting every State and thirty-two foreign countries. The three found-
ers were religious men, but the noteworthy thing is that, although all
were Methodists, they showed themselves broader, more tolerant, and
more liberal than the founders of almost any other privately endowed
institution in the State; for from the very beginning they prescribed that
the University should never discriminate on denominational or sectarian
lines. To these liberal tendencies which still endure may be attributed the
rapid growth of the University.
Boston University is co-educational, with the exception of the College of
Practical Arts and Letters and the Sargent College of Physical Education,
which last was transferred to Boston University in 1929. Both are ex-
clusively for women.
The proposed site for a new building to house the entire University except
the Law and Medical Schools is on the banks of the Charles River where
Alexander Graham Bell, a professor at Boston University, will be signally
honored by a memorial tower 375 feet high.
In 1937 the University had no definite campus. The different schools were housed
in various parts of the city as follows:
College of Liberal Arts, 688 Boylston Street.
College of Business Administration, 525 Boylston Street.
College of Practical Arts and Letters, 27 Garrison Street.
College of Music, 178 Newbury Street.
Sargent College of Physical Education, 6 Everett Street, Cambridge, Mass.
School of Theology, 72 Mt. Vernon Street.
School of Law, n Ashburton Place.
School of Medicine, So East Concord Street.
School of Education, 84 Exeter Street.
School of Religions and Social Work, 28 Mt. Vernon Street.
Graduate School, 688 Boylston Street.
Retrace Boylston St.; L. from Boylston St. on Dartmouth St.
A FLASHBACK IN
EARLY PRINTS
FOR a flashback on the Massachusetts scene prior to photog-
raphy we are indebted to early artists, engravers, and
lithographers. The prints that follow afford a fair prospect of
old Boston that has all but disappeared, and make pictorial
historical events that we still celebrate. The Remick drawing
recalls the provision of 1643 by which Governor Winthrop set
the Common aside for a ' trayning field and pasture for cattell.'
The house beyond the fence on the top of the hill is the
Hancock Mansion; the wooden tower back of it is the old
beacon which for a century and a half surmounted the hill. In
the picture of forty years later, the Bulfinch State House
stands on the land where Hancock's cows grazed, while the old
beacon has been replaced by a monument.
As shown in the Bird's-Eye View of the city, a water-line still
existed in 1850 along Charles Street below the Common. Here
in 1775, before the extension of Beacon Street blocked the
way, the British soldiers boarded their boats and rowed
across to Cambridge on the eve of their battle in Concord.
Less than a century after the settlement of the Bay Colony, an
Englishman, describing the activity in Boston Harbor, said
the masts of the ships here ' made a kind of wood of trees.' The
city grew with its commerce, gradually encroaching on the
harbor as well as on the back bay. Water Street in Post
Office Square was the original shore-line. One of the prints
shows a dock just below Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall;
the market was built on made land in 1825.
The set of four prints of the Old State House reveals the
changes this building underwent and the variety of its
architectural expressions. Today the lion and the unicorn up-
hold their corners of the roof as they did in the Paul Revere
picture of 1770.
Engraving from one of America's earliest historical paintings, by Earle-in i
NORTH BRIDGE, CONCORD
BOSTON COMMON IN 1768, SHOWING THE HANCOCK HOUSE AND THE OLD BEAC
From a Renick water co
JL
*-M-
IE OLD STATE HOUSE AND THE 'BLOODY MASSACRE,' 1770
THE OLD STATE HOUSE IN l8oi, THE LION AND UNICORN REMOVED
OLD STATE HOUSE FIRE, 1832. Note new balconies and chimneys
OLD STATE HOUSE IN 1876 WITH MANSARD ROOF AttD ADVERTISEMEN'
UTHEAST VIEW OF BOSTON IN 174^, FROM THE HARBOR
THE CITY IN 1848, VIEWED FROM EAST BOSTON
Lithograph after the Price engrav
THE OLD BEACON ON BEACON HILL IS THE NINTH SPIRE FROM THE LEFT
THE NEW STATE HOUSE IS JUST RIGHT OF THE CENTER OF THE PICTU1
Lithograph by WhiteJ
*
BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF BOSTON AROUND 1850
^ : "?^
HtfWtF I ~;^
" ^- . /-' A
"ilf ;' ;
tEFORE THE BACK BAY WAS FILLED IN
Lithograph by Sarony and Majt
Lithograph by Pendleton
ANEUIL HALL AND THE OLD SHORE LINE
NEW STATE HOUSE AND THE BULFINCH BEACON, ABOUT l8lO
Lithograph by Pendleton
Boston 149
5. The Boston Art Club Gallery (open to the public during exhibitions),
corner of Dartmouth and Newbury Sts., features exhibitions of con-
temporary painting and sculpture of New England artists.
L. from Dartmouth St. on Commonwealth Ave. (central gravel mall).
Commonwealth Ave., Marlborough St., and Beacon St., parallel thorough-
fares, are 'The Three Streets' of Boston impeccable residential ad-
dresses in their lower numbers.
6. The Statue of William Lloyd Garrison in the center of the walk, memo-
rialized (1886) the celebrated Abolitionist. The declaration inscribed
beneath his statue is dynamic: I am in earnest. I will not equivocate. I will
not excuse. I will not retreat a single inch, and I will be heard. Yet the
seated figure by Olin L. Warner shows him as a kindly deacon. It was
James Russell Lowell who said :
There's Garrison, his features very-
Benign for an incendiary.
Retrace on Commonwealth Ave.
7. The First Baptist Church (formerly New Brattle Square Church),
corner of Clarendon St., designed by H. H. Richardson and built in 1870-
72, marks the beginning of the architect's professional maturity. The
exigencies of the corner site resulted in an asymmetrical composition,
with the entrance located on a side street and the tower placed on the
corner. The first Richardsonian work definitely Romanesque rather than
Victorian Gothic, its style is still far from true Romanesque and not typi-
cally ' Richardsonian Romanesque.' Once vacated because of its failure
acoustically, the church is notable mainly for its tower, with the heavy
frieze by Bartholdi, a fellow student of Richardson at the Ecole des Beaux
Arts. This frieze of trumpeting angels is responsible for the irreverent but
affectionate name: 'The Church of the Holy Beanblowers.' Bostonians
like their Beanblower tower so well that a group of them have purchased it
privately, so that it can never be torn down without their consent.
L. from Commonwealth Ave. on Berkeley St.
8. The First Church in Boston (Unitarian) (open daily 9-5, through Marl-
borough St. entrance, or on Sunday by main entrance on Berkeley St.) , corner
of Marlborough St., originally Congregational, was formed by Governor
Winthrop in 1630 as the first parish. A bronze Statue of Winthrop, by
R. S. Greenough, stands on the lawn at the side.
Retrace Berkeley St.; L. from Berkeley St. on the Commonwealth Ave. mall.
9. The Statue of Alexander Hamilton, is a nine-foot, full-length granite
carving by William Rimmer, a self-taught Boston sculptor and teacher of
Daniel Chester French. Rimmer had a theory, ahead of his time, of
working impressionistically without models. Though contemporary
criticism was violently adverse, the statue was admired by Hamilton's
own family for its graceful and somewhat aloof pose, characteristic of its
subject. Its ultra-modern qualities receive present-day recognition.
150 Main Street and Village Green
Straight ahead into the Public Garden; L. from entrance on first path within
the Garden.
10. The Public Garden, with its academically labeled trees of rare vari-
eties, its formal flower beds and its celebrated swan boats, has been a
treasured feature of Boston ever since it was laid out in the middle of the
nineteenth century on the 'made land' along the Charles. All the newer
fashionable residential district west of this point was once a broad
marshy tidal basin: this region is still called 'the Back Bay.'
11. The Ether Monument (1867), is not an artistic masterpiece, but none
commemorates a greater humanitarian achievement than ' the discovery
that the inhaling of ether causes insensibility to pain, first proved to the
world at 1 the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, October, 1846.'
12. The George R. White Memorial Fountain, by Daniel Chester French,
is a tribute to a citizen who bequeathed a large fund to the city for use in
health education.
L. from the Public Garden path on Beacon St.; R. from Beacon St. on Em-
bankment Rd.
13. The Esplanade is a grassy promenade along the Charles River where
in an open shell summer evening concerts are given by members of the
Boston Symphony Orchestra.
R. on Chestnut St.
Beacon Hill is a conservative residential section where new buildings are
considered extremely regrettable, though occasionally necessary. The
correct building material is plain red brick.
This level end of Chestnut St. was once popularly known as Horse-
Chestnut St. because the stables of the wealthy householders of the Hill
were here. Some of these stables may still be seen, converted into
studios. Crossing Chestnut St. is Charles St., once the home of Boston's
literati, but now widened and lined with small markets and antique shops.
L. from Chestnut St. on Charles St.
14. Charles Street Church, at the corner of Charles and Mt. Vernon Sts.,
was built in 1807. The red-brick Federal structure with well-designed
facade and low cupola was designed by Asher Benjamin, who, as author
of 'The Country Builder's Assistant' and other preceptorial works on
architecture, propagated the mode set by Bulfinch and Mclntire.
Retrace on Charles St.; L. from Charles St. on Chestnut St.
15. Francis Parkman's House (private}, 50 Chestnut St., with its arched
recessed doorway, slate hip roof, and high flues, was built in 1824 and was
for many years the home of the noted historian.
1 6. The Home of Edwin Booth (private), 2gA Chestnut St., has a few of
the original purple window-panes once favored in this district, which sun
and time have transformed to a lilac hue, the despair of imitators. To
have a house with original purple panes is practically to have a patent of
Bostonian aristocracy. This house has the small, wrought-iron second-
Boston 151
story balconies introduced by Bulfinch and Benjamin. It is the only
house on the street with a main entrance at the side, facing a small lawn.
The arched Georgian doorway with Corinthian portico is beautiful, and
the entire house has a princely, brooding air suggestive of 'Hamlet/
Booth's most famous role.
17. The Home of Julia Ward Howe and later of John Singer Sargent
(private), 13 Chestnut St., is attributed to Bulfinch. It is a four-story
brick structure, with a delicate-columned Georgian doorway, ivory-color,
and second-story long windows with wrought-iron balconies. Such win-
dows indicate a second-story drawing room, a hallmark of fashion in
Boston. For many years this house was the meeting-place of the Radical
Club that succeeded the noted Transcendental Club.
L. from Chestnut St. on Walnut St.
18. The Ellery Sedgwick House (private), 14 Walnut St., the home of the
recently retired editor of the Atlantic Monthly, built in 1805, is the most
individualistic house on the Hill. It has three stories and gray-painted
brick ends, with black blinds, the south side wall being of wood painted
gray. On that side is a large tree-shaded garden, which, owing to the
slope of the Hill, is elevated high above the street and buttressed by a
base- wall of hand-hewn granite blocks.
R. from Walnut St. on Mt. Vernon St.
19. Thomas Bailey Aldrich's House (private), 59 Mt. Vernon St., is dis-
tinguished by its white marble portico and a white marble band between
the second and third stories.
20. The Home of Charles Francis Adams, Sr. (private), 57 Mt. Vernon St.,
is of a conservative elegance to be expected of the Civil War Ambassador
to England, son of John Quincy Adams, and father of the author of ' The
Education of Henry Adams.' Its four substantial stories face a trim lawn.
The white doorway has an unusual richly carved lintel. There are tall
second-story windows, the one over the door distinguished by a covered
balcony.
Retrace Mt. Vernon St.
21. The Sears House (Second Harrison Gray Otis House, 1800) (private),
85 Mt. Vernon St., is a good example of Bulfinch's domestic design, some-
what resembling his notable group on Franklin Crescent. The square
house with roof balustrade is excellently proportioned and has the typical
Bulfinch arched recesses surrounding the lower windows. The upper
stories are enlivened by four Corinthian pilasters. Although somewhat
altered, the architecture of this dignified Federal mansion remains im-
pressive.
R. from Mt. Vernon St. into Louisburg Square.
22. Louisburg Square, looking much like some square in London's May-
fair, is the epitome of Beacon Hill style. Noted residents have included
William Dean Howells, Louisa May Alcott and her father, Amos Bronson
Alcott, Jenny Lind, and Minnie Maddern Fiske. The houses, inhabited by
152 Main Street and Village Green
elderly and ultra-conservative families, are large three- or four-story
brick dwellings, mostly with bow-fronts and plain doorways, the whole in
synchronous monotone. The central green, enclosed by an iron fence
with no gate, belongs to the proprietors of the Square. The small statue
of Aristides the Just, at the south end, and that of Columbus at the north,
have been adopted affectionately by the residents through many years of
custom, but when their donor, Joseph lasigi, a wealthy Greek living at
No. 3, included also a fountain, it was hastily removed.
At Christmas each year the Square echoes with Christmas carols, sung
by trained voices usually selected from musical groups with sufficient
social prestige to be asked to contribute carolers. Bellringing and the
keeping of open house are additional features of the program.
R. from Louisburg Square on Pinckney St.
Pinckney St. was named for South Carolina's Charles Cotesworth Pinck-
ney, famous for his reply to Talleyrand: 'Millions for defense, but not
one cent for tribute.' The street is the border-line between wealth and
poverty and beyond it a less proud district slopes down the back of the
Hill.
L. from Pinckney St. on Joy St.; R. from Joy St. on Cambridge St.
23. The Harrison Gray Otis House (open, 10-5, fee 25 f), 141 Cambridge
St., built in 1795, has been since 1916 the headquarters of the Society for
the Preservation of New England Antiquities. The interior has not been
greatly altered, and the Society has restored the exterior to its former
beauty by replacing on the facade the semi-circular porch, Palladian
window, and third-story fan window that are the main decorative fea-
tures. This square hip-roofed mansion has an interior finished with
unusual refinement and delicacy. It is attributed to Bulfinch.
24. The Old West Church (West End Church) was built in 1806 from
designs by Asher Benjamin, architect-writer. Characteristic of his work,
it is of well-studied proportions, but more solid and masculine than the
work of his contemporaries, Bulfinch and Mclntire. Its facade, with
stepped gable and lofty tower, is capped by a square gilt-domed cupola.
The church has for some time been converted to the uses of a branch
library.
Retrace Cambridge St.; L. from Cambridge St. on Joy St.; R. from Joy St.
on Beacon St.
25. The Women's City Club (open by permission), 40 Beacon St., although
built in 1818, is believed to be a Bulfinch work. Today, beautifully pre-
served, it exemplifies the gracious tradition of Post-Colonial architecture.
Its beautiful spiral stairway is as fine as any in New England.
26. The Wadsworth House (Third Harrison Gray Otis House) (private},
45 Beacon St., built in 1807, reveals the influence of Bulfinch's sojourn
in France by his use of an oval drawing-room on the garden side and
perhaps also by his placing the entrance at ground level and the important
Boston 153
rooms on the story above. The facade shows a uniform range of five
windows, with a novel departure from Colonial precedent in the type of
enframement. The entrance, too, is unusually handled, a rectangular
portico with four columns coupled columns and coupled pilasters
behind being used as the door enframement. The house is a fine
example of an aristocratic city mansion of the Federal period.
Retrace Beacon St.
27. The Robert Gould Shaw Memorial, facing the State House from the
edge of the Common, is a notable group statue in high relief, by Augustus
Saint-Gaudens. Colonel Shaw, his horse, and the Negro troopers are all
sculptured with remarkable sensitivity to the medium and the subject.
Charles F. McKim designed the frame, a wide pink granite exedra with
crouching eagles, Greek urns, and low benches, shadowed by two enor-
mous English elms.
28. The State House (open weekdays 9-5), with its golden dome, crowns
the Hill. Built in 1795, the 'Bulfinch Front' of the State House stands as
a monument to the architectural genius of Charles Bulfinch and as an ex-
pression of classicism in American design. Unhappily, this original portion
of the present State House is now sandwiched between huge, inept wings.
The 'Bulfinch Front' cannot be seen merely as a unit of the structure;
its quality sets it apart as a thing to be known and revered independent
of its setting. Bulfinch was the first professional architect of the Republic.
The State House was his greatest work. He spread across its front a
colossal portico; he topped it with a high and dominant gilded dome.
The Corinthian colonnade that surmounts the projecting arcade of the
first story, the arched windows with classical enframement, the pediment
that breaks the line of the dome, the sweep and lift of the dome itself,
contribute to the classicism vibrant in Bulfinch 's work, strongly in-
fluenced at this period by that of Sir William Chambers, an older London
contemporary.
The entrance hall contains portraits of the Massachusetts Governors.
Just beyond is a more imposing white marble hall with historical murals.
The Hall of Flags opening from this displays State regimental flags of the
Civil and World Wars. The stained-glass dome bears the seals of the
Thirteen Original States. In the Hall of Representatives (second floor
rear, left) hangs the Sacred Cod, the State emblem symbolizing a his-
toric basic industry.
At the front of the lower floor, a left turn down a passage leads to a
unique memorial very characteristic of Boston, always appreciative of
its 'dumb animal' friends, the Dog and Horse Tablet (in the through
corridor from the Hooker Statue to Mt. Vernon St.), a tribute to the
dogs and horses that served in the World War.
Traverse the corridor from Beacon St. to Mt. Vernon St., passing into the
greensward square behind the State House. Straight ahead on Ashburton
Place.
154 Main Street and Village Green
29. Ford Hall, which houses the Ford Hall Forum, 15 Ashburton Place,
in a tall office building, is a modern stronghold of Boston liberalism,
entrenched in the very shadow of the State House.
FOOT TOUR 2 (The Old City) 2m.
E. from Park St. on Beacon St.
30. The Boston Athen&um (open to scholars by guest card obtained at the
desk), is at lojhz Beacon St. The building (1847-49) was designed by
Edward C. Cabot a minor Renaissance gesture in the Palladian style
that seemed significant then. The Athenaeum, which contains one of
the most famous private libraries in the country, is a descendant of the
'Anthology Club' formed in 1807 by the father of. Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Among its 200,000 volumes are rare collections of news on international
law, of State papers and historical documents, of books published in
the South during the Civil War, and most of George Washington's
private library.
Retrace Beacon St.; L. from Beacon St. on Park St.
31. The Park Street Church (Congregational), corner Tremont St., was
built in 1809 and was the only building designed by Peter Banner. It
bears little evidence of the Classic Revival felt in contemporaneous work;
it maintains closely the character of earlier work. An unusual feature
is the use of the semi-circular porches between the tower base and the
body of the main building. The tower proper is probably as fine as any
extant. The church originally housed a Trinitarian congregation formed
in protest to the spreading Unitarian movement. It stands on the site of
the Granary where the sails of the ' Constitution ' were made. This site
is known as 'Brimstone Corner,' because in the War of 1812 gunpowder
was stored in the basement. When Henry Ward Beecher, a believer in a
literal Hell, preached vigorous guest sermons there, the Unitarians slyly
said that the corner was well named.
L. from Park St. on Tremont St.
32. The Old Granary Burial Ground (open), hemmed in by business
blocks and Tremont St., contains the graves of three signers of the
Declaration of Independence (John Hancock, Samuel Adams, and Robert
Treat Paine), Paul Revere, Peter Faneuil, the parents of Benjamin
Franklin, the victims of the Boston Massacre, nine early Governors of
the State, and Mother Goose (a real person actually named Mary Goose).
33. Tremont Temple (Baptist), 82 Tremont St., stands on the site of an
earlier temple in which Jenny Lind sang (1850-52). Founded in 1839
because the Charles Street Church, then Baptist, decreed that any
member bringing a Negro into his pew would be expelled, it is one of
the most popular evangelical congregations in Greater Boston.
Boston 155
34. King's Chapel (Unitarian) (open daily 9-5), corner of School St.,
built in 1749, was designed by Peter Harrison, who had been a student
of Sir John Vanbrugh, a younger contemporary of Sir Christopher Wren.
It was from this intimacy with the mode set by Wren and his successor,
Gibbs, that the architecture of King's Chapel is derived. But the New-
port gentleman-architect possessed too much native genius for his design
to be a servile copy of the British masters. The bold and somewhat cold
masonry exterior is headed by a low, squat base intended to support a
tower which was never built. The interior, replete with aberrations
characteristic of its designer, is perhaps the finest Colonial church interior
extant. Its rich sobriety, its repose and studied suavity of proportion
proclaim it a work of genius. It ranks in historic fame with the Old
South Meeting House and the Old North Church, for King's Chapel is
both the first Episcopal church in New England and the first Unitarian
church in America; and its establishment in both faiths was accompanied
by storm. The present building was built in 1754 around a wooden build-
ing which was then dismantled.
35. King's Chapel Burial Ground (1630), adjoining the church, is the
oldest burial ground in Boston. Here lie Governor Winthrop, John
Cotton, and Mary Chilton Winslow.
Retrace Tremont St.; L. from Tremont St. on School St.
36. The Boston Public Latin School Tablet on the wall of the Parker
House marks the site of the first Public Latin School (1635) in America.
37. The Old Corner Bookstore Building (1712), at the corner of School
and Washington Sts., is an ancient three-and-a-half -story brick building
with gambrel roof. From 1828 to 1903, it housed the most famous book-
store in Boston, and at one time the offices of Ticknor and Fields, who
published the early works of all major New England poets. Through its
doors strolled Hawthorne, Emerson, Longfellow, Lowell, and Holmes, as
well as Whittier, the latter rarely, for he was shy and confused by the roar
of nineteenth-century traffic.
R. from School St. on Washington St.
38. The Old South Meeting House (1729) (open daily, summer 9-5, winter
9^1; adm. 25), corner of Milk St., shared with Faneuil Hall the most
fervid and momentous oratory of Revolutionary days, and an Old South
meeting was always a danger signal to Burke and Pitt. It is still used
for public meetings of civic or social protest. The church building, de-
signed by Robert Twelve, has a simple mass with severely plain exterior
of brick laid in Flemish bond. The wooden steeple rising 180 feet is of
conventional design, more impressive than that of its predecessor, the
'Old North Church.' Its double row of arched windows is especially
effective in the interior, where interest centers in the great arched recess
above the altar. The Old South greatly influenced later ecclesiastical
design in the Colonies.
The interior with its gate-pews was restored after the British had used
it for a riding-school during the Siege; in 1876 the pews were again
156 Main Street and Village Green
removed when the building ceased to be used as a church. The only
remaining parts of the original building are the walls and their frame-
work, including the windows and doors, and the double tier of white
galleries, in the topmost of which sat Negro slaves. The high broad
white pulpit is a replica of the one which resounded to the voices of Otis,
Samuel Adams, Quincy, Warren, and Hancock. Here began the line of
march of the Boston Tea Party, and here General Warren, prevented by
the British from entering the pulpit by the stairs, climbed into it through
the window at the rear. The beautiful gilded Gallery Clock, surmounted
by a spread eagle bearing in his beak a double string of gilded balls, is a
reproduction of a famous pattern designed by Simon Willard, a Boston
clockmaker (1753-1848). The women of Massachusetts purchased and
thus saved this noted landmark from destruction in 1876, when it was
proposed to sell it, because of the great increase in value of the land.
The parish, formed in 1669 (Congregational), worships at the 'Old South
Third' in Copley Square.
L. from Washington St. on Milk St.; L. from Milk St. on Congress St.
39. The United States Post Office and Federal Office Building is a massive
new granite building in modern style designed by Cram and Ferguson.
It occupies the entire block between Devonshire, Congress, Water, and
Milk Sts. A tablet on the Milk St. frontage of the former Post-Office
block commemorates the fact that the great Boston fire of 1872, that
raged November 9-10, sweeping 60 acres and destroying $60,000,000
worth of property, was halted here.
L. from Congress St. on State St.
40. The Site of the Boston Massacre, 30 State St., is marked by a brass
arrow pointing into the street where a cobblestone circle indicates the
exact spot where the first patriots fell when fired upon by British soldiers.
41. The Old State House (open daily except Sun. and Holidays, 9-4.30;
Sat. 9-1), Washington and State Sts., built in 1713 on the site of its
predecessor, has been restored to its original robust appearance after
successive alterations. Its steeply pitched roof with stepped gables at
either end, its tower with gracefully telescoped members finished by a
fine cupola rising from the middle of the building, are enhanced by the
aloof position of the building. Upon the stepped gables, strangely enough
Dutch in derivation, ramp the British lion and unicorn. Classic details
in doors, windows, and cupola are a new note in this period. The famous
building, the identity of whose architect is a mystery, is markedly im-
portant as an influence upon the architecture of its time.
This was the State House of the British in the eighteenth century, until
the Revolution, and thereafter of the Commonwealth until the new State
House was ready in 1798. In 1881, it was proposed to demolish the Old
State House, because the land was valued at $1,500,000. At this junc-
ture, Chicago offered to transfer the building to Lincoln Park on Lake
Michigan and take care of it, paying all the expense of removal and
reassembly. The offer stung Boston so sharply that the City Fathers
Boston 157
agreed to stand the loss on the land in perpetuity, and never again to
threaten the building with removal or destruction.
Within, the spiral stairway is the best architectural feature, but is not
coeval with the original structure. The building is the headquarters of
the Bostonian Society and houses intimate historical relics and a fine
marine museum.
Straight ahead from State St. on Court St.
42. The Ames Building, corner of Washington St., Boston's first sky-
scraper, 13 stories high, was erected in 1891 from plans made by Shepley,
Rutan and Coolidge, successors of Richardson. It is among the rare
instances of skillful adaptation of the Richardson Romanesque to com-
mercial purposes.
43. The Site of the Franklin Printing Press is marked by a tablet on the
Franklin Ave. frontage of the building at No. 17 Court St. Here Ben-
jamin Franklin learned the printer's trade from his brother and composed
ballads that he later disparaged.
Retrace Court St.; L. from Court St. on Washington St.
44. The Site of Paul Revere* s Goldsmith Shop, 175 Washington St., is
marked by a bas-relief tablet. The patriot who rode to Lexington to
give his memorable alarm was a great artist in gold and silverware. Any
of his work now commands fabulous prices. Examples are at the Museum
of Fine Arts (see below).
R. from Washington St. into Dock Square.
45. Dock Square, so named because the docks of the present Atlantic
Ave. waterfront once extended here, is now the market district of Boston.
From earliest dawn till dusk it is in constant turmoil, with huge vans
unloading whole carcasses of meats, and crates of fruits and vegetables
piled over the sidewalks. The predominant human type is the market-
man, in soiled apron and inevitable straw hat, but many a humble shopper
is also here, bargain-hunting.
46. Faneuil (Fan'l) Hall (open daily 9-5, Sat. 9-12, closed Sun.) was
called the ' Cradle of Liberty ' because many important meetings of pro-
test were held here before the Revolution. It was the first Colonial
attempt at academic design, completed in 1742 from the plans of John
Smibert, the Colonial portrait-painter, and given by Peter Faneuil, a
Boston merchant. It contained a town hall above and a public market
below. The original structure, two stories and a half of brick, with open
arches below and a bell- tower above, was considered impressive and or-
nate. When fire destroyed the building in 1762, it was promptly rebuilt
on the original plan. In 1805, Charles Bulfinch added a third story and
doubled the original 40-foot width, but retained the original style of the
building. Its weathervane, a grasshopper, is the most noted steeple adorn-
ment in Boston, modeled by Shem Drowne of Hawthorne's story,
'Browne's Wooden Image.' The leading Faneuil historian says that
158 Main Street and Village Green
-Drowne chose a grasshopper because while chasing one as a small boy
he met the man who started him on the road to success. An American
consul once tested those claiming Boston citizenship by asking them what
is on top of Faneuil Hall. Its chief present treasure is G. P. A. Healy's
gigantic painting of 'Webster's Reply to Hayne.'
Faneuil Hall is protected by a charter against sale or leasing. It is never
rented, but is open to any group upon request of a required number of
citizens agreeing to abide by certain prescribed regulations. The lower
floor is occupied by market stalls handling all sorts of produce, a busy
and fascinating spectacle.
Two flights upstairs from the hall are the rooms (open weekdays 10-4,
Sat. 10-12) of the Ancient and Honourable Artillery Company, oldest
military organization "in America (1638), which still parades in Boston
on important occasions, dressed in elaborate historical uniforms.
47. Quincy Market (open), adjacent to Faneuil Hall and sometimes called
New Faneuil Hall, is architecturally a product of the Greek Revival,
designed in 1826 by Alexander Parris.
L. from Dock Square on Union St.
48. The Union Oyster House, 41 Union St., Boston's renowned sea-food
restaurant, has been situated for the past 1 10 years in this low, angular
three-story brick tavern with the small-paned windows, all of 200 years
old. The lower floor contains very old semi-private eating-booths, and a
small bar at which Daniel Webster used to drop in for a toddy on cold
days. Several other excellent restaurants in the vicinity are located in
less historic buildings.
R. from Union St. on Marshall St.
49. The Boston Stone is embedded in the back wall of the last building
on the right, just around the corner of the side alley. It is a granite
block (1737), surmounted by a spherical granite paint-grinder about the
size and shape of a cannon ball. The block and the ball constituted a
hand paint mill for Thomas Child from 1693 to 1706. The stone was
later used as the starting-point for the measurement of mileages from
Boston.
R. from Marshall St. on Hanover St.
Hanover St., now the main thoroughfare of the Italian North End, was
once favored by wealthy sea captains and leading patriots of the Revolu-
tion. The finest houses are gone, but here and there are old wooden
dwellings, flush with the street between cheap modern brick tenements,
Italian food stores, and clothing shops. The North End is one of the
most congested sections in any major American city.
R. from Hanover St. on Prince St.; R. from Prince St. into North Square.
50. Paul Revere' s House (open daily 10-4, adm. 25^), 19 North Square,
which was a century old when it became the home of the famous patriot
Boston 159
and silversmith, is the only 17th-century structure now standing in
downtown Boston. Claimed by some to have been built in 1660, there is
more proof that it stands on the plot once occupied by the Increase
Mather Parsonage that burned in the great fire of 1676, so it is likely that
it was built within the next year. During its long life it has undergone
many changes, but in 1908 it was rescued from the encroachments of
progress by the Paul Revere Memorial Association and restored to its
original condition. Characteristic of the medieval influence which domi-
nated all seventeenth-century architecture in Massachusetts, it has the
overhanging second story with ornamental drops or pendrils, the small
casements with diamond-shaped panes, and a simple floor plan with
massive end chimney.
The house has only four rooms and an attic, and contains some beautiful
old furniture and china (not much of it Revere's); two enormous fire-
places with brick ovens and ancient utensils; portions of wallpaper of
1750, depicting in block pattern the Church of Saint Mary le Bow in
London; and some of Revere's etchings and manuscript letters.
Retrace North Square; L. from North Square on Prince Si.; R. from Prince
St. on Salem St.
Salem Street, narrow at best, is so crowded with pushcarts laden with
fruits and vegetables that locomotion is difficult. Here is the heart of
the Italian quarter, noisy, garrulous, good-natured, and vital.
51. The Old North Church (Christ Church, Episcopal) (open daily 9-5;
voluntary contributions; Sun. services 10.45), 193 Salem St., had a belfry
known to every American child by Longfellow's lines: 'One if by land
and two if by sea, and I on the opposite shore will be.' The eight melo-
dious bells in the tower are inscribed : ' We are the first ring of bells cast
for the British Empire in North America.'
The church was built in 1723. The design of this historic building was
made by William Price, a Boston print-seller and draftsman who, while
in London, made a study of Christopher Wren churches. During a
violent gale in 1804 the steeple was blown down, and in 1808 a new one,
built after a model by Charles Bulfinch, replaced the old. Although fol-
lowing closely the design of the original, the new tower was lowered in
height by 1 6 feet. The interior, although obviously the product of an
untrained man, is modeled after the designs by Wren. The galleries are
supported by square columns carried through to the roof. The pews
carry small brass plates inscribed with the names of eighteenth-century
merchant-prince owners. Some are still held by descendants; others
have become prized possessions of old Boston families.
160 Main Street and Village Green
FOOT TOUR 3 (Waterfront) 1.5 m.
S. from Salem St. on Charter St.; L. from Charter St. on Hanover St.; R.
from Hanover St. on Commercial St.
This tour covers the old waterfront, once the port for all ships, now
devoted to coastwise shipping and fishing boats. Vessels from European
ports now dock in East or South Boston.
52. Constitution Wharf, 409 Commercial St., at the foot of Hanover St.,
is occupied chiefly by a high brick warehouse which cuts off the harbor
view. A bas-relief tablet on the Commercial St. wall commemorates
the launching (1797) of the famous U.S. Frigate 'Constitution' ('Old
Ironsides') the Queen of the Navy, which made history in the War with
Tripoli and the War of 1812.
Straight ahead on Atlantic Ave., Commercial St. having slipped unobtru-
sively off to the right, after the manner of Boston streets.
Just beyond Lewis's Wharf, 32 Atlantic Ave., is the first delightful glimpse
of the actual waterfront, with freighters using the same slips as the
humble power-boats of small fishermen. Along the quays are marine
hardware shops and numerous lunchrooms for sailors. On the hottest
summer day, the air has a cool salty tang, becoming definitely fishy as
one passes the brief row of fish-markets.
53. T Wharf, 178 Atlantic Ave., is one of the most famous and picturesque
fishing piers in the country. The entrance, obscure and poorly marked,
is just beyond the huge brick warehouse of the Quincy Cold Storage
Plant. Suddenly the gaudy small trawlers of Italian and Portuguese
fishermen appear, outlined against the long, low yellow shed of the pier
- a shed with many small-paned windows, which give upon fish-
brokerages and small restaurants specializing in New England fish dinners.
This is the center of the 'Little man's fishing industry,' for the larger
boats go to the modern great Fish Pier at South Boston. Knots of
Latin fishermen are always gathered here mending nets, repairing buoys,
or baiting Unes, and animatedly discussing the weather, the catch, and
current prices.
54. Long Wharf (1710), 202 Atlantic Ave., was once a great deal longer,
beginning in fact up by the present Custom House which now soars in
the background. From here a century and a half ago the British em-
barked for home (March 17, 1776), and from here today hundreds of
summer tourists embark daily for Provincetown. In the late eighteenth
century, the wharf, then privately owned, was a center for fashionable
smugglers, said to have included Governor Hancock.
R. from Atlantic Ave. on State St.
55. The United States Custom House (open 9-5 daily}, (1847) designed
Boston 161
by Ammi B. Young and Isaiah Rogers, was among the last monuments
of the Greek Revival. A dome with which it was originally crowned
is concealed within the tall shaft of floors which in 1915 transformed the
building into a 5oo-foot skyscraper and a fitting mausoleum to the era
of Greek affectation. The tower shows a similarity to that of the Metro-
politan Building in New York, although on a much smaller scale. Peabody
and Stearns were the architects of the super-structure. A balcony near
the top offers a splendid panorama of Boston.
Retrace State St.; R. from State St. on Atlantic Ave.
56. India Wharf, which begins at 288 Atlantic Ave. and continues for
four piers, now serves the Eastern Steamship Lines. The ancient lofts
of the two middle piers were once occupied by riggers and sail makers.
57. Rowe's Wharf, 344 Atlantic Ave., a small but busy railroad terminal,
was the scene of the seizure and deposition of Governor Andros (1689).
The Nantasket steamer, which sails from here and offers a good view of
the harbor islands, is a Boston institution.
58. The Boston Tea Party (Dec. 16, 1773) took place at the northeast
corner of Atlantic Ave. and Pearl St., then Griffin's Wharf, when a group
of patriots disguised as Indians boarded British tea-ships and threw the
cargo overboard. A tablet on the Atlantic Ave. wall of the commercial
building now occupying the site gives the Boston version of the party.
FOOT TOUR 4 (Downtown] 2.5 m.
N.E. from Atlantic Ave., at South Station, on Federal St.
59. The Shoe Museum of the United Shoe Machinery Corporation (open
weekdays 9-5), 140 Federal St., exhibits 1500 pairs of shoes of all periods,
styles, and countries; Egyptian sandals dating back to 2000 B.C.; boots
worn by Henry IV of France; postilion boots weighing 12 pounds each;
Spanish shoes made especially to protect against snakebite. Pictures and
models illustrate the many stages and varied machinery involved today
in making a single pair of shoes.
Retrace on Federal St.; R. from Federal St. on High St.; R. from High
St. on Summer St.; straight ahead from Summer St. into Winter St.; L.
from Winter St. on Tremont St.
60. Saint Paul's Cathedral (1819-20), opposite the Common, the seat of
the Episcopal Bishops of Massachusetts, is Boston's earliest example of
the Greek Revival. The architects were Alexander Parris, who later
built the Quincy Market, and Solomon Willard. The Ionic capitals were
carved by Willard. The white interior is severely plain, with high stall-
like pews and no stained glass. Daniel Webster, a pewholder, was on the
building committee. The dome of the present chancel is a reproduction
of that in Saint Paul's, London.
1 62 Main Street and Village Green
61. Boston Common, part of a tract set aside by Governor Winthrop as
a cow pasture and training field, retains as paved walks the casual
paths worn by grazing cattle. Here stocks and pillory once stood, as
well as a pen where those who desecrated the Sabbath were imprisoned.
Several Quakers are thought to have been hanged and buried on the
Common. Both British and Massachusetts regiments were mustered on
it, and it is still used on occasion as a drill ground.
Free speech has always been a privilege on the Common. Group argu-
ments on social and economic problems are in daily progress around the
Grecian Parkman Bandstand and orators address the public along the
Charles Street Mall. The Frog Pond in the center is now a shallow arti-
ficial pool patronized during hot weather by little boys in various stages
of undress.
62. The Crispus Attucks Monument (set back on lawn) commemorates
the 'Boston Massacre' (1770), which John Adams and Daniel Webster
united in calling the origin of the Revolution. Crispus Attucks, a Negro,
was one of several persons killed when soldiers, taunted by a group of
excited citizens, fired on the crowd.
L. from Tremont St. into Boylston St.
63. The Liberty Tree Site, facing Boylston St. on Washington St., is
covered by a business block, bearing on its wall a carved tree commemo-
rating this Revolutionary landmark, scene of Stamp Act meetings and
frequent hangings in efiigy of well-known Tories.
L. from Boylston St., diagonally across Washington St. into Essex St.; R.
from Essex St. on Harrison Ave.; L. from Harrison Ave. on Beach St.
64. Chinatown begins at Harrison Ave. and Beach St. with a group of
small native shops, principally markets, the latter displaying in their
windows strings of strange-looking sausages and small wire hanging
baskets of ancient eggs. At the corner of Oxford St. (L) is the Chinese
Bulletin, a news sheet in native characters, posted daily.
R. from Beach St. on Hudson St.
Near-by is a district crowded with Chinese restaurants and Oriental
curio shops.
R. from Hudson St. on Kneeland St.
Kneeland Street is the center of the ready-made dress business of New
England. Wholesale houses and workshops crowd the district, and on
warm days the hum of hundreds of sewing machines can be heard through
the open windows.
Straight ahead on Stuart St.; L. from Stuart St. on Tremont St.
65. The Wilbur Theatre, built in 1913 from plans by Blackall, Clapp and
Whittemore, is an adaptation of late Georgian Colonial architecture. It
is one of the first auditoriums to be designed with scientific knowledge of
acoustics, Professor Sabine of Harvard, pioneer in the field, being the
consultant.
Boston 163
Retrace Tremont St.; L. from Tremont St. on Stuart St.; straight ahead into
Eliot St.; R. from Eliot St. through Park Sq.; L. from Park Sq. on Boylston
St.
66. Statues along Boylston Street Mall are: (i) Wendell Phillips, ' Cham-
pion of the Slave' (1811-84), done in bronze by Daniel Chester French;
(2) Theo Alice Ruggles Kitson's handsome young Thaddeus Kosciuszko
(1746-1817), the popular Polish patriot who served under Washington;
(3) Charles Sumner, one of the leading abolitionist senators, by Thomas
Ball.
67. Boylston Street Subway (1897), its streetcar entrance opposite the
Sumner statue, was the first transportation subway in the United States.
68. The William Ellery Channing Statue, by Herbert Adams, corner of
Boylston and Arlington Sts., is a tribute to a leader (1780-1842) of the
Unitarian movement in America.
69. The Natural History Museum (open weekdays 9-4.30; Sun. 1-4.30),
corner of Berkeley St., a Palladian structure of brick and brownstone,
houses collections of minerals and fauna of New England.
FOOT TOUR 5 (Fenway District) 2.5 m.
E. from Massachusetts Ave. on Huntingdon Ave.
70. The Christian Science Church (open Wed. and Fri. 10-5; services Sun.
morning and evening and Wed. evening) is The Mother Church. Christian
Science was discovered in 1866 by Mary Baker Eddy, who developed the
theme into a Christian Science textbook, 'Science and Health with Key
to the Scriptures,' and published it in 1875. In 1879, she organized the
Church of Christ, Scientist, and reorganized it in 1892. The present
organization, including all its branches and activities, is the direct out-
growth of her work. The Publishing House across the street issues The
Christian Science Monitor, widely read throughout the English-speaking
world. A large terraced grass plot on Huntington Avenue, adorned with
shrubs and small trees, allows the buildings to be seen in perspective.
Two church structures in actual contact with each other are connected
by an interior passage. The smaller one of gray rough-faced granite with
a square granite tower, erected in 1894, is the first Christian Science
church building in Boston, though its congregation dates from 1879. The
main church (1904), in Italian Renaissance with a great central dome, is
of limestone, trimmed with granite below and with glazed white tiles
above. Its vast open nave, seating 5000 people, rises 108 feet from floor
to dome, with no support of pillars. The doors and pews are of San
Domingo mahogany, richly carved; the walls of limestone, with windows
of clear glass. The wide pulpit contains two lecterns, one for the First
Reader, a man, and one for the Second Reader, a woman.
164 Main Street and Village Green
The Publishing House (open daily, 9-11.30 and 1-4, guide service) occupies
a three-story limestone building, covering a city block and surmounted
by six additional stories in a recessed tower, capped by yellow tiles.
Beyond the white marble entrance hall is the Mapparium, unique in the
world, a spherical room, thirty feet in diameter, with walls of colored glass
depicting a world map. Passage through the room is by a glass bridge.
Throughout the building marble corridors lead from room to room
opulently paneled in rare woods, beautifully tiled or carpeted, hung with
Venetian blinds and tapestries. Even in the halls of the presses is spotless-
ness, quiet, and order.
Retrace on Huntingdon Ave. across Massachusetts Ave.
71. Symphony Hall, northwest corner of Massachusetts Ave., a low,
oblong, red-brick building trimmed with granite, is a subdued adapta-
tion of Renaissance forms designed by McKim, Mead and White (1900)
and admirably suited to its specific function. The concert hall, with two
balconies, seats 2500 persons. In a side room is the Casadesus Collection
of Ancient Musical Instruments (open during concert hours). The Boston
Symphony Orchestra, founded in 1881, by Major Henry Lee Higginson,
is recognized as one of the finest in the country. In early summer a re-
duced orchestra gives a ten-week season of popular concerts, affection-
ately known to all Boston as 'the Pops.' For this series Symphony Hall
assumes a gala appearance with gay lattices adorning the stately walls
and the floor occupied by small square tables at which refreshments are
served.
72. The New England Conservatory of Music, at the corner of Gains-
borough St., occupies a three-story, square, flat-roofed building of gray
brick, trimmed with granite and marble. It is one of the oldest institu-
tions (1867) of its kind in America, as well as one of the best, offering
co-educational instruction in instrumental and vocal music, in composi-
tion and teaching. It has a distinguished faculty, and many of its 140,000
graduates have attained eminence.
Within the building, reached from the Gainsborough St. entrance, is
Jordan Hall, the leading recital hall in Boston, with perfect acoustics and
a seating capacity of 1000.
73. Northeastern University (incorporated 1916), 316 Huntington Ave.,
is a co-operative educational institution with a total enrollment (1937) of
5293. The student is enabled to combine classroom instruction with
supervised employment, effectively uniting theory and practice. Among
its professional branches the divisions of law and engineering are well
known.
74. The Boston Opera House (1906), corner of Opera Place, is a massive
brick building of somber Neo-Classic design. The front wall is plastered
with billboards advertising downtown theatrical attractions, except dur-
ing brief visiting engagements of operatic companies. On November 8,
Boston 165
1909, this building was the scene of the brilliant debut of the new Boston
Opera Company, founded and maintained at a heavy loss for three years
by Eben D. Jordan, a Boston merchant.
75. The Museum of Fine Arts (open daily except Mon., 9-5, winter 9-4,
Sun., 1-5; closed Thanksgiving, Christmas, 4th of July) occupies several
buildings. These, grouped by halls and loggias, are of granite, admirably
situated in a broad quadrangle on the open, sunny lawns of the Fenway.
The not-too-well-designed Neo-Classic buildings derive their impress
from the massiveness of the group. Directly in front of the entrance is
the ' Appeal to the Great Spirit,' Cyrus Dallin's renowned American
Indian on ponyback, his face lifted skyward, both arms outstretched in
supplication.
The largest showings of individual painters are of Millet, Copley, and
Stuart. The American Colonial silver is very fine, and includes many
examples of the work of Paul Revere. Equally memorable are the Colonial
interiors, consisting of entire rooms transferred from New England houses,
together with their original period furniture. Notable among these in the
American Wing are three complete rooms designed and executed by
Samuel Mclntire from his ' Oak Hill ' in Peabody.
The Dancing Bacchante, a copy of a statue by Frederick MacMonnies,
in the central courtyard, has a piquant past. A nude figure of a young
dancer, holding aloft in one arm an infant whom she tantalizes with
a bunch of grapes held high in the other hand, the original statue was
placed in the courtyard of the Public Library in 1895, where it roused a
storm of protest still clearly remembered by middle-aged citizens. Morals,
especially the morals of youth, were regarded as imperiled and a sugges-
tion was made in all seriousness that the sculptor be asked to clothe the
figure. The original young lady is now in the Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York.
76. Wentworth Institute (open Sept -May, 9^, except Sat. and Sun.; in
summer to shops and laboratories not in use), corner of Ruggles St., trains
young men in the mechanical arts. It occupies a wide, four-story yellow-
brick building trimmed with granite, set well back on a spacious lawn.
R. from Huntingdon Ave. on Longwood Ave.
77. The Massachusetts College of Pharmacy, corner of Worthington St.,
was instituted in 1823, as an association of Boston pharmacists who
fostered the training of apprentices in apothecary shops.
78. The Angell Memorial (animal) Hospital (open 9-9 daily; Sunday and
holidays for emergency only), named for George T. Angell, founder and
first president of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty
to Animals and editor of Our Dumb A nimals, occupies a handsome three-
story brick and granite building at 180 Longwood Ave., opposite the
Massachusetts College of Pharmacy.
79. The Harvard Medical School (1903-06), built entirely of white Ver-
1 66 Main Street and Village Green
mont marble, from designs by Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge, is of simple
classic design adapted from the Greek and made impressive by its formal
setting upon a terrace.
The Four Laboratory Buildings, set upon a lower level than the Administration
Building, are symmetrical in design. The Administration Building, approached by
broad steps leading up from the terrace to a gigantic Ionic portico is monumental
in character. On its ground floor is a great hall of design conforming to the classic
exterior, and a marble staircase rises on the axis of the building.
R. from Longwood Ave. on Avenue Louis Pasteur.
80. The Boston Public Latin School (1635) now occupies a three-story
brick building, three blocks deep, with granite Corinthian columns. It
is the oldest public Latin school still in existence.
L. from Avenue Louis Pasteur on Fenway.
81. Emmanuel College, 400 Fenway, a massive four-story brick and
granite edifice in English Collegiate Gothic, with a broad, square, open
bell-tower and wide lawns adorned with shrubbery, is a non-resident
Catholic institution for women, directed by the Sisters of Notre Dame de
Namur.
Retrace on Fenway.
82. Simmons College (for women), 300 Fenway, occupies a wide three-
story yellow-brick building dating from 1902. It was the first college for
women in the United States to recognize the desirability of giving stu-
dents such instruction as would fit them to earn an independent liveli-
hood. It offers courses in science, household economics, literary and
secretarial work, and is affiliated with schools of physical education and
store service. It has more than 1600 students.
83. The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (' Mrs. Jack Gardner's Venetian
Palace') (open Tues., Thurs., Sat. 1CM, adm. 25^; Sun. 1-4, free, closed in
August), at junction of Fenway and Worthington St., built in 1902, is
a composite of fragments and materials from Venice and other parts of
Italy. Although Edward H. Sears, an architect, drew the plans, the
edifice is obviously the work of a collector indulging an unbridled fancy.
The Museum houses works of Raphael, Titian, Rembrandt, Cellini, and
many other old masters. Chamber-music concerts are given in the
romantic setting of the Tapestry Room (Tues., Thurs., Sat. at 2.45, Sun.
at 2, no extra fee) .
Mrs. John Lowell Gardner, known to Boston during her lifetime as ' Mrs.
Jack Gardner,' was the most picturesque figure in the social, art, and
music world of Boston in the Mauve Decade. The daughter of a wealthy
New York merchant with an artistic and musical flair, she was witty and
independent, flaunting social tradition, and gathering about herself
a salon of artists and musicians. Her shrewd acceptance of drawbacks in
her personal appearance, and her capitalization of her good points, is
somewhat cryptically embodied in the small portrait of her by Zorn,
representing her as flinging open her palace doors, her face a mysterious
Boston 167
vague blur without features, but her shapely arms and hands very
prominent, even reflected in the doors.
Straight ahead from the front of Gardner Museum.
84. The Back Bay Fens, commonly called The Fenway, are reclaimed
mud flats. This stretch of charming parkway, following the beautified
meanderings of a sluggish brook far from lovely in itself, gives a rustic
touch to the surrounding residential district and the art and educational
institutions. The Fens, with their bridle paths and motor roads, begin
a long strip of parkway winding through Brookline and Roxbury.
On the right is the Museum of Fine Arts (north front), and just beyond,
the marble walls of the Forsyth Denial Infirmary for Children.
85. The Boston Medical Library (open Mon. and Wed. 9.30-10; Tues.,
Thurs., FrL 9.30-6; Sat. 9.30-5), 8 Fenway, is a modern three-story
yellow-brick building trimmed with granite, built in 1901.
R. from Fenway on Boylston St.
86. The Massachusetts Historical Society (open weekdays 9-5; Sat. 9-1;
museum open Wed. 2-4), 1154 Boylston St., corner of Fenway, occupies
an incongruously modern bow-front granite and yellow-brick building.
Founded in 1791, the oldest historical society in the United States, it is
primarily a library, rich in early books, historical documents, newspapers,
manuscripts, and engravings. Of special interest are a suit of clothes
worn by Benjamin Franklin in Paris, of lilac poplin, with cuffs of pleated
lawn, Governor Winthrop's Bible, Shem Browne's Indian weathervane
from Province House, Peter Faneuil's mahogany wine chest, and a British
drum from Bunker Hill. Casually tucked away among these is the pen
with which Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
MOTOR TOUR 1 (South Boston, Roxbury, and Dorchester) 23 m.
E. from South Station, Boston, on Summer St.
87. The Commonwealth Pier, built by the State just before the World
War, is a fine passenger and freight pier. Twelve hundred feet long and
400 feet wide, it provides berths for five 6oo-foot vessels at a time, and is
used by a number of transatlantic lines.
88. The Army Base (open by approval of Officer of the Day), corner of
Harbor St., comprises a 2ooo-foot pier and an 8-story concrete warehouse
1600 feet long. Built during the World War, it is the Army Quartermaster
depot for New England, and the second largest Army base in the United
States.
Straight ahead from Summer St. on L St.; L. from L St. on East Broadway.
The City Point Section of South Boston is traversed by East Broadway,
bordered by old bow-front brick residences reminiscent of the fashionable
1 68 Main Street and Village Green
forties. It has the finest situation, with respect to the harbor, of any
district of Boston, and one of the best beaches near the Metropolitan
Center.
89. The Boston Aquarium (open 10-5 daily), corner of Farragut Rd., is
a low stucco building with octagonal, red-tiled tower and a fish weather-
vane.
L. from East Broadway on Gardner Way.
90. Castle Island, so named by Governor Winthrop, who thought its
natural contours resembled a castle, is a peninsular headland park, its 20
rolling acres capped in the center by the solid stone walls of Fort In-
dependence (yard only open), erected in 1801 and abandoned about 1880.
When exposed fortifications were of service in warfare, this fort was of
great strategic value in the defense of Boston, for the harbor channel
passes within a stone's throw of its northern face.
In 1827, Edgar Allan Poe, at eighteen, enlisting under the name of Perry,
did five months of army service here. In 1905, an amazing parallel to
Poe's story, ' The Cask of Amontillado,' was disclosed by the finding, in
a sealed casemate within the fort, of a skeleton clothed in army uniform.
Motor cars may proceed only to the ' island's ' edge. The short footpath around the
fort offers an interesting panorama. To the northwest, surmounted by another
abandoned stone fort, is Governor's Island, one of Governor Winthrop's three Bos-
ton homes. To the north is Winthrop (see Tour 1.4), huddled at the foot of a silver-
gray water-tower. Northeast is Deer Island, identified by the long red-brick build-
ings of a city penitentiary.
Due east on the far horizon rises the white tower of Boston Light, the oldest light-
house in America, not to be confused with the nearer white tower of Long Island
Light, a trifle southeast of it, marking the entrance to Nantasket Roads, where the
British gathered their departing fleet in 1776.
Directly opposite the Clipper Ship Monument to Donald McKay (see NEWBURY-
PORT) is the Ship Channel of the inner harbor, busy at all hours with passing ves-
sels, large and small.
Retrace Gardner Way; straight ahead on Columbia Rd.
91. The L Street Baths (adm. 10f), at the junction with L St., are built on
the European plan of enclosed bathing areas, one for men, one for women
and girls, and one for boys. The enclosure is roofed over to hold the bath-
houses; the walls extend out, surrounding open-air sections of beach and
water. A group of intrepid bathers known as the 'L Street Brownies'
go into the ocean here every day of the year.
R. from Columbia Rd. on L St.; L. from L St. on East Broadway.
92. The Site of the Old Mount Washington Hotel, later the first building
of Perkins Institution for the Blind (see WATERTOWN), is covered by
the South Boston Municipal Building, 535 East Broadway.
L. from East Broadway on G St.; R. from G St. on Thomas Parkway.
93. The Dorchester Heights Monument (not open), summit of Thomas
Park, is a square white marble tower 80 feet high, commemorating the
Boston 169
gunfire from this hill that was a contributive factor in the British evacua-
tion of Boston on March 17, 1776.
R. from Thomas Parkway on Telegraph St.; R. from Telegraph St. an
Mercer St.
94. Old Saint Augustine's Chapel (open upon application at Saint Augus-
tine 's Church, one block left on Dorchester St.) (1819) stands in the
walled cemetery at the junction of Mercer and Dorchester Sts. The tiny
brick chapel, with its irregular slate-tiled roof and its arches, small-paned
clear-g]ass windows, nestling in a century-old graveyard under giant
English elms, inevitably suggests Gray's 'Elegy.'
L. from Mercer St. on Dorchester St.; L. from Dorchester St. on Old Colony
Blvd.
95. Old Harbor Village (R), framing the expansive area of Columbia
Circle, is one of the largest ventures of the Federal Housing Projects in
New England. Occupying 20 acres, this group comprises 1016 apart-
ments in a block of three-story buildings with penthouses, play yards,
and social halls. The buildings are centrally heated. The apartments
have 3 to 5 rooms and rent at a moderate figure. The smaller structures,
called 'low houses,' have from 3 to 6 rooms, each section with its own
private entrance.
R. from Old Colony Blvd. on Columbia Rd. to the junction with Pond St.
96. The Blake House (1648) (owned by the Dorchester Historical Society,
open upon application), corner of Pond St., is a two-and-a-half-story
shingled cottage with steep pitched roof and diamond-paned windows.
The interior, consisting only of four rooms and an attic, has hand-hewn
cross-beams, slightly arched, and ' S ' hinges. By the front doorsill is the
Dorchester Milestone.
97. The Site of Edward Everett's Birthplace, corner of Boston St., Edward
Everett Square, Dorchester, is marked by a tablet, just across the square
from his Statue, by W. W. Story. Congressman, Governor, Minister to
England, Secretary of State, President of Harvard, and U.S. Senator,
Edward Everett (1794-1865) was in addition a graceful orator, without
whom no commemorative exercises in the New England of his day were
considered complete.
R. from Columbia Rd. on Boston St.; L. from Boston St. on Willow Court.
98. The Clap House (open by arrangement), 23 Willow Court, early 17th-
century, still retains its gambrel roof.
Retrace Willow Court; R. from Willow Court on Boston St. to Edward
Everett Sq.; R. from Edward Everett Sq. on East Cottage St.; L. from East
Cottage St. on Humphreys St.
99. The Bird-Sawyer House (private), 41 Humphreys St., is a two-and-a-
half-story gray clapboarded dwelling built in 1637 with broad windows,
a green door with a brass eagle knocker of Federal date, and a square
central chimney. Additions were made in 1804.
170 Main Street and Village Green
R. from Humphreys St. on Dudley St.; R. from Dudley St. on Shirley St.
100. The Shirley-Eustis House (not open, 1937, but present ownership
plans to restore as a museum), 31 Shirley St., was once a gubernatorial
mansion in the grand manner. It is a four-story square frame structure
with dormer windows and cupola built in 1748. Two wide stone flights
of steps lead to the second or main floor. The west flight gives access to
the entrance hall, while the east flight opens into a two-story banquet
hall with a musicians' gallery. The east doorway is treated with pilasters,
a fan-light, and side panels of glass. The house itself is also pilastered,
and has an elaborate carved cornice. The windows of the main floor
reach from floor to ceiling. Originally there were piazzas north and
south. Occupied by Governor William Shirley until his death in 1771,
it passed through a succession of merchant princes and then to William
Eustis, Governor from 1823 to 1825. Its guests have included Washing-
ton, Franklin, Lafayette, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, and Aaron Burr.
Retrace Shirley St.; L. from Shirley St. on Dudley St.; R. from Dudley St.
on Columbia Rd.; L. from Columbia Rd. on Hancock St.; R. from Hancock
St. on Winter St.
101. The First Parish Church (Unitarian) in Dorchester (open 9-5 daily
by the -vestry entrance), Meeting House Hill, houses a Roman Mosaic from
Dorchester, England, dating from the Conquest of Britain by Caesar.
In the vestry is an Anglo-Chinese clock of 1770, the works English, the
case Chinese, beautifully lacquered. This case, larger than needed for
the clock, was used just before the Revolution for smuggling tea, an un-
dertaking then considered so patriotic as not to disturb the conscience
of the church when the gift of the clock was made.
L. from Winter St. on Adams St.; R. from Adams St. on Dorchester Ave.;
L. from Dorchester Ave. on Ashmont St.
102. All Saints 1 Church, constructed in 1894, was the initial success of
the contemporary medievalist, Ralph Adams Cram. In his autobiography
he wrote : ' Into it I put all I knew or suspected of Gothic which to tell
the truth was not much It struck a new note in the cacophony of
disintegrating Romanesque and an arid Victorianism.'
Retrace Ashmont St.; R. from Ashmont St. on Talbot Ave.
103. Franklin Field has facilities for baseball, football, tennis, and
bowling.
R. from Talbot Ave. on Blue Hill Ave.
104. Franklin Park, 527 acres of open, rolling terrain, beautifully wooded
and watered, contains a public golf course and motor and bridle paths.
The park forms a unit in a parkway chain which circles Boston southwest
and south from Commonwealth Ave. to the Blue Hills.
Franklin Park Zoo (open daily 10-5), corner of Seaver St., is one of the ranking
zoos of America. Boston follows its news with absorbed interest, and new arrivals,
whether by ship or by stork, are an occasion for headline stories and pictures in
the press.
Boston 171
Retrace Blue Hill Aw.; R. from Blue Hill Ave. on American Legion High-
way; R. from American Legion Highway on Morton St. (second unmarked
road within park).
105. Forest Hills Cemetery (plan and information furnished at office),
famous for its rhododendron hedges, is the largest cemetery in New
England and is known as one of the most beautiful in the United States.
Here are buried Joseph Warren, William Lloyd Garrison, Fanny Daven-
port, and Edward Everett Hale. 'Death Staying the Hand of the Sculp-
tor,' a memorial by Daniel Chester French, marks the grave of Martin
Milmore.
Straight ahead from Morton St. on Arborway; L. from Arborway on Wash-
ington St.
1 06. Stony Brook Reservation, West Roxbury, 464 acres, is the one forest
park in Metropolitan Boston. It is densely wooded with pine, oak, and
birch, but traversed by trunk motor highways and many paths, some of
the latter leading to knolls which offer delightful views of the Charles
River Valley.
R. from Washington St. on La Grange St.; L. from La Grange St. on Centre
St.
107. The Roxbury Latin School, corner of St. Theresa Ave., the third
oldest school still existing in the United States, is remarkable because
it was for 250 years the oldest, if not the only, free school not aided by
public funds. It was established by the Apostle John Eliot and 60
families of Roxbury practically the entire town in 1645 by generous
contributions of land, money, and labor.
R. from Centre St. on Spring St.; R. from Spring St. on Baker St.
1 08. Brook Farm (open as the Martin Luther Orphans' Home), 670 Baker
St., was the scene of an early experiment (1841-47) in communal living
by the Transcendentalists. Among actual members or associate partici-
pants were Hawthorne, Emerson, Bronson Alcott, Theodore Parker,
George W. Curtis, and Margaret Fuller. Everyone had some share of
work, and all members shared in educational and social enjoyments.
Under the influence of Albert Brisbane, father of the late Arthur Bris-
bane, the associates adopted the phalanx according to the plan of Fourier,
and established primary departments of agriculture, domestic industry,
and mechanic arts. In March, 1846, one of the main buildings, the
Phalanstery, was burned. At this heavy financial blow, the group, already
somewhat discouraged, lost heart completely and disbanded in October,
1847-
Retrace Baker St.; L. from Baker St. on USl; R. from US1 on Arborway.
109. The Arnold Arboretum (for pedestrians only), just beyond USl, is
the largest living-tree and shrub museum in the country as regards
foreign introductions. In May and early June its 223 acres are a paradise
of blooming lilac hedges and cherry trees, forsythias, plum trees, mag-
nolias, rhododendrons, and azaleas. Endowed (1872) by the late James
172 Main Street and Village Green
Arnold, a New Bedford merchant, the Arboretum is owned by Harvard
University (see CAMBRIDGE) and contains the buildings of Harvard's
Bussey Institute of Horticulture and Agriculture.
Retrace Arborway; R. from Arborway on Centre St.
1 10. The Loring-Greenough House (1758) (open as a tearoom, except Tues.),
12 South St., in Whitcomb Square, is set in sizable grounds which once
extended half a mile to Jamaica Pond. It is a square two-story frame
mansion, with dormer windows, painted white, black blinds, a dentiled
cornice, a slate mansard roof, white roof-rail, and white chimneys.
There are three formal doorways, one of which opens from a porch
(added later). Another has an iron lock eighteen inches wide and a
keyhole the size of the human eye. The wide hall is especially fine, having
a hand-carved stair-rail imported from early Georgian England, and
landscape wallpaper of the same period. The large square rooms are
wainscoted in white and furnished with valuable and beautiful antiques.
A feature of the house is a large vault, built between two chimney flues.
The house was first the home of Commodore Joseph Loring, a Tory naval
officer who distinguished himself in the conquest of Canada. In 1775, it
was the headquarters of General Greene, and later a hospital for Ameri-
can Revolutionary soldiers.
Sharp L. from Whitcomb Square on Eliot St.; R. from Eliot St. on Pond St.
in. The Children's Museum of Boston (open daily except Monday 9-5;
Sun. 2-5; free), 60 Burroughs St., is a modern stucco building with white
wood trim. Founded in 1913 and maintained by private subscription,
its purpose is to stimulate the interest of children in the wonders and
beauties of nature. Natural history specimens, including animal skele-
tons, stuffed animals and birds, are displayed; and a collection of varie-
gated minerals illustrates the simpler stages of geologic history. There is
a small but instructive industrial exhibit, as well as a collection of dolls,
ancient and modern, dressed in typical costumes of various countries.
112. Jamaica Pond (refreshments and rowboats available; also fishing, by
permit from Fish and Game Commission), junction of Pond St. and Arbor-
way, a beautiful 65-acre expanse of fresh water, is encircled by 55 acres
of parkway in the Boston Park Department.
Straight ahead from Pond St. on Jamaicaway; R. from Jamaicaway on
Perkins St.; straight ahead from Perkins St. on Centre St.
113. The First Church in Roxbury (Unitarian) (open Tues. and Thurs.
1-3; Sun. service 11), Eliot Square, erected in 1804, was built after the
design of the First Unitarian Church in Portsmouth, New Hampshire,
and was known as the Church of John Eliot, Apostle to the Indians. It is
a typical New England meeting house, simple and dignified, with a clock-
tower and open belfry.
The interior, in ivory color and brown, has broad lateral galleries sup-
ported by columns. There is a balcony pulpit, raised halfway between
the floor and the galleries. Treasures of the church are John Eliot's
Boston 173
Chair and a Simon Willard Gallery Clock, surmounted by a spread eagle,
holding in its beak two strings of gilded balls. This famous design has
often been copied, but this clock is one of the two or three authentic
examples.
114. The Dillaway House (open daily 9-5), 183 Roxbury St., originally
the parsonage, built 1714, is a fine type of the two-and-a-half-story
gambrel-roof dwelling with dormer windows. Some of the rooms show
the supporting corner posts; some have rounded corners. The wide,
uneven floor boards and the hand-hewn timbers of the roof, are original,
as well as the door-knobs, hinges, and massive locks.
Straight ahead on Roxbury St.; R. from Roxbury St. on Guild Row; L. from
Guild Row on Dudley St.; R. from Dudley St. on Warren St.
115. General Joseph Warren's Statue by Paul Bartlett, Warren Square,
shows the physician and Revolutionary hero as a handsome, imperious
young man in his early thirties. Quite indifferent to personal danger,
Warren had been a marked man to the British ever since he had outwitted
their guard at the Old South Meeting House and climbed through a
second-story window over the heads of British soldiers, to address the
patriots within. His death at the battle of Bunker Hill was mourned
throughout Boston.
Retrace Warren St.; straight ahead from Warren St. on Harrison Ave.; L.
from Harrison Ave. on Massachusetts Ave.; R. from Massachusetts Ave. on
Tremont St.; L.from Tremont St. on Dartmouth St.; R.from Dartmouth St.
on Montgomery St.
1 1 6. The Boston English High School founded in 1821, one year before
Boston became a city, is the oldest high school in the United States.
Straight ahead from Montgomery St. on Tremont St.; R.from Tremont St. on
Castle St.; L. from Castle St. on Shawmut Ave.
117. Morgan Memorial at the junction of Shawmut Ave. and Corning
St., occupies a group of buildings. Here are the central offices of
the far-famed Morgan Memorial activities, founded in 1868 by Henry
Morgan. The various branches of this social service have been so ex-
tended that they provide useful employment for many people unable to
find work in other fields. The best-known of these projects is the Good-
will Industries, which collects discarded clothing, furniture and household
equipment of all sorts for resale.
MOTOR TOUR 2 (Charlestown) 5m.
N. from North Station, Boston, across Charlestown Bridge on Main St.;
R. from Main St. on Chelsea St.; R. from Chelsea St. on Wapping St.
1 1 8. United States Navy Yard (ppen daily 9.30-4.30; adm. to cars and
pedestrians), popularly known as the Charlestown Navy Yard, and con-
174 Main Street and Village Green
tinuously operated since 1800, occupies 123 acres in a narrow, high-walled
strip extending \y^ miles along the waterfront. The great attractions of
the yard are the U.S. Frigate ' Constitution ' (' Old Ironsides ') (open during
yard "visiting hours), and the Rope Walk, a long stone building where the
great hempen cables of the fleet are carded, twisted, and wound. Ships in
port may usually be visited.
Retrace on Wapping St.; straight ahead on Henley St.; R.from Henley St. on
Warren St.; R. from Warren St. on Winthrop St.
119. Blinker Hill Monument on Breed's Hill (open 9-5, May to Sept. ; 9-4,
Oct. to April; adm. 10^) is a granite obelisk about 220 feet high, designed by
Solomon Willard, a noted architect, and erected between 1825 and 1842.
Its design shows the influence of the Greek Revival which lamentably
dominated American architecture at the time. At the base of the monu-
ment is a Statue of Colonel William Prescott (' Don't fire until you see the
whites of their eyes'), in a spirited pose, sculptured by William Wetmore
Story. A small museum contains portraits, statues, and engravings of
battle participants, both British and American.
L. from Winthrop St. on High St.; L. from High St. on Cordis St.
1 20. The Webb- Adams House (private), 32 Cordis St., with yellow clap-
boards, low hip roof, small-paned windows, and semi-circular white Doric
portico, is the best remaining example of the pleasant homes of nine-
teenth-century Charlestown (1801). It has the frequent Charlestown
feature of a front door at the garden side of the house, away from the
street, frequent in Southern cities, but unusual in New England.
Retrace on Cordis St.; L. from Cordis St. on High St.; L. from High St. on
Green St.
121. The Boys' 1 Club of Boston (open daily, 9-9; visitors welcome), founded
in 1898, by Frank S. Mason, represents in its broad two-story brick build-
ing, surrounding a flagged terrace, one of the finest civic undertakings in
Boston. The combined membership, consisting of boys from 7 to 21, is
7500.
R. from Green St. on Main St.
122. The Site of the Birthplace of Samuel F. B. Morse, inventor of the
telegraph, 195 Main St., is marked by a white marble tablet.
L. from Main St. on Phipps St.
123. The Phipps Street Burial Ground, at the end of the street, dates from
1638. Here lies John Harvard, founder of Harvard College, beneath a
granite shaft, erected in 1828, 190 years after his death, through popular
subscription directed by Edward Everett, who limited contributions to
one dollar a person, in order to give a large number of people a chance to
participate.
Boston 175
MOTOR TOUR 3 (East Boston) 5 m.
N.E. from Haymarket Sq., Boston, through Sumner Tunnel.
124. The Sumner Tunnel (fare for passenger car, 15^), constructed (1931-
34) by the city at a cost pf $19,000,000, was named for General William
H. Sumner, founder of East Boston. At the Boston terminal is a brick and
granite administration building. The tunnel is more than a mile long and
serves the seaboard north of the city, passing under the harbor and
emerging in East Boston. Blow-plants at either end supply air-condition-
ing.
L. from Sumner Tunnel on Porter St.; L. from Porter St. on Meridian St.
into Central Square.
125. The East Boston Social Centers Council (open) occupies an old red-
brick building, formerly a church, in Central Square. Endowed by Jewish
philanthropists, it offers to all creeds and races recreation, instruction in
arts and crafts, music, drama, and health education.
R. from Meridian St. on Paris St.; L. from Paris St. on Henry St.
126. The Lutheran Seamen's Home, n Henry St., occupying a pair of old
bow-front brick dwellings, is a Scandinavian bethel, where comfortable
shelter, regardless of the recipient's ability to pay, is provided and leav-
ened by a measure of home life and wise counsel.
R. from Henry St. into Maverick Square; L. from Maverick Square on
Sumner St.; R. from Sumner St. on Orleans St.; L. from Orleans St. at its end
on unmarked Marginal St.
127. Saint Mary's House for Sailors (open 8-10), 120 Marginal St., a
recreational center founded in 1890 by Phillips Brooks, furnishes reading
and game rooms, shower baths, and foreign money exchange service free.
In a wing is Saint Mary's Church for Sailors (Episcopal) .
128. The United States Immigration Station, 285 Marginal St., is not very
busy in these days of restricted immigration.
L. from Marginal St. on Jejfries St.
129. The Boston Airport (daily airplanes to New York, Albany, Burlington,
and Bangor connecting at those cities for all other points) occupies a two-
story yellow brick terminal, surrounded by five hangars.
BROCKTON. City of Shoes
City: Alt. 120, pop. 62,407, sett. 1700, incorp. town 1821, city 1881.
Railroad Stations: 104 Center St., 41 Station Ave., 31 Riverside Ave., and 847
North Montello St. for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.
Bus Stations: 104 Center St. and 233 Main St., for New England Transporta-
tion Co.; Legion Parkway and Main St. for Great Eastern Line and Grey
Line; 117 Main St. for Interstate Transportation Co.
Accommodations: Four first-class hotels.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, Legion Parkway.
BROCKTON is one of the two great shoe-manufacturing centers of
New England. The middle of the city is occupied by block after block
of factories making shoes and shoe findings. From this core stretch the
areas crowded with the homes of the workers, tenements, and small
houses. Beyond these, chiefly toward the south, lie residential areas.
In 1649 the lands now occupied by this city were deeded by the Indians
to Miles Standish and John Alden for approximately thirty dollars.
The district including Brockton was part of the town of Bridgewater
until 1821, when it was set off as North Bridgewater.
The Revolutionary War did not vitally affect the everyday lives of the
townsfolk of North Bridgewater, the scene of actual hostilities being
comparatively remote. But the post-Revolutionary depression found
them vigorously opposing the ruthless laws affecting small debtors.
Militant townsmen snatched their hunting guns from the walls and came
out into the street in sympathy with Shays's Rebellion.
Continuing their democratic traditions, the inhabitants of North Bridge-
water played an important role in pre-Civil War days. The skilled shoe
workers, most of whom had fled their respective countries to escape the
tyranny of the old order and had come to America to help build a new
and free world, felt a ready sympathy with the Negroes of the South.
They became devoted followers of William Lloyd Garrison, and developed
an intricate system of 'Underground Stations' to facilitate the escape
of runaway slaves.
In the second quarter of the nineteenth century, just prior to the Civil
War, the invention of the McKay sewing machine, which made it possible
to sew together the uppers and soles of shoes instead of pegging them,
changed North Bridgewater from a small unimportant farming center
to one of the foremost industrial cities in Massachusetts.
Civil War days brought unparalleled prosperity to the owners of the
shoe factories. Government orders for army shoes during the Civil
Brockton 177
War made it the largest shoe producing city in America. Half the Union
Army was shod by North Bridgewater.
Workers streamed into town, and by 1880 the population of Brockton
- the name adopted in 1874 had more than tripled. William Cullen
Bryant in describing the city said: 'The whole place resounds, rather
rattles, with the machinery of shoe shops, which turn out millions of
shoes, not one of which, I am told, is sold in the place.'
Before the Civil War the social life of Brockton consisted almost wholly
of church functions characterized by a minimum of gaiety a residuum
from Puritan days. With the influx of foreign-born workers communal
gatherings assumed a livelier cast. Public dances became the vogue.
The Swedish workers were the first church group to sanction dancing,
holding their parties in the church vestry. Volunteer firemen grouped
themselves into engine companies and soon became leaders in the social
life of the community. The Firemen's Ball became the most brilliant
and colorful social event of the year. Local dramatic groups produced
such plays as 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' and 'Ten Nights in a Bar-Room.'
The young bloods formed secret societies and musical clubs. The
workers organized into trade unions, and various foreign-language groups
erected halls which were later to become community centers.
Civic improvement kept pace with the rapid industrial and social
growth of the town. It is claimed that the first central power station
in the United States from which power was distributed through three-
wire underground conductors was located here, becoming the present
Edison Electric Company. An early experimental street railway espe-
cially built for the use of electric power was developed here, and Thomas
Alva Edison came to Brockton to see the first car run over the line.
In 1893, Brockton worked out a solution of the sewage disposal problem
for inland cities, and investigating committees came from foreign coun-
tries as well as from many cities of the United States to learn the Brock-
ton system and arrange for its adoption.
In 1929, in the neighborhood of Brockton there were thirty thousand
skilled shoe workers employed in sixty factories. Three of the largest
shoe manufacturing corporations in America are today located in Brock-
ton, as are also several of the largest plants producing tools and supplies
for the shoe industry.
During the last few years the emigration of shoe industries from New
England, due to attractive offers of cheap unorganized labor and tax
rebatements in other States, has noticeably affected Brockton. This
movement, along with antiquated production methods and lack of
foresight on the part of the manufacturers, has been a primary factor
in the decline of the shoe industry. Between 1919 and 1929 local pro-
duction fell off forty-nine per cent.
On the whole, Brockton has been remarkably fortunate in relationships
between employer and employee. Aside from two large strikes, the city
did not participate in the series of violent industrial revolts that swept
178 Main Street and Village Green
the country at the beginning of the twentieth century. Eighty per cent
of the local shoe workers are members of the Brotherhood of Shoe and
Allied Craftsmen. Brockton had one of the first Socialist mayors in the
United States, Charles Coulter, elected in 1900.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. The Brockton Fair Grounds, on Belmont St., are the property of the
Agricultural Society. The Brockton Fair, held here in September, has
been famous since 1874. It includes agricultural, industrial, and educa-
tional exhibits, vaudeville acts, an automobile show, horse and automobile
races, and other popular attractions.
2. The Bryant House (open; present occupant, a relative of the poet, permits
visitors), 815 Belmont St., corner of Lorraine Ave., is a simple unpainted
frame dwelling. Here William Cullen Bryant lived for a time while
studying law, and here the famous New England poet is said to have
composed 'Yellow Violet' and a part of 'To a Waterfowl.'
3. Stone House Hill, opposite 330 Belmont St., has a boulder-studded,
pine-covered crest from which, or from a rock near-by, according to tradi-
tion, the Indians relayed smoke signals from Plymouth to the Blue Hills.
4. The Public Library (open weekdays 9-9, Sun. 3-9), White Ave. and
Main St., will eventually house the Walter Bryant Copeland Collection
of American Masters of Art, which was bequeathed to the city with a fund
to maintain it.
5. The Walk-Over Shoe Factory and Club (open; permission at office], 82
Perkins Ave., occupies the old Keith plant, which includes a hospital with
health clinics, clubhouses, and a park.
6. The W. L. Douglas Shoe Factory (open; permission at office), occupies
133-173 Spark St. Begun in 1876 by W. L. Douglas with a capital of
$875 and a small group of carefully chosen workmen, it has grown into
a $10,000,000 business.
7. D. W. Field Park, Oak St., beautified by woods, gardens, ponds and
artificial waterfalls, is one of the show places of the State. From a tower
in the grounds it is possible to see Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay.
Municipal golf links adjoin the park, which was named after a citizen
who helped to create it Daniel Waldo Field (1856), leading shoe manu-
facturer, agriculturist, dairyman, philanthropist, and author.
BROOKLINE. Opulent Comfort
Town: Alt. 18, pop. 50,319, sett, about 1638, incorp. 1705.
Railroad Station: Brookline Station, Station St., for B. & A. R.R.
Bus Station: Blueway Line, Boston to Springfield, stops at Brookline Village,
115 Washington St.
Accommodations: Three hotels and several private houses.
Swimming: Municipal Pool, Tappan St. (fee 10). Separate hours for men and
women.
Annual Events: National championship tennis matches at Longwood Cricket
Club; horse show and races at Brookline Country Club.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 306 Harvard St.
BROOKLINE is almost exclusively a residential town. Over its three
hills, Fisher Hill, Corey Hill, Aspinwall Hill, and along Beacon Street
and Commonwealth Avenue, around the Reservoir and over into Chest-
nut Hill, spread the homes of people who find their source of income in
the business districts of Boston. In the first decade of the twentieth
century, Brookline was popularly known as the 'Town of Millionaires.'
By 1910, however, it had begun to open its doors to residents of far
more modest means. Restricted areas are still occupied by hedged and
landscaped estates, handsome showplaces of the metropolitan area. In
other sections the beautiful old estates have begun to be split into
house lots; apartments have appeared, especially along the boulevards;
large private dwellings have been turned into rooming houses. Half of
Brookline still remains the closed citadel of wealth and leisure; the other
half has become a modern residential hive for the better paid of the busy
workers of Boston.
In 1630, the Company of Massachusetts Bay, bringing the Charter and
its Governor, John Winthrop, arrived from London. Shortly afterward
the worthy citizens of old Boston found their Common overcrowded
with cows, and the town fathers found it needful to seek a new place to
the west for grazing.
Governor Winthrop first mentions 'Muddy River Hamlet' in his writings
in connection with early allotments made for 'planting.' John Cotton,
urbane, affable, and of easy fortune, as his well-fed embonpoint testified
the foremost divine of Boston was granted the first tract of land.
Following him, other distinguished citizens of Boston hastened to secure
for themselves generous grants, until by 1639 the available acreage
began to run decidedly short. After the first famous allotment of Janu-
ary 8, 1638, the grants were smaller, more numerous, and made to less
well-known applicants.
In the earliest days, agriculture was naturally the most important in-
i8o Main Street and Village Green
dustry. Truck farms raising produce for sale in Boston, and fields,
were under cultivation as early as 1662, and a clerk of market was ap-
pointed to represent the Muddy River farmers at Old Faneuil Hall
Market, Boston. Growth of the little village went forward, and in 1705
it was granted recognition as the separate town of Muddy River Hamlet
(now euphemistically called Brookline), having been named for the estate
of Judge Samuel Sewall, of witchcraft fame, who owned a large tract
in Muddy River.
During the Revolution much property in Brookline owned by Boston
Tories was confiscated. A Mr. Jackson, living near the present Public
Library, sold his home and moved away when he was forced to provide
quarters for Continental soldiers. The house of Henry Moulton, man-
damus counsellor for the British Government, was mobbed by a crowd
of boys who broke the windows with stones.
By the middle of the nineteenth century a larger town hall was built;
the first railroad ran through the town; telegraph posts and wires were
beginning to appear; the Coolidges had a store near the spot later to be
known as Coolidge Corner.
As time passed, many leading citizens of Boston were attracted to this
flourishing suburb, so far removed in appearance as well as in name from
the Old Muddy River Hamlet. Taxes were low. Brookline was near
Boston and could be reached by train and trolley in a short time at a
moderate fare. It was an ideal commuter's town.
In 1870, Boston attempted to annex Brookline. Aroused, the citizens
gathered in town meeting and blocked this proposal. Five times more
did Boston attempt to pull out this coveted plum from the political
pie, but each time met with failure, though at times the margin of votes
was narrow. Brookline is today an 'island' almost entirely surrounded
by Boston. A modified form of town government is still maintained to
avoid expense and political complications, although the population of
Brookline makes it by far the largest town in New England. In the last
forty years the racial character of the general population has materially
changed; it is now about equally divided among native inhabitants,
foreign-born residents, and those of mixed parentage. Among the latter,
the Irish strain predominates, with the Jewish influence second.
Among the famous citizens of Brookline was Hannah Adams, said to be
the first woman in America to follow the profession of literature. In
recent times the roll of honor has included such diverse personalities as
Serge Koussevitzky, conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra;
Jack Sharkey, the former heavyweight champion prize-fighter of the
world; and the poet, Amy Lowell, known to the general public as much
for her masculine appearance, her blunt speech, and her long black
cigars as for 'What's O'clock' or 'A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass.'
During her later years, however, Miss Lowell was the most striking
figure in contemporary American poetry. She lectured widely. Among
her contributions to poetry must be reckoned the perfecting, in her best
Brookline 181
work, of the technique of free verse; her almost unrivaled command of
the vocabulary of sensuous impressions; the wide range of the themes
to which she has given poetical expression; and the clarity and restrained
beauty of many of her shorter poems. Her most important critical work
was the biography of John Keats.
TOUR 14 m.
W. from State 9 (Boylston St.) on Washington St.
1. The Brookline Public Library (open weekdays, 8.30-9; Sat. 2-9), at 361
Washington St., was designed by R. Clipston Sturgis and erected in 1910.
It is set well back from the street in landscaped grounds. The library
houses the Desmond Fitzgerald Collection of Paintings, in which among
other artists are represented Maufra, Bloos, Banderweiden, and Dodge
MacKnight.
R. from Washington on School St.; L. from School on Harvard St.
2. The Harvard Congregational Church, Harvard and Marion Sts., is
a low rambling brownstone building in Gothic style with a high tower
which contains an unusually fine set of chimes. It was designed by
E. Tuckerman Potter and erected in 1873.
L. from Harvard St. into Marion St.; L. from Marion into Beacon St.
3. All Saints 7 Church, 1773 Beacon St., consecrated in 1926, and like
the cathedrals of Europe built slowly over a period of years, was one of
the first large churches undertaken by Cram, Goodhue, and Ferguson.
It shows the influence of the ' perpendicular ' churches of England late
Gothic design. The high walls, low-pitched roof, and restrained use of
carving are characteristic. The rose window, by Charles F. Connick of
Boston the American authority on stained glass is a notable feature.
Retrace Beacon St.; L. from Beacon into Summit Ave., a steep grade.
4. The Corey Hill Outlook (alt. 265) is the best vantage-point of Brookline.
Beneath it, to the west, lie the towns of Brighton and Watertown, with
the tower of Perkins Institution for the Blind, and the Watertown Ar-
senal, a group of gray-brick buildings, standing out among the huddle of
roofs. To the north the horseshoe of the Harvard Stadium is easily
distinguished, with the towers of the college buildings on its right. To
the east the Charles River widens to its greatest breadth and merges
with Boston Harbor in the distance.
Retrace Summit Ave.: L. from Summit Ave. on Beacon St.
5. The Brookline Trust Company, at 1341 Beacon St., has the Ernest
B. Dane Collection of Tapestries, which includes four Gobelin tapestries
valued at $2,000,000.
L. from Beacon St. on Harvard St.
1 82 Main Street and Village Green
6. The Edward Devotion House (open Sat. 2-4; adm. lO^f), at 347 Harvard
St., was built in 1680 by Edward Devotion, town perambulator, town
constable, fence viewer, and tythingman. The neat cream and yellow
two-and-a-half-story frame house with small-paned windows, gambrel
roof, and central chimney stands on the premises of the Devotion School.
Two old maples shade and partly hide the little house, which is now the
headquarters of the Brookline Historical Society.
Retrace Harvard St.; L. from Harvard St. on Beacon St.; L. from Beacon
St. on Amory St.
7. Hawes Pond (skating), lies in the Amory St. Playground. Tradition
has it that a white horse and wagon once sank in its reputedly bottomless
depths, and for many years thereafter it was known as White Horse Pond.
Retrace Amory St.; R. from Amory St. on Beacon St.; L. from Beacon
St. into Kent St.; L. from Kent St. on Aspinwall Ave.; L. from Aspinwall
Ave. into Netherlands Rd.
8. The Netherlands House (private), is a close copy of the Stadthuise at
Franeker in Fresland (i6th century). From the World's Columbian Ex-
position held at Chicago in 1893, where it served as the Dutch Cocoa
House, it was moved piece by piece and set up in its present location.
The door frame, embellished with stone animals, is a replica of the door-
way of the Enkhaisen Orphanage.
Retrace Netherlands Rd.; L. on Aspinwall Ave.; R. from Aspinwall Ave.
on Brookline Ave.; R.from Brookline Ave. on Boylston St.; R.from Boylston
St. on Buckminster Rd.; L. from Buckminster Rd. on Seaver St.
9. The Zion Research Library (open daily 1.30-4.30), 120 Seaver St., is
a non-sectarian institution for the study of the Bible and church history.
The building, a brownstone mansion of 60 rooms, once John Munro
Longyear's private residence in Bay City, Michigan, was carried stone by
stone to its present location on the crest of Fisher Hill.
Retrace Seaver St.; R.from Seaver St. into Buckminster Rd.; R.from Buck-
minster Rd. into Summer St.; across Boylston St., entering Warren St.
10. The Davis-Cabot-Goddard Home or Green Hill (private), 215 Warren
St., on one of the tall inner chimneys bears the inscription, 'Greenhill
1730.' The first-floor windows and their sturdy green blinds are ten feet
high. The wallpaper in the living-room is of the design known as Les Rives
du Bosphore, and was printed in colors from wooden blocks by Joseph
Defour in Paris; the dates ascribed to this design vary from 1816 to 1829.
The rear wing, with its floors three feet lower than those in the original
house, is a long, low, rambling addition.
L.from Warren St. into Cottage St.; R. from Cottage into Goddard Ave.
11. Green Hill (The Goddard House; private), 235 Goddard Ave., was
built as a farmhouse for Nehemiah Davis in 1732. The great drawing-
room with chambers above was added in 1797, and subsequent alterations
have been made. This house is one of the oldest in Brookline. Just beyond
the house is a cone-shaped pudding-stone boulder set in an alcove of young
Cambridge 183
evergreens, with a bronze tablet to Hannah Seaver Goddard and her
husband John Goddard, loyal patriot and wagonmaster-general during
the Revolution. In the barn, long since demolished, were secreted military
stores which Goddard carted to Concord in 1775.
Straight ahead into Newton St.; R. from Newton St. on Clyde St.
12. The Country Club (adm. by invitation), claimed to be the oldest course
in the United States, was established in 1882. Along Clyde St. the
grounds, over 100 acres, are enclosed by a high wooden beanpole fence.
Here are perpetuated the ancient sport of curling and various turf sports,
as well as the more modern horse-racing, steeple-chase, and golf. In the
dining-room are several interesting murals depicting hunting scenes,
painted by Karl Yens.
Retrace Clyde St.; R. from Clyde St. on Newton St.; straight ahead into
West Roxbury Parkway.
13. The Municipal Golf Course is one of the finest public courses in the
vicinity of Boston (available to transients; small fee).
R. from West Roxbury Parkway on Hammond St.
14. The Longwood Cricket Club is at the junction of Hammond and
Boylston Sts. This organization sponsors national annual tennis tourna-
ments.
Retrace Hammond St.; L. from Hammond St. on Boylston St.
15. A Tercentenary Marker opposite Reservoir Park indicates the Site
of the Zabdiel Boylston House. Here, in 1736, lived Dr. Zabdiel Boylston,
the first American physician to inoculate for smallpox. In 1721, despite
popular prejudice, he inoculated his son and two slaves. As a consequence
of the success of this experiment, smallpox inoculations gradually became
general, public hostility was reduced, and smallpox finally ceased to be
a scourge.
CAMBRIDGE. University City
City: Alt. 9, pop. 118,075, sett - 1630, incorp. town 1636, city 1846.
Railroad Station: Cambridge Station near Porter Square, for B. & M. R.R.
Bus Stations: Bence Pharmacy, 1607 Mass. Ave., for B. & M. Transportation
Company; Leavitt and Pierce, Harvard Square, for Frontier Coach.
Accommodations: Five hotels, including 3 apartment hotels, and a large number
of certified tourist homes.
184 Main Street and Village Green
Swimming: Magazine Beach, Memorial Drive.
Annual Events: Ride of William Dawes, April 19.
Information Service: Booth at Harvard Square (summers only).
ON THE northwest bank of the beautiful Charles River, occupying a
level plain broken only by Mt. Auburn, lies the city of Cambridge, bi-
sected by the busy arteries of Massachusetts Avenue and Mt. Auburn
Street and bordered by the leisurely sweep of Memorial Drive. In reality
four cities occupy its confines. Here in elm-shaded streets, in fenced door-
yards and landmarks that preserve treasured memories, still live Old
Cambridge and that second Cambridge which succeeded it, the Home of
the Literati. And here, visible in contemporaneous lusty existence, are
two other cities : the University City and one other the Unknown City.
The University City shelters ten thousand people within the walls of the
Harvard dormitories, and Harvard Yard is a hive of learning vaster than
any Tibetan monastery. The University City houses a thousand Rad-
cliffe students in beautiful Georgian Colonial brick buildings. The Uni-
versity City may claim the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(1861), the leading technical institute in the United States, and one of the
foremost in the world, with 2600 men and women students.
This Cambridge is famous. The story of its historic shrines, its illustrious
authors and poets, its learned scholars and scientists, has been told and
retold. But the story of Cambridge, the Unknown City, has seldom been
told.
Yet this is a very real Cambridge. A hundred and fifty thousand people
throng its streets, stores, and crowded subway stations. Five hundred
distributing and manufacturing plants pour out a score of nationally
known products. The streets of its mercantile sections are lined with
banks, motion-picture theaters, department stores, and more than one
thousand small retail stores. It presses in between Harvard Yard and the
vast Technology Unit; it surges toward the elegant Embankment; it
encroaches on the placid dignity of Brattle Street and Lincoln Lane; the
city of which one seldom hears but which no one should ignore : Cambridge
the Industrial City.
This Unknown City is the second of Massachusetts in the value of goods
manufactured; it is third in all New England, outranked only by Boston
and Providence. Huge factories pour forth goods, including candy, bread,
and soap, into the great stream of American commerce and industry.
Within its confines over a hundred thousand workers dwell.
So they stand, interlocked, interpenetrated, Cambridge the University
City and Cambridge the great Industrial City; and behind them and with-
in them in surviving landmarks lie the shadows of two other cities: Old
Cambridge and the Home of the Literati.
OLD CAMBRIDGE dates back over three centuries. In 1630, the Com-
pany of Massachusetts Bay arrived from London with its charter and
Cambridge 185
its Governor, John Winthrop. A fortified place was needed for a cap-
ital, protected against the enemy most to be feared not the Indians,
but the warships of King Charles. ' Wherefore they rather made choice
to enter further among the Indians, than hazzard the fury of malignant
adversaries that might pursue them . . . and erected a town called New
Towne, now named Cambridge.'
Great pains were taken in laying out and building the 'New Towne/
One of its earliest visitors describes it as 'having many fair structures
with many handsomely contrived streets one of the neatest towns in
New England. The inhabitants, most of them, are very rich.'
An early episode had much to do with determining New Towne's destiny.
In October, 1636, the General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony
agreed to give 400 towards a school or college a sum equal to the
whole colony tax. It remained to select the place.
The preceding year a solemn synod of the teaching elders had been called
at the little meeting house on Dunster Street, Cambridge, to put down the
dangerous and disturbing doctrines of Mistress Anne Hutchinson of Bos-
ton, a strong-minded and brilliant New England woman who took the
liberty of expressing lively doubts as to the Boston clergy's being the
recipients of divine inspiration. This first New England synod was dom-
inated by the Rev. Mr. Shepard of New Towne; and Mistress Hutchinson
was condemned by the General Court together with about eighty others
for opinions 'some blasphemous, others erroneous, all unsound.'
As the country was ' miserably distracted ' by a storm of Baptists and other
'unorthodox sects,' and as 'the vigilancy of Mr. Shepard preserved the
congregation from the rot of these opinions,' Cotton Mather, the eminent
Puritan divine, says that Cambridge was selected as the site of the new
college because it was ' under the soul-ravishing ministry of Mr. Thomas
Shepard.'
At the time there was living in Charlestown a young dissenting minister,
John Harvard, and as the friends of higher education ' were thinking and
consulting, how to effect this great work ... it pleased God that he died,
and it was then found he had bequeathed his library to the proposed col-
lege, and one-half his estate in all, some 1,700.' It was therefore
decreed that the new college should bear John Harvard's name. The
Court also ordered that 'New towne shall henceforth be called Cam-
bridge,' the name of the Old English University town.
Less than a decade later, once more in solemn synod, the solid men of the
town assembled to set forth a document of all known opposites to the
Church of England. This was the famous ' Cambridge Platform,' wherein
the powers of the clergy were minutely defined, and the duty of the com-
mon people stated to be ' obeying their elders and submitting themselves
unto the Lord.' By this action Church and State were united by law, and
the rule of the clergy was made absolute.
In spite of all this, there shortly appeared in Boston 'an accursed and
pernicious sect of heretics lately risen up in the world, who are commonly
1 86 Main Street and Village Green
called Quakers.' The plague spread, and the horrified people of Cambridge
beheld Elizabeth Horton passing through the streets crying, ' Repentance !
Repentance ! A day of howling and sad lamentation is coming upon you
from the Lord!' Elizabeth was soon laid hold of by a mob and cast into
jail; then tied to a whipping-post and lashed ten stripes with a three-
stringed whip having three knots at the end. Then they carried her,
miserably torn and beaten, many miles into the wilderness, and toward
night 'left her among the wolves, bears, and wild beasts.'
The Devil, however, continued to afflict Old Cambridge ; and the Mathers,
father and son, as God's appointed judges, jousted vigorously with him.
At Harvard, Bible study was most important. The student was expected
to live under a monastic code. The main aim of his life was * to know God
and Jesus Christ.' All his acts were performed under the vigilant eye of
the Town Watch. He was to read the Scriptures twice a day, and not to
'intrude or inter-meddle on other men's affairs.' He could not 'buy, sell,
or exchange anything above the value of a sixpence,' nor could he use
tobacco without permission of the president or prescription of a physi-
cian, and then only 'in a sober and private manner.'
In spite of all this praiseworthy regulation, however, the infant college,
which should have been a stronghold of piety, was not free from the
taint of 'willfulle heresie.' There was the painful conduct of President
Dunster, who obstinately would neither renounce nor conceal his opposi-
tion to infant baptism, and who was therefore haled before a Grand Jury
and removed from office for ' poisoning the minds of his students and thus
unfitting them to become preachers of the truth.' By the early quarter
of the eighteenth century the College had fallen into a sad state of
decay. Its buildings were dilapidated, the number of students reduced,
and all available funds did not amount to 1000.
Cambridge in those days was still primitive. The forest was still near at
hand and the town had not yet 250 taxable inhabitants. 'A great many
bears are killed at Cambridge and the neighboring towns about this time,'
wrote student Belknap of Harvard.
But the town had its elegant sophistication. The wealthy and aristocratic
families who gave social strength to the Church 'made a superior figure
to most in the country.' The Phipses, Inmans, Vassalls, Sewalls, Lees,
Ruggles, Olivers, and Lechmeres were all in easy circumstances. The
whole easterly part of the town was divided into a few great farms, and
the luxurious estates stretching along Brattle Street on the highway to
Watertown won for it the name of Tory Row.
Tories were, however, soon to become decidedly unpopular in Cambridge.
In 1768, delegates from ninety-five towns met in patriotic protest at
Faneuil Hall among them two Cambridge delegates. On March 8,
1770, the solemn tolling of the bell in the meeting house in Cambridge
mingled with the tones of the bells at Charlestown and Roxbury while the
victims of the Boston Massacre were carried through the streets of Bos-
ton to their burial. In May of that year, the House of Representatives
Cambridge 187
sat in the halls of Harvard College. In 1772, events were moving rapidly
toward the crisis. Cambridge elected a revolutionary committee of ten
despite the efforts of William Brattle, its Tory Moderator, to prevent it.
The night following the famous Boston Tea Party thousands of people
assembled round the courthouse steps, forcing the Crown's officials to
resign, including High Sheriff, Judges, and Councillors.
One evening a party of British soldiers dined in Cambridge, arousing great
suspicion. That night, hoofbeats echoed in the frosty air Paul Revere
set out on his midnight ride ; William Dawes, his comrade, galloped over
the Great Bridge into Cambridge to arouse the town. The women and
children, awakened by the 'horrors of that midnight cry were bidden to
take refuge near Fresh Pond away from the Redcoats' line of march.'
From all quarters, small companies of militia and Minutemen were has-
tening to Cambridge.
By the end of the week a rude army of fifteen to twenty thousand men had
assembled. For the next year, after the nineteenth of April, 1775, Cam-
bridge became the headquarters of the first American army.
Shortly after the Battle of Bunker Hill, a cavalcade of citizens and a
troop of light horse gathered by the Watertown road. There they were
met by General George Washington, newly commissioned Commander.
The weathered bronze tablet on the Common gate tells the rest of the
Story: Near this Spot
on July 3, 1775
George Washington
took command of the American Army.
Through a glass, from a 'crow's-nest' erected in the branches of a tree,
Washington surveyed the surrounding country. A citizen wrote : ' Thou-
sands are at work, every day from four until eleven o'clock in the morning.
. . . There is a great overturning in Camp. Generals Washington and Lee
are upon the line every day. Everyone is made to know his place, and keep
in it or be tied up and receive forty lashes.'
On the first day of the new year, over the camp a new flag of thirteen
stripes was unfurled, symbolizing the union of the thirteen Colonies. On
the second day of March, the booming of cannon and mortar announced
that the bombardment of Boston had begun. A sortie and counter at-
tack by the British was expected ; but on the seventeenth day of March the
British troops were seen moving out of the city. Boston was evacuated
and Washington left for New York soon after. The military days of
Cambridge were ended.
After the Revolution, the life of the little town flowed along. The church
gave an impulse to the college, the college to the town, and a scholastic
and literary atmosphere took form, regarded as the epitome of American
culture even by critical European intellectuals. Cambridge, borne on a
sluggish but smooth and comfortable current, was entering upon the
second chapter of its existence, as the Home of the Literati.
1 88 Main Street and Village Green
Oliver Wendell Holmes, the kindly 'Autocrat of the Breakfast Table,'
brilliant talker and disarming wit, too sympathetic to practice medicine
despite his brilliant contribution in the discovery of puerperal fever, at
fifty had embarked on a new career literature. Associated with him
was a young Harvard 'professor of modern languages, Henry Wadsworth
Longfellow. No poems of the era entered more deeply into the life of
the people than Longfellow's. 'The Psalm of Life' was translated before
the century was out into fifteen languages. The children of Cambridge
subscribed to give him an armchair from the wood of the 'spreading
chestnut tree.' James Russell Lowell, also a Harvard professor, and also
a poet, author of the famous 'Biglow Papers,' was twice appointed
United States ambassador, once to Spain and once to the Court of St.
James's. In London his popularity was tremendous in literary circles.
Now appeared the North A merican Review, devoted to the ' true revival
of polite learning,' its editors and its foremost contributors mainly from
Cambridge. Similarly came into being The Dial, the journal of the
famous Transcendental Club, edited by the brilliant Margaret Fuller.
Two famous presses, the University Press and The Riverside Press, were
a practical factor in this literary domination.
The history of Cambridge is peppered with the names of scholars, his-
torians, and scientists. Among the historians are Henry Adams, Ticknor,
John Fiske, and Palfrey. To these may be added distinguished European
scholars, among them the great scientist Louis Agassiz from Switzerland ;
Francis Sales, that living Gil Bias in hairpowder and pigtail, from France.
By the last quarter of the eighteenth century, Cambridge the University
City was far beyond the embryo stage. ' This business of teaching, lodg-
ing, boarding and clothing and generally providing for the [Harvard]
students [who numbered five hundred] was the occupation of the ma-
jority of the households of the Old Village.' College and town, mutually
dependent, grew steadily during the next century.
One evening in 1878, Dr. Oilman, a noted teacher, historian, and author,
invited Prof. Greenough and his wife to come to his house to talk over a
very important matter, namely, the foundation of a college for women.
Radcliffe was created, unofficially, in 1879, as a mere association of
Harvard instructors, who agreed that in response to popular demand
they would give women 'some opportunity for systematic study in
courses parallel to those of the University.' There was no official con-
nection with Harvard until 1894. In that year the new college was
formally named Radcliffe, in honor of Ann Radcliffe of England, donor
of the first Harvard scholarship fund. The new institution of learning was
long known among the irreverent as Harvard Annex, and serious qualms
were felt by the respectable citizenry of Cambridge at the idea of ' hosts
of young women walking unescorted through the town.'
Today, though Radcliffe has its own President and other administrative
officers, the counter-signature of the President of Harvard on all diplomas
officially establishes standards of scholarship equal to those of Harvard.
Cambridge 1 89
In 1916 another and most distinguished institution of learning added
itself to Cambridge, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Late
one August afternoon, a procession, its members clad as Venetian sailors
and led by a marshal in the crimson and velvet of a Doge, moved slowly
to the river edge in Boston. Followed by a group of men in gowns and
crimson hoods, and bearing a great gilded and ornamental chest contain-
ing charter and archives, the solemn procession moved forward. They
were met by a Venetian barge, which, under the eyes of ten thousand
spectators, bore them away to the other shore.
The processional solemnity, the colorful spectacle, the silent throngs
massed on both banks of the river, the hovering sailboats and motor
craft, constituted a peculiarly appropriate celebration of a civic event of
tremendous import: the University City had come of age.
So, too, but without heralds or fanfare, the date unnoticed and unre-
corded, had the Industrial City.
While Washington was still President, the building of the Unknown
City began. One of its founders was a lad who walked ninety miles from
a New Hampshire farm to make his fortune. From good Deacon Liver-
more he learned to make brown soap. Today from his efforts stands the
Lever Brothers Soap Works, one of the largest in the country.
One of its founders was a cook on a Nova Scotia fishing schooner, a boy
of sixteen who came to Cambridge to seek his fortune, paying his toll
over the bridge with a lead pencil. He learned to make coffins, and today
his business is part of the National Casket Company.
Two of its founders, named Little and Brown, were clerks in a bookstore.
They, with Henry O. Houghton, founder of The Riverside Press, estab-
lished two great publishing houses in Boston.
The stories of these men and a hundred more read like those of Oliver
Optic, and are stranger than fiction. Among them were the farsighted
men who built the town buildings on the edge of a marsh in the far
corner of the town and reclaimed the useless mud flats along the river,
where great factories stand today. They made the laws, freed the
bridges from tolls, founded the banks, and kept the town records. Old
residents still recall the hundred and twenty-four foot chimney of the
New England Glass Company, and the great banquet held on its top the
day that it was completed.
Before mid-century the Unknown City was a going concern with eight
times as many workers in its factories as there were students in the
college.
Today the country's first ladder factory and the great carriage works
are but memories. So, too, are the immense ice cuttings on Fresh Pond,
from which the ice trade of the country was controlled. But here, laying
the foundations of today's industrial city, was made the first galvanized
iron pipe, relieving thousands of tinsmiths from making their pipe by
hand. Here were the machines that produced the first piano keys, and,
CAMBRIDGE
TOUR
Cambridge
191
in humbler fields, perfected flowerpots, the famous reversible collars,
waterproof hats, and the first mechanical egg-beater. Call the roll of the
industries today and Kendall Square will answer: Ink, machineries, and
foundries; glass, rubber, food and cracker factories. Call the roll and
North Cambridge and Cambridgeport will answer: Binderies, printeries,
and paper boxes; wire cable, valves, and boilers.
Here it lies, crowded in between and around two great universities: a
city of workers, most of whose thousands never even dreamed of going to
college, many of whom never even completed high school; yet a city no
less real than its intellectual other self, with no less lusty a heritage and
no less potent and problematic a future.
FOOT TOUR 1 1.5 m.
SW. from Harvard Square on Brattle St.; R. from Brattle St.
i. The Brattle Mansion (open), 42 Brattle St., is a three-story, clap-
boarded, gambrel-roofed house with dormer windows, shorn of much of
its former glory, but otherwise well preserved as the home of the Cam-
CAMBRIDGE MAP INDEX
1. Brattle Mansion
2. Site of Village Smithy
3. Cock Horse Tearoom
4. Read House
5. Samuel Longfellow's Home
6. House that John Fiske Built
7. Belcher House
8. Craigie-Longfellow House
9. Longfellow Park
10. Campus of Radcliffe College
11. Site of the Washington Elm
12. Christ Church
13. Old Town Burying Ground
14. First Parish Church
15. George Washington Memorial
Gateway
1 6. Common
17. Wadsworth House
1 8. Harvard Yard
19. Chinese Student Memorial
20. Widener Library
21. New Yard
22. University Hall
23. Statue of John Harvard
24. Massachusetts Hall
25. Harvard Hall
26. Hollis and Stoughton Halls
27. Holworthy Hall
28. Holden Chapel
29. Appleton Chapel
30. Robinson Hall
31. Sever Hall
32. Emerson Hall
33. Fogg Art Museum
34. Memorial Hall
35. Germanic Museum
36. Semitic Museum
37. Biological Laboratories
38. University Museum
39. Children's Museum of Cambridge
40. Harvard Law School
41. Site of the first Meeting House
42. Bishop's Palace
43. New Houses
44. Harvard Business School
51. Cambridge Observatory of Har-
vard University
52. Botanic Garden of Harvard
University
53. Cooper-Frost-Austin House
54. Site of Oliver Wendell Holmes'
Birthplace
192 Main Street and Village Green
bridge Social Union. Built in 1727, it was one of the i8th century show
houses of Cambridge.
Later it was the home of Margaret Fuller (1810-50), the most brilliant
American woman of her day, a friend of Emerson and other transcen-
dentalists, first editor of the Dial, author of 'Woman in the Nineteenth
Century,' literary critic and teacher. Holmes, who went to grammar
school with her, described Margaret Fuller as a queer child; and the.
urbane and customarily gallant Lowell went as far as to call her 'that
dreadful old maid.' In her thirties, however, she married the Marquis
D'Ossoli in Italy and bore him a son. On their return voyage to America
she perished with him and the child in a shipwreck off New Jersey.
2. The Site of the Village Smithy immortalized by Longfellow is marked
by a stone at the corner of Story St.
3. The Cock Horse Tearoom (open), 56 Brattle St., was built in 1811 as
the home of Dexter Pratt, the village blacksmith ('The smith a mighty
man was he'). The main house, to which have been added quaint and
harmonious ells, is of two stories with brown clapboards and green blinds.
4. The Read House (private), 55 Brattle St., was built in 1725. It is a
two-and-a-half-story yellow frame dwelling distinguished by a white
doorway framed by wedge-shaped wood quoins. Though encroached
upon by the business district, it maintains a front garden stretching back
60 feet from the sidewalk to the house.
5. Samuel Longfellow's Home (private], 76 Brattle St., is a two-and-a-
half-story brown frame dwelling with a flat-roofed ell. Its one-time
owner, brother of the famous poet, wrote several fine hymns still in
general use.
6. The House that John Fiske Built (private), corner of Ash St., is a
Victorian dwelling with a tower, which the eminent historian (1842-1901)
was building at the time of his sudden death. An early champion of the
then heretical theory of evolution, Fiske was not invited to teach at
Harvard. After the University embraced the theory it still thought
Fiske a little too 'popular' to adorn its faculty, but awarded him an
honorary degree.
7. The Belcher House (private), 94 Brattle St., is an impressive mansion
of yellow frame, with a mansard roof and white roof-rail. Having main
entrances both east and west, it could easily be mistaken for a double
house, and as a matter of fact the west end was constructed first some
experts say as early as 1635, because of its use of shell plaster in the
chimney. The east end, a harmonious block, dates from 1700. Although
the house has undergone alterations, it is still a dignified example of the
more massive type of Colonial home.
8. The Craigie-Longfellow House (study and grounds open Sat. 2-4), 105
Brattle St., the home of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and now occupied
by his grandson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Dana, has a mellow
prosperous dignity very characteristic of the poet himself. Built in 1759
by Major John Vassall, a Tory, the house is a three-story square yellow
Cambridge 193
clapboarded mansion with white Ionic pilasters, a white roof-rail, and
yellow brick chimneys capped with ornamental hoods. Side piazzas,
east and west, overlook wide lawns, and in front of the house a small
formal park runs down almost to the Charles River.
This was one of the seven famous houses that made up Tory Row. When
Major Vassall fled to Boston in 1774, General Washington made the
house his headquarters. Martha Washington joined him in December,
and on the sixth of January they celebrated their wedding anniversary
here. Later the house was occupied by Dr. Andrew Craigie, who added
the banquet hall behind the study and entertained lavishly. He died
bankrupt, and his wife rented rooms in the front of the mansion.
Young Longfellow came here to lodge in 1837, in his second year of
teaching at Harvard, and was installed in the second-floor front rooms
at the right of the entrance. His study at that time had once been
Washington's private chamber. In this historic atmosphere, the poet
wrote 'Hyperion,' 'The Psalm of Life,' 'The Wreck of the Hesperus,'
and other early poems. Here he brought his second bride, Frances
Appleton of Boston, whose father gave them the house as a wedding
present. In 1845 the poet's former study became the nursery, and the
study was transferred to the right-hand front room on the lower floor,
outside which in the hall, stands 'The Old Clock on the Stairs.'
Here in his later years were held the meetings of the Dante Club. At
the Wednesday evening gatherings, to which Lowell, Norton, and other
scholars and friends were invited, Longfellow read his translation of 'The
Divine Comedy,' and welcomed suggestions for revision. The evenings
always ended with a good supper, good wine and good conversation.
9. Longfellow Park, opposite the Craigie-Longfellow House, was named
after the poet and later given to the city by his family and friends. At
the lower end of the park stands a Memorial Monument by Daniel Chester
French, embellished in bas-relief with figures of some of the poet's best
known characters, including 'The Village Blacksmith,' 'Miles Standish/
'Evangeline,' and 'Hiawatha.'
Retrace Brattle St.; L. from Brattle St. on Mason St.
10. The Campus of Raddiffe College for women occupies a block bounded
by Garden, Mason, James, and Brattle Sts. and Appian Way.
The architecture of the college buildings, like those of Harvard, derives
from the Georgian; but the more modern of them are tempered with a
strain of refinement especially in interior work which distinguishes
and feminizes them. Unlike Harvard, where the architecture runs the
full gamut from early Georgian through Victorian Gothic and Richard-
sonian Romanesque to revived Colonial forms, Radcliffe has maintained
a certain consistency of style.
Fay House, the Administration Building, is the oldest structure. It was built in
1807 by Nathaniel Ireland as a private home from, according to tradition, designs
by Charles Bulfinch. Agassiz House and Bertram Hall were designed by the poet,
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The Library was designed by Winslow and Bige-
394 Main Street and Village Green
low, and Hemenway Hall, the gymnasium, was built in 1899 from designs by
McKim, Mead, and White.
Alice Alary Longfellow Hall, completed in 1931, brought to her architects, Perry,
Shaw, and Hepburn, award of the Parker medal. The design of this building,
which is devoted to lecture halls, is based upon that of University Hall, a Harvard
building designed by Bumnch. Besides the base course of cut granite, a special
brick of a pink salmon color was used in the structure to match that of Fay House.
R. from A fas on St. on Garden St.
1 1 . The Site of the Washington Elm, under which Washington took com-
mand of the Continental Army in 1775, is marked by a circular bronze
plaque, bordered by cobblestones.
12. Christ Church, designed by Peter Harrison and built in 1761, is the
oldest church building in Cambridge, and was used in the Revolution as
a barracks for the Colonial troops. The gray flush-board exterior and
the small squat wooden tower, visibly leaning forward, and only relieved
by small lunette windows at front and sides, are not particularly pre-
possessing, though their humility has a certain charm; and they give little
idea of the great beauty of the interior. It is, in fact, among the four or
five best church interiors in or near Boston, and is a jewel of Georgian
Colonial. The simplicity of the seven tall windows at each side, and the
six white wooden columns in each of the side aisles, give it, though small,
a great deal of dignity; and the mahogany-colored pew-backs add the
necessary touch of warmth. An unusual feature is the presence of heavy
two-piece slatted shutters inside the church, folded back so as partly to
obscure the white wooden pilasters between the windows. These do much
to enrich the whole effect of the interior, and to give it depth. The
windows, of plain glass, are heavily muntined in the early Georgian
manner. The fine crystal chandeliers were given in memory of Mrs.
Francis Sayre, daughter of Woodrow Wilson. The tower holds the
Harvard Chime, a set of thirteen bells given in 1860 by Harvard gradu-
ates. The original organ loft remains, but the metal pipes of the original
organ were melted into bullets during the Revolution.
13. The Old Town Burying Ground (open to visitors) lies adjacent between
Christ Church and the First Parish Church and dates from 1636, the
year Harvard College was founded. Here is buried Dexter Pratt, the
'Village Blacksmith.'
R. from Garden St. on Massachusetts Ave.
14. The First Parish Church (Unitarian) houses the oldest church or-
ganization in Cambridge, dating from 1633. Among its early pastors
was Thomas Hooker, who, disagreeing with some of the policies of the
Massachusetts Bay clergy, quietly and peaceably led his flock to Hart-
ford, Connecticut. The present building, a gray wooden edifice with a
latticed belfry, was erected in 1833. Harvard College commencements
were held here from 1833 to 1873, and a number of Harvard Presidents,
including Dr. Eliot, were inaugurated here. Its most popular minister
was the late Samuel McChord Crothers, genial wit and essayist, who
after listening to the speeches at a certain Harvard Commencement re-
Cambridge 195
marked that he gathered that the world had been in great danger, but
that all would now be well.
Retrace Massachusetts Ave.
15. The George Washington Memorial Gateway to the Common at the
corner of Garden St. was dedicated on the sesquicentennial of Washing-
ton's taking command of the Continental Army.
1 6. The Common was originally the common pasture and was called the
'cow common.' On it criminals were punished, and it was the scene of
several executions.
FOOT TOUR 2
(Harvard University)
E. from Harvard Square on Massachusetts Ave.
17. The Wadsworth House (semi-private housing the Alumni Association),
which stands at the edge of Harvard Yard opposite Holyoke St. was
built in 1726. It is a typical yellow clapboarded Colonial house of two-
and-a-half-stories, and is of considerable dignity. The ell is of brick; the
roof gambrel, with dormers; green blinds set off the 24-paned windows
on the lower floor. Harvard presidents, from Wadsworth to Leverett,
lived here, and Washington stayed here briefly in 1775.
L. from Massachusetts Ave. into the Yard by the McKean Gate, the first
gate E. of Wadsworth House.
1 8. The Harvard Yard, which is the university campus, is the original
center of the College, and still keeps much of its Old World charm. Not
unlike Lincoln's Inn Fields and Gray's Inn, in London, and roughly con-
temporary with them, it shares much of their characteristic blending
of Georgian stateliness and mellowed red brick. On the whole, the modern
additions to the Yard have been tactfully adapted to their surroundings,
with but a few exceptions, to be noted later. It may well be described
as one of the most beautiful college campuses in America.
19. The Chinese Student Memorial is a granite shaft 10 feet high, carved with
dragons at the top, its base resting on a dragon-headed mythical monster. An
inscribed tablet explains in Chinese that it was presented at the Harvard Ter-
centenary in 1936 by 1,000 Chinese alumni of the University.
20. The Widcner Library (open Mon.-Fri. 8.45-10; Sat. 8.45-5.30), on the south
side of the Yard, is a huge red-brick edifice which unfortunately somewhat dwarfs
its surroundings, and has therefore been adversely criticized. A wide cascade of
shallow stone steps leads up into the deep Corinthian portico, with its 12 lofty
columns, the main floor being considerably above ground level. Designed by
Horace Trumbauer and built in 1913-14, the Library is a memorial to Harry Elkins
Widener, class of 1907, who was drowned with the sinking of the 'Titanic.' The
much-marbled interior, at its worst in the pillared entrance hall, has been con-
sidered too lavish to be quite in keeping with the general character of the college
buildings. On the stairway above are John Singer Sargent's World War Murals.
196 Main Street and Village Green
The Treasure Room, reached from the southwest corner of the entrance hall, is
allotted to such rare books and manuscripts as need special supervision. Here are
a collection of the various editions of the 'Imitatio Christi,' a similar series of the
issues of the ' Compleat Angler/ the ' George Herbert Collection,' given by George
Herbert Palmer, and a remarkable theater collection. Among examples of fine
printing is the collection of books designed and printed by Bruce Rogers. Also
of interest is a case containing an approximate reproduction of the library of books
bequeathed by John Harvard.
The Widener Memorial Room, on the first landing of the main stairway, entered
between the two Sargent murals, contains a portrait of Widener and his own collec-
tion of rare books, among them an almost unrivaled collection of Stevensoniana.
This room, finished in carved English oak, is approached through an octagonal
reception room executed in white Alabama marble.
The Poetry Room, on the third floor, west of the staircase, dedicated to George
Edward Woodberryj contains the valuable Amy Lowell collection, especially
interesting for its Keats manuscripts.
21. The New Yard, on which the Library faces, bounded on the west by University
Hall, on the north by Appleton Chapel, and on the east by Sever Hall, was the
scene of the tercentenary exercises in 1936.
22. University Hall, at the left, designed by Charles Bulfinch and built in 1813-15,
is one of the most beautiful buildings in the Yard. Its gray Chelmsford granite
body, white wooden pilasters and white chimneys, provides an excellent foil for
the Georgian red brick which everywhere surrounds it. Particularly effective, in
the unusual impression of lightness which they give, are the six tall round-topped
windows of the second story which light the Faculty Room. Within is a flight of
granite stairs, each step a single granite block, so designed that they appear to
climb to the second floor unsupported. With its white wainscoting and pilasters,
green-tinted walls, and the twelve tall windows with deep-paneled reveals, the
Faculty Room is easily the handsomest room in the university. One regrets the
presence of a good many indifferent portraits of Harvard worthies. To be noted,
however, is the very fine portrait of Nicholas Boylston by John Singleton Copley,
one of the painter's most brilliant works.
23. The Statue of John Harvard, which stands in front of University Hall, was done
by Daniel Chester French in 1880, and is an imaginary likeness; no portrait of
Harvard is known to exist.
24. Massachusetts Hall was erected in 1720 with funds granted by the Province
of Massachusetts, and designed by John Leverett, then president of the college,
is the oldest of all the Harvard buildings, and in recent years has been used as the
archetype from which the style of the new buildings has been evolved. Standing
opposite University Hall, but endlong to it, it plays a lesser part in the general
impression of the Yard than the houses which face directly on the Yard. Simple
in line, with gambrel roof, end-chimneys, and white roof-rail, the belt-courses of
brick between the stories and the somewhat heavy woodwork of the windows (as
in the thick muntins) give it an air of great solidity. It is this effect which has
been sought, for the most part in the recent additions to Harvard an earlier and
heavier type of Georgian Colonial, with the emphasis on weight and simplicity.
25. Harvard Hall, to the North of Massachusetts Hall and parallel with it, built
in 1766 from the design of Sir Francis Barnard, has been largely spoiled by later
additions, in 1842 and 1870, but traces of the i8th century character may still
be seen in the upstairs lecture rooms.
26. Hollis and Stoughton Halls, to the North, are almost identical twins, the former
built in 1763 from the design of Colonel Thomas Dawes, the latter being frankly
modeled after it. They are not quite identical, however, for Hollis has belt-courses
between stories, and looks heavier than the more graceful Stoughton.
27. Holwortky Hall (1812), which closes the north end of the Yard, does most,
along with University, Hollis, and Stoughton Halls, to give the Yard its character.
Cambridge 197
It was named for Sir Matthew Holworthy, a generous English benefactor of the
college, and its architect, Loammi Baldwin, was a graduate of the college, class of
1800. The building is a very nearly perfect example of the essential unobtrusive-
ness with which, in such groupings as this, the Georgian Colonial style makes its
effect. Seen from any part of the Yard, with its simplicity, in which no detail,
not even the admirable doorways with their stone trim and splayed steps, is con-
spicuous, it affords the perfect counterfoil to University Hall, and the perfect
end-piece for the finest part of the Yard. The brick work is very good without being
quite as good as that of Hollis and Stoughton both of the latter having a color
of brick probably not to be matched in beauty today.
28. Holden Chapel (between Hollis and Stoughton) is a tiny building of which the
most conspicuous feature is the huge coat of arms with elaborate mantling (much
imitated in the new college Houses) which adorns the bright blue flush-board gable
of the eastern end. But it is also the most complete small example of pure Georgian
Colonial architecture to be seen in the Yard, and one of the finest in America.
Built in 1744, its plans were probably drawn in London. Its anonymous architect
set an example of purity which is now probably more intelligently appreciated than
in his own day.
Recross the Yard and pass University Hall to the N.
29. Apphton Chapel or Memorial Church (open daily by the west door, 9-5), built
in 1932 as a War Memorial for Harvard men, was designed by the firm of Coolidge,
Shepley, Bulfinch, and Abbott, who were also architects of the new Houses.
It tries at one and the same time to oppose the mass of Widener to the south and
the dead weight of Thayer Hall to the west, with a portico of heavy Doric columns
directed toward each. A doubtful success, though admired by some, the building
seems on the whole to be at odds with its surroundings, and not too well synthesized
in itself: the needle-fine white spire appears much too elongated for so squat and
massive a structure. Part of this effect is due to the excessive fatness of the wooden
Doric columns, and to the fact also that the pediment above the south portico
breaks the otherwise admirable long roof-line. The interior, very much in the Wren
tradition, is carried out almost wholly in white, with white Colonial pews, Corin-
thian columns, and pilasters between heavy-muntined rounded windows. The
pulpit is of the Colonial wineglass design, and advanced into the body of the church.
At the right of the nave is the Memorial Room, which commemorates the 373
Harvard men who died in the World War. The pseudo-classic treatment, carried
out in Italian travertine, is too opulent, and out of key with the rest of the church.
The low-relief figures on the north wall, by Joseph Coletti, and the sculptured
group by Malvina Hoffman do little to redeem it.
30. Robinson Hall, to the east, built in 1901 by McKim, Mead, and White, houses
the Schools of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. The entrance is properly
from the south, the side which faces Emerson, which, together with Sever and the
Fogg Museum (across Quincy St.), forms what is known as Sever Quadrangle,
one of the pleasantest quadrangles in the Yard, and the scene of the Harvard
Commencements. The small brick columns which intersperse the windows of the
second story, together with the wide shallow steps, set with urns before the door-
way, and the sculptured plaques inlaid in the walls right and left of the door, com-
bine to give an air of spaciousness to a small quadrangle which might easily have
looked a little cramped.
31. Sever Hall (1880), a red-brick building which forms the west side of the Sever
Quadrangle, was designed by Henry Hobson Richardson, famous for his adapta-
tions of the Romanesque style. Not too fortunate a specimen, it was the first, and
remains the most glaring, note of incongruity in an otherwise harmonious grouping
of Georgian Colonial buildings. Of interest is the brick carving, comparatively rare,
over the doors at front and back.
32. Emerson Hall (1905), designed by Coolidge, Shepley, Bulfinch, and Abbott
for the Philosophy Department, is a somewhat heavy building whose massive
brick columns and pilasters, of Doric design, dominate Sever Quadrangle from the
198 Main Street and Village Green
south. Beyond this, in the southeast corner of the Yard, are the President's House
(1912) (private), a brick Colonial house designed by Coolidge, Shepley, Bulfinch,
and Abbott, and the Dana-Palmer House (1820) (private), built by Thomas Foster.
To the west of this, behind Widener, and somewhat cramped for room, is Wiggles-
worth Hall (1931), which together with Straus Hall in the southwest corner of the
Yard, and Lionel and Mower Halls in the northwest (1926-31), are the most recent
additions to the Yard, showing on the whole a very skillful adaptation of the style
of Massachusetts Hall.
Exit from the Yard by the SE. gate; L. from gate on Quincy St.
33. The Fogg Art Museum (open weekdays 9-5; free) is an admirably
designed Georgian Colonial building of red brick in which function and
appearance have been skillfully combined. It was built in 1927 from the
designs of Charles A. Coolidge, with the co-operation of Henry R. Shepley
and Meyric Rogers. In addition to its use for lectures and class-work, it
houses an extremely good art collection. Noteworthy are two very fine
Spanish sculptures in wood of the i3th century, a superb group of Copley
portraits, some excellent Italian primitives, fine Tintorettos and El
Grecos, and a very large collection of prints.
34. Memorial Hall (open Mon.-Fri., 9-5; Sat. 9-1), the one fantastic
building in all the Harvard group, is an immense pile of red brick in
Victorian Gothic style, with a gargoyled tower which is a landmark for
miles. Dedicated as a memorial to Harvard men who died in defense of
the Union in the Civil War, and built between 1870 and 1878 from the
designs of Ware and Van Brunt, this remarkable building is fascinating
if only as a monument in a style now wholly discredited. The Great Hall,
at the west end, was formerly used as a dining-hall, and Sanders Theatre,
the Auditorium at the east end, is now used for part of the Commence-
ment exercises and for symphony concerts.
R. from Quincy St. into Kirkland St.
35. The Germanic Museum or Adolph Busch Hall (1917) (open weekdays
except holidays from 9-5; Sun. 1-5), corner of Divinity Ave., is a curious
and very interesting stucco and limestone building with red-tile roof.
It was done from designs by Prof. Germain Bestelmeyer of Munich, in
the pre-war Munich ' kunstlerisch ' style, the designs then being adapted
to local conditions by Dean H. Langford Warren of the Harvard School
of Architecture. The low clock-tower is not unimpressive, the outdoor
courtyard, with a cast of the Brunswick Lion, charming, and the interior
affords an admirable progressive survey of the characteristic features of
Romanesque, Gothic, and Renaissance styles. It contains also a collec-
tion, outstanding in America, of reproductions of great medieval sculpture.
L. from Kirkland St. into Divinity Ave.
36. The Semitic Museum (open weekdays 9-5; Sun. 1-4.30) houses col-
lections which relate to the history and arts of the Arabs, Aramaeans,
Assyrians, Babylonians, Hebrews, and Phoenicians. Among Assyrian
reproductions are bas-reliefs from the palace of Ashurnazirpal, King of
Assyria (884-860 B.C.) and the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III (860-
825 B.C.). In the Babylonian collection is the oldest known map (dating
Cambridge 199
from 2500 B.C.) and discovered by a Harvard expedition. Of importance
in the Palestinian collection is a model of the hill of Zion with its modern
buildings and a tentative reconstruction of Herod's Temple, made, in
1903, by Dr. Konrad Schick of Berlin. Other conjectural reconstructions
include the Tabernacle and the Temple of Solomon.
37. The Biological Laboratories, housed in what is certainly one of the
most distinguished of the university buildings, form a three-sided court
five stories in height, and offer a superb example of modern 'functional'
architecture. Largely the design of Henry Shepley (Coolidge, Shepley,
Bulfinch, and Abbott), and built in 1931 with the help of the Rockefeller
Foundation, this lovely brick building, with its harmoniously spaced tall
windows and exquisite use of plane surfaces, is a gentle reminder of what
might have been done with Widener Library. The frieze of animals
carved in the brick of the upper facing by Miss Katherine Lane, and so
skillfully done that the shadows resulting from the slant-cut carving
enhance the effect of the line, affords just the requisite offset of richness
to the beautiful simplicity of the building as a whole; and Miss Lane's
colossal bronze rhinos and carved doors complete a distinguished archi-
tectural unit.
L.from Divinity Ave. by footpath to Oxford St.
38. The University Museum (open weekdays 9-4.30; Sun. 1-4.30), opposite
Jarvis St. is a six-story rambling brick structure. Its most celebrated and
popular exhibit is that of the Glass Flowers. Glass models of the humbler
flowers of field and wood are realistically produced with an astonishing
delicacy of detail and complete botanic accuracy. The secret of this art
was discovered in the i9th century by a German family named Blaschka,
and it remains with them.
Stuffed specimens of North American Birds form one of the most com-
plete collections and the Harvard Forest Models depict the history of
land-clearing and reforestation.
L. from Oxford St. into Jarvis St.
39. The Children's Museum of Cambridge (open weekdays except Sat.
8.30-4.30; Sun. 1-4.30; closed on Sat.), 5 Jarvis St., is a small red wooden
building, a department of the Cambridge Public Schools and indirectly
connected with Harvard University through the study privileges accorded
at University Museum. The Children's Museum is less an exhibition
hall than a classroom and club center for visual education in geography
and nature study. Some of the instruction is given at the museum, some
at the public schools, and much of it in the fields. There are, however,
Indian and Eskimo models, small collections of mineral and stuffed
birds, and exhibits of such popular hobbies as postage stamps and air-
plane modeling.
L.from Jarvis St. into footpath at W. end of Children's Museum.
40. The Harvard Law School mainly occupies Langdell Hall, a long two-
story limestone building with an Ionic colonnade. This is the oldest law
2OO Main Street and Village Green
school now in existence in the United States. Its library of over 460,000
volumes is claimed to be the most complete law library in the world,
and contains the statutes, judicial decisions, and legal treatises of every
country on the globe. Portraits of eminent lawyers and judges within
its walls include canvases by Lawrence, Raeburn, Romney, Lely, and
Stuart.
R. from footpath into Cambridge St.; L. from Cambridge St. into Peabody
St.; straight ahead on Massachusetts Ave. through Harvard Square.
41. A Tercentenary Marker, corner of Dunster St., marks the Site Of
The First Meeting House, where Thomas Shepard, that 'holy heavenly
sweet affecting and soul-ravishing' preacher, held forth.
This same corner is the Site Of The House Of Stephen Daye, the first
printer in British America, who arrived here in 1638 and set up his press
under the auspices of Harvard.
R. from Massachusetts Ave. into Linden St.
42. The 'Bishop's Palace' (Apthorp House) (private) is half hidden in
a courtyard, reached by a footpath. It is a fine three-story mansion
with white clapboards, dentiled cornice, and large inner chimneys, built
in 1760 by the first minister of Christ Church (Episcopal) and named
irreverently by Provincial dissenters. It now serves as the residence of
the Master of Adams House, the nearest to the Yard of the 'New Houses.'
R. from Linden St. into Mt. Auburn St.; L. from Mt. Auburn St. into
Holyoke St.; L. from Holyoke St. into Holyoke Place.
43. These 'New Houses,' seven in number, lie between Winthrop St. and
the Charles River, from north to south, and between Boylston Street
and McCarthy Road, from west to east. Something more than dormi-
tories for the three upper classes, they serve as units for special types
of study concentration, with resident masters and tutors, and their own
libraries and dining-halls. Some of them were built originally as Fresh-
man dormitories, but their amalgamation into the Houses has done a
good deal to shift the center of the University toward the river, and has
created a little university town of great charm. Of the completely new
Houses Lowell (1930), Dunster (1930), and Eliot (1931), all designed
by Coolidge, Shepley, Bulfinch, and Abbott perhaps Lowell, which is
the largest, is also the handsomest. In all of them may be seen the
following-out of the Georgian Colonial motif, with now and then a heavy
leaning on Holden Chapel (as in the frequent use of arms and mantling
on the gables) and University Hall (as in the dining-hall of Lowell,
which bears a close resemblance to the Faculty Room). The rapidity
with which they were built has made them possibly a shade too uniform,
despite the deliberate attempt of the architects to vary them.
Retrace Holyoke Place; L. from Holyoke Place into Holyoke St.; L. from
Holyoke St. into Mill St.; R. from Mill St. into Plympton St.
44. Across the Charles River from Memorial Drive is the Harvard
Business School (graduate), visible on the opposite shore like another
Cambridge 201
fine group of the 'colleges within the college,' extending on either side
of the white-columned Baker Library (open) with its white steeple. The
establishment of the school in 1902 was accompanied by a sharp protest
from scholars in the liberal arts against its association with cultural
Harvard, but such comment has now largely disappeared. Baker Library
contains 135,000 volumes and pamphlets relating to commerce and trade.
45. The Harvard Stadium, rising 60 feet in air and approximately two
city blocks in length, is impressively visible across the river, just west
of the Business School. It is not the largest in the country but was the
first, and is still considered, with its ivy-clad arches and classic colonnade,
one of the most beautiful. It seats 22,000 on the concrete, and with
additional steel stands and temporary seats can accommodate a total
of 57,750. It was constructed under the direction of Prof. Lewis Jerome
Johnson, Class of 1887, and Joseph Ruggles Worcester, Class of 1882.
The general architectural design was worked out by George Bruns de
Gersdorff, Class of 1888, under the direction of Charles Follen McKim,
Master of Arts, Harvard 1890. The stadium, 570 feet long by 420 feet
wide, encloses a field 478 by 430 feet on which are held, in addition to
the usual athletic events, part of the Class Day festivities and outdoor
theatrical performances of note.
Tourists especially interested in Harvard University are referred to the
following additional points of interest :
Radcliffe College (10), First Parish Church (4), in list above; Mt. Auburn Cemetery
(47), Cambridge Observatory (51), and the Botanic Garden and Gray Herbarium
(52), below; also the Harvard Medical School and Arnold Arboretum (see Bos-
ton), the Thayer Bird Museum (see Tour 7, LANCASTER) and the Harvard
Astronomical Observatory (see Tour 7, HARVARD) and the Black Brook Planta-
tion (see Tour IA, HAMILTON.
CAMBRIDGE MOTOR TOUR 6m.
SW. from Harvard Square through Brattle Street; R. from Brattle Street into
Mt. Auburn St.
46. Elmwood (private), corner of Elmwood Ave., was the home of James
Russell Lowell. It is a fine three-story yellow clapboarded mansion with
white roof-rail and square yellow chimneys.
The house was built in 1767, and was first the home of Lieutenant
Governor Oliver, the last of the royal deputies in Massachusetts, who
in 1774 was forced by 4000 Cantabrigians to write his resignation and
seek safety in Boston. In 1810 Elbridge Gerry lived here while he was
Governor, just before becoming Vice-President in 1812. Lowell was born
here and made it his lifelong home, except for his absences as United
States minister to Spain and England (1877-85). Here he wrote his
'Vision of Sir LaunfaP and the first of the 'Biglow Papers.'
2O2 Main Street and Village Green
47. Mt. Auburn Cemetery (free map at gate) has famous graves of nearly
every one of note who has died in or near Boston for the past hundred
years.
Individual graves may be found by circling left from the gate, as follows: Mary
Baker Eddy, Halcyon Ave.; Oliver Wendell Holmes, Lime Ave., in the Jackson
plot of his wife's relatives; James Russell Lowell, Fountain Ave., next to the stone
of the child immortalized in 'The First Snowfall'; Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,
Indian Ridge Path, next to Gay Alice of 'The Children's Hour' (Laughing Allegra
and Edith with Golden Hair became Mrs. Thorp and Mrs. Dana, respectively) ;
Charlotte Cushman, Palm Ave. (the trustees of the cemetery would be glad to hear of
any of her heirs); Charles Sumner, Arethusa Path; Louis Agassiz, Bellwort Path,
under a boulder taken from a glacier near his birthplace in Switzerland; Margaret
Fuller, Pyrola Path; Edwin Booth, Anemone Path; Phillips Brooks, Mimosa
Path; William Ellery Channing, Greenbrier Path.
In Mt. Auburn are buried also Julia Ward Howe, Henry James, Edward Everett,
Hosea Ballou, Joseph Story, Rufus Choate, and the historians Prescott ana Park-
man.
The reason for the choice of Mt. Auburn by the families of so many
celebrities, before it became so historically noted, was that it was for
many years the only garden cemetery in the environs of Boston. It is
still one of the two most beautiful. Its grounds are thickly wooded
with rare trees and shrubs, landscaped with occasional ponds, and they
rise to a commanding hill, from which is a dreamy view of the winding
Charles River, Cambridge, Boston, and distant hills.
Retrace Mt. Auburn St.; L. from Mt. Auburn St. into Brattle St.
48. The Nichols-Lee House (private), 159 Brattle St., is a heavy-set
oblong three-story dwelling, clapboarded, except for a stone west end,
in cinnamon color, with ivory-colored wood quoins, and surmounted by
a roof-rail and a central chimney 12 feet wide, with six hoods. The
20-paned windows have brown blinds. A broad doorway, ivory colored,
with pilasters in the Doric, fronts upon a lawn enclosed by a picket
fence. The house dates from 1660, and was occupied at the time of
the Revolution by Joseph Lee, a mild and kindly Tory who thought
best to flee, but who was such a general favorite as a citizen that he was
allowed to return after the war without confiscation of his property.
When he died at over 90 years of age the entire city mourned.
49. American Thomas Lee's House (private), 153 Brattle St., is one of
several sumptuous and beautiful old mansions to be seen hereabout. It
is a three-story, clapboarded house (1685), with mansard roof, dormer
windows, white roof-rail, and massive chimneys painted white with black
hoods. It is set behind an ornamental white picket fence, on a lawn shaded
by horse chestnut trees, and broken by a terrace with a low white rail.
50. Baroness Riedesel's House (private), 149 Brattle St., is of interest as
having been the home of the Baron and Baroness Riedesel, prisoners of
war in the days of the Continental Army's second major success. The
Baron was Burgoyne's chief staff officer at Saratoga, and the Baroness's
gay and vivid letters about her social life in Cambridge are evidence that
the city treated her well, in spite of its Revolutionary sympathies. After
Cambridge 203
the Baroness left, Washington gave the house to 'English Thomas Lee/
a former Tory who changed over to the American Cause. English Thomas
was so named to distinguish him from his neighbor 'American Thomas
Lee.'
L. from Brattle St. into Craigie St.; R. from Craigie St. into Concord Ave.;
L. from Concord Ave. into Garden St.
5 1 . The Cambridge Observatory of Harvard University (open weekdays 9-5 ;
closed Sun. and holidays), 60 Garden St., is in the unmarked hilly land-
scaped grounds just across the street from the Botanic Garden (see No.
52, below).
There is a public exhibit of Astronomical Pictures on glass plates lighted
from behind. These are magnified examples of some of the famous collec-
tion of 400,000 glass plates which the University has made in studying
motions, magnitudes, and variations of celestial objects. This collection
is studied by astronomers from all over the world, and some of the plates
come from another observatory of the University in South Africa. The
beehive-like houses in the Cambridge grounds are shelters for powerful
photographic telescopes and sky-patrol cameras, which on every clear
night swing the circuit of the universe, noting everything that happens for
some billions of miles.
52. The Botanic Garden of Harvard University (open weekdays 9-5; closed
Sun. and holidays), corner of Garden and Linnaean Sts., was established
in 1807 for the cultivation of all herbaceous plants hardy in this climate.
From 1842 to 1872 Asa Gray, the celebrated botanist, was director. There
are a rock garden, a rose garden, a water garden, and a greenhouse. In
the grounds is the building of the Gray Herbarium (open only to botantists),
containing 750,000 sheets of mounted specimens.
Retrace Garden St.; L. from Garden St. into Linnaean St.
53. The Cooper-Frost-Austin House (open Thurs. 1-5; adm. 25fi, 21
Linnaean St., built in 1657, is the oldest house in the city, except possibly
for one block of the Belcher House at 94 Brattle St. It is a two-and-a-half-
story clapboard dwelling with lean-to and central chimney, furnished
in early Colonial style and owned by the Society for the Preservation of
New England Antiquities.
R. from Linnaean St. into Massachusetts Ave.
54. The Site of Oliver Wendell Holmes' s Birthplace is marked by a granite
tablet within the triangular green opposite the Common. Here as a young
physician he first displayed his shingle, on which he considered inscribing:
'The smallest fevers thankfully received.'
L. from Massachusetts Ave. into Peabody St.; R. from Peabody St. into
Kirkland St.; L. from Kirkland St. into Irving St.
55. Shady Hill (private), 136 Irving St., is a broad two-story mansion of
1790 with a long front piazza, crowning a landscaped knoll. Its chief
interest lies in its occupancy by Charles Eliot Norton (1827-1908),
Harvard Professor of Art, and personal friend of Browning, Ruskm,
2O4 Main Street and Village Green
Carlyle, and the pre-Raphaelites. Norton was one of the most admired
American scholars of the igth century, and exerted a profound influence
on all Harvard graduates of his day. Like Ruskin, however, he was deeply
concerned with the moral implications of art, and it was once slyly said
that his art courses were 'Lectures in Morals as Illustrated by Art.'
Retrace Irving St.; R. from Irving St. into Cambridge St.; L. from Cam-
bridge St. into Felton St.; L. from Felton St. into Broadway.
56. The Cambridge Public Library (open 9-9), corner of Trowbridge St.
(1889), is in the Romanesque style, of granite trimmed with sandstone.
Murals in the reading room depict 'The Evolution of the Printing Press.'
A collection of copies of paintings by old masters includes subjects by
Correggio, Domenichino, Van der Werff, Murillo, and Raphael, and an
original painting 400 years old (artist unknown), 'St. Jerome Interpreting
the Scriptures.'
R. from Broadway into Inman St.
57. The Site of General Putnam 7 s Headquarters during the Siege of Bos-
ton is marked by a tablet near the rear of City Hall. Putnam's troops
had erected a small earthworks, known as Fort Washington, on the
present Waverly Street, and had on the present Otis Street a battery
which fired by mistake on the Brattle Square Church in Boston.
L. from Inman St. into Massachusetts Ave.; L. from Massachusetts Ave.
into Main St.
58. New Towne Court, corner of Windsor St., a Federal Housing project,
is an attempt to provide attractive low-cost homes for people of small
incomes. It consists of six large and two small brick apartment buildings,
entrance to all of which is gained from the court, which runs from one
end of the unit to the other. It contains 294 modern apartments of
three, four, and five rooms, with a central heating plant. Rentals are
moderate and include the utilities: heat, water, electricity, gas, and
refrigeration. On the corner stood the house in which Elias Howe, in-
ventor of the sewing machine, lived and perfected his model.
Retrace Main St.; L.from Main St. into Massachusetts Ave.
59. The Massachusetts Institute Of Technology, corner of Memorial
Drive, occupies an 8o-acre campus in a beautiful location facing the
broad terminal basin of the Charles River and, across this, the Boston
skyline. Its 46 so-called separate buildings, of limestone and yellow
brick, in restrained neo-Classic style, are in reality almost a single
massive unit, connected by interior corridors, forming a U-shaped hollow
square. A terraced lawn spreads before them, landscaped by rhododen-
drons, poplars, and small elms, and ornamented by formal rows of
decorative lamp-posts. The central or administration building, with a
low central dome and Ionic portico, is known simply as 'Number 10.'
All the buildings are illuminated by flood-lights at night, and with their
reflection in the beautiful waters of the Charles they constitute an out-
standing attraction of Boston and Cambridge.
Chelsea 205
To scientists, every department of the Institute contains equipment and exhibits
of absorbing interest. The general public, however, finds special features of more
comprehensive appeal. In the lower right hand corridors of Building 10 are repre-
sentative exhibits, changed frequently, from the Institute's noted ceramics collec-
tion, which comprises beautiful pottery and glass from all ages and lands, including
specimens from the Chinese dynasties from 206 B.C. to A.D. 1850. In the dome of
Building 10 is the Library, one of the best in the United States in scientific and
engineering subjects.
In Building 5 is a Ship Model Museum, a part of the Institute's distinguished School
of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, which fosters one of Tech's most
popular sports, sailboat-racing in the Charles River Basin. In Building 4 is The
Colossus of Volts, a giant electrostatic generator which created the highest steady
direct voltage ever achieved by man. In the basement of Building 6 is The Round
Table of Light Camera, a great circular table, hollow at its core, with a grating of
optical glass, which has no rival as an apparatus for spectroscopy.
The Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory (Separate Building No. 35) has interest-
ing wind-testing machines. Adjoining this laboratory, in Separate Building 20, is
a large Model of the Cape Cod Canal, through which water is operated at the various
levels and forces of the tides in the actual canal.
The Walker Memorial, a separate unnumbered building, is the student social and
athletic center, distinguished by a lofty and handsome restaurant hall adorned
with a vast mural by Edwin H. Blashfield, representing 'Technology Saluted by
the Hosts of Science.' The building contains also reading rooms and a gymnasium.
Four main schools, the School of Science, the School of Engineering,
the School of Architecture, and the Graduate School, together offer over
900 subjects of instruction. In the words of President Compton, the
Institute 'pioneered in extending the laboratory method of instruction
as an indispensable educational technique. It virtually created the
modern profession of chemical engineering. Its courses in electrical and
aeronautical engineerings and in applied physics were probably the first
in the world.'
CHELSEA. City of Transformations
City: Alt. 29, pop. 42,673, sett. 1624, incorp. town 1739, city 1857.
Railroad Station: Washington Ave. and Heard St. for B. & M. R.R.
Bus Station: Markel's Drugstore, Chelsea Square, for Greyhound Lines.
Accommodations: Inns and boarding-houses.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 445 Broadway.
CHELSEA is a city of transformations. Humbly beginning as a trading
post, it has been successively a manorial estate, an agricultural com-
munity, a ferry landing, a summer resort, a residential suburb and finally
an industrial city. Its principal manufactures today are rubber, elastic
webbing, boots and shoes, and paper stock.
206 Main Street and Village Green
In 1624, Samuel Maverick, a youth of twenty-two, saw possibilities
in a permanent trade with the Indians of Winnisimet, now Chelsea, and
with some followers he set up his homestead, the first permanent one on
Boston Harbor.
Ten years later he sold out his large holdings to Governor Richard
Bellingham, one of the most extensive landowners about Boston. A
leader in the political affairs of the Bay Colony, he must have been some-
what scandalously erratic from the Puritan point of view. Quite soon
after his first wife's death, he married a woman betrothed to another
man, performing the ceremony himself. When prosecuted for this breach
of law and decorum, he, being a judge, refused to leave the bench, thereby
trying and freeing himself.
With equal independence, he adopted a procedure with regard to his
land which was not customary in New England. Dividing it up into
four farms in manorial fashion, he leased out each quarter to a tenant
farmer.
When in his eightieth year the old Governor was gathered to his
fathers, he left behind him as his final self-assertion a last will and testa-
ment that was to torment legal minds for a century to come. The contest
over this memorable will had no parallel in the country, and by tying up
the property it effectively retarded the development of early Chelsea.
Though the original Bellingham purchase transformed Chelsea from a
fur- trading post into an agricultural community, geographic location
singled it put for another and more impressive function. Boston, practi-
cally insular until after the Revolution, was reached by land from towns
to the north by a route which entailed a whole day's journey. For north-
country folk, the nearest point of mainland to Boston was Winnisimet
(Chelsea) but a mile distant by water. Consequently, the General Court
enacted a subsidy to encourage a ferry route between Boston, Charles-
town and Winnisimet. This was the first ferry in New England and
probably in North America.
The Court also kept an eye on the ferry business, regulating fares and
schedules and imposing suitable penalties for neglect of duty. The con-
venience and safety of the passage was a matter of vital concern to these
early legislators. The difficulties they themselves experienced in crossing
are vividly described in Cotton Mather's diary: 'A fearful hurricane and
thunderstorm overtook us, just as we got out of Winnisimet Ferryboat (a
ferry three miles wide), which, had it overtaken us four or five minutes
earlier, we had unquestionably perished in ye waters.'
The hazards of wind and tide often delayed travel; so, before long,
taverns sprang up near the ferry, where, besides a night's lodging, 'strong
waters ' might be had to console or embolden the traveler.
Throughout much of the nineteenth century Chelsea was a well-known
summer resort, offering not only country landscape, but also three miles
of beautiful sandy beach (now Revere).
Chelsea 207
Paradoxically, the steam ferry made and then ruined Chelsea as a
summer resort. The efficient operation of the Winnisimet Company
made commuting to Boston possible. In a phenomenally short period,
Chelsea's population passed the ten thousand mark. After a while, man-
ufacturing and shipping usurped the waterfront; the residential section
was pushed back from the sea, and congestion of population followed.
Its rustic appeal gone, many of the older inhabitants packed up and went
elsewhere. Many remaining commuters departed after the great Chelsea
fire burned their homes to the ground.
A century's upbuilding vanished in smoke on Palm Sunday morning,
April 12, 1908. Because of a heavy gale, the flames spread with remark-
able rapidity and within ten hours all buildings burned were in ruins. By
nightfall the city was a devastated waste of smoldering embers: seven-
teen thousand four hundred and fifty people were homeless. It is said
that in the entire burned area there was not enough combustible material
left to start a kitchen fire.
In the reconstruction of the city, the business section was considerably
enlarged and the population took on a decidedly cosmopolitan cast. To-
day Irish Catholics, Jews, Italians, Poles, and Armenians represent over
fifty per cent of the total population.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. City Hall, Broadway, in Bellingham Square, is in the Georgian
Colonial style, its design having been based on that of Independence
Hall at Philadelphia.
2. The Thomas Pratt House (about 1662) (occasional visitors welcome) , 481
Washington Ave., occupied by a descendant of the original owner, sets
back from the road, its steep sloping roof and huge chimneys distinguish-
ing it from the modern dwellings which surround it on every side. The
shingled exterior is in need of repair, but the interior has been well pre-
served and retains the spirit of the original design. The hand-hewn
ceiling beams in the living-room and the warped floor boards are of special
interest.
3. The Bellingham-Cary House (open Thurs. 2-5, at other times through
courtesy of the resident caretaker; adm. free}, 34 Parker St., is a square
hip-roofed frame house with interior chimneys. The original portion was
built in 1629 and was at one time the home of Governor Bellingham. It
was remodeled by Samuel Cary in 1791-92, and was purchased by the
Gary House Association in 1912. In it Washington quartered the last
outpost of the left wing of the Continental Army besieging Boston.
4. Powder Horn Hill, Hillside Ave., is so named because it was believed
sold by the Indians to the early settlers for a horn of gunpowder. On its
208 Main Street and Village Green
summit, 200 feet above sea level, is Soldiers' Home, a haven for 2500
veterans.
5. The Forbes Lithograph Co. (permission at office), Forbes St., off Crescent
Ave., has a national reputation for unique color processes.
6. The U.S. Lighthouse Service (permission from officer in charge) has a
depot at 37 Marginal St. where gaudy-colored buoys line the quays and
bright-hued lightships arrive from and depart to their lonely vigils along
the Atlantic coast.
7. The Samuel Cabot Co. (open), 229 Marginal St., a pioneer in the
field of chemical experimentation, manufactures the commercial product
known as Sylpho-Nathol. This firm is also nationally famous for its
research in the field of shingle stains.
8. The Pulaski Monument, Chelsea Square, a medallion head on a
granite shaft, was erected by the Poles of Chelsea, and dedicated in 1931
in honor of the great Polish patriot of the Revolutionary War.
9. The Chelsea Clock Co. (permission at office), 284 Everett Ave., is
internationally known for its marine clocks.
C H I C O P E E . The Future-Minded
City: Alt. 92, pop. 41,952, sett. 1652, incorp. town 1848, city 1890.
Railroad Stations: Chicopee Station, Exchange St., and Willimansett Station,
near Prospect St., for B. & M. R.R.
Bus Station: 276 Exchange St. for Blue Way Line.
Accommodations: Hotels and tourist houses.
Swimming: Municipal pools in Nash Field (Willimansett), and on Front St.
CHICOPEE, a manufacturing city just above Springfield on the Con-
necticut River and across the river from Holyoke, consists of three
separate units, Chicopee, Chicopee Falls, and Willimansett. These are
all manufacturing centers, but the outlying districts have a rural char-
acter. Of its 41,952 inhabitants, over half are of foreign-born parentage,
with French-Canadian predominating. It has sixteen large industrial
plants, those outstanding being A. G. Spalding Company, specialists in
sporting goods, and the Fisk Rubber Company, the second largest
rubber factory in the world.
The residential parts of the manufacturing sections are crowded with
the homes of the workers, individual frame or brick dwellings with little
tree-shaded yards, or solid blocks of tenements. Springfield Street, in
Chicopee 209
the better residential quarter, has a look of considerable prosperity and
Victorian charm.
The Chicopee River, bisecting the city from east to west, is so banked
with factories as to be hidden from sight, but where it joins the Con-
necticut River there are broad, elm-shaded meadows. These meadows
and the river attracted the first settlers.
On April 20, 1641, the Indian Nippumsuit deeded land now included in
Chicopee to William Pynchon in return for ' fifteen fathom of wampum
by tale accounted and one yard and three quarters of double shagg
bags, one bow, seaven knifes, seaven payer of sessars and seaven owles
with certaine fish hooks and other small things given at their request.'
The region remained a part of Springfield until its incorporation as a
town in 1848.
Down to the last days of the eighteenth century Chicopee continued a
quiet farming community. Then certain industrial-minded men of the
town perceived possibilities in the water-power of the Chicopee River,
which cut through the main section of the town into the Connecticut
River. Others set about mining bog iron (iron ore) and erecting blast
furnaces. In 1805, Benjamin Belcher bought out from his two partners
an iron foundry on the Chicopee River and prospered.
In 1822, Edmund Dwight, of the Boston and Springfield Manufacturing
Company, decided upon Chicopee for the site of a textile factory. He
located at a natural waterfall, now called Chicopee Falls, and the corpo-
ration he founded is today the Chicopee Manufacturing Company.
Later, in 1829, Nathan Ames and his father and brother were settled in
Chicopee, busily manufacturing edged tools and cutlery, electro-plated
silverware, and swords. Heretofore, Army and Navy swords had been
imported from abroad, but the Ames brothers began filling government
contracts, their products rivaling the illustrious blades of Toledo and
Damascus. By 1853 the Ames Manufacturing Company had expanded
to include a department of bronze statuary, the first of its kind in America.
The first friction matches in the country are claimed to have been made
in Chicopee in 1835; some of them are still in the possession of old Chico-
pee families.
By 1845 the town of Chicopee, with a population of 8000, had set up its
own government. The citizens, feeling that they had interests foreign
to those of Springfield, broke away from that city. Chicopee was then
known as Cabotville, not taking its present name until a later period.
Prior to the Civil War, Chicopee was one of the stations in the Under-
ground Railroad to Canada. A. G. Parker, a shoe manufacturer, har-
bored numerous fugitive slaves in his home on Chicopee Street. Not
infrequently funds were raised to buy freedom for runaway Negroes.
One illustrious son of Chicopee, Edward Bellamy, became internationally
famous. Within ten years of publication, almost a million copies had
been sold of his 'Looking Backward,' best known of American Utopias.
2io Main Street and Village Green
Translations into German, French, Italian, Russian, Arabic, Bulgarian,
and several other languages and dialects brought this Chicopee man's
name into many parts of the world.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. City Hall, Front and Springfield Sts., is an Italian Gothic building in
red brick designed by Charles Edward Parker and erected in 1871. It
is arresting because of its very high, slender, square tower, capped by a
pointed roof, and its second-story stained-glass windows and beautiful
rose window.
2. The white Victorian Stebbins Mansion (private), Springfield St., now
a part of the College of Our Lady of the Elms, is a typical American
Victorian dwelling of the best type, complete with a little tower, narrow
projecting ells, offering bay windows, and a little porch with fretwork
pillars. It is reminiscent of the Swiss chalet.
3. The Ames Mansion (at present still occupied by an Ames descendant,
but open free as a museum at suitable daylight hours), Front St., corner of
Grape St., is a square two-story brick residence of 1844, with an almost
flat hip roof, and is set in a gardened lawn behind a picket fence. It con-
tains some delightfully personal mementoes of sorts: a bronze wall can-
delabrum taken from the White House when gas was installed, an in-
vitation to dinner with President Lincoln, a punchbowl brought from
Japan by Commodore Perry in 1851, a landscape by Albert Biers tadt
painted surreptitiously by him as a present to his host, a presentation
autographed photograph of Mary Garden.
4. Edward Bellamy's Birthplace (private), 93 Church St., Chicopee Falls,
is a small two-and-a-half-story plain white clapboarded house with a
small ell and two porches. Here the son of a Baptist minister mused on
the theme of social equality later to be treated by him in 'Looking Back-
ward' and 'Equality.'
CONCORD. Golden-Age Haven
Town: Alt. 135, pop. 7723, sett, about 1635, incorp. 1635.
Railroad Station: B. & M. R.R. (Fitchburg Division), Thoreau St.
Bus Stations: B. & M. Transportation Co., Colonial Inn, Monument Square,
and R.R. Station; Grey Line sightseeing tour from Hotel Brunswick, Boston.
LITERARY LANDMARKS
ONE might suppose that the authors of Massachusetts had
been influenced by the dignity and spare simplicity of the
houses which sheltered them. Elmwood, the Cambridge home
of James Russell Lowell, and the Craigie-Longfellow House
are graceful Georgian mansions. The two views of the rooms
in the Antiquarian House in Concord reflect Emerson's love of
ingenuous, homely order. The rambling country house where
Longfellow set the scene of the * Tales' is still the Wayside
Inn, Sudbury; Fruitlands, in Harvard, is where Alcott and his
{ English Mystics ' struggled with farming for their ideal of a
consociate family. And the Orchard House, on the main Con-
cord road, is today very much as it was when Bronson and
Louisa May Alcott lived in it, with sister May's sketches still
preserved on the walls and doors of the girls' rooms.
It was in the Salem Custom House that Hawthorne spent un-
happy years as a clerk. After he had left Salem, he wrote
'The House of the Seven Gables,' a story which is vividly re-
called by the tinkle of the bell above the door through which
visitors enter. The tale of Moby Dick, the white whale, was
written at Arrowhead, in Pittsneld, where Melville worked,
and on the same page is pictured the house (austere as his
writings) where Thoreau lived.
The stately, shadowed house in Amherst is the Emily Dickin-
son home. On the right, in the second story, is the 'window
facing west.' The Dickinson memorabilia may be seen in The
Evergreens, the house across the lawn, built by Emily's bro-
ther in 1856.
ELMWOOD (JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL HOUSE), CAMBRIDGE
CRAIGIE-LONGFELLOW HOUSE, CAMBRIDGI
u 1. 1.1 u 1-1
CUSTOM HOUSE, SALEM
EMERSON ROOM, ANTIQUARIAN HOUSE, CONCORD
WAYSIDE INN, SUDBURY
FRUITLANDS, HARVARD
ORCHARD HOUSE, CONCORI
HOUSE OF SEVEN GABLES, SALEM
ARROWHEAD (BUSH-MELVILLE HOUSE), PITTSFIELD
THOREAU'S HOUSE, CONCORI
EMILY DICKINSON HOUSE, AMHERST
Concord 211
Accommodations: Several inns and rooms in private houses.
Information: Independent Information Bureau, 26 School St.
CONCORD, situated where the Sudbury and Assabet join to form the
Concord River, is rich in historical and literary associations. It shares
with Lexington the honor of being the birthplace of the American Revo-
lution; later, in the 'Golden Age' of American literature, it was a haven
for poets, authors, naturalists, and philosophers.
The Concord River has not attracted great industries, so that the
village is predominantly residential, retaining much of its quiet Colonial
atmosphere. Around the Green are grouped the trim red-brick and clap-
boarded shops of the business district. Along the river, so slow-moving
that Hawthorne said he lived beside it for weeks before discovering which
way it flowed, stand fine white houses on broad lawns that slope down to
the water's edge. Tall elms shade other homes distinguished by the
beautifully proportioned doorways and panelled interiors that are a
heritage of eighteenth-century craftsmanship. Outlying fields are given
over to farms.
In 1635, scarcely five years after Boston had been settled, Simon
Willard, a fur trader, and the Reverend Peter Bulkeley led about a dozen
families to this spot, then the Indian village of Musketaquid. It was the
furthermost inland point in the wilderness. With garments, hatchets,
knives, and cloth the settlers purchased from the Massachusetts tribe a
plantation described as 'six myles of land square,' then clinched the bar-
gain by smoking the pipe of peace with the Indian chieftains. The name
'Concord' commemorates this friendship, a friendship that was never
broken.
It went hard with the settlers during the first winters, but the settle-
ment slowly grew, in the latter half of the century becoming a county
seat. The first county convention to protest against the Acts of Parlia-
ment met here in August of 1774; the First Provincial Congress in October
of the same year. From March 22 until four days before the Battle at the
Bridge, the Second Provincial Congress held sessions in the town.
Throughout this period Concord was a depot for military stores and
consequently a focal point for British attack. On April 19, 1775, after
Dr. Samuel Prescott and William Dawes had carried Paul Revere's mes-
sage to Concord, the British redcoats appeared and, as the Concord Min-
utemen advanced across the Concord Bridge, fired the ' shot heard round
the world.'
During the siege of Boston that followed, so many patriots took refuge
in Concord that a Boston town meeting was called here. Again, while
Harvard served as a barracks for American forces, the university classes
were conducted in Concord. The town was the seat of the Middlesex
field of Shays's Rebellion.
Following a post-war period of readjustment, Concord entered upon
its second phase this time as an important center of American culture.
CONCORD
TOUR
Concord 213
Here Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote his greatest essays, poems, and jour-
nals, and revived the philosophy of Transcendentalism. Closely associ-
ated with the Transcendentalist movement were Nathaniel Hawthorne,
novelist; Franklin B. Sanborn, journalist, philanthropist, and biographer;
and William Ellery Channing the poet. While not residents in Concord,
Margaret Fuller, editor of the School of Philosophy's organ the Dial, and
Elizabeth Fuller, Boston educator who established the first American
kindergarten, were of this literary group.
By the shores of Walden Pond, Emerson's intimate friend, Henry
David Thoreau, the naturalist, fled from society, built his hut and studied
the trees and birds he was to write about in 'Walden, or Life in the Woods.'
In the building known as Hillside Chapel, Amos Bronson Alcott opened
his School of Philosophy, while his more practical wife and daughters
wrestled with the humdrum problem of making ends meet. As a result
of their struggles, Mr. Alcott's daughter Louisa May wrote her series of
books, the most autobiographical of which, 'Little Women,' has taken its
place among children's classics. Margaret Sidney (Mrs. Harriet Mulford
Stone Lothrop) was another Concord author, and Jane Austin wrote here
the 'Nameless Nobleman.' Daniel Chester French (1850-1931) of Concord
has won fame for his sculptures. These are represented in his home town
by the Minuteman, the Melvin Memorial, and a statue of Emerson.
Concord men have made contributions outside the field of the arts.
Harrison Gray Dyer erected the first telegraph line in this country and
William Monroe made the first lead pencils in America. In 1853 Ephraim
Bull bred the Concord grape, a development which began the commercial
production of table grapes in America.
Though Concord, with its many memories, seems so much a part of an
older New England, it is nevertheless a flourishing modern village. Today
ten small factories and a busy tourist trade supplement the revenue that
comes to Concord from its position as trading center for farm and garden
products. Many Boston families have in recent years established their
homes here, since Concord is within commuting distance.
CONCORD MAP INDEX
1. Monument Square n. First Parish Church
2. Emerson Elm 12. Concord Art Association
3. Sleepy Hollow Cemetery 13. Reuben Brown House
4. Bullet-Hole House 14. Emerson House
5. Old Manse 15. Antiquarian House
6. Battle Ground 16. School of Philosophy
7. Colonial Inn 17. Orchard House
8. Public Library 18. Wayside
Q. Thoreau-Alcott House 19. Grapevine Cottage
10. Wright Tavern 20. Site of the Attack by Minute Men
214 Main Street and Village Green
TOUR 7.0 m.
NW. from Lexington Rd. through Monument Square.
1. Monument Square has three war memorials on its Green. In the
center is the huge granite shaft of the Civil War Memorial; the Boulder
at the north end of the Green commemorates the heroes of the Spanish
War; the World War Memorial, a boulder now almost covered with ivy,
bears Emerson's words:
'So nigh is grandeur to our dust,
So near is God to Man,
When duty whispers low, "Thou must,"
The youth replies, "I can.'"
2. In front of the Town Hall, NE. of the square is the Emerson Elm.
Under this tree for the past three generations Concord men on their way
to battle have been addressed by a member of the Emerson family.
R.from Monument Square into Monument St.; R. from Monument St. into
Court Lane; straight ahead into Bedford Rd.
3. Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, lying in an oval basin surrounded by high
ridges and tall trees, holds the graves of many of Concord's notable dead
-Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau, the Alcotts, Elizabeth Peabody,
William Ellery Channing, Frank Sanborn. Here lie Colonel Prescott
and members of the Hoar family, prominent in national politics during
the last century. The tombstone of Ephraim Bull, who lacked the
shrewdness to profit by his development of the Concord grape, bears the
significant epitaph: 'He sowed, others reaped.'
Retrace Bedford Rd. into Court Lane; R. from Court Lane into Monument
St.
4. Bullet-Hole House (private], 36 Monument St., the original portion of
which was built in 1644, is probably the oldest house in Concord. It is a
two-and-a-half-story white, yellow-trimmed structure with a plain board
front, a clapboarded ell, and a mansard roof. During the battles of Con-
cord and Lexington, Elisha Jones, a Minuteman, guarded Colonial
military supplies stored in this house. When the British began their re-
treat, Elisha rashly appeared at the door and was fired upon. The bullet-
hole is still to be seen, enclosed in a glass case at the left of the door in
the ell.
5. Old Manse, adjacent to the Battleground (open weekdays 10-6; Sun.
12-6), a dark gray, clapboarded, three-story structure with a gambrel
roof, was built in 1765 by the Rev. William Emerson, the militant min-
ister, grandfather of the writer Ralph Waldo Emerson. Hawthorne
lived here for a time and made it the setting for 'Mosses from an Old
Manse.'
Concord 215
L. from Monument St. into footpath.
6. Battleground, made famous in 1775. The Minuteman, the first
statue by Daniel Chester French, guards this site. Too poor to afford
a model, the sculptor is said to have used as model a statue of Apollo
Belvedere arrayed in the dress of the Minutemen. Near-by is a concrete
reproduction of the original wooden Concord Bridge over which the
Americans crossed in pursuit of the British attacking force. A tablet
marks the graves of two British soldiers.
Retrace to Monument St.; R. from Monument St. into Monument Square.
7. Colonial Inn, n Monument Square (open the year round) , faces the
Concord Green at its northern end. The inn, a long rambling yellow
structure formed by joining together three adjacent houses, is in an ex-
cellent state of preservation. The original unit was built in 1770. The
taproom holds its original fittings besides Revolutionary relics.
R. from Monument Square on Main St.
8. Public Library, corner of Sudbury Rd., a red-brick structure lately
modernized, has French's statue of Emerson, cabinets of Indian relics,
volumes by Concord authors, paintings, and other objects of historic
and artistic interest.
9. Thoreau-Alcott House (private), 75 Main St., a buff-colored dwelling,
is the house in which Thoreau died.
Retrace Main St.; R. from Main St. into Lexington Rd.
10. Wright Tavern (open as a hotel), 2 Lexington Rd., built in 1747, is
the oldest existing tavern in Concord. The exterior, hip-roofed, with
two large chimneys, retains much architectural charm. Here Major
Pitcairn had his headquarters on April 19, 1775, and here he made his
boast that before night he would ' stir the blood of the damned Yankee
rebels.'
11. First Parish Church (Unitarian) is on the site of the building in
which sat the First and Second Provincial Congresses, with John Hancock
presiding and William Emerson as chaplain.
12. Concord Art Association (open April-Oct. 15), 15 Lexington Rd.,
housed in a white clapboarded building with a central chimney, has
permanent exhibits of unusual historical interest. During the summer
months resident artists hold exhibitions.
i2a. The Concord Summer School of Music, 21 Lexington Rd., founded in
1914, and directed by Thomas Whitney Surette, gives a series of three
public chamber music concerts each summer. Public classes (free) in folk
dancing are also conducted.
13. Reuben Brown House (open as tearoom), 27 Lexington Rd., a red
clapboarded structure with white trim and with a central chimney,
was the home of Reuben Brown, a saddler by trade, who brought back
from Lexington the news of the outbreak of hostilities. The British fired
his house, but it was saved.
216 Main Street and Village Green
14. Emerson House (open weekdays 9.30-11.30, 1.30-3.30 and fry appoint-
ment), Lexington Rd. and Cambridge Turnpike, is a square white dwell-
ing in a setting of pines. In 1820 Emerson himself built the house, and
here he lived from 1835 until his death in 1882, except for the period of
his European tour, when Thoreau occupied the house. The Victorian
interior shows furnishings, portraits, hangings of Emerson's day as well
as the philosopher's fine library of classics and first editions.
15. Antiquarian House (open weekdays April ig-Nov. n, 10-5.30, Sun.
2-5; after Nov. n, 10-5; adm. 25^), Lexington Rd. at Cambridge Turn-
pike, is one of the most important museums in Concord. The two-and-
one-half-story brick structure with green blinds, has a pitched roof and
two wings. The museum contains several authentic New England period
rooms, in which are admirably displayed furniture, glass, and china dat-
ing from the iyth to the igth centuries. The Emerson Room reproduces
the philosopher's study with its furnishings kept just as they were when
he died. Thoreau's books, flute, and surveyor's chain, as well as articles
from the Walden hut, are exhibited in the room bearing his name.
1 6. School of Philosophy, Lexington Rd., once known as the Hillside
Chapel, is a small, unpainted building with Gothic doors and windows.
Here for nearly a decade Bronson Alcott gathered together leaders of
American thought.
17. Orchard House (open weekdays April ig-Oct. 31, 10-6, Sun. 2-6; adm.
25^), a tan two-and-a-half-story house with central chimney and small
paned windows, was the second home of the Alcotts. The old house,
considered unlivable, was shaded by great elms in front. In the rear was
an apple orchard. The members of the Bronson family repaired, painted,
and papered the house. The interior and the Alcott furnishings, books,
and pictures are all preserved. Drawings by 'Amy' are still on the doors
and walls of her room. It was here at 'Apple Slump,' as she called it,
that Louisa May Alcott wrote the first part of 'Little Women.'
1 8. Wayside (open daily May 3 -Nov. n, 9-6; adm. 25^), near Haw-
thorne Rd., was known as Hillside during the residence of Bronson
Alcott in 1845-48. Here Louisa and her sisters spent part of their girl-
hood, and here in the barn they staged their early plays. Hawthorne,
upon purchasing the property in 1852, named it Wayside, and lived here
until his death in 1864. In the tower that he built as a refuge from
visitors, Hawthorne wrote 'Tanglewood Tales' and the * Marble Faun.'
Margaret Sidney, while a resident at Wayside, wrote several volumes of
her children's series, 'The Five Little Peppers.' On display are photo-
stats of pages of Hawthorne manuscript and letters, as well as furniture
belonging to Hawthorne and Margaret Sidney.
19. Grapevine Cottage (open as tearoom), a gambrel-roofed cottage, has
a tablet identifying it as the home of Ephraim Wales Bull. For many
years a trellis against the cottage wall supported the original Concord
grapevine. Recently this was winter-killed, but the present vine is a
shoot from the same root. On the trellis is a tablet inscribed with a
Dedham 217
quotation from Bull's journal: 'I looked to see what I could find among
our wildings. The next thing to do was to find the best and earliest grape
for seed, and this I found in an accidental seedling at the foot of the hill.
The crop was abundant, ripe in August, and of very good quality for a
wild grape. I sowed the seed in the Autumn 1843. Among them the
Concord was the only one worth saving.'
20. A tablet, junction of Lexington Rd. and Old Bedford Rd., indicates
the Site of the Attack made by the Minutemen of Concord and neighbor-
ing towns upon the British while they were retreating from North Bridge,
April 19, 1775.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN THE ENVIRONS
1. W olden Pond Reservation, 1.5 m. S. of the village (see Tour 1 C).
2. Concord Reformatory, W. Concord (see Tour 2).
3. Middlesex School for Boys (1901), about 3 m. N. of Concord on Lowell
Rd., is a college preparatory school with fine modern buildings, dormi-
tories and equipment.
D E D H A M . The Sober-Minded
Town: Alt. in, pop. 15,371, sett. 1635, incorp. 1636.
Railroad Station: Dedham Station, off High St., for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.
Bus Station: 380 Washington St. for New England Transportation Co.
Accommodations: Inns and boarding-houses charge reasonable rates.
Information: Board of Trade, Hartnett Square.
FEW towns in Massachusetts have changed as little in their basic char-
acteristics between the time of settlement and the present day as has
Dedham. In its earliest beginnings and through the pioneer period it
was known as a sober-minded and solid community full of the well-
recognized virtues of citizenship; and this reputation still endures,
embodied in the substantial architecture of its center and the comfortable
residential uniformity of its surrounding districts.
The permanent character of the town was determined at its very genesis
by the character of the men who settled it. The Dedham settlers were
not religious enthusiasts or sentimental visionaries. They cared for all
218 Main Street and Village Green
the solid respectable things of life. For many of them the new land
promised primarily social and economic advancement. So they chose
a place on a pleasant river, well watered by subsidiary streams, and
blessed with a fruitful soil. The town covenant announced their purpose
of being 'a loving and comfortable society.' And in the word 'comfort-
able' they certainly meant to include physical comfort. It is significant
that in their petition to the General Court they requested that their town
should be named * Contentment.' These were sober persons who wanted
security, a congenial group, and the goods of life.
Moreover, the founders had a penchant for law and civic regulation.
The Dedham town covenant antedated the first code of colony laws by
several years.
Had the new town been situated on the shore, a spirit of adventure might
have been stimulated. Men who go down to the sea in ships learn to take
chances; the infinite variability of wind and sky and season accustoms
them to change. No such salty alchemy wrought upon the men of
Dedham. It was sheltered from the bufferings of circumstance. Even
the Indian wars hardly touched it.
Other settlements of Massachusetts might be more conspicuous, self-
assertive as leaders of Colonial development, finally revolutionary; the
Dedhamites went sanely and solidly on their way, laying the foundations
of a prosperous industrial and residential town.
TOUR 6 m.
W. from Dedham Square on High St. (State 135).
1. The building of the Dedham Historical Society (open weekdays 2-5),
612 High St., erected in 1887, contains a collection which includes among
many notable items, a mother-of-pearl tea chest, exquisitely carved,
brought from China before 1775 and donated by the Quincy family; a
Simon Willard clock with an unusual astronomical base made about
1780; wallpaper depicting a Roman chariot race, taken about 1819 from
the dining-room of the Dickson House on High St. ; and a steam jack in
use about 1765 and probably the first steam machine in the country.
The jack is composed of a water-compartment and an arrangement of
cogs attached to a roas ting-spit. The water-compartment was bedded
in the fire on the hearth. As the water boiled, the spit turned and browned
the roast. Among documents preserved in the vault is the original
manuscript of a diary (1726-29, 1729-75) kept by Dr. Nathaniel Ames,
Jr., the editor of an almanac which rivaled Benjamin Franklin's in
popularity in its time.
2. The Thayer House (private), 618 High St., a two-story yellow-painted
clapboarded structure with two chimneys, brick ends, and a small ell,
has grown shabby with the passing years, during which four generations
Dedham 219
of Thayers have lived and died within it; but on the door gleams a
brightly polished brass Masonic emblem placed there in 1831 by Dr.
Elisha Thayer at the time of a national attack on the Masonic Order,
when Dedham Masons were being stoned in the streets.
3. The Norfolk County Courthouse (1827) is an imposing edifice of gray
stone with a dome and frontal columns. Within its walls have been
pleaded many interesting cases. First of these was the controversy be-
tween the Natick Indians and the town over certain lands occupied by
the Indians. The latter won but Dedham was allotted 8000 acres in the
west (now Deerfield) in compensation.
A second noteworthy trial centered around the Fisher Tavern, later to
be known as the Ames Tavern and finally as the Woodward Tavern
(see below}. Dr. Nathaniel Ames, Sr., married a Fisher. By a series of
four deaths in rapid succession, the last that of an infant, the tavern came
into probate court. Ames brought suit for possession and won his case,
the first ruling in Massachusetts by which a father inherited a deceased
child's estate.
Of prime importance was the litigation culminating in 1818 with an
historic decision of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, which gave
to the Dedham Parish, rather than to the church fellowship, the right
to elect ministers, and thus paved the way for the rise of Unitarianism
in Massachusetts.
The most notorious of all Dedham trials was that of Sacco and Vanzetti
before Judge Webster Thayer in 1921. The injection into the trial of
political considerations, the quality of the testimony, the attitude of the
judge, the dragging-out of the trial over six long years aroused a world-
wide storm of denunciation from pulpit and press, resulting in the ap-
pointment of a commission headed by ex-President Lowell of Harvard.
The commission reported that it believed the trial had been fairly con-
ducted and had reached a proper conclusion. Sacco and Vanzetti were
executed following the publication of this report. But ten years after
the case, a play based on it won the Pulitzer prize, and a brochure on
the report of the Lowell Commission was circulated at the Harvard
Tercentenary Celebration in 1936. 'Though the tomb is sealed, the dry
bones still rattle,' said Heywood Broun.
4. A tablet on the Norfolk County Registry, another large gray stone
building, across from the courthouse, commemorates the Site of Woodward
(Fisher) Tavern, where was held the Suffolk Convention for the drawing-
up of the Suffolk Resolves. The legend reads in part: 'They lighted the
match that kindled the mighty conflagration of the American Revolution.'
Another tablet marks this site as the Birthplace of Fisher Ames (1758-
1808), a member of the Massachusetts Constitutional Convention and
a distinguished Federalist, author of the Lucius Junius Brutus papers
written in denunciation of Shays's Rebellion.
5. On the Church Green at the southeast corner of High and Court Sts.
is the stone Base of the Pillar of Liberty, erected in 1766 by the Sons of
DEDHAM
TOUR
Dedham 221
Liberty to glorify William Pitt for his vigorous opposition to the Stamp
Act.
6. The First Church in Dedham (Unitarian) fronts on the Church Green.
A dignified and simple type of American Georgian architecture, built
about 1768, it is painted white and has a steeple and two round-topped
doors.
7. A tablet in front of the church marks the Site of the First Free Public
School in America (built 1649) to be supported by general taxation.
8. The Haven House (open as Dedham Community House; tearoom), 669
High St., was built by Judge Samuel Haven in 1795. Two venerable
English elms standing in front of the house were set out by the judge in
1789, when he graduated from college.
9. The Dexter House (private), 699 High St., was built about 1762 by
Samuel Dexter, member of the Provincial Congress, 1774-75. The in-
terior retains its 18th-century features including the beautiful staircase
with elaborate balusters, high paneled wainscoting and ample fireplaces.
Retrace High St.; R. from High St. on Bullard St.; L.from Bullard St. into
Village Ave.
10. St. Paul's Episcopal Church is an impressive edifice of rough granite.
Most of the buildings of the business section of Dover, an adjoining town,
are tenants on 999-year leases of lands bequeathed to this church in 1757
by Samuel Colburn.
11. Horace Mann's Law Office (private), 74 Church St., diagonally op-
posite St. Paul's Church across Village Square, is now a two-and-a-half-
story, broad gabled dwelling; its original character has been lost by re-
modeling. Horace Mann occupied it from 1828 until 1835, while he was
a representative from Dedham in the General Court.
L.from Village Ave. into Court St.; straight ahead into Ames St.
12. The Powder House, opposite 162 Ames St., is perched on a rocky
knoll. A tiny cube, hardly bigger than a large closet and surmounted by
a (restored) conical roof, it was built in 1766 of bricks formed of clay from
local pits and baked in a local kiln.
L.from Ames St. on Bridge St.
DEDHAM MAP INDEX
1 . The Dedham Historical Society 10. St. Paul's Episcopal Church
2. Thayer House n. Horace Mann's Law Office
3. Norfolk County Courthouse 12. Powder House
4. Site of Woodward (Fisher) Tavern 13. Noble and Greenough School
5. Pillar of Liberty 14. Fairbanks House
6. First Church in Dedham 15. Avery Oak
7. Site of first free public school 16. Dedham Pottery
8. Haven House 17. Mother Brook
9. Dexter House
222 Main Street and Village Green
13. Granite gateposts mark the entrance to the campus of the Noble and
Greenough School for boys, a non-sectarian institution originally estab-
lished (1886) in Boston as a preparatory school for Harvard. In 1917 the
Volkmann School was combined with it, and in 1922 it moved to Dedham.
Well worth an extra ten minutes is the drive along the charming wooded
lane with views (R) of a picturesque main building set high on a rocky
eminence like a luxurious castle with red tiled roof and (L) of athletic
fields, modern new buildings, and a small lake.
Retrace Bridge St.; R. from Bridge St. into Ames St.; L. from Ames St. into
High St.; cross Dedham Square; R. from High St. into Eastern Ave.
14. The Fairbanks House (open daily 9-6, Apr. 19 to Nov. 1; contribution
expected) stands at the corner of East St. Set on a mound lawn and
shaded by giant elm trees this long, low, faded brown house stretches
along in three sections, its lower story massed by flowering shrubs. The
roof sags in two deep curves on each side from the great central chimney
and slopes almost to the ground in the rear. The central block, built in
1636, with two wings of different architecture added at a later date, is
generally conceded to be the oldest frame house still standing in America.
Like Dedham itself in 1936, it celebrated its 3ooth anniversary. Furnished
with family heirlooms, it is a shrine for 6000 Fairbanks families in-
corporated as descendants of the builder, Jonathan Fairbanks. Five
doors lead from a small entrance hall to other parts of the dwelling. The
step down into the kitchen is a simple log, worn concave by the feet of
many generations of Fairbanks.
L. from Eastern Ave. into East St.
15. The Avery Oak, 80 feet in height and 16 feet in circumference, stand-
ing on the lawn of a modern frame house (R) half a block down, is under
the protection of the Dedham Historical Society. This patriarch of a
vanished forest was ' marked ' in its prime to be used in the construction
of the frigate ' Constitution,' but the Averys refused to sell it.
R. from East St. into High St.; R. from High St. into Pottery Lane.
1 6. The Dedham Pottery (open, guide provided) is an attractive brick
building within which is made, by secret process, a famous blue-and-
white porcelain reminiscent of old Chinese crackleware.
Retrace Pottery Lane; L. from Pottery Lane into High St.; R. from High St.
into Washington St.; L. from Washington St. into US 1.
17. Mother Brook, believed to be the first canal in America, connects
the Charles and Neponset Rivers. The narrow channel, long unused
now, was dug, according to the tablet, 'before 1640,' to provide water
for the mills of the early settlers, and was the basis of the town's in-
dustrial growth.
DEERFIELD. ,4 Beautiful Ghost
Town: Alt. 204, pop. 2963, sett. 1673, incorp. 1677.
Railroad Stations: Memorial St., Deerneld and Elm Sts., South Deerneld, for
B. & M. R.R.
Bus Stations: Elm St. for B. & M. Transportation Co.; Billings Drugstore for
Blue Way Line.
Accommodations: One hotel open summer only, Deerneld; two hotels open all
year, South Deerneld. Tourist houses.
Information: See Greenfield.
IF IT is no exaggeration to say that Deerneld is not so much a town as
the ghost of a town, its dimness almost transparent, its quiet almost a
cessation, it is essential to add that it is probably quite the most beautiful
ghost of its kind, and with the deepest poetic and historic significance to
be found in America. Salem, with its somber echoes of the witch hang-
ings, of the brighter pages of the clipper-ship trade with the East, New
Bedford with its whale-ships, Concord with its bold patriotism and its
almost unexampled literary flowering these all perhaps have a greater
' importance.' But Deerneld has something to say which none of these
say, and says it perfectly. It is, and will probably always remain, the
perfect and beautiful statement of the tragic and creative moment when
one civilization is destroyed by another. And the wonderful ghostliness of
this mile-long 'Street' of grave and ancient houses, the strange air of
unreality which hangs over it, arises precisely from the fact that the little
town is really saying two things at once. It is saying, 'I dared to be
beautiful, even in the shadow of the wilderness'; but it is also saying,
1 And the wilderness haunts me, the ghosts of a slain race are in my door-
ways and clapboards, like a kind of death.'
The air of unreality, moreover, is simplified and heightened by the fact
that Deerfield is one of those towns which have literally and completely
been forgotten by time: it has fallen asleep. To all intents, nothing has
happened there for two hundred years; and the whole history of its
greatness is crowded into the first three decades of its existence, the
violent and dreadful years from 1672 to 1704, when it was the northwest
frontier of New England, the spearhead of English civilization in an un-
known and hostile country. The town of Dedham having been awarded
a grant of land in 1663 (see DEDHAM), the site of Deerfield was 'laid
out' in the Pocumtuck country just west of the Connecticut River in
1665. Not a single Dedham man settled there until 1669, when Samuel
Hinsdell of Dedham, a squatter, began the cultivation of the fertile
soil, where the Pocumtucks had grown their corn and pumpkins and
tobacco; and by 1672 Samson Frary and others had joined him. After
224 Main Street and Village Green
two expeditions to Boston, Hinsdell got the consent of the General Court
to form a township.
A minister was procured and the little town throve. In 1673 it had
twenty families, and two years later its population numbered 125. But
seeming peace and prosperity were to prove only an illusion: with the
outbreak of King Philip's War began the interminable series of Indian
and French attacks on Deerfield which for thirty years kept its inhabi-
tants in constant terror. The two most famous of these the Bloody
Brook massacre of 1675 an d the great Deerfield raid of 1704 practically
emptied the town: the first, in fact, wholly, and the second of all save its
garrison. In 1675 the garrison was withdrawn, the families were scat-
tered among the towns lower in the valley, and for seven years Deerfield's
houses were empty.
Not to be discouraged, the survivors in 1678 presented a petition to the
General Court asking leave to return. They had their way, the town was
re-established in 1682, and in 1686 was held its first town meeting. John
Williams, destined to become Deerfield's most famous citizen, came to
take over the church in the same year, induced by the handsome offer of
' sixteen cow-commons of meadow-land,' a 'homelott,' and a house
'forty- two foot long, twenty foot wide, with a lentoo.' Of Williams's part
in the great raid of 1704, during Queen Anne's War, when half the town
was burned, 49 inhabitants killed, and Williams himself with no others
taken captive to Canada, it is sufficient here to say that Williams's own
account of it in ' The Redeemed Captive ' remains the best.
With its slow rehabilitation after the great raid, Deerfield had really
ended its active life, and began to become the long reminiscence which it
seems destined to be. Agriculturally, its importance died with the open-
ing of the West, though it still grows its tobacco and cucumbers; a de-
velopment of handicrafts late in the eighteenth century was of short
duration; and a revival of them again in the early part of the present
century needlework, hand-weaving, basket-making is only now
(1937) making headway. Actually, the town's chief industry is its
schools. Deerfield Academy is one of the oldest boarding-schools in the
country: this and Eaglebrook, a preparatory school for boys, and Bement,
co-educational, add about five hundred to the town's population.
TOUR 1.5 m.
i. Old Deerfield Street, a mile long, contains none but old houses, most of
them Colonial, beside a church, two schools, and a post-office. The shops
of the town are elsewhere, and this one long street gives an effect of being
the entire village, with glimpses of open country, fields, and far hills
beyond. All the way along it, spreading elms, two hundred years old,
form an arch; a setting once frequent in New England, but now rare.
Some of the houses are singularly handsome and still prosperous; others
Deerfield 225
are plain but well tended; still others are on the verge of romantic decay.
Two-leaf front doors, characteristic of the Connecticut Valley and rare
elsewhere in New England, are to be seen here on many of the dwellings.
2. The Frary House (private), in the Town Square on the southeast corner
of Old Deerfield and Memorial Sts., was built at least its north end
in 1689, and was one of the very few to escape being burned in the most
disastrous Indian raid of New England. It is a long, massive, L-shaped
structure of two and a half stories, of unpainted, darkly weathered clap-
boards, with a white portico, white sashes, and white dentiled cornice.
Samson Frary, who built this old house, was murdered by the Indians.
Later it became a Revolutionary tavern, where Benedict Arnold closed
a contract which afforded his army much needed supplies.
N. from the Town Square on Old Deerfield St.
3. The Wittard House (private), built in 1768 and sometimes called the
Manse, is one of the loveliest houses in Deerfield, a square Georgian
Colonial mansion of yellow clapboards with white trim, set imperiously
on a banking, and adorned about its doorway and windows with all the
decorative detail the general conception will stand. The curious gam-
brel-roofed red ell in the rear was originally a separate building, the oldest
in Deerfield. The Manse was the home of Dr. Samuel Willard, one of
the ministers of the First Church across the way and a pioneer in the
Unitarian movement in Massachusetts.
4. The Meeting House (Unitarian), built in 1824, was probably designed
by Isaac Damon. The brick body of the church, with arched doorways,
is surmounted by a pediment, roof, and closed cupola of wood, which
lighten the somber dignity of the design.
5. The Joseph Stebbins House (private; about 1772), marked by a granite
tablet in the grounds, is a massive three-and-a-half-story white Georgian
Colonial house with wood quoins and gambrel roof. The front and side
doorways match, except for an arched hood over the front door. Each
has a top light of five panes cut in the rare pattern of a triple hood (sim-
ilar to the tops of many old gravestones), the center hood rising above
the two flanking ones.
6. The ' Indian House' Reproduction (open daily 9-12 and 1-5; adm. 10f),
with its dark weathered timbers and second- and third-story overhangs,
illustrates a special type of the earliest Colonial architecture. It takes
its name from its survival of the Indian raid of 1704. The original house
was torn down in 1848, but its door, with a hole caused by a tomahawk,
may be seen at Memorial Hall. The present structure was erected in
1929 by the Deerfield Historical Society, and on a Millstone in the yard
is inscribed the history of its predecessor. The rooms are furnished in
Colonial style, and one of them contains an exhibit of handicraft and
paintings by local artists.
7. Old Bloody Brook Tavern (open daily 9-12 and 1-5; adm. free), in the
rear yard of the Indian House, is a long one-and-a-half -story frame build-
226 Main Street and Village Green
ing with giant central chimney, now the home of the Deerfield Art School.
It was built prior to 1700, and was moved here from South Deerfield.
8. The Bardwell-Stebbins-Abercrombie House (private) is a charming
two-and-a-half-story gray frame dwelling with a central chimney and a
gabled roof. It sits on a banking above a field-stone wall. At the rear is
a low ell porch, added later, but designed with the open arches of the
early New England woodshed to conform to the style of the older part
of the dwelling.
9. The Sheldon Homestead (open as an antique shop) is a two-and-a-half-
story unpainted clapboarded structure. It was built in 1734, and has a
gable roof, and a gambrel-roof ell. Its major interest, as often in Deerfield,
is its narrow two-leaf front door, framed with ornamental pilasters.
10. The Hinsdale House (visitors by permission) is a two-and-a-half-story
frame house with hip roof, very well preserved, and interesting because
of its unusual doorway, which has wide white paneling in the jambs and
heads, framing a large fanlight and ornamental sidelights. The house was
built in 1738 and remodeled in 1816.
Retrace Old Deerfield St.; R. from Old Deerfield St. on Albany Rd.
11. Deerfield Academy occupies several modern brick buildings in the
Georgian style. It was established in 1797, and after several changes,
including one period when it was a local public school, it is today one of
the leading smaller preparatory schools for boys, having 275 resident
students, in addition to day students.
12. The John Williams House (private) was built in 1707, a two-and-a-
half-story brown frame dwelling of generous proportions and in a good
state of preservation. The graceful and beautiful entrance has a broken-
arch pediment over its two-leaf door. The house has a secret stairway.
It belonged to the Rev. John Williams, 'The Redeemed Captive.'
13. The 'Little Brown House' (private) is a broad one-and-a-half -story
unpainted clapboarded house with gable roof, interesting as an adaptation
to a studio by means of a large window in the north front.
Retrace Albany Rd.; straight ahead from Albany Rd. on Memorial St.
14. Memorial Hall (open weekdays 9-12 and 1-5; adm. 1Q) is a three-
story brick building erected in 1798, the first building of Deerfield Acad-
emy and now a museum of the Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association.
EVERETT. Industrial Half-Sister
City: alt. 31, pop. 47,228, sett. 1649, incorp. town 1870, city 1892.
Railroad Stations: West Everett, West St.; Everett, off Broadway, for B. & M.
R.R.
Bus Station: Glendale Square for B. & M., Grey Line, and Greyhound busses.
Accommodations: Rooms in private houses.
Information: Board of Trade, National Bank Bldg.
EVERETT, an industrial city adjacent to Boston, today shows one
hundred and forty-two manufactories with an employment roll of over
five thousand, specializing mainly in coke and petroleum products, oils,
chemicals, and shoes. Everett is the home of the New England Coke
and Coal Company and the New England Fuel and Transportation
Company, the latter one of the largest coal discharging plants in the
east, with a storage capacity of two hundred thousand tons or more and
with equipment to handle fifteen hundred tons hourly. Another of the
city's notable enterprises is the Beacon Oil Company. A fleet of tankers
plies constantly between the company's docks and Texas. Within the
plant there is an underground storage room for one million barrels of
crude petroleum; above ground are warehouses with storage facilities for
500,000 barrels of refined oil. The main supply of gas for Boston is
manufactured on the Everett side of the Mystic River (but on Boston
territory) by the Boston Consolidated Gas Company. A local plant
of the General Electric Company turns out castings, while another of
du Pont de Nemours and Company produces a complete line of paints
and varnishes. At the Mystic Iron Works may be seen in operation the
only blast furnace in New England, and one of the few on the eastern
seaboard. There are many other outstanding industrial firms.
A year before John Winthrop's fleet dropped anchor in Salem Harbor,
three brothers were exploring the virgin timberland along the Mystic
River. Diverging a trifle from their course, they came upon a country
which one of the brothers, Ralph Sprague, reported as an 'uncouth
wilderness' (uncouth then meaning 'wonderful,' 'uncommon') full of
'stately timber.' This is the first record (1629) of a white man's visiting
the three square miles of territory that now contain the thriving industrial
city of Everett.
Since more than two centuries passed before Everett became self-
governing, its history is entangled with that of Maiden and early Charles-
town. As early as 1649, a petition granted to some 'Mystic Side' men
permitted them to separate from Charlestown and to set up a town
called 'Maulden.'
228 Main Street and Village Green
In the first half of the nineteenth century, South Maiden was important
principally because of the commanding position which it occupied in the
overland communication to Boston. A penny ferry, opened in 1640, had
formerly been the most direct route to the capital. From the back country
one of the oldest New England roads led to the ferry. In 1 796 a country
road was laid out, three rods wide, running to Maiden Bridge, built ten
years before to supplant the ferry. Private capital financed the construc-
tion of Maiden Bridge, which the Maiden Bridge Corporation owned and
operated as a toll bridge for seventy- two years. During that time the
round trip from Maiden to Boston was costly: the tolls amounted to forty-
seven cents, a heavy tax in a time when a daily wage rarely exceeded a
dollar.
When the Newbury Turnpike Corporation decided upon South Maiden
as a terminus for the new highroad to Newburyport, the first step was
taken in making the future Everett a consequential post in the trans-
portational plan of the Commonwealth. Yet, in spite of its favorable
location in the system of communication between Boston and the north
country, Everett's progress before 1870 was slow. Until 1845 the town
was engrossed in agriculture. In 1859 toll charges were done away with
on the Maiden Bridge, thus attracting more business and more residents
to the town, which in 1870 was incorporated under the name of Everett,
in honor of the illustrious orator, statesman, and scholar Edward Everett.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. Parlin Library, Everett Square, a modern white brick building, chief
public library of the city, and memorial to Albert N. Parlin, civic philan-
thropist, contains one of the few copies now readily available of a useful
historical-descriptive booklet, 'The Straight Road/ concerning the New-
buryport Turnpike, which passed through what is now Everett. On the
lawn of the library grounds is a Sundial inscribed: 'To the children of
Everett that they may measure their hours of sunshine.'
2. The Milburn Collection of Hawthorniana (open only to accredited stu-
dents of Hawthorne), 88 Waverly St., is a large and exceedingly valuable
treasure-house of first editions of Nathaniel Hawthorne's works and
other Hawthorniana. Except for 'Fanshawe' and the two 'Carrier's
Addresses' (broadsides soliciting newspaper subscriptions in Salem), the
set of Hawthorne 'firsts' is complete. Among the rare items are the
large paper copy of 'The Gentle Boy,' containing a frontispiece drawing
by Mrs. Hawthorne and the privately printed 'Love Letters of Haw-
thorne.' There are also in the collection notebooks, manuscripts, and a
very nearly complete compilation of all comment so far discovered in
print about the great novelist, as well as association objects.
3. Mt. Washington (summit on Garland St., alt. 176) is one of several
glacial drumlins in a chain, the others, visible from this one, being
Fall River 229
Powder Horn Hill in Chelsea and Orient Heights in East Boston. West-
ward is a good view of Everett. Once there were remains of Indian forts
here, testifying to the defeat of a Massachusetts tribe by the Wabanaki
of Maine. Indian relics, including pottery, have been dug up at various
times, indicating that the Indians also used Mt. Washington for cere-
monials and encampments.
4. Woodlawn Cemetery, Elm St., 176 acres, planted with rhododendrons
and many varieties of beautiful trees, is one of the notable burial
grounds in Greater Boston, comparing favorably with Mt. Auburn and
Forest Hills.
5. The Mystic Iron Works (open by permission), on the Mystic River,
has a five-million-dollar blast furnace turning out 500 tons of pig iron
daily, which is about 20 per cent of this type of raw material used in New
England. This furnace is among the largest in the country. The great
ore bridge, first object to catch the eye of the approaching visitor, has a
clear span of 250 feet and is equipped with an eight- ton bucket. The
plant, built in 1926, revived in Massachusetts an industry which had
been lost to the State for a century and a half.
6. Merrimac Chemical Company' (open by appointment Mon. Fri. 9-4.45;
guide provided), Chemical Lane, off Broadway, is another vast and im-
portant plant, picturesquely marked for many years to travelers on the
Eastern Division of the Boston and Maine Railroad by the great outdoor
pile of sulphur which lies west of the buildings. This plant, formerly the
Cochrane Chemical Co., was established in 1858. During the World War
it did a huge business in TNT, phenol, and picric acid. It marketed the
first H-acid made in the United States, and produces also fire and sagger
clay, mined at Bennington, Vermont. A favorite statement is that its
total output supplies the basic materials of every applied science and
manufacturing process and the physical media of all the arts.
FALL RIVER. City of Falling Water
City: Alt. 39, pop. 117,414, sett. 1656, incorp. town, 1803, city 1854.
Railroad Station: Fall River, 860 North Main St., for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.
B-us Stations: North Main St., Granite Block opposite City Hall, for Eastern
Mass. Ry. Co.; Union Coach Terminal for New England Transportation Co.,
Short Line, Inc., Union Ry. Co., and I.C.T. Bus Co.
Piers: Fall River Line Wharf, off Water St., near Anawan St.
Accommodations: Ten hotels; twenty-four lodging houses; three boarding-houses.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, N. Main and Granite Sts.
230 Main Street and Village Green
FALL RIVER, strikingly outlined against the sky on a long steep hill
crest across Mount Hope Bay, looks both larger than it is and very
foreign. The lofty chimneys of the great stone or brick mills and the
soaring stone towers of numerous Roman Catholic churches, especially
the twin pagoda-like spires of Notre Dame, give a European tone. In
the foreground of the bay, the white Fall River Boat to New York, one
of a line known to all New Englanders for ninety years, lies moored await-
ing its evening sailing hour.
The uphill approach to City Hall and the heart of the municipality,
through warehouses and mills, many of the latter now silent and empty
except for some solitary watchman, is unimpressive, but the center of
the business district is solid and substantial, with large stores, banks,
and public buildings, mainly of granite, brownstone, or limestone.
Excursions from this center bring the visitor at almost any block to
sudden stretches of time-darkened mill plants, of which the Durfee Mills,
all of granite, extend for eight blocks, largely closed, though some sections
have been leased to small concerns. South and east of these lie large
areas of shabby but self-respecting wooden tenements; toward the north
the streets open into a more prosperous and pleasant residential district.
The territory of the present city was settled in 1656 as part of a large
land grant from Plymouth known as Freemen's Purchase. What is now
Fall River was then called Pocasset, an Indian name still preserved by
one of the villages in the town of Bourne on Cape Cod. In 1804 Fall
River's Pocasset took the name of Troy, because of the affection of one
of its citizens for Troy, New York. The present name of the city dates
from 1834, and originated from the Indian name of the Quequechan
River ('Falling Water'), which runs through the city and gives power
to its mills.
Agricultural interests predominated until the Revolution, and there-
after no drama appears in the settlement until its sudden discovery by
the industrial age. Fall River has three natural advantages as a center
for cotton manufacturing: water-power, a mild, moist climate suited to
the weaving of cotton fibers, and a sea harbor adequate for trade ship-
ments. In consequence, its textile mills were among the first to be estab-
lished in New England, and by 1871 they experienced a boom which from
then until 1929 made the name of the city practically synonymous with
cotton in the social and industrial history of the nation. Even in 1936,
after seven years of depression, the city directory listed 236 industrial
plants. There are upward of fifty labor unions.
Today the dominant note of the working city is French. The handsomest
churches are French; French translations parallel the English inscriptions
on monuments; the radios in the restaurants offer French popular songs;
French newspapers are read in the trolleys.
Dark, stolid, built four-square, the Portuguese from the settlement at
the far north of the city, more numerous than the French, are also princi-
pally engaged in the textile industry. Other races have spread through
Fall River 231
the city, have intermingled by marriage, and have developed a cosmo-
politan culture.
Fall River, by its very pre-eminence in cotton manufacture, has been
the hardest hit of all New England mill cities through the combination
of general business depression, the preference of modern women for
rayon or silk to cotton, and the removal of many textile factories to the
cheaper operating field of the South.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. The Site of the Battle of Fall River is indicated by a Tablet on the City
Hall, North Main St. Shortly before the Revolution, Tory sentiment
was still strong, but this feeling changed, and 31 Freetown men responded
to the Lexington alarm. Colonel Joseph Durfee, who later started the
first cotton mill here, organized a home guard in 1777. On Sunday morn-
ing, May 25, 1778, boats were discovered cautiously approaching the
town. Challenged, they did not reply and were fired upon by Samuel
Reed, one of the guards. The whole neighborhood sprang to arms.
Colonel Durfee stationed his men behind a stone wall and maintained a
constant fire until the British brought cannon to bear. The Colonials
then retreated slowly to Main Street, where, near this spot, a stand was
made and the enemy was repulsed, leaving one soldier dead, one dying
and carrying a number of wounded with them.
The attacking British numbered about 150, commanded by Major Ayres.
On landing, they set fire to the home of Thomas Borden, near Anawan
and Pond Streets, and to his saw and grist mills. They fired the build-
ings of Richard Borden, an aged man, and took him prisoner, but re-
leased him on parole a few days later. As the boats retreated down the
bay the Colonials kept up musket fire, killing one soldier.
2. The Sand Bank where the skeleton in armor was found (1831) is indi-
cated by a tablet on the gas plant at the corner of Fifth and Hartwell
Streets. This discovery inspired Longfellow to write a famous poem,
'The Skeleton in Armor.' Some of the remains are now to be found at
the Fall River Historical Society.
3. In a haunted hut on the Banks of the Quequechan River lived for many
years an old hag reputed to be in league with the Devil. Driven out and
stoned by her superstitious neighbors, she was left to die while they
burned her hut. Before setting the torch to it, however, they searched it,
and found or so the oldsters say a letter from Captain Kidd to the
crone which indicated that in her youth she had been his cherished
mistress.
4. The Bradford Durfee Textile School, Bank and Durfee Sts., is free to
citizens of the State who wish to make themselves more proficient in
this trade and for those who seek preliminary training. In 1933 the
school had 148 students. At the present time it is giving active attention
232 Main Street and Village Green
to courses designed to meet new trends in the textile industry, a pro-
gressive policy demanded by the recent hardships experienced in New
England mills under changed conditions of trade.
5. The Old Church House (private), corner of June St., is the oldest house
in Fall River, a vine-covered, gambrel-roofed one-and-a-half -story frame
structure, painted red, with a central chimney. Built about 1763, it is
said to have been occupied by a Tory, who during the Revolutionary War
lent his assistance to the British by using the house as one of the many
connecting stations which sent messages to Taunton by means of flags
and beacon lights.
6. Fall River Historical Society (open to public weekdays 2-A, Sat. 10-12;
adm. free), 451 Rock St. With its high-ceiled rooms and impressive dig-
nity, the building lends itself well to museum purposes. On the first
floor is a picture gallery with oil paintings by Bryant Chapin, Robert
Dunning, and others. A false bookcase in the parlor once concealed the
entrance to a wine-cellar, a station of the Underground Railroad. Mills,
millmen, and streets of Fall River are represented in the room named
* Down town of the Nineteenth Century,' where also are many interesting
photographs of the steamers on the 'Old Fall River Line.'
7. The Lafayette Monument in Lafayette Park, Eastern Ave., County
and Mason Sts., presented to the city by the Franco-Americans in 1916,
depicts in bronze a youthful Lafayette on horseback. It was executed
by Arnold Zocchi in Rome.
8. Rolling Rock, facing Lafayette Park on Eastern Ave., is a huge con-
glomerate resting on a granite ledge. It is said that in former times the
Indians found that, by applying force, this rock could be rolled about on
its base without falling off, and they used this discovery as a unique
method of torture, placing captives' arms under a raised part of the rock
and then rolling it onto them, crushing flesh and bone.
9. Notre Dame Church, Eastern Ave. at St. Joseph Street, contains 'The
Last Judgment' of Cremonini painted on the ceiling of the main audi-
torium. This is the largest work of this famous Italian mural artist in
the United States.
FITCHBURG, The Farmer Goes to Town
City: Alt. 458, pop. 41,700, sett, about 1730, incorp. town 1764, city 1872.
Railroad Station: Union Station, 264 Main St., for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R. and
B. & M. R.R.
Bus Station: 261 Main St. for Blue Way Line and New England Transportation
Co. Union Station for B. &. M. Transportation Co.
Fitchburg 233
Accommodations: Two hotels open all year at reasonable rates.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 560 Main St.; Y.M.C.A., 525 Main St.
NESTLED among rolling hills, in the valley along a branch of the
Nashua River, Fitchburg illustrates the almost inevitable trend of many
Massachusetts cities which, after more than a century's existence as
small agricultural hamlets, were transformed in a few years into in-
dustrial cities. Second in size in Worcester County, Fitchburg is notable
in its segregation of the industrial and residential sections. The steep
slopes on the south side of the little Nashua River are covered almost
entirely by dwelling houses, while the business section monopolizes the
north side close to the river bank. The outlying portions, sparsely popu-
lated, are used principally for pasturing and farming.
Owing to the dominance of heavy industries, Fitchburg gives the appear-
ance of being a man's town, although the census reports that women lead
in actual numbers. A Yankee twang is at once detected in the voices,
but the city is a composite of many races. There are Irish, some de-
scended from early railroad hands, many dark French-Canadians, who
came as mill workers about 1860, lean, blue-eyed Swedes, brought
by Iver Johnson interests in 1890, and serious-faced Finns, introduced
in the great immigration of 1880 to 1912, and Poles and Italians. The
city itself has an air of substance, unleavened by imagination. It strikes
a level midway between an impressive display of wealth and a marked
revelation of poverty. This is due in part to the great number of small
commercial enterprises owned principally by Germans, Jews, and
Armenians. Racially organized co-operatives, notably the Finnish
Co-operative Society, the Farmers Co-operatives, and the new German
enterprise, promote an orderliness of living not usually found in ' factory
towns.'
Fitchburg for fifty years after its incorporation was primarily a dairying
and agricultural community, largely self-contained. In 1793 an outlet
was provided by the opening of a stagecoach line between Boston and
Fitchburg. At the same time the industrial potentialities of the Nashua
River were recognized. As early as 1805 General Leonard Burbank
established a paper mill near the 250-foot fall of the river.
The opening of the Boston and Fitchburg Railroad in 1845, an d the
Vermont and Massachusetts Railroad in 1848, insured still more rapid
transportation facilities and attracted new industries, many of which are
now in operation. The quarrying of granite from Rollstone Hill is still
an important industry.
POINTS OF INTEREST
i. The Home of the Fitchburg Plan is the new High School, Wallace
Ave., a red-brick building capped by a white cupola. The Plan, originated
234 Main Street and Village Green
in 1911, is a co-operative arrangement by which boys in engineering
courses are allowed to spend three days a week at high school and three
days at work in local factories, and are paid on an apprenticeship basis.
2. The Fitchburg Historical Society (open Sun. and Thurs. 2-4), 50 Grove
St., occupies a modern two-story brick building with limestone trim.
Rare exhibits are a Vinegar Bible published in London in 1777 ('vinegar'
is erroneously used in the margin instead of 'vineyard'); also a Breeches
Bible, published in 1588 ('breeches' instead of 'apron' used in Genesis
III, 7). A drum used by a high priest of Haiti in the voodoo dance and
an English hurdygurdy 300 years old are on display.
3. The Fitchburg Art Center, at the end of the Merriam Parkway (open
weekdays except Mon. 10-12 and 2-5; Sun. 2-5), has been transformed
into an attractive two-story building of brick and exposed timbers
covered with woodbine. It houses a notable permanent collection of
18th-century French provincial furniture, pottery, and glass; monthly
traveling exhibits are shown, with emphasis on textile weaves and de-
signs, and on color prints.
4. Rollstone Rock, Main St. near Caldwell Place, is a huge glacial boulder
which geologists classify as 'erratic,' since no rock of like formation or
substance is found nearer than 100 miles to the north. As quarrying on
Rollstone Hill progressed, it was found necessary to move the rock, but
its loo-ton weight prohibited its removal in a single piece. It was con-
sequently split into sections and reassembled.
5. The Iver Johnson Arms and Cycle Co. (open to ranking technicians
only) , River St. (State 2) , occupies a series of long two-story brick build-
ings covered with woodbine. A tour of the plant and an explanation of
the 4000 processes involved in the manufacture of a shotgun takes three
hours. Iver Johnson was a Norwegian mechanic with a genius for fire-
arms and organization, and a passion for fine materials and work-
manship. Sporting firearms are manufactured, but not ammunition;
bicycles, though originally a side-line, are now of primary importance.
6. The paper industries of the city are perhaps best represented by the
large brick Mills of the Fitchburg Paper Co., River St. (State 2), and the
extensive series of Mills of the Crocker-Btirbank Co., Westminster St.
(State 2) (both open to technicians only). The Fitchburg Paper Co.
specializes in wallpaper and coated paper for lithography.
7. Mysterious Arches, on a terraced bank 200 feet back from Blossom
St., near the summit of the hill, somewhat resemble a Roman aqueduct
in miniature. They are constructed of smooth field-stones the size of a
man's palm, set in cement. Early in the 2oth century Andrew Whitney,
a wealthy citizen with a reputation for eccentricity, started to build
'something' whose purpose he refused to divulge. He died when the
structure had progressed thus far. As Mr. Whitney was interested in
theatrical ventures, it is thought that he may have had in mind an out-
door theater or a home for retired actors. Saplings and brush have
encroached on the arches, adding to their mystery a touch of desolation.
Gloucester and Rockport 235
8. The State Teachers' College, at the junction of Pearl and North Sts.,
occupies a broad three-story red-brick building on a pleasant campus.
It is one of the largest teachers' colleges in the State, and has an especially
good art school. It established one of the first junior high schools in
the country.
9. The Simonds Saw and Steel Co. (open only to visitors with special
mechanical or mercantile interests), 5 North St., makes the largest saws
in America, those used by the lumber trade.
10. The Laurel St. Bridge, Laurel St. (descend on foot to see arches), is
unique in Massachusetts in that its abutments are not at right angles to
the river or railroad tracks, but set at an angle of approximately 45
degrees, so that the water flows almost diagonally beneath it through a
series of arches. It withstood the floods of 1936.
1 1 . The Gushing Flour and Grain Co. (seen from the bridge) has occupied
since 1868 a fascinating old stone building with a gambrel roof, small-
paned windows, and white cupola.
12. Coggshall Park (picnic groves, skating rink), South St., is a beautiful
natural pine grove and lake with a combined area of 200 hilly acres,
noted for its profusion of laurel in June.
GLOUCESTER and ROCKPORT
Mother Ann's Children
GLOUCESTER
City: Alt. 57, pop. 24,164, sett. 1623, incorp. town 1642, city 1873.
Railroad Station: Railroad Ave. for B. & M. R.R.
Piers: Annisquam and Eastern Point Yacht Clubs, Wonson's Cove.
Accommodations: One year-round hotel; 12 summer hotels.
Annual Events: Italian fishermen's three-day St. Peter festival early in July; the
Fishermen's Memorial Service in August.
Information: Booth in summer on Western Ave., near Fisherman Statue.
Chamber of Commerce, Main St.
ROCKPORT
Town: Alt. 61, pop. 3634, sett. 1690, incorp. 1840.
Railroad Station: Rockport Station on Granite St. and Railroad Ave. for the
B. &M.
Piers: T Wharf off Dock Square for the Municipal Yacht Basin at the Sandy
Bay Yacht Club.
236 Main Street and Village Green
Accommodations: One year-round hotel; eight summer hotels.
Annual Event: The Artists' Ball sponsored by the Rockport Art Association,
third week in August.
Information: Board of Trade off Dock Square.
GLOUCESTER and ROCKPORT comprise the whole of the granite
peninsula of Cape Ann. Gloucester is an up-to-date industrial city,
fringed by summer resorts ranging from fashionable Eastern Point, Bass
Rocks, and Magnolia to quiet Annisquam. Nevertheless the persistence
of its seafaring tradition for more than three hundred years gives its
wharves, its narrow streets, its skyline of weathered roofs and spires, a
unique atmosphere, of which the essence is the never-to-be-forgotten
smell of Gloucester, a compound of tar, salt air, and the strong fresh aroma
of codfish drying in the sun. Modern Rockport is an artist's paradise,
with neat wooden houses crowding close around the harbor, still looking
seaward and away from the bleak and boulder-strewn moorlands of the
interior Cape.
The work of innumerable artists who flock to Cape Ann every summer,
Kipling's classic 'Captains Courageous,' and the salty yarns of James B.
Connolly have spread the fame of the picturesque seaport of Gloucester
and the tiny fishing villages of the outer Cape far beyond the confines of
New England. For more than two centuries Rockport shared this tradi-
tion and a fleet of small fishing boats still rides at anchor in the minute
harbor, snugly sheltered from the battering surge of the open Atlantic
by natural buttresses of sea- worn granite.
Since 1623, when the Dorchester Adventurers' colony at Gloucester was
established, Cape Ann men have drawn their livelihood from the sea.
But with the mushroom growth of American cities during the boom days
of the industrial age, Rockport found a valuable article of export in the
high-grade granite that everywhere underlies the town. Riggers who had
learned their trade in the lofts of Gloucester turned their talents to erect-
ing the quarry derricks, which with their spider webs of gray wires are
today still a feature of the Rockport landscape, as are the piles of faulted
blocks and the deep pools of the abandoned quarries. A special type of
vessel was perfected in the shipyards of Rockport and the near-by towns
for carrying granite. Up to about twenty-five years ago these stone sloops
were a picturesque sight as they lay loading in almost every narrow deep
tongue of water along the outer Cape. The quarries attracted a colony of
Finnish stoneworkers, who still remain, although the granite industry is
greatly diminished in scope.
And time has brought changes to the fisheries of Gloucester. The fast
schooners that once sailed out past the breakwater are giving way to
smaller trawlers and gill-netters, Diesel-powered. The Anglo-Saxon
population that dominated the city for more than two hundred and
fifty years has recently been given vitality and color by large immigrant
groups of Portuguese and Italians and a sprinkling of Scandinavians.
Gloucester and Rockport 237
These men, seafarers all, have brought their own traditions to the fisher-
ies and their allied industries, spar- and sailmaking, rigging and iron-
working and to the manufactures dependent on the fisheries glue,
isinglass, and fertilizer. The fishermen seek their living upon the most
dangerous waters in the world, the fog-shrouded, berg-haunted Grand
Banks, with their swift currents and steep, short seas, and the treacherous
shoals nearer home Georges Bank, Stellwagen Bank, and the pictur-
esquely named ledges along the coast. Although ten thousand men of
Gloucester have been lost at sea in the three centuries of her history, the
modern fishermen still pursue their calling without heroics but with skill
and daring undiminished.
GLOUCESTER FOOT TOUR 2m.
E. from Legion Square on Middle St.
1. The Joan of Arc Equestrian Statue, at Legion Square, is a distinguished
work of Anna Vaughn Hyatt.
2. The Universalist Church, corner of Church St., was erected in 1868,
its octagonal steeple a copy of one on an earlier church on the same site,
where was held in 1774 the first Universalist service in America.
3. The Sargent-Murray-Gilman House (1768) (open in summer as a tea-
room; no inspection charge to patrons; otherwise 25 j), 49 Middle St., has
a gambrel roof, denticular cornice, and quoined corners. It was, some-
time after 1788, the home of the Rev. John Murray, founder of Uni-
versalism.
4. The Sawyer Public Library (open weekdays 9-9, Sun. 2-9) is a resi-
dence in the Federal style with white clapboards, quoined corners, a
recessed third story and a modern red roof. The walls of the fine old
stairway were adorned in 1934 with Murals of Gloucester Scenes, under
the sponsorship of the Federal Art Project.
L. from Middle St. on Dale Ave.; R. from Dale Ave. on Warren St.; L.
from Warren St. on Pleasant St.
5. The Cape Ann Scientific, Literary, and Historical Association (open
daily in summer, 11-4; ddm. 25^), corner of Federal St., is a three-
story Georgian Colonial house, containing ship models, period furniture,
old china, pewter, costumes, minerals, and marine plants.
R. from Pleasant St. on Prospect St.
6. The Portuguese Church of Our Lady of Good Voyage (open), is known
for its carillon of 32 bells. Above its door is a sensitively conceived
figure of the Madonna holding a schooner in one hand, the other hand
raised in blessing the waters. The Fiesta Of Pentecost is celebrated on
three successive Sundays. Dark-skinned, brilliant-eyed children march
with their elders to the church, where the pastor places crowns on the
Gloucester and Rockport 239
heads of those chosen to express the gratitude of the community for the
intervention of St. Peter in their behalf during the past year.
R. from Prospect St. on Main St.
7. Below the Waterfront are the wharves where for more than 300 years
fishing boats have discharged their cargoes. The vessels returning with
their great catches from the Grand Banks and nearer waters were once
all sailing ships and the crews all Yankee. Now the 40-foot power
trawlers and gill-netters predominate, and most of the crews are Portu-
guese.
Straight ahead from Main St. on Western Ave.
8. The Gloucester Fisherman in bronze, executed by Leonard Craske,
stands on the Esplanade, looking across the harbor to the open sea. By
the statue every year on an August Sunday afternoon is held the fisher-
men's memorial ceremony. Flowers are placed at the feet of the Fish-
erman; from a point of land near Blynan's Bridge, the roll of those
lost at sea during the past year is slowly read and armfuls of blossoms
are strewn upon the water, to be carried out by the ebb tide to unknown
graves.
The larger island in the harbor is Ten Pound Island, purchased from
the Indians for ten pounds, and now a Coast Guard station. Farther
east stretches Eastern Point, from the tip of which juts Dog Bar Break-
water. Little Five Pound Island was chosen as the site of the new Fish
Pier, in 1937.
MOTOR TOUR 1 (Eastern Point), 7.3 m.
S. from Legion Square on Washington St.; L. from Washington St. on
Main St.; R. from Main St. on E. Main St.
9. The Gorton-Pew Fisheries Plant (open) is a series of gray fish sheds,
piers, and open-air 'flakes' for canning and drying fish.
GLOUCESTER MAP INDEX
1. Joan of Arc Equestrian Statue 8. Gloucester Fisherman
2. Universalist Church 9. Gorton-Pew Fisheries Plant
3. Sargent-Murray- Gilman House 10. North Shore Art Association
4. Sawyer Public Library n. Rocky Neck
5. Cape Ann Scientific, Literary, and 12. Gloucester Society of Artists
Historical Association 13. Eastern Point Yacht Club
6. Church of Our Lady of Good 35. Stage Fort Park
Voyage 36. Hammond Museum
7. Waterfront 37. Rafe's Chasm
240 Main Street and Village Green
10. The North Shore Art Association (open in summer; weekdays 10-6,
Sun. 2-6), on the water's edge, holds exhibitions from July to September.
R. from E. Main St. on Rocky Neck Ave.
1 1 . Rocky Neck is the heart of the summer colony of artists, actors and
writers, occupying bungalows, old sail lofts and remodeled sheds along
the narrow peninsula. To the left lies the open bay; to the right is the
inner harbor.
The Gloucester School of the Theater presents plays acted by its students
in a red-shingled small barn (the Little Theater) at the end of the road,
by the side of the marine railway.
Retrace on Rocky Neck Ave.; R. from Rocky Neck Ave. on E. Main St.
and straight ahead from E. Main St. into Eastern Point Rd.
12. The Gloucester Society of Artists (open in summer, weekdays 10-6,
Sun. 2-6, adm. 15^) exhibits paintings and sculpture through the summer
season, and joins in August with the North Shore Art Association in the
Artists' Ball.
13. The Eastern Point Yacht Club (private) occupies a small promontory
in the harbor on the edge of Niles Beach. Here begin the large summer
estates.
Straight ahead from Eastern Point Rd. into Eastern Point Blvd. West.
14. Niles Pond is a curious and lovely natural phenomenon, a reed-
bordered and lily-starred fresh-water pond divided from the sea on the
east by the narrowest of causeways.
Beyond the pond the road (barred in summer to tourists) leads to Eastern
Point Light and Mother Ann, a rock formation bearing a fancied re-
semblance to a reclining woman.
L. from Eastern Point Blvd. West, on Lake Ave.; R. from Lake Ave. on
Eastern Point Blvd. East; Straight ahead from the boulevard on Atlantic
Rd.; R. from Atlantic Rd. on Bass Ave.
15. Little Good Harbor Beach (public; parking charge on Sun.), is an
excellent sandy bathing beach at all tides. The small rocky island just
offshore is Salt Island', and in the near distance is Thatcher's Island,
with the granite towers of its twin lights (erected in 1771), only one of
which is now in use.
MOTOR TOUR 2 (Cape Ann), 19 m.
S. from Legion Square on Washington St.; L. from Washington St. on
Main St.; L. from Main St. on Eastern Ave.; R. from Eastern Ave. on
Thatcher Rd.; R. from Thatcher Rd. on Long Beach Rd.
1 6. Long Beach, one and a half miles long, is a fine sandy bathing beach
on the open Atlantic.
Gloucester and Rockport 241
Retrace Long Beach Rd.; R. from Long Beach Rd. on Thatcher Rd. which
becomes South St., Rockport; R. from South St. on Marmion Way.
17. The Straitsmouth Inn, perched on the rocks overlooking Straits-
mouth Island, commands a fine view. Just below the inn at the right
is a U.S. Coast Guard Station (open) .
Retrace Marmion Way; R. from Marmion Way, on South St.
The tour now plunges abruptly into the heart of ROCKPORT, rival of
Gloucester in its summer art colony.
R. from South St. into short lane leading to docks.
1 8. New Harbor is the joy of artists. At the left stretches little Bearskin
Neck, crowded with weathered fishermen's shacks, small gray sail lofts
and piers, to which are usually moored two or three fishing smacks. At
the right is the Sandy Bay Yacht Club (private).
' Motif No. 1 ' is the designation facetiously applied to the natural com-
position made by a little sail loft with a siding of vertical brown planks,
which juts out into the harbor, and a small vessel usually tied alongside,
because the scene has been so often painted by Rockport artists.
Retrace lane; R. from lane on South St.; R. from South St. on Bearskin
Neck.
19. Bearskin Neck takes its name, as indicated by a marker at the turn
from South St., from the capture there in early days of a bear which
had been caught by the tide.
At the end of the Neck is the Site of an Old Fort which served the town well
in the War of 1812, when Rockport was of sufficient importance to draw
a naval attack from the British.
Retrace Bearskin Neck; R. from Bearskin Neck on Main St.
20. The Ebenezer Pool Mansion (private). 25 Main St., is a square white
dwelling erected in 1805, with four great chimneys rising from a hip roof.
21. The Rockport Art Association (open in July and Aug. daily; free),
12 Main St., holds summer-long exhibitions, and sponsors an Artists'
Ball, the great event of the Rockport season. The Association occupies
The Old Tavern, erected in 1770, and considerably renovated.
22. The First Congregational Church (1803), known as the 'Old Sloop,' has
a steeple rebuilt in 1814 after being demolished by a shot from the British
man-of-war ' Nymph.'
R.from Main St. on Beach St.; straight ahead from Beach St. into Granite St.
23. The Granite Quarries represent a nourishing igth-century industry
which was crippled by the introduction of substitutes for stone in buildings
and highway construction.
24. The Old Castle (open July and Aug., and Sun. 2-5; free), at the junc-
tion of Curtis St., is a dwelling dating to about 1700, with a lean-to roof,
shingled sides, and a red door and window sashes, the whole set well back
from the road in a grassy, tree-shaded yard.
242 Main Street and Village Green
L.from Granite St. on Curtis St.; L.from Curtis St. on Pigeon Hill St.
25. The Paper House (open in summer daily; fee 25^f) is a bungalow (1922)
with walls and furniture constructed entirely from newspapers, rolled and
glued.
Retrace Pigeon Hill St.; R. from Pigeon Hill St. on Curtis St.; L. from
Curtis St. on Granite St.
26. The Garrison Witch House (open by arrangement), nearly opposite
Phillips Ave., dates in part from 1670, a gray clapboarded dwelling with
unusual roof line, a later white doorway and a side second-story overhang.
It is the only authentic garrison house remaining near Boston, and was
probably used as a refuge during King Philip's War. Here fled Elizabeth^
Proctor, condemned with her husband and four other settlers as guilty
of witchcraft.
R. from Granite St. on Gott Ave.
27. Halibut Point (reached by footpath only, from a point 200 yards down
Gott Ave.; parking 25) is a State Reservation on a jagged rocky headland.
At the beginning of the footpath is the Gott House (open by arrangement) ,
a humble gambrel-roofed dwelling of 1702.
Retrace Gott Ave.; R.from Gott Ave. on Granite St., which becomes Washing-
ton St. in Gloucester.
28. Lanesmlle offers a view of granite cliffs and sand dunes across a stretch
of ocean.
29. The Consolidated Lobster Company (open to visitors) is a large plant
which makes deliveries by airplanes, keeping the crustaceans alive in pools
until shipped.
30. At Goose Cove, Annisquam, from the bridge crossing the inlet, appears
the nearest view on the Cape of sand dunes, white across the Annisquam
River, and accented with sage-green beach grass. The nearer beach is
Coffin's Beach with Wingaersheek Beach beyond.
31. The Annisquam Willows, through which the highway runs in a
doubled roadbed, were planted that their interlacing roots might make
a firm underpinning for the road.
L.from Washington St. on Reynard St.; L.from Reynard St. on lane marked
'To Dogtown.'
32. Dogtown, truly a 'blasted heath,' is a vast open, rolling moor, thickly
strewn with glacial boulders and rendered yet more desolate by a sparse
growth of stunted cedars. It contains the cellar holes of more than 40
dwellings, the homes in 1650 of fishermen and their families. Through
war and wrecks at sea and the removal of remaining settlers closer to the
harbor, the village came to be inhabited solely by poverty-stricken
widows and children, protected by ferocious watchdogs from which the
settlement took its name. The majority of the cellar holes have been
numbered on adjoining boulders, to identify them under their owners'
names in Roger Babson's 'History of Dogtown/ Here lived old Luce
Gloucester and Rockport 243
George, a wild-eyed hag, and her niece, Tammy Younger, who so be-
witched the oxen hauling grain past their cabin that the animals stood
with lolling tongues and would not move until part of their load had been
donated to the Devil, as represented by Goody George. Here, too, dwelt
young Judy Rhines, heroine of Percy MacKaye's poem, casting her spells
over fine strong lads; and old Peg Wesson, who, in the guise of a black
crow, followed a detachment of soldiers to Louisburg in 1745 and annoyed
them until the crow was shot by a silver bullet made from the buttons of
a soldier's coat; at which very moment, back in Gloucester, Old Peg fell
down and broke her leg and soon died some say with a silver bullet in
her.
Retrace ' Dogtown' Lane; R. from ' Dogtown' Lane on Reynard St.; L. from
Reynard St. on Washington St.
33. The Babson House (private} (1740), 245 Washington St., a gambrel-
roofed yellow mansion with white trimmings, contains attic pens once
used for slaves.
34. The Ellery House (private), directly opposite the Babson House, dates
from 1704. Its gray walls have an overhanging second story, a lean-to
roof, and the typical central chimney of the period.
MOTOR TOUR 3 (West Gloucester), 11 m.
SW '.from Legion Square on Middle St.; R.from Middle St. on Western Ave.;
L. from Western Ave. on Hough Ave.
35. At Stage Fort Park, overlooking Gloucester Harbor, was the first
fishing stage and the first fort on Cape Ann.
L. from Hough Ave. on Western Ave.; L. from Western Ave. on Hesperus
Ave.
36. The Hammond Museum (open June l-Oct. 1 on weekday mornings
only; tours under guide at 9, 10, and 11 ; adm. 50), a stone castle in medie-
val style in the Magnolia section, overlooks the sea. It contains a picture
gallery, rare old furniture, wood carvings and sculpture collected and
arranged by John Hays Hammond, Jr.
L. from Hesperus Ave. on dirt road marked 'To Rafe's Chasm.'
37. Rafe's Chasm is a narrow cleft in the granite coast at sea level, in
which the tide surges back and forth with a hollow boom, and from which
an east wind and an incoming sea send up sheets of spray high in the air.
Offshore is the small reef of Norman's Woe, familiar from Longfellow's
'The Wreck of the Hesperus.'
HAVERHILL
From Hardscrabble to Hats and Shoes
City: Alt. 59, pop. 49,516, sett. 1640, incorp. town 1645, city 1869.
Railroad Station: Haverhill Station, Railroad Square, off Washington St., for
B. & M. R.R.
Bus Stations: Corner Bridge and Water Sts. for Eastern Mass. Ry. Co. ; Lyon's
Drugstore, Merrimack St., for the Blue Way Lines, Short Line, B. & M., and
Checker Cab Bus; 6 Washington St. for Grey Line.
Airport: Emergency landing field only, with no refueling service; daylight land-
ings only. Located 2 m. S. of the center of the city on State 108.
Accommodations: Two hotels open all the year.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, Washington Sq.
HAVERHILL, now a typical New England manufacturing city, in its
three hundred years' history has developed from a hardscrabble frontier
village to its present high position in the industrial world. Something of
its variegated past still remains to give the city a flavor quite different
from that of its neighbor Lawrence. At HaverhiU's back door flows the
Merrimack. New houses shoulder weathered old ones along the wide
streets, and from the Haverhill bridge there unfolds upstream a panorama
of factories, office buildings, and spires, while downstream lies the long,
lovely perspective of rounded hills, neat farms, and broad river of an
unchanged New England.
Certainly the Reverend John Ward and his twelve followers could never
have previsioned more than an eventual approximation of the quiet
market town of Haverhill, England, when they landed on the muddy
Merrimack shore in 1640 to found a new plantation. The swift wide
waters of the river were too powerful for them to harness, but they early
saw modest possibilities in the rapid small streams rushing down from
the hills, and they offered grants of land and other inducements to such
applicants as would put them to use.
During the first century of its existence Haverhill was a frontier town cut
off by the Merrimack from the more secure settlements of the coast. The
settlers clearing their fields had no Indian troubles until King Philip's
War in 1675, an d their frontier position had many advantages. The soil
of the glacial hillsides was fertile. The forests provided oak and pine
timber, and the wilderness trails became the avenues for a profitable trade
in skins and furs. The oaks and pines provided frames and planking for
the ships which were building all along the Merrimack. The first vessel
was launched from a Haverhill yard in 1697, and for nearly one hundred
and fifty years the town's merchants sent their goods adventuring in their
own ships. The pelts purchased from the Indians were cured in the tan-
Haverhill 245
neries which had flourished from 1643, an d which are still a feature of
the town's industrial life.
The making of hats, recorded as early as 1747, was an important industry
in Haverhill throughout the last century, and continues at present on
a diminished scale.
The mercantile boom that swept the cities of the Massachusetts coast to
prosperity during the Federalist period gave impetus to Haverhill ship-
building. Four shipyards in 1800 were turning out ships, schooners, and
sloops; sometimes three were launched in a single day. Trade with the
South and with the West Indies flourished. Haverhill's position as a port
of entry, however, was gradually surrendered to Newburyport and other
coastal cities. The larger vessels which gained favor after the Revolution
were not suited to river navigation, and this was made even more difficult
when a group of Newburyport merchants built the Chain Bridge across
the Merrimack in 1811. Haverhill merchants turned manufacturers and
invested their profits in shoe factories, hat factories, comb factories, and
tanneries. In 1836 there were twenty-eight shoe factories in Haverhill.
The invention of the Goodyear turn shoe-stitching machine, patented in
1875, assured Haverhill's position as a manufacturing center of high-grade
shoes. Later the local manufacturers specialized in fashionable shoes for
women. As a center of shoe manufacture and allied industries, Haverhill
was outdistanced only by Brockton among Massachusetts cities in 1934.
Other manufactures are boxes and paper, woolens, food products, brooms,
chemicals, shirts, mattresses, hats, cigars, and radio cabinets.
Haverhill, like the other Massachusetts shoe cities, Lynn and Brockton,
is a center of unionism. For the student, trade-union structure and opera-
tion is vividly depicted in the activities of the Shoe Workers Protective
Union in Haverhill from 1900 to 1930. Thomas Norton in his 'Trade
Union Policies in the Massachusetts Shoe Industry' analyzes this union
and its arbitration technique. Other strong unions in the city are the
Boot and Shoe Workers' Union of the American Federation of Labor, the
Brotherhood of Shoe and Allied Craftsmen and the United Shoe and
Leather Workers' Union, the last two independent. Recently there has
been a movement to amalgamate all these groups.
The city is definitely divided into foreign quarters, whose residents are
more or less segregated and intermingle with those from other quarters
only during the working day at the factories. Along the Methuen high-
way, Polish immigrants till their small farms. Between the end of this
highway and the western side of the city, the Latin immigrants have built
a little Italy. The Jewish quarter, complete with markets, clubs, and
synagogues, borders both sides of Washington Street near the junction
of River Street. The homes and societies of the French-Canadians
dominate Lafayette Square. In the section between Washington Square,
Essex, Emerson, and Winter Streets are the places of business, the coffee
houses, and the homes of the Syrians and Armenians. From Winter Street
to the northern outskirts of the city is the 'Acre,' as the Irish section of
246 Main Street and Village Green
Haverhill has long been called. From Monument Square toward the
northeast extends that part of the city inhabited by families who took
root in Haverhill soil before the industrial era.
Haverhill is one of the few cities in the east with a commission form of
government. Such a system is built on the theory that the modern city
is essentially a great business enterprise and should be administered by the
same methods which would be regarded as efficient by any successful
commercial corporation.
TOUR 7.5 m.
N. from River St. into Main St.
1. The Hannah Dustin Statue (1879), occupying a small triangular Green
near the junction of Summer St., depicts the heroic woman who was
abducted by the Indians in March, 1697, and escaped with the scalps of
ten of her captors dangling from her belt.
R. from Main St. into Summer St.
2. The Haverhill Public Library (open weekdays 9-9, Sun. 2-6, Nov.- Apr.)
is rich in souvenirs of the poet Whittier, and contains a complete and
valuable collection of first editions of his works.
R. from Summer St. into Mill St.; L. from Mill St. into Water St.
3. The Rev. John Ward House (open Tues., Thurs., Sat. 2-5; adm. free),
the first frame house in Haverhill, was built about 1645 for the first
minister. The Haverhill Historical Society, present owners, have restored
the rooms to their original condition and furnished them in 17th-century
style.
4. The Buttonwoods (adm. free), built in 1814 and now headquarters of
the Haverhill Historical Society, is adjacent to the Ward House and ter-
raced high above the Merrimack. In front of it are still standing the two
sycamores of which Whittier wrote. Tenny Hall (open Tues., Thurs., Sat.
2-5; adm. free), is a modern wing added to the brick-end clapboarded
house. It houses the Archeological and Natural History Department of
the Society, containing Indian relics and other antiquities of this section.
5. The Spiller House or Hazen Garrison House (1680-1690) (private),
on the corner of Groveland and Water Sts., is a charming dwelling care-
fully restored. A two-and-a-half-story brick house, its bricks laid in shell
mortar, it contains unusually large fireplaces with two huge ovens shaped
like beehives. The window arrangement is unusual and the hardware,
which includes oak latches and hinges and strap and butterfly hinges, is
for the most part original.
Retrace Water St.; R. from Water St. into Mill St.
6. The Ayer Homestead (private) overlooks the Green from the northwest
Haverhill 247
side at the intersection of Saltonstall St. This is a 17th-century dwelling
with a dark weather-stained exterior, steeply pitched roof, central chim-
ney, and interesting doorway.
R.from Mill St. into State 110 (Kenoza St.).
7 The Winnikenni Reservation (automobiles must park at entrance) con-
tains tennis courts, bridle paths, and hiking trails. In the background
loom the massive gray walls of Winnikenni Castle (open on application to
Park Dept.), built in 1873 and in imitation of a medieval castle in Bath,
England.
8. Kenoza Lake (Indian, meaning 'Lake of the Pickerel') lies near-by,
mirroring the wooded banks of the Reservation.
9. The Birthplace of John Greenleaf Whittier (open daily 10-sundown;
adm. Wf) (on State no, 3 m. from city) is a fine example of a New Eng-
land early American farmhouse. The house contains relics which include
the old desk on which the poet's earliest rhymes and last poem were
written. Built in 1688, it has been restored as nearly as possible to its
original condition. The many landmarks identified with Whittier's poems
are those of the old Haverhill, the quiet New England farming town. The
gentle Quaker poet was not sensitive to the throbbing industrial city that
was growing up along the Merrimack shore, and preferred to sing of
country ways and the 'proud isolation' and 'self-righteous poverty' of
the old stock from which he sprang.
Retrace State 110; L. from State 110 into Main St.; straight ahead across
Merrimack River on State 125.
10. The Kimball Tavern (about 1690) (open 10-5; adm. free}, stands at
the corner of Salem St. The first iron stove in Haverhill was set up in this
house, which is also noted for its fine woodwork and finish, its old latches
and panels, its old furniture and curios.
n. The First Church of Christ (organized 1682; erected 1848) (services,
11 Sun.; midweek services Thurs. 7.30), across the Common, is an animated
adaptation of the late Colonial style, adorned with Corinthian columns,
an elaborate cornice, and a graceful steeple. The tower of the church was
used as a model for that of the Chapel of Mary and Martha in Dearborn,
Michigan, built by Henry Ford.
A Boulder on the church green claims the birth here in 1810 of the foreign
missionary movement in the United States, through the organization of
the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. In 181 2, four
missionaries sailed for Calcutta on the brigantine 'Caravan' 'to bring
light to the moral darkness of Asia.' They were the famous Adoniram
Judson (see MALDEN) and his wife Anne Hasseltine and Samuel Newell
and Newell's wife, Harriet Atwood, the latter a resident of Haverhill.
12. Bradford Junior College, South Main St., occupies a well-equipped
campus of 37 acres. Founded in 1803 as an Academy, it is believed to be
the oldest upper school for girls in New England. None of the original
buildings are now standing.
HOL.YOKE.The Power of Water
City: Alt. 152, pop. 56,139, sett. 1745, incorp. town 1850, city 1873.
Railroad Station: Mosher St. for B. & M. R.R.
Bus Stations: 69 Suffolk St. and 443 High St. for Blue Way, B. & M., Greyhound,
Interstate, and Vermont Transit Co.
Airport: Barnes Airport, on Hampton Plains, between Westfield and Holyoke.
Accommodations: Five hotels.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 98 Suffolk St.; County Automobile Club,
129 Chestnut St.
HOLYOKE, a manufacturing city lying between the Connecticut River
and Mount Tom, is built around the numerous power canals that cut
across the city. Entered from the north, it is modern, well-groomed, and
prosperous. To the south are a number of imposing Catholic institutions,
educational and charitable. The manufacturing center, lying along the
power canals, has been unusually active throughout the depression. The
absence of drab slum quarters usually associated with mill towns is
notable.
One factor in creating this prosperous atmosphere is the skilled type of
worker employed by the numerous paper mills that manufacture high-
grade writing paper, the principal support of the town. Particularly well
known are the Whiting Mills. This and six other important paper mills,
attracted by cheap water-power from Hadley Falls Dam, have given the
town the name of 'The Paper City.'
The American Thread Company and the Skinner Silk Company are about
all that remain of what once promised to be a great textile center. Cheap
water-power, easily accessible wood for wood-pulp, and rag-scrap from
near-by textile mills early diverted interests to paper-making.
The waterworks and gas and electric plants are municipally owned.
A daily and weekly paper in English, and one weekly each in French and
German, are published. The City Hall, a striking building with a great
granite tower, is an object of civic pride. Cultural pursuits are evidenced
by the excellent small museum of natural history and a small art gallery,
both at the Public Library, by the Holyoke League of Arts and Crafts,
and by a number of musical organizations.
The first foreign-born citizens to arrive were the Irish, whose descendants
constitute one third of the present population. These, with the French-
Canadians, make the city an outstanding Catholic center. Poles number
ten per cent of the inhabitants, and the rest are of English, Scotch, Ger-
man, Italian, Greek, Scandinavian, or Jewish origin. All this foreign
growth has been made in the past ninety years, but it is the very essence
Holyoke 249
of Holyoke, and there is little or nothing other than the Indian arrow-
heads at the Public Library to remind the visitor that there was a settle-
ment as early as 1725.
During Revolutionary years the village remained an agricultural com-
munity centered about a tavern that served as a halfway stop on the stage
route between Springfield and Northampton. The potential water-power
of the Connecticut River just above Hadley Falls was not long in attract-
ing the attention of manufacturing pioneers, and as early as 1828 a dam
had been constructed, and a few small textile, grain, and metal mills were
in operation. Not until 1848, however, did capital appear in the form of
a group of New York and Boston investors and developers who secured
the rights of the old Hadley Falls Company. In 1848 a $75,000 dam was
completed, and on the same day it was swept away by the terrific pressure,
incorrectly calculated, of the water behind it. The story is said to have
been graphically told in a series of telegrams directed to the Boston office:
10 A.M. Gates just closed: water filling behind dam.
1 2 A.M. Dam leaking badly.
2 P.M. Stones of bulkhead giving way to pressure.
3.20 P.M. Your old dam's gone to hell by way of Willimansett.
Within a year a second dam, twice as costly, was completed, which served
until 1900. The present dam and its great waterfall are visible only from
the uppermost of the three city bridges which cross the river. Known as
'The Gateway of New England Waters/ this dam proved its strength by
withstanding the destructive flood of 1936.
TOUR 5.5 m.
W.from High St. on Appleton
1. The interior of Skinner Memorial Chapel (Congregational) (open daily
9-5), Appleton and Maple Sts., is designed in Gothic style. A decorative
panel in the choir stall represents the conversion of the Ethiopian eunuch
by St. Philip, and is surmounted by dull stained-glass windows. The
chancel floor is mosaic.
L. from Appleton St. on Maple St.
2. The Holyoke Library and Museum (open weekdays 10-5), 335 Maple
St., contains exhibits of wild life, of prehistoric and Indian relics, and
a gallery of paintings. Professor Burlingham Schurr, the noted naturalist,
is the curator. The paintings include examples of the work of Twachtman,
Whistler, Homer, Diaz, Monet, Chase, and Duveneck.
R. from Maple St. on Cabot St.
3. In the Skinner home, ' Wistariahurst,' at the corner of Pine and Cabot
Sts. (open 2.30-5; permission at office of Skinner Silk Mills, 208 Appleton
St., or from curator at house opposite: i Wistariahurst'}, is the Belle Skinner
250 Main Street and Village Green
Collection of musical instruments and manuscripts. The collection, num-
bering some ninety pieces, includes a Chinese instrument, 600 years old,
and several other ancient instruments. All are kept in such perfect con-
dition that Conductor Koussevitzky of the Boston Symphony Orchestra
called it 'a collection of superlatives.'
Straight ahead from Cabot St. on Pleasant St.; L.from Pleasant St. on Dwight
St., R.from Dwight St. on Northampton St. (US 5).
4. Mt. Tom and Mountain Park (open in summer, fee), 3.5 m., are reached
by a winding drive, uphill through a marked entrance. The park has pic-
nicking facilities and an amusement center.
Opposite the entrance, a path leads to Dinosaur Tracks, embedded in a
ledge 150 by 30 feet..
Straight ahead on Northampton St. (US 5).
5. Mt. Tom State Reservation (picnicking facilities), 5.5 m., is an extensive
wooded area through which winds a fine road past heavy growths of
laurel. In 1932, 10 pounds of the rare mineral babingtonite were found
near-by. Some geologists believe Mt. Tom was once volcanic.
LAWRENCE. Warp and Woof
City: Alt. 43, pop. 86,785, sett. 1655, incorp. town 1847, city 1853.
Railroad Station: B. & M. R.R., South Canal St.
Bus Stations: Eastern Mass. Street Ry. Co., 400 Essex St.; Blue Way Line,
Inc., B. & M. Transportation Co., Checker Cab bus, P.Q. Mass., North-
eastern Bus Line, Mason's Bus Line, Hampshire St.
Airport: North Andover Airport, partly owned by city of Lawrence, about
7 m. from the city. Emergency landing field, refueling.
A ccommodations: Two hotels open all year.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, Essex St.
TEXTILE mills dominate both the life and the landscape of Lawrence.
From the heights above the Merrimack at Andover the city sprawls, with
its forest of chimneys and acres of red-brick factory buildings regimented
along the river-banks. The striking uniformity of the city is the result of
a made-to-order construction program. For Lawrence is Massachusetts'
only 'made city.'
Lawrence 25 1
In 1845 the Essex Company was formed by a group of Boston financiers
to utilize the water-power of Bodwell's Falls in the Merrimack. An area
of 6.75 miles was purchased, comprising parts of the townships of Andover
and Methuen, which, although industrial almost since their beginning, had
neither the capital nor the engineering skill to harness the river. The
group of capitalists who envisioned the city on the flat plain where only
some twenty families then scratched a living from the soil was headed
by Abbott Lawrence as principal stockholder and first president. It
included wealthy merchants long powerful in Boston maritime enterprise,
who turned from foreign commerce to the mounting profits of the first
textile centers.
Within a month after the incorporation of the Essex Company in March,
$1,000,000 was subscribed. During the summer, work on the great dam,
the heart of the whole enterprise, went forward at a tremendous rate.
In the autumn of 1848, three years after the first stone was laid, the dam
was completed, hills were leveled, valleys filled in, buildings erected, and
a sizable imported population installed in the rows of workers' houses.
The vast program of the Essex Company included also the construction
of two canals running parallel into the river, the erection of a machine
shop for the building of locomotives, a reservoir on Prospect Hill, gas-
works, fifty brick buildings, a large boarding-house, and plants of the
Atlantic Cotton, Pemberton, Upper Pacific, and Duck Mills.
The first group of immigrants were natives of England and Ireland,
mechanics, artisans, printers, engravers, and weavers. The stream of
immigration from other countries, mostly of unskilled workers, continued
steadily, and by 1890 as many as forty-five languages were spoken. Today
eighty-three per cent of the population is of foreign birth or ancestry.
The Italians, who constitute the largest of the foreign-born population
groups, have jealously preserved their ethnic identity. The Poles, Syrians,
Armenians, and French- Canadians also form large and cohesive racial
groups. The International Institute sponsors each year a three-day
carnival in which fourteen or more national groups appear in the costumes
of their native lands, and re-enact in exact detail the age-old pageantry
of their countries.
Built and populated almost overnight, Lawrence at first was totally
lacking in many of the actual necessities of community life. There was
no store in the town until Amos Pillsbury in 1846 brought supplies up the
river in a gondola and set up shop near the Andover bridge. In 1847,
passenger train service was first introduced by the Boston and Maine
Railroad. The first newspaper, the Merrimac Courier, was issued in 1846,
and in the same year the first religious services were held in the Free Will
Baptist Church. Following the granting of the city charter in 1853,
Charles S. Storrow, a director of the Essex Company, was elected the first
mayor.
The abnormally rapid growth of the town, coupled with the focusing of
its builders' attention upon industrial production rather than on social
252 Main Street and Village Green
evolution, naturally resulted in unfortunate living conditions. Sanitation,
proper heating, and ventilation were lacking. Overcrowding, low wages,
and long working hours prevailed. Little consideration was given in the
design of factory buildings to the health or safety of the operatives.
In 1860 the roof of the Pemberton Mill crashed in. The debris took fire
and 525 workers trapped within the building were killed or injured. A jury
attributed the disaster to flimsy wall construction. In 1890 a tornado
swept across the southern part of the city, killing and injuring many
persons and destroying property. Though the misery caused by this 'act
of God ' had no essential connection with the wretchedness resulting from
labor conditions, the psychological effect was cumulative. In 1912 the
labor problem of the city reached a climax and the workers began to
demonstrate in protest against allegedly intolerable conditions. The
result was a strike into which the Industrial Workers of the World, led
by ' Big Bill ' Haywood, injected themselves with telling effect. More than
three hundred arrests of strikers on charges ranging from riot to murder
followed.
One of the most spectacular incidents which developed in the conflict
was the arrest of Joseph Ettor and Arturo Giovannitti. Ettor, a member
of the general executive board of the I.W.W., had been summoned from
New York and elected chairman of the strike committee. Giovannitti
was editor of an Italian labor paper. In the midst of a clash between police
and strikers on January 25, 1912, an Italian worker, Anna LoPezzi, was
shot and killed. The two conspicuous labor leaders were arrested as
accessories to murder, bail was denied, and they remained helpless in jail
until the end of the strike.
It was in this strike that the ' Exodus of Children' occurred. Partly to
relieve the desperate conditions which accompanied the strike and partly
to call the attention of the country to the struggle, the strike committee
published an appeal in the New York Call to working-class families in
other cities to adopt workers' children during the strike. Shortly there-
after the first group of children arrived in New York and were greeted at
the Grand Central Station by cheering crowds.
Subsequent investigation by a congressional committee gave the following
findings:
Sixty thousand of the city's 86,000 people were dependent on earnings
from the textile mills with a weekly wage averaging $8.76. The textile
industry had become a family industry. Wives worked beside their hus-
bands in the mill. Half the children above 14 years of age were also em-
ployed. Many of these workers lived in wooden fire-traps of which the
dark and damp rooms were breeding places of moral and physical disease.
Malnutrition was universal; the chief articles of diet were oleomargarine,
condensed milk, and a cheap meat stew.
The strikers won, although the terms of settlement were not superficially
impressive a wage increase of about one cent an hour, and the privilege
of returning to work without discrimination against strikers or leaders.
Lawrence 253
There are today thirty-eight local trade unions in Lawrence which send
delegates to four central labor bodies, the Allied Printing Trades' Council,
the Building Trades' Council, the Carpenters' District Council of Law-
rence and Vicinity, and the Central Labor Union. In 1937 Lawrence was
made the center of a national textile organizing campaign by the Com-
mittee for Industrial Organization. Although woolen mills still predomi-
nate, there has been a growth in diversified industries. A report of the
Chamber of Commerce for 1936 gave a total of 155 industries, and an
estimated payroll of $23,560,680. Besides textiles other manufactures are
paper and soap. The Champion-International Paper Company is one of
the largest coated paper concerns in the world, and the Wood Mill of
the American Woolen Company is the largest single woolen mill.
TOUR 5 m.
E.from Broadway (State 28) on Haverhill Si. (State 110).
1. St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church, near Hampshire St., founded by
the Augustinian Fathers in 1848, is in the Gothic manner.
2. The Common, between Haverhill and Common Sts., is surrounded by
public buildings, schools, and churches. Near the pond stands a large
wooden flagpole which commemorates the Flag Day celebration held by
the vigilantes in protest against the strike of 1912. In the granite founda-
tion is a tablet which reads: 'The gift of Joseph Shattuck [a Boston,
Springfield, and Lawrence banker] to the people of Lawrence, as a per-
petual reminder of October 12, 1912, when 32,000 men and women of the
city marched under the flag for God and Country.'
L. from Haverhill St. on Jackson St.; R. from Jackson St. on Elm St.; L.
from Elm St. on East Haverhill St.
3. The Bodwell House (private), 33 East Haverhill St., erected about 1708
(ells added later), is the only surviving landmark of the days before the
made-to-order city was built.
Retrace East Haverhill St.; L. from East Haverhill St. on Elm St.; R. from
Elm St. on Union St.; L. from Union St. on Haverhill St.; R.from Haver-
hill St. on Prospect St.
4. From the grounds of the Lawrence General Hospital, Prospect St.,
there is an unparalleled View of Industrial Lawrence, red-brick chimneys
emitting their smoke periodically; miles of red-brick factories with clock
towers and small-paned windows; the canal with its dull look of cooling
metal.
R. from Prospect St. on Canal St.
5. The North Canal, Union St., is about 5330 feet in length. This and the
South Canal across the Merrimack were startling engineering feats in their
254 Main Street and Village Green
day. The North Canal was built in connection with the great Lawrence
Dam in 1845, and diverts the Merrimack waters to supply the great mills
which lie on the left along Canal St. The South Canal was built in 1866
and is about 2000 feet in length.
L. from Canal St. on Island St.
6. The Lawrence Experimental Station of the State Board of Health
(open), the first institution of its kind in America, was established in 1887
for bacteriological and sewage disposal research. One of the early results
of experimentation was the construction of the municipal filter, the first
large sand filter in the country. The Station has been visited by sanitary
and medical experts from many countries.
Retrace Island St.; L. from Island St. on Canal St.
7. The Pacific Print Works is the largest print works in the world. The
Lower Pacific Mill is a worsted plant. Also in the same group is the Pacific
Cotton Mill (all open by permission at the office). Extending for more than
half a mile, they occupy the entire block beyond the intersection of
Amesbury St. The first combing machines in the country were set up
here.
Retrace Canal St.; R. from Canal St. on Union St.
8. The Wood Mill (open by permission), near Merrimack St., built in 1905
by the American Woolen Company, is the largest woolen mill in the world,
more than one third of a mile long, 126 feet wide, and 6 stories high. It
contains under one roof more than 30 acres of floor space.
R.from Union St. on Merrimack St.; R.from Merrimack St. on Broadway.
g. The Great Stone Dam, immediately above the O'Leary Bridge, was
built in 1845 to furnish water-power from the falls of the river, and was
a notable engineering achievement of the time. It withstood the floods of
1936, which otherwise must have devastated the city.
10. The Arlington Mills (open by permission before 1), established in 1865,
were the first in the country to manufacture black alpacas and mohairs.
They are devoted largely to worsted manufacture and carding and comb-
ing wool for spinners. The mills have also an exclusive process for the
removal of grease from wool.
LEXINGTON. ,4 Town of Heroic Past
Town: Alt. 201, pop. 10,813, sett - 1640, incorp. 1713.
Railroad Station: Lexington Station, Massachusetts Ave., serving B. & M. R.R.
Bus Stations: Lexington R.R. Station for B. & M. Transportation Co. Lexington
Center for Granite Stages.
Local Busses: Frequent service to neighboring towns, 10^.
Accommodations: No hotels; several inns and boarding-houses.
Swimming: Parker Field (pool).
Information: Gary Memorial Library, 1874 Massachusetts Ave.
THE town of Lexington today presents nothing of its heroic past, little
of its ancient rustic calm, and still less of its brief industrial fever. It is
a haven of quiet streets and comfortable homes, free of industrial ugliness
and urban squalor. For 364 days of the year Lexington runs along in the
placid groove of a suburb of Boston. But on each April 19 the town
plunges back into the past and relives its part in ushering in the American
Revolution.
There was no permanent settlement at Cambridge Farms, as Lexington
was first called, until about 1642. The settlers supplied the main town of
Cambridge with hay and wood, raised food for themselves, wove coarse
fabrics for clothing, and erected a few rude houses. In 1691 the General
Court recognized the community as a separate parish.
Lexington furnished 148 men for the wars against the French and the
Indians between the years 1756 and 1763. Those who survived formed the
nucleus of the militia that gathered when the threat to Boston by the
British in April, 1775, roused Lexington to a quick response. The town's
minister, the Reverend Jonas Clarke, sympathetic to the cause of the
rebellion, led his fellow townsmen to join with Boston in resistance. He
formed a Committee of Correspondence to keep in touch with develop-
ments. So lively was the resentment of Lexington's patriots that in 1773
resolutions were sent to the Legislature affirming that their people ' would
be ready to sacrifice our estates and everything dear in life, yes, and life
itself, in support of the common cause.'
On April 19, 1775, local farmers gathered on Lexington Green to resist
the troops of General Gage. Gage had laid plans to confiscate the stores
of muskets and ammunition at near-by Concord. It was believed at the
time that he was also planning to capture the Revolutionary leaders,
Samuel Adams and John Hancock, who had fled to Lexington after re-
ceiving a report early in April that Parliament had ordered their arrest
for trial in England. It now seems probable, however, that Gage did not
even know that Adams and Hancock were hiding in the region. The
256 Main Street and Village Green
purpose of this expedition was undoubtedly twofold: to overawe the
people by a show of British strength and thus to check a movement toward
unity that was beginning to grow in the New England Colonies; and to
capture the stores at Concord.
Despite the care with which Gage's plans were laid, news of them leaked
out, and Dr. Joseph Warren on the eve of the battle dispatched Paul
Revere and William Dawes to Concord and Lexington to warn the patriot
leaders of the danger. By two o'clock in the morning the Green at Lexing-
ton was swarming with Minutemen, and the roll was called by Captain
John Parker, veteran of the French wars.
At four- thirty in the morning word reached Parker that the enemy was in
sight. Some fifty or. sixty Minutemen lined up hastily on the Green and
received the famous order from Parker: 'Stand your ground; don't fire
unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here.' A few
minutes later the little band of farmers faced four hundred redcoats, the
advance guard of British regulars, under Major Pitcairn.
' Disperse, ye rebels!' shouted Pitcairn. The men of Lexington did not
stir. Twice the major repeated his command; then a musket shot rang
out. The British officer ordered his regulars to open fire. The Minutemen
returned it, but so inferior were their numbers that Parker ordered an
immediate retreat.
When the regulars had passed on, marching toward Concord, they left
behind them eight patriots dead and nine wounded. The British casualties
were only two wounded. The stores at Concord were destroyed. The
British retreated to Boston, harassed by the Minutemen, who followed
them, firing from behind stone walls and trees. The battle had small im-
mediate result, but the stand of the Lexington farmers was the beginning
of a dogged resistance which ultimately ended in defeat for the forces of
the King.
Meanwhile Adams and Hancock were hiding a few miles out of Lexington.
As they ran across a field, Adams shouted, 'It is a fine day!' 'Very
pleasant,' answered one of his companions, taking it to be a reference to
the weather, and rather surprised at such small talk. 'I mean,' said
Adams, 'this day is a glorious day for America.'
The name of Lexington spread over the land. Hunters in Kentucky
baptized their camp Lexington. Twenty-four counties, cities, and towns
by the name of Lexington scattered over the country testify to the pride
awakened by the events of April 19, 1775.
Exhaustion and unrest were the post-Revolutionary lot of Lexington, as
of most communities in Massachusetts. Debts mounted as business
stagnated. Despite their passion for liberty and democracy, however,
Lexington farmers did not join the insurrection of embittered debtors
led by Daniel Shays; on the contrary, the town sent militia to aid in
putting it down.
By the end of the eighteenth century the town had recovered a peaceful
Lexington 257
prosperity. Its population at that time was sixteen hundred, most of
whom were engaged in farming. The Industrial Revolution brought
a spurt of manufacturing which lasted for the first quarter of the nine-
teenth century. The activity had no sound basis, however, and when
neighboring towns more advantageously located for power and markets
surpassed it, Lexington returned to the less eventful pursuits of agricul-
ture. In later years the town has been transformed gradually into a
residential community.
TOUR 6 m.
N '. from junction ofWaltham St. and Massachusetts Ave., Lexington Center,
on Massachusetts Ave.
1. The Lexington Battleground, 'Birthplace of American Liberty,' a
triangular level Green, is marked by the arresting Minuteman Statue of
H. H. Kitson.
2. The Marrett and Nathan Munroe House (private), 1906 Massachusetts
Ave., facing the Green, originally (1729) had a hip roof sloping to the
ground in the rear from the third story. The line of the roof has been
broken by the addition for the back porch, but the effect is not inhar-
monious.
R. from Massachusetts Ave. on Elm Ave. along N. edge of Green.
3. The Old Burying Ground lies just behind the white-steepled church,
overlooking pleasant meadows rimmed by distant hills. Some of its
slate stones with their bas-relief skulls date back to 1690. Here are
graves of Revolutionary patriots and their 'agreeable consorts.' The
Rev. John Hancock and the Rev. Jonas Clarke, whose successive local
pastorates covered the entire i8th century, rest beneath the same stone.
4. The Jonathan Harrington, Jr., House (private], corner of Elm Ave.
and Bedford Sts., is a rectangular white, two-storied frame dwelling,
with green shutters. It has a Georgian Colonial doorway. The rear
enclosed porch is a modern addition. During the battle on the Green,
Jonathan Harrington was wounded by the British. He dragged himself
to the door of his home, where he died at his wife's feet.
5. The First State Normal School in the United States, opposite corner
of Bedford St., was founded in 1839 under the direction of the Rev.
Cyrus Pierce, with three pupils. It is a two-story white building, now
a Masonic Temple, at the northeast corner of the Green.
R. from Elm Ave. on Bedford St.
6. The Buckman Tavern (open summer, weekdays 10-5; Sun. 2-5), built
in 1690 and later the rallying-place of the Minutemen, retains some
interesting interior features of the iyth century, but has been greatly
altered in appearance by the addition of a hip roof with dormer windows,
fCl
\F
LEXINGTON
TOUR
Lexington 259
forming a third story. Here, about the great fireplace on the morning
of April 19, the Minutemen assembled to await the approach of the
British troops; from the chamber windows above Paul Revere witnessed
their arrival; across its threshold that afternoon were brought two
wounded British soldiers, one of whom died. Since 1921 it has been
maintained as a community meeting place. The inn has a small collec-
tion of old bottles, jugs, flip mugs, loggerheads, and tavern table and
chairs.
L. from Bedford St. on Massachusetts Ave.; R from Massachusetts Ave.
on Clark St.
7. A reproduction of the Belfry from which sounded the alarm to the
Minutemen stands on the original site on a low hill, a stone's throw to
the southwest of the Green. The bell long ago disappeared, but these
weather-beaten timbers vividly commemorate the humble daily functions
of its tongue, faithfully year in and year out ' summoning the people to
worship, warning them at night to rake up the fires and go to bed, and
tolling for them when one after another they passed away.'
Retrace Clark St.; L.from Clark St. on Massachusetts Ave.; R.from Massa-
chusetts Ave. on Bedford St.; R.from Bedford St. on Hancock St.
8. The Hancock-Clarke House, 35 Hancock St. (open weekdays 9.30-5,
Sun. 2-5, Apr. l-Nov. 1; -weekdays 11-4, Sun. 2-4, Nov. Dec. March;
not open during Jan. and Feb.; adm. free), is the eleventh house across
the railroad track. The one-story gambrel-roofed ell was the original
dwelling, built in 1698 by the Reverend John Hancock, whose son John,
father of Governor John Hancock, was born here. The frame is of hand-
hewn oak and shows little sign of decay. Enlarged in 1734, at the out-
break of the Revolution it was the home of the Rev. Jonas Clarke.
Here John Hancock and Samuel Adams lay hidden on the night of
April 1 8, 1775, when Paul Revere sounded his alarm; and Dorothy
Quincy, Hancock's betrothed, met them there, bringing a 'fine salmon
for their dinner.' An ell contains Revolutionary costumes and the drum
beaten at the battle. The large, low-ceilinged kitchen, then the real
center of family life, exhibits utensils in use at the time. In all, there
are 2400 pieces owned by the Lexington Historical Society which has
maintained headquarters in this house since the date of its purchase by
the Society in 1896.
9. The Botanic Garden (open daily; free), 91 Hancock St., was begun in
LEXINGTON MAP INDEX
1. Lexington Battleground 7. First State Normal School
2. Marrett and Nathan Munroe House 8. Hancock-Clarke House
3. Old Burying Ground 9. Botanic Garden
4. Jonathan Harrington, Jr., House 10. Gary Memorial Building
5. Buckman Tavern u. Munroe Tavern
6. Belfry
260 Main Street and Village Green
1930 to 'grow, test and display all hardy herbaceous plants.' Most of
the labor is voluntarily contributed by friends and members of garden
clubs. Beginning with the summer of 1937 the Garden was used as a
classroom for the Summer School of the School of Landscape Architec-
ture of Harvard University.
Retrace on Hancock St., back to Green; L. from Hancock St. on Bedford
St.; L.from Bedford St. on Massachusetts Ave.
10. The Gary Memorial Building, 1605 Massachusetts Ave., a modern
low brick structure which serves as a town hall, is worth a brief visit
for the purpose of seeing the painting of the Battle of Lexington, 'The
Dawn of Liberty,' by Henry Sandham, and a portrait of Lady Lexington.
11. The Munroe Tavern (open weekdays 9.30-5, Sun. 2-5, April 19-
Nov. 11; free), 1332 Massachusetts Ave., built in 1695 and subsequently
altered, now houses beneath its hip roof a museum collection. Its old
rooms, which retain many of their original features, are furnished in the
manner of the period. In 1789 Washington was entertained here at a
testimonial dinner and the chair, table, dishes, and hatrack which he
used are preserved.
12. The Mason House (private), almost opposite, 1303 Massachusetts
Avenue, was built in 1680 but is still in a good state of preservation.
13. Another Jonathan Harrington Home (private) is at 955 Massachusetts
Ave. near Joseph Rd. Its builder, a relative of the Jonathan Harrington
killed in the battle, was the fifer of the Minutemen and the last survivor
of the battle. Seventeen years old in 1775, he lived to be 95 and occupied
a front seat at commemorative exercises of the 25th, soth, and 75th
anniversaries of the battle, shaking the hands of famous statesmen and
always referring to himself as the Minute Boy.
14. The Ben Wellington Tablet (R), Massachusetts Ave. and Follen
Rd., commemorates ' the first armed men taken in the Revolution.'
L O W ELL. Company Founders and City Fathers
City: Alt. no, pop. 100,114, sett. 1653, incorp. town 1826, city 1836.
Railroad Station: Northern Depot, Middlesex St., for B. & M. R.R. and N.Y.,
N.H. & H. R.R.
Bus Stations: Railroad Station and Lowell Bus Terminal, 44 Bridge St., for
B. & M. Transportation Co., Vermont Transit Co., Frontier Coach Lines,
Champlain Coach Lines, and Blue Way Line; 70 Central St. for Grey Line.
Accommodations: Four hotels.
Information: Lowell Chamber of Commerce, Merrimack St.
Lowell 261
ONE hundred feet above sea level, on a plateau where the powerful Mer-
rimack joins the sluggish Concord River, stands Lowell, one of the leading
manufacturing cities of New England. Canals and grassy plots criss-
cross the crowded metropolitan business section. On the hills beyond are
a city's homes from mansion to tenement.
The early history of this region is identified with the town of Chelmsford,
of which it was for many years a remote and insignificant part. At that
time only a settlement existed here, supporting itself by the handicrafts
of the home and the fisheries of Pawtucket Falls.
At the turn of the eighteenth century, the name of Francis Cabot Lowell,
known as the originator of American cotton manufacturing, enters the an-
nals of this city. In England he had studied British methods of textile
operations. Returning to this country he devised and financed a practical
power loom for American use. Through Ezra Worthen, the possibilities
of the river Merrimack and the recently constructed Pawtucket Canal
were investigated. Lowell was enthusiastic, and in February, 1822 (five
years after Lowell's untimely death), the Merrimack Manufacturing Com-
pany was formed by his associates. Overnight the company founders be-
came the first city fathers in what would today be called a huge company
town. Both men and women slept in corporation lodging houses, ate in
company dining-rooms, shopped in company stores, and were buried in
company lots. Employees worked from five in the morning to seven at
night. Women received from two dollars and twenty-five cents to four
dollars a week, men about twice that. On March i, 1826, the district was
incorporated as the township of Lowell in recognition of its sponsor, and
the company associates promptly took over the political reins. Outside
capital poured in from the merchants of Boston and many other sources.
To the cotton manufacturing of the Merrimack Company was added the
Print Works in 1824. The Hamilton Company, with a capital of $600,000,
and the Appleton and Lowell Manufacturing Companies were among the
many that rushed in to exploit the miraculous water-power of the Merri-
mack. Agents of these various companies scoured Europe in search of
cheap labor, painting glowing pictures of the promised land across the sea
and luring thousands of immigrants into the maw of the hungry, growing
city.
Canals formed an integral part of this expansion. The Middlesex Canal,
built in the first years of the nineteenth century, was the first American
traction canal of a type already familiar in England and on the Conti-
nent. Much of the freight and passenger traffic of the new community
flowed between its banks.
Europe watched Lowell with something like amazement. Its rapid rise to
industrial eminence interested and astounded economists, historians, and
writers all over the world. Many of the skilled workers who first came to
the factories were the Irish and English, who now occupy prominent
places in the city life. After thorn came the non-English-speaking groups
who settled in their own little communities, building their churches,
LOWELL
TOUR
Lowell 263
schools, and convents and preserving the culture of their homeland. The
French-Canadians, the Poles, and the Greeks today have their own clubs
and newspapers. The Greeks dominate so large a section of the city that
Lowell has often been called a modern American Athens.
The peak of the city's industrial development was achieved in the period
of artificial prosperity preceding 1924. After 1924 there was a general de-
crease, ending in the devastating debacle of 1929. Many of the mills
moved south. Other industries were liquidated. The whole textile indus-
try of the city was reduced by fifty per cent, and thousands of workers
were left jobless and homeless. Lowell lost its position as the most impor-
tant textile center in the world. It ceased to be the 'Spindle City.' Yet
in place of these losses, it began slowly to make gains and to change its
aspect. From a concentration on textiles it broadened its scope to include
many kinds of manufactures. By 1934 it seemed to have entered the up-
ward grind toward recovery.
TOUR 11.7 m.
S.from Appleton St. on Thorndike St.
1. South Common is a 22-acre recreational center.
L. from Thorndike St. into Central St.; R. from Central St. into Wamesit
St.; L.from Wamesit St. into Rogers St., crossing the Concord River, tribu-
tary to the Merrimack.
2. Rogers Hall, 196 Rogers St., facing a hilly park, is a preparatory school
and junior college for girls.
R.from Rogers St. into Park Ave. and straight up the hill.
3. Fort Hill Park, beautifully planted in open vistas framed by birches,
maples, beeches, poplars, oaks, pines, spruces, cedars, and tamaracks, has
from its crest a magnificent view.
Down the hill into Park Ave.; E., as a direct return is prohibited; L. from
Park Ave.; E. at cemetery into unmarked Knapp Ave.; L.from Knapp Ave.
on Rogers St., bearing R.from Rogers St. into Nesmith St.; L.from Nesmith
St. into E. Merrimack St.
LOWELL MAP INDEX
i. South Common 10. St. Patrick's Church
4. Immaculate Conception Church n. North Common
5. St. Anne's Church 12. Statue of Father Garin
6. Lucy Larcom Park 13. Lowell Textile Institute
7. Cardinal O'Connell Bust 14. Wannalancit Park
8. Birthplace of Whistler 15. Spaulding House
9. Greek Orthodox Church 16. The Francis Floodgate
264 Main Street and Village Green
4. The Immaculate Conception Church (Catholic), corner of Fayette St.,
is a Gothic edifice of the gray granite which abounds in this region.
The truncated tower of the church, its delicate spires, and its great rosette
window on the side are reminiscent of the cathedrals of France.
5. St. Anne's Church (Episcopal), corner of Kirk St., is the gem of the
city's smaller churches. This is a plain Norman house of worship with a
square tower, constructed almost entirely of small, irregular field-stone
blocks, smooth-faced and almost slate in color. The low wing of the
church vestry and the rectory at its farther end break the monotony of
the line.
6. Lucy Larcom Park, adjacent to St. Anne's, is a long, narrow strip of
greensward extending -along the Pawtucket Canal, which here swirls sud-
denly up from gatelocks after flowing for some distance beneath the city.
This parkway was named in honor of Lucy Larcom, a 19th-century New
England poet who wrote 'Hannah Binding Shoes' and the prose 'New
England Girlhood,' which tells of her early days as a mill hand at Lowell.
At the Merrimack St. end of the park is a section of the Railroad Track
laid in 1835 for the Boston and Lowell Railroad, the first steam railroad in
New England.
L. from Merrimack St. into Cardinal O'Connell Parkway.
7. The Cardinal O'Connell Bust surmounts a granite bird bath in the mid-
dle of the Green, commemorating the fondness of St. Francis of Assisi
for the winged creatures of God. The bust is an excellent likeness of the
Cardinal, a native of Lowell.
L.from the Parkway into Market St.; R. from Market St. into Worthen St.
8. The Birthplace of Whistler (open weekdays 10-5 except Mon.; Sun. 12-5) ,
243 Worthen St., is a shrine for artists who often know nothing of Lowell
except that it is the birthplace of James Abbott McNeil! Whistler (1834-
1903), America's most renowned painter, dandy, and wit, son of an Army
engineer. The house, built in 1824, stands directly on the sidewalk in
what is now a shabby but quiet byway near the Greek quarter of the city.
R. from Worthen St. into Broadway; R. from Broadway into Lewis St.
9. The Greek Orthodox Church, corner of Jefferson St., established in 1907,
was the first of its denomination in America. It is a Byzantine structure in
yellow brick, with a squat central red dome surmounted by a gilded Greek
cross and fronted by two still lower domed towers. This section is Little
Greece, a center of humble, nondescript frame dwellings and small variety
shops bearing signs in modern Greek.
L.from Lewis St. into Jefferson St., crossing the canal.
10. St. Patrick's Church, on Suffolk St. facing Jefferson St., is an im-
pressive Gothic gray-stone church, distinguished by its very tall tower
with tapering spire.
L. from Je/erson St. into Suffolk St.; R. from Suffolk St. into Cross St.
Lowell 265
11. North Common is a recreational center, serving the Acre, a section
tenanted by Irish, French, and Greeks.
Retrace Cross St.; L.from Cross St. into Suffolk St.; L.from Suffolk St. into
Merrimack St.
12. The Statue of Father Garin, on the small side lawn of St. James's
Catholic Church, was erected by the French-Canadians to their parish
priest of this name. A fine bronze statue of heroic size, by Philippe Heber,
it presents a tall, bareheaded, commanding figure, with strong but sensi-
tive scholarly face.
R. from Merrimack St. into Pawtucket St.; L. from Pawtucket St. into
Moody St.
13. The Lowell Textile Institute (co-educational), corner of Colonial Ave.,
established in 1897, is probably the largest school of its kind in the world
and the only one offering instruction in textile processes. Among technical
schools of every nature, it ranks at the top. Of especial interest is an ex-
hibit (open) of the various processes undergone by cotton from the boll to
the finished cloth. In connection with this exhibit are spindles and looms
in full operation.
L. from Moody St. into Riverside St.; straight ahead on Varnum Ave., the
continuation of Riverside St.
14. Wannalancit Park, a grassy embankment shaded by trees, traversed
by footpaths and dotted with benches, extends for several miles along the
river.
Retrace Varnum Ave.; R.from Varnum Ave. into Mammouth Rd., crossing
the bridge; R. from Mammouth Rd. into Pawtucket St.
15. The Spalding House (private), 275 Pawtucket St., originally a tavern,
erected in 1760, presents a carefully restored exterior of two-and-a-half
stories with hip roof, its twin chimneys, later than the single central type,
its yellow clapboards with white trim, and its i8-paned windows. The
narrow black blinds are a variation from type. The curved iron hand rail
with brass knob, at the front steps, and the green-paneled front door are
restorations.
L. from Pawtucket St. into Wannalancit St.; R. from Wannalancit St. into
Clare St.; R. from Clare St. into Broadway.
1 6. The Francis Floodgate consists of a guard lock of massive timber 27
feet wide, 25 feet deep, and 2 feet thick, built in 1848 and at the time known
as 'Francis' Folly.' Major Francis, its builder, at that time chief engineer
of the Locks and Canal Co., was the target of sharp criticism and caustic
derision to the day of his death. But 88 years after its construction the
gate was dropped and reinforced by sandbags, just in time to save Lowell
from the havoc wrought by the river in cities to the north.
L. from Broadway into Wilder St.
17. The Lowell State Teachers' College (1894), 850 Broadway, is con-
structed of the yellow brick which Lowell favors whenever tempted from
266 Main Street and Village Green
its allegiance to gray granite. It is notable for its beautiful location in a
broad-landscaped campus on a spacious hilltop.
L. from Wilder St. into Liberty St.
1 8. The Lincoln Memorial, in Lincoln Square, is a medallion head of the
Emancipator by Bela Pratt, given to the city by its school-children.
LYNN". Machine City
City: Alt. 34, pop. 102,320, sett. 1629, incorp. town 1631, city 1850.
Railroad Stations: Central Square for B. & M. R.R.; Market and Broad Sts. for
Boston, Revere Beach, & Lynn (Narrow Gauge).
Bus Station: Costello's Book Store, Lambert Square, for Greyhound Lines.
Piers: Yacht Basin, Lynn Harbor, end of Washington St.
Accommodations: One first-class hotel, rates same winter as summer. Apart-
ment hotels, tourist homes.
Swimming: Lynn Beach, two miles in length, end of Nahant St. Fresh water,
Flax Pond, bath-houses, etc.
Information: Hotel Edison, Lynn Chamber of Commerce.
FROM the General Edwards Bridge, the industrial city of Lynn sprawls
across a plain flanked by rocky hills to the north and west, and by the
sea and miles of tidal flats to the east and south. The vast River Works
plant of the General Electric stretches beyond the Saugus River, and
ahead are the dreary Victorian buildings of the shoe factories. From the
congested heart of the industrial district tenement roofs, spires, and
brick walls rise in a chaotic jumble to the distant city heights, in fantastic
contrast with the great woods and the several quiet lakes which lie, sur-
prisingly, within the limits of this noisy machine city.
Lynn, first known as Saugus, was named in honor of King's Lynn in
Norfolk County, England. Appropriately, Lhyn to the ancient Britons
signified 'Place of the Spreading Waters.' Very early the town began to
swing toward industrialism.
One of the first settlers was a tanner, and his establishment laid the
foundation of a related industry that was to make Lynn famous through-
out the industrial world. Two highly skilled shoemakers, Philip Kirtland
and Edmund Bridges, settled near the tannery in 1635 and began to fash-
ion shoes that compared favorably with those produced elsewhere. By
the beginning of the eighteenth century almost every house had its
Lynn 267
' back-yard' shop, and presently Lynn was supplying most of the foot-
gear for Boston. John Adam Dagyr (1750), a Welsh shoemaker, set a
high standard of workmanship which lasted for many years after his
death.
The beginning of the nineteenth century brought new life, resulting in
part from the activities of Ebenezer Breed, who was influential in per-
suading Congress to protect the growing industry with a tariff. In 1800
the State Legislature passed an act to encourage the manufacture of
shoes, boots, and * arctics ' (galoshes) . An army of craftsmen toiled early
and late in their small shops, and in 1810 manufactured about one million
pairs of shoes.
With the introduction of the first shoe sewing machine in 1848, the fac-
tory system began to take over. The domestic production units of the
craftsmen were liquidated and the workers were absorbed into huge
plants. With bewilderment and resentment, they saw their craftsmen's
status fade into insignificance when they took their places at the alien
machines. The ensuing friction brought about the shoe strike of 1867,
when all shoe factories were closed down for seven weeks. Demanding
better living conditions, the employees organized parades in which several
thousand men and women marched with brass bands, fire companies,
military organizations, and sympathizers from neighboring towns.
The new system attracted foreign workingmen by the thousand and al-
tered the racial complexion of the city. The French-Canadians, the
largest racial group, dispersed through the city. The Irish, second in
numbers, were forced by religious intolerance to settle in a compact dis-
trict. The third most numerous group, the Italians, as well as Greeks,
Poles, and Armenians, formed distinctly bilingual communities but lost
most of their picturesque color. The Greek district in the vicinity of Pleas-
ant and Tremont Streets has several restaurants which feature native
dishes, notably Turkish coffee, nutritious yoghourt, and badava. There
are five large Jewish districts where Yiddish is still widely spoken and
orthodox customs are maintained.
An interesting episode of the period of immigration was the sojourn of
Charles Bata, a Czechoslovakian, who came here to learn the trade.
Having observed factory methods, he returned to Czechoslovakia, and
built one of the largest and most modern shoe factories in the world,
capable of producing footgear at a very low cost, somewhat to the resent-
ment of his industrial alma mater.
Until the last decade of the nineteenth century Lynn was the leading shoe
center in the country. In November, 1889, fire ravaged thirty-one acres
of the business section, with a property loss of about $5,000,000. By
1915, it had fallen to third place. The introduction of modern machinery
decreased the reliance on skilled craftsmen, and manufacturers began to
remove into areas of cheaper, less-skilled labor. Recently, this migration
seems to have halted. There has also been a recent noticeable expansion
of the leather industry.
268 Main Street and Village Green
In the period immediately following the Civil War, Lynn shoe workers
joined the powerful Knights of St. Crispin, but this union declined.
Never since has there been a long period when the principal crafts were
unorganized, but the unions in the several crafts have not always co-
operated well. At present most of the Lynn shoe workers belong to the
United Shoe Workers of America, affiliated with the Committee for In-
dustrial Organization. A company union in the Lion Shoe Company was
recently dissolved by the National Labor Relations Board.
The General Electric Company set up a system of works councils in its
huge plant just after the World War. In 1934, the workers organized an
industrial union, and secured recognition. This union spread to other
centers, and as the United Electrical and Radio Workers is affiliated with
the C.I.O. The leather workers of Lynn also belong to a C.I.O. affiliate,
the National Leather Workers. The workers in a number of other trades
hold charters from unions affiliated with the American Federation of
Labor.
Lynn's varied industries have made it possible for the city to withstand,
somewhat better than single-industry communities, the tremors of
economic instability. Although the shoe factories and their allied trades
predominate numerically, the General Electric Company is the largest
industry of the city, and in 1935 its two Lynn plants employed more
workmen than any other concern in the State.
TOUR 10m.
E. from Central Square on Exchange St.; L. from Exchange St. into Broad
St.; R.from Broad St. into Nahant St.; L.from Nahant St. into Lynn Shore
Drive.
1. Lynn Beach (restaurants, amusements, municipal bathhouse), bordering
on Nahant Bay, is a vast playground crowded in summer with throngs
almost as brown as were the Indians who once gathered here to watch
their braves in contests of strength and skill.
L. from Lynn Shore Drive into Ocean Ter.; L. (straight ahead) from Ocean
Ter. into Lewis St. and then into Broad St.
2. The Mary Baker Eddy Residence (free Christian Science Reading Room;
open weekdays, 10-5.30), 12 Broad St., is the house where it is thought the
Founder of Christian Science (see Tour IA, SWAMPSCOTT) wrote the
major part of 'Science and Health.'
R. from Broad St. into Green St.
3. The Lynn Historical Society (open summer Wed. 2.30-4), 125 Green St.,
exhibits in its museum wing a collection of early furniture, household
utensils, pewter, glassware, and historical records.
L. from Green St. into Union St.; R. from Union St. into Ireson St.; cross
Lynn 269
Morrison Sq. into Rockaway St.; L. from Rockaway St. into High Rock
St.; L. from High Rock St. into Circuit Ave.
4. High Rock is a bold promontory, from the summit of which an observa-
tion tower 275 feet above sea level affords a magnificent view of the indus-
trial panorama of Lynn and also of the ocean and the rocky rim of the
Massachusetts Basin.
5. The Home of Moll Pitcher (inaccessible), built in 1666, stands in the
shadow of this dull purple porphyry cliff. Moll's fame as a fortune-
teller spread to most of the principal parts of Europe, and her memory is
perpetuated in a poem of Whittier's named for her, and by a melodrama
entitled 'The Fortune Teller of Lynn,' popular on the New England
stage for 30 years.
Retrace on Circuit Ave.; R. from Circuit Ave. into High Rock St.; L. from
High Rock St. into Rockaway St.; straight ahead into Rock Ave.; R. from
Rock Ave. into Grant St.; L. from Grant St. into Rockingham St.; R. from
Rockingham St. into Western Ave.
6. The Lydia E. Pinkham Medicine Company (open by permission}, on
Western Ave., manufactures a famous medicinal compound first made by
Lydia E. Pinkham in her kitchen. Financial losses in the panic of 1873
led her to capitalize on her remedy. Once started, the fame of the cure
spread rapidly through the world, and as a favorite ballad stated, ' the
papers printed her face.' According to recent international advertising
programs, ' although dead, she still sends her messages of hope to millions
of women.'
L. from Western Ave. into Chestnut St.; straight ahead into Broadway.
7. At Flax Pond (public bath-house; boating}, the pioneer women of Lynn
retted flax from which to spin thread for weaving linen.
L. from Broadway into Lynnfield St.
8. The Lynn Woods, a 2ooo-acre park of wild natural beauty, begins at
Lynnfield St. and Great Woods Rd. by the Happy Valley Golf Course
(public}.
On Burrill Hill is an Observation Tower, from which there is an excellent view of
the Blue Hills, Bunker Hill Monument, and the golden dome of the State House.
Great Woods Rd. leads to a lovely ravine, framing the long slender mirror of
Walden Pond with overhanging branches of birches and elms.
Dungeon Rock is one of the most interesting landmarks in the Woods. According
to tradition a group of buccaneers hid vast treasures here in a huge cave whose
entrance was closed by the earthquake of 1658.
Approaching the Penny Brook entrance the trail passes Lantern Rock, where
pirates once hung signal lights for small boats stealing up the Saugus River under
cover of night. Near Lantern Rock is Circle Trail, with signs designating the
unusual minerals and glacial deposits, and the varieties of flora indigenous to Lynn
Woods. Near-by is the Botanical Garden with its multitude of rare blooms.
L.from Penny Brook Entrance into Walnut St., and, following State 129, R.
from Walnut St. into Kirtland St.; L. from Kirtland St. into Boston St.; R.
from Boston St. into Federal St.
270 Main Street and Village Green
9. The General Electric Company occupies both sides of Federal St. in
West Lynn (open by permission) . Turbines, arc lights, and generators are
manufactured here.
R. from Federal St. into Western Ave.
10. The River Works Plant of the Lynn General Electric Co. (open by per-
mission), together with the West Lynn Plant, employs about 10,000
workers and is the city's ranking industry. Here Elihu Thomson, one of
the founders of the General Electric Company and world-famous as an
inventor and electrical engineer, carried on most of his experiments.
M A L D E.JST . Neighbor of Boston
City: Alt. 9, pop. 57,277, sett. 1640, incorp. town 1649, city 1881.
Railroad Stations: Maiden Station on Summer St. near Pleasant St. ; Oak Grove,
277 Washington St., for B. & M. R.R.
Bus Station: Eastern Mass. R.R. Busses for Lowell and Lawrence stop at
Maiden Square (opposite Baptist Church).
Accommodations: One hotel at reasonable rates; tourist camps.
Riding: Several miles of bridle paths, carriage roads, and trails in Middlesex
Fells.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, Pleasant St.
FROM the summit of Waitt's Hill, Maiden is seen to be both a resi-
dential and a manufacturing city, tree-shaded, and girt on the north
and northwest by the rugged, wooded cliffs of the Middlesex Fells.
Although manufacturing is actually of prominence, it is largely confined
to a limited area near the Everett border, and the main impression
gained by a drive through the city is of frame dwelling houses mainly
of the parvenu era, schools, churches, community centers, and a number
of small but pleasant parks. The proximity of Maiden to the great
metropolitan center of Boston is both an advantage and a drawback to
its residential appeal. Inevitably with the years, its suburban identity
tends to be swallowed up in the overflowing tide from the greater city.
Yet there are not many apartment houses, and if there are no preten-
tiously wealthy districts, neither is there shabby poverty. Maiden re-
mains what it has long been, a good-sized city of comfortable middle-class
homes.
The settlers of Maiden, mainly Puritans, landed at Charlestown, situ-
ated in a part of the grant made in 1622 to Robert Gorges by the
Northern Virginia Company. However, in 1628 the Council at Plymouth
Maiden 271
disregarded this grant and the subsequent lease and sold the land to
the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
After the arrival of Governor Winthrop, in 1630, Charlestown grew
rapidly and extended its boundaries. Within ten years a few settlers
had crossed to the north side of the Mystic River, built homes, and
founded a new town. Upon the petition of a committee chosen from
among these persons the General Court granted, in 1649, the charter.
Maiden's first free school was established in accordance with the terms
of the will of William Gooden, who left a portion of his estate in trust
for this purpose.
Difficulty was experienced in securing men competent to teach. More
than once an hiatus occurred between the release of a schoolmaster and
the appointment of his successor, so that on one occasion the town was
presented at Court sessions on the charge of not maintaining a school.
The first schoolhouse, built in 1712, saw only eighteen years in the
service of education; in 1730 it was sold to the town bellman and grave-
digger. Private homes were again requisitioned for use as schoolhouses.
Not until 1783, after much discussion and long delay, was the nucleus
of the present school system created.
A company of soldiers known as the Maiden Band was formed shortly
after the incorporation of the town. Citizens also organized a company
of cavalry, which saw service in King Philip's War. On September 23,
1774, the townsmen voted to instruct Captain Ebenezer Harnden, their
representative in General Court, that it was their 'firm and deliberate
resolution rather to rule our lives and fortunes than submit to those
unrighteous acts of the British Parliament which pretends to regulate
the government of this Province.' This resolution was translated into
action at the outbreak of the Revolutionary War.
Until it received its city charter Maiden was regulated by five selectmen
chosen from churchmen in good standing. The granting of the city
charter in 1881 made necessary a different form of government, and
city affairs have since been administered by a mayor, a board of alder-
men, and a city council.
Maiden is now primarily a manufacturing center. It is within twenty-
four-hour rail delivery of three quarters of the nation's markets and has
easy access to the major trans-Atlantic and coastwise passenger and
freight lines. Its factories, of which there are approximately one hundred
and fifty, are widely representative of varied industries.
POINTS OF INTEREST
i. The Maiden Public Library, Maiden Sq., was built 1879-85, and de-
signed by H. H. Richardson. Characteristic of his work, it is a personal-
ized adaptation of Romanesque forms. It is an excellent example of his
272 Main Street and Village Green
later and more mature designs which came to be known as 'Richard-
sonian Romanesque/ Its simple and well-studied masses are entirely
of brownstone, and its interior is enhanced by Romanesque-Byzantine
carving.
The library contains a small but distinguished art gallery, displaying
works of noted French and American artists dating from Claude Lorraine
to the present day. Of historic interest is Albion H. Bicknell's large
group portrait, 'The Gettysburg Address.'
2. The Parsonage House (private), 145 Main St., is a two-and-a-half-
story white structure built in 1724 and first occupied by the Rev. Joseph
Emerson, who has been piquantly characterized by his son: 'He was a
Boanerges, a son of .thunder, to the workers of iniquity; a Barnabas, a
son of consolation, to the mourners in Zion.' In this house in 1788 was
born Adoniram Judson, the famous missionary to Burma. Judson
attended Brown University and after graduation opened a private
school at Plymouth, where he prepared a book entitled ' Young Ladies'
Arithmetic' presumably a gentle adaptation of the knotty subject to
the young female brain. In 1808, while traveling through the United
States, his mind became affected by 'infidel views' of religion and, with
no decided plan for his life, he became a member of a theatrical company.
In 1809, after a short but wretched period of skepticism and doubt, he
joined the Third Congregational Church in Plymouth. After his ordina-
tion in 1812, he married and set out with his young bride for India,
but was converted to the Baptist denomination while on board ship.
3. Bell Rock Memorial Park is opposite the Parsonage, near which stood
the house in which the congregation of the Church of Mystic Side
gathered and where preached Marmaduke Matthews, the first pastor in
Maiden. The bell that summoned the people to worship, sounded the
alarm in times of danger, and called the freeholders to meet for action
in public affairs was hung upon a rock of which only a part now remains.
In the park is a replica of a small fortress, accessible from the street by
a stairway, and at its summit stands a modern Civil War Soldiers' and
Sailors' Monument by Bela Pratt.
4. The Greene House (private), 51 Appleton St., is also known as the
Perkins House. On what was then known as Greene Hill, James Greene
built a house in 1648. The present dwelling was constructed of timbers
taken from its predecessor. In 1686 a council was held in the old house
to try a man named McCheever for alleged irregularities of speech and
conduct. Increase Mather was the moderator, but the council, which
included five ministers from Boston, could not arrive at an agreement.
The upshot of the matter was that 'they left the whole matter in the
hands of the Lord as an easy way out of it.'
5. WaitCs Mount, Leonard St., a small park which crowns the highest
hill in the city, affords a fine panoramic view of the surrounding country.
During the months of July and August a camp is maintained here for
undernourished children.
Marblehead 273
6. Pine Banks Tourist Camp (free), Main St., at the Malden-Melrose
city line, is situated in a beautiful natural wooded park. It was be-
queathed to the cities of Maiden and Melrose by the children of Elisha
Slade Converse, first mayor of Maiden and former director of the Boston
Rubber Shoe Company.
MARBLEHEAD. Where Tradition Lingers
Town: Alt. 15, pop. 10,173, sett - 1629, incorp. 1649.
Railroad Station: 97 Pleasant for B. & M. R.R.
Piers: Marblehead Neck for Eastern Yacht Club and Corinthian Yacht Club.
Front St. for Boston Yacht Club. Public landing at foot of State St. The
Ferry, Ferry Lane (harbor trips, 10^).
Accommodations: One large hotel, several small first class hotels and boarding
houses. Winter accommodations limited.
Information: Rotary Club, Washington St.
MARBLEHEAD, in whose narrow, twisted streets traditions linger, is
built upon a rock, and everywhere through the thin garment of turf
protrude knobs and cliffs of granite. Along the steep, winding ways
weather-beaten houses shoulder each other, with intermittent glimpses
of the harbor and the sea between their grayed walls. A mass of tumbled
rocks chiseled by the sea forms the grim profile of the 'Neck.'
Reckless, hardbitten fishermen from Cornwall and the Channel Islands
settled Marblehead (Marble Harbor) in 1629 as a plantation of Salem.
Their rude huts clung to the rocks like sea-birds' nests. Said a Marble-
header of a later day ' Our ancestors came not here for religion.
Their main end was to catch fish.' As might have been expected from
such ungodliness, early Marblehead was a favorite with the powers of
darkness. Many a citizen met Satan himself riding in state in a coach
and four, or was chased through the streets by a corpse in a coffin. The
eerie lament of the ' screeching woman of Marblehead' resounded across
the harbor, and Puritan Salem hanged old ' Mammy Red ' of Marblehead
who knew how to turn enemies' butter to blue wool. Within a decade
unruly Marblehead was without regret permitted to become a separate
town, 'the greatest Towne for fishing in New England.'
The early prosperity of the fisheries was short-lived. The Reverend
John Barnard, who came in 1715 to minister to the heathen, wrote,
1 Nor could I find twenty families that could stand upon their own legs,
and they were generally as rude, swearing, drunken and fighting a crew
274 Main Street and Village Green
as they were poor.' Under his guidance markets were sought in the
West Indies and Europe for the carefully cured fish, and a class of mer-
chants began to send larger vessels to more distant ports.
As war with England approached and His Majesty's frigates lay threat-
eningly in the harbor, the rafters of the Old Town House thundered to
revolutionary speeches and all Marblehead blazed with patriotism. Her
merchants patriotically extended shipping privileges to the merchants of
Boston when Marblehead took Boston's place as the port of entry after
the passage of the Boston Port Bill (1774). The Tory merchants fled
for their lives, seafaring men turned to privateering with its promise of
prize money and adventure or joined General John Glover's famous
'Amphibious Regiment' which was later with muffled oars to row
Washington across the Delaware. The Marblehead schooner 'Lee,'
manned by a captain and crew of this regiment, flew the Pine Tree flag
and took the 'Nancy,' the first British prize.
Privateering became unprofitable as the British blockade tightened.
The close of the war found Marblehead economically prostrate, the
merchant fleet captured or sunk, the fishing fleet rotting at the wharves.
To relieve the distress two lotteries were organized and the fishing
fleet was reconditioned with the proceeds, but just as prosperity again
seemed assured, the War of 1812 tied up the fleet once more and embargo
closed the ports of trade. After the war the fishing fleet gallantly put
to sea, but the town with little capital could not compete with the more
fortunately situated ports of Boston and Gloucester. The great gale of
1846, which took a frightful toll of men and ships, hastened the end.
Undaunted, Marblehead turned to industry. The back-yard shoe shops,
a feature of every fisherman's cottage, were amalgamated into factories
after 1840, and within a decade, trained hands and mass production
methods were turning out a million pairs of shoes a year. Other factories
produced glue, rope, twine, barrels, paint, and cigars. But the spider
web of railroads that spun out across the country, tapping the resources
of the West and concentrating manufacturing in the larger cities, spelled
doom to Marblehead as an industrial center, a doom hastened by two
disastrous fires.
Ultimately it was the sea that once more brought prosperity. The
harbor, where long ago the high-sterned fishing boats rode to tree-root
moorings, has become the yachting center of the eastern seaboard.
Summer estates line the once bleak shore of the Neck and overlook the
harbor where hundreds of sleek-hulled craft ride at anchor. In the
yachting season more sails slant out past Halfway Rock, where once
the fishermen tossed pennies to buy good luck and safe return,
ever did in the days of Marblehead's maritime glory.
Marblehead 275
FOOT TOUR 2m.
E. on Washington St. through Washington Square.
1. Abbot Hall, the Victorian Town Hall and Public Library, in the
center of the Square, houses Willard's 'The Spirit of '76,' the familiar
historical painting.
2. The Colonel William Lee House (private), 185 Washington St., is one
of the network of old houses, nearly all of them pre-Revolutionary,
which form the heart of Marblehead. Colonel Lee was an early merchant
prince of the town, and a Revolutionary army officer. The house dates
from the mid-i8th century, and has the wood-block front, popular in
Marblehead's fashionable dwellings. An Ionic portico and octagonal
cupola add distinction.
3. The Jeremiah Lee Mansion (1768) (open weekdays 9-5; adm. 25),
opposite Mason St., is one of the finest examples of the second phase of
New England Georgian architecture. A three-story building, rusticated
over the entire surface and accented by quoined corners, it is surmounted
by an octahedral cupola. The chief embellishment is a simple portico of
two fluted Ionic columns. The elaborate paneling of the 'mahogany
room/ the magnificent staircase, and the rich variety of detail in wood
finish give the interior exceptional interest.
R. from Washington St. on Hooper St.
4. The King Hooper House (private), 8 Hooper St., which was built in
1745, is the third of three houses built by early merchant princes. The
three-story front is of wood executed to give the effect of stone cours-
ing. Robert Hooper, the builder of the house, was nicknamed ' King'
because of his great wealth and royal manner of life.
Retrace on Hooper St.; straight ahead on Washington St.
5. St. Michael's Church (Episcopal) (open daily 9-5), corner of Sum-
mer St., was erected in 1714, and is probably the oldest Episcopal church
edifice in New England. The interior has gate pews and the typical
Colonial raised pulpit, reached by a winding stair and surmounted by an
overhanging sounding board.
6. The Old Town House (1727) needed to be sturdy of rafters to with-
stand the turbulent shouts of pre-Revolutionary town meetings. It is
a pleasing example of the first phase of New England Georgian design
a two-story clapboarded building set high upon a granite walled
basement, its corners flanked with quoins, its low gabled roof enhanced
by a simple cornice.
7. The Marblehead Art Association (open publicly in August for an annual
exhibition, free), 65 Washington St., has a membership of 400, with head-
quarters at this Colonial house.
MARBLEHEAD
TOUR
Marblehead 277
8. The Major Pedrick House (now a rooming house, but also open as a
Colonial dwelling, 10-11 and 2-4 daily; adm. 15ff), 52 Washington St.,
is almost as fine architecturally as the Lee and Hooper mansions. It
was built in 1756, a square three-story house, with wood front repre-
senting stone coursing, elaborate cornice, and huge, square chimneys.
9. The Elbridge Gerry House (private), 44 Washington St., is marked by
a tablet as the birthplace of Elbridge Gerry (1744-1814), a member of
the Continental Congress, Governor of Massachusetts, Vice-President
of the United States during the War of 1812, and popularly known as
the originator of the device of 'gerrymandering.'
10. The Old North Church (Congregational), opposite the Gerry House,
was erected in 1824, but is the first parish in the town. The vine-covered
stone church has a characteristic Colonial Georgian steeple.
L. from Washington St, into Orne St.
11. The Azor Orne House (private], 18 Orne St., was the home of
Colonel Azor Orne, a member of the Revolutionary Committee of
Safety which included Elbridge Gerry, John Hancock, and Samuel and
John Adams.
This district is Barnegat, long ago named for the town on the New
Jersey coast where ' mooncussers ' lured vessels to destruction by false
lights from shore, with the purpose of plundering their cargoes. (A
mooncusser is one who curses the moon for its hindrance to his nefarious
designs.)
12. The Agnes Surriage Well (see Tour 1C, Ashland] is at the end of
the grassy lane leading (R) from Orne St. just beyond the Orne House.
13. The Old Brig (about 1720), known also as the Moll Pitcher House,
on Orne St. opposite the lane leading to the Agnes Surriage W^ell, is
the unnumbered low white gabled roof Colonial house with the big
central chimney. It was the home of the famous psychic fortune-teller,
Moll Pitcher, born here about 1743, and of her ancestor the wizard
Dimond. Above this house, on the rocky summit of Old Burial Hill,
MARBLEHEAD MAP INDEX
1. Abbot Hall 12. Agnes Surriage Well
2. Colonel William Lee House 13. Old Brig
3. Jeremiah Lee Mansion 14. Old Burial Hill
4. King Hooper House 15. Parson Barnard House
5. St. Michael's Church 16. Fort Sewall
6. Old Town House 17. Old Tavern
7. Marblehead Art Association 18. General John Glover's House
8. Major Pedrick House 20. Gove House
9. Elbridge Gerry House 21. The Churn
10. Old North Church 22. Castle Rock
n. Azor Orne House 23. Lighthouse
278 Main Street and Village Green
among gravestones outlined against the sky, the awed townsfolk often
saw Old Dimond's shadowy form swaying in a wild northeaster, as
with brandished arms he defied the gale and shouted to invisible satanic
thralls his orders for the safe guidance of the Marblehead fleet.
14. Old Burial Hill, just beyond the Old Brig on Orne St., dates from
1638 and contains the graves of no less than 600 Revolutionary heroes.
The low white Obelisk on the crest of the hill honors 65 Marblehead
fishermen who lost their lives in a great gale in 1846. From the hill is
obtained a panoramic view of Marblehead Harbor, the summer yachting
center of the eastern seaboard.
Retrace on Orne St.; L. from Orne St. on Franklin St.
15. The Parson Barnard House (open by arrangement with its resident
tenant), 7 Franklin St., was the home of Marblehead's second and most
famous pastor, during his 54-year ministry from 1716 to 1770. It was
Parson John Barnard who schooled the rude fishermen in the foreign
commerce which brought such great prosperity to the town before the
Revolution. And it was Parson Barnard who declined the presidency
of Harvard University, referring the Committee of Invitation to his
rival pastor in the town, the Rev. Edward Holyoke, who accepted.
When Marblehead objected strenuously to losing either clergyman,
Parson Barnard appeared in his colleague's pulpit and told the Holyoke
flock in no uncertain terms how great was the honor to their leader.
A visitor afterward inquired for Mr. Holyoke, and was told, ' Old Barnard
prayed him away.'
L. from Franklin St. on Front St.
16. Fort Sewall, at the end of Front St., was erected in 1742 and did
good service in keeping the British at bay in the Revolution, but has
long been abandoned to the pacific uses of a small seaside park.
Retrace on Front St.
17. The Old Tavern (open), 82 Front St., corner of Glover St., was built
in 1680 and is now an antique shop. Its clapboards long held British
shot fired at it from the harbor after a Marblehead patriot had disarmed
several British officers in its bar by fencing with a mere stick against
their rapiers.
R. from Front St. on Glover St.
1 8. General John Glover's House (private), n Glover St., built in 1762,
bears a tablet recording the General's crossing of the Delaware and
other military services. Glover was actually a sailor rather than a
soldier, and his privateer vessel, the 'Hannah,' manned by Marble-
headers, was the first ship of what came to be the American Navy.
Medford 279
MOTOR TOUR 4m.
W. from Washington Square on Washington St.; L. from Washington St.
on Atlantic Am.; L. from Atlantic Ave. on Ocean Ave.
19. The Causeway and Bathing Beach (bathhouses') continue Ocean Ave.
from Marblehead to Marblehead Neck. On the left is Marblehead Har-
bor, gay in summer with yachts. On the right is the long sandy, shelving
beach, facing Massachusetts Bay.
Ocean Ave. bears (R) around the ocean side of the Neck, which until
the Civil War was one great cow pasture, dotted alongshore with an
occasional fisherman's shack. It is now the home of an exclusive summer
colony.
20. Outstanding among the residences at Marblehead Neck is the Gave
House on Ocean Avenue, designed by Smith and Walker of Boston
after the ancient Castle of Carcassonne in Southern France and built
about 1934 for the daughter of Lydia Pinkham.
21. The Churn, on Ocean Ave., reached by an unmarked path leading
through a field (R) where the latter makes a short turn west, is a fissure
in the rocks at tide level from which under an east or northeast wind
great billows of spray rise to a height sometimes of 50 feet.
22. Castle Rock, adjoining the Churn (R), a rugged granite bluff rising
sheer from the sea, offers a beautiful ocean view with a long line of
shore breakers.
L. from Ocean Ave. on Follett St.
23. The Lighthouse (open daily 10-12 and 2-4) is a circular iron tower
at the tip of the Neck. From the rocks at its base is obtained the best
view of the yacht races. Just offshore, northeast, is Children's Island,
its rocky reaches covered with the buildings of a hospital for tubercular
children.
MEDFORD. Rum, Ships, and Homes
City: Alt. 12, pop. 61,444, sett. 1630-35, incorp. town 1684, city 1892.
Railroad Stations: Tufts College, Boston Ave. ; Medford Hillside, Boston Ave.
and Winthrop St.; West Medford, High St., for Lowell Division of B. & M
R.R.
Accommodations: Boarding and rooming houses; some tourist places.
280 Main Street and Village Green
Swimming: Municipal pool, Tufts Park, Main St.
Riding: Bridle trails through Middlesex Fells Reservation.
Information: Public Library, 117 High St.
MEDFORD rum and Medford-built ships, once staples of world-wide
repute, today are only legend. Still Medford thrives; a paradox accounted
for by its proximity to Boston, its residential attractiveness, and a fine
educational system reaching its climax geographically as well as peda-
gogically in Tufts College. Its hustle and bustle over, today Medford
has closed shop and settled back to its destiny as a community of homes.
In the early days of its settlement, rich loam near the river banks beck-
oned farmers, and the surging tides of the Mystic River offered thriving
fisheries. Shipbuilding was soon under way. John Winthrop, a year
before settling on Ten Hills Farm at Somerville, had launched the
'Blessing of the Bay' at Medford. Then followed a century of depression,
until the New England rum and slave trade sprang up.
Medford rum had its start when the Hall family set up a wooden still
on the site of a spring, to which the special flavor of the rum was attrib-
uted. The Hall formula, used for two hundred years, was finally de-
stroyed by General Samuel C. Lawrence, when Medford distilling came
to an end.
The navigable Mystic River was the direct cause of the other very
substantial economic activity of Medford. Freighting produce to the
State capital by boat became a bustling enterprise.
Medford developed into a supply shop for New Hampshire and Vermont,
furnishing iron, steel, lead, salt, molasses, sugar, tea, codfish, chocolate,
gunpowder, and rum at lower than Boston prices. In addition Medford
merchants engaged directly in extensive trade with foreign and domestic
ports. Barrel-making and slaughtering thrived.
One day in the year 1802, Thatcher Magoun, a youth on a holiday from
a Charlestown shipyard, was rambling about Winter Hill. In a vision he
saw a thriving shipyard on the river banks below him, himself its master.
Excitedly he clattered down the hill and boarded a two-masted schooner
lying alongside a distilling-house wharf. Breathlessly he plied the
amazed captain with all sorts of questions. A year later he returned and
laid the keel of his first ship.
Thatcher Magoun's project came at a critical moment. The English
navigation laws, after the Revolution, ended American trade with the
British West Indies, and New England merchants were frantically
seeking new markets.
Finally Yankee ingenuity found a way out, in a new trade with China.
Because their two hundred to three hundred ton capacity made possible
the navigation of the shallow bays of the northwest coast, many Medford
vessels were dispatched to the Pacific. 'Medford-built' found its way
into the idiom of the sea.
Medford 281
Such Medford builders as J. O. Curtis, Hayden and Cudworth, and S.
Lapham had more fast California passages to their credit, in proportion
to the number of clipper ships built, than those of any other town.
Sailing vessels became definitely unprofitable with the Civil War and
the introduction of steamships. In 1873 the last Medford-built ship
was launched. Nor did the distilleries long survive; by 1905 they, too,
had ceased.
TOUR 10.7 m.
W. from Medford Sg. on High St.
1. Three Hall Houses (private), homes of early Medford merchants and
patriots, 45, 49, and 57 High St., offer an unusual chance to compare at
close range varying details of Colonial architecture. No. 57, the most
ornate, has the familiar broad, square lines and cornice of the prosperous
town houses of the i8th century. No. 49 has a wood front and brick
ends, U-shaped double end-chimneys which serve to add height and
pride, and an ornamental rail across the sloping roof. No. 45, the smallest,
of frame and clapboard, is the plainest.
R. from High St. on Governors Ave.; L. from Governors Ave. into South
Border Rd.
2. Pine Hill is approached by a wooded lane (vehicles excluded] which
skirts a small pond. A number of footpaths wind to the summit, from
which there is an excellent view of the Mystic Valley.
3. Lawrence Observatory (marked footpath), an iron tower the summit of
which is 310 feet above sea level, offers a beautiful panorama of pond-
studded woodland and fields, with Medford and the Mystic River water-
front in the foreground.
L. from South Border Rd. by foot on bridle path; R. from bridle path into
first wagon path; L. from wagon path one-fourth mile to an open field.
4. A Cedar Tree, 15 ft. tall, growing out of a solid boulder, is a curious
natural wonder. Its age is estimated at about 400 years.
Retrace on South Border Rd.; R. from South Border Rd. on Governors Ave.;
R. from Governors Ave. on High St.
5. The Medford Public Library (open weekdays 9-9), 121 High St.,
formerly the residence of Thatcher Magoun 2d, was built in 1835. With-
in are several autographed letters of George Washington written to
Medford patriots; and one of the 100 existing copies of 'The Catalogue
and Investigation in Jade,' edited by George F. Kunz, Tiffany expert
in precious stones, for the estate of Heber Bishop, a Medford collector
of jade.
6. The Charles Brooks House (private), 309 High St., is a notable ex-
MEDFORD
TOUR
Medford 283
ample of the white wood front and brick-ends type, with a pair of chim-
neys at each side.
7. The West Medford Railroad Station, West Medford Square, is a bizarre
structure built about 1880. In its outside walls were embedded, when it
was built, various glittering minerals and semi-precious jewels, a whale's
tooth, fluted seashells, and an eroded boulder which is supposed to bear a
natural resemblance to the head of George Washington. Unfortunately
the building has been denuded of most of its jewels, which have been
picked out of their cement bed by souvenir hunters.
8. The Route of Paul Revere to Lexington is indicated by a board on a
tree at the corner of Grove and High Sts., with the following addendum:
'On Grove St. was the home of Rev. Edward Brooks where the returning
Minute Men were served with food and chocolate, BUT NO TEA.'
L. from High St. into Boston Ave.; R. from Boston Ave. into College Ave.
9. Tufts College, co-educational, crowns the summit of the hill. It was
founded in 1852 by Hosea Ballou 2d, nephew of the famous Universalist
divine of the same name, with endowment funds and land given by
Charles Tufts. The Goddard Chapel (1882-83), of early Gothic style, is
built of field-stone.
At one time consisting only of Ballou Hall, the college now forms an impressive
group.
In the Barnum Museum (open weekdays, 9-5; Sat. 9-12) is the famous showman's
extensive zoological collection, including the stuffed hide of Jumbo, an elephant be-
loved by the circus crowds of a past generation.
Tufts College had its origin primarily in the fact that dogmatic proselyting was
an approved function of the igth-century American college. When someone asked
Charles Tufts of Somerville, a man of open mind in sympathy with liberal religion,
what he intended to do with the windswept heights of Walnut Hill, in a prophetic
flash, he answered, 'I will put a light on it!'
Courses are given in liberal arts, theology, engineering and law. Of particular
interest is the recently founded Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy adminis-
tered in co-operation with Harvard University. Training is offered for government
foreign service, international business, and research in international relations.
Tufts College is now affiliated with Jackson College for women. The total enroll-
ment of students is 2,104, including those in attendance at Tufts Medical and
Dental Schools in Boston.
Retrace on College Ave.; R.from College Ave. into George St.
10. The Usher Roy all House (open May-Nov. daily except Mon. and Fri.
MEDFORD MAP INDEX
1. Three Hall Houses 9. Tufts College
2. Pine Hill 10. Usher Royall House
3. Lawrence Observatory n. Craddock Bridge
4. Cedar Tree 12. Old Sawyer House
5. Medford Public Library 13. Peter Tufts House
6. Charles Brooks House
284 Main Street and Village Green
1-5; adm. 25^) is at 15 George St. A three-story mansion, it derives from
the Usher nucleus; it was built before 1697 and is one of the few existing
brick houses of the iyth century. Successive alterations, mainly before
1750, have created a three-story mansion, the gabled brick ends terminat-
ing in tall chimney stacks, the wooden west front rusticated and adorned
with a colossal order, the angles decorated with quoins (among the
earliest examples) and the windows richly framed, with cornices one
of the most elaborate dwellings of its period extant in Massachusetts.
L. from George St. into Main St.
11. Craddock Bridge, a small concrete span over the Mystic River, takes
the place of a timbered draw said to have been the first toll bridge in
New England. To the right are replacements of the docks from which
ships were launched and the famous Medford Rum was exported.
R. from Main St. into Riverside Ave.
12. Old Sawyer House (private), 306 Riverside Ave., is an unpainted
story-and-a-half dwelling, with clapboarded front, shingled sides, and
central chimney, typical of the more modest Colonial dwellings. It is
at least 200 years old, and its present resident is a descendant of the
original owner.
13. The Peter Tufts House or 'Old Fort 1 (open on request; adm. 25^), 350
Riverside Ave., sometimes called the Craddock House, is a landmark
dating from 1677-80. It is interesting to architects as one of the earliest
brick houses built from the start with a depth of , two rooms in each story.
Porthole windows from which to fire revivify in the mind the terrors of
Indian attack. Some antiquarians believe this to be the house built in
1638 for Governor Matthew Craddock.
NEW BEDFORD. Thar She Blows
City: Alt. 9, pop. 110,022, sett. 1640, incorp. town 1787, city 1847.
Railroad Stations: New Bedford Station, 624 Acushnet Ave.; New Bedford
Wharf Station, 41 Front St.; Weld St. Station, 81 Weld St.; all for N.Y.,
N.H. & H. R.R.
Bus Stations: Middle St. for Union St. Ry. Co.; Vineyard Steamboat Line
Dock, Front St., for New England Transportation Co.; 'Times Lot/ 911
Purchase St., for I.C.T. Bus Co.
Piers: Homer's Wharf, from n Front St. to Acushnet River, for New Bedford
Cuttyhunk Line; Vineyard Steamboat Line, from 41 Front St. to Acushnet
River, for the New Bedford, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket Steamboat
Line.
New Bedford 285
Accommodations: Three hotels, adequate modern inns and transient facilities.
Information Service: Board of Commerce, Pleasant and William Sts. ; New Bed-
ford Auto Club, 628 Pleasant St.
NEW BEDFORD, once a famous whaling port, now a textile center at
the mouth of the Acushnet River, is made up of a number of interesting
contradictions. Gone are the whalers, but the harbor is still busy with
small Portuguese fishing craft, with steamers plying between New Bed-
ford and Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket, and with coastwise freight-
ers. New Bedford, once the fourth in the United States, is still a busy
secondary port.
Even the mills, employing large numbers of English and French-Canadian
operatives, have not destroyed this nautical flavor, perpetuated by a
whaling museum, a seamen's Bethel, and substantial old houses once the
homes of captains and wealthy traders. Twelve thousand Portuguese
live in the town. 'The Crowning,' a Portuguese religious festival, takes
place the sixth Sunday after Easter and any Sunday thereafter through-
out the summer. It takes its name from the custom established by an
early queen of Portugal who, legend reports, performed miraculous cures
of the sick by placing her crown on their heads. A heavy silver crown,
a replica of the queen's, is kept at one of the Portuguese churches for
repetitions of these crownings, performed by a priest. 'The Charmarita,'
the other annual festival, is a summer carnival and food fair, the proceeds
of which go to the church.
Until its incorporation as New Bedford, ' Bedford Village' was a part
of the town of Dartmouth. Up to 1760 there were no more than a dozen
scattered farms in the village, the homes chiefly of Quakers from Rhode
Island and Cape Cod. But Joseph Russell, known as the ' Father of New
Bedford ' because he gave it its name in honor of the Duke of Bedford, a
relative, was already engaged in whaling on a small scale, and soon
afterward Joseph Rotch arrived from Nantucket, extended the industry,
and presently attracted shipbuilders including George Claghorn, later
to build the U.S. Frigate 'Constitution' at Boston. New Bedford's first
ship, the 'Dartmouth,' was launched in 1767. In 1773 she was one of the
ships whose cargoes of tea were dumped into Boston Harbor on the eve
of December 16.
The Revolution temporarily halted local expansion, and New Bedford
saw the first clash between the British and the Colonials on water. Gen-
eral Gage, isolated in Boston since April 19, 1775, had sent ships of war
scouting southward for food supplies, and one of these, the 'Falcon,'
seized two sloops in Vineyard Sound for use as decoys, and advanced
slowly toward New Bedford. An unknown messenger made a gallant
ride from Wareham with the news. Twenty-five men in a small vessel
at once set out to intercept the British, and on May 14 and 15 captured
both sloops, thereby discouraging the 'Falcon.' Thereafter, New Bedford
Harbor was a rendezvous for American privateers, who turned the tables
by preying upon British shipping. This fact prompted a British invasion
286 Main Street and Village Green
of the town on September 5, 1778, with five thousand soldiers, who met
with little resistance and who burned all patriot homes, vessels, and
business houses, but spared those of the Tories.
Nan tucket was the leading whaling port until after the War of 1812, but
by 1820, with a population of 3947, New Bedford had outstripped it and
thereafter led the industry, gradually absorbing almost the entire whaling
of the Atlantic seaboard. The year 1845 saw New Bedford's greatest
receipts from its fleet 158,000 barrels of sperm oil, 272,000 barrels of
whale oil, and 3,000,000 pounds of whalebone. Ten thousand seamen
manned the ships.
While this industry brought wealth to certain sections, to the waterfront
it brought rough living and exploited vice. A notorious district known
as 'Hard Dig' was burned in 1826 by a mob of zealous citizens.
The discovery of petroleum in Pennsylvania in 1857 spelled the doom of
the whaling industry, hastened to some extent by the growing scarcity
of whales. Today almost the entire product of blackfish oil (derived
from a species of small whale and by sailors called porpoise jaw oil), a
lubricant for clocks and watches, is refined here.
In the years just before the Civil War, New Bedford was a station of the
Underground Railway for smuggling runaway slaves into Canada. Aboli-
tion sentiments were fostered by the Quakers and by Frederick Douglass,
a distinguished Negro orator, who aided in recruiting Colonel Robert
Gould Shaw's Negro troops. New Bedford had a number of ships in the
Stone Fleet which blockaded Southern ports by sinking vessels laden
with granite at Southern harbor entrances.
The Wamsutta Mills, the first important textile plant, were chartered
in 1846, but the industry grew slowly, owing to the fact that whaling was
still dominant. New Bedford shared, however, in the New England
textile boom of 1881-83, an d from that time on the city was in the front
rank as a manufacturer of fine cotton fabrics. Its mild damp climate is
favorable to the handling of cotton.
About 1921 came the turn. Even before the general business depression
of 1929, low-cost Southern production began to cut into New Bedford's
business. A number of mills went into liquidation; others operated on
greatly curtailed schedules, creating a major unemployment problem.
Matters were precipitated, April 9, 1928, by a ten per cent cut in the
wages of all textile operatives except those of the Dartmouth and Beacon
Mills. A six-months strike followed in which twenty-seven thousand
workers were involved. About three thousand skilled workers in the
Textile Council of the American Federation of Textile Operators joined
with the United Textile Workers during the strike in order to gain the
support of the American Federation of Labor. The more radical workers,
chiefly unskilled and foreign-born, found leadership in the Textile Mill
Committee, a national organization. During the course of the strike, the
latter joined the vertically organized New Bedford Textile Workers'
New Bedford 287
Union, which later became the chief local of the National Textile Workers'
Union, an industrial union.
A summary of national press comment showed practically unanimous
country-wide sympathy with the workers. Settlement was eventually
made on the basis of a five per cent reduction in wages, to be restored as
soon as conditions might warrant; agreement by the manufacturers to
give thirty days' notice of any future reductions; and agreement of the
operatives to co-operate in a study designed to increase, if possible, the
efficiency of production in the mills. Several plants, however, failed to
resume operations and eventually went into liquidation.
Nevertheless, New Bedford's textile history is by no means a closed
chapter. During readjustment a number of new industries have been at-
tracted to the city, including needle industries employing thirty-five
hundred in the manufacture of cotton garments.
In addition, the development of truck transportation has made New
Bedford a modern fish-shipping center. Many fishing boats from Cape
Cod waters which formerly unloaded their cargoes directly in Boston
or New York now trans-ship their haul at New Bedford. Ten million
pounds of fish were brought here in 1934.
FOOT TOUR 1.5 m.
S. from Middle St. into Pleasant St.
1. The Public Library (1856) (open 9-9), between William and Market
Sts., an impressive building fronted by massive columns, contains a col-
lection of Quaker relics and whaling logs. Established in 1852, it is one
of the oldest free public libraries in the country.
2. The Whaleman Statue, executed in granite by Bela Pratt, stands on
the north side of the Library lawn. It was dedicated (1913) to the
whaler's motto, 'A dead whale or a stove boat.'
L.from Pleasant St. into School St.; R. from School St. into Front St.
3. The Bourne Office Building, end of School St., is a large three-story
stone survival with boarded windows, old-fashioned wooden shutters,
and tightly locked doors. Jonathan Bourne, the most successful of all
the whaling merchants, opened offices in this building in 1848. His
counting-rooms, covered with the accumulated dust of half a century,
remain today as he left them.
The first floor contained chandlery shops and storage rooms for whaling
outfits. Lofts and rigging lofts occupied the upper stories; the counting-
rooms were on the second floor, with counters and iron railings fencing
off the tall mahogany desks at which the bookkeepers stood up, or sat
on high stools. There were few luxuries. About the walls were models
of whaleships and whaling prints.
NEW
BEDFORD
TOUR
New Bedford 289
In the heyday of whaling, oil casks were loaded upon the dock in front
of the building^ where they were carefully covered with seaweed to pre-
vent the sun from drying them out and spreading the seams. A pen was
then built around each collection until such time as a buyer could be
found.
Retrace Front St.
4. Along the east side of Front St. is the Waterfront Area, centered
about the State Pier, and utilized today by a large fishing fleet.
L.from Front St. into Union St.; R.from Union St. into Johnny Cake Hill.
5. On the crest of the hill stand the Museum of the Old Dartmouth Histori-
cal Society, and the Bourne Whaling Museum (open daily; adm. 25j).
The chief exhibit here is a half-size reproduction of Jonathan Bourne's
favorite vessel, the whaling bark 'Lagoda.' The main floor contains
smaller models and half models of hulls made by master shipbuilders to
guide their workmen. Around the walls are harpoons, darting guns,
lances, and other implements used in the chase. There are examples of
scrimshaw work made by the whalemen in their leisure time out of
whales' teeth and bone. Six hundred logbooks reward research with an
almost inexhaustible yield of local color and detail.
6. The Seamen's Bethel (open), facing the Museum, was dedicated on
May 2, 1832, to give moral and religious inspiration to the thousands of
sailors, native and foreign-born, who frequented the city. It was im-
mortalized by Herman Melville in 'Moby Dick' and has been little
changed since Melville's time. Still adorning the walls are the black-
bordered, marble cenotaphs inscribed in terms of bitter and hopeless
grief; still from the ship's-prow pulpit resound the chaplain's salty
sermons.
L. from Johnny Cake Hill into William St.
7. The Customhouse, at the corner of North Second St., on which it
fronts, is a granite structure more than a century old. It has two stories,
a portico in classic style, and a winding stone stairway of unusual design.
R. from Williams St. into Purchase St.
8. The Liberty Bell Tablet, on the eastern wall of the Merchants' Na-
NEW BEDFORD MAP INDEX
1. Public Library 9. Bridge Park
2. Whaleman Statue 10. Acushnet Park
3. Bourne Office Building n. Fort Rodman
4. Waterfront Area 12. Rodney French Memorial Tablet
5. Museum of Old Dartmouth His- 13. Municipal Bathing Beach
torical Society 14. Mark Duff Home
6. Seamen's Bethel 15. Perry House
7. Custom House 16. Buttonwood Park
8. Liberty Bell Tablet 17. Wamsutta Mills
290 . Main Street and Village Green
tional Bank at Liberty St., reads in part: 'News of the passage of the
Fugitive Slave Law was brought from Boston in 1851 by an express
messenger who rode all night, and the bell on the old Hall was rung to
give warning to fugitive slaves that U.S. Marshals were coming.'
MOTOR TOUR 6 m.
E. from Pleasant St. into Middle St.
g. Bridge Park at the head of the State bridge, is a beautifully land-
scaped area.
R. from Middle St. into Front St.; R. from Front St. into Walnut St.; L.
from Walnut St. into South Second St.; L. from South Second St. into Cove
St.; R.from Cove St. into Rodney French Blvd.
10. Acushnet Park (open-air dance hall, public bathing beach, clambake
pavilion) (privately owned; open in summer; adm. free), adjacent to the
Infirmary, is a public amusement park.
11. Fort Rodman (open, visitors restricted), at the top of Clark's Point,
is one of the key defenses of the North Atlantic coast. Two active bat-
teries are maintained here. The fort antedates the Civil War.
12. The Rodney French Memorial Tablet, at the entrance to Hazelwood
Park (public; tennis; baseball; bowling), was erected by the Negroes of
the city in honor of an abolitionist mayor in 1853-54.
13. The Municipal Bathing Beach (bathing suits for hire, outside showers)
was cleared and improved, walls constructed, and a children's beach
created by Emergency Relief Administration and Works Progress Ad-
ministration projects.
L.from Rodney French Blvd. into Cove Rd.; R.from Cove Rd. into County St.
14. The Mark Duff Home (private), between Madison and Cherry Sts.,
was designed by Russell Warren, early iQth-century Providence archi-
tect. It is a two-and-a-half-story frame building topped by a cupola,
surrounded by spacious grounds with sunken gardens.
R. from County St. into Walnut St.; L. from Walnut St. into Seventh St.
15. The Perry House (private), southeast corner of School St., a mansion
of whaling days, is an excellent example of New England Georgian
architecture. A winding, mahogany staircase rises through the center
of the house from the street floor to the cupola or captain's walk.
L. from Seventh St. into Union St.; R. from Union St. into County St.; L.
from County St. into North St.; L. from North St. into Rockdale Ave.
16. Button-wood Park (west end of the city) is the largest in the city.
Here is the Barnard Monument, a twofold tribute to the whalemen and
to the promoters of the textile industry.
Newburyport 291
Retrace Rockdale Ave.; R. from Rochdale Ave. into Mill St. (one-way, east) ;
L. from Mill St. into Acushnet Ave.
17. Wamsutta Mills (not open to the public), between Wamsutta and
Logan Sts., the oldest of New Bedford's many textile mills, are con-
structed of granite.
NEWBURYPORT. City of Captains' Houses
City: Alt. 26, pop. 14,815, sett. 1635, incorp. town 1764, city 1851.
Railroad Station: Winter St. for B. & M. R.R.
Accommodations: One hotel open all year; two open only during summer.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 12 Pleasant St.
ONCE seagoing vessels huddled so close in the Merrimack that they
almost bridged the river from the Newburyport to the Salisbury shore.
Now the great river runs placidly by the city, and the harbor is clogged
with sand. Along the shore still stand a few factories, their red-brick
walls faded and picturesque against the background of moving water.
A dignified and charming city rises from the river level, bisected by the
gleaming Turnpike a modern note in a setting which is otherwise
almost a monument to the glorious days of Newburyport's maritime
supremacy. Shipowners and their captains built the stately houses which
border High Street for several miles; square three-storied dwellings with
hip roofs, often crowned by cupolas, their severity of line relieved by
cornices, doorways, and window treatments, skillfully executed by men
who had learned their craft as shipwrights in the famous Newburyport
yards. Throughout the country the street is known as a distinguished
survival of the best in Federal architecture.
Newburyport's business district is that of any busy modern city, although
even in Market Square space is given to a tablet which tells the tale of
old Goody Morse, victim of the witchcraft delusion. The aroma of mo-
lasses still floats from the rum factory, and fine silver is made today in a
plant whose antecedents go back to early Colonial days. Newer manu-
factures have been established, and the city strives to adjust itself to the
modern tempo. Yet it is in the upper reaches of the city, where the old
jail used for British prisoners frowns over Bartlett Mall, and St. Paul's
Church rears its bishop's mitre high over the roofs of the old houses, that
Newburyport reveals its inner character.
Long before bands of sober-minded Puritans ventured northward to
found the city of Newburyport at the mouth of the Merrimack, free-
292 Main Street and Village Green
lance traders had realized its strategic position. They had tapped the
rich Indian country to such an extent that the apprehensions of Governor
John Winthrop were aroused. He feared lest such outsiders might secure
too firm a foothold within the borders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
In 1635, therefore, a party of colonists was dispatched to set up an out-
post of virtue and commerce against these interlopers. For seven years
they attempted to farm the forest at Old Newbury. In 1642 many of
them gave up the thankless task and moved to the present site of New-
buryport. Industry sprang up at once. Trapping and fishing were fol-
lowed by whaling and international trade. The deep-channeled river
and the limitless supply of lumber made shipbuilding an inevitable de-
velopment. Between 1681 and 1741, 107 ships were launched from
Newburyport shipyards. Subsidiary industries came to life. Along the
waterfront appeared ironworks, sail lofts, and ropewalks. For a time the
pre-eminence of Boston was seriously threatened, but heavy duties im-
posed before the Revolution by the British Crown, and the exclusion of
American ships from the West Indian trade and the Newfoundland fish-
ing banks after the Revolution, left the town economically prostrate.
By 1790 Newburyport had recovered a measure of its prosperity, but it
was short-lived. The ninth ship-owning community in the country, it
never recovered from the disastrous effects of the Jefferson Embargo
Act. The town's plight was thus mourned by a Newbury poet in 1808:
'Our ships all in motion once whitened the ocean,
They sailed and returned with a cargo;
Now doomed to decay, they have fallen a prey
To Jefferson worms and embargo.'
Another blow was the fire of 1811. Fifteen acres in the heart of the city
were burned to the ground. The Industrial Revolution proved Newbury-
port's commercial undoing. After the War of 1812, textile mills sprang
up on every natural water site in Essex County; and the more farseeing
mercantile families of Newburyport, such as the Lowells and the Jack-
sons, turned from trade to manufacture. As the country became in-
dustrialized, tariffs were enacted to protect infant industries. Such im-
ports as India cottons, English woolens, Russian duck and canvas, and
Baltic iron backbone of Newburyport's seaborne commerce were
practically wiped out.
Shipbuilding, however, knew another day of glory in the clipper-ship
era. The demand for packets to carry adventurers to the California gold-
fields in '49 gave the industry new impetus. Donald McKay, noted
designer of clipper ships, came to Newburyport after his New York
apprenticeship. Between 1841 and 1843, in partnership with John
Currier, Jr., he turned out three packet vessels of such perfection that his
reputation was made. Later, in the same yards, the record-breaking clip-
per ' Dreadnought ' was built by Currier and Townsend.
A geographical position far from the mercantile centers, the ever-increas-
ing sandbars and dangerous shoals at the harbor mouth, and the advent
of steam brought to a close this last glorious era in Newburyport's history,
Newburyport 293
and with its passing something of glamor and vitality seemed to leave
the city. Newburyport turned to manufacturing, but without enthusiasm.
Today the principal industries are shoes, iron and steel products, textiles,
and cigars, besides the traditional Newburyport manufactures, rum and
fine silver, that have persisted for more than two centuries.
TOUR 6.5 m.
E. from Green St. into Pleasant St.
1. The Church of the First Religious Society (Unitarian), built in 1801, is
virtually a duplicate of Mclntire's Old South Church in Salem, and
valuable although ascribed to another architect as an indication
of the style of the Salem genius in church design.
L.from Pleasant St. into State St.; R.from State St. on Middle St.; R.from
Middle St. into Federal St.
2. The Old South Church, corner of School St., now known as the First
Presbyterian Meeting House, was built in 1756 and remodeled in 1856.
Benedict Arnold and the men of the Quebec Expedition gathered here to
worship on September 17, 1775. Here preached the great revivalist,
George Whitefield.
R.from Federal St. into Temple St.; L. from Temple St. into State St.
3. The Tracy House (open), now the Public Library, is the red-brick
building at the corner of Prince Place. This house was built in 1771 by
Patrick Tracy for his son Nathaniel, who equipped and sent out the first
privateer to sail from the United Colonies against England.
4. The Wolfe Tavern (open as a tavern June to Oct.), corner of Harris St.,
was built in 1807. The present building, three-story brick with full-
length porch, replaced the original tavern built in 1762 and destroyed by
the fire of 1811. William Davenport, the original proprietor of the hos-
telry, named it in honor of the British General Wolfe, with whom he
served against the French at Quebec.
5. The Dalton Club (open by special arrangement) is directly across the
street. This spacious gambrel-roofed structure was built in 1746. Par-
ticularly interesting are the fine doorway with its carved detail and the
interior woodwork.
L. from State St. into High St.
6. The Cashing House (1808), on the corner of Fruit St., is a fine example
of Federal architecture on a street noted throughout the country for its
beauty. The square, three-story brick house is especially notable for its
cornice. Caleb Gushing, distinguished statesman, entertained John
Quincy Adams here in 1837.
7. The Wheelwright House (1797), now the Home for Aged Women, is
294 Main Street and Village Green
characterized by a portico supported by Doric columns and surmounted
by a balustrade; a central Palladian window adds charm to the facade.
Retrace on High St.; R. from High St. into Green St.
8. The interior of the Sumner House (open 2-4; adm. free), corner of
Harris St., is considered an excellent example of Federal architecture.
9. In Brown's Park, corner of Green and Pleasant Sts., stands the
Statue of the ' Great Liberator,' William Lloyd Garrison, abolitionist,
orator, and publisher of The Liberator, which championed the cause of
the slaves.
Retrace on Green St.; R. from Green St. into High St.
10. Across the green . stretch of Bartlett Mall is the Old Hill Burying
Ground. Here is buried the self-styled 'Lord' Timothy Dexte- (see
below) .
L. at end of Mall on Aubin St.
11. The Old County Jail was built in 1744 and used until 1825 as the
county prison. During the Revolution many British privateersmen were
confined here.
Retrace on Aubin St.; L. from Aubin St. into High St.
12. St. Paul's Church, corner of Market St., is said to be the oldest
Episcopal parish in Massachusetts, dating from the erection of Queen
Anne's Chapel in 1711. In 1797 the rector was consecrated the first
Bishop of Massachusetts. Atop the vine-covered stone church is a
bishop's mitre.
13. The Historical Society of Old Newbury (open June-Sept, daily 2-5;
adm. 25f ) contains early relics of the Newbury settlements and a marine
collection. This is the Pettingell-Fowler house, built in 1792.
14. The Moseley House (private), 182 High St., is a graceful building of
the Federal period. Built in 1811, it has a two-story portico with Corin-
thian columns.
15. The Jackson-Dexter House (private), at 201 High St., was built in
1771. The ornate wood-encased chimneys, the watch-tower surmounted
by a gilded eagle, the columns flanking the door, give an aspect of ec-
centric charm to this old dwelling, which was once the lavish residence of
'Lord' Timothy Dexter. Lord Timothy, Newburyport's self- titled
eccentric, cluttered his estate with statues of the great, his own included.
He beat his wife for not giving vent to sufficient grief at a mock funeral
held for himself. But his 'lordship' was far from crazy. He gained a
good portion of his wealth by buying up depreciated Continental cur-
rency. He made a tidy profit out of a cargo of warming-pans sent, with
every appearance of lunacy, to the West Indies, and there snapped up
for molasses ladles. He published in 1802 a book called 'Pickles for the
Knowing Ones,' in which all the punctuation appeared at the end of the
book as pages of commas and periods, bearing the unique caption ' Salt
and Pepper to Taste.'
Newton 295
1 6. Atkinson Common, at the juncture with Moseley Ave., is a spacious
Green in which stands a newly erected field-stone Observation Tower.
This vantage-point affords an exceptional view of the Merrimack River,
the inland country, and the sea.
R.from High St. into Moseley Ave.; straight ahead into Spojford St. (Ames-
bury highway).
17. The Moseley Woods (parking space, tennis courts, pavilion, bathing
beach, playground equipment, open fireplaces) , on the Amesbury highway
at the western end of the city, is one of the larger recreational centers
of Newburyport.
1 8. Chain Bridge, which crosses the Merrimack from Amesbury Rd.
near the entrance to Moseley Woods, was the first bridge over the
navigable waters. It was rebuilt as a suspension bridge in 1810.
Retrace on Spo/ord St.; L. from Spo/ord St. into Merrimac St.; L. from
Merrimac St. into Jefferson St.
19. Carr's Ferry Approach is the site of the first ferry established between
Newbury and Carr's Island. The original ferry was the only connecting
link between Boston and the northern frontier.
Retrace on Jefferson St.; L. from Jefferson St. into Merrimac St.
20. The Shipyard Sites are at the foot of Ashland St. Here was launched
the famous i4oo-ton clipper 'Dreadnought.' Its record crossing of the
Atlantic (9 days, 13 hours, from Sandy Hook to Liverpool) was the mar-
vel of the year 1859.
21. The Towle Company Factory (open by arrangement) is a survivor of
an industry for which early Newburyport was noted. This firm is today
one of the largest manufacturers of sterling silverware, exclusively, in the
world.
22. The Caldwell Distilleries (open by arrangement) housed in a red-brick
plant on the river bank, are the only distilleries in the city still manu-
facturing rum, a commodity once inseparably associated with the name
of Newburyport.
N E W T O N . Commuter's Haven
City: Alt. 142, pop. 66,144, sett. 1639, incorp. town 1691, city 1873.
Railroad Stations: Newton, Newtonville, West Newton, Auburndale, and River-
side for B. & A. R.R. (main line); Chestnut Hill, Newton Centre, Newton
Highlands, Eliot, Waban, Woodland and Riverside for B. & A. R.R. (High-
land branch) ; Newton Upper Falls for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R. Newton Lower
Falls (Wellesley) for B. & A. R.R. (Newton Lower Falls branch).
296 Main Street and Village Green
Bus Stations: Chestnut Hill, Newton Highlands, and Newton Upper Falls for
Boston & Worcester Lines; Charles Pharmacy, Elm and Washington Sts.,
West Newton, for Victoria Coach Lines (Boston & N.Y.).
Information: Bureau of University Travel, n Boyd St.
NEWTON is a city built, like Rome, on seven hills; but it is suburban
and residential rather than truly urban. It has its business sections and
a few isolated industries, but the slopes and summits of its hills are almost
entirely mantled with small or large estates or acreage not yet developed.
Its roads are excellent, its parkways beautiful, and its proximity to
Boston, combined with its lavish natural beauty, places it in the front
rank of commuters' towns.
In few Massachusetts cities has the identity of the original villages per-
sisted as it has in Newton. These villages number fourteen. All except
Nonantum are recognized by separate railway stations; all have distinct
business and civic centers; and though the confines melt into each other,
each has its own individuality and is worthy of a visit on its own account.
The town had been settled for seven years when, in 1646, John Eliot first
began to preach to the Indians at Nonantum, an event commemorated
by the city seal. His first sermon, an hour and a quarter in length, was
followed by a distribution of apples and biscuits to the children and of
tobacco to the men an apparently effective method of holding the
audience. Whether the women were so interested that no reward was
necessary, or whether their attendance was a matter of indifference to
the preacher, the record does not state.
John Eliot was the first pastor of Newton's first church. After his death
in 1690 the church was for some years without a spiritual guide, during
which time various visiting ministers, objecting to the inadequate com-
pensation offered them, sued the town for additional payment. The
Court ordered the town to pay, and pay it did.
In these early days in Newton, farming was a principal occupation, and
friendly Indians were helpful in introducing the pioneers to such new
crops as potatoes, maize, squash, pumpkins, and beans. Some of the
settlers built looms or forges or engaged in fishing. Everybody prospered.
Substantial frame houses soon supplanted the original log huts.
Newton Upper Falls and Newton Lower Falls became the seat of busy
industries in the early nineteenth century with two year-round hotels,
many stores, and, on the Needham side of the river, a cotton mill with
three thousand spindles. The rest of the Newtons developed more slowly.
During one period Newton was distinguished by the residence of out-
standing leaders of culture. For a time Horace Mann lived in West
Newton at the corner of Highland and Chestnut Streets. After he moved
away, his brother-in-law, Nathaniel Hawthorne, occupied the same house
for a year, the year in which he wrote 'The Blithedale Romance.' 'It is
calm as eternity and will give you lively ideas of the same,' wrote Ralph
Waldo Emerson, who in 1833 came with his mother to occupy an old
Newton 297
farmhouse near the Upper Falls. At the Old Elms, the home of Governor
Claflin in Newtonville, Mrs. Mary Claflin, author of 'Old time Folks'
and 'Under the Elms,' entertained such distinguished guests as John
Greenleaf Whittier, Henry Ward Beecher, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Presi-
dent Hayes, Chief Justice Chase, and others. Another literary group
used to meet with Celia Thaxter and her husband, Levi Lincoln Thaxter,
a Browning enthusiast, in the Thaxters' barn in Newtonville.
The 1934 census of manufactures of the Department of Labor and In-
dustry gives the total number of manufacturing plants in operation as
fifty-four. The census of 1935 indicates a shrinkage to fifteen. It is not
the hum of machinery which the casual visitor hears in Newton today, but
the passing of shining automobiles over well-built roads; it is not the
brick walls and huddled squalor of a factory city which greets one's eye,
but fine residences with spacious garages; not the soot of an industrial
center which reaches one's nostrils, but the summer fragrance of carefully
landscaped estates. It was not the destiny of Newton's hills to be mantled
in smoke or of its glistening lakes to be filmed with a scum. When the
rails of the Boston and Worcester Railroad reached out in 1834, Newton
began to receive the residential overflow of the near-by metropolis, and
from its earliest days it attracted a prosperous type of home-maker. Not
to become an agricultural community, not to become an industrial center,
but to be a city of quiet and handsome homes where the strain and un-
certainty of a busy civilization seem like a distant murmur, this was
Newton's destiny.
TOUR 23 m.
W. from Newton Corner into Washington St. (one-way traffic} ; L. from
Washington St. into Hall St. (short unmarked street at end of first block);
R. from Hall St. into Centre St.
NEWTON CORNER is the first of the fourteen famous Newton villages.
Its core, covering several blocks, is occupied by stores and office buildings,
giving the effect of a busy small town. Immediately on turning into
Centre St., however, the visitor enters typical residential Newton. This
is one of the older sections characterized by large comfortable Victorian
dwellings, some of them slightly shabby but more of them very well
preserved, or by the smaller modern houses, popularly of Tudor brick
and timber, which have replaced their more substantial predecessors.
Here and there handsome churches and prosperous city buildings rise as
appropriate civic accents in the residential scene.
i. The Shannon House (private), 749 Centre St., suggests the early
Victorian by its solid quiet lines and its serenely terraced lawn and
shading trees. It was, however, built at a still earlier date (1798) and was
one of the show houses of the town. The small conservatory was at-
298 Main Street and Village Green
tached to the house by its 19th-century owner, Miss Mary Shannon, a
local philanthropist, whose hobby was gardening.
Retrace on Centre St.; R. from Centre St. into Sargent St.; straight ahead
from Sargent into Kenrick St.; R. from Kenrick St. into Magnolia St.
2. The Eliot Memorial is a small stone terrace attractively landscaped.
A tablet in the superstructure records the date of 1646, when the Apostle
to the Indians preached his first sermon near the spot in the wigwam of
Chief Waban.
R.from Magnolia St. into Eliot Memorial Rd.; L.from Eliot Memorial Rd.
into Waverley Ave.; R. from Waverley Ave. into Cotton St.; L. from Cotton
St. into Centre St.; L. from Centre St. into Commonwealth Ave.
On the way one passes residence after residence of handsome design, all
with lawns and trees, and hardly a shop to indicate any commercial
interest.
Commonwealth Avenue skirts the second and perhaps the most opulent
village of all, that of Chestnut Hill, which Newton shares with Brookline.
Here are the really large estates, to every one of which is attached some
name well known in national trade, finance, or political history.
3. Boston College spreads its fine open campus on a hill slope overlooking
the beautiful Chestnut Hill Reservoir. Four imposing gray-stone build-
ings in English Collegiate Gothic accommodate a large student body
made up largely of day students. Its library contains illuminated manu-
scripts, including breviaries, books of hours, and missals, of the medieval
era, and a very famous collection of the Negro folklore of Africa and the
West Indies. The College is operated by the Society of Jesus.
Retrace on Commonwealth Ave.; L. from Commonwealth Ave. into Ham-
mond St.; R. from Hammond St. into Beacon St.
4. The Home of Mary Baker Eddy (open weekdays 2-5; adm. by card only,
obtainable at Administration Office of Mother Church, Boston), at 400
Beacon St., Chestnut Hill, is of modified Tudor architecture. Mrs. Eddy
resided here for about three years, from 1908 to 1910.
Along here is a procession of stately homes as the visitor approaches
NEWTON CENTRE, the third village, wkh its small focus of business,
its civic buildings and churches.
R. from Beacon St. into Centre St.
5. The Smith House (private), 1181 Centre St., a broad, low frame house
painted cinnamon color, was the home for many years of the Rev.
Samuel Francis Smith, author of 'America.' A tablet within the grounds
which refers to this as the ' site ' of the house is slightly misleading, as this
is not only the site but actually the house itself.
Retrace on Centre St.; L. from Centre St. into Institution Ave.
6. The Andover Newton Theological School, impressively crowning a
salient hill, combines the former Newton Theological Institution, founded
in 1825 for training young men for the Baptist ministry, and the former
Newton 299
Andover Theological Seminary, founded in 1808 as a training school for
the Congregational ministry. The somewhat heterogeneous group of
buildings is less notable than the superb view in every direction from the
campus.
South is OAK HILL, the fourth village, an attractive cluster of roofs
and trees half encircled by the Charles River Country Club.
Retrace on Institution Ave.; L, from Institution Ave. into Season St.; R.
from Beacon St. into Walnut St.; L. from Walnut St. into Homer St.
7. The Newton City Hall and War Memorial (1932, Allen and Collens,
architects) make a notable civic group. Apparently out in the country,
actually it is very nearly in the geographical center of the city taken as a
whole. A symbolic sculpture designed by Charles Collens representing
History, Patriotism, and Sacrifice is executed upon the pediment of the
Memorial. A popular feature in the Memorial is a group of four realistic
action-groups in miniature waxwork composition containing over 200
figures and representing four important events in American military and
naval history.
R. from Homer St. into Commonwealth Ave.; R. from Commonwealth Ave.
into Walnut St. at front of City Hall; R. from Walnut St. into Lincoln St.
Here is the village of NEWTON HIGHLANDS, which consists of more
and yet more fine residences clustered about a small business center.
R. from Lincoln St. into Woodward St.; L. from Woodward St. into Fairlee
Rd.
8. The Woodward Farmhouse (private) (R), up a gravel lane, was built
in 1 68 1, and is occupied by a descendant of the builder. Its brown clap-
boards, massive central chimney, and small-paned windows blend with
the tree-shaded meadows of the background.
Retrace on Fairlee Rd.; R. from Fairlee Rd. into Woodward St.; R. from
Woodward St. into Boylston St.; R. on marked dip for underpass; L. into
Ellis St.
Here is the village of NEWTON UPPER FALLS, a small manufacturing
center. It has not the crowded look, however, of a typical mill settlement.
The factories have a rather casual air and the workers' houses, many of
them 100 years old or more, have an appearance of space and rural
leisure.
9. Here Echo Bridge spans the Charles River. It was built in 1876 not
for traffic but to carry the Sudbury River conduit, which brings in part
of Newton's water supply. The foundations are sunk in solid rock, and
the triple stone arch is one of the largest of this construction in the world.
A footpath leads along the river brink to the central arch, where a shout
or a laugh will be mimicked in eery echoes.
The clear dark tide flows smoothly at this point through Hemlock Gorge,
one of the very few natural hemlock groves remaining on the eastern
seaboard.
300 Main Street and Village Green
Retrace on Ellis St.; straight ahead from Ellis St. into Quinobequin Rd.
Farther to the left lie the wooded meadows not yet developed, land such
as once comprised all Newton. On the right lie WABAN and ELIOT,
adjacent villages filled with attractive homes, most of them unpretentious,
well-kept, and pleasing in appearance.
L. from Quinobequin Rd. into Washington St.
Here is NEWTON LOWER FALLS, another small manufacturing
center.
10. The Baury House (private), 2349 Washington St., is a fine three-story
Colonial house of the massive square type. Its recessed doorway with
carved panels and ceilings, an architectural detail common in the Con-
necticut Valley, is rarely found in this section. The fleur-de-lis carving
on the door lends a French touch incongruous but pleasing and a reminder
of an early owner of French descent, who was rector of the beautiful
white church (open) which stands in the rear. The house dates from 1750,
the church from 1814. Within the latter at the ends of the old-fashioned
box pews are the amusing old gate-doors.
Retrace on Washington St.; L. from Washington St. into Grove St.; L. from
Grove St. into Woodland Rd.; L. from Woodland Rd. into Auburn St.; R.
from Auburn St. into Commonwealth Ave.
1 1 . Norumbega Park (open, small fee) occupies an attractive woodland
stretch along the banks of the Charles River (canoeing).
At RIVERSIDE, the tenth village, there are also canoes for hire.
The road traverses AUBURNDALE, a residential village of pleasant,
not too pretentious homes.
L. from Commonwealth Ave. into Auburn St.; L. from Auburn St. into
Washington St.
This leads to the village of WEST NEWTON, which has a much larger
business center than has yet been visited, surrounded by handsome resi-
dential areas.
12. The First Unitarian Church (1905-06), designed by Cram and Fergu-
son, forms a quadrangle around a central open courtyard. The style of
the building is modified English Perpendicular Gothic; the material
seam-face granite, with limestone and terra-cotta trim, and some wood
and plaster in the subsidiary wings. The church proper consists of a nave
seating about 800 and narrow aisles. The open timber roof is supported
by heavy arched masses, resting on corbels in the form of angels.
The adjacent village, NEWTONVILLE, increases the conviction that
there actually is a place in Newton where its citizens can shop without
journeying to Boston; but in the outlying districts, which have here and
there escaped the Realty Development Company, a pond or two, a
wooded slope, here and there an open field, still remind the visitor of the
days not so long ago, when Newton was a scattering of villages in open
country instead of a close-knit suburb.
Northampton 301
L. from Washington St. on Walnut St.; R. from Walnut St. on Watertown
St.
The fourteenth village bears the original Indian name of the settlement,
NONANTUM. This is a fair-sized manufacturing and commercial
center, and its drab and huddled tenements and crowded streets come
as more than a slight shock after the long tour of wide boulevards and
shaded avenues bordered by charming and elegant, or at least commodi-
ous, homes and spacious opulent estates.
R.from Watertown St. on Adams St.; L.from Adams St. on Washington St.
13. The Jackson House (private), 527 Washington St., was said by the
late Robert N. Cram to look 'like Mrs. John Hancock, making up her
mind whether she would speak to the neighbors.' The ell of the present
building is said to have belonged to the original structure (1640). The
proportions of the house, a white, square two-story dwelling with clap-
boarded front, brick ends, and four end chimneys, are quiet and refined.
NORTHAMPTON
From Jonathan Edwards to Sophia Smith
City: Alt. 133, pop. 24,525, sett. 1654, incorp. town 1656, city 1883.
Railroad Station: Union Depot, Main St. and Strong Ave., for B. & M. R.R.
Bus Stations: New England Transportation Co., 171 Main St., 86 Green St.;
Railroad Station.
Accommodations: Three hotels.
Information: Wiggins Old Tavern (Hotel Northampton), King St.; Draper
Hotel, Main St.
NORTHAMPTON, a residential and industrial city on the Connecticut
River, has the prosperous rural beauty of wide streets shaded by stately
trees, and lined in almost every quarter by substantial homes of quiet
distinction. The many parks, the Smith College Campus, 'Paradise,'
Sunset Hill, and Round Hill offer agreeable strolls. A large part of its
twenty-five thousand citizens are engaged in the manufacture of silk,
hosiery, cutlery, brushes, indelible ink, and caskets.
About twoscore years after the Pilgrims had landed at Plymouth, a
party of Connecticut men petitioned the General Court at the Colony
of Massachusetts Bay for permission to settle a second 'plantation'
north of Hartford.
302 Main Street and Village Green
The first crude shelters were built along a rough dirt road, now Pleasant
Street. Four acres of land were presented to each householder, together
with a generous portion of fair meadow. Soon the fertile soil attracted
many other pioneers, and Hawley, Market, and King Streets were
quickly settled.
In the beginning, Indian attacks were infrequent, for when the French and
Indian Wars began, the Nonotucks had long since left the country. But
other tribes began to go on the warpath and, at the beginning of King
Philip's War severely harassed the settlers.
Early in the eighteenth century, Jonathan Edwards, a Puritan divine,
took over the Northampton pastorate and was soon recognized as the
mightiest preacher in New England. He was one of the inspired leaders of
the 'Great Awakening' of 1740, America's first great revival movement.
Soon in a frenzy of religious hysteria the townsfolk were falling into
trances and seeing visions; even little children swooned in the streets
from their 'conviction of sin.' All New England was convulsed with
terror of hell-fire. Finally Edwards's Northampton career came to an
abrupt end with his forced removal to Stockbridge as a missionary. It
was in Stockbridge that he wrote his great philosophical treatise, 'On the
Freedom of the Will.'
After the Revolution, deprived of the independence for which they had
fought, the inhabitants of Northampton rose in rebellion along with
many of their neighbors. Led by their preacher, Sam Ely, they stormed
the courthouse, in 1782, to prevent the foreclosure of their farms. In
1786, near the tragic end of Shays's Rebellion, a crowd of angry citizens
again descended on the court to keep it from holding session. On the
other side of the question, in this same year, William Butler, a youth of
twenty-two, founded the Hampshire Gazette (still published today) to
combat the discontent.
Impetus was given to the development of the town by the establish-
ment here of Smith College by Sophia Smith, a resident of Hatfield, at a
period when the intellectual standards of women's colleges were very
slightly superior to those of secondary schools. Her phrase, ' the intelli-
gent gentlewoman,' expressed the ideal of the college body; the spirit
of Christianity was to pervade the teachings and life of the college, but
it was to be absolutely non-sectarian. Smith, which opened with 14
students in 1875, is among the largest resident women's colleges in the
world (enrollment approximately two thousand). During the first two
years at the college, a broad general foundation is laid. An opportunity
is given for specialization during the remaining two years, and students
in French, German, Italian, and Spanish may spend their junior year
abroad in the respective countries. Honors, under special tutors, permit
a student to work at her own rate of speed.
Northampton 303
TOUR 9 m.
E. from King St. (US 5) on Main St. which becomes Bridge St.
1. Calvin Coolidge's Law Office, Masonic Temple, a yellow-brick building
opposite Strong Ave., is still marked with his name on a second-story
window. At one time Mayor of the city, in 1920 Governor of Massachu-
setts, Coolidge became Vice-President in 1921, and at President Hard-
ing's death in 1923 he became President of the United States.
2. The Bliss House (private), 58 Bridge St., was erected between 1655
and 1658, and is a small two-and-a-half -story white clapboarded dwelling
with small ells east and west, a central chimney, and a small, modern
but harmonious plain white portico, fronting a tree-shaded lawn.
3. The Wright House (private), 96 Bridge St., is a lyth-century dwelling
not readily recognizable as such, owing to its additions. It is a large
two-and-a-half-story gray clapboard house with white trim, hip roof,
and a long rear ell, the whole set in a pleasant lawn bordered by a lilac
hedge.
Retrace Bridge and Main St.; R. from Main St. on King St.; L. from King
St. on Court St.
4. The Wiggins Tavern (open as antique shop) is a three-story brick
hostelry built in 1786, and famous for its Currier and Ives prints, Rogers
groups, glass, pewter, brass, and kitchen and table utensils. In the
courtyard is a clever reproduction of a Country Store, such as existed as
late as the turn of the present century, crammed with every conceivable
product.
Retrace on Court St.; R. from Court St. on King St.; R. from King St. on
Main St.
5. The Northampton Historical Society (open Wed., Sat. 10.30-12 and
2^.30) is in Memorial Hall, a two-story brick building. On the grounds
is a granite bas-relief of Casimir Pulaski, Revolutionary general, given
by the Polish-American citizens of Northampton.
R. from Main St. on Gothic St.
6. The People's Institute was founded half a century ago by George W.
Cable, a popular author, as a reading group. Mr. E. H. R. Lyman of
Northampton gave them the old Methodist Church on Center St. and a
wider program was introduced which included instruction for young
women in the domestic arts, and classes in Americanization. In 1905,
Andrew Carnegie made it possible to erect the present building, for all
practical purposes a community center.
Retrace Gothic St.; R. from Gothic St. on Main St.
7. The old Smith College campus is bounded by Elm St., West St., and
Paradise Pond. The college property, however, has expanded gradually
304 Main Street and Village Green
to take in both sides of Elm St. and an extensive area farther up Elm St.
It covers 119 acres and is prepared to house almost the entire student
body, but in order to retain the old 'cottage idea' of the founders,
dormitories have been made small and homelike. Four of these are co-
operatives for the use of students who wish to reduce expenses.
The Grecourt Gates (motor cars may enter), at the Main St. entrance to the campus,
are of wrought iron, swung from brick and stone pillars surmounted by urns.
They are a replica of the gates of the Chateau Robecourt, Grecourt, France, and
commemorate the work of the Smith College Relief Unit during and after the World
War, 1917-20.
College Hall (L), just inside the Grecourt Gates, is of brick, in Collegiate Gothic,
with a square clock-tower containing the melodious Dorothea Carlile Chime.
From here, right and left, is a beautiful view of landscaped, tree-shaded lawns, set
with large and handsome dormitories, lecture halls, library, gymnasium, and
Botanic Garden. The present trend in the architecture of the college favors Colo-
nial Georgian, with buildings of red brick and white stone trim.
Paradise Pond, at the farther end of the campus, is said to have been named by
Jenny Lind. It is a limpid pool bordered by oaks and pines, a part of the college
property. On the near shore is a boathouse with canoes and rowboats, on the far
shore playing fields. Here on a June night, as part of the Class Day exercises, is
held a glee club concert, the girls singing from shadowy floats under the moon to
an audience covering the high bank of the pond.
Retrace through the campus; L. from Grecourt Gates on Elm St.
Gateway House (private) is a gabled brick residence with white wood trim, known
from 1875 to 1920 as ' the President's House.' The new President's House overlooks
Paradise Pond.
Tryon Art Gallery (open weekdays 10-6; Sun. 2.30-4.30; adm.free), opposite Bed-
ford Terrace, is a small brick, ivy-clad building, housing one of the only two con-
siderable collections anywhere of the magical crepuscular landscapes of Dwight
William Tryon (1849-1925), for many years visiting professor of art at Smith
College. Tryon alone of American artists was considered worthy to companion
Whistler in any extensive showing at the Freer Gallery in Washington, D.C. The
adjoining Hilly er Art Gallery at Smith contains less specialized examples of Ameri-
can art.
John Greene Hall, opposite Prospect St., is a brick assembly hall with lofty Ionic
columns on the principal facade named for John Morton Greene, Sophia Smith's
pastor and advisor, to whom is credited much of the foresight in the liberal wording
of the bequest for the college foundation.
Sessions House, 109 Elm St., was built in 1700, and is now college property. It is
the most beautiful early American house in Northampton, a large white clap-
boarded gambrel-roofed dwelling with a simple white portico, small-paned win-
dows, dormer windows, and a central chimney. Although a large and irregular ell
has been added, this extension harmonizes well with the original house.
Mandell Quadrangle, between Paradise Rd. and Kensington Ave., is the seat of
two of the newest, largest, and most luxurious Smith dormitories. Colonial
Georgian in style and constructed of brick with white trim, they are beautifully
grouped with six other similar dormitories around terraced and balustraded lawns.
The loggia in Laura Scales House has photo-murals made from old prints of North-
ampton, and is furnished in a modern manner with isolated units of divans and
chairs, to assure some degree of privacy to individual conversational groups. Each
house has its own reference library.
Retrace Elm St.; L. from Elm St. on Round Hill Rd.
8. The Clarke School for the Deaf (open by permission}, at the top of the
MASSACHUSETTS: ONE OF THE
WORLD'S CENTERS OF LEARNING
THE educational opportunities that Massachusetts offers are
surpassed by no other State. The laboratories of the Massa-
chusetts Institute of Technology are ranked with the finest in
the world. The administration and library building, shown on
the same page with the photograph from the Institute's re-
search laboratories, is situated on the Charles two miles below
the Harvard buildings seen in the air view.
Contrasting these buildings, as well as Smith College and
Andover Academy, with the little rural schoolhouse where
Mary's lamb is said to have followed her to school, we see the
extremes in the story of education in the State.
Massachusetts is rich in collections of fine art and in offerings
of music, the two sometimes admirably combined. The
Japanese Garden at the Museum of Fine Arts is only one of
the Museum's rare exhibitions of foreign art. The court in
the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum is- kept in colorful
bloom all through the year, and on certain afternoons during
the week concerts are given in the Tapestry Room. Likewise,
Fogg Museum in Cambridge has an attractive interior court,
where chorales are sung at Christmas time.
However, the popular concerts are those held outdoors the
orchestral concerts on the Charles River Esplanade, and the
week of symphonies in the Berkshires.
THE SPLASH OF A DROP OF MILK
Photograph, by Ultra-Rapid Camera, made at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
THE MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, CAMBRIDGE
HARVARD COLLEGE FROM THFC ATR
**'<* ****..
BULFINCH HALL, AISTDOVER ACADEMY
SMITH COLLEGE QUADRANGLES, NORTHAMPTON
JAPANESE GARDEN, MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, BOSTON
T
THE COURT OF THE ISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM, BOSTON
n
THE COURT, FOGG ART MUSEUM, CAMBRIDGE
THE ESPLANADE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA UNDER FIEDLER
THE LITTLE RED SCHOOLHOUSE, SUDBURY
Northampton 305
hill, is a comparatively small but well-equipped institution, 70 years old
and housing 150 pupils of both sexes from kindergarten to high-school
age. Massachusetts pupils are paid for by the State. President of the
Trustees is Mrs. Calvin Coolidge, who once studied in the teachers'
training course.
Retrace Round Hill Rd.; R. from Round Hill Rd. on Elm St.; R. from Elm
St. on Mass as oil St.
9. Calvin Coolidge' s First Northampton Home (private), 21 Massasoit St.,
is a square two-family frame house with yellow clapboards, green blinds,
two porches, and a small lawn, on a modest, tree-shaded residential
street lined with similar houses.
Retrace Massasoit St.; R. from Massasoit St. on Elm St.
10. Childs Park (privately owned, open; adm. free) is a wooded beauty spot
into which has been introduced practically every variety of New England
wild flower.
L. from Elm St. on N. Elm St.; straight ahead from N. Elm St. on N. Main
St.
1 1 . Look Park (open daily 7-10 ; first hour free, graduated charges after;
pool 25^; luncheonette) was presented to Northampton by the widow of
Frank Newhall Look, prophylactic toothbrush manufacturer, under a
large endowment. The 125 acres, beautifully wooded and watered, con-
tain an open-air Pompeiian swimming pool, an open-air theater, a deer
park, picnic grounds, and a great variety of playing fields.
Retrace on N. Main St. and N. Elm St.; R. from N. Elm St. on Elm St.;
R. from Elm St. on West St.
12. Forbes Library (open weekdays 9-9; Sun. 2-6), a low granite building
with brownstone trim, set on a wide lawn, is the city library. It contains
Portraits of President and Mrs. Coolidge, by Howard Chandler Christy,
an autographed photograph of Marshal Foch, the Holland House Col-
lection of some 40 miniatures of English celebrities from Queen Elizabeth
to Cromwell, which once adorned Holland House, the home of Charles
James Fox, and the priceless Judd Manuscript, the chief source for the
genealogy, manners, and customs of the entire Connecticut Valley in
Colonial times.
Retrace^ on West St.; R. from West St. on Main St.; R. from Main St. on
New South St.; L. from New South St. on High St.; R. from High St. on
unmarked street ending in stone gates.
13. The Beeches (private), facing the end of the street, is the home which
Calvin Coolidge bought after retiring from the White House, and where
he died. It is a large, many-gabled residence with gray-shingled walls and
green trim, set in a fine grove of beeches with a view of the Holyoke
Range.
NORTHFIELD.4 Prophet with Honor
Town: Alt. 262, pop. 1950, sett. 1673, incorp. 1723.
Railroad Stations: East Northfield for Central Vermont R.R. and B. & M. R.R. ;
Northfield Farms for Central Vermont R.R.
Bus Stations: East Northfield, Northfield, and Mt. Hermon for Boston and
Maine Transportation Co.
Accommodations: Four hotels.
Information: Northfield Inn, off Highland Ave., E. Northfield.
NORTHFIELD is one of the most charming of the older rural com-
munities. Built on the Connecticut River, it is crossed by the Ashuelot
Brook and watered by more than a score of woodland brooks. Tidy
farms dot the broad river meadows and the rolling plains which rise to
the wooded uplands. The main street of East Northfield, home of
Northfield Seminary, has a double arch of elms, fringing the chaste
white frame dwellings of the 'Center/ as New England farmers always
call their village.
Northfield is one of the dozen Massachusetts municipalities which are
internationally known, because for the past fifty years it has sent thou-
sands of Protestant missionaries to remote corners of the globe.
In 1673 fourteen families moved into Northfield from Northampton
and Hadley, but after two years of struggle with Indian raids they
abandoned the settlement. In 1714, despite the dangers still appre-
hended from the French and Indian Wars, a permanent settlement was
made.
Agriculture flourished, and to this was added apple-growing. In 1771,
when the ' merino craze ' swept New England, Northfield developed into
a sheep-raising community. The town's only venture into industry
occurred between 1830 and 1855, in the manufacture of brooms from
broom corn, locally grown.
In 1879 D wight Lyman Moody established the Northfield Seminary for
the daughters of farmers, and two years later, in the neighboring town
of Gill, the Mount Hermon School for boys.
An equally celebrated Moody enterprise, closely allied with Mount
Hermon, is the Student Volunteer Movement, established in 1886 in
collaboration with the International Y.M.C.A., which results in the en-
listment of many young men and women annually in foreign mission work.
The first American Youth Hostel was founded here in 1934. Separate
sleeping quarters are provided for the boys and girls, with a common
kitchen and recreation rooms. The young travelers carry their own
sleeping sacks, but blankets are provided at the hostels. Each youth
Northfield 307
must present a Membership Pass, which costs a dollar for those under
twenty-five years of age, two dollars for members over twenty-five, and
three dollars for a family. Northfield was the first of several hundred
towns in the United States which now recognize the cultural and edu-
cational benefits of youth hosteling.
TOUR 9 m.
N. on Main St. (State 10) from the junction of State 63.
1. The Old Janes House (private) (L) is still occupied by descendants
of the builders. Tradition has it that an underground tunnel connected
it with the Young House, a white Colonial dwelling across the street,
and it is said to have served as a station in the Underground Railway.
2. The Captain Samuel Field House (open by permission), opposite a
marker indicating the First Settlement, was built in 1784. The house
has five enormous fireplaces and a large brick oven in the ell. The
wainscoting is of virgin pine boards and the fine old doors have iron
strap-hinges (H and L).
3. The Old Dollard House (open by permission] (R) is a restoration,
but shows an arch under the massive chimney in the cellar. Sometimes
such an arched tunnel was part of a secret chamber. The carving around
the front door was taken from an old house in Factory Hollow near
Greenfield.
4. The Beehive (open as Ye Old Hunt Tavern), a big three-story house
with verandas on the first and second floors, was for many years the
village inn.
5. The Old Pomeroy Place (private) (L), owned by Northfield Schools,
w r as restored by Elliot Speer, late principal of Mount Hermon, and
presents a fine example of Colonial architecture.
R. from Main St. on the Schell Chateau Rd.
6. The Schell Chateau (open) (L), an annex of the Northfield Inn, built
in 1890 by Robert Schell who originally intended it for an English country
house.
Retrace on Schell Chateau Rd.; R. from Schell Chateau Rd. on Main St.
7. The Home of the Rev. Dwight L. Moody (open) is at the corner of
the first road N. of West Northfield Rd. The son of a widowed mother,
Moody lacked educational opportunities, but his driving ambition made
him achieve financial success. In 1855, however, he was converted, re-
nounced the world, and preached his way to fame. Conscious of his
own meager opportunities and keenly sympathetic with those who
yearned for an education, he founded Northfield Seminary and the
Mount Hermon School.
308 Main Street and Village Green
8. Northfield Seminary (open) (R), established in 1879, occupies 1200
acres with 79 buildings accommodating over 500 women students. Its
founder had been impressed with the hopelessness of the lot of the girls
from the poorer homes after driving past a mountain cottage where a
mother and two daughters were braiding palmetto straw hats in an
effort to support a family whose father was a paralytic. All the Seminary
students help with the housework and receive an education for about
half the cost usual in other schools. Northfield Summer Conferences
(religious; open to public) are held the first two weeks in August.
East Hall, built in 1880 was the first building on the campus. The Birthplace of
D. L. Moody and the house where he lived, as well as his Grave and that of his
wife are on the campus grounds and may be visited by making arrangements at
Kcrnarden Hall, the administration building. The beautiful Chapel, in Gothic
style, a gift of Mrs. Russell Sage, and Gould Hall, given by Miss Helen Gould are
two of the outstanding buildings on the campus. The Auditorium seats three
thousand people.
Retrace on Main St. to junction with State 63; straight ahead on State 63.
9. The Lookout, a vantage-point high on the river terrace, offers an
excellent view of the Connecticut River country with the towers of the
Mount Hermon Boys' School (see Tour 15A, Gill) in the foreground.
NORTON. Typical New England
Town: Alt. 104, pop. 2295, sett. 1669, incorp. 1711.
Railroad Station: East Norton for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.
Accommodations: Inns and private boarding-houses.
NORTON is a pleasant small country town, well wooded and watered,
which gives the general impression, no longer strictly correct, of a typical
New England farming community. As it occupies a level plain, without
hills of note, the landscape is not much diversified and makes no im-
mediate or striking appeal. Norton is the sort of place, however, which
grows upon the affections. In every direction there are agreeable walks,
running now across open pastures, walled by the loose stones cleared
from the fields by the first settlers, now past some small sawmill still in
operation, now through pungent pines, and coming suddenly upon a pretty
brook or delightful pond. These things the girls at Wheaton College
have known for the past hundred years.
For Norton is distinctively a college town, the seat of Wheaton College,
one of the pioneer schools for the education of women in this country.
It is the only small independent college for women in Massachusetts
Norton 309
which is neither co-educational nor affiliated with other institutions,
with a limited enrollment of five hundred students in 1937, representing
twenty-one States, Puerto Rico, and three foreign countries. The faculty
is composed of both men and women. ' That they may have life and have
it more abundantly' is the college motto.
Norton, originally a rural and agricultural village, took on its academic
character with the founding of Wheaton Female Seminary, established
by Judge Laban Wheaton in 1834 as a memorial to his daughter. Mary
Lyon was its organizer, but left to found Mount Holyoke College afteV
two years.
Jewelry has been manufactured in Norton since 1871, the first concern
being established by W. A. Sturdy. The Barrowsville Bleachery has
been in operation for over thirty years. These, along with the Talbot
Wool Combing Company, the T. J. Holmes Company, manufacturers of
atomizers, and the paper and wooden box factories, represent the in-
dustrial activity of the town today.
Norton for its size had an unusual amount of trouble with the powers
of darkness. Beside Dora Leonard and Naomi Burt, town witches, old-
timers tell a story from Colonial days about one Major George Leonard,
a highfalutin fellow who sold himself soul and body to the Devil for
gold. In 1716 His Satanic Majesty cashed in on his bargain, they say,
whistling the Major's soul out of his body and then carrying his body
off through the roof. Anyone who doesn't believe this can see with his
own eyes the Devil's footprints on a rock below the eaves where Satan
landed when he jumped off with his heavy burden. No one saw the
corpse at the funeral, there being nothing but a log of wood in the box,
to avert the townsfolks' suspicions.
TOUR 12 m.
E. from State 140 on State 123 (Main St.)
i. Wheaton College is attractively placed on a campus of over 100 acres.
It occupies 40 buildings, 15 of which are modern brick in the Georgian
Colonial style of architecture, examples of restraint and usefulness,
whose loveliness lies in their lines rather than in any external ornament.
The extensive grounds include a beautiful strip of woods to the south,
known as College Pines, and a body of water about two acres in extent.
They are diversified by gardens, lawns, hedges, trees, and meadows, and
contain athletic fields, concrete and clay tennis courts, and other equip-
ment for outdoor sports.
Among Wheaton College buildings are three designed by Cram and Ferguson.
The Chapel (1917), the Library (1923), and Everett Hall (1926) are modern inter-
pretations of Georgian Colonial style, in red New Hampshire brick with trim of
limestone and white-painted wood. The architects are known also for their con-
temporary work based upon medieval precedent.
3io Main Street and Village Green
2. House in the Pines, a preparatory school for girls, was established in
1911, when Wheaton College was emerging from the old Wheaton Sem-
inary and discontinuing its preparatory department. The school grounds,
covering an area of 80 acres, have a great deal of natural beauty due to
a variety of trees with pines predominating. Here are a beautiful out-
door theater with two old oaks and a hedge of pines; rose gardens; a
lily pool surrounded by iris; Japanese cherry trees; the smoke bush, the
lilacs, the lindens; and the arborvitae hedge that forms a screen for the
athletic field. The school also has a string of saddle-horses.
R. from Main St. on Leonard St.; L. from Leonard St. on Plain St.
3. King Philip's Cave, near Becker's Farm on Great Rocky Hill, formed
by the projection of .one very large rock over another, is said to have
been a favorite retreat of King Philip, on his fishing excursion tc Win-
nicunnet Pond.
R. from Plain St. on Bay St.; L. from Bay St. on dirt road opposite Winni-
cunnet Pond.
4. Winnicunnet Turkey Farm (open), or the Rundge Turkey Farm, was
formerly used for raising horses and was purchased from gypsies. It
covers over 400 acres and is situated on Toad Island. Over 100,000
turkeys are raised annually. The flocks consume five tons of grain per
day as food and rejoice in open-air roosts, on a triangular skeleton frame
six feet high.
PITTSFIELD. Power-Source and Playground
City: Alt. 1038, pop. 47,516, sett. 1752, incorp. town 1761, city 1889.
Railroad Stations: Union Station, West St., for B. & A. R.R.
Bus Stations: 48 South St. for Greyhound, New England Transportation Co.,
Arrow, Interstate Busses Corp., Vermont Transit Lines, Berkshire Motor
Coach Lines, Blue Way, Nutmeg Lines, and Peter Pan Bus Lines.
Accommodations: One first-class and three second-class hotels; numerous inns.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 50 South St.; Automobile Club of Berk-
shire Co., 26 Bank Row.
IN THE shadow of Mount Greylock, high in the rolling Berkshires,
Pittsfield opens the commercial gateway to western Massachusetts.
Situated between the upper branches of the Housatonic River more
than one thousand feet above sea level, the city is traversed by streams
which for a hundred years or more have furnished power to factories
Pittsfield 311
producing such varied products as silk thread, mohair braid, tacks,
metal goods, textiles, paper, and electrical machinery.
Today the city has a prosperous, tranquil look of general comfort and
cultivation which makes it one of the most attractive industrial cities
in the State. The homes of the well-to-do line its elm-shaded streets
with substantial dignified residences and smooth lawns. From almost
any point within the business and residential district there is a broad
view of the rolling Berkshires, across the wide meadows and small lakes
and elm-bordered streams of the plateau. The altitude of the city gives
it a salubrious climate which makes it a favorite winter and summer
playground for tourists and sportsmen.
There has been a change, however, in the character of the city's holiday
population. In the latter part of the nineteenth century Pittsfield at-
tracted a wealthy leisure class who resided solidly on spacious estates.
The rambling old Maplewood Hotel, in the heart of the modern city,
was a relic such as could not be matched short of Saratoga, with its
long verandas and wide and spacious elm-shaded lawns, the latter dotted
with seats, fountains, and urns.
But the great estates have been broken up into realty developments for
smaller residences or business property, and the few that remain in the
environs of Pittsfield have converted their stables into garages. The
advent of the automobile has changed everything. The leisurely old-
school ladies and gentlemen who once trotted sedately in victorias or
runabouts along the city lanes are no more. Their modern successors
now whirl in and out again in swift cars, and hotels, old and new, are
conduits for a never-ending stream of summer and winter visitors. A great
circle of the country round about is a motorists' paradise and Pittsfield
is its hub. Nearly every owner of a car on the eastern seaboard and many
from the Middle and the Far West at some time or other tour the Berk-
shires; and nearly everyone who visits the Berkshires calls at some time
on Pittsfield.
The city's development from a small agricultural community to a thriving
center of textile, paper, and electrical machinery manufacturing has
paralleled the general development throughout the State. Its entire
history is bound up with industrial progress.
Although Indian troubles and disputes with New York over the boundary
of the State delayed its settlement until 1752, the plantation of Pontoo-
suck, as it was called, rapidly achieved agricultural prosperity and be-
came a trading center for Berkshire communities. Two years later it
had approximately two hundred inhabitants.
Pittsfield joined the eastern settlements in early protesting the domina-
tion of England. The town contained many wealthy Tories, but the
majority of its citizens followed the Revolutionary leadership of Major
John Brown and the Reverend Thomas Allen, the Fighting Parson, who
mustered troops for the assault on Fort Ticonderoga led by his cousin,
Ethan Allen. Heading the local Committee of Safety, this militant
312 Main Street and Village Green
pastor organized the Berkshire Militia and led it to the Battle of Ben-
nington. More than three months before the signing of the Declaration
of Independence, Pittsfield renounced royal authority.
The little community, still predominantly agricultural, shared in the
general depression which followed the Revolution; but while the farmers
elsewhere were crushed by poverty, Pittsfield turned to industry. Al-
though it seems certain that a majority of the townsfolk were in sym-
pathy with the desperate rebellion of their neighbors under Daniel Shays
in 1786, and although they treated the forty fellow citizens implicated
in the rebellion with lenience, the hope of imminent prosperity deterred
them from participating. Their hopes were justified: in 1801 Arthur
Schofield, who had invented a wool-carding machine, opened a shop to
manufacture his invention, and a few years later undertook the pro-
duction of looms. The War of 1812 brought an abnormal demand for
clothing and military supplies which definitely established the town as
a manufacturing center. The consequent need for raw materials made
sheep-raising an important affiliated industry. Later penetration by
railroads connecting the town with New York and Boston made it the
shipping distribution point for the whole district. Throughout the nine-
teenth century paper and shoes were among the most important pro-
ducts of its busy factories.
With the turn of the century came a change. The early isolation and
independence fostered by Pittsfield 's geographical situation were de-
stroyed by an invasion of outside capital and a change of direction in its
industrial activity. Pittsfield now began to change from a quiet self-
insulated community to a unit integrated with the outer world and
seething with business. Its population grew faster during the first decade
of the new century than that of any Massachusetts city except New
Bedford. This increase no less than forty-seven per cent created a
serious housing problem which in turn attracted other outside capital.
This was directed to housing construction and realty developments.
The Tillotson Textile Plant; Eaton, Crane and Pike Company, famous
manufacturers of stationery; foundries producing machinery for the
textile and paper factories all these and others contributed to make
the development of Pittsfield a microcosm of what was going on in the
entire country.
FOOT TOUR 2.7 m.
E. from South St. on Bank Row.
i. In City Hall Park, the original village Green, was held in 1810 what
is said to be the first cattle show in America. A marker memorializes
that event, which was sponsored by Elkanan Watson, a famous patriot,
friend of Washington, traveler, canal surveyor, biographer, and breeder
of livestock. Watson stimulated the importation of merino sheep for
Pittsfield 313
the textile mills of Pittsfield and encouraged agricultural improvement
throughout New England.
A sundial marks the Site of the Old Elm beneath whose lofty branches
stood such famous men as Holmes, Longfellow, Hawthorne, Melville,
and Lafayette. On this spot soldiers of all wars were mustered and
honored; old taverns and stores faced it on all sides, and historic houses,
too. Here were held the Fourth of July celebrations, the cattle shows,
and all the country gala days. Here lovers lingered for precious moments.
Travelers celebrated the tree in their books, and poets immortalized it
in their verse.
In 1790, when the destruction of the elm was planned to make way for
a new meeting-house, Lucre tia Williams, wife of a prominent lawyer in
Pittsfield, stood guard over the tree, placing herself in front of it when
the woodchopper came to cut it down. John Chandler Williams, whose
former homestead, the Peace Party House, stands near-by, gave land
to the town so that the park might remain an open space forever and
the old elm be saved.
Such was the veneration in which the old elm was held by some of the
citizens of Pittsfield that when at the age of 265 years, after being struck
by lightning several times, it was so damaged that the axe had to be
applied, there was actual weeping among those who witnessed its fall.
2. The Berkshire Athenaeum (open weekdays 9-9), 44 Bank Row, a
Victorian Gothic structure of gray granite, has been noted as a public
library and art repository for many years.
R. from Bank Row on East St.
3. The Peace Party House (private), southeast corner of Wendell Ave.,
erected in 1776, was the scene of a grand ball and feast, with roast
oxen, game birds, and vast pastries all washed down with plenty of
good liquor in celebration of the signing of the Treaty of Paris in
1783. The Marquis de Lafayette was a guest here while on his tour in
1825. Though considerably altered, this white, three-story house, clap-
boarded, and gambrel-roofed, still retains much of its original dignity.
Retrace on East St.
4. St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, next to the Parsonage Lot, is con-
structed of red granite in the Gothic manner.
R. from East St. on North St.
5. The Old Cantonment Grounds, opposite Linden St., were used during
the War of 1812. The war brought Pittsfield to the fore not only through
its possession of a cantonment, but also as a place for making cloth,
guns, and drums.
Retrace North St.; R. from North St. on West St.
6. In Crane Memorial Park, in front of the Union Station, is a Marker
in memory of the late Zenas Crane, a noted philanthropist.
Retrace West St.; R. from West St. on South St.
Pittsfield 315
7. Museum of Natural History and Art (open weekdays 10-5; Sun. and
holidays 2-5), 39 South St., is an adaptation of the Italian Renaissance
style. The 'mineral room' is one of the most beautiful in the country.
Ultra-violet rays are used to bring out the beauties of the collection.
Among the outstanding exhibits are: one of the two sledges used by
Admiral Robert E. Peary when he discovered the North Pole, Nathaniel
Hawthorne's desk, and (miraculously reconstructed?) the original 'one-
hoss shay' which inspired Oliver Wendell Holmes's 'The Deacon's
Masterpiece.' The art collection includes fine examples of the works of
old masters and some excellent original Greek and Roman sculptures.
L. from South St. on Broad St.
8. The Calvin Martin House (private), 14 Broad St., removed here from
its original site to make way for the Berkshire Museum, is a two-story
frame building painted yellow with two inner chimneys. It is enriched
by fluted Ionic pilasters and an elaborate cornice.
MOTOR TOUR 32.5 m.
(Note: The Pittsfield Tour Map provides the tourist
the means of covering this tour in smaller units )
W. from City Hall Park on West St.
9. Fort Hill, near Lake Onota, is the site of Fort Ashley, one of four
early Colonial forts in Pittsfield. During the French and Indian wars
there was a considerable settlement around the block-house, including
many wigwams of friendly Indians.
The view of Lake Onota and the mountains beyond it, from this high point, is
one of the most beautiful to be found in the Berkshire Hills country. The long
sweep of the lake to the north draws the eye to the distant majestic height of Mt.
Greylock almost 20 miles away.
PITTSFIELD MAP INDEX
1. City Hall Park 12. South Mountain
2. Berkshire Athenaeum 13. Brattle House
3. Peace Party House 14. Wells's Tavern
4. St. Stephen's Episcopal Church 15. Grave of Sarah Deming
5. Old Cantonment Grounds 16. Holmesdale
6. Crane Memorial Park 17. Arrowhead
7. Museum of Natural History and 18. General Electric Plant
Art 19. Canoe Meadows
8. Calvin Martin House 20. Government Mill
9. Fort Hill 21. Pontoosuc Lake Park
10. Walton Wild Acres Sanctuary 22. Pittsfield State Forest
n. Pittsfield Country Club
316 Main Street and Village Green
Onota in the Indian language means 'Lake of the White Deer.' Legend relates
that a pure albino doe used to come here to drink. No Indian's bow was ever drawn
on her, for it was believed that she brought good luck to the valley. Should she
be harmed, the pow-wows warned, disaster would befall the tribe. During the
French and Indian wars a young French officer, hearing of the superstition, boasted
that he would kill the white deer. He bribed an unsuspecting member of the tribe
to show him the doe's watering-place, where he hid in ambush and made good his
boast. The prophecy also was made good, however: the Frenchman met his death
while trying to escape to Canada; the crops of the tribe failed and their prosperity
waned, a plague came upon them, and they slowly dwindled away.
Retrace West St.; R. from West St. on Merriam St.; L. from Merriam St.
on Woodleigh Ave.; R. from Woodleigh Ave. on West Housatonic St.; L.
from West Housatonic St. on Barker Rd.; L. from Barker Rd. on South
Mountain Rd.
10. Walton Wild Acres Sanctuary (open to picnic parties; small fee) is a
tract of 83 acres of well- wooded land, established in 1929 as a bird and
game sanctuary. The Izaak Walton League made it a semi-public re-
creation area, stocked the ponds with trout, built fireplaces and an out-
door pavilion, cleared away the underbrush, established trap-shooting
ranges, and constructed a dam to enlarge Lake Holman.
R. from South Mountain Rd. on South St.
11. The Pittsfield Country Club (open by invitation), an i8-hole course,
occupies a mansion known as Broad Hall, erected by Henry Van Schaack
in 1785 and at one time owned by an uncle of Herman Melville. The
cellar is said to have been one of the depots for the Underground Rail-
road. At the northeast corner of the club is Morewood Lake, sometimes
known as Melville Lake, and called by Longfellow 'The Tear of Heaven.'
12. South Mountain (alt. 1870), is the highest point of land in Pittsfield,
lying near the Lenox Line at the south end of the city and rising west
of US 7 and US 20, just beyond the Pittsfield Country Club. A favorite
resort for hikers, the mountain offers a view of the entire city. It is
now largely owned by the Coolidge family, a member of which, Mrs.
Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, founder of the South Mountain Music
Colony and Temple, sponsors a series of chamber music concerts given
every Sunday during the summer months.
Retrace South St.; R. from South St. on East Housatonic St.; R. from
East Housatonic St. on Appleton Ave.; L. from Appleton Ave. on Dawes
Ave.; R. from Dawes Ave. on High St.; L. from High St. on William St.
13. The Brattle House (open during summer; small fee for benefit of the
National Memorial Foundation for army and navy memorial aid), near
Elm St., built in 1762, and now owned by a descendant of its builder,
is the oldest house in Pittsfield, and is furnished with antiques of its
period. It is set on a knoll surrounded by an apple orchard and ancient
beech trees. It is a three-story red clapboarded, gambrel-roofed dwelling
with an overhanging second story.
Straight ahead from William St. on Elm St.
14. Wells' s Tavern (private), 847 Elm St., was one of several such places
Pittsfield 317
of resort on the old stagecoach route to Springfield. It is a white clap-
boarded, two-story, hip-roofed house with a series of additions in the
rear. The old woodshed is a copy of the first frame house in Pittsfield.
The tavern contains portions of the original house, built by Solomon
Deming, the first white settler who came in on horseback through the
wilderness from Wethersfield, Connecticut, in the spring of 1752, bring-
ing his wife, Sarah, on a pillion behind him.
15. The Grave of Sarah Deming (R), just inside the gate of the Old
East Park Cemetery, is indicated by a neat marble obelisk erected by
the city to its pioneer housewife.
Retrace Elm St.; L. from Elm St. on Holmes Rd.
1 6. Holmesdale (private), just beyond junction with Pomeroy Ave., is
the former residence of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Here the physician
and poet spent seven seasons and wrote 'The Deacon's Masterpiece/
'The New Eden,' and 'The Ploughman' on local themes. His favorite
refuge was the arbor formed by the low-hanging branches of a white
pine tree on a small knoll on the lawn. Only a glimpse of the house and
the famous Holmes Pine can be had from the road. Holmes did some of
his work in a little house on the hill across the road, now occupied by
Miss Hall's School for Girls.
17. Arrowhead (private), a mile farther on Holmes Rd. at the top of the
hill, was the home of Herman Melville, where he wrote 'Moby Dick/
'My Chimney and I/ 'Piazza Tales/ and 'October Mountain.'
Retrace Holmes Rd.; L. from Holmes Rd. on Dawes Ave.; R. from Dawes
Ave. on Appleton Ave.; R. from Appleton Ave. on East St.
1 8. The General Electric Plant (open to visitors scientifically interested;
guide] is fascinating to visit. The alternating current transformer in-
vented by the late William Stanley was developed at the Pittsfield
Works of the General Electric Company. Recently, huge transformers for
Boulder Dam were constructed here.
Important electrical research is done here, requiring the services of inter-
nationally distinguished technicians and scientists. The most picturesque
feature of this research for the general public is the occasional display
of 'artificial lightning/ a series of huge blinding flashes occasioned by
testing the ability of electrical current to jump a long distance through
the air from two or more high steel towers unconnected by wire.
There were in 1890 about 1500 power stations throughout the country
operating on the alternating current system, with only two companies
producing the machines. The Stanley Electrical Manufacturing Com-
pany of Pittsfield was organized in 1907 into a corporation to supply
these stations first with transformers and later with generators, switch-
boards, and motors. The rapid growth of this corporation, which erected
a new plant in 1912 employing one sixth of Pittsfield's population, be-
came a strain on the city's limited supply of capital, and threats of its
withdrawal from Pittsfield were a constant source of apprehension.
31 8 Main Street and Village Green
This disaster seemed imminent when, in 1930, the corporation was
absorbed by the General Electric Company. The latter, however, to
the great relief of the city, immediately announced that it had no in-
tention of moving the plant away. On the contrary the bringing in of
a new and practically unlimited supply of capital foreshadowed con-
tinued expansion.
L. from East St. on Merrill Rd.
19. The Canoe Meadows at Umkamet's Crossing, near the railroad
bridge over the Housatonic River, were the site of an Indian fort and
landing place for the Red Men in the ancient days when they came to
visit the burial mounds of their ancestors now obliterated by the
march of progress and the overflow of the rivers.
R. from Merrill Rd. on Dalton Ave.
20. The Government Mill (private) is a branch of Crane & Co. of Dalton,
manufacturers of paper for currency and United States bonds.
Retrace Dalton Ave.; R. from Dalton Ave. on Crane Ave.; R. from Crane
Ave. on North St.
To the south from the crest of the hill on North St., a bird's-eye view
of the entire city may be had. On the far side may be seen the Bosquet
Ski Run (small fee), distinguishable in summer by the broad, bare
swath curving down from the opposite mountain-top through the woods
that clothe its slope.
L. from North St. on Hancock Rd.
21. Pontoosuc Lake Park (picnicking grounds, public bathing; boats and
fishing equipment for hire) , with its splendid white pines, is on the banks
of Pontoosuc Lake, an Indian name meaning 'Place of Winter Deer.'
Legend says that an Indian brave, while paddling across the lake to
meet his sweetheart, was slain by a jealous suitor. The distracted
maiden flung herself into the lake, following her lover to his watery
grave. Even today, it is said, a spectral canoe with a shadowy paddler
is sometimes seen to glide over the lake at midnight, darting from point
to point. It is the frenzied lover searching for, but never finding, the
drowned form of his betrothed.
L. from Hancock Rd. on Churchill St.; R. from Churchill St. on Sham-
rock Blvd.
22. The Pittsfield State Forest (camping and picnicking), covering 2127
acres, lies partly in Hancock and partly in Lanesborough. Several foot
trails lead about the Forest, while the Skyline Trail, in process of being
built, follows an ancient Indian hunting path along the crest of the
Taconics, north to south. Ghost Trail and Honwee Trail, two ski trails,
were recently constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps, and plans
are under way to provide facilities for all winter sports.
At the entrance to the camp area of the Civilian Conservation Corps is
Goodrich Cave, forgotten for 40 years, its entrance blocked by boulders
Plymouth 319
and a wash of sand and gravel. It was rediscovered by a worker on the
'Massachusetts Guide' and reopened, disclosing a large chamber be-
neath a shelf of limestone. Here, according to old inhabitants, a band
of lawless youths used to hide for weeks, subsisting by raids on near-by
farms, and making counterfeit half-dollars from stolen spoons, lead
pipes, and quicksilver in a handmade mould.
Near-by is Lulu Cascade, a pretty fall of water on Lulu Brook.
High above the Cascades, on Honwee Mountain, is Berry Pond, the
highest natural body of water in Massachusetts. Not far distant is a
majestic view of the New York Taconics rising in the west with the
Catskill Mountains on the horizon. The pond is the source of a brook
which flows down the west side of the mountain through Goodrich
Hollow, a secluded and lovely vale. Here, in May, are woods pink and
white with mountain laurel; in June come the red and white azaleas;
the deep wine-colored velvet of the September sumach is a color-theme
for the gorgeous orchestration of later autumn.
PLYMOUTH. The Colony's First ' Main Street '
Town: Alt. 29, pop. 13,183, sett, and incorp. 1620.
Railroad Station: Park Ave. for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.
Bus Station: Park Ave. for New England Transportation Co.
Accommodations: One hotel all year round; three during summer months;
tourist houses.
Annual Events: Pilgrim's Progress; every Friday in August, march of Pilgrim
descendants.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, Leyden St., opposite Post Office.
PLYMOUTH, its white beaches stretching for eighteen miles along the
inner shore of Massachusetts Bay, is known as one of New England's
famous vacation spots. Here the 'South Shore' becomes Cape Cod.
Inland hummocky hills of tumbled pines are dotted with ponds and
brooks running into Plymouth Harbor or Buzzard's Bay. Here, too, are
bird sanctuaries and game preserves, the Myles Standish Forest, and
the Town Forest. Erosion of the outer slopes of its coastal hills has left
the boulders and bluffs of Manomet and lagoons and beaches of glistening
white sand set against the sparkling blue sea.
Plymouth's main street is now a thoroughfare, bustling with shops and
commerce as befits the county seat, but in many other ways, as a de-
32O Main Street and Village Green
lightful bit of old New England, the town remains the same. (Even as
late as 1840, Christmas, banned by the Pilgrim Fathers, was not ob-
served. Newcomers who put wreaths in their windows were commented
upon and called * 'piscopals.') Ancient houses, few of them remodeled or
modernized, line the ancient streets of the center, setting a tone which
triumphs still over the outlying modern residential areas; and the old
Pilgrim stock, though now in the minority, still dominates the com-
munity.
After the Civil War, the rise of manufacturing brought an influx of
immigrants German, French, Italian, and Portuguese who now
make up a quarter of the town. Today, with thirteen thousand people,
the town has a score of mills, small factories, and ropeworks. As there
is little good top soil, "farming has not flourished, except poultry-raising,
dairy farming, fancy stock breeding, and cranberry culture.
In the year 1620, the 'Mayflower,' bound for Virginia, was blown far
north of her course and cast among the roaring breakers and dangerous
shoals of Cape Cod. It anchored in what today is Provincetown Harbor,
and finding that terrain unfriendly, about a month later the Pilgrims set
sail for the mainland. They were tossed about by a storm and nearly
wrecked, but at nightfall they landed on an island in Plymouth Harbor.
On December 21 (new style calendar), 1620, with seventeen men, oc-
curred the 'Landing of the Pilgrims' at their first settlement. The
legends surrounding the landing are picturesque, but seem to have little
basis in substantiated fact.
The majority of the Pilgrims, indeed, remained aboard ship for the better
part of a month until shelters could be erected ashore. Snow covered the
decks of the vessel; exposure and insanitation increased, and sickness
grew apace. Scurvy and ship fever raged, and juniper was burned
aboard to dispel the noisome smells of death. Sometimes two or three
died in a single day. By March nearly half the company was dead.
There was never actual starvation, for berries, wild fowl, and shellfish
abounded; but great disaster befell the little community in their second
year when the ship 'Fortune,' carrying over their entire yield of furs and
produce, was captured by the French as a prize.
Early difficulties were not all material; the more important ones were
spiritual. To the horror of the community, it was discovered that Lyford,
their pastor, had been exiled from England as unfit for the ministry.
* The circumstances,' writes the good Governor Bradford, ' I forbear, for
they would offend chaste ears to hear them related.'
Moreover, Lyford was soon convicted at court of writing 'slanderous
letters,' disparaging Plymouth Colony and the country. This gave
great pain to the London adventurers, who, to increase their revenues,
depended on finding persons in England willing to go as colonists. It
also damaged the pride of the Pilgrim Fathers beyond repair. Later
Thomas Morton recounted the manner of Lyford's deportation :
Plymouth 321
His exile was arranged after a solomne invention in this manner. A lane of mus-
keteers was made and hee compelled in scorne to passe along betweene, and to
receave a bob upon the bumme by every musketier. And then aboard a shallop
and so conveyed to Wessaguscus shore.
Lyford was succeeded by 'one Mr. Rogers a young man for minister,'
who within twelve months 'proving crazied in his brain, they were
forced to be at further charge in sending him back after losing all the
cost expended in bringing him over which was not small.'
Finally, the congregation secured the services of one Reverend Smith, a
pastor who had been discarded by the Salem Colony; though it is related
that he too was of odd temperament, even supposed by some to be insane.
Now Thomas Morton, a companion of Captain Wollaston, set up a rival
trading colony near-by at what is now Wollaston, in Quincy. The staid
Pilgrims were duly horrified by the 'Merrymount' revels, but Morton
flourished in his wickedness like the green bay tree. He sold rum and
guns; and with these to be got in exchange for their furs, the Indians
practically refused to take any amount of the Plymouth wampum and
trinkets. At last, however, Miles Standish proceeded to Merrymount,
seized Morton prisoner, and deported him to England.
In spite of all such zeal, by 1642 the piety among the 'Pure and Un-
spottyd Lambs of the Lord' of Plymouth seemed at a low ebb, and
severe measures were taken to combat the powers of evil. For nearly
fifty years there were but forty-eight freemen, all of whom had to be
church members. They controlled all the affairs of the town, and it
would have been hardly human if occasionally piety had not been
made the handmaid of profit.
At the end of a century after the landing, Plymouth had a population
of two thousand, comfortably supported by agriculture,, navigation, and
commerce. Already, too, settlers from the mother town had founded or
were founding other prosperous communities in the environs, extending
as far as Eastham on Cape Cod and the present city of Fall River near
the Rhode Island Line. Whale-fishing, begun about 1690 and abandoned
about 1840, occupied many of these daughter towns, notably Wareham
and the Cape Cod towns.
By the turn of the nineteenth century, stagecoaches ran from Boston
to Plymouth, and thence in various directions. Alongside the wharves
were seventy-six ships, brigs, and schooners. By 1830 the population was
nearly five thousand. A hundred ships engaged in coastwise trade and
fishing, especially for cod and mackerel. Four vessels went whaling.
The town had forty ships, five iron mills, two cotton mills, and three
ropeworks. Among these was the Plymouth Cordage Company, which
today is one of the largest in the world.
Honor was brought to the town by one of its most distinguished citizens,
Dr. Charles Jackson, who was awarded twenty-five hundred francs by the
French Academy of Science as the co-discoverer of etherization.
Plymouth 323
FOOT TOUR 2.5 m.
NW. from Town Square on Main St.; straight ahead on Court St. (State 3).
1 . The Tabitha Flasket House (home of one of the earliest schools) is located
adjacent to Pilgrim Hall. It is said to have been built by Consider How-
land, grandson of John Howland in 1722, but it has the appearance of
having been built at a much later date possibly 50 years. It is a large
two-story w r hite frame house, early Colonial, with four chimneys. Much
of it is still intact, including the wide floor boards and H and L type hinges.
2. Pilgrim Hall (open weekdays 9-5, Sun. 12-5, April Nov.), on the
corner of Chilton St., is a granite building in the Greek revival style,
dedicated to the memory of the Pilgrims. Erected in 1824, it has since
been enlarged, and its Doric portico re-erected from plans by McKim,
Mead and White. At the east end of the Hall is the famous painting ' The
Landing of the Pilgrims' by Henry Sargent. On the north wall is the
original of Robert F. Weir's l Embarkation of the Pilgrims from Delft
Haven.' From this study W T eir produced the larger painting for the Cap-
itol rotunda in Washington. Among historical articles in the Hall are:
the patent of Plymouth Colony; the chairs of Elder Brewster and Gover-
nor Carver; the Peregrine White cradle, in which slept the first white
child born in Massachusetts; the Bible of Governor Bradford, printed in
Geneva in 1592.
Retrace Court St.; L. from Court St. on North St.
3. The Lindens, in front of the Public Library, were imported and
planted in 1760 by Colonel George W T atson.
4. The Edward Winslow House (private), on the corner of Winslow St.,
was built in 1754 by Edward Winslow, great-grandson of Governor
Edward Winslow of the 'Mayflower' company, and brother of General
John Winslow. Little is left of the original house, which in the iSgo's
was enlarged to manorial proportions with a formal garden added.
PLYMOUTH MAP INDEX
1. Tabitha Flasket House n. Burial Hill
2. Pilgrim Hall 12. Sites of some of the first houses
3. Lindens 13. Brewster Gardens
4. Edward Winslow House 14. Antiquarian House
5. Pilgrim Mother Fountain 15. John Howland House
6. Plymouth Rock 16. William Harlow House
7. Cole's Hill 17. Kendall Holmes House
8. Leyden St. 18. National Monument to the Fore-
9. Site of the first ' Common House ' fathers
10. House of the Rev. Nathaniel 19. William Crowe House
Leonard 20. Myles Standish State Forest
324 Main Street and Village Green
5. The Pilgrim Mother Fountain, at the corner of Water St., was erected
as a tribute to the Pilgrim mothers, historically so much less vocal than
the fathers, but certainly quite as deserving of admiration.
R. from North St. on Water St.
6. Plymouth Rock, with the date 1620 carved upon it, reposes under a
magnificent granite portico of classical design. Two thirds of the rock
is underground, and an iron fence protects the remainder from souvenir
chippers. Historians have for the most part exploded the landing myth,
but popular sentiment clings to the long-hallowed stepping-stone.
Retrace Water St.; L. from Water St. on North St.; L. from North St. on
Carver St.
7. Cole's Hill was the scene of the secret night burials of those who died
during the first year of the settlement. Corn was planted over their
graves so that the Indians should not know how many of their number
had perished. A sculptured sarcophagus now contains many of the
exhumed bones. An imposing Statue of Mass as oil, the Pilgrims' friend,
crowns the hill.
R. from Carver St. on Ley den St.
8. The first houses erected by the Pilgrims stood on 'First St.' now
Leyden St. 'The Meersteads and Garden Plots' allotted to the early'
settlers, and on which the houses were built, sloped thence to the Town
Brook the 'very Sweet brook mentioned by the first explorers.'
9. Opposite the end of Carver St. is the Site 'of the First 'Common
House,' marked by tablet. It was used as a shelter by the Pilgrims on
their frequent trips to and from the 'Mayflower' before it sailed on the
return voyage to England, April 15, 1621. Later it was used as a store-
house. In that house on February 27, 1621, the right of popular suffrage
was exercised and Miles Standish was chosen Captain by popular vote.
10. The House of the Rev. Nathaniel Leonard (1734) (private), across from
the Common House site, is an early white house with a rainbow roof.
Straight ahead into Town Square and Church St.
1 1 . Burial Hill (at head of Town Sq.) was long used both as a place of de-
fense and as a place of worship. On its summit are the sites of the Watch-
Tower and Old Fort. The site of the Old Powder House on Burial Hill is
marked by a small round brick house claimed to be a replica of the original.
12. The Sites of Some of the First Houses built in 1621 are along the
south side of this square. These houses were started as common property
but were finished by the people who were to occupy them: the Allertons,
Winslows, Cookes, and others.
i2a. The Richard Sparrow House (1640) (open; adm. 25), Summer St.,
corner of Spring St., is a restored house with red clapboards and shingles
and early English diamond-shaped windows.
S. from Town Sq. on Market St.; R. from Market St. on Sandwich St.; L.
from Sandwich St. on Water St.
Plymouth 325
13. Brewster Gardens provide a pleasant setting for the Statue of the
Pilgrim Maid, dedicated to ' those intrepid English women whose courage
and fortitude brought a new nation into being.' In Brewster Gardens
are also the Ship Anne Memorial and the Pilgrim Spring, the latter a
delightful spot to visit.
14. The Antiquarian House (open weekdays 10-5, Sun. 2-5; closed in
winter}, 126 Water St., was built in 1809, and is completely furnished
in its period. The kitchen has century-old cookbooks, a children's play-
room has old-fashioned dolls and toys, and there is an old-fashioned
garden.
Retrace Water St.; L. from Water St. on Sandwich St.
15. The John Howland House (1666) (open daily; adm. 25 fi is opposite
the southwesterly end of Water St. This two-and-a-half -story structure,
painted red, with hip roof and central chimney, was restored in 1913.
1 6. The William Harlow House (open summer, weekdays 9-6, Sun. 2-5;
adm. 25), 119 Sandwich St., was built in 1677 of timber taken from the
Old Fort on Burial Hill. It is solidly constructed and clings close to the
crest of a knoll; the smooth lines of the low gambrel roof melt into the
slope of the ground from which it seems to have sprung. Overshadowing
it is an ancient tree that was only a seedling when the house was already
old. Recently this house has been acquired and authentically furnished
in its own period by the Plymouth Antiquarian Society, which during
the summer months keeps open house at the Harlow House and re-
enacts the early domestic life of the Pilgrims. Flax grown in the garden
at the rear of the house is harvested and prepared for spinning. Corn
is planted by the school-children, who, following the old custom, place a
herring in each hill.
L. from Sandwich St. into Winter St.
17. The Kendall Holmes House (open, free} , Winter St., was built by Wil-
liam Harlow in 1666. It has been little changed. The old stairway and
rooms on the lower floor as well as the chambers above preserve the
original plan. There are open fireplaces and an old oven, and a great
central chimney.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN THE ENVIRONS
1 8. The National Monument to the Forefathers is an immense and im-
pressive memorial. The principal figure represents Faith, hand pointing
to Heaven. At the base are four wings representing Morality, Law,
Education, and Freedom. On the face of each wing are slabs of marble
carved in bold relief to depict: the Departure from Delft Haven, the
Signing of the Compact, the Landing of the Pilgrims, and the Treaty
with Massasoit.
3 2 6 Main Street and Village Green
19. The William Crowe House (not open), about 3 miles north from the
center, is claimed to be the oldest house in Plymouth, the rear portion
dating to 1664. It is a two-story white house of early American design,
enclosed by a weather-beaten picket fence.
20. The Myles Standish State Forest (8000 acres), one of the oldest in
the State, was established in 1916 under the State Forest Commission.
Picnic and camping areas (small fee), with individual fireplaces and tables,
are open to the public on College, Charge, and Fearing Ponds.
PROVINCETOWN. Way Up Along
Town: Alt. n, pop. 4071, sett, shortly before 1700, incorp. 1727.
Railroad Station: N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R., Bradford St., east of Pilgrim Monu-
ment.
Bus Station: Same.
Piers: Town Wharf, Bay State S.S. Co., Monument Wharf, Commercial St.,
west of Town Wharf, Cape Cod S.S. Co. Steel Pier.
Local Bus: Busses run, Commercial St., length of town, supposedly every 20
minutes in summer time, fare 5^f, 25^f sightseeing; no winter service.
Accommodations: Hotels and tourist homes. All rates higher in summer.
Swimming: All beaches private on Bay Side within limits of village center;
public outside these limits.
HERE, where Cape Cod goes down to the sea with a last flourish of
sandy beachland, nestles the best known and perhaps the most colorful
of its old villages, Provincetown.
On the Cape, travelers have observed, 'They call a house a house, but
a house with a shed is a village.' Provincetown, compact neighborhood
of Portuguese fishermen, of artists and writers, and of old Yankee
families, is by comparison a city. And its career from Old Colony days
has had a touch of urbanity that sets it apart from its neighbor towns.
Of interest historically as the first landing-place of the Pilgrims, the
town has also been a center of whaling, an important fishing port, and
in modern times the location of a famous art colony.
Much of the ancient flavor of Provincetown has been saved, especially
in the old houses, the prim white cottages and staid Colonials that line
its narrow streets, and in the bright gardens, the wharves, fish-sheds
and vessels that still carry on with net and trawl.
The village is ' only two streets wide/ but for nearly four miles it skirts
Province town 327
the inner shore of the Cape; and from there out, Long Point extends like
a sandy finger crooked around the harbor. Here, at Long Point, is the
tip of Cape Cod, punctuated with a lighthouse. The remainder of the
township broad dunelands reaching ' up-back ' to the outer or Atlantic
shore is called the Province Lands, and is owned by the Common-
wealth.
The visitor who drives down the 122 miles from Boston, including the
65 miles on US 6 from the Cape Cod Canal, is well out to sea when he
reaches Provincetown 55 miles from 'the mainland,' on a sandspit
where bedrock has never been found. Geologists say Provincetown
owes its very underpinnings to the sea, having been left here as Father
Neptune's own personal sandpile 30,000 years ago.
If so, the town has been acknowledging its debt ever since. Province-
towners say their village covers the waterfront when the waterfront
is not covering it. 'The good God,' wrote Cotton Mather, after a visit
here, 'gives this people to suck of the abundance of the seas.' But the
seas, one might add, have been playing the town for a sucker from the
start invading it, battering its stone breakwaters, sneaking up on it
to deliver a smashing southeaster against the bulkheads along its water-
front, in a hundred ways plotting to collect that 3o,ooo-year debt. Sand,
wind, and tide are accessories before the fact, ever conspiring to fold
the dunes over upon the little village, to drive it into its own harbor.
Historically, Provincetown has had an ancient crow to pick with Ply-
mouth.
'Plymouth Rock? That's the name of a chicken,' the proud old Cape
Cod Yankee will snort. 'The spot where the "Mayflower" people first
stepped on American soil is right here in Provincetown, and you ought
to freeze on to that fact in your guide book, for it's been rising three
hundred years now, and most off-Cape folks don't seem to know it yet"!'
After falling ' amongst deangerous shoulds and roring breakers ' off what
is now Chatham, the ' Mayflower ' did indeed drop anchor in ' ye Cape-
harbor [Provincetown] wher they ridd in saftie,' November n, 1620.
That same day the first party of Pilgrims came ashore in America, and
the ship lay at anchor five weeks here before her people decided to try
settlement at Plymouth.
Provincetown has placed a stone marker where those men climbed out
of their shallop, waded across the icy flats and 'fell upon their knees
& blessed ye God of heaven, who had brought them over ye vast &
furious ocean.' It has scattered other markers around too, to remind
the nation that the Pilgrims came here first. There is even a great
stone tower for that purpose. And yet, Provincetown still has to tell
Americans from points west of the Cape Cod Canal that the ' stern and
rockbound coast,' across the Bay in Plymouth, was merely an after-
thought of the 'Mayflower' company! Provincetown has a great stone
tower. Plymouth has a poem.
328 Main Street and Village Green
Historians believe that before the Pilgrims came, Basques and other
daring fishermen visited these shores; and there has long been the theory,
without tangible support, that it was to Cape Cod the Norsemen sailed
in their voyages of the early eleventh century. Gosnold, who sailed
around the Cape in 1602, named the tip-end Cape Cod. Other explorers
gave it other names, but ' Cape Cod' had clicked, and as Mather wrote,
it is a name the Cape will never lose 'till the shoals of codfish be seen
swimming on the highest hills.'
For nearly a century after the Pilgrims left, Provincetown drew a strange
assortment of transients. The Indians Pamets, of the tribe of Wam-
panoags came here often, but had no permanent settlement. Prov-
incetown was thus a sort of aboriginal Coney Island, where they gambled
and drank with visiting fishermen. One imaginative historian writes of
their 'bacchanalian carousals, which were continued sometimes for
weeks with unrestrained license.'
In 1714 'the Province Town' was put under the jurisdiction of Truro,
as a precinct. But pious, respectable Truro wanted no part of it, and
after a long campaign, the horrified goodmen of that town succeeded in
getting rid of the 'Poker Flats of Cape Cod,' as historian Shebnah Rich
terms it. Provincetown was thus incorporated in 1727.
Deepwater whaling began at about that time, and the fleet grew rapidly.
Provincetown and Truro took the lead. The whalemen and the Banks
fishermen gave the Lower Cape a fair start toward prosperity in the
latter half of the eighteenth century. At the same time the business of
' wrecking' was pursued with uncommon diligence.
Mooncussing and beachcombing now synonyms meaning recovery of
goods from the beach, chiefly cargoes drifting ashore from wrecked
ships were wreckers' work. This was a recognized means of liveli-
hood certainly recognized by the good citizens of 'Helltown,' as part
of Provincetown came to be called, if not by the law. The legend of
false lights hung out on moonless nights to lure unwary mariners of
those days persists in the Cape's oral traditions. Rum-running and other
smuggling were facilitated by long, deserted beaches, hidden from the
village by the dunes.
About 1800 the Cape began making salt by evaporating sea water, and
this discovery gave the fishery a new impetus. Provincetown became
more prosperous and somewhat more respectable. A settlement grew up
on Long Point itself, to be nearer the fishing. In lieu of lawns these peo-
ple had patches of seaweed at their front doors, and children were cau-
tioned against crossing the road at high tide.
Shortly before the Civil War the people at Long Point moved across-
harbor to the main part of town. They loaded their houses, stores,
church, and schoolhouse on scows and casks, and poled them across.
The only structure one sees on the Point today is the lighthouse.
Fishing went on, however, and expanded, reaching a peak in the last
quarter of the nineteenth century. A reporter for the Chicago Tribune
Provincetown 329
visited the town in 1900, and wrote back, 'Fish is bartered at the grocery
stores, shoe shops and bread stores for all the commodities of life
The main business street is paved with rock cod. The women use the
hind fin of the great halibut for brooms. Awnings shading the store
fronts are made from the skin of the sportive porpoise. The bellrope in
the church is made of eels, cunningly knotted by some old sailor. Over
the altar was the picture of a whale. The collection plate was the top
shell of a turtle. After the choir had sung "Pull for the Shore," the crew
passed down the port aisle. Provincetown ladies trim their hats with
red gills of the mackerel. Dog-fish often lie around the shore at low tide
and bark and howl in a frightful manner.'
However, in the yellowed scrapbook in which this clipping was found,
in Provincetown, is a notation by its one-time owner, 'A damned liar's
description of Provincetown.'
Provincetown is still essentially a fishing village, and the majority of its
people are fishermen and their families. They fish aboard the trawlers,
the draggers, seiners and trapboats, and they work in the ' freezers' -
fish-packing plants, of which there are five.
The industry, however, is long past its heyday, and many an old skipper
who once hung out his sidelights and stood out for the Banks now hangs
out a sign on his porch * Tourists Accommodated ' and sits down
to wait for the summer people.
Beyond the first of June, they do not keep him waiting long. Artists
at their easels begin to dot the wayside and block the traffic ; clicking
typewriters join the nightly chorus of the crickets; and poets chirp
from studio attics at all hours. These are Provincetown's trusty peren-
nials the yearly flowering of its 'art colony,' which, for all the con-
fusion, has nevertheless produced many of the nation's foremost painters,
playwrights, novelists and poets.
The founding of the Cape Cod School of Art here in 1901 by Charles W.
Hawthorne was the real beginning of the art colony, though a few painters
had visited the town before that. Hawthorne's own pictures of the
Portuguese fisherpeople did much to build up the colony's prestige.
Since his death in 1930, other schools have carried on, and the Province-
town Art Association's annual exhibit is an event of widespread interest.
Prominent painters who have been associated with the colony include,
besides Hawthorne, Arthur Diehl, Heinrich Pfeiffer, Edwin W. Dickinson,
Ross Moffett, Frederick Waugh, George Elmer Browne, Richard Miller,
John Noble, Mrs. Max Bohm, John Frazier, Gerrit A. Beneker, Hans
Hoffman, Jack Beauchamp, Karl Knaths, W. H. W. Bicknell, William
Paxton, Tod Lindenmuth, John Whorf, Henry Hensche, Jerry Farns-
worth, and Charles J. Martin. Among sculptors here have been William
Zorach and William F. Boogar, Jr.
In 1915 the Provincetown Players gathered under the leadership of
George Cram Cook. They later took a theater in New York City, where
they carried on until 1922. Drama on Broadway, at the time they set
330 Main Street and Village Green
themselves up, was stilted and heavily encrusted with outgrown tradi-
tions. The Players broke away from the timeworn formulae, offering
plays with a fresh outlook, a new simplicity of method. The pioneering
work done at that time has had a lasting influence, and has made the
organization long remembered.
Among writers and dramatists who have lived in Provincetown are John
Dos Passos, Susan Glaspell, Mary Heaton Vorse, Edmond Wilson,
Harry Kemp, Frank Shay, George Cram Cook, Wilbur Daniel Steele,
Max Eastman, and two winners of the Nobel Prize for literature, Eugene
O'Neill and Sinclair Lewis.
Many of the artists and writers of reputation return each summer, and
with them come large numbers of young unknowns. But to the old
skipper of Provincetown who has retired from the sea and hung out his
tourist sign, these are merely the forerunners of an even greater throng
the summer vacationers. By July i all is in full swing the painters
painting, the writers writing, tourists buying, and the traffic policemen
perspiring.
On Labor Day the season ends. The Boston steamers whistle a last
farewell, the ' accommodation ' (street bus) is converted back into a fish
truck, the dealer in 'Antiques' turns his sign around, the landlady cleans
the cigarette butts out of the potted plant, and Provincetown settles
down again to a 'nice quiet winter.'
1 Summer people ' are estimated at about 8000. Of the 4000 ' year-round
people,' at least three fourths are Portuguese 'Azoreans' (from the
Azores), 'Lisbons' (from the mother country), and a scattering of
'Bravas' (descendants of Cape Verde islanders who came over in the
whaling days). The other 1000 are principally the 'old Yankee stock,'
who have lost the town, politically, to the Portuguese; who deplore the
influx of the 'off-Cape furriners'; and to whom a volume of genealogy
is a piece of escape literature.
The Provincetown sea-food cuisine is justly famous. In these kitchens
few fish are allowed to enter their third day ashore. The world knows
many ways to cook a fish, and Provincetown claims to know an improve-
ment on every one. To conventional recipes are added many methods
of the Portuguese; and sea cooks have contributed their best inspirations.
Provincetown favorites are baked haddock, cooked Portuguese style
with a sauce of tomatoes and spices; fresh mackerel, fried or baked in
milk; tuna (horse mackerel) or sea catfish served mnha d'alhos, which
involves a pickling process before frying; 'tinker' mackerel, which are
baby fish pickled with a variety of spices, to be served cold or fried;
and stuffed fish, baked. Favorites cooked English style include all
manner of chowders, and such delicacies as sea-clam pie, broiled live
lobster and salt-water scallops, sliced and fried or made into a creamy
stew.
The Portuguese are fond of linguica, a form of pork sausage, and of
trutas, small pastries served at Christmas and other feast-days. These
Provincetown 331
are stuffed with a sweet potato preparation, and fried in deep olive oil
and coated with honey.
Beach plums grow in profusion at this end of the Cape, and housewives
make the famous beach plum jelly. Skully-jo, once popular, is no longer
made by any but a few Portuguese families. This is codfish or haddock
cured in the sun, ' till it's hard enough to bend lead pipe around.' When
fish was plentiful the Portuguese made barrels of it and the children
carried it about in their pockets and chewed it instead of candy. It was
said that 'the longer you chewed on a junk of skully-jo, the more you
had.'
People at the Cape-end have always been willing warmers of the yarner's
bench. Among them live many a legend and tall tale from seafaring
days. There are still in Provincetown a few old-timers who can remember
stories their own parents told them about the * witch with red heels,'
for example, who cruised in a cozy cabin inside a great whale. She
played cards there with the Devil himself, and the stakes were the souls
of luckless mariners whose vessels had run aground on Nauset shoals
or the Peaked Hill Bars. To provide ' chips,' a light was hung from the
flukes of the whale, and he would swim through the shoalest of the Cape
waters.
There is the story, too, of the Whistling Whale, with a snore like a
siren whistle, caused by an old iron embedded in his spout. Several
times his whistling brought out the volunteer fire department. And
when he was apprehended and finally harpooned after weeks of
serenading the town some of the citizens declared they had become
accustomed to the whistling, and were afraid they would never sleep
again !
'Professor' George Washington Ready, town crier in 1886, one day
solemnly deposed that he had seen a sea-serpent not a common,
run-of-the-mill sea-serpent, but a monstrous one, a reptile three hundred
feet long and twelve feet in the beam, with three red eyes to port and
three green eyes to starboard. The serpent came ashore, the Professor
said, breathing sulphurous fumes and searing the beach-plum bushes at
Herring Cove, undulated overland to Pasture Pond, and slowly went in,
head first, never to be seen again! And the Professor made 'afftdavy,'
too, that he was 'not unduly excited by liquor or otherwise.'
Provincetown has too many such tales for space here, and the stuff of
which these old yarns were spun would make a nautical glossary necessary
equipment for the average listener of today. Even that would not clear
up some of the local idiom. A ship bunk's mattress was a 'donkey's
breakfast.' The 'apple-tree fleet' was the class of coasting schooners,
with skippers who never sailed out of sight of the orchards alongshore.
Molasses was 'Porty Reek long-lick,' or 'long-tailed sugar.'
332 Main Street and Village Green
FOOT TOUR 3m.
NE. from the Town Hall on Commercial St.
1. Town Wharf, a long, wide-timbered pier, is the heart of Provincetown's
summer life. For many years it has been the landing stage of the daily
Boston steamer in summer, and it is used by fishermen at all seasons.
The harbor view from this pier is a gay scene. Trawlers, seiners and
draggers mingle with slim white yachts, low-lying cruisers and gray
battleships. The short wharf on the left is littered with nets stretched
to dry, lobster pots, kegs and coils of tarry rope. On the beach, artists
are often at work, some singly, some in classes. Gulls wheel overhead,
ever on watch for tidbits from the fishing boats.
Retrace Commercial St.; R. from Commercial St. on Ryder St.
2. A Mayflower Memorial Tablet near the Town Hall gives the wording
of the Mayflower Compact, which was drawn up and signed in the
cabin of that vessel while she lay at anchor in Province town Harbor.
The names of the signers are appended.
3. The Compact Memorial, a large bas-relief by Cyrus F. Dallin, depicts
the signing of the covenant. Fifteen by nine feet, it is set in a broad
granite wall flanked by stone benches.
R. from Ryder St. on Bradford St.
4. Another Mayflower Memorial Tablet, at the junction of Bradford St.
with the steep unmarked road leading to Pilgrim Monument, is in memory
of 'the five "Mayflower" passengers who died at sea while the ship lay
in Cape Cod Harbor.' The names include that of Dorothy Bradford,
wife of the Governor.
L. from Bradford St. up the unmarked road to the Pilgrim Monument.
5. Pilgrim Monument (open daily 8-5, Mar. 1-Nov. 30; closed in winter;
adm. 25^) is constructed of gray granite, 252 feet high and 352 feet above
sea level. It is visible many miles at sea. Storm signals are flown atop
this hill from one of the steel towers of the U.S. Signal Service. The monu-
ment commemorates the landing of the Pilgrims at Provincetown, Novem-
ber n, 1620, and the signing of the Compact. The view from the top is
spectacular; to the north and east lies the open Altantic; to the west,
across Cape Cod Bay, are Duxbury and Plymouth; to the south, the
Cape, in bold relief, curves away in a tawny half-circle. The town below
appears like a toy hamlet.
Retrace unmarked road; R. from unmarked road on Bradford St.; L. from
Bradford St. on Ryder St.; R. from Ryder St. on Commercial St.
6. The Town Hall is a Victorian frame building housing art treasures,
seafaring trophies and items of local interest. In the entrance hall are
murals of Provincetown industries, by Ross Moffett. The offices on the
Provincetown 333
ground floor contain a painting, * Provincetown Fishermen,' by Charles W.
Hawthorne. In the same suite is Sir Thomas Lipton's $5000 gold and sil-
ver 'Fisherman's Cup,' won in 1907 by the schooner 'Rose Dorothea,' of
Provincetown, Captain Costa. In the basement is an ancient horse-
drawn fire pumper, with wide wheels, especially constructed a hundred
years ago for use on the hard sand of the town beaches.
7. The Church of the Redeemer (Universalist) is a white frame edifice,
with a steeple.
8. The Historical Museum (open June-Oct.; adm. 25), 230 Commercial
St., a square brown Victorian building, houses an Arctic Exhibit con-
tributed by Donald B. MacMillan, the Provincetown Arctic explorer,
and also Indian relics, old glassware, ship models and whaling imple-
ments.
Straight ahead from Commercial St. into unmarked Tremont St., up Chip
Hill.
9. The 'Norse Wall House' (private), 15 Tremont St., is a small cottage
built above an embedded wall (not visible) which is sometimes men-
tioned in support of the theory that the Norsemen came here. In 1853,
Francis A. Paine began excavating for a cellar. At a depth of five feet
(30 feet below the original level of the hill) a stone wall was encountered,
three feet high and two feet wide, laid in shell-lime mortar. Later 'a
hard earthen floor composed of peat, clay and fine white sand, hammered
and pounded together,' was discovered, with the remains of a fireplace.
These discoveries have been linked conjecturally to the visits of the
Vikings to this country, where they saw the 'Wonder Strands' referred
to in the three ancient Copenhagen manuscripts which tell of the early
voyages from Scandinavia. In the vicinity of Provincetown there are
no stones to be found of the size used in this wall. The Norse, it is said,
carried such stones as ballast.
Retrace on Tremont St.; R. from Tremont St. on Commercial St.
10. The Wharf Theater is a remodeled gray-shingled fish shed on a
harbor pier. A summer stock company plays here.
11. One of the oldest houses in Provincetown, the Seth Nicker son House
(open as hooked rug shop), is at 72 Commercial St. The structure is
estimated to be about 200 years old, and looks it, with its white clap-
boarded front, its shingled siding, its hip roof, broad central chimney and
small-paned windows, around which climb rambler roses. When this
house was built, the street did not exist and the residents of this district
traveled to and from the village along the beach.
From this point on, prevailing features of the dwellings are gray-shingled
walls, white picket fences, and gardens bright in summer with scarlet
poppies, blue delphiniums and masses of white Easter lilies.
R. from Commercial St. on any of the lanes, all of which lead back to Brad-
ford St.; two blocks back of Commercial St. and parallel to it; R. on Brad-
ford St.
334 Main Street and Village Green
12. Bradford Street is the only other throughfare in Provincetown. The
two streets run parallel, the length of the town, and all others are little
more than interesting lanes.
MOTOR TOUR 8 ra.
W. from Town Hall on Commercial St.
13. The Site of the Pilgrims' First Landing, at the juncture of Commercial
St. and Beach Highway, is marked by a bronze tablet on a low granite
slab. To the left at a bend in the sandy isthmus, are Wood End Light and
Wood End Coast Guard Station and at the tip-end, Long Point Light. Just
outside, off Wood End, occurred one of the most horrible disasters of
modern times, the sinking of the submarine '8-4,' Dec. 17, 1927, when she
breached under the bow of the coast guard destroyer 'Paulding' and
went to the bottom with 40 men. Naval authorities were bitterly crit-
icized on this occasion, both locally and throughout the country. A
marked course off Wood End is still used as a proving ground for sub-
marines, and occasionally battleships come to anchor in the harbor.
Provincetown is a lively scene when 'the fleet is in.'
R. from Commercial St. into Beach Highway.
14. New Beach was the location, a generation ago, of a colony of fisher-
men's shacks known as Hell Town. Its white shelving sand and its safe
exposure on Cape Cod Bay make it now the finest bathing beach of the
town. From here on the drive is one of unusual beauty, wild and desolate.
The billowing sand dunes shift eternally, driven by gales that sweep in
from the Atlantic. From time to time these sandhills have been planted
by the Federal Government with scrub pine, beachgrass and other shrubs
to stem their march. The co-operative bayberry grows wild. The cross-
raftered poles which appear at intervals are spindle ranges used by the
navy. In late afternoon the light over the dunelands is of many hues,
sometimes a clear, soft golden-mauve, compounded of the slanting rays of
the westerly sun, the tremendous open horizon, the sea air, the sage green
of the grass, and the gold of the sand.
L. from Beach Highway on road marked, ( To Race Point Coast Guard
Station.'
15. Race Point Coast Guard Station (open to visitors at any daylight hour;
drills Mon., Tues., and Fri., 9) becomes visible a long distance ahead, a
two-story square white frame building with a red roof and a skeleton
observation tower, standing upon a sandy bluff above the open waters of
the Atlantic at one of the most dangerous spots to shipping on the eastern
seaboard. It is a typical station, spotlessly clean, with a crew of ten men
who do all the cooking and housework in addition to their seafaring duties.
Chiefly interesting are the surfboats, 24 feet long. The shooting of the
line for the breeches buoy may be seen at scheduled drills.
Quincy 335
On the beach below the station is the wreck of the 'Spindler,' a rum-
runner 125 feet long, which was cast ashore in 1922. A few years ago she
stood high above the sand. Masts, riggings, even the bowsprit, are gone
and the hull is deeply embedded now.
Retrace side road; L. from side road on Beach Highway; L. from Beach
Highway on Bradford St.; R. from Bradford St. on Commercial St., un-
marked, but evident as the last junction on Bradford St.
16. Eugene O'NeiWs Former Lodging (private), 577 Commercial St., is
the right-hand half (as one faces the dwelling) of the upper floor of a re-
modeled sail loft with business offices on the first floor. Here the dramatist
began his career. On the beams of the living-room of the apartment is
written, 'Before the eyes can see, they must be incapable of tears.'
17. The Church of St. Mary of the Harbor (Episcopal) is a one-story,
rambling frame structure, with a clapboarded front and gray-shingled
sides. It has a small Mission bell. The simple and pleasing interior, with
its alternating dark timbers and white plaster, and its white painted un-
cushioned pews, is adorned with a small statue of Christ in cream-colored
glazed terra-cotta. The figure stands upon a wooden cross beam, with
arms outstretched, and is flanked by kneeling angels.
1 8. The Figurehead House (private) is a square yellow house with a ship's
figurehead of a woman, surmounting the porch. The figurehead was
found afloat in the Indian Ocean in Civil War days by Captain Ben
Handy of Provincetown, who placed it where it is today.
19. The Home of Commander Donald B. MacMillan (private), 473 Com-
mercial St., is a modern white frame house with a small lawn at the side
and a large studio window in the north gable.
QUINCY. Iron Ships and Great Men
City: Alt. 42, pop. 76,909, sett. 1625, incorp. town 1792, city 1888.
Railroad Stations: Atlantic off Hancock St.; Montclair off Montclair Ave.;
Norfolk Downs on Newport Ave.; Quincy in Quincy Square; West Quincy on
Willard St. ; Wollaston on Beale St. ; and Quincy Adams on Presidents Ave.
for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.
Accommodations: Six hotels at reasonable rates.
Recreation: Swimming and bathing at Wollaston Beach on Quincy Shore Drive.
Yachting at the Squantum and Wollaston Yacht Clubs (adm. by invitation).
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 1535 Hancock St.
336 Main Street and Village Green
QUINCY is one of the commercial centers of Massachusetts, known for
its granite quarries, shipbuilding, machinery, and radio-transmitting
stations WNAC and WAAB, part of the Yankee Network. Quincy owes
much to the Italians, Jews, Finns, Scots, Greeks, and Syrians who came
to work in the quarries and shipyards and who contributed generously
toward the city's artistic, intellectual, and civic development. Thirty-
two churches may be credited in part to a fund left to the Quincy churches
by the King family to 'aid the breaking down of religious prejudice [in
the belief] that a better understanding of the religious faith of one an-
other is one of the most important movements in the world.'
In 1625 Thomas Morton, the 'pettifogger of Furnival's Inn,' as Governor
Bradford contemptuously called him, arrived at Mount Wollaston and
took part in establishing the settlement later to be known as Ma-re
Mount or Merrymount. Morton traded with the Indians, taught them
the use of firearms, and supplied them with liquor in exchange for furs,
thus cutting in on the Plymouth trade. Bradford, further irked at Mor-
ton's celebration of May Day as a pagan feast and fearing that Mor-
ton's Merrymount would become a refuge for lawbreakers, dispatched
Miles Standish and eight men from Plymouth, where a council was held,
some members of which pressed for his execution. Instead, however, he
was sent to England. Eighteen months later he returned to Merry-
mount, was again arrested, his house burned, and he himself again sent
a prisoner to England. His 'Newe English Canaan,' published about
1637, gave excellent descriptions of New England scenery and bird and
animal life, and scathingly exposed what he claimed to be the hypocritical
pretenses to morality of the Pilgrims and Puritans.
Quincy was not separately incorporated till nearly one hundred and
seventy years after the earliest settlements in this section. In 1789, while
it was still the north precinct of Braintree, local consciousness was
brought to a high pitch by the election of a native son, John Adams, to
the Vice-Presidency of the United States. Eight years later, in 1797, he
took the chair of President. His son, John Quincy Adams, was regarded
as the finest diplomat in the foreign service. Later he, too, became Presi-
dent. When men with whom they had played as children were making
history, Quincy's inhabitants felt it was high time to assert their right to
an individual existence. The town was called Quincy in honor of Colonel
John Quincy, an eminent and able citizen who had occupied Mount
Wollaston.
Until 1830 the town was mainly a farming community, but from that date
onward agriculture gave precedence to industry, a transition brought
about by the expansion of the shoe trade, a natural outgrowth of the
tanneries on the town brook; and by improved facilities for quarrying
granite. Men had learned how to use iron instead of wooden wedges in
splitting the rock.
In 1752 King's Chapel in Boston was built with Quincy granite. This
sudden demand frightened the town fathers. Fearful of the supply of
Quincy 337
rock giving out, they passed an ordinance prohibiting the use of granite
boulders for outside purposes. In spite of this, Quincy's trade in granite
continued to expand until it was known the world over. In 1825 the
Quincy quarries received a contract to supply the stone for the Bunker
Hill Monument, and a railroad was built to convey the granite on horse-
drawn wagons from the quarry to the wharf on the Neponset River.
In 1883 a little shop in Braintree Fore River experimented in marine
engines. The business grew so fast that in 1884 it was forced to remove to
Quincy Fore River. In 1913 it came into the possession of the Bethlehem
Steel Corporation. During the world war thirty-six destroyers were built
here. Today, as Quincy's main industrial unit it stands on a par with the
greatest shipyards of the world, having built every conceivable type of
vessel from the seven-masted schooner * Thomas W. Lawson ' to the giant
airplane carrier l Lexington.'
TOUR 14 m.
NW. from the junction of the Southern Artery (State 3) on Hancock St.
1. Adams and Son (R), at the edge of Merrymount Park, near the corner
of Fenno St., sculptor Bruce Wilder Saville (1893- ), is a granite
monument bearing a bronze bas-relief of John Adams and John Quincy
Adams.
R.from Hancock St. on East Squantum St.; straight ahead on Dorchester St.
which terminates in a rustic park, Chapel Rocks.
2. Squaw Rock, at the eastern end of the park, is the extremity of Squan-
tum Peninsula. According to one tale, an Indian woman fell into the sea
from the rock, which then became known as Squaw Rock and the whole
district was called Squaw Tumble or Squan-Tum. Another account ex-
plains the name of the rock by the fact that it resembles an Indian pro-
file, and states that Governor Winthrop named the region after Squanto,
the Englishman's friend.
The ledges of the hill behind the rock are composed of ' Roxbury pudding-
stone,' an interesting conglomerate found in the environs of Boston.
Retrace Dorchester St. into East Squantum St.; L.from East Squantum St. on
Quincy Shore Drive; R. from Quincy Shore Drive on Davis St.; R. from
Davis St. on Muirhead St.
3. The Colonel Josiah Quincy House (private), 20 Muirhead St., was
erected in 1770. This square yellow house with white block quoins and
pillared portico was, until the middle of the i9th century, a gentleman's
farmhouse, surrounded by rolling pasture. At the age of forty, Colonel
Josiah Quincy (1709-1784) exchanged the career of successful shipbuilder
for that of country gentleman. He was the father of Josiah Quincy, Jr.,
who horrified his parent by his defense of the British soldiers involved in
QUINCY
TOUR
Quincy 339
the Boston Massacre. The house was presently inherited by a third
Josiah Quincy, who was successively Mayor of Boston, Congressman,
and President of Harvard College.
Straight ahead from Muirhead St. into Beach St.; L.from Beach St. on Han-
cock St.; R. from Hancock St. on Bridge St.; straight ahead on Adams St.
4. The Vassal- Adams Mansion (R), (open summer weekdays 9-5; adm.
25jf), is a white clapboard Georgian Colonial house with five chim-
neys, and one brick end painted white. It was built in 1731, was the resi-
dence of Presidents John Adams and John Quincy Adams, and remained
a private home of the Adams family until 1927.
L. from Adams St. on Furnace Brook Parkway; R. from Furnace Brook
Parkway on Co pel and Si.
5. The Granite Quarry, across the tracks from the West Quincy R.R.
Station, unmistakable by its high walls of stone detritus and its derricks,
is the erstwhile center of New England's granite quarrying. The stone for
Bunker Hill Monument came from here, as well as for countless buildings
in Boston. This quarry is now only moderately active, as composition
building materials have superseded natural granite.
Retrace on Copeland St.
6. The Co-operative Market, 32 Copeland St., founded over a quarter of a
century ago by the Finnish residents of Quincy, transacts annually a busi-
ness in excess of $100,000.
Copeland St. terminates in Water St.; R. from Water St. on Franklin St.
7. The John Adams Birthplace (open weekdays 9-6, April 19-^0^. 1 ; adm.
25^), Adams Sq., is also a small red clapboard salt-box farmhouse built
in 1 68 1, enclosed by an ancient pole fence with turnstile, with small steep
winding stairway, huge central chimney, and mammoth fireplace. One
of the chambers has a false front at its fireplace, the entire panel from
floor to ceiling swinging to reveal a space by the chimney large enough to
hold a man in concealment. The central ceiling beams are hand-hewn.
The inverted gunstock post used in the frame of the house distributes its
weight equally. In the kitchen is the bole of the giant cedar tree which
witnessed the notorious Merrymount revels.
QUINCY MAP INDEX
1. Adams and Son 9. Abigail Adams Stone Cairn
2. Squaw Rock 10. Robert Burns Statue
3. Colonel Josiah Quincy House n. Granite Trust Building
4. Vassal- Adams Mansion 12. Stone Temple
5. Granite Quarry 13. Old Cemetery
6. Co-operative Market 14. Crane Memorial Public Library
7. John Adams Birthplace 15. Dorothy Quincy Mansion
8. John Quincy Adams Birthplace
34-O Main Street and Village Green
8. The John Quincy Adams Birthplace (open weekdays 96, April 19
Nov. 1; adm. 25ff), adjacent, built in 1716, is a red clapboard salt-box
farmhouse with huge central chimney.
9. The Abigail Adams Stone Cairn (L), opposite 353 Franklin St., a
duplicate of the Miles Standish Cairn, marks the spot on the summit
of the hill where, during the Battle of Bunker Hill, Mrs. John Adams with
her little son, John Quincy Adams, prayed for the safety of the Colonial
soldiers.
Retrace on Franklin St.
10. The Robert Burns Statue, School and Franklin Sts., was erected by the
Burns Memorial Association of Quincy to honor the poet who 'as a lover
of Freedom and Democracy penned an ode to Washington.'
R. from Franklin St. into School St.; L. from School St. into Hancock St.
11. The Granite Trust Building (tower open) is Quincy 's skyscraper.
12. The Stone Temple, 'Church of the Presidents, 1 1266 Hancock St., now
a Unitarian church, was built in 1828 of Quincy granite, and was designed
by Alexander Parris in the style of the Greek revival. Its white colon-
naded portico with pediment and the open cupola soften the severe mass
of the structure. The name is derived from the fact that John Adams and
John Quincy Adams worshiped and are buried here (crypt open upon
application to sexton}.
13. The Old Cemetery, opposite, dates from 1666, and is the burial place
of many members of the Quincy and Adams families.
14. The Crane Memorial Public Library, at the rear of the Stone Temple,
commissioned in 1880, is considered the best of H. H. Richardson's work
in this field. The single low mass of the front is not broken by the gable
over the entrance, and the stair turret is unemphasized. Romanesque to
some degree, the design is also bold Richardsonian, with a notably
original handling of fenestration, and the dominant Richardson theme
stress upon function and material powerfully expressed.
15. The Dorothy Quincy Mansion (open daily, April 19-Nov. 1; adm.
25 jf), 34 Butler Rd. (corner of Hancock St.), a spacious hip-roofed
mansion built in 1706-09, was the birthplace and home of the spirited
girl who became the wife of John Hancock. A feature of the house is a
secret chamber which repeatedly afforded asylum to pursued Colonial
troopers.
R E V E R E . A Beach Beside a City
City: Alt. 15, pop. 35,319, sett, about 1630, incorp. town 1871, city 1914
Railroad Station: Revere Center for B. & M. R.R.
Bus Stations: Revere Center and Point of Pines for Greyhound Bus Lines.
Accommodations: Several inns and overnight cabins on the Boulevard.
Swimming: The largest beach in New England; Ocean Pier Swimming Pool
(adm. 50j), Ocean Pier.
Dog Racing: Wonderland Park.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, Beach St.
REVERE is a city bordering a beach. Block after block stretch out the
crowded habitations of those who from the Fourth of July till Labor Day
will house or feed or amuse the vast throngs who cannot frequent expen-
sive resorts and who take their sea air and their bright lights where they
can afford it. The three-mile stretch of broad, sandy beach is one of the
best in Massachusetts. Hundreds of amusement palaces line the prom-
enade. On the sands, thousands of sun-bathers lounge and caper; thou-
sands more frolic in the surf. Histrionic barkers cater to the carnival
spirit of holiday throngs. High overhead, sinuous roller coasters stuffed
with shrieking humanity dive into abysmal depths. And everywhere there
is music the swaying rhythm of the dance hall, the hoarse strains of
the steam organ, the blaring syncopation of the loudspeaker, the unceas-
ing beat of * canned music.'
In view of its democratic present, the beginnings of Revere were distinctly
aristocratic. Back in 1636, the town of Boston parceled off a surplus of
undistributed land, part of which lay within the confines of what is now
Revere. The first landowner of Revere was Sir Henry Vane, son of a
Privy Councillor of England. Chosen Governor of the Massachusetts
Bay Colony, he received an allotment of two hundred acres of Rumney
Marsh, as Revere was then called. But his term of office was brief;
handsome Harry Vane was a romantic idealist ; his openly stated convic-
tion that all creeds should have equal rights in New England appalled the
clergy. Sir Harry sailed back to England and Rumney Marsh became
the property of a dozen or so wealthy gentlemen who, for the most part,
left it in the hands of tenants or servants.
The titles to these lands extended only to the beach. In 1812, in a law-
suit regarding the town's jurisdiction in the matter of digging clams at
low tide when, the defense maintained, the floor of the ocean was exposed,
the town won the case on the premise that ' if the sea rolled back to the
Azores, it would do nothing more than expose undeveloped territory in the
town of Chelsea.'
34 2 Main Street and Village Green
The necessity for reclaiming large areas of marsh and sea grass dis-
couraged settlers, and until 1710, when the first church was erected at
Rumney Marsh, community life in this locality progressed slowly.
For about a hundred years after 1739, when Chelsea separated from Bos-
ton, Rumney Marsh was the northern part of Chelsea. In 1852, Pullen
Point broke away as the town of Winthrop. For the next twenty-five
years North Chelsea was at a complete standstill; then, changing its
name to Revere in honor of the famous patriot, it experienced a rebirth.
The Narrow Gauge Railroad running out to its white sandy shore lifted
Revere out of oblivion and gave it its place in the sun.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. Revere Beach (State bathhouse, moderate fee), Revere Beach Parkway,
is one of Boston's two Coney Islands.
2. The Masonic Temple, southeast corner of Eustis and Beach Sts.,was
originally The Church of Christ in Rumney Marsh, built in 1710. Its first
pastor, the Rev. Thomas Cheever, was suspended from his ministry in a
neighboring parish for breaking two of the Ten Commandments. At Rum-
ney Marsh, however, he was greatly beloved for his championship of other
sinners, and lived to the mellow age of 91, still eloquent in the pulpit and
active in good works.
3. The Hastings House (private), southwest corner of Eustis and Beach
Sts., was built in 1782, and preserves the flavor of a typical old New Eng-
land farmstead. This effect is created in part by its rambling, weather-
worn comfortable ells and gables ; in part by its grass-grown yard shaded
by old trees ; and in part by the two huge clumps of very old lilac bushes
at its front entrance.
4. The Slade Spice Mill (open weekdays 10-4), Revere Beach Parkway
near Broadway, a small, red wooden building, was until 1934 a tidewater
mill, and one of the old millstones is preserved within, and can still be
turned. Spice has been ground here for over a century, and the visitor is
greeted at once, on opening the door, by the pungent smell of mingled
nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, pepper (red, white, and black), thyme, mar-
joram, and anise, much of which comes from the far-off Spice Isles of
Java. A fine buff-colored dust permeates the air. The workers look
healthy, however, and say that only white pepper makes them sneeze.
5. A Granite Tablet, corner of Revere Beach Parkway and Railroad St.,
commemorates the so-called Battle of Chelsea Creek, May 27, 1775. In
the spring of 1775, the British, in need of fresh meat, food, and forage,
overawed the farmers in and about Chelsea Creek into selling them such
supplies. The Committee of Safety ordered the patriots of Chelsea and
thereabouts to move back their cattle, sheep, and horses from the coast
line. Hog and Noddle Islands (now East Boston) were at that time sep-
Salem 343
arated from each other and from the mainland by narrow sea inlets,
easily forded at low tide. The patriots had just cleared off Hog Island,
and were preparing to do likewise at Noddle Island when up Chelsea
Creek to the east came the British schooner 'Diana' and opened fire
upon the very damply 'embattled farmers.' Fortunately up came rein-
forcements, and at their head Israel Putnam, America's 'Cincinnatus of
the Plow' who led his men out waist-deep into the water and returned
the attack so vigorously that the British, after losing several men, aban-
doned their ship and rowed home in small boats. The ' Diana ' was stripped
and then burned by the Continentals, who could not use it themselves as
the British were holding Boston Harbor. Chelsea Creek, though little
more than a spirited skirmish, was of chief import because it seemed to
be the first real American victory of the Revolution, and engendered in
the ranks of the Continentals an invincible confidence.
SALEM. New England's Treasure- House
City: Alt. 13, pop. 43,472, sett. 1626-28, incorp. town 1630, city 1836.
Railroad Stations: B. & M. R.R., Washington & Norman Sts.
Airport: Winter Island, U.S. Coast Guard base, private.
Bus Stations: Greyhound, at Harmon & Kimball's on Central St.
Piers: Salem Willows Pier, Salem Willows, launches to Marblehead and North
Shore in summer. Congress St. Bridge, launch for Baker's Island (summer
only) .
Accommodations: Several hotels open year round, with no change in rates during
tourist season.
Information: Hotel Hawthorne.
SALEM is one of the historic treasure-houses of New England. Here are
the haunting shades, not only of Nathaniel Hawthorne, but also of every
character Hawthorne created, of his old houses impregnated with super-
natural influences, and of the eerie atmosphere that still lingers in the
narrow streets which the master of delicate implications frequented.
Here are the more robust memories of docks and wharves from which
poured crude wealth in fish and ships' supplies, and into which, after
many turnovers of cargo, flowed all the exotic treasure of the Indies and
China. Here stored in old landmarks is the romance of swift clipper
ships, of bellying sails, of masts stripped for the gale, of sailors' oaths and
sailors' roaring chanteys, of ambition and avarice, of mansions built by
merchant princes and delicate women nurtured in them.
344 Main Street and Village Green
Salem also possesses architectural treasures so numerous and so varied as
to re-create in an almost complete synopsis the development of the
Colonial architecture of New England. From the seventeenth-century
house, accidentally beautiful in its expression of function, to the sophisti-
cated maturity of Samuel Mclntire's superb Federal mansions, eloquent
expressions of each period are scattered throughout the city. Though
chiefly concentrated about Washington Square, and on Essex, Federal,
and Chestnut Streets, they occur sporadically throughout the old dis-
tricts of Salem. Mclntire, a native genius, labored here throughout his
life; many of his superb houses retain their original beauty, and the dwell-
ings of the great maritime period after his death partake of the dignity
and delicacy of detail of the examples which he created. Salem cannot be
neglected either by the student of the American tradition in architecture
or by the lover of beautiful houses.
Salem 's name is the Hebrew Sholom, meaning Peace, but never did a city
have less of the spirit of peace. It was founded by intellectual revolt,
and nurtured in dissension.
In 1626 Roger Conant and a group of emigrants from Cape Ann, after
the failure of the Dorchester Company's fishing settlement there, chose
this sheltered site to found a community where they might fish and farm,
think their own thoughts, and hold their own religious opinions. But
two years later Governor Endicott and a group of followers arrived and
trouble began. The Governor was an autocrat; the newcomers thought
well of themselves; Conant and his friends smarted under their assump-
tion of superiority; there were wranglings about property rights and com-
munity regulations. Ultimately the differences were ' adjusted,' and in
1630 the name Salem was adopted to celebrate peace. Peace, however,
turned out to be only the briefest truce. Quarrels broke out hotter than
before. Conant, with his followers, packed up, and, abandoning the
homes and gardens it had taken them nine years to build and cultivate,
moved across the North River.
As the town grew and man became more confident in his dealings with
nature and less conscious of physical dependence on God, a decline of
religion threatened. Calvinism made a desperate effort to retake the lost
trenches and hold what it still had by preaching hell-fire with redoubled
energy. This proving inadequate, it turned to persecutions of the
Quakers, causing Roger Williams, the pastor, to flee to escape banish-
ment in the winter of 1635-36. The Quakers, however, known to be harm-
less and peaceable folk, found too many sympathizers. Witchcraft per-
secutions, already popular in Europe, were far more fruitful.
In 1692, among the servants of the Reverend Samuel Parris was a West
Indian slave named Tituba, with a talent for voodoo tales which she ex-
ercised not wisely but too well. Her auditors were young girls, and quite
naturally Tituba' s grisly tales scared them into fits. When bedtime came
after a secret seance with Tituba they shuddered and screamed and saw
things in dark corners. Examined by the village physician, they were de-
Salem 345
clared bewitched. The little wretches accused Tituba and two unpopular
old women. They were questioned with deep gravity; the tale was em-
broidered; Tituba and the others were charged with consorting with the
Devil and sentenced to death.
For a year thereafter in Salem and neighboring towns, the witchcraft
pestilence raged. Nineteen persons were hanged on Gallows Hill, and at
least two died in prison. No one was safe. The saintly Mrs. Hale, wife
of the Beverly minister, was accused. Even the wife of Governor Phips
was suspected for sympathizing with a prisoner; but that finished the
matter.
Agricultural pursuits predominated in early Salem. Slowly, however,
during the seventeenth century, commerce and industry got a foothold.
The protected harbor encouraged trade. By the beginning of the eight-
eenth century, shipbuilding and allied industries were thriving and ex-
tensive trade relations with the West Indies and European ports had been
established. As its city seal, Salem adopted the motto, ' The wealth of the
Indies to the uttermost gulf.'
The Revolutionary War turned seafaring Salem to privateering. The
latter was profitable at first, but during the strict British blockade it
proved ruinous. Moreover, at the close of the war England prohibited
all relations with British controlled markets and Salem vessels were
forced to rely on a meager coastwise trade.
Then the pendulum swung. The great Chinese market was discovered
and Salem entered upon its career of maritime glory. In 1785 the stout
ship 'Grand Turk' sailed out of Salem harbor, China-bound. Following
her in rapid succession a fleet of thirty-four vessels were put into service
between Salem and distant Cathay.
Rarely did they sail direct for the Orient. Around the Horn they went,
with ports of call along the Northern Pacific Coast for valuable furs, and
in the Hawaiian Islands for fresh supplies and sandalwood, before they
set out to do their real trading in China. Then around the Cape of Good
Hope and home, often touching at European ports. And all the way
shrewd Yankee captains drove profitable bargains, often turning over
their cargoes a dozen times. Profits of several hundred per cent were not
uncommon. Huge wealth was piled up. Promotion was rapid. Wages
were high. Often a captain had made his fortune and retired by the time
he was thirty years of age. Many merchants in the Far East believed
Salem to be a separate country of fabulous wealth.
The result of this rapid commercial development was a cultural expan-
sion in the life of the city, and the growth of a romantic background pe-
culiarly its own. Something of Oriental luxury and richness flowed into
Yankee Salem. From Canton, the Dutch East Indies, from the Philip-
pines and Mauritius, came rich and assorted cargoes of tea, chinaware,
nankeens, silks, fans, feathers, embroidered shawls, coffee, spices, and
with them glamorous tales of a different way of life in an ancient and
346 Main Street and Village Green
fabulous country. Joseph Hergesheimer's novel 'Java Head' portrays
this period of Salem's glory.
In 1812 the city was again seriously affected by a war and its ensuing
depression. Before it could recover again, the Erie Canal was opened and
New York entered the lists as a serious competitor in foreign and inland
trade. Moreover, Salem Harbor was not deep enough for the new vessels
of large draught.
From this period onward, Salem's position in the world of commerce
slowly faded out, to be replaced by the growth of industry. In 1848 the
Naumkeag Steam Cotton Mills were established, and after the Civil
War numerous tanneries, paint, and shoe factories were founded. The
great fire of 1914 destroyed a large part of the industrial district and many
concerns moved to other towns; but Salem is still industrially active in the
production of cotton goods, shoes, radio tubes, and games.
TOUR 1 2.3m.
West from Washington Square on Essex St.
1. The Gardner-White-Pingree House (property of the Essex Institute;
open Wed. and Sat. afternoons or by appointment; fee 50^), 128 Essex St.,
built in 1810, was among the last works of the architectural genius Sam-
uel Mclntire, and is conceded to be his finest work in brick. The house is
square, with a low third story capped by a cornice and balustraded
parapet. It has a symmetrical arrangement of marble-headed windows,
a graceful elliptical porch, and the severity of the high facade is softened
by broad bands of white marble at each floor level. The interior work is
exceptionally fine.
Mclntire, born in Salem in 1757, learned the trade of carpenter and
joiner from his father, a successful housewright. His initiative and ambi-
tion made him the most highly skilled American woodcarver of his time.
Permanent monuments to his memory are the finely wrought Federal
houses of Salem, their uncompromising lines lightened and enriched by
Palladian windows, porches with delicate fluted columns, and magnificent
carved woodwork.
2. The Essex Institute (open weekdays except holidays 9-5; adm. free), 132
Essex St., includes a library and a museum. The former contains the
Ward China Library probably the finest on China and the Chinese in
the United States logbooks and sea journals, and county and town his-
tories. Exhibits in the museum consist of Colonial portraits and paintings,
miniatures and silhouettes, and three period rooms, a kitchen typical of
1750 and a bedroom and a parlor of 1800.
The John Ward House (property of the Essex Institute; open daily in sum-
mer except Sun. and holidays 9-5; adm. 25^) stands in the shady grounds
to the rear of the main buildings of the Institute. It was built in 1684
Salem 347
with wide clapboards, a lean-to roof, and an overhanging second story.
In the garden are reconstructions of an Old Cobbler's Shop, a 'Cent Shop'
and a Weaving Room.
3. The Peabody Museum (open weekdays 9-5; Sundays 2-5; adm. free),
Essex St., was endowed by George Peabody as the permanent repository
of a marine collection, including a circle of reflection presented by Na-
poleon to his navigation instructor; a sextant which served Livingstone
in the mazes of the Congo; and ship models, nautical instruments, and
whaling implements.
L. from Essex St. on Derby Square.
4. The Old Town Hall (open 9-5) , opposite the Salem Five Cent Savings
Bank, was built in 1816, and its ground floor was used as a market for
more than one hundred years. Architecturally the hall is simple and dig-
nified. Characterized by a gable roof with pedimental treatment accented
by a fan window, the structure is interesting chiefly for its pleasant sym-
metrical arrangement of round-headed windows and door, with a Palla-
dian window as the central feature.
Retrace Derby Sq.; L. from Derby Sq. on Essex St.
5. The Witch House (open daily in summer 9.30-5 ; fee 10j), 310^2 Essex
St., once the residence of Judge Corwin of the notorious witchcraft trials,
has, unfortunately, been altered by the addition of a modern drugstore in
front; but the interior remains very much as it was in 1692.
6. The Ropes Memorial (open Tues., Thurs., and Sat. 2-5; adm. to garden
any day except Mon.; adm. free), 318 Essex St., is a stately gambrel-
roof building (1719) enclosed by a graceful wooden fence with carved
posts. The upper slope of the roof is outlined by a railing. The house
was owned and occupied by Judge Nathaniel Ropes (1726-74) and his
descendants for four generations. It contains a rare and valuable col-
lection of Canton, Nanking, and Fitzhue china and Irish glass.
7. The Salem Athenaeum (adm. by invitation of a member), 339 Essex St.,
contains, among other rare editions, the Kirwan Library, taken by a
privateer from an English vessel and used as the basis for his studies by
Nathaniel Bowditch, the famous mathematician and navigator, a native
of Salem.
8. Behind a graceful wooden fence decorated with carved urns, at 393
Essex St., is the Rev. Thomas Barnard House, a large and delightful
gambrel-roof dwelling with a pedimented doorway, and two great chim-
neys.
Retrace Essex St.; R. from Essex St. into Flint St.; L. from Flint St. into
Chestnut St.
9. Chestnut Street, laid out in 1796, has been called one of the finest
streets, architecturally, in America. Most of these Federal houses, among
which are some designed by Mclntire, are three-story, of mellow brick,
with beautiful exterior detail of porches, columns, and Palladian windows.
In the rear are charming gardens and picturesque buildings which form an
Salem
349
appropriate background. Almost every house deserves study. Among
them, and selected almost at random, are the Pickman-Shr eve- Little
House, No. 27 (1816), with a classic porch below a Palladian window; the
similar Dodge-Shreve House, No. 29 (1817), with balustraded hip roof,
cornice set with modillions, and classic porch; the Mack and Stone
Houses, No. 21 and No. 23 (1814-15), simple in detail but with elliptical
colonnaded porches and keyed marble lintels.
10. Hamilton Hall, on the corner of Cambridge St., was designed by
Mclntire in 1805. Although somewhat altered, it retains some character-
istic detail such as the five Palladian windows on the side, each with a
paneled insert above containing a carved ornament. The famous Mc-
lntire eagle is preserved in the center panel.
R.from Chestnut St. into Cambridge St.; R. from Cambridge St. into Broad
St.
11. The Pickering House (private) stands at the corner of Pickering and
Broad Sts. Built in 1660 (altered), it is said to be the oldest house in
Salem proper. The house has been extensively altered, and its medieval
core is now veiled by excessive ' carpenter Gothic ' work.
R. from Broad St. into Flint St.; R. from Flint St. into Federal.
12. The Cook-Oliver House (private), 142 Federal St., benefited greatly by
that architectural tragedy, the destruction of the Elias Hasket Derby
Mansion. After Derby's death, Mclntire, who began this dwelling for
Captain Samuel Cook in 1804, persuaded the Captain to buy the gate-
posts and much beautiful wood finish of the unoccupied Derby man-
sion. The fence, with its elaborate gateposts decorated with urns sur-
mounted by the flame motif, is probably the best of Mclntire's many de-
lightful fences. The house is typical Mclntire square, three-story
frame, hip roof, a heavy cornice with large dentils along the eaves, a
horizontal band, vertically fluted, along the second floor line, finely
wrought entablatures above the windows, and a porch and doorway
9-
10.
SALEM MAP INDEX
1. Gardner-White-Pingree House
2. Essex Institute
3. Peabody Museum
4. Old Town Hall
5. Witch House
6. Ropes Memorial
7. Salem Athenaeum
8. Rev. Thomas Barnard House
Chestnut Street
Hamilton Hall
Pickering House
Cook-Oliver House
12.
13. Assembly Hall
14. Pierce-Nichols House
15. Washington Square
16. Statue of Roger Conant
17. Hawthorne Monument
18. Narbonne House
19. House of the Seven Gables
20. J. C. B. Smith Swimming Pool
21. U.S. Coast Guard Air Station
22. Richard Derby House
23. Custom House
24. Hawthorne's Birthplace
25. Forest River Park
35 Main Street and Village Green
notable even among the many beautiful doorways of Salem for Mcln-
tire's free interpretation of the classic orders.
13. The Assembly Hall (not open), 138 Federal St., an historic Mclntire
building of 1782, has been remodeled for private use but the elaborate
match-boarded facade, Ionic pilasters on the second story, and fanlight
are unchanged. The porch, added later, is elaborately decorated with
scrolls, festoons, and a heavy grapevine frieze.
14. The Fierce-Nichols House (owned by Essex Institute), So Federal St.,
is one of the most interesting houses, architecturally, in Salem. This
magnificent dwelling, built in 1782, the first flower of Mclntire's genius,
has with its outbuildings been called one of the finest architectural groups
executed in wood in the United States. The square, three-story exterior
is of classic simplicity with a Doric pedimented porch and fluted Doric
pilasters at the corners. Notable is the roof treatment with its balus-
traded parapet and belvedere. The urns on the gate-posts were carved
out of solid blocks of wood by the hand of the master.
L.from Federal St. on North St.; R.from North St. into Bridge St.; R.from
Bridge St. into Winter St.; R. from Winter St. into Washington Square.
15. The stately houses of Washington Square, surrounding Salem
Common, perpetuate the charm and dignity of Salem's past. Included
among many of architectural interest are the Hosmer-Townsend-Waters
House, No. 80 (1795), by Mclntire, known for its lovely, enclosed side
porch and its hip roof rising to a massive central chimney; the Boardman
House, No. 82 (1785), of beautiful proportion and detail, with an enclosed
porch; the Baldwin-Lyman House, No. 92 (1818), with its symmetrical
arrangement of great chimneys joined in pairs; and the distinguished hip-
roofed Andrew-Sa/ord House, 1818, which uses roof balustrades, heavy
cornice, and fluted columns on a side portico for decoration, but centers
its emphasis upon an elaborate Corinthian entrance porch below a
Palladian window.
1 6. The Statue of Roger Conant, founder of the city, Washington Square
and Brown St., was executed by Henry Hudson Kitson.
TOUR 2 4m.
South from Washington Square into Hawthorne Boulevard.
17. The Hawthorne Monument by Bela Pratt, at the head of Hawthorne
Boulevard, is appropriately placed near the scenes chiefly associated with
Salem's great literary figure.
Retrace Hawthorne Blvd.; R. from Hawthorne Blvd. into Essex St.
1 8. The Narbonne House (private), 71 Essex St., stands almost opposite
Washington Sq. E. Built before 1671, its steep pitched roof and great
central chimney proclaim its period. The Dutch door of the lean-to was
formerly the entrance to a 'Cent Shop,' as described by Hawthorne.
Salem 351
R. from Essex St. into Turner St.
19. The House of the Seven Gables (open daily 10-5; fee 25 f), 54 Turner St.,
is, as the supposed setting of Hawthorne's novel by that name, perhaps
the most celebrated spot in all historic Salem. Unfortunately for sen-
timent, there is some grave doubt whether this house is actually the one
described by Hawthorne. There is even more doubt as to how much of
the building is authentic. It was certainly greatly restored in 1910, and it
has been said that a good deal of imagination went into the restoration.
Its present appearance is weather-beaten and rambling, with seven
gables, huge chimneys, a lean-to, and a second-story overhang adorned
with pendrils; it shows strong medieval influence. It was probably built
in about 1668.
The House of the Seven Gables is one of three 17th-century dwellings
clustered about a garden, the others being the Hathaway House (parlor
and kitchen open; included in the original fee) , built in 1682 and, with its
overhanging second story and small diamond-paned windows, beauti-
fully preserved; and the Retire Becket House (open during summer as tea-
house], built in 1655.
Retrace Turner St.; R. from Turner St. into Derby St. Straight ahead into
Fort Ave.; R.from Fort Ave. into Winter Island Road.
20. The /. C. B. Smith Swimming Pool is a large and inviting salt-water
cove made by damming the head of Cat Cove.
R. around swimming pool to Winter Island.
21. The U.S. Coast Guard Air Station (open 3 to sundown on weekdays; 1
until sundown on Sat. and Sun.; guide) is a modern, completely equipped
depot, which includes airplane hangars.
Retrace Winter Island Rd.; L. from Winter Island Rd. into Fort Ave.;
straight ahead into Derby St.
22. The Richard Derby House (open daily 9-5; fee 20j), 168 Derby St.,
built in 1762 and now owned by the Society for the Preservation of New
England Antiquities, is the oldest brick house in Salem. Except for its
gambrel roof, it is American Georgian in style, with dentiled cornice,
pedimented doorway, and four-end chimneys joined in pairs. From its
small-paned windows, the first of the line of merchant princes could
watch his vessels unloading almost in his dooryard, or follow with his
glass their topsails receding beyond the horizon.
23. The old Custom House, 178 Derby St., built in 1819, where Nathaniel
Hawthorne once dreamed over his ledgers, looks down along the granite
finger of Derby Wharf that once beckoned home the vessels of the Derby
family but which now points only to a harbor empty of ships. In architec-
ture it is akin to the Federal dwellings of Salem. The Palladian window
above the Ionic, balustraded portico, the round-headed first-floor win-
dows, the balustraded parapet, and the cupola are the outstanding archi-
tectural features. Surmounting the parapet rail is a carved eagle.
352 Main Street and Village Green
R. from Derby St. into Union St.
24. Hawthorne 1 s Birthplace (private), 27 Union St., is a gambrel-roofed
house built before the witchcraft year, 1692. It is said that the author
was born (1804) in the left-hand chamber of the second story. In the
shadows of the old house he spent a shy, solitary boyhood. Though he
was city port surveyor in 1846, he was a mystic and a recluse by nature
and entirely unfitted by an abnormal sensitiveness for his duties at the
Custom House. He realized that actualities must be insisted on in
America, but his genius reached its full fruition only when he turned to
romantic fiction. Three volumes of short stories, besides 'The Scarlet
Letter,' 'The House of Seven Gables,' 'The Blithedale Romance,' and
'The Marble Faun,' are works of major significance. He created one of
the best sustained prose styles in American literature.
Retrace Union St.; R. from Union St. on Derby St.; L. from Derby on
Lafayette St. (State 1A); L.from State 1A into Clifton Ave.
25. Forest River Park overlooks the harbor and sea, almost at the city
limits. Three acres of this park are devoted to Pioneers' Village (open
until dusk, adults 25^, children 15 <), an accurate reproduction of typical
units of a Puritan community of about 1630, ranging from dugouts and
primitive cabins to the 'Governor's Fayre House' with its huge central
chimney and vast fireplace. Here can be seen the village life in epitome:
a blacksmith's forge, a saw-pit, a brick kiln, as well as the grim whipping-
post and stocks; in the garden are the same flowers and herbs that grew
in the dooryards of the pioneers.
Below are briefly listed other buildings in Salem worth a visit for their
architectural significance.
'The Studio' 1826 2 & 4 Chestnut St.
Mansfield-Bolles House 1810 8 Chestnut St.
Hodges-Peele-West 1804 12 Chestnut St.
Goss-Osgood House 1810 15 Chestnut St.
Hawthorne's Residence 1846-1847 18 Chestnut St.
Peabody-Rantoul House 1810 19 Chestnut St.
Mack and Stone Houses about 1814 21 & 23 Chestnut St.
Hoffman-Simpson House about 1827 26 Chestnut St.
Hodges-Webb-Meek House before 1802 81 Essex St.
Col. Benjamin Pickman House 1743 165 Essex St. Rear
Lindall-Gibbs-Osgood House 1773 314 Essex St.
Cabot-Endicott-Low House 1748 365 Essex St.
Salem Public Library 370 Essex St.
Wheatland House before 1773 374 Essex St.
Peabody-Silsbee House 1797 380 Essex St.
Stearns House (East India Inn) 1776 384 Essex St.
Captain Edward Allen House 1780 125 Derby St.
Home for Aged Women (Benjamin W.
Crowninshield House) (Samuel Mclntire) 1810 1 80 Derby St.
County Commissioners Building Federal St.
City Hall (eagle by Mclntire) 93 Washington St.
Railroad Station 1847 Washington & Derby Sts.
Bertram Home for Aged Men (Colonel
George Peabody House) 1818 29 Washington Sq.
Silsbee-Mott House 1818 35 Washington Sq.
SOMERVILLE. Traditions of Trade
City: Alt. 41, pop. 100,773, set t. 1630, incorp. town 1842, city 1871.
Railroad Stations: North Somerville, off Broadway near Boston Ave.; Somer-
ville, Park St.; Somerville Junction, 114 Central St.; Winter Hill, Gilman
Square, for B. & M. R.R.
Accommodatiom: One hotel.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 59 Union Square.
ONE of the independent municipal spokes radiating from the Boston
hub, Somerville is a type of the many industrial-residential communities
that press upon the borders of the capital of the Commonwealth and
which, proud of their own identity, have stood their ground against
annexation to Boston. The city is the center of a network of highways
reaching all New England, and its railroad facilities are unusually good.
Although part of Charlestown until 1842, Somerville has had a past that
is distinctly its own. Traditions of trade dominated the early settlers.
For the early Somervillite, there was little of the frivolous diversion of
concern about one's neighbor's conduct and beliefs so characteristic of
his Boston neighbor.
About the beginning of the nineteenth century, Somerville took on dis-
tinct individuality. The building of the Cambridge and Charlestown
bridges to Boston had established the city as an important outpost on
the direct route from Boston to the north ; but it was the opening of the
Middlesex Canal through Somerville in 1803 that gave impetus to its
industrial development. By 1822 the canal had been outmoded by the
turnpikes, and by 1835 Somerville was a regular stopping-place on the
new Boston and Lowell Railroad.
With such transportation advantages, it was not long before the town
entered upon an era of expansion. Three-fourths of the meat-packing
of the Commonwealth is carried on in the six packing-houses of the
city. In the order of their importance, other leading industries are:
slaughtering, bakery products, confectionery, foundry and machine-shop
products, beverages, structural iron and steel, printing, automobile
assembling, coffee-roasting, furniture making, and household and photo-
graphic equipment.
Because of its definitely residential character, self-rule is prized in Somer-
ville. It is this love for self-government that gives the city its vigor and
its virility.
354 Main Street and Village Green
MOTOR TOUR 12.2 m.
N. from Union Square into Bow St., straight ahead into Summer St.
1. St. Catherine's Church, 183 Summer St., designed by Maginnis and
Walsh and executed in 1892 in gray brick with white marble trim, shows
the influence of the Byzantine style of northern Italy, and of the Gothic.
It has been termed by authorities one of the most beautiful churches in
America. The basement is treated as a crypt, its arched vaulted ceiling
supported by heavy piers.
Retrace Summer St.; L. from Summer St. into Washington St.
2. The James Miller Tablet stands at the spot where James Miller,
aged 65, was slain by the British retreating from Concord and Lexington,
April 19, 1775. 'I am too old to run,' he said.
L. from Washington St. into Medford St.; L. from Medford St. into Pros-
pect Hill Ave. to junction of Munroe St.
3. The Prospect Hill Tablet commemorates the raising, Jan. i, 1776, of
the first American flag of 13 stripes. It was unfurled here over the main
American fortress covering the siege of Boston, where the British were
entrapped, except for egress by sea, for n months.
R. from Prospect Hill Ave. into Munroe St.
4. The Memorial Tower crowns the site of the fortress (Point 3). At
the base of the tower are five small tablets, one of which reads: 'The
flower of the British army, prisoners of war who surrendered at Saratoga,
were quartered on this hill from November 7, 1777, to October 15, 1778.'
They numbered about 4000 men, of whom half were Hessians. The
winter was very cold, firewood was scarce, and hardship was extreme.
L. from Monroe St. into Walnut St.; R. from Walnut St. into Aldersey St.;
R. from Aldersey St. into Vinal Ave.; R. from Vinal Ave. into Highland
Ave.
5. At Central Hill Park is a Civil War Monument, the work of Augustus
Lukeman, depicting an angel as bodyguard for a marching soldier.
Adjoining it, directly in front of the Public Library, is a simpler Spanish
War Monument, by Raymond Porter, in which the treatment of both
soldier and sailor are markedly realistic. This monument includes com-
memoration of Americans in the Boxer Revolt in China in 1900, being
one of the few to do so.
6. The Public Library (open weekdays 9-9), 35 Highland Ave., contains
in its central hall a full-size copy of the frieze of the Parthenon at Athens.
As was the case in the original, the frieze has been tinted in blues and
greens. Of note, also in the entrance hall, is a bas-relief portrait of Sam
Walter Foss, author of the poem, 'The House by the Side of the Road,'
and former librarian (1898-1911).
Somerville 355
Retrace on Highland Ave.; R. from Highland Ave. into Sycamore St.
7. The Oliver Tufts House (private), 78 Sycamore St., was originally
built on Barberry Lane (Highland Ave.) by Peter Tufts, grandson of
the Peter Tufts who emigrated to America in 1646, and who operated
a ferry from Charlestown to Maiden. The house was the headquarters
of General Lee of the American Army during the siege of Boston. Some
50 years later Charlotte Cushman, the noted Boston actress, spent her
childhood holidays at 'Uncle Oliver's Farm.'
R. from Sycamore St. into Broadway.
8. Ploughed Hill is the site of a celebrated and distressing incident of
social history, the burning by an anti-Catholic mob in 1834 of the Ursuline
Convent. Broadway below the hill, traversed at this point, was in 1775
a narrow neck of land enclosed on two sides by water. It was the last
hostile territory crossed by the British on their retreat from Concord
and Lexington, before they plunged into present-day Charlestown, then
held by them. Here was also the start of the Middlesex Canal.
L. from Broadway into Union St.; L. from Union St. into Mystic Ave.;
R. from Mystic Ave. into Middlesex Ave.
9. The Ford Motor Plant (visitors by permission), Middlesex Ave., corner
of Fellsway, is a model assembly unit of the Ford system, capacity
300 cars daily.
10. A Marker at junction of Middlesex Ave. and Fellsway indicates where
Governor John Winthrop built a bark of 36 tons, named 'The Blessing
of the Bay/ which was launched July 4, 1631. This was probably the
first vessel built in Massachusetts.
Sharp (L.) from Middlesex Ave. into Fellsway ;R. from Fellsway into Puritan
Rd.
11. The Site of Ten Hills Farm, now covered with modern residences,
extended from Shore Drive to the Fellsway. Here Governor Winthrop
spent his first winter in America, afterward maintaining a town house in
Boston, but frequently visiting his country estate, of which he was very
fond.
L. from Puritan Rd. into Shore Drive; L. from Shore Drive into Mystic
Ave.; R.from Mystic Ave. into Temple St.; R. from Temple St. into Broad-
way.
12. The Magoun House (private), 438 Broadway, is a two-and-a-half -
story gray wooden dwelling, remarkable for its delicate arched fanlight,
one of the best Colonial specimens remaining in Greater Boston. In
this house the first printing press in Somerville was operated.
13. The Old Powder House (L) (not open), facing Powder House Square,
a circular field-stone structure 40 feet high, with cone-shaped shingled
roof, was a storm-center of Revolutionary history. Here, on September
i, 1774, General Gage seized the 250 half -barrels of gunpowder stored in
it, thereby provoking the Great Assembly of the following day on Cam-
356 Main Street and Village Green
bridge Common, when thousands of patriots met ready to fight at once
if called upon. Judicious counsel postponed the event till the following
April at Lexington. In 1775 this Powder House became the magazine of
the American army besieging Boston. The structure was built in 1 703 as
a gristmill.
SOUTH HADLEY. Milk, Butter, and Ideas
Town: Alt. 260, pop. 6838, sett, about 1659, incorp. 1753.
Transportation: Busses to Holyoke, Granby, Belchertown.
Accommodations: Two inns open all year round; one in summer only.
Information: College Inn and Book Shop Inn, South Hadley Center.
SOUTH HADLEY is a farming and college community on the Con-
necticut River below the low foothills of the Holyoke range of mountains,
which give variety to the town's northern horizon. It is characterized by
shaded streets, broad lawns, and quiet homes, and in the outskirts by
elm-bordered sunny pastures, on which farms produce milk and butter
for near-by manufacturing districts.
Early development was slow. The first meeting house, begun in 1732 and
still standing, took five years to complete, owing to a violent controversy
as to its site, during which the opposing parties several times removed
structural timbers from the frame and hid them. The first minister was
presently dismissed, but took no notice of his removal, and eventually
had to be forcibly ejected from the pulpit with a handkerchief stuffed in
his mouth, to prevent him from praying en route.
The local Indians, the Norwottucks, were peaceable, but the cruelties of
invading tribes in the Connecticut Valley, especially at Deerfield, were
never far out of mind, and the South Hadleyites did not feel safe until
the Norwottucks were reduced to begging at scattered farmhouses for
food or cider.
The Revolution found South Hadley active in the patriot cause. In 1774
the citizens voted to ' chuse four men to inspect the District about drink-
ing East India tee.' Two shillings a day were voted ' for training men to
go at a minute's warning.'
After the Revolution the town became interested both in manufactures
and in the development of river navigation by means of locks and canals.
By 1831 a map of the town shows at South Hadley Falls, a sawmill, a
gristmill, a button factory, two paper mills, a tannery, and a large
South Hadley 357
popular tavern. The leading industry continues to be paper-making, on
a moderate scale, but farming is a close second. A large Irish immigration
in the i84o's revived the town's agricultural interests. French-Canadians
followed, taking to the mills, and there are smaller colonies of German and
Polish descent.
For the past century, however, South Hadley has been best known as the
seat of Mount Holyoke College for women, the oldest of the seven leading
colleges for women in New England, and the mother of five colleges at
home and five abroad, notably Mills College in California and the Inter-
national Institute at Madrid. It has now (1937) one thousand students.
Courses in the liberal arts are chiefly emphasized, but the curriculum in-
cludes also excellent courses in science.
Mary Lyon, founder of the college, was born in 1797 on a farm in near-by
Buckland, and began teaching at the age of seventeen. She early dis-
played a scholarship remarkable for those times, as well as earnest con-
victions relating to the betterment of her sex through intellectual develop-
ment. While she was teaching at Ipswich in the early i83o's she envisaged
a permanent seminary for the thorough education of young women of
moderate means. Her organization of Wheaton Seminary in 1834 (see
NORTON) was the first step toward her goal. In 1837 Mount Holyoke
opened its doors as a seminary with Mary Lyon as principal and with
eighty students, who filled its four-story brick building to capacity.
Co-operative management of the dormitories was an immediate feature
which still exists, the students giving one hour's service each day to their
household tasks, with the primary purpose of furthering training and self-
reliance in household arts. In 1893 a new charter was issued to Mount
Holyoke College. From 1900 to 1936, its President was Mary Emma
Woolley, best known to the general public as an American delegate to the
International Disarmament Conference at Geneva, the first time in
history that any woman other than a reigning ruler has been admitted to
participation in such an international conference.
MOTOR TOUR 7m.
N. from the village green on Woodbridge St. (State 116).
i. The Skinner Museum (open daily 2-5, free) occupies a small former
church across the road from the beautiful Skinner estate (private), with
its white house hidden behind formal evergreen trees. An Historical
Museum is housed in the church, which, without its present spire, was
the Congregational meeting house of Prescott, purchased and moved to
its present site during preparations for the flooding of the town of Prescott
by the waters of the Quabbin Reservoir.
Retrace State 116 through South Hadley Center.
358 Main Street and Village Green
2. The Mount Holyoke College Campus of 270 acres, spreading over a
naturally beautiful terrain, includes Prospect Hill, an athletic field, tennis
courts, ample lawns and farm lands, and two small lakes for canoeing,
swimming, and skating. At the Pageant Field, an open-air auditorium, is
held the annual May Day Festival.
The lecture halls and dormitories, mainly of red brick in Tudor style, are widely
spaced on vivid greensward under fine trees. Outstanding are Mary Lyon Hall,
which contains the administrative offices, and Dwigkt Memorial Art Building (open
"weekdays 9-5, Sundays 12-1 ; adm. free), housing a complete collection of the noted
engravings of Elbridge Kingsley (1842-1918). The Talcott Arboretum consists of
plant houses, a palm house, a horticultural economics house, and a house for
aquatics. The Playshop Laboratory is a small, completely equipped modern ex-
perimental theater. Mary Lyon's Tombstone on the campus bears her memorable
statement: 'There is nothing in the universe that I fear, except that I may not
know my duty, or may fail to do it.'
Retrace State 116 to village green; L. from State 116 on State 63.
3. The Pass of Thermopylae, well named, is a narrow rock-bound passage
through the foot of Mt. Holyoke near the Connecticut River. Early
settlers laboriously constructed it by pouring water on the rock in winter
and raking away the frozen gravel that split off.
R. from State 63 on Mt. Holyoke Rd.
4. Titan y s Piazza, a volcanic bluff of columnar formation, has been
classified as one of the world's major natural phenomena. A short distance
from this bluff fossil footprints have been found.
5. The Devil's Football is a magnetic boulder weighing 300 tons. Geolog-
ical authorities agree that it was carried here from Sunderland or Deer-
field during the glacial period. Its name is derived from the popular
legend that Satan kicked it from the Devil's Garden at Amherst Notch
several miles away.
R. from Mt. Holyoke Rd. on toll road (small fee) .
6. Mt. Holyoke (alt. 995), from which the college takes its name, is a huge
wooded mass of trap rock of exceptional beauty, which rises high above
the Connecticut River; and from the top, on a clear day, it is possible to
see a distance of 70 miles. The hotel on its summit is the third to stand
there. In the first one, in 1825, the town planned to entertain Lafayette
with a choice of Jamaica rum, St. Croix rum, Holland gin, brandy, cognac,
or cherry cordial. Unluckily the Marquis was late in his tour schedule,
and had to pass directly through the town without pausing for these
refreshments.
SPRINGFIELD
The Metropolis of Western Massachusetts
City: Alt. 69, pop. 149,642, sett. 1636, incorp. town 1641, city 1852.
Railroad Station: Union Station, Lyman & Liberty Sts., for N.Y., N.H. & H.
R.R., B. & M. R.R., and B. & A. R.R.
Accommodations: Seven hotels.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 134 Chestnut St.; Automobile Club,
140 Chestnut St.; A.L.A., 1387 Main St.
SPRINGFIELD, the metropolis of western Massachusetts, lies on the
east bank of the Connecticut River, holding a strategic position in the
traffic of the New England states with New York and the West. Its
situation on a series of terraces and in gently rolling country produces an
effect of spacious leisure, and imposing architecture and tree-shaded
lawns, parks, and boulevards give it an atmosphere of dignity, substance,
and comfort. Its diversified industries, superior transportation facilities,
large merchandising establishments, and fine residential sections make it
an important center of industry, commerce, and finance ; and its notable
interest in music and the other arts make it an outstanding cultural
center.
In 1636 a dozen families made their way to the inviting valley where the
Agawam River joins the Connecticut. Their livestock inflicted so much
damage on the cornfields of the Indians that they were forced to abandon
the settlement. They moved on across the Connecticut River, to a barren
terrain demanding heart-breaking labor and promising little reward for
toil.
Fortunately, the leader of the group was stout-hearted William t-ynchon.
With such vigor did he build up the new settlement that even after a
board had been elected determination of program and policy was left in
his hands. His leadership was not questioned until 1650, when he pub-
lished a theological work. The Puritan Fathers detected in the book
germs of heresy. To protect the community from infection they admin-
istered the antitoxin of denunciation. The services of Pynchon were soon
forgotten; he was badgered on all sides, and finally returned to England.
His son, John, remained and assumed the management of the town.
In the next year the Springfield community indulged in a witch hunt
a sport more exciting than the battle against heresy. Hugh Parsons was
a dyspeptic, of choleric disposition which had not endeared him to his
neighbors. His wife was subject to periodic fits, probably epileptic. But
such an explanation of their eccentricities was too simple, and the savants
360 Main Street and Village Green
of the occult brought charges of witchcraft against the couple. Not a few
good people were disappointed when the court acquitted the pair.
Twenty peaceful and constructive years followed. In 1675, however,
King Philip declared war on the Colony, and Springfield did not escape.
The town was almost totally burned. The townspeople pushed recon-
struction, building on a larger scale.
Early in the eighteenth century the citizens of Springfield made the river
a capital asset. They erected sawmills and gristmills and took their first
step away from a complete agricultural economy. The large clay deposits
were utilized in the manufacture of brick.
Acute financial depression resulted from the Revolutionary War; farmer
and mill-owner were bogged in a morass of debt. Thousands banded
themselves together under Daniel Shays, and for six months tramped up
and down western Massachusetts in an attempt to prevent the convening
of the courts and the entering of judgments against debtors. Although
their cause won numerous sympathizers, it failed. Springfield became
Shays's Waterloo when an attempt to capture the United States Arsenal
was frustrated.
The manufacture of metal goods was given an impetus in 1794 by the
passage of a bill in Congress establishing the United States Armory at
Springfield. The advent of the railroad, about 1835, stimulated business.
At that time the town already had seventy-three mechanic shops, six
cotton mills, four printing offices, thirteen warehouses, two card factories,
two forges, one rifle factory, one powder mill, six sawmills, four grist mills,
three tanneries, two jewelers' tool factories, one sword factory, and one
spool factory.
Developments in the manufacture of textiles brought French-Canadians,
English, and Scots. Skilled artisans of all races were attracted by the
openings in the machine shops. Irish, Italian, Swedish, and German labor
was plentiful. Long hours and meager wages were the lot of those whose
labor enriched the town. But aside from the general agitation that accom-
panied the crisis of 1830, there was no real organization of labor until
after the Civil War.
The year 1824 marked the founding of the Springfield Republican by
Samuel Bowles. The excellent style of this journal, under the editorship
of Dr. J. G. Holland, and the liberal philosophy of its editorials, made the
paper almost a national institution. The first newspaper in Springfield,
however, was the Massachusetts Gazette and General Advertiser, published
in 1782, which failed to survive, posting this notice: 'Those gentlemen
who engaged for their papers in grain are once more requested to make
immediate payment, as the printers are in much want of that article.'
Other papers published during this period were the Hampshire Chronicle,
the Hampshire Herald, and the Federal Spy.
In 1847 J onn Brown of Akron opened the warehouse of Brown and Per-
kins, wool merchants. The business enjoyed a fair degree of prosperity,
but John Brown was absent from business the greater part of the time, his
Springfield 361
real enthusiasm being centered in the Abolitionist movement. Said
Emerson, ' If he kept sheep, it was with a royal mind. And if he traded in
wool, he was a merchant prince, not in the amount of wealth, but in the
protection of the interests confided to him.' He organized the United
States League of Gileadites, which assisted fugitive slaves to escape.
Shortly after his arrival in Springfield, John Brown was visited by
Frederick Douglass, Negro orator and scholar, who found him living in a
cottage near the shacks occupied by Negroes. ' Plain as was the house on
the outside,' wrote Douglass, ' the inside was plainer. Its furniture would
have satisfied a Spartan. There was an element of plainness about it
which almost suggested destitution. . . . The meal was such as a man might
relish after following the plow all day, or performing a forced march of a
dozen miles over a rough road in frosty weather.' John Brown lived in
Springfield for two years, and during this time hundreds of runaway
slaves were harbored in the town, then were passed along to the next
station of the Underground Railway.
The termination of the war once more allowed the free flow of commerce.
An expanding market aided in Springfield's prosperity. Factories were
rebuilt and enlarged, the population swelled. Simultaneously labor took
its first organized steps toward improving working and living conditions.
Following the example of the horse-car drivers, who in 1861 had estab-
lished a benevolent association, which was forced by a threatened wage
reduction to transform itself into a trade union, workers in many indus-
tries began to wage a united battle for the eight-hour day. In 1864 cigar-
makers, stonecutters, pianoforte-makers, blacksmiths, carpenters, and
tailors were organized to secure higher wages and shorter hours. The
Massachusetts Legislature investigated the possibilities of regulating and
limiting hours of labor, and eventually the eight-hour day became a real-
ity. In the later i88o's all the trade unions in the city participated in the
formation of the Central Labor Union. To Bishop N. Saltus, first presi-
dent of this federation, belongs a chief share of the credit for its vigorous
development.
Since 1890, such large industries have been established as the Van Norman
Tool and Machine Company, the United States Envelope Company, the
Fiberloid Company, the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Com-
pany, and the Milton Bradley Company, makers of toys, games, and
school supplies. Motorcycles have been manufactured here since the be-
ginning of the century. On the West Springfield side of the river numer-
ous industries have located. The Gilbert and Barker Company makes
gasoline pumps and oil-burners. Matches, packaging machinery, radios,
magnetos, hot-water heaters, air-conditioning equipment, and forgings
are also manufactured here.
Between 1910 and 1920 the population increased 117 per cent. Of the
present residents of Springfield, about one-fourth are foreign-born. The
largest racial group is the Irish, which numbers nearly 6000. The Italians
follow with about 4500, Russians with 3800, French-Canadians with
362 Main Street and Village Green
3700, and Poles with 2400. Scotland, England, Sweden, and Germany
each contribute about 1000 to the foreign-born population.
The high percentage of skilled workers among the population has been a
strong influence in the social and political life of the city. The general
housing situation, for example, is considerably better in Springfield than
in most industrial cities of its size. The civic life is heightened by the
social clubs, singing societies, and physical culture centers of the various
racial groups.
A flood in 1927 caused considerable loss when the Connecticut River over-
flowed its banks; but it can hardly be compared to the catastrophe of
1936, when the worst flood in the history of New England inflicted untold
suffering on Springfield and caused property losses amounting to millions
of dollars. Only efficient organization, prompt action, and many deeds of
heroism prevented wholesale loss of human life.
FOOT TOUR 1.5 m.
NW. from State St. (US 20) on Main St.; L. from Main St. into Court
Square Green.
1 . The First Church of Christ (Congregational) , near the midpoint of the
Green in Court Square, was designed in 1819 by Isaac Damon, the fourth
structure of the First Parish. Commissioned to design a church ' with a
decent plain front' he achieved a building adorned by a portico with Doric
columns, triangular pediment, and decorated frieze, and topped by a
cupola of three members none, unfortunately, of open design.
2. The Hampden County Courthouse was built in 1871 after the design of
H. H. Richardson, and showed his individualistic adaptation of late
Gothic, powerfully handled to express modern function. Remodeling in
1906 has changed the mass and composition and virtually destroyed the
Richardsonian elements.
3. The Springfield Municipal Group, on the north side of the Square, con-
sists of an office and court building, an auditorium, and a 3oo-foot cam-
panile (open Mon.-Fri. 9-11, 2-4; Sat. 9-11), with an illuminated clock
and a carillon of 12 bells. It was designed by Pell and Corbett and
dedicated in 1913. The view from the observatory platform (elevator)
offers a view of the city against a background of mountain peaks. The
group is an impressive civic monument, imposing in its proportions, its
classic detail and in the identical Corinthian porticoes which dignify the
front of both buildings.
Retrace on Court Square; R.from Court Square Green into Main St.; L. from
Main St. into State St.; R. from State St. into Maple St.
4. The Colony Club, 50 Maple St., is the former home of the late D. B.
Wesson, manufacturer of firearms. The walls are of pink Milford granite ;
Springfield 363
the interior is finished in woods of native and tropical origin, variegated
marbles, and satin wall coverings.
L.from Maple St. on Cemetery Ave.
5. In the Springfield Cemetery is a bronze relief by Saint-Gaudens rep-
resenting J. G. Holland, author and first editor of the Springfield Re-
publican.
Retrace Cemetery Ave.; R. from Cemetery Ave. on Maple St.; straight ahead
on Chestnut St.
6. In Merrick Park, corner of State St., is The Puritan, by Saint-Gaudens.
R. from Chestnut St. into first drive.
7. The Springfield Museum of Fine Arts (open weekdays except Mon. 1-
4.30; Sun. 2-5), erected in 1933, is of steel with limestone facing, by
Tilton and Githens, architects.
8. The George Walter Vincent Smith Art Museum (open weekdays except
Mon. 1-5; Sun. 2-5) was designed in 1895, in the Italian Renais-
sance style, by Renwick, Aspinwall, Renwick and Walter T. Owen. In
addition to paintings, it contains an especially fine collection of Chinese
porcelain and cloisonne enamels.
9. The Museum of Natural History (open weekdays except Mon. 1-4.30,
Sun. 2-5), with limestone facing, was recently rebuilt from the brick
museum erected in 1899. It is by Tilton and Githens, and corresponds in
style to the new Museum of Fine Arts. Groups of mammals and birds are
mounted in reproductions of their natural habitat. An American Indian
group illustrates the manufacture of soapstone bowls.
10. The William Pynchon Memorial Building (open weekdays except Mon.
1-4.30, Sun. 2-5) of Georgian Colonial architecture, was designed by
Gardner, Payne, and Gardner, architects, and completed in 1927.
Retrace driveway; R. from driveway into Chestnut St.
11. Christ Church Cathedral (Episcopal) (open) was built in 1876. The
pulpit and lectern were carved by Kirchmayer. The windows are by
Butler and Payne and by Kemp and Kemp. A window by La Farge pic-
tures 'Mary and Magdala at the Tomb.'
Retrace on Chestnut St.; L. from Chestnut St. into State St.
12. The City Library (open weekdays 9-9; Sun. 2-6), erected in 1912, is
built of Vermont marble in the Italian Renaissance style; it was designed
by Edward L. Tilton. Open stacks give patrons direct access to the books.
13. The Church of the Unity (Unitarian- Universalist) , opposite the City
Library, was designed by H. H. Richardson. It is notable for its stained-
glass windows by Louis Tiffany, a rose window, and 14 memorial windows
which include 'Heosphorus the Light-Bearer' by Edward Simmons, 'The
Family' by Will H. Low, and 'Rebecca at the Well' by La Farge.
The competition for the Church of the Unity was H. H. Richardson's
first real opportunity. The English parish church type was the model set,
but the architect's interest already centered upon function. His adapta-
SPRINGFIELD
TOUR
Springfield 365
tion of medieval precedent, fumbling though it was, gave promise of his
later brilliance. The proportion and harmony of the interior detail are
noteworthy, and the focalization of interest upon the east end of a non-
ritualistic church is handled with rare mastery.
14. The Classical High School (open), opposite Elliot St., of yellow brick,
was designed by Hartwell and Richardson. It contains a mural painting,
4 The Light of Education,' by Robert Reid.
15. The U.S. Armory and Arsenal (open by permission) occupies a site
selected by George Washington and Colonel David Mason of Boston. It
was established by Congress in 1794, and the first muskets were manu-
factured here in 1795. The Civil War brought a great influx of workmen
and in 1864 over 3000 men were employed turning out 1000 rifles a day.
The Springfield rifle is still made here. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
stopped at the Arsenal on his honeymoon ; his wife noticed the resemblance
of the tiers of stacked arms to the pipes of an organ, and Longfellow after-
ward wrote 'The Arsenal at Springfield.'
The Museum (open weekdays except Sat. 8.30-12, 1-4.30) has an excellent
collection of small arms. Of especial importance is the old Blanchard
lathe, an invention for turning gunstocks.
1 6. The High School of Commerce (open) , opposite the Arsenal, is of Tudor
style and was designed by Kirkham and Parlett. It contains a mural
'Beside the Still Waters' painted by Paul Connoyer.
17. The Site of the Crucial Battle of Shays's Rebellion is marked by a large
boulder on Benton Lawn, between St. James Ave. and Federal St. Here
the United States soldiers, commanded by General Shepard of Westfield,
repulsed Shays's attack on the stores in the Springfield Arsenal in 1786.
On the same Green is an Old Brownstone Milestone bearing Masonic sym-
bols erected by Joseph Wait of Brookfield in 1 763 after he had lost his way
in a blizzard at this parting of the Bay Path and Chicopee Road.
1 8. St. Peter's Episcopal Church (open), Buckingham St. near State St.,
is of Gothic design, with murals painted by Arthur S. Smith in the style
of the i4th century.
SPRINGFIELD MAP INDEX
1. The First Church of Christ n. Christ Church Cathedral
2. Hampden County Courthouse 12. City Library
3. Springfield Municipal Group 13. Church of the Unity
4. Colony Club 14. Classical High School
5. Springfield Cemetery 15. United States Armory and Arse-
6. The Puritan nal
7. Springfield Museum of Fine Arts 16. High School of Commerce
8. George Walter Vincent Smith Art 17. Site of Crucial Battle of Shays's
Museum Rebellion
9. Museum of Natural History 18. St. Peter's Episcopal Church
10. William Pynchon Memorial Build-
ing
366 Main Street and Village Green
MOTOR TOUR 16 m.
SW.from Main St. on State St.; L.from State St. on Columbus Ave. (US 5).
19. Forest Park (open to motorists, low speed rate) is a woodland area of
800 acres. Small ponds contain rare varieties of lotus and water lilies
which bloom in July. Porter Lake is a haunt of several species of wild
ducks and herons. There are trails, bowling greens, a paddle pool, tennis
courts, botanical gardens, and a rose garden. A large Zoo (open daily 10-7)
contains many species of animal life, while at the Trailside Museum, a
branch of the Springfield Natural History Museum, are exhibits of flora
and fauna. An exhibition of sandstone slabs shows fossil footprints of
dinosaurs quarried in the Connecticut Valley near Holyoke.
20. Pecousic Villa, on a terrace near Longhill St., is the former home of
the late Everett H. Barney, skate manufacturer, by whom a large part of
Forest Park was bequeathed and endowed to the city of Springfield.
21. The Site of King Philip's Stockade and the vantage-point from which
King Philip is said to have directed and observed the burning of Spring-
field in 1675 is in Forest Park. The drive, planted with rhododendrons,
swings out on a terrace overlooking the Connecticut River.
L. from Columbus Ave. through South Main Entrance of Forest Park;
traverse Forest Park northwesterly; R. from Forest Park into Sumner Ave.
22. Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church, opposite Oakland Ave., is part of
a connecting group of buildings of Gothic architecture designed by Allen
and Collins, including a community house with its gymnasium, swimming
pool and playrooms, an auditorium with well equipped stage, and other
facilities. It is surmounted by a tower containing a carillon of 61 bells.
The church contains a series of 24 stained-glass windows representing
historic personages with the theme 'The Light of Christ in the Life of
Civilization,' depicting Lindbergh, Streseman, Kellogg, Briand, and
others.
L. from Sumner Ave. on Oakland St.
23. The All Saints' Episcopal Church is a copy of the All Saints' Church in
Springfield, England, from which came William Pynchon, founder of the
city.
L. from Oakland St. on Allen St.
24. The Drop Forge Plant of the United States Armory (open by permis-
sion), known as the 'Watershops/ borders on Massasoit Lake.
R. from Allen St. on Hickory St.
25. Massasoit Lake or Water shops Pond (swimming, boating, canoeing)
was formed by damming the Mill River to provide power for the Armory.
26. Springfield College is also known as International Y.M.C.A. College.
Founded in 1885 by Dr. Luther H. Gulick, it was first known as the
Taunton 367
School of Christian Workers. It is widely known for training in physical
education and for boys' work, with graduates in nearly every part of the
world. It was at this college that Professor James Naismith is said to
have invented the game of basketball in the winter of 1891. Across
Massasoit Lake in a grove is the Freshman Day Camp known as the
Pueblo of the Seven Fires (open by arrangement) , a roomy lodge for camp
work and nature study. Designed like the pueblos in the Southwest, it is
decorated with murals in Indian symbolism painted by the Indian artist
Wo Peen (Louis Gonzaleus of Santa Fe) , also a few murals by Bear Heart
(Herman Stoldt).
27. The House of Professor Edgar M. Robinson (private) , near Cross Town
Boulevard, is a strange architectural whimsy. Straight lines were disre-
garded when its bricks, stones, and slates were fashioned into house and
garage, and oddest of all are the large pictures of bears, birds, and snakes
painted on gable ends and edges, the work of Ernest Thompson Seton.
L. from Hickory St. on Wilbraham Rd.
28. American International College (co-educational) , between College and
Amaron Sts., was chartered in Lowell, Mass., in 1885, where it was
known as the French Protestant College. Moving to Springfield in 1888,
it became known in 1894 as the French- American College, and in 1905
the name was changed to its present form. Most of the buildings are of
red brick with light gray granite pillars and trim, in the Georgian
Colonial style.
R. from Wilbraham Rd. on Amaron St.; R. from Amaron St. on State St.
29. Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company Building (open week-
days 9^t; apply front door for guide) is in the Georgian Colonial style, and
was built in 1926.
L. from State St. on Alton St.
30. Blunt Park is a grove with picnic tables and fireplaces, rustic shelters,
and nature trails.
TAUNTON. Largest City for its Size
City: Alt. 37, pop. 37,355, sett. 1638, incorp. town 1639, city 1864.
Railroad Stations: Central Depot, corner of Cohannet and Washington Sts.,
for N.Y., N.H. & H. R.R.; Whittenton Station, Whittenton St. (flag stop).
Bus Stations: City Square for Eastern Mass. Street Ry. and Greyhound Line.
Accommodations: Six hotels.
Information: Chamber of Commerce, 35 Summer St.
368 Main Street and Village Green
/
ABOUT the Green, an elm-fringed rectangle, is concentrated the business
and civic life of Taunton; but for fifty square miles the city stretches out
in fertile acres, broken by rocky outcrops and dotted by quiet residential
sections and factories. Not excluding Greater Boston, Taunton is the
largest city in point of area in Massachusetts. Its manufactures include
textile machinery and products, machine drills and tools, marine engines,
electrical specialties, minor hardware, silver jewelry, Britannia metal-
ware and pewterware, stoves, stove linings, ceramic products, leather
novelties, and medicines. But it has plenty of elbow room, and that is
why despite its busy manufactures the city has an air of tranquil leisure
and placidity.
Records are somewhat at variance as to the actual first settlers of Taun-
ton. The city's seal, however, adopted January i, 1865, bears on a central
shield the figure of a woman negotiating with Indians, and above the
shield the inscription ('vEneid,' I, 364), * Dux Femina Facti' (A Woman
was the Leader of the Things Accomplished). This commemorates an
early proprietor, Elizabeth Poole, in whose hands tradition places a jack-
knife and a peck of beans, regarded as symbolic of industry and agricul-
ture.
The story of Taunton's l Things Accomplished' dates back to the fisher-
ies in Mill River, which had long been visited by the Indian tribes, and
from which the first white settlers obtained their livelihood. It is quite
possible that the stories of the fabulous herring-runs in April of each year,
when the fish swarmed up the Cohannet and Taunton Rivers to spawn,
attracted many of the first colonists. With the building of mills and the
consequent pollution of the river waters the herring-runs .diminished
a cause of bitter controversy between the fishermen and the early mill
operators.
Some ten years after her alleged purchase of Cohannet, Elizabeth Poole
formed a joint-stock company capitalized at six hundred pounds for the
manufacture of bar iron; and in 1652 the town of Taunton imported three
men from Braintree to assist in the erection of an iron bloomery, believed
to be the first successful one in America, two previous ones in Quincy and
Braintree having failed. The manufacture of bar iron and ironware was
for many years one of the town's principal industries. During a scarcity
of specie at the time of King Philip's War, when there were few Bank of
England notes in circulation and no paper money had as yet been issued
in Massachusetts, bar iron manufactured in Taunton became an accepted
medium of exchange.
As early as 1684 the townsfolk replied to demands of Governor Andros
for poll and property taxes that they did not ' feel free to raise money on
the inhabitants without their own assent in assembly.' For transmitting
this message the town clerk was fined twenty marks and held in jail for
three months. On his release, however, his fellow townsmen presented
him with one hundred acres of land.
In October, 1774, a Liberty Pole, 112 feet tall, was erected on the Green,
Taunton 369
bearing a Union Jack lettered with the words 'Liberty and Union; Union
and Liberty ' ; and nailed to the pole was a bold declaration of the rights
of the colonists as free and independent people. The claim is advanced
locally that Taunton Green, and not Faneuil Hall in Boston, was the true
'Cradle of American Liberty.'
In 1699 the building of the first shipyard launched Taunton on its way to
fame as a seaport. 
