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MUNDALE, The West Parish of Westfield, Massachusetts, in the Olden Days.
ELOISE FOWLER SALMOND
Gc 974.402 W537s 1225935
M. D.
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
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ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY
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MUNDALE, The West Parish of Westfield, Massachusetts, in the Olden Days.
WRITTEN AND COMPILED BY ELOISE FOWLER SALMOND
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1 9 3 4 THE POND-EKBERG COMPANY PRESS Springfield, Massachusetts
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Copyright 1934 by ELOISE FOWLER SALMOND
1225935
DEDICATED to the
WESTERN HAMPDEN HISTORICAL SOCIETY WESTFIELD, MASSACHUSETTS
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
Foreword
9
Mundale, The West Parish of Westfield, Massachu-
setts, in the Olden Days
II
Schools
53
Church
71
R. S. Barnes $3, 50
ILLUSTRATIONS
From a Map of West Parish about 1850. ... Frontispiece
OPPOSITE PAGE
Ruinsville Mill
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The Pirates' Den .
25
The First Methodist Meeting House, Westfield.
27
The Farmers' Hotel.
28
The John Loomis House
32
The Fourth School Building
35
Pirates' Lane (near the Den)
38
The Eager Noble House
47
Mr. Horace G. Nelson, standing on the site of
"Boss" Pomeroy's Powder-keg Factory
48
Mr. Thomas Cowles
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FOREWORD
A BOUT the first of May, 1930, in preparing for an auction of the effects of Mrs. Willis H. Gibbs, who had died March sixth, an old tavern sign was found in the attic of her home. Knowing that I was interested in antiques, her mother-in-law, Mrs. Emory H. Gibbs, called me in hopes that I might find out if it had been the sign of the old hotel in this parish. Endeavoring to do so, I learned from a few bits of information given me by Mr. Horace G. Nelson that Mundale had had a very interesting history, much of which would be lost if someone did not obtain and record it before those of the older generation should pass on. It seemed to me to be my duty as well as pleasure to undertake this task. I have endeavored to make it not simply a narration of facts but a story of human interest. As we progress I refer to peo- ple living in Westfield, unless otherwise noted, or, in a few instances, to some whom we well remember, in order to make the old characters more real by mentioning their relationship to people of our ken.
I have used some information obtained from "Land Abstracts From Early Records," to be found in the Spring- field Registry of Deeds, old deeds recorded in the same registry, History of the Connecticut Valley in Massachu- setts by Louis H. Everts, History of Suffield by Hezekiah Spencer Sheldon, Westfield and Its Historic Influences by Rev. John H. Lockwood, D. D., the map of Westfield after 1658, prepared and drawn by Louis M. Dewey, the Record of the West Parish, Westfield, Methodist Episcopal
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Church, Records of West Monzebrook School District 1809-'41, and Historic Hampshire in the Connecticut Val- ley by Clifton Johnson.
To all those who have assisted me in securing informa- tion for this book I wish to express my sincere appreciation. Mr. Horace G. Nelson, who celebrated his eighty-fifth birthday February 22, 1934, was cheerful and untiring in relating historical facts handed down by his father, George Nelson, and others of that generation, who used to gather in the kitchen of his home when he was a boy and discuss the life, past and present, of their parish. His own long life enabled him to tell much that happened many years ago in his own experience and observation. He also vigor- ously piloted me over the old highways and byways, thread- ing barbed wire and pushing through all sorts of brush and brambles. Without his assistance it would have been impos- sible to write this little history. Therefore, to him I am especially grateful.
ELOISE FOWLER SALMOND.
West Parish Filters, Mundale, Westfield, Massachusetts, March 21, 1934.
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MUNDALE, The West Parish of Westfield, Massachusetts, in the Olden Days.
I N THE very early days Munn's Brook, as Mundale was then called, was divided into two sections running east and west. South from a line parallel with the present main street of Mundale, and drawn a very short distance south of it, was the so-called Bull District. North of that, all land as far as the old boulevard, now Western Avenue, was called Loomis District.
In order to get acquainted with the territory, the roads of the old parish, its houses, and some of its people, let us take a horse and buggy, if you please, for a suitable and comfortable journey. With the air unpolluted with any incongruous odor of gasoline, let us try to breathe the atmosphere of the olden days.
Having crossed the modern cement bridge which not many years ago replaced the last of the old covered wooden bridges about here, called the Horton Bridge, from Samuel Horton who conducted the paper mill near by, we turn abruptly to the right, passing several houses. The first just ahead on the right was built by Dennis Barnes (father of Mrs. Robert R. Nelson, 15 Green Avenue) who came down from the old West Granville Road leading into the Wildcat Road.
This road was not accepted by the town until after the blowing up of a powder mill which stood in the depression which shows just northwest of where Horton's mill after-
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MUNDALE IN THE OLDEN DAYS
wards was built, as its proximity to that mill was consid- ered too dangerous. Mr. Horace Nelson's father had come on his way home just about as far as we are now when the fatal explosion took place, and never knew whether he saw the bodies of the two men killed or only timbers thrown high into the air.
Mundale in the earliest days of its history was called Munn's Brook, from the name of the brook which we shall shortly see, which itself was named after John Munn, the first man to receive a grant of farm land in this region from the town, February 7, 1670-ten acres in the "New- found land." This was only the year following the incor- poration of Westfield as a town, and the land granted to him then, lying over yonder west of Munn's Brook, to- gether with many more adjacent acres, is still called Munn's Meadow. The "Newfoundland" included Munn's Meadow and the large tract north of it, which many years later became Woronoco Park. John Munn's home lot of six acres was the third from our present Elm Street on the north side of Main Street. He was in the Falls fight in King Philip's War, where he lost horse, saddle, and bridle. In 1683 aid was asked for him of the General Court, stat- ing that "he is under a wasting sickness by reason of a sur- feit got at the Falls fight and will decline into an incur- able consumption." The following year he died. He was the son of Benjamin Munn, a soldier in the Pequot War, who moved from Hartford to Springfield in 1649, where, no doubt, his son was born in 1652.
In the early part of the eighteenth century Munn's Brook commenced to be called "Hooppole," from the great number of powder-keg factories in the region using many lithe young trees or hoop poles which, being split and
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shaved inside, were then bent and fashioned into hoops for the kegs. Both names were used for quite a while. Then it was called "West Parish" for obvious reasons until a post office was established there, when the government requested a name consisting of one word instead of two. Mr. Milton Davis Knowles, father of Dr. Rollin H. Knowles of New York City, had given the name of Mun- dale to a section just ahead of us, so at a meeting called in the church Mr. George W. Loomis, father of Mrs. John H. Fowler and Mrs. Frank Grant, suggested that the name "Mundale" be made to cover the whole parish. "Why not bring the name right up around to include the whole?" asked Mr. Loomis, and it was done. May 19, 1892, is the date of the appointment of Mr. Horace Nel- son as the first postmaster, when John Wanamaker was Postmaster General of the United States. Two years and a half later Mrs. Alpheus Drake became postmistress and the office was moved from Mr. Nelson's to her home, which I shall mention later as the Seldon Jones house. When Emerson Barnes moved into the Thomas Loomis house he became postmaster there. Then the office was moved back to its second home under A. B. Pendleton, fol- lowed by Sumner Robbins, until about twenty-five years ago when a post office here was given up entirely.
Well, I've taken you in imagination away up into the main street, but really, you see, we have come but a short distance and here we are by a modern store. We shall slip down this road to two houses situated in the hollow to the west. These houses, one larger than the other and neatly kept, were the old boarding houses for a mill which stood a few paces to the north.
We know that early in the 1830's John Shepard owned
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MUNDALE £ IN THE OLDEN DAYS
and operated a carding mill here, almost undoubtedly one and the same mill. At that time there was a canal with two dams which conveyed water for power. Later in the thirties the Westfield Paper Mills Company, consisting of Lucas Cowles, Israel M. Parsons, Boardman Noble, Mat- thew Ives, Norman T. Leonard, George Chandler, John Wilson, Daniel Lee, and Marvin Chapin, bought the property and, no doubt, according to information which has come down to us, were the men who deepened the canal. It seems likely also that the carding mill may have been enlarged, as the value of the real estate was greatly increased and the property was sold for ninety-five hun- dred dollars May 13, 1840, to Cyrus W. Field of Atlan- tic Cable fame. The seventh of the following May, Mr. Field, having been unsuccessful, turned the property back to the Westfield Paper Mills Company.
Westfield citizens proudly relate that having borrowed money which went into this failure of men in the vicinity (Westfield, City View, Southwick, where his brother Mat- thew lived in the house last owned by Mr. Charles Arnold on the east side of the road, just north of the center, which burned a very few years ago) Mr. Field left town, but after achieving a fortune, returned and paid all of his debts with compound interest, I think, in all cases.
The Westfield News-Letter was started in February, 1841, and an item appeared in an early issue, stating, "Our paper is furnished from the mill of Cyrus W. Field & Co. of this town."
In 1844 the property again came into the possession of Mr. Field who sold it the following year to Mr. Asa B. Whitman. Mr. Whitman did a very great deal for the Central Baptist Church. He built and occupied the house
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RUINSVILLE MILL.
Mr. Lozene Osden's horse and carryall. Bus for transporting workers to and from Westfield. Mr. Lozene Osden standing.
MUNDALE IN THE OLDEN DAYS
which later became the Allen Memorial Building, a gift of Mrs. Gustavus Hays to the Baptist Church. In West- field Mr. Whitman was in the hardware business, but just what he manufactured in his mill - if, indeed, he ran it himself - has been impossible to learn.
In 1856 Asa Whitman sold the mill to his brother, Warren. These men were great-uncles of Mrs. W. I. Barton of 77 Firglade Avenue, Springfield, formerly of 37 Broad Street, Westfield. Warren Whitman manufac- tured cotton goods, twine, clothes lines, mops, etc., and the mill was known as "The Twine Factory."
In 1865 Mr. Warren Whitman sold his property to Josiah S. Knowles. He, together with his son Milton D., Langdon Kellogg, George Peck, and Jonathan Hastings, all Westfield men, engaged in the manufacture of whips. It was then that Mr. Milton Knowles named this small section "Mundale," and the company was called "The Mundale Whip Company."
Before this time the boarding houses, once run by Cot- ton Cooley, had ceased to function as such and have since been used as dwelling houses. Mr. Milton Knowles occu- pied the larger of the two houses, and after him Mr. Frank Osden who, with his brother Lozene, both Westfield men, bought out the Knowles and Kellogg Company in 1881 and ran a whip business here under the name of Osden Brothers.
Nobody seemed ever to succeed in this location and the place soon came to be known as "Ruinsville."
Let us get out and take a look at the old site while we give the horse his head to get a bit of grass. The first story of the mill was of brick and the second story of wood painted white. There you see the great hole where the
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MUNDALE IN THE OLDEN DAYS
enormous wheel used to turn, now filled with water from Munn's Brook and Little River. Here is the old canal which brought the water for power. Looking off toward the west we see a part of Munn's Meadow where the mill owner for many years had the right to remove at random material for repairing the dams. So much damage was done to crops in this way that the Westfield Paper Mills Company were obliged to take a deed for yonder pine knoll for the purpose.
At last, in February, 1891, during the proprietorship of the Osden Brothers, the factory burned. The land and remaining buildings were then sold to Crane Brothers when they wished to raise the dam at their upper mill, formerly the Horton Mill, which we passed just before crossing the cement bridge.
Retracing our steps now to where the horse is rather impatiently waiting, we'll climb into the buggy and, back on the main highway, jog along until on the left we come to a house just before we make the turn into the main parish road. It is the old Clapp house, more recently occu- pied by William Hatch's family, emigrants from England. Mr. Jebediah Clapp used to truck for the old Ruinsville mill when it was doing its best with cotton, and many are the bales of that commodity that his old one horse drew out from Westfield, to return with finished products. His daughter, Miss Lucy, was a teacher ; another, Kate, became the second wife of Norman Higgins of the East Mountain section.
As we cross the bridge over Munn's Brook I miss the turtles from the log today. This iron bridge was built about forty-five years ago to replace two small wooden structures. This road had been here for years but the main
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highway led from Loomis Street, opposite the Whittaker Road, across a bridge, over the lowlands to the south of us, coming up into this road at the top of the hill ahead. A year or two after this bridge was built, the one down below was washed away, was not replaced, and since then this has been the only road.
Here on our right I am going to tie the horse to the fence while we crawl between the boards of Mr. Nelson's gate to show you where the old dam was which sent the water from Little River which flowed years ago entirely through the channel of the branch still flowing here, to join with Munn's Brook to flow through the canal to give the power to the mill at Ruinsville. It sounds like "The House That Jack Built," doesn't it? Right here on the right of this footbridge was the old log and stone dam, from which ran an earthen bank southeasterly to that left bank of the old canal yonder. The beautiful pine knoll to the south once formed the right bank diverting the waters into the canal. The gouges in its side show where dirt was obtained to repair the dams.
Let us follow along in the bed of the canal. Here, a lit- tle farther on, the combined waters of Little River and Munn's Brook formed a lake extending south as far as the first bridge down Loomis Street. I shall take you no far- ther because the underbrush and brambles are so dreadful that it is difficult to believe that a road led through them to a point several rods north to a sawmill run by Lucas Cowles, which derived its power from the waters of the two streams dammed at that point. And just above this dam started the canal which carried the power to the Ruins- ville mill.
Sit down here beside me a few minutes, for I must tell
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MUNDALE £ IN THE OLDEN DAYS
you about the deepening of the canal. Micajah Taylor of Westfield contracted for the job. He hired a gang of Irish- men who had been working on the Northampton Canal. They struck red sandstone which was of such a nature that it all had to be picked out instead of blasted. This ate up the contract money long before the work was finished. Mr. Taylor put the situation squarely up to the company who said that the canal must be completed, and that it would be paid for according to the cost.
The story is told that Lydia Nelson Bushnell, then a little girl ten or twelve years old, sister of Mr. Horace Nelson's father, went to spend the night at the home of Mr. Paul Shepard, grandfather of Mr. Fred Shepard of the Bryan Hardware Company. The house was that now occupied by Mr. George W. Winslow, 52 Court Street. She became afflicted with the dreadful malady of homesick- ness and set out straightway for the only cure. When she reached the southern end of Horton's Bridge, where the camp of the wild Irishmen was located, she became so frightened by their mere presence that she ran all the rest of the mile and a half home.
Before we go back to the buggy, let us cross the foot- bridge into Munn's Meadow. When cultivated this was hard land to plow. One day when very young, Horace Nelson was engaged in plowing with two yoke of oxen. Stopping to rest and feed his animals, he gathered them under this very shagbark hickory tree, the oxen lined up south of the youth. Along by the water came Mr. Edwin Smith, hunting birds with his fine gun and beautiful pointer. His son, Mr. W. T. Smith, honored President of the Western Hampden Historical Society and donor of the Edwin Smith Historical Museum in memory of his father,
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gives us the very reliable information that his father was a crack shot. The dog pointed toward the south; Mr. Smith fired; the bird flew northwest; Mr. Smith wheeled and fired again, crack shot indeed, right into the midst of the oxen. Excitement reigned, but the would-be-stampeding quartet were quickly subdued by the active young farmer.
Back again on the road we pull to the top of Black- smith Hill, whence we see the sites of old houses which used to stand on the lowlands to the south. There to the left Mr. Samuel Lee was born and lived in a large house, burned since I went to live in Mundale in 1920. He was the great-grandfather of Miss Mary S. Thayer of I East Silver Street, Mrs. Etta Snow Turner who recently died in Westfield, and Mrs. Patty Lee Clark of Hartford, Connecticut. Later Nelson Andrus lived there and ran a powder-keg factory on the place.
Farther to the south stood the house of John Shepard, great-grandfather of Mr. A. S. Rising of the Northwest Road in Mundale. Across the road to the west was the home of his son Solomon, later occupied by Mr. Archibald Little, great-grandfather of Mr. David Little, 7 Woron- oco Avenue. John Shepard ran a cider brandy distillery, situated southwest of his house on the north bank of Wal- ker Brook, a branch of Munn's Brook. A short distance west were the cider mills belonging to his son.
As we jog along we pass on our right the Mundale Cemetery, the second in the parish, and come to the site of Mr. John Hallbourg's old blacksmith shop on the same side, from which the hill just climbed took its name. Mr. Horace Nelson's father built the shop for Mr. Hallbourg, who came from Alsace-Lorraine. His son Francis now lives at 156 Western Avenue.
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On our left we see a very trim little house, occupied by Mr. Bertram Champlin and his mother. It was originally built by Mr. John Shepard for his son Jehiel, and later became the parsonage. You may have heard it called "the Moses Herrick place."
Next on our right is the home of Mrs. Harry Nelson, widow of the son of Mr. Henry Nelson, brother of Hor- ace. The house was originally built by Mr. Lucas Cowles, a brother of Oren, and great-uncle to Mrs. Jennie Cowing, mother of His Honor Mayor Raymond H. Cowing of Westfield.
In the very early days when men came out from West- field to till their fields, the first well built in Mundale to save going to the spring to the south for fear of Indians, was built here before there was any house, but now the old well is enclosed by the shed.
One day, so the story goes, Mr. Lucas Cowles injured his thumb sawing at his mill. Being a very temperate man he refused the wine which might have done him good. He went out and down to the Walker Brook where a hydraulic ram was being installed, but realizing soon that he was in a very serious condition he came back and told his wife they had better send for Doctor Homer Holland. Doctor Holland had started for Russell so a student doctor re- turned with the messenger. Recognizing a critical condi- tion he sent Mr. Lucas' son across the Northwest Road to see if perchance he could intercept the doctor. He rode so fast that the neighbors wondered at Lucas Cowles' allow- ing a son to ride a horse at that speed, but was too late to catch the doctor. When the latter finally did reach the house, Mr. Cowles had already died. The doctor said a good drink of whiskey would have saved him. Many years
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later his son Henry sawed his thumb. They made him drink and, however it was, he lived.
On the left we pass the site of Mr. Thomas Cowles' house. He was the maternal grandfather of Mr. Lester Campbell of 74 Franklin Street. "Uncle Thomas," as he was affectionately called, was a saint on earth. Everything in connection with the Church was of chief interest to him. He was the sexton, class leader Saturday nights as long as class meetings were held, and he always presided over the prayer meetings in the absence of the minister. For twen- ty-five years he was superintendent of the Sunday school and during that time he started several schools in outlying districts which he conducted Sunday afternoons. In 1855- '56 he served on the Board of Selectmen in Westfield.
Next on our right is a pretty, new bungalow in which we are not especially interested because it is new, but just beyond we come to a little house, very evidently recently renovated. It is the old Lysander Searle house. He was a sawyer, carrying his saw into Westfield to ply his trade. His son, Mr. Frank P. Searle, very recently died at 7 Kellogg Street.
Just beyond is an old and narrow lane down which we are about to turn. On the map I see it is marked "New Road" and no wonder because, though old, it is a short strip leading into the old road to Westfield, built to save going through Mr. Thomas Loomis' field after the old road was discontinued. We cannot go on the first part of the old road as it is entirely obliterated, but I shall tell you about it when we get back onto the main highway.
A little way down on the left, just around a slight curve to the right, we come to the old cemetery, the first ceme- tery in the parish. Just inside you see the stones of Moses
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Sackett and of his wife, Tryphena, and his daughter, Try- phosa. This old burying ground is said to have been filled though there are not many stones. Many colored people were buried here, being brought with much wailing down the old road from miles around.
This cemetery had become too small. People had been buried here in families only in a general way. In the old Munn's Brook Church the question of drinking cold water or allowing one's self the warming effects of an occasional glass of something stronger caused, not long after 1840, a dissension in the Church. Mr. Thomas Loomis of the Hot Water Party was in favor of adding more land to this cemetery, but Mr. Lucas Cowles of the Cold Water Party, being opposed, gave the land for the cemetery at the top of Blacksmith Hill, and was the first person to be buried in it. This last cemetery is laid out in family lots and Mrs. Cowing has a deed dated May 3, 1864, granting to her father, Jarvis Cowles, a lot for $1.50, Mr. Thomas Cowles acting for the West Parish Cemetery Association as its president.
Now continuing down a hill we find ourselves at the site of the old Rogers house on the right, still showing the depression of the old cellar hole. Here was born the mother of Mr. Frank Grant who passed into the Great Beyond March 5, 1932, terminating thirty-three years' service as Treasurer of the Westfield Athenaeum. You will remem- ber that as we passed what has been known for years as the Henry Nelson house I said that it was built by Lucas Cowles. So it was, but he used for its ell part this old Rogers house, drawn there by Micajah Taylor, who was a Second Adventist, or Millerite. He contracted to move the house for a certain sum of money which he wished paid
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immediately, as he expected to be gathered to his fathers at the end of three days and he felt that he must spend his money in that time. The third day passed but he was not called to his reward.
Mr. Rogers had moved to West Springfield where he lived in a house a short distance east of Tatham Hill on the south side of the Springfield Road. His daughter, Miss Amelia Rogers, died at our city infirmary in June, 1926, at the age of one hundred and one years.
Next on the left is the site of the old Purchase house. Mr. Jonathan Purchase, of unusual business ability, had come from England. A little farther on I shall show you the place where he had his fulling mill and made woolen cloth into broadcloth.
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