A History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, vol 1, Part 2

Author: Hutt, Frank Walcott, 1869- editor
Publication date: 1924
Publisher: New York, Chicago, Lewis historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 570

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The steps that led up to the construction of the court house of today are as follows: Commissioners were appointed to settle the question of

INTRODUCTORY

the eastern boundary of Rhode Island, and as a result, in 1746, Tiverton, Little Compton, Bristol, Warren, Barrington and Cumberland were set off to Rhode Island. It was then that Bristol lost the distinction of being the county seat. Thereupon, the act establishing Taunton as the shire town of Bristol county was passed at the session of the General Court of Massa- chusetts, begun and held at Boston, November 6, 1746, and the records were removed to Taunton, where the first session of the Court of Common Pleas was held, December 9, 1746, Hon. Seth Williams, George Leonard and Stephen Paine presiding. The Court of Sessions was held the same day, fifteen justices being present.

The county house of 1747 was built considerably to the front of the present structure, and, though of simple construction, it answered the purpose for about a quarter of a century. On December 17, 1771, the court ordered that a new court house be built, "to be 48 feet square and 24 feet post; and George Leonard jr., Benjamin Williams, Robert Treat Paine and Daniel Leonard, esquires, or either two of them, are appointed a committee to dispose of the now standing court house, by sale thereof, or by taking it down and disposing of the timbers." Therefore the old building was removed to Court street, and finally to Leonard street, where it is now used as a boarding house. The second court house, like the first, was built of wood, and that in 1826 gave way to a brick building that was removed to Court street, and is now used for District Court purposes.

It was in 1821 that the judicial system was organized in this county, and the Court of Common Pleas for the Commonwealth was established. The Superior Court was established in 1859, to take the place of the Court of Common Pleas.

Material Development-From the standpoint of their general farming interests, Bristol county townships have for some years held third position, in the estimate of experts, among Massachusetts counties' townships -- the farmers' enterprise, the excellence of the soil conditions, and the number of farms themselves, contributing to that standard. The but recently estab- lished farm bureau movement, the increasing cooperation of city and town, and the progress that is being made in the improvement of farming prop- erty, are factors that combine to feature the agricultural proposition in this history approximately to its full value. It is a subject whose continuously historic worth, at least, has been almost completely neglected. Bristol county is nothing if it is not an agricultural community, hundreds of farmers would declare. The other factors in the industrial world here are almost unparalleled, some of them, yet they are of comparatively recent establishment. But the agriculturist we have always had with us.

When we are told that 49 per cent. of the county lands are in farms, we become aware of the influence of the farmer. With Worcester and Hampden counties in the lead, Bristol county follows with 3770 farms to her credit, and within her area of 567 square miles. With her 324 farms of from 100 to 174 acres, 1108 farms of from 20 to 40 acres, and three farms of 1,000 acres and over, the approximate land area in farms here is 362,860 acres; improved land, about 69,000 acres, and woodland about 71,000 acres.

Such attested figures as the following suggest a county-wide agricul- tural influence: The value of farming property is (1923) close to $27,-

BRISTOL COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS

000,000; the value of land in farms is over $11,000,000; that of farm build- ings nearly $11,000,000; of implements and machinery, nearly $2,000,000; of live stock on farms, over $3,000,000. The average value of land alone, per acre, is $62.47, and the number of farms operated by the owners them- selves is close to 3300. More than 5000 horses are in use on Bristol county farms, their total value being rising $20,000, and the total number of cattle is 18,500, valued at $1,886,000. The total of beef cattle is more than 900, valued at over $74,000; dairy cattle, more than 17,000, with a value greater than $1,811,000; sheep, over 400, worth rising $10,000; goats, about 80, value about $2,200; swine, 11,700, valued at more than $272,000. Through- out the county, more than 7,000,000 dairy products are raised, valued at $2,870,000; eggs and chickens total more than 1,265,000, at a value of more than $1,085,000. And the value of all crops including vegetables, hay and fruits is approximately $4,000,000.

Among the modern and at the present day very active organizations that have been established in the special interests of the farmer are the North and South Bristol Farmers' clubs, the County Holstein Club, Milk Producers' Association, the County Cow-testing Association, dairymen's clubs, farm clubs in the various towns, poultry protective associations; and clubs for boys and girls in the city and town schools, in pig and poultry raising and home economics.

The county fairs were the unique social occasions of seventy-five and one hundred years ago, when the towns were growing into cities, and be- fore the host of new-comers had arrived. It was the Bristol County Agri- cultural Society that was the means of providing the show and diversion for farm-folks and everybody else, and within the bounds of its existence is included the record of the social recreations and contests of a century for county people.

On June 21, 1820, a group of agriculturists and men of other callings convened at the hostelry in Taunton, known as Atwood's Hotel, that stood at the corner of City Square and Weir streets. The gathering consisted of men from different parts of the county, and they there and then started the society that was the fifth of its kind and purpose in this State, and all succeeding farmers' societies here have taken inspiration from that one. Leaders in the movement were Hon. Samuel L. Crocker, one of Taunton's captains of industry; Rev. Otis Thompson, of Rehoboth; and Thomas Kin- nicut, of Seekonk.

The first annual meeting of the society, which was a mutual organiza- tion with farmers and manufacturers, took place, but officers were not elected until October, 1821, when Hon. Samuel L. Crocker was chosen president; Rev. Otis Thompson of Rehoboth, Rev. Pitt Clark, of Norton, Nathaniel Morton of Freetown, and Thomas Almy of Dartmouth, vice- presidents; Horatio Leonard, of Raynham, recording secretary; James L. Hodges of Taunton, financial secretary; Peter Thacher of Taunton, treasurer. Hon. Francis Baylies, Old Colony historian, Samuel L. Crocker and James L. Hodges visited the county towns to arouse interest; and when at the meeting that was held in April, 1823, it was announced that the sum of $1,000 had been raised, it was voted to have a public exhibi- tion. The act of incorporation was also passed in 1823, and on October 21 that year, the first exhibition of the society took place. During the first

INTRODUCTORY

ten years, with but one exception, these events were held in Taunton, and afterwards they became portable affairs. At the opening fair there were thousands in attendance, and Hon. Francis Baylies was the leading speaker. The amount paid in premiums at that time was $161. In 1853 Taunton was established as the fixed location of the society, and the Sproat lot was purchased for the sum of $5,000. From the older society a new one de- veloped in 1860 at Myricks, that was continued many years.

The fairs of the original organization were continued at the Sproat lot, and in 1863 it was voted to have the exhibition three days instead of two, while in October of that year the exhibition building was erected. In 1864 Hon. Oliver Ames of Easton was elected president of the society, and he was succeeded in 1869 by William Mason, of Taunton, who in 1872 presented the society with the judges' stand. The fair of 1875 went into sheds and barns, and in the Centennial Year, 1876, the society cooper- ated with the leading industrial organizations of the State in representing Massachusetts at the Philadelphia Exhibition. Theodore Dean was the president that year, and he was succeeded in 1884 by Philander Williams. In 1892 the society was reorganized, and after many vicissitudes the prop- erty was disposed of to Walter N. Smith. The fair of 1885 was considered the most profitable in the history of the institution, when the receipts for the three days amounted to $9,000.

The Bristol County Agricultural School is the outstanding institution of the kind in this county that has made itself and its aims known, and secured a high value for its mission since any other history of the county was written. In the ten years of its existence (1913-1923), George H. Gil- bert, directed and aided by capable boards of trustees and advisers, has directed the school, and the scope of its influence has ranged the county bounds, and beyond.

While it has a curriculum of study and a force of teachers that fulfill the requirements of the farmer-student, the school also has made its pres- ence permanent here because of the vital efforts being made to be of prac- tical use to the farmer in general, as well as to interest boys and girls in garden-making, in poultry and pig raising, in canning, in rural home-mak- ing, and the like. Since county conferences and demonstrations have be- come annual features of the school's constructive work, the Bristol county farmer everywhere has become interested, and his inquiries for assistance and advice from this source are part of his own day's work. The school has its attractive location in the town of Dighton, near the geographical centre of the county (the railroad station nearby being that of Segreganset) with Taunton and the Attleboros to the north, and Fall River and New Bedford and their clustering villages to the south.

Looking back to the beginnings of the institution, a law was signed by the Governor of the State, March 6, 1912, providing that the people of this county should vote at the next State election upon the question "Shall the County of Bristol establish an independent agricultural school?" And a majority of the voters of every city and town in the county favored the establishment of the institution. The law provided that the control of the school property and the management of the school should rest with a board of seven trustees, subject to approval by the Massachusetts State Board of Education, these trustees being appointed by the governor, and the three

BRISTOL COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS

county commissioners being trustees of the school ex-officio; that funds for establishing and maintaining the school should be provided by the county ; but that the county should be reimbursed each year by the State for one- half the cost of maintaining the school; that to enter the school a candidate must not be under fourteen years of age, and that candidates should be admitted without examination, and without the payment of tuition. The work of starting the school was advanced with the appointment of trustees at the beginning of 1913, the election of the school director in February, and the purchase of property, May 12, at Segreganset in Dighton. Land and buildings were then bought, together with a small herd of pure-bred Ayr- shire stock, poultry and some farm equipment. Then began actual farm operations, with the purchase of teams and tools, the farm labor as per- formed by the young men at the school being a necessary part of their agricultural training. The school property now includes a farm of nearly 150 acres on the west bank of the Taunton river, the farm being used first of all as an aid to agricultural instruction, but its management being that of a productive farm. Certain of its areas are devoted to each of the important lines of productive agriculture, such as a dozen acres to orchard, a plot fenced to poultry, another for hog-breeding pens and pasture; others for gardening, small fruits, field crops and dairying. The plant consists of a main building with its offices, class-rooms, laboratories, halls and assembly room ; the hothouses, the poultry and hog houses, barns, silos and stables.

'The school furnishes a four years' course, which includes English farm business and a forum for debates; agricultural botany; mathematics; agri- cultural survey ; with the usual courses of kitchen gardening, small fruits raising; and the care of beef cattle, draft horses, dairying, etc .; and project work, like the caring for poultry, hives of bees, a market garden, a dairy herd, etc. Graduates have often been placed as managers and assistant managers of farms, as herdsmen, as supervisors of home gardening, and as foremen. Class-room work begins the first Monday in October, and continues through the last week of April; legal holidays, the Friday of Thanksgiving week, and ten days in December, excepted; though the school is actually in session the entire year, and the teachers are co-operat- ing with the pupils through the summer at home and elsewhere. Lectures and institutes, the annual Bristol County Fair, and tours of observation of successful farming, are part of the year's programme. The county farmers are in constant touch with the school and its purpose through the county agent, a member of the staff specially appointed for that work, and the calls are miscellaneous, such as those for plant-insect troubles, seed-testing, pruning and spraying methods, poultry-raising and farm building plans. Throughout the year, hundreds of farm visits are made, with demon- strations in orchard-planting, spraying, caponizing, apple-grading. Also, the boys and girls in the school have been directed in their corn clubs, in garden club work, dairy, poultry and canning club work, as well as in home economics. The officers of the school, in 1923: Board of Trustees : Allen P. Keith, New Bedford, president; Joseph K. Milliken, North Digh- ton, vice-president; John I. Bryant of Fairhaven, and Algernon H. Barney of Swansea, auditors; William N. Howard, North Easton; Richard E. Warner, Taunton; Arthur M. Reed, North Westport. The teaching staff : George H. Gilbert, director; Curtis Peckham, manager and instructor in

INTRODUCTORY

poultry ; Walter E. Curtis, instructor in farm crops and soil fertility; David A. Millard, instructor in animal husbandry and dairying; H. Judson Robinson, instructor in gardening; Lester W. Simmons, instructor in orcharding and small fruit culture. Extension staff: Warren L. Ide, as- sistant director and county agricultural agent; Flora M. Miller, home demonstration agent; Edwin R. Wyeth, junior agricultural agent. Advisory council: Elmer M. Poole, North Dartmouth, president; Mrs. Lucy P. Morse, Segreganset; John A. Smith, South Westport; Ralph M. Strange, Taunton; Charles S. Bliss, Raynham; Russell L. Hutchinson, Raynham; Alden C. Walker, Norton; Frank G. Arnold, Touisset; Mrs. W. H. Allen, Mansfield; Mrs. Percy Blatchford, Rehoboth.

The institution met with the severest loss in its history when the main building was burned on the morning of January 17, 1923. The build- ing, a brick structure two stories in height, built in 1915, at a cost of $35,- 000, housed the classrooms and administrative offices. The equipment of the school was a total loss, but plans for rebuilding were immediately begun.

The Forestry Division of the State has given generous attention to the county, especially in the popular proposition of taking over, upon agreement with owners, and planting many theretofore barren properties with white pine. Thus there are now five Forestry plantations in Bristol county, totalling two hundred acres, the sections planted being those in Attleboro, Berkley, Raynham, East Taunton and Freetown. The enter- prise, that was started about 1910, has brought about satisfactory results here and there. Formerly wild and otherwise useless lands, that had been placed in the care of Forestry, are now valuable pieces of property with their growing timber. Besides the farmers, too, the cities have become interested and Forestry associations and committees on Forestry interests have been formed in a number of communities. The business of Forestry, as well, is to protect farm-lands and growing timber; and Fall River has its district fire warden, while there are fire-towers at Fall River, Rehoboth and Acushnet. The work of safeguarding against fire is county-wide.

The State Division of Fisheries and Game has forwarded its notable effort in this county, as elsewhere, by installing fishways wherever it has been found necessary to do so, and by planting mature alewives upon the spawning grounds in the fresh-water ponds. Stocking operations have been performed in Taunton river. For a long time, these natural spawning grounds have been shut off by dams; and the ponds in the Nemasket river above the county, were the only breeding grounds at hand for keeping up the supply of the Taunton river alewives-this limitation being one of the chief reasons for the lessening of alewive fishery on Taunton river. The work of developing the Taunton alewive fishing by this means was undertaken in 1917, when a new fish-way was installed at East Taunton; and in 1921 work was started on the final fishway in the Taunton river series at the Eastern Investment Company's property on Town river.

Bristol county receives its proportionate share of the fish distributed from the fisheries station, fish planted in the county from December 1, 1921, to November 30, 1922, being as follows: Brook trout eggs planted in streams, 25,000; brook trout fingerlings, 65,750; brook trout yearlings and adults, 900; small mouth bass fry, 48,000; small mouth bass fingerlings, 2200;

BRISTOL COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS

small mouth bass adults, 115; yellow perch fingerlings, 8000; white perch adults, 5600; pike perch fingerlings, 450,000; horned pout fingerlings, 6000.

The State fire warden, the fish and game warden and the Forestry department frequently co-operate in the county, as their work is related in several ways.

With the increase of population in Bristol county to twice the number of three decades ago, the question of the water supply of the large cities is one of the leading problems continuously affecting the county's general wel- fare. The State Department of Public Health is the source of such infor- mation that brings facts up to the minute in this regard, and it is through Hon. Thomas J. Morton that these facts have been ascertained.

The county is fifth in number of inhabitants in the State, and fourth in density of population, the population per square mile being exceeded only by Suffolk, Middlesex and Essex counties. Five-sixths of the popula- tion is concentrated in New Bedford, Fall River, Taunton and Attleboro, and most of the remaining municipalities of considerable population are ad- jacent to those cities. The city of Attleboro, whose population in 1920 was 19,731, obtains its water supply from reservoir and ground-water sources in the water-shed of the Seven Mile river, and the consumption of water in the city has reached the safe yield of these sources of supply. There are other waters in the regions about the city, however, from which an addi- tional supply can be obtained independently, so that, in the light of present information, the department states, it will be best for Attleboro to obtain a water supply from independent sources near the city.

The chief problems of water supply in southeastern Massachusetts, the State report has it, are found in Bristol county, and they are especially those of the large and growing manufacturing cities of New Bedford, Fall River and Taunton, in the central and southerly part of the county. Fall River obtains its water supply from North Watuppa pond; and the cities of Taunton and New Bedford, including the towns of Acushnet and Dart- mouth, which are furnished with water by the city of New Bedford, take their supplies from the Lakeville ponds.

The population of the cities of New Bedford, Fall River and Taunton, including that of the towns of Dartmouth and Acushnet, now supplied with water by the city of New Bedford, increased from 144,728 in 1890, to 288,407 in 1920-that is, the population had doubled in thirty years. The aggregate quantity of water used in these municipalities in 1890 was about 7,000,000 gallons per day, while in 1920 it was about 19,950,000 gallons. The growth of these cities in the future will be affected, doubtless, by vary- ing business conditions, changes in industries, and other causes, and these causes will also affect the quantity of water which will be used from the public supply. The per capita consumption of water is gradually increas- ing here, as elsewhere, after the meter system has become established, and in making provision for future water supply requirements, allowance must be made for further gradual increase in the per capita consumption of water. Assuming that these cities will continue to increase in population in the future about as in the past, and allowing for a gradual increase in the consumption of water per capita, the probable future water supply require- ments have been estimated thus for 1925: New Bedford, with estimated

MONUMENT OF ELIZABETH POOL, TAUNTON CEMETERY

SOUTHWEST VIEW OF ANNAWAN'S ROCK, REHOBOTH

CENTRAL PART OF FALL RIVER IN 1840

ANCIENT LEONARD HOUSE IN RAYNHAM

INTRODUCTORY

population of 136,300, total consumption 11,858,000 gallons; Fall River, estimated population 132,800, total consumption 7,556,000 gallons; Taunton, estimated population 40,000, total consumption 3,756,000 gallons.

Because of her dominant manufacturing interests, Massachusetts is rightly considered an industrial rather than an agricultural State, writes George H. Gilbert, director of Bristol County Agricultural School. And what is true for the State as a whole is similarly true for Bristol county. Yet this is not so much because of the meagerness of her agriculture as because of the wealth of her manufactures. There is somewhat over a quarter of a billion of dollars of capital invested in agriculture in Massa- chusetts, yielding an annual return of more than $50,000,000 in created wealth. Among the counties, Bristol ranks but third or fourth in agri- culture, outranked only by such large counties as Worcester, Middlesex, and by the intensive farming in the county of Essex. The exact figures of the latest census are not at hand as I write, but the investment in farming in this county is between fifteen and twenty million dollars, with an annual income from agriculture of about one-third that sum. Bristol enjoys the rather unique distinction of being the only county of the State in which the dairying industry has shown an increase during the past decade. Poul- try husbandry within the county has shown like development. But the possibilities for production of poultry products, of small fruits and orchard fruits for the special market, and of vegetable gardening, have hardly been touched. Until recent years the county has supplied its own whole milk, but of late some milk is being shipped in from distant farms; yet there is no good reason why Bristol county should not largely supply its own food and help supply the large cities just beyond its borders.

The markets are at our very doors, and the roads to market and trans- portation facilities are nowhere better. Home conditions for those on the farm can, in many sections of the county, be made equal to those in the village or city. The best educational opportunities are available for the farmer's family wherever he may live in the county, on a par with those for the children of the city. There are considerable areas of land well suited to farming in the county that are not being farmed, or are only partially developed. The soil is often poor, but is of a type that will re- spond quickly to right handling. What, then, is lacking? Why is farming in such ill repute with the vast majority of people who are residents of the county? There are several reasons. One has already been mentioned- that agriculture is overshadowed by the wealth of city industries. Another very potent factor is that farming in this section very rightly lost prestige in an earlier day, when the Massachusetts farmer could not compete with the free, rich lands of the Middle West, and, consequently, few able young men went into this as a life work. Those conditions have changed, and we shall see steadily increasing numbers of capable young fellows taking to farming in Bristol county. Farming has lagged behind all other industries, almost, in organizing to rightly sell the products of the farm, with the result that a fair price at the farm has been the exception rather than the rule. In this, also, a very rapid improvement is already well under way. The California Fruit Growers worked out their own salvation, and have pointed the way to others. The movement among farmers for cooperative selling and effectively handling their products to their own advantage has,

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A History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, vol 1, Part 2

Author: Hutt, Frank Walcott, 1869- editor Publication date: 1924 Publisher: New York, Chicago, Lewis historical Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 570

Author: Hutt, Frank Walcott, 1869- editor
Publication date: 1924
Publisher: New York, Chicago, Lewis historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 570