USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Andover > Andover: symbol of New England; the evolution of a town > Part 32
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39
Andover, only three miles distant, could not keep itself in isolation. As some of the immigrants became prosperous, they discovered that Andover was a pleasant community, cleaner and more attractive than the city in which they worked. William M.
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The celebration of Andover's Tercentenary
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Wood, president of the American Woolen Company, built a house in Andover, and some of his junior executives followed his example. Thus, as the new century went along, Andover also became in some degree cosmopolitan and lost something of its pristine racial unity. The Andover mills still employed an over- whelming proportion of English and Scotch, but here and there a new face was appearing, swarthy and hirsute, of Latin or Slavic origin.
Lawrence in those days was a perfect example of the melting pot at the boiling point. More than once, as I addressed a gradu- ating class in the high school, I watched the boys and girls as they marched up for their diplomas. Their names were strange, like my own, but they were neatly dressed, and they repeated the Salute to the Flag with obvious enthusiasm, while their parents, still a trifle bewildered, gazed on the ceremony with satisfaction and applauded in the right places. These new citizens were thor- oughly American in their loyalties. Indeed many of them were to sacrifice their lives in the two world wars which in the 1900's seemed so impossible. But they were even then quite different in tastes and mores from the Stevenses and Holts and Abbots who had made the region habitable.
Donald Cole concludes his enlightening article with these sig- nificant words:
From these statistics emerges the pattern of immigration in Law- rence. Between 1845 and 1912 many ethnic groups had come to a city which could not have existed without them; and after they arrived they shaped the city as they willed.
Although the notorious Lawrence Strike of 1912 affected di- rectly no operatives in the Andover mills, it did have a profound impact on the town, which had not confronted so much vio- lence in the vicinity since the Indian raids. The strike was a de- plorable affair which could probably have been quickly and justly settled if the mill workers had had a responsible union or if the mill managers had shown even a moderate degree of coöp-
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eration and forebearance. The employees, ignorant and excit- able, were the easy tools of demagogues and rabble-rousers. On the other hand, the mill owners were only too frequently resi- dents of other communities, caring little about working condi- tions so long as dividends were regularly paid. The faults on both sides were numerous, and neither fully understood the other.
The strike was directly brought about by the enforcement of a state law reducing the factory working hours of women and children (not men workers) from fifty-six to fifty-four hours a week and the consequent necessary shutting down of the entire mills for those two hours. The employers had warned the pro- ponents of this legislative measure that its passage would compel the withdrawal from the weekly pay envelope of two hours' pay; but this had not been explained fully to the workers, a large percentage of whom could neither read nor understand English.
All the fuel for mob action was there waiting only for the spark to ignite it. When the workmen found that their take- home pay had been reduced, agitators urged them to walk out, and a mad rush followed. The strike began almost spontaneous- ly on Friday, January 20, 1912, and lasted sixty-three days through the most stormy part of a New England winter. Un- fortunately for everybody honestly interested in a rapid settle- ment, the small Lawrence Branch of the Industrial Workers of the World, better known as the IWW, called in Joseph Ettor, an unscrupulous fomenter of discontent, of Syrian-Italian an- cestry, a complete outsider, unfamiliar with personalities and conditions in the city. Later William D. Haywood, a syndicalist and anarchist whose avowed aim was to stir up trouble, arrived. Many observers felt that the strike could have been settled fair- ly had it not been for the intervention of these incendiaries.
To meet what had clearly become an emergency, Governor Foss ordered out the state militia, who, under the wise command of Colonel E. Leroy Sweetser, undertook to police the city. On the morning of January 29, an Italian woman, Anna Lo Pezzi,
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was killed by a stray bullet. Her death was clearly accidental, but Ettor and his colleague, Arturo Giovanitti, were arrested on a charge of inciting to murder. They were eventually acquitted. As a reprisal William M. Wood was accused of hiring an agent to plant dynamite in a strategic spot and then revealing this as a strikers' plot, but he too was exonerated.
Day after day the strike continued, watched with intense in- terest by Andoverians, only too well aware of the prevailing hysteria. Newspaper men with time on their hands concocted sensational stories; and the usual contingent of sentimental "sob sisters" appeared on the scene to make matters worse. Dis- torted magazine articles increased the tension by the familiar device of perverting the facts. William M. Wood refused to con- fer with a committee of the strikers. On the other hand, the rep- resentatives of the IWW did not really wish a settlement so long as they could make the capitalists squirm.
Finally the strike leaders arranged to send away a consider- able number of young children to other areas, ostensibly as a relief measure but actually and admittedly to arouse public sympathy. An attempt to block their departure was vigorously criticized by certain newspapers, and the employees profited by the incident. The Boston Herald, certainly not prejudiced in fa- vor of labor, said editorially:
The public appears convinced that the textile workers have been inadequately paid, that their conditions of living are most discredit- able, and that something must be done to better them.
The eminent sociologist, Robert A. Woods, on March 16, 1912, in a signed article in The Survey, offered an intelligent analysis of the situation:
This strike, probably beyond any previous one in this country, contains what is as yet an inextricable complication of old and new forces and issues,-the almost spontaneous rising of thousands of apparently helpless and certainly most vaguely understood Italians, Poles, Belgians, Russian Jews, Syrians, Armenians, living an almost
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wholly foreign life; the projection of a group of local men in the sub- ordinate leadership who, though in many ways worthy men in them- selves, called in a group of syndicalistic Socialists, committed to the precipitous mob action of all the workmen in every grade of an industry.
At the end of two months, when it was apparent that every- body was losing, particularly the tradespeople of Lawrence, the mill owners, headed by Mr. Wood, made important concessions on wages. They announced a raise of 5 per cent to 25 per cent, depending on the type of work involved; they gave an increase of 25 per cent in most overtime work; and they corrected some obvious mistakes in the so-called "premium system." On March 14, the strike was officially ended, and most of the men went back to their jobs. The result was hailed as a victory for the employees, and it had widespread consequences, for other tex- tile mills in the state were forced to raise their wage standard also.
Not for many months did conditions in the area return to anything resembling normal. On September 29, 1912, as a re- grettable aftermath, some hoodlums started the wildest demon- stration ever seen in Lawrence, during which the American flag was deliberately trampled upon and the police were openly de- fied. This outbreak aroused loyal citizens to action. On October 12 (Flag Day) they held a patriotic parade, in which thousands of law-abiding residents marched in protest against the un- American ruffians, who had at last disclosed their true intent.
The Lawrence Strike of 1912 was rightly regarded by sociolo- gists as having profound significance. Andover citizens, however, were somewhat ashamed of their close proximity to it, and de- plored the facts which were revealed when the spotlight of pub- licity was aimed at the unhappy city. The workers in Andover mills were for the most part responsible people, not likely to be thrown off balance. Furthermore, the managers and foremen of the Andover factories were in close relationship with the em- ployees, sharing their problems and aware of their needs.
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Nevertheless the president of the American Woolen Com- pany, William M. Wood, was to have a lasting influence on An- dover institutions. Born on April 5, 1858, he was the son of a Portuguese ship cook named Jacintho, a native of Pico, on the island of Santa Maria, in the Azores. The father came to this country in a sailing vessel and took the name of William Jason Wood as a tribute to a benefactor. The legend that his own Portuguese name was Selva, which was easily turned by transla- tion into Wood, seems to have no foundation.
The father settled first on Martha's Vineyard, where his son, William, was born, but he moved when the boy was six to New Bedford. Five years later he died, leaving William, at the age of eleven, without any resources except his energy and determina- tion. The lad withdrew from school to support his family and went to work in the Wamsutta Mills. His rise to fortune was as rapid as that of David Sarnoff or J. Meyer Schine. Through punctuality, diligence, and loyalty, he attracted the attention of Andrew Pierce, chief owner of Wamsutta, and moved up quickly from the ranks, learning all the essential steps in cotton manufacturing. At twenty-one, driven by vague ambitions, he left the local mills and took other jobs, one after another, in the South; but he eventually returned to New England, where he became assistant treasurer and paymaster of the Border City Mills, in Fall River. By this date his competence as a trouble- shooter was recognized, and when the Washington Mills, in Lawrence, the largest in the world, fell into difficulties, Fred- erick Ayer, the controlling stockholder, called in Wood, who was made first selling agent and then treasurer. To round out the ro- mantic picture, he married Ellen Ayer, his employer's daughter.
The 1890's were difficult years for the woolen industry, and some of the leading manufacturers reached the conclusion that a merger was the only solution for their problems. Wood, now high up among textile experts, suggested a workable plan and, with his infectious enthusiasm, carried it through to the incor- poration, on March 29, 1899, of the American Woolen Com-
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pany, with twenty-seven mills, more than five thousand looms, and a capitalization of 65,000,000 dollars. Although it was a ti- tanic project, it was not a monopoly, for it produced at most only 20 per cent of the woolen and worsted fabrics made in this country. At first, Frederick Ayer was president and Wood was treasurer; but the latter, who was relatively young, tireless, and dynamic, headed the company's three-man executive commit- tee and was its dominating personality. He was elected president of the American Woolen Company in 1907, when he was still under sixty, and held that position for nineteen years.
In his prime, Wood was a recognized lone wolf. To an inter- viewer in 1923, he said, "I am a man that works alone. . . . Wheth- er I want to or not, I must travel alone." He also had an inerad- icable confidence in himself and his own judgment. Through the Great Strike of 1912, he ignored well-meant advice from his associates, insisting on standing pat and refusing even to listen to the demands of the workers. In the end, however, even he had to yield to a pressure which threatened to destroy his company and wreck his plans for the future.
These plans had a grandiose quality resembling the dreams of a Renaissance despot or a French monarch like Louis, the Sun King. In 1920, following the First World War, Wood re- solved to create a model community, intended to provide hous- ing for American Woolen Company executives and foremen. He acquired a large area along the Shawsheen River in what for many years had been known as Frye Village and instructed archi- tects to design not only dwellings but also a comprehensive coun- try club with a championship eighteen-hole golf course, a club house, a spacious assembly room with adjoining bowling alleys, a swimming pool, and even a baseball park. There was an im- pressive drug store called Balmoral Spa-the only place north of Boston, Mr. Wood once remarked, where you could buy a dollar cigar. The colony had its own meat market and general store and, in due course, its own post office. Construction went ahead with magical speed, and in 1923 the American Woolen
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Company's headquarters were moved from Boston to the new Shawsheen Village, which was, of course, a part of the town of Andover. The town fathers had naturally done everything with- in their power to promote this extraordinary development. On October 9, 1924, a tablet was unveiled in the administration building commemorating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the American Woolen Company. Within this tablet, which was five feet in height, was recessed a bust of William M. Wood.
Mr. Wood meanwhile had moved his residence to Shawsheen Village and became an Andover citizen. Family misfortunes fell heavily upon him. His daughter, Irene, died in 1918, and his older son, William M. Wood, Jr., whom he was training to take over his responsibilities, was killed in 1922 in an automobile accident. From these blows Mr. Wood did not easily recover. Worn out by incessant activity and disappointed in some of his hopes, he resigned on December 30, 1924, as president and treas- urer of the American Woolen Company. On February 3, 1926, at Daytona Beach, where he had sought refuge in a mood of de- spondency, he took his own life, glad to escape from what for him had indeed been a "fitful fever." At his funeral in Shaw- sheen Village, the brick and stone consummation of his vision, every one of the sixty-three American Woolen Company mills sent a floral tribute, and messages of condolence were received from President Coolidge, Governor Fuller, and hundreds of business friends.
The obituaries spoke of Mr. Wood as "a peculiar compound of despot and philanthropist," pointing out that although he was "arbitrary to a fault in dealing with associates," he was also "the soul of kindness to humbler employees." He certainly per- formed a creditable number of unsystematic acts of generosity, but he could also be completely ruthless when opposed. Of his power, amounting at times to genius, there can be no doubt. Through such personages as Judge Phillips and Mrs. Stowe, Nathaniel Stevens and William M. Wood-quite different from one another-Andover became something more than a "typical
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New England town." But it has been a symbol of what such a town, under favoring auspices and the right guidance, can become.
Coincidental with the spectacular rise of William M. Wood was that in another field of John Nelson Cole. Born in Andover, November 4, 1863, five years after Wood, he attended the local schools; and although he had no funds for a college education, he early displayed a high intelligence and an unusual gift for fluent, effective speech. At the age of twenty-four he became associated with the Andover Townsman, the local newspaper which was to be his useful plaything for the remainder of his life. In 1903, at forty, he was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, where his ability to clarify and summarize issues gave him almost immediate prominence. Chosen Speaker of the House in 1905, he held that office for three terms. In de- bate he was exceptionally and successfully aggressive. Governor Channing H. Cox once said of him, "John N. Cole was a positive character. He always had convictions, and he always took sides." He was married, September 21, 1886, to Minnie White Poor, by whom he had one son, Philip, and three daughters.
Once established on the Republican political ladder of the 1900's, Cole's ambition drove him on. In 1908, he attempted to move up one more round by becoming a candidate for the Re- publican nomination for lieutenant-governor, running against two formidable opponents, Louis A. Frothingham and Matthew Luce. But Cole had made enemies, particularly an instructor on the Phillips Academy faculty, who accused him of political cor- ruption and aroused public opinion against him. At the Repub- lican convention, held on September 23, 1908, Frothingham had a decisive lead on the first ballot, and Cole withdrew in a grace- ful speech. He was never again to run for office. In 1916, how- ever, Governor McCall appointed him chairman of the state Commission on Waterways; and when this was merged with Highways in 1919, Cole was named as Commissioner of Public Works, in which position he performed a very useful service to
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the Commonwealth. Almost literally worn out by strenuous work, he died on October 18, 1922, not yet sixty years old.
"John N.," as he was called by nearly everybody within his wide range, was a formidable opponent anywhere. As editor of the Townsman he had always at hand a convenient medium for expressing his views, and his tongue and pen could be equally scathing. As a reporter at Andover town meeting in his later years, he had, by common consent, a table near or on the plat- form, and his intimate knowledge of rules of order was often helpful, especially when the moderator became confused. A thick-set figure, with round face, bald head, visible teeth, and a smile which could be both placating and relentless at the same time, he was obviously the dominant personality on the floor, and even those who didn't like him were afraid of his knowledge and experience, and remained silent. Sometimes, with his thick neck and glancing eyes, he resembled a mad bull; and then a grin would break through, and he was as benign as Mr. Pickwick. At one period it seemed as if he might rise to any height in the Re- publican Party, but some not quite explicable deficiency broke the continuity of his progress.
Cole and Wood, contemporaries on the Andover scene, were much alike. Both were poor boys who rose to distinction by perseverance and their native wits. Both were tough-minded, impatient by temperament, conservative in their thinking, and inclined to be dictatorial. They understood one another and often worked together. If they had differed, sparks would have flown whenever they met.
Throughout this period Andover voted persistently and con- sistently Republican. In 1904, it gave Theodore Roosevelt 770 against Parker's 271. In 1908, it went for Taft against Bryan by 797 to 274. In 1912, when the Republicans were split, it gave Wilson 384, Taft 436, and Roosevelt 364. In all three of these presidential elections about fifteen voters cast their ballots reg- ularly for the Socialist, Eugene V. Debs. It would be interesting to know who some of these "radical rascals" were.
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Andover had no state senator or Congressman of its very own during these years, although William S. Knox, a Lawrence law- yer who sat in the House of Representatives for four terms (March 4, 1895-March 3, 1903), was later a resident of the town. Among those who represented the town in the state House of Representatives when Andover and North Andover were placed together as District 6 were Charles Greene (1890 and 1893), James B. Smith (1891 and 1892), and others. In 1897, a rear- rangement grouped Andover with Middleton and North An- dover as District 8, which William Odlin represented in 1897 and 1899 and Albert Poor in 1898. Not for many years had any Andoverian been able to serve long enough in the legislature to learn procedures and make himself felt. In 1903, however, John N. Cole was chosen from the same district and remained for four successive terms, largely because he frightened any possible com- petitors off. When, in 1907, Andover became District 9, all by itself, Cole continued to be its representative until his defeat as a candidate for lieutenant-governor terminated his political ca- reer. Representatives from Andover succeeding him were Sam- uel H. Boutwell (1910), Harry M. Eames (1911-1912-1913), and Samuel H. Bailey (1914). It is unnecessary to remark that all these gentlemen were staunch, undiluted Republicans. No Dem- ocrat would have had a chance at the polls.
In 1913, Andover revived a tradition by receiving two former Presidents of the United States. At the Phillips Academy Com- mencement in June, Theodore Roosevelt, who had a son in the graduating class, addressed the alumni, pointing out that the best citizen is both practical and idealistic and delivering a sol- emn warning based on the American flight at the Battle of Bla- densburg. At Founders' Day at the Academy, on October 11, the chief guest was William Howard Taft, who spoke outdoors from a stand erected on Brothers' Field, giving the boys some excel- lent advice. He was applauded when he declared, "I am no re- actionary. I am in favor of making progress, but I am in favor of making progress on the solid foundation that those who went
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before us laid for that progress." The appearance of these two eminent but quite different Americans in the same year at An- dover was especially noteworthy because only in the preceding autumn they had been rival aspirants for the Presidency. On this same Founders' Day another guest was Henry L. Stimson, an alumnus and trustee of the school and former Secretary of War, who was often to visit the town in years to come.
The death on October 4, 1901, of Dr. Cecil F. P. Bancroft, principal of Phillips Academy, removed a citizen who had been a good friend of the town and its people. Broad-minded and pro- gressive, he had brought in 1873 a new spirit to a school which was threatened with ossification. He had been not only chairman of the general committee for Andover's two hundred and fiftieth anniversary but also a director of the Andover National Bank and of the Merrimack Insurance Company. He was succeeded after a brief interim period by Alfred E. Stearns, who, under the title of principal (changed in 1928 to headmaster), was to be deeply concerned over the relationship between Town and Gown. Like his predecessor, Dr. Stearns never declined or evad- ed a responsibility which promoted the welfare of Andover. Ev- erybody in the community was proud of his honors; and nobody was at all astonished when, in 1928, a national Rating of Private Schools placed Phillips Academy first, with Exeter second, Hotch- kiss third, and Hill School fourth.
An event of profound significance to the town was the with- drawal from it in 1908 of Andover Theological Seminary. Since the 1880's, for reasons which need not be explained here, its en- rollment had been dwindling; and shortly after 1900 even opti- mistic faculty members began to realize that unless it were to perish of sheer inanition, some radical shift in policy was in- evitable. The trustees, believing that a change of location was essential, perfected an agreement with Harvard Divinity School under which the Seminary would be moved to Cambridge but still retain its identity. Some of the legal complications were ap- parently solved by the passage of a legislative act creating a new
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and separate board of trustees for Andover Theological Semi- nary. Thus ironically the institution founded in 1808 partly as a protest against the rising tide of Unitarianism at Harvard was glad to take refuge under an affiliation with the college which the Seminary founders had so much hated. With the subse- quent departure of Seminary faculty, Andover lost some of her outstanding citizens, scholars with national and international reputations.
Since the Seminary grounds and buildings could no longer be used for the original purpose, an arrangement was made for their sale to Phillips Academy, the logical purchaser. Principal Stearns was thus confronted early in his administration with the necessity of raising 250,000 dollars, for the acquisition of several old halls and dormitories and more than two hundred acres of land. Through stupendous efforts he and the treasurer, James C. Sawyer, accomplished this feat, and in 1916 the final payment was made and the transaction completed. Naturally the addi- tion of this very considerable property opened a new era for the Academy under "Al" Stearns as leader.
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