USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Athol > History of Athol, Massachusetts > Part 23
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In relating the story of the mills along this brook and the other streams we will (as we have done in the story of South Brook) tell the story in the order of their location, beginning at the head waters rather than by dates of development.
About the middle of the nineteenth century industrial de- velopment along Mill Brook made a more steady flow of its
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waters imperative, and to accomplish this a group of these mill owners planned a series of reservoirs to impound flood waters and release them in periods of drought. This original group consisted of Abram and Ira Oakes, owners at Pegville, Edwin Ellis, owner at Water Street, Festus F. Amsden, then interested at Mechanic Street, Jacob S. Cooke and Laban Morse at Pleasant Street, and Dexter Cheney, an adjoining owner, Theodore Jones at Mechanic Place, Frederick Jones and Milton Baker at Chestnut and Main Streets, and Lyman W. Hapgood at Chestnut and Hapgood Streets.
The first reservoir built by these associates was in Athol, a short half mile south of our former Welfare Home; the next and larger reservoir, known as No. 2, was perhaps a quarter of a mile south of No. 1, its dam being in Athol but much of its flowage area in Phillipston. As this is written, studies are being made looking to the taking of this No. 2 reservoir for an additional source of water for Athol's Municipal Water System.
No. 3 reservoir was built about 1854, on a small brook tributary to Mill Brook and a short half mile northeast of Peg- ville.
Some time later these associates were incorporated as Athol Water Company, thus forcing Robert and Solon Wiley to adopt another name for their original municipal water system. They chose Athol Acqueduct Company as their name but at a later period Athol Water Company became Athol Reservoir Com- pany and still later Mill Brook Associates and Athol Acqueduct Company became Athol Water Company.
Downsteam from these reservoirs the first industrial plant we come to was at "Pegville", the dam being west of Garfield Road and the mill pond extending well east of that road. Here long ago was a flourishing mill producing a variety of wooden items including shoe pegs. It was operated by Abraham Oakes and later by his son Ira, one George Wilder, and for a short time L. J. Whitney. In early deeds, Abraham Oakes describes himself as a "plough maker" which is not inconsistent with the operating of a woodworking plant as these implements were made entirely of wood previous to around 1835. According to my notes this mill was first taxed in 1833.
When the use of wooden pegs in the manufacture of foot- wear ceased, this property fell into disuse and was eventually acquired by Athol Water Company and a mechanical water filter installed there. Since the construction of the filter beds off the north end of Hillside Terrace, this power has been en-
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tirely idle although the dam is maintained by the Water De- partment.
Next below this filter location is a substantial stone dam said to have been built by the Pegville owners when their business seemed to warrant expansion, but my information is that the project was never completed.
Next on the stream and just east of Petersham Road was a substantial reservoir built as an auxiliary to the saw mill below.
The reserve waters from this pond were released into a small fore-bay west of Petersham Road, thereby wasting fully half the available "head" for this mill. Various owners recalled are Edward Drury, William B. Spooner, Orcutt and Samuel D. Prouty, Jonathan Drury, Eric D. Walker, Edmund Moore, Charles H. Butterworth, and T. Sidney Mann the present own- er. The land and buildings are utilized by the Mann Lumber Company, but the use of the water power was discontinued some twenty years ago.
Pressing hard upon the tail race of this last named saw mill are the waters of Lake Ellis, the most pretentious development on Mill Brook.
Much of the land covered by these waters was, previous to about 1840, a peat bog from which that fuel was cut at times.
7
EELLAS ISOL SASH & BUND MANUFACTURERE
1
EDWIN ELLIS FACTORY, WATER STREET, ABOUT 1885
Across this bog the road to Templeton and Boston crossed when first laid out in 1754, this section being a cordroy or log road.
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June 22, 1843, Timothy Hoar, William Fletcher and Jonathan Kidder acquired some fifteen acres of land which later became a part of the Ellis plant. At approximately where Water Street crosses Mill Brook they built a dam of rather large proportions utilizing the water to produce power for a woodworking mill which they erected west of the dam.
There is some evidence that this mill power was a rejuve- nation of a mill power long before developed and abandoned on this site, but the mill pond dates back only to 1843. The entire area was a part of a hundred acre lot (126 acres) laid out to John Ballard on the right of John Fiske and is numbered 47 on the plan.
Kidder, early in 1845, disposed of his share in this enter- prise to his partners, and the preponderance of evidence is that later in 1845 Mr. Fletcher likewise retired from the busi- ness.
On December 18, 1845, this dam suddenly gave way re- leasing a large volume of water into Mill Brook. The Hoar factory was destroyed, as were several others down the stream.
Succeeding this disaster, the ownership passed through sev-
DEA. EDWIN ELLIS 1822 - 1888
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eral hands until finally on March 13, 1852, it became the property of Edwin Ellis, a native of (North) Orange who speed- ily developed it into a prosperous industry continuing until his death on July 9, 1888. Succeeding him, his family carried on for a time.
In 1889 the Athol Reservoir Company entered upon a plan to improve the water powers of Mill Brook by increasing many fold the storage capacity of Lake Ellis.
It acquired the old Ellinwood dam and power on Doe Valley Road, got assents to flow intervening land, and asked the town of Athol, in the guise of improving Water Street, to rebuild the Ellis dam raising its spillway three feet, giving assurance that if this could be done the reservoir company would attend to all other details including land damages and the building of a new dam at Doe Valley Road with the spillway the same height as that contemplated at Lake Ellis. Against the better judgment of many citizens the appropriation was made and the prosecution of the work delegated to Gardiner Lord, Orrin F. Hunt and Henry Grey, its Selectmen, with the addition to the committee of James M. Lee, O. A. Fay and James F. Whit- comb.
The Water Street job was completed in 1889 as directed by the town, the spillway was raised the full three feet and an iron bridge constructed carrying Water Street across the dam, but none of the waters of Lake Ellis have ever flowed over that spillway for the agreement of Athol Reservoir Company was not kept and no dam was built at Doe Valley Road.
The bridge at Water Street was maintained until 1948 when it was removed and an earthen roadway constructed above the spillway.
The 1889 construction provided for a pen stock into the Ellis Plant and through this for sixty years a moderate supply of water has been released into Mill Brook, but all surplus or flood waters have found their way into South Brook and through it into White Pond, Rohunta and Millers River.
Adverse economic conditions eventually proved to be the undoing of the Ellis family. To add to their troubles the plant was destroyed by fire on May 15, 1896, but was rebuilt and was again in operation in less than a year. Bankruptcy pro- ceedings ensued in late 1897 and the plant was sold at auc- tion to Alfred J. Raymond and Millard W. White, both of Royalston; Mr. Raymond also purchasing the Ellis homestead at 1405 Main Street.
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Mr. White soon retired from the business leaving Mr. Ray- mond as sole owner and he carried on an active business there for some thirty years.
Eventually financial difficulties overtook Mr. Raymond also and the plant again went under the auctioneer's hammer.
After a relatively short period of idleness it was acquired by Swift River Box Company, a refugee from North Dana which village was wiped out by the huge Quabbin Reservoir project, and by this company active operations are still continued there, but it is many years since the water power at this plant has been utilized.
Next on this stream is the so-called Morse plant at the end of Mechanic Street. Here about 1833 Timothy Hoar built a dam and factory and began manufacturing there. The factory was burned February 14, 1842 but "by the exertions of the (fire) company the lumber house and small shop were saved." (Records of Engine Co. No. 2).
The factory was rebuilt only to be destroyed again when the dam above gave way December 18, 1845.
L. MORSE AND SON SHOP ABOUT 1879
Soon after this disaster Mr. Hoar sold this plant to Washing- ton H. Amsden and his brother, Festus F. Amsden, natives of Dana who had recently removed here. These brothers con-
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tinued there until March 4, 1864 when fire again destroyed the plant.
Mr. W. H. Amsden then purchased the Kennebunk Street plant and removed the Amsden business there, the Mechanic Street plant being sold to Laban Morse who, with his sons Henry T. Morse, Leander B. Morse and Frank F. Morse, re- moved their furniture manufacturing from Main Street, corner of Pleasant Street, and there it continued under the name of L. Morse & Sons for seventy-five years. Henry T. Morse re- tired from the business and removed to Boston, Laban Morse died January 31, 1890, Leander B. Morse died November 3, 1924, and Frank F. Morse died April 1, 1916, but he had been inactive in the business for some years before his death, the burden of the management falling upon Sumner L. Morse, son of Leander B. Morse, who actively entered into the business in 1886.
March 23, 1935, the business, then a Massachusetts cor- poration, was sold to Robert E. Greenwood, once of Gardner
LABAN MORSE 1812 - 1890
but later of Fitchburg, under whose management it became bankrupt and was liquidated. Since the bankruptcy various
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small industries have occupied some of the smaller outlying buildings but the main plant has been abandoned as a factory and allowed to decay. It was entirely removed in 1953.
Soon after the sale of the business to Mr. Greenwood, Mr. Sumner L. Morse resumed manufacturing in a small way in a disused barn which stands on the spot where his grandfather started making furniture over a century previously, and there he continues in business.
Below this Morse factory site and above Spring Street there was long ago an impounding dam storing surplus water for the powers below but this has been abandoned many years.
Mill Brook, until perhaps 1830, after leaving the Morse plant ran northerly across Main Street into an area of low land southeast of Summer Street, probably having sometime con- tinued northerly across Winter, Glen and Kennebunk Streets into Millers River, although its main course, either natural or artificial, turned south from the Summer Street area, recrossed Main Street, flowing thence in its present course into Lord's Pond. As the mills below were developed the course was changed, cutting off the flow across Main Street.
The whole area near the junction of Main and Pleasant Streets was originally owned by a family named Wood who pioneered here from Stowe.
In the original division of the house lots in Pequoig Lot No. 1, E E was drawn by John Wood, and four other tracts in that immediate area were allocated to a kinsman, Jeremiah Wood. Adjoining some of these was 100-acre lot No. 25 set off to Isaac Ball out of which this family acquired some acreage. In fixing the location of this No. 1 E E it must be borne in mind that as originally laid out, Pleasant Street ran in a straight line its entire length, the deflection at Kelton Street having been effected by the Worcester County "Sessions" some sixty years later. This would bring Pleasant Street into Chestnut Street probably slightly west of the Evangelical Congregational Church. The Wood residence was at approximately 1729 Main Street.
Between Spring Street and Pleasant Street there were two and possibly three water powers developed.
The first to develop here was Paul Morse, a tanner, who purchased of Esq. Humphrey, administrator of the estate of Kimball Wood, one acre and eighty-six rods of the House Lot, it having a frontage of 16 rods on Main Street and 23 rods on
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Pleasant Street. On this he built a house (probably the one now numbered 44 Pleasant Street), a bark house, built at about 1719 Main Street and now the dwelling at No. 100 Bearsden Road, a hide mill about on the site of the present S. L. Morse Manufacturing Company building at 38 Pleasant Street, and a Curry Shop, possibly the building now a dwelling at No. 1 Morse Place. Here he conducted a successful business until his death, June 25, 1841. His business was continued by his sons, Laban and Sumner Morse, until the buildings were de- stroyed by the freshet of December 18, 1845. July 10, 1847 the Morse brothers conveyed the bark house to Dexter Cheney who converted it into a wheelwright shop. From this point this title was merged with two other acquisitions of Mr. Cheney, recited below. In 1851 Mr. Cheney conveyed it to Jacob S. Cooke, also a wheelwright. After Mr. Cooke's death, Febru- ary 4, 1876, the property passed by conveyance to George S. Brewer.
Mr. Brewer was a native of Petersham who had come here in the early seventies. His first activity was in company with Dwight E. Bass in the woodworking business at the Hapgood mills. In 1873 this partnership was dissolved and Mr. Brewer, in company with his brother-in-law, Warren D. Lee, were active for a time. Part of the Main Street mill was occupied for several years by Dennis Goddard, box manufacturer, but this business was purchased by Mr. Brewer in 1892. The old factory was burned but was speedily rebuilt and operations resumed. House finish, screen doors and windows were among the prin- cipal activities there.
In January 1900, Frank C. Hastings and Christopher J. Kratt joined with Mr. Brewer in organizing Athol Toy Company which operated only about a year under that management. Messrs. Hastings and Kratt sought other employment and Mr. Brewer turned his interest to automobile sales and repairs.
The toy company was sold to Charles F. Porter who three years later sold it to N. D. Cass who speedily removed it to his Freedom Street plant, selling the Brewer plant to Joseph Wil- cox who removed his comb business there from the brick fac- tory at 1225 Chestnut Street.
Through some prosperity and much adversity the Wilcox family carried on here until 1942 when the factory was sold to George Gerry & Son, an industry whose long established loca- tion had been purchased from them by L. S. Starrett Company for expansion purposes incident to World War II. Previous to this Gerry acquisition the corner lot had been acquired for a
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gasoline filling station but the larger part of the extensive fac- tory erected by the Wilcox interests passed to the Gerry owner- ship.
In 1809, Esq. Humphrey conveyed another part of lot No. 1 lying east of the bark house to Nathan Stone who, on April 6, 1814, conveyed it to Jesse Thayer. December 21, 1815, Mr. Thayer conveyed it to Timothy Hoar, Jr., a native of West- minster who had recently come to town. Mr. Hoar erected a two-story building thereon which he used as a combination. dwelling house and wheelwright shop, the dwelling being for a few years occupied by his brother, William. Power for his shop was obtained from water taken from the bark house flume through a penstock to his breast wheel. About 1832 during his tenure at that location, he built for a home the house numbered 1702 Main Street, and the building numbered 1706 Main Street.in which he established the first bakery in Athol. In his. wheelwright shop he is said to have installed the first circular saw to be operated in Athol and to have been an early manu- facturer of matches there.
The combined industrial and residential property on the southwest side of Main Street was conveyed by Mr. Hoar on February 12, 1833, to William Fletcher and Stephen W. Bliss, the latter a native of Royalston who had recently removed here.
These owners converted the industrial section of the prop- erty into a blacksmith shop, utilizing the water power to op- erate a trip hammer. After five years Mr. Bliss conveyed his interest in the property to Mr. Fletcher who, on April 4, 1845, sold his holdings to Dexter Cheney. Since this conveyance this title has merged with the other Cheney purchases.
December 6, 1826, Paul Morse conveyed a tract at the corner of Main and Pleasant Streets to Joel Stratton, carpenter, who erected thereon a two-story building which he used as a carpenter's shop. In 1832 Mr. Stratton sold this property to Elbridge Boyden, a native of Orange (Fryville) who is described as a carpenter but who later removed to Worcester and became a successful architect. Among his local achievements were the designing in 1859 of the ornamental front and spire of the First Baptist Church, the Starr Hall Block 1872, and the rais- ing of the ceiling of the Athol Town Hall 1880.
Apparently Mr. Boyden resided at 25 Pleasant Street. After some eleven years' operations there, Mr. Boyden disposed of both his shop and his dwelling and removed from town. One- generally accurate chronicler states that the shop passed into-
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the control of Frye & Humphrey but the records at Worcester indicate that the dwelling was sold to Isaac Stevens, Esq., while the "shop built by Joel Stratton" was deeded to Barzilla J. Whitney who the next year conveyed it to Jotham Lincoln of Orange, who in precisely one year deeded it to Robert E. Car- penter also of Orange and in just another year passed the title to Whitman T. Lewis. On the same day that he made this pur- chase Mr. Lewis acquired the adjoining property of Dexter Cheney. Mr. Lewis was a marble worker who operated there until 1851 when he resold to Dexter Cheney, thus giving Mr. Cheney the ownership of the three little industrial plants and the Main Street frontage from Pleasant Street southeasterly to the "Stockwell House," all of which passed to Mr. Brewer with his other purchases at this location.
Crossing Pleasant Street we come to another area which was a hive of industry. This, like the area above it, was originally owned by the Wood family, ten acres of the area having been allotted to Jeremiah Wood as holder of the rights of John Smeed, one of our five original settlers.
May 14, 1788, Jeremiah Wood conveyed all the land be- tween Pleasant and Chestnut Streets to Kimball Wood who speedily erected a grist mill and soon thereafter a blacksmith shop. May 2, 1790, Mr. Wood sold the south half of his pur- chase to John Howe, a blacksmith. From Howe the ownership passed through Joshua Moore, Abraham and Nathan Derby to Prescott Jones in 1809, and by him in 1826 to Joel Stratton who the same year passed the title to Alden Spooner who de- veloped the power where the Brewer-Carlson garage now stands, and there for some years operated a cabinet shop. For several years he was associated there with George Fitts, Esq., under the name of Fitts and Spooner, in making many articles of household furniture. Pieces of this furniture are not infre- quently found in these days by antique dealers and collectors.
One of Spooner's activities was making coffins to measure. When a death occurred in town, measurements were taken by kind neighbors who "laid out" the body, a messenger was dis- patched to Spooner's Shop where a coffin was fashioned with bent sides, stained with lamp-black, and delivered in a few hours to the messenger. Mr. Spooner's charge of some three dollars for this coffin was the only expense of a funeral in those days.
The building standing in the rear of the Brewer & Carlson garage was built on this lot by Mr. Spooner for a home. Mr. Spooner survived until 1877 but this property passed out of
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his hands in 1846. Successive owners of the tract have been Sylvester Stockwell and Benjamin C. Skinner, John F. Hum- phrey, J. W. Ellis, Blake & Bruce, Theodore Jones, Reuben Stratton and his sons Henry W. Stratton and Frank R. Stratton, John E. Woodis and George S. Brewer. The Spooner dwelling was eventually converted into a blacksmith shop. James D. Ahern, Joseph H. Haskins and Isaac J. Dodd are remembered as blacksmith with a rather long tenure there, Mr. Ahern hav- ing removed there from a building which became too obsolete for use at about No. 1690 Main Street.
The northerly corner of Main and Pleasant Streets was sold to Dexter Cheney who carried on a portion of his rather exten- sive wheelwright business there. When in 1867 Athol found the old No. 2 Engine House on Common Street inadequate for its needs, it acquired a frontage on Pleasant Street of Mr. Cheney and when in 1896 expansion was again imperative it acquired of Mr. Dodd, then the successor to the Cheney title, a considerable larger area selling the old engine house to him to be removed to his remaining land.
In the decade following the Civil War, when Luther Ramsey was building the popular "Orange Sleigh" at Orange, his brother, John Ramsey, competed with him for a time by mak- ing an "Athol Sleigh" in this Cheney shop.
Reuben Stratton began the manufacture of matches and packing boxes on the small brook near Petersham line eventu- ally removing to the Spooner Shop. He was succeeded by his sons, Henry W. Stratton and Frank R. Stratton, who took in as a co-partner their kinsman, Albert C. Crawford. As Stratton Brothers & Company this firm operated in the Spooner plant until 1885-6 when they built a new factory at No. 168 Hap- good Road, their successor in the old plant being John E. Woodis. Subsequently Mr. Brewer acquired the plant and established his automobile business there, razing the old plant in 1909 and building the present Brewer & Carlson garage there.
Next on Main Street below the Spooner shop stood the build- ing still there known to a recent generation as the "Boutell Mill." There, as has been stated, was a grist mill and long thereafter, south of the mill, a blacksmith shop. In this grist mill building were located many small industries for a century after it was built.
In 1834 the manufacture of sash was begun there and con- tinued for the succeeding forty years by a considerable number
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of different owners including Alexander K. Spooner, Perrin Bliss, John Boutelle, Gamaliel Smith, Josiah Haven, Edwin Ellis, Warren Amsden, and Charles Frye, Joel Stratton, Abra- ham Oakes, Benjamin Estabrook, Lyman Kendall, Joseph P. Moore, L. V. B. Cooke, Sullivan Moore, James Kelley and Charles C. Phelps. John W. Burbeck was associated there for some years.
OLD HIGHLAND DONT
GRIST MILL, ETC., 1629 MAIN STREET WITH ALDEN SPOONER HOUSE AT LEFT
In 1873 title passed to John Boutelle and he, his sons, Harry F. and George W. Boutelle, and the latter's children, James and Bernice Prussman, carried on until 1936, then the Potter of Greenfield interests operated the old mill for two years, and then the business was discontinued. The old mill is now the only commercial laundry in town.
The northerly portion of the lot conveyed by Jeremiah to Kimball Wood was first used as a blacksmith shop, perhaps the first in town, but very soon Mr. Wood entered into a contract with one Sylvanus Sherwin to build and operate a fulling mill there. A generation ago, remains of the old water power for this clothier's shop were still to be seen there.
Apparently the clothier's operations were not an outstand- ing success for late in 1793 the whole area, including this shop, was sold by Mr. Wood to Prescott Jones who soon discon- tinued the fulling mill and established a tannery there, the first of that industry to be established in town, so far as is known. Mr. Jones retired from active business in -- 1825, his
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sons, Prescott Jr. and Frederick, taking over management of affairs, but shortly after that Mr. Prescott Jones, Jr., removed to Boston where he was engaged as a dealer of hides and leather until his death in 1839.
Prescott Jones, Sr., died in Athol, April 19, 1828, but his widow retained an interest in the business until her death, May 26, 1835.
Frederick Jones in 1831 added to the tannery business the manufacture of heavy shoes and brogans, changing the product four years later to boots.
A few small operators had preceeded this family in making footwear but the Jones factory was the beginning of footwear manufacture on a larger scale which was the outstanding in- dustry of our town for nearly three-quarters of a century. In 1838 he removed to Boston where with his cousin. Nahum Jones, he continued as a footwear distributor for over thirty years.
Those remembered as having been associated with him in the tannery here are Fisher A. Wilder, Jacob Tyrell, Peter Moore, David B. and Otis P. Davenport. Associated with him in the footwear manufacturing business was Stillman Simonds, under the name of Jones & Simonds.
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