History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 134

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1818

USA > Massachusetts > Bristol County > History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men > Part 134

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The record says, "At a town-meeting lawfully warned and held ye 14th day of January, 1745, voted to choose a committee to divide the town into five parts and the Gore to be one part. Voted also that the school be kept in two places, six months cach in each part, during the next two years and six months." This committee made the di- vision and named the houses where the school should be kept. This was the first step towards the district system, though its inception was still in the future. By this plan the school "ambulated" from quarter to quarter, and when one quarter had had its six months' schooling, three months in each of the two places, it waited two years and six months before its turn came again to drink at the fount of knowledge.

Besides this districting the town, another action occurred at the same time indicating that the cause of education received a new impetus from some source. The record says the warrant contained the following article : "To see if the town will vote any money to be expended in keeping women schools." That so important an innovation might have due consideration, the article was laid over to an ad- journed meeting, when it was "voted to raise thirty pounds old tenor money to encourage ye keeping of women schools."

During several years the records contain but little in regard to the subject of schools. Some years ap- propriations for their support were not apparently made. The usual item for "diet" disappears. In 1771 the east part of the town was granted, for some unexplained reason, one week's additional schooling. But what women schools were taught, and with what success, we are left in the dark.

With increasing population and enlarged areas of occupied territory, increased facilities for educational advantages were required. In November, 1771, the town voted to choose a committee "to divide the town into twelve parts, and appointed the places where the school shall be kept." This committee attended to the duty assigned them, and after careful consideration of the territory and the wants of the people they decided to divide the town into thirteen parts. They performed the work, and submitted a

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report to that effect Oct. 14, 1771. In accordance with the committee's recommendation, the voters, then assembled, rescinded the vote to divide the town into twelve parts, and then agreed and voted to divide into thirteen parts, naming the houses wherein the schools should be kept.

The schoolmasters of the time were men not un- known to fame. Prominent among them was Elisha May, who often held public office, both civic and military, during the Revolution, and was the friend of Washington. His name appears as schoolmaster as early as 1768. The term dollars appears in the town records for the first time in connection with the payment of his salary, but at the same time the amount received is stated in pounds, shillings, and pence.

In 1769, Ephraim Stark weather kept the grammar school one year. He was a native of Rehoboth, where he did duty on the Committee of Correspond- ence in the early days of the Revolution. He served two years-1775 and 1778-as representative to the General Court, and was three years senator from that town.

In 1776 the record is, " Voted to divide the school money, that each one may have his equal part. Voted that no person shall send out of his own quarter. Voted that any quarter that neglects to improve his money within the year shall lose it. Voted that each quarter shall draw one-thirteenth of the money raised for schooling." But what sum of money was raised for that purpose does not clearly appear.

For ten years the division of the town into thirteen parts was accepted with but little dissent, then agitation commenced. The old thirteen districts lost prestige with the close of the Revolution, and in 1787 the town " voted to make twenty quarters." Be- fore this action was put into practice, and at the next town-meeting, it was "voted and agreed to let the quarters stand as they be, and the money shall be di- vided among the quarters according to the number of children in said town from four to sixteen years old." This is the first time that school money was appor- tioned according to the number of pupils in a dis- trict, -a method of division which obtained with some interruptions and various modifications until the abolition of the district system.

The question of increasing the number of quarters, as they were persistently called, did not rest, and in 1789 the town was divided into twenty quarters. This arrangement continued until 1808, when the town chose a committee and "districted," according to a late law of the commonwealth, into eighteen districts. The " metes and bounds" are accurately entered in the records in the words and over the signatures of the committee.

The records give no clue to the time when school- houses were erected, or of the erection of any pre- vious to 1804. The town then voted authority to the quarters to raise money to build houses, to select "a

spot where to build," and "to act upon any other matter that may be deemed beneficial to said districts and not contrary to law."

This authority seems to have been first employed by the Old Town district. The district at the falls soon after took steps to erect a house by a warrant over the signatures of the selectmen, and after 1808 most of the quarters received at different times simi- lar dispensations at the hands of the town fathers. The town annually elected prudential committees for the districts, who received and disbursed the school money, and previously to 1827 contracted uncondi- tionally with teachers. At this time committees were chosen by the town, sometimes one person from each district and at other times two persons, "to view and inspect the schools." But their actions and reports have not been handed down to this generation.

In 1804, for the first time, a committee was chosen to select and recommend a uniform list of text-books for all the schools. ' This committee consisted of Rev. John Wilder, Rev. Nathan Holman, Rev. James Read, Ebenezer Bacon, John Richardson, Jr., Dr. William Blanding, Joel Read, Elijah Ingraham, and Peter Thacher. This supervisory committee was re- elected, with some resignations and changes, two or three times.

The appropriations for "tuition and schooling" after the Revolution for forty years were made per capita, the children from four to sixteen years of age being numbered usually the Ist of November. The sum voted and allowed increased from fifty-eight cents to each child in 1798 to seventy-five cents in 1801, and one dollar in 1807, at which sum it continued until 1820. The several districts received an amount of money determined by the number of scholars in the district, except in 1815, when one-half was divided equally among the eighteen districts and the other half distributed by the scholars. But how much money was raised or the number of weeks' schooling it furnished is not made evident by the town records.

Since 1827 the history of the public schools is writ- ten in the reports of the several superintending com- mittees the town has annually elected. The details would fill several pages. The gradual increase of the appropriations for educational purposes from one dollar per scholar to eight dollars, the ercction of school-houses, the interest or lack of interest in the cause, the increase of the number of scholars from six hundred to more than two thousand, are facts known to every citizen. The pertinacious adherence to the district system established in 1789, and contin- ued modified and perfected during seventy years, until, outliving its usefulness, it was abolished by the State at the commencement of the year 1883, and the early withdrawal of pupils from the grammar and even the intermediate schools, to the manifest injury of the child, are equally well known.

The establishment of two high schools, one at At- tleborough and one at North Attleborough, in May,

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1867, was the most marked advance in this period of the town's school history. These schools furnish all who wish and are qualified to enjoy their advantages thorough instruction in the higher branches of learn- ing, according to the laws of the commonwealth. During the fifteen years of their existence they have continued the even tenor of their way, not always with full ranks, but with steady beneficial influence.

The East School has had during this time four prin- cipals, -Calvin G. Hill, William Wilkins, A. F. Wood, and J. Osmond Tiffany, and is now in a prosperous condition. Its average membership has been about forty-five. The assistant teachers have been Mrs. C. G. Hill, Misses Tonks, Kelton, Sheffield, Hawes, and Helen W. Metcalf, the present efficient teacher.

The North High School has had two principals,- Burrill Porter, Jr., from May, 1867, to July, 1879; and Henry M. Maxson, from 1879 to the present time. There have been six assistants,-Miss Lucy L. Holden, Mrs. Sarah Austin, Mary'I. Hinkley (now Mrs. E. A. Hall), Elizabeth K. Goss (now Mrs. Albert Dodge, of Minneapolis, Minn.), and Miss Agnes Peirce. Its average membership has been fifty pupils, and its graduates, numbering about one hundred and fifty, are among the best scholars in town.

The appropriations for the support of schools have increased from eight thousand dollars in 1867 to twenty-four thousand in 1883. The State has abol- ished the school districts. The town erected two new high school buildings in 1881 and 1882 at a cost of thirty-one thousand dollars. The town has taken possession of the property of the former districts, which, exclusive of high school buildings, is valued at one hundred thousand dollars. A superintendent of public instruction has been chosen, and the schools are in a fair way to enter upon a new career of pros- perity.

The present superintending committee are Samuel P. Lathrop, chairman; Charles E. Bliss, secretary ; Henry Rice, George A. Adams, Rev. John White- hill, and Rev. George E. Osgood; Superintendent, Francis E. Burnett.

In closing this monograph of the public schools of Attleborongh, I would not forget to record that some of the old school districts have funds whose income is applied to prolonging and otherwise benefiting the schools. The school recently known as District No. S receives annually the interest of seven hundred dol- lars, devised nearly fifty years ago by a Mr. Richards. He was born in Marseilles, France, came to this coun- try, and settled in South Attleborough, where he kept a store for nearly a century. He was never married, and this property was given to the district, provided it should not be called for within six years by a nephew, supposed to be living in France. In senti- ment he was a deist. His will, dictated by himself, disavows a belief in the divinity of Christ and the Christian religion. He declared also a disbelief in

Mahomet, and asserted a reliance in the only living and true God, to whom he commended his spirit. He was warmly attached to republican democracy, and of choleric temperament, and quite eccentric.

The school in the Holmes neighborhood has the income of twelve hundred dollars.

In 1843, Mr. Abiather Richardson died, conferring a legacy of eleven thousand dollars upon the ten dis- tricts in the East parish. His will requires real estate security for the invested fund, and provides for a trien- niał election of twelve trustees, in whom the manage- ment of the fund and the distribution of its income are vested. By careful management the legacy has been considerably increased, and its income materially pro- longs the schools. His gravestone bears the inscrip- tion, " His legacy to common schools is his best epi- taph and most enduring monument."

Thus the record shows that true progress has been made along the years whose flight has brought us hither, and it may still continue to be made provided we observe the Baconian apothegm and "make haste slowly."

"Palmam qui meruit ferat."

Industries -The means and energies of the first settlers were devoted to clearing up their farms. In the wilderness which then covered the territory of Attleborough, our fathers had neither time nor need in their simple living to turn themselves to manufac- tures. Only the arts necessary to living and farming got a footing in town until near the close of the last century. At that time new industries commenced which have had an important influence upon the character and prosperity of the town.

While the war of the Revolution was still in prog- ress, and its results not foreseen except in the faith of the patriots who carried it on, the manufacture of jewelry was begun by a simple Frenchman in the year 1780. This pioneer in the business was known as " the foreigner," --- perhaps he was the only alien in town at that early period,-and his name cannot now be ascertained.

From this humble origin the manufacture of jew- elry has received yearly more and more attention, until now, in 1883, Attleborough is one of the chief places where this industry flourishes.

Although a hundred years have passed since the commencement of making jewelry, yet as its most rapid strides have been made during the last twenty- five years, or more accurately during the last decade, antiquity, never at peace with growth, has not yet incrusted anything connected with it. Its success has been reached not by the aid of united capital under the corporate system, but by the organizing ability and most intelligent personal direction of in- dividual enterprise. The industry has grown by a process of evolution from the handicraft of the shop until it has become a rare combination of mechanism and manual skill and dexterity. Human ingenuity is taxed to its utmost to devise new lines of novelties

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HISTORY OF BRISTOL COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

and new styles of staple goods, and the most cun- ningly-devised machinery is employed in their pro- duction. Hence the well-paid masters of this art have always displayed a marked intellectual activity, which exerts a beneficial influence upon the history of the town, a result which always accompanies well- remunerated labor and the better conditions of life.

Progress has not always been made with equal step, but it has always brought large returns. Intelligent judges have estimated the value of the product during the year 1882 at nearly ten millions of dollars. Cer- tain it is that during the past five years this industry has made an unusual stride. During this time the number of firms engaged in the manufacture of jew- elry in some of its numerous branches has doubled, and the value of the products has increased in still greater ratio. The goods produced find a ready market all over the country and across the Atlantic. Whatever the varying demands of the market may be, whether for solid gold work or for that class in which "all is gold that you see," they are here speedily met.

H. F. BARROWS & Co. is one of the oldest firm- names now engaged in the jewelry business in Attle- borough. Mr. H. F. Barrows, the senior member of the firm, began business in 1853 in the old shop south of the braid-mill, Attleborough Falls. The next year he associated with him James H. Sturdy, under the style of Barrows & Sturdy. They moved to the Rich- ards manufactory, North Attleborough, in 1856, and in 1857, Mr. Sturdy withdrew, and L. A. Barrows and E. S. Richards associated themselves with H. F. Bar- rows, under the name of H. F. Barrows & Co. The members now are H. F. Barrows and H. F. Barrows, Jr. For the last twenty-one years they have occupied their present factory on Broad Street. He was one of the first manufacturers of rolled-plate jewelry in this section of the town, and continues to make the finest goods of this class, of all varieties and patterns, which the market demands. They employ an average of one hundred and fifty hands, with a yearly pay- roll of seventy-five thousand dollars. New York office, 177 Broadway.

F. G. WHITNEY & Co. began business in 1849, when F. G. Whitney and E. W. Davenport formed a partnership to manufacture jewelry in the building which now stands on East Street. In 1852 they built and used for a shop the building now occupied by John Stanley & Son for a carriage-shop. Mr. Whit- ney, after several changes in the firm, moved, July, 1856, to E. I. Richards & Co.'s factory, where he did a successful business, often employing from one to two hundred operatives. In 1876 he built the brick fac- tory on Chestnut Street, one hundred and fifty feet in length by thirty-five feet in width, and three stories in height, recently destroyed by fire, but now rebuilding. The old firm manufactured fancy brass-work, novel- ties, specialties, and fancy goods, which the market in its varying needs calls for. The same business is now

conducted by his sons, George B. Whitney and Edwin F. Whitney, under the firm-name of F. G. Whitney & Co. They are manufacturing successfully a large line of goods for the domestic and foreign markets.

The firm of IRA RICHARDS & Co. will long be memorable in the history of the jewelry industry in Attleborougli. In 1833, H. M. and E. Ira Richards formed a copartnership. In 1834, Ira Richards, then a member of the firm of Draper, Tifft & Co., with- drew from that firm and entered into partnership with his son and cousin as Ira Richards & Co. The new firm began well. It invested two thousand dol- lars, ran twenty weeks, and cleared twenty thousand dollars. Then, Dec. 14, 1836, H. M. Richards with- drew, and George Morse and Virgil Draper were re- ceived as partners. In 1841 both of the last-named gentlemen in their turn withdrew, and Abiel Cod- ding, Jr., the skillful foreman of the factory, was admitted to one-third interest in the business. Ira Richards died in 1845, and Josiah D. Richards re- ceived a one-third interest in his father's place. E. Ira Richards, Abial Codding, Jr., and Josiah D. Rich- ards, with equal interests, under the firm-name of Ira Richards & Co., carried on business together with remarkable success for thirty years, until the firm ac- quired a national reputation. The number of their employés averaged for many years from two hundred to two hundred and twenty-five. The variety, quan- tity, and excellence of their goods has never been surpassed by any firm in town.

F. B. RICHARDS & Co. manufacture jewelry in the new factory building of E. Ira Richards, occupying the entire second floor. They make the first quality of rolled-gold plated goods, in bracelets, bangles, sets, and novelties, to meet the comprehensive demands of the trade. They employ one hundred and forty hands, with a yearly pay-roll of sixty-five thousand dollars. The firm-name in New York is E. Ira Richards & Co. They are the successors of the well-known firm of Ira Richards & Co., the members of the firm being E. Ira Richards, F. B. Richards, and E. Ira Richards, Jr.

The firm of Stephen Richardson & Co. dates back to the year 1837, when Stephen Richardson and Abial Codding manufactured jewelry on the south side of Elm Street, near the Ten-Mile River. Here they employed ten hands. In 1840 went into the factory of Calvin Richards, near the present residence of Abial Codding. Here the number of workmen was donbled. Moved thence to the factory of Draper, Lifft & Co., near Barden's store. At this time David Capron, who had been in company with Mr. Rich- ardson, retired, and Samuel R. Miller was admitted as Richardson & Miller. At this time the goods were sold at Western hotels until Miller opened an office in Maiden Lane, New York, but in 1856 he withdrew from the firm. Stephen Richardson continued alone until 1859, when his son, Clarence H. Richardson, be- came his partner, and the office was removed to 177 Broadway, New York, where it remained twenty

4 4 milto

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years. The firm was now styled Sephen Richardson & Co. Their factory was owned by Stephen Richard- son, on East Street. The building was burned in August, 1870, and immediately rebuilt. Stephen Richardson died in 1877, and his son continues the business. During the last twenty years they have manufactured a large variety of goods, chains, and novelties,-gold, silver, copper, or brass,-anything the market calls for. They are the only firm that ever shipped goods to Japan, and were the first to open an export trade in jewelry with Europe.

F. S. Draper was in company with Draper, Tifft & Co. six years before the war of the Rebellion, the other members of the firm being his father, Josiah Draper, John Lifft, and George Horr. George Horr died, and Joseph Bacon became a member of the firm, which was now styled Draper, Tifft & Bacon. In 1862, Mr. F. S. Draper sold his interest to the rest of the firm and entered the army. Returning from the war in 1865, in connection with F. S. Bailey and F. G. Pate, he organized the firm of Draper, Pate & Bailey, carrying on business first in E. Ira Richards' manufactory, and then in the stone building of the Whiting Manufacturing Company. In 1875, Mr. Pate withdrew, and two years later Mr. Draper bought out F. S. Bailey's interest, and continued the business. The original firm was located in Plainville, and em- : ployed one hundred and fifty hands in the manufac- ture of fine gold jewelry. Draper, Pate & Bailey increased from twenty-five to one hundred and twenty- five hands in two years, and did a most successful business. F. S. Draper now employs sixty-five hands, with an annual pay-roll of fifty-five thousand dollars, in the manufacture of plated charms and fire-gilt chains.

Theron Ide Smith, son of Stephen and Mercy S. (Ide) Smith, was born in the south part of Attle- borough, April 9, 1836.

Stephen Smith was born in Mansfield, Mass., in January, 1796. He married, first, Ruth Hodges, by whom he had one son, Stephen N. ; second, Mercy S., daughter of Nathaniel Ide, who married Hannah Daggett, daughter of Col. John Daggett, an officer in the American Revolution. Mercy was named after Mercy Shepard, wife of the aforesaid Col. John Dag- gett, and daughter of John Shepard "the ancient," who lived to the great age of one hundred and five. (Of this John Shepard, we extract from John Dag- gett's "Sketch of the History of Attleborough," 1834, the following : "John Shepard, who was a native of Foxborough, where he lived until a few years before his death, died in this town in 1809, aged one hun- dred and five years. He retained all his faculties of mind and body, except his eyesight, to the last, and was able to walk, with a little assistance, till a few days before his death. He lived over one hundred years on his native spot, and during this time lived in two counties and four different towns. He was a man of pious character, cheerful in disposition, jocose,

witty, and of a quick undertanding. He was deprived of his eyesight on a sudden during the night, and was not himself aware of it until the next morning, when he sought in vain for the light of day. He had one son and several daughters, two of whom lived to be over eighty years old, another, Mrs. Mary Mann, of . Wrentham, died in 1828, aged ninety-seven.")

Stephen Smith was a farmer, purchased the old Joel Read farm of eighty acres, in Attleborough, and resided there during life. He took quite an interest in town and county affairs. He was a Free-Soiler when but three or four in the town advocated those prin- ciples. He was strict in his religious belief, Calvinist Baptist, and a prudent, temperate, reserved man, of few words, honest in his dealings, and of sterling in- tegrity. From the small farm of six or seven hundred dollars his thrift accumulated a fine property, valued at his death at six thousand dollars. He had by his wife, Mercy, Ruth A. (deceased), Maria (deceased), Josephine (Mrs. William Gooding, deceased), Han- nah D. (married George Crawford, of Pawtucket, and died, leaving one son, Eugene A., who is now clerk for Mr. Smith), Eliza E. (married (1) John Shurtleff, (2) George F. Crowninshield, and died, leaving two children), and Theron Ide.

Theron had the common school advantages of a farmer's boy, working on the farm until he was eigh- teen, when, feeling that there was a more congenial and profitable life for him than agriculture, he came to North Attleborough and entered the employ of Ira Richards & Co. as an apprentice to the jewelry trade. After remaining one year business became dull, and he only worked eight hours a day at six cents an hour. He then went to work for J. T. Bacon & Co., Plainville, " chasing" jewelry at one dollar per day, which price was soon voluntarily raised by his employers to one dollar and twenty-five cents. Re- maining here six months, by illness he was compelled to stop work for several months and entirely quit " chasing." His next employment was work at the bench for Barrows & Sturdy, where he remained until his marriage, May 16, 1856, to Emily C., daughter of Abiel and Chiloe (Daggett) Codding.1 She was born Feb. 4, 1839.

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History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 134

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1818

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1818