History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 219

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1576

USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I > Part 219

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LITHOTYPE PUBLISHING .- In the year 1879 Mr. A. G. Bushnell, who . since 1869 had been connected with the Gardner News as editor and general man- ager, becoming interested in a new style of producing pictures, associated with himself Mr. W. H. Cowee, Charles Heywood, and perhaps others, and started what is called the lithotype publishing business. Be- fore getting fairly established, Mr. Heywood, an im- portant member of the partnership, died, causing a partial suspension of the work for awhile, although Mr. Cowee assumed the care of it and continued it on his own responsibility for several years. In 1886 new interest in the enterprise was awakened, and a cor- poration was constituted called the Lithotype Print- ing and Publishing Company, with a capital of ten thousand dollars, of which Charles D. Burrage was president, W. H. Cowee, secretary, and Herbert S. Stratton, treasurer and manager. The following year the capital was increased to twenty-five thousand dollars, the business going on as before. In 1888 a private company, consisting of Burrage & Stratton, bought out the corporation and are now going on under the name of the Lithotype Publishing Com- pany, prosperously and promisingly. Twenty-five lith-

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otype presses are in use, and fifty-five or sixty persons, mostly young women, are employed in the large, well- furnished establishment on Green Street. The work now done amounts to sixty or seventy thousand dol- lars a year, and is of excellent quality, growing con- tinually in popular favor. Much attention is given to furnishing illustrations for family and town his- tories, sketches of interesting localities, popular re- sorts, manufacturing centres, educational institutions and similar kinds of delineation for which there is a constantly increasing call. The company has re- cently purchased an engraving establishment in New York City, which is running in connection with the Gardner house, under the care of Mr. A. G. Bushuell, agent.

SILVER-WARE .- One of the later industries now in operation in Gardner is that of the manufacture of the more substantial and serviceable articles of silver-ware, which was started in the year 1887 by Frank W. Smith, who came from Concord, N. H., where he had previously been engaged in the same business. A commodious brick building three stories high, with a basement, was erected on Chestnut Street near the corner of Walnut, and thoroughly furnished with the most modern machinery and appliances for carrying on the work. Only skillful hands are em- ployed, of whom there are forty-five in number, in- cluding several women, and only solid sterling silver goods are produced. This is a valuable acquisition to the manufacturing interests of the town, having the promise of a prosperous future before it, and destined to shine with a lustre distinctively its own, varied, enriched and beautified at times with golden hues.

BRICK-MAKING .- A large section of territory in the southern part of the town has an aluminous or clayey subsoil unusually free from foreign substances and lying in many places quite near the surface of the ground, which renders the manufacture of brick at numerous points comparatively easy of accomplish- ment. At what particular date, or in what locality, this business was first started here has not been as- certained. But it is understood by the older inhabit- ants that the material of which the Bickford house in South Gardner was built, shortly after the town's incorporation, was obtained on the premises and moulded and burned there ready for final use. Abel Jackson at an early day made brick near by where the yards and factory of George N. Dyer are now located, some tokens of which are still to be seen. And the present stand of Abijah Hinds has been devoted to this industry for a long term of years. For two generations or more the only brick made in town were the product of this establishment, the father of the present proprietor carrying on the business in his day. The demand of the com- munity could then be met by this one concern, and there was no necessity for another yard. With the growth of the place and the increasing tendency to

put up brick buildings, even the home market was greater than Mr. Hinds, with all his facilities, which he had multiplied as time went on, could supply. And so Mr. H. N. Dyer, an old brick-maker of Templeton, seeing the opportunity, came to town, purchased the property where his son, George N. Dyer, now carries on the business, and there, near the site of the old Jackson yard, started anew. He soon gave way to his son, who has been highly pros- pered, his trade increasing from year to year, necessi- tating a constant increase of productive power. He has made the present year one and a half million bricks, for most of which he finds a ready sale within the limits of the town. For several years he produced a fine quality of pressed brick, the clay on his grounds being suited to that kind of goods, but at present he deems it more profitable to limit his production to the more common grades. Both Mr. Dyer and Mr. Hinds employ steam-power to run their machinery, which is of the latest and best pattern, and their facilities for speedy and efficient work are excellent and unsurpassed in all the region round-about. Mr. Hinds turns out about seven hundred and fifty thousand bricks a year, making the entire production of the town two and a quarter millions.

CARRIAGES AND SLEIGHS .- The principal estab- lishment for the manufacture of carriages and other vehicles is located iu South Gardner village, near the railroad crossing, and is conducted by Lyman Sawin and his son, Wm. O. Sawin. The senior member of the firm came to Gardner from Ashburnham more than thirty years ago, and entering into partnership with Amasa Lovewell, carried on the general black- smithing business for a dozen years, when he sold out and went to Ashby. After an absence of a year or two he returned, and having erected the buildings since occupied by him started anew, combining the wheelwright business with his former trade. The call for his work increasing, he took his son into com- pany with him and subsequently consolidated his business with that of Albert Barron, who had for some years made carriages in a portion of his shop, assuming the style of the Sonth Gardner Carriage Company. Besides common carriages, the firm made a specialty of heavy team wagons and gained a repu- tation for thorough and substantial work. They also manufactured open and top buggies and sleighs of various patterns. The carriage business declining somewhat, more attention latterly has been given to repairs, other work being done chiefly upon orders. Half a dozen men find employment in the establish- ment. A similar enterprise of some years' standing has recently been re-organized, bearing the name of the Chestnut Street Carriage Manufactory, in which James D. Gay and others are interested, and Town- send L. Bennett, No. 10 Cross Street, does something incidentally in the same line of manufacture.

GRAIN AND FLOURING-MILLS .- The need of the

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HISTORY OF WORCESTER COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

early settlers of Gardner in respect to the grinding of of the largest and best appointed sales-rooms in this section of the State, carrying a heavy stock and doing an extensive business. There are several other ready - made clothing stores in town, besides some half-dozen merchant tailors, so that the needs of the public in this regard are abundantly supplied. corn and other cereals for domestic use was originally met by the putting in a set of stones in connection with facilities for sawing lumber by William Bickford as early as 1770 or 1775; and a few years later a grist-mill was built in the north part of the town near the school-house on the site, probably, which MARBLE-CUTTING .- Mr. T. J. Stafford, an expe- rienced marble-worker, came from Cambridge in 1870 and commenced the marble-cutting business in Mar- ket Block near the head of Chestnut Street. Building up a respectable and satisfactory trade, he, after sev- eral changes, located in the shop erected for his use toward the lower end of the same street, where he now is. Numerous tomb-stones and monumental pieces of various design and styles of finish in the burial-places of the town and vicinity testify to the artistic excellence and superior quality of his work. was afterwards occupied by the Cowee Brothers as a chair factory. More recently an extensive business has been done in the same direction by T. Augustus and Marshall M. Howe, under the name of Howe Brothers, who succeeded by purchase the late Charles W. Bush in the manufacture of meal and flour at the factory on Mill Street near Sawyer. This privilege had a varied and somewhat unfortunate history dur- ing the earlier years of its occupancy. In or about the year 1824, Luke Sawin and Dr. David Parker, then a new resident of the town, bought the Abel | Messrs. John E. Partridge & Co., located near the Jackson farm, which covered a large tract of land in : railroad station, and Joseph C. Sargent, 105 Chestnut the vicinity, including the site under notice. Mr. Street, are engaged in the same line of business. Sawin soon built a dam and erected a shop, which he fitted up for the purpose of getting out chair stock. The business went on but a short time, the shop being burned. Henry Whitney then purchased the privi- lege and lands adjoining, erecting a saw-mill upon it, which was also destroyed by fire in 1834. The mill was immediately rebuilt and run a few years as be- fore, when it was sold to Daniel J. Goodspeed, who converted it into a factory for the making of chairs, having enlarged the facilities by putting up an ad- ditional building to suit his needs. In 1852 a third fire destroyed the buildings and their contents. Charles Travers bought the premises and put up a new chair-shop, which was run by himself for awhile and then sold to Charles Britton, from Westmoreland, N. II., who, being a carpenter, used it for getting out moldings, trimmings and stock in general for his trade. It afterward passed into the hands of Calvin Conant, who reconverted it into a chair-shop for his own use. Subsequently it came into the pos-ession of Charles W. Bush, who removed the old machinery and fitted it up as a meal and flour-producing mill, in which capacity it has remained till now. Howe Brothers, the present proprietors, have occupied it for eighteen years, doing a large and growing busi- ness, amounting at this time to an annual value of $50,000.

READY-MADE CLOTHING .- The Monadnock Cloth - ing House may be regarded as the representative of one of the important industries of the place, inasmuch as the goods in which it deals are to a large extent manufactured on the premises. Its stock embraces every style, grade and quality requisite for the wear of men, boys and even children. The establishment was founded by E. Ballard and A. A. Jerould in 1869, it being the first ready-made clothing store in town. Passing through some changes, it came into the hands of Mr. Samuel Despeaux, a veteran in the trade, in 1880, who gave it the name it now bears. It has one

CONTRACTORS AND BUILDERS. - Milton M. Favor, a native of Bennington, N. H., came to Gardner in 1867, and after working awhile for Heywood Bros. & Co., started business on his own account. He has had a large patronage, having erected, since locating in the place, over five hundred buildings in this and ad- jacent towns, or about twenty-five a year. He em- , ploys a force of from sixty to seventy-five men, accord- ing to the season and demand for work. In the same business are John R. Hosmer, Wm. N. Moore, Cyrus F. Boutelle, Michael J. Ryan, George B. Hager, Jo- seph J. Gale & Son, Silas Holt and Thomas Wheeler.

PRINTING AND PUBLISHING .- The first printing- office was opened in Gardner in the year 1868, when A. G. Bushnell, formerly of Templeton, took passes- sion of one room in the third story of the bank building, where he was engaged in doing job work till the following spring, when, his business having increased sufficiently to warrant it, he employed an assistant. About that time the project of starting a local weekly paper was agitated, resulting in the organization of an enterprise for the purpose of car- rying that project into effect. Charles Heywood asso- ciated himself with Mr. Bushnell under the firm-name of A. G. Bushnell & Co., and a prospectus for a paper was immediately issued. Satisfactory patronage be- ing promised, the first number of the Gardner News was published July 3, 1869. The original subscrip- tion price was two dollars a year, but the patronage increasing, it was soon reduced to one dollar and fifty cents. The size of the paper, to begin with, was twenty-two by thirty-two inches folio, containing twenty-four columns of matter, or six columns to a page, but has been much enlarged since. Though chiefly a local journal, it yet contains much general news, and has correspondents in all the neighboring towns, thus representing a wide constituency and secur- ing a circulation far beyond the limits of Gardner. It claims to be independent in religion and politics,

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fearless in expressing honest convictions upon ques- tions of private and public morality, and especially desirous of promoting the welfare and prosperity of the town. It has always been a bright, wide-awake publication, displaying more than average editorial ability and maintaining a creditable standing among its contemporaries. Upon the death of Charles Hey- wood, in 1882, Mr. Bushnell became sole proprietor, as he had been sole manager from the inception of the undertaking. In 1885 he sold the whole estab- lishment, including the paper, to Asa E. Stratton, of Fitchburg, who uow has its several departments in charge, conducting the business on the same general lines as before." The circulation of the News is twen- ty-one hundred. The business of job printing has increased from year to year, makiug frequent addi- tions of materials and machinery necessary as well as new accessions of room, so that the entire floor of the third story of the bank building is required for the use of the establishment, which now commands the service of from twelve to fifteen employés.

In the year 1880 Mr. E. J. Fuller, from Winchen- don, started a second paper in town, called the Gardner Record, having his headquarters in Stevens' Block, West Village. In the fall of 1883 the office was removed to the building of Howe Brothers, near the depot. The following June Mr. Fuller sold to Charles Adams and Daniel Rowe, when the name of the sheet was changed to the Worcester County Demo- crat, in order that its title might indicate the politics which the new proprietors designed to have repre- sented in its columns. Struggling on for two years under much difficulty, the experiment of a daily is- sue was tried for a few weeks in the hope, apparently, of retrieving its falling fortunes, but it had practi- cally the opposite effect, and late in 1886 yielded to the inevitable, and ceased to be. At the end of about three months R. W. and C. A. J. Waterman, of Athol, purchased the stock and fixtures of the of- fice, removed them to Opera-House Block, Pine Street, near Lynde, and commenced the publication of the Gardner Journal under the firm-name of Waterman & Son. The first number was issued April 12, 1887, and was favorably received by the public, obtaining at the start a respectable list of subscribers, which has increased since, until at the expiration of twenty months they number seventeen hundred and fifty. The paper is independent in spirit and purpose, and aims to be a general news sheet as well as a medium of local intelligence, seeking to maintain and promote the general welfare by fair dealing and an honest expression of opinion upon all matters pertaining thereto. A good busi- ness at job printing has been built up in connection with the publication of the Journal, the whole giv- ing employment to nine persons.

MERCANTILE INTERESTS .- A few general state- ments in regard to what may be called the mercan- tile affairs of Gardner will no doubt serve the speci-

fic purpose of the present volume and satisfy the de- sire of those who may read it. The first merchant in the place was Mr. Jonathan Prescott, from Lan- caster, son-in-law of John Glazier, who located on the east side of Green Street, opposite the Common, where the residence of the late Francis Richardson, Esq., now stands. His was the only store in town for many years, and even down to a date within the memory of large numbers now living, a single old- fashioned country store supplied all the needs of the Central village and a large section around it, reaching in some directions into neighboring towns. A store was opened in South Gardner early in this century, or perhaps shortly before its opening, and for several decades this and the one at the Centre were amply sufficient to meet all the existing needs of the com- munity in this respect. But to-day the shop-keepers of the place are numbered by scores, if not by hun- dreds. Certain sections of the different villages are almost wholly given up to traffic of one sort or an- other, and one in them need not go far to find, with rare exceptions, whatever may be desired in the line of merchandise for personal, domestic or more gen- eral use. Dry-goods merchants, grocers, clothiers, furniture and crockery dealers, druggists, jewelers, traders in hardware, paper-hangings, gentlemen's and ladies' furnishing goods, cutlery, stoves and furnaces, sewing-machines, stationery, meat, flour, grain, farm produce and venders of all sorts of small wares, confectionery, fruit and peanuts-all these have a place in this busy town, and stand ready to serve the public need.

Before leaving the manufacturing interests of Gard- ner altogether, it is desirable that a statement be made respecting an important adjunct to that portion of them located in the southern part of the town, to which reference has been several times made in the foregoing pages, to wit :- The South Gardner Reser- voir. This body of water covers an area of about one hundred and eighty acres, of which nearly three- fourths are in this town, the remainder in Westmin- ster. Up to a comparatively recent date the owners of what is known as the Wright Mill were allowed to flow the broad expanse of meadow-land which the dam was high enough to cover, only through the later autumn, winter and early spring months, so as in no wise to lessen or damage the grass grown thereon. As a consequence, a large amount of water would pass by that and other privileges on the stream below when the pond was drawn down to its summer level, with advantage to no one, while, later in the season, a scarcity of water would compel the stopping of the machinery at all of those privileges for weeks, or per- haps months, before the autumn rains came on. It was evident to practical men that, if the amount of water which thus ran wholly to waste could be held in some way for use when needed, the mills, so often idle in the dryer parts of the year, could, with rare

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HISTORY OF WORCESTER COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

exceptions, be kept in operation the twelvemonth through. It was for Mr. David Wright, who . was eager for improvement, and who had sagacity to dis- cover chances for improvement, to turn this thought to practical account. He set himself about interest- ing his co-manufacturers on the stream with him in a project for a reservoir for the purpose indicated. The dam mentioned, as it was and had been for years, was capable of holding an immense body of reserve water, and, by raising it a few feet, which could be easily done, the quantity could be greatly augmented. The raising of the dam would involve some expense, and the using it for permanent flowage would involve still more, since it would necessitate the payment of heavy damages to the proprietors of .the meadows above, or the purchase of those meadows. Mr. Wright, therefore, when the subject had been sufficiently dis- cussed, circulated a paper and secured subscriptions enough to buy the lands in question, which put the matter on a permanent basis. Previous to the con- summation of this scheme, however, a canal bad been cut from the Walter Greenwood mill-pond to the pro- posed reservoir, in order that whatever surplus water existed there might be diverted from its natural course, and held in reserve with the other, to the ex- tent of the capacity of the new pond. And so the plan of Mr. Wright was carried out to the fullest ex- tent, and all the advantages to be gained from it were secured. The expense of keeping the reservoir-dam in repair is met by occasional assessments upon the owners of the privileges benefited by it.

Nor was this all. The owners of certain mill-sites on the stream, desirous of gaining still other benefits of the same sort, bought two dams, and the meadows flowed by them, situated above the reservoir itself, while, still later, S. K. Pierce & Co. purchased a third one,-the Minot Meadow, so-called,-and dam there- unto belonging, which now constitutes a part of his estate. So that, in fact, there is a series of four reser- voirs on the upper part of the stream, each one of which contributes directly to the value of every mill- property below, and indirectly to the prosperity of the whole town.

CHAPTER CXIII. GARDNER-(Continued.)

EDUCATION-SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES.

AT an early day in the history of the Pilgrim settle- ment at Plymouth the subject of education became a matter of general interest and the question of the public instruction of children and youth entered very soon into the deliberations that pertained to the per- manent policy of the colony. And the Puritan found- ers of Massachusetts, animated by the same spirit, soon after acquiring a foothold on these shores, made

provision for the establishing of schools of different grades to the end, as they said, "that learning may not be buried in the graves of our fathers." So, under a wise inspiration and guidance, the founders of New England built the school-house beside the church, making education and religion, intelligence and piety, co-ordinate factors in the new civilization they pro- posed to establish on this virgin soil-living forces to energize, direct and give character to its advancing life. True to their noble descent, the founders of Gardner did the same thing. At the first annual meeting, held March 7, 1786, action was taken which resulted in the division of the town into four district, or squadrons, as they were called, in each of which a school was soon after established. These were re- spectively in the parts of the territory corresponding to the four cardinal points of the compass and were designated accordingly. One-half of the money ap- propriated for schools, which was thirty pounds, was to be divided equally between the four squadrons, and the other half according to the number of scholars in each between four and twenty-one years of age. The complex duty of providing a place for the schools, of selecting and employing teachers and of caring for and expending the money was assigned to four per- sons, one in each squadron respectively. The names of this first School Committee were William Bickford, David Foster, Ebenezer Howe and Josiah Wheeler. There was but one school-house in the town, which was built by Westminster some years before, " on Mr. Bickford's land on the County road, or the road lead- ing to Mr. Timothy Howard's (Heywood's) house, where the major part of the squadron shall appoint." It actually stood on the site of the house built and formerly occupied by Amos B. Minott on South Main Street. It is likely that this building was used by the South Squadron for some years, although in 1791 it was declared to be " so old and shattered that it is not fit to keep school in." It would seem by this record, and by the absence of any record regarding the erection of school-houses previous to this date, that the schools in other squadrons were held for some years in private dwellings. At the annual town- meeting in 1795 it was voted to build four school- houses, but the appropriation of four hundred and fifty pounds to pay for the same was not made till April, 1796. In March, 1797, the town voted to pro- vide a chair and table for each house, so that it may be presumed that about this time Gardner was fully and satisfactorily equipped with the institutions and accompanying facilities for public education. The school-houses were indeed small, incommodious and unpainted, but they served the needs of the time and were important helps to the laying the foundations of that more complete system of common-school in- struction, with its large array of instrumentalities and appliances, which now exists-a blessing unspeakable to the entire community and an honor to the town.

In 1802 an article was inserted in the warrant calling

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History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 219

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) Publication date: 1889 Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1576

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1576