USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Hanover > History of the town of Hanover, Massachusetts, with family genealogies > Part 21
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The next year William Barstow gave bonds to the Court, "in consideration of the payment to him of twenty pounds, to forth-
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with repair the bridge and keep it in repair sufficient for the trans- portation of passengers, horses and cattle for the full term of twenty years." Mr. Barstow died in 1668, and others took up the work of repairs.
We will not further follow the orders relative to the first bridge (which was always called Barstow's bridge) but will say a word about William Barstow, the builder, as we have glimpses of the strength and weakness of his character. He was one of four brothers who came to New England about 1635. Barry says that William was "the first settler of whom we have any record on the present boundary of Hanover." He was a large land-owner and was often engaged in the business of the Colony. He was high- way surveyor for the town of Scituate, this being then the most important town office. He was one of the jurors in a murder case, and on a committee for laying out lands. Soon after the con- struction of the bridge, (in June, 1657) he was authorized by the Court "to draw and sell wine, beer, and strong waters for passengers that come and go over the bridge he hath lately made or others that should have occasion, unless any just "exceptions" came in against." These "exceptions" came evidently, as in 1666 the Court passed an order censuring him for "not keeping an ordin- ary fit for the entertainment of strangers." "This ordinary was kept by his son Joseph after the death of his father, and in 1684 he was discharged from "keeping an ordinary at the North River" and Joseph Sylvester, the ancestor of the Sylvesters who now live near the bridge, was licensed to keep it.
An interesting episode in the life of William Barstow was his apology before the Court for slandering the Rev. Charles Chauncy, pastor of the Church in Scituate, who afterwards became presi- dent of Harvard College. Mr. Barstow had stated publicly that Mr. Chauncy's utterances were the cause of the death of his bro- ther George. He closes the apology by saying "and I desire that this sad experience of my aptness to offend God and his people may be a motive unto me to set a better watch over my tongue in the future."
Deane thinks the second or cart bridge was constructed in 1682. Probably it was a little after this date. While there had been previous to 1682 orders relative to such a bridge, it was as late as 1683 when the Colony Court passed an order "that, if Scituate, Marshfield and Duxborrow shall see cause to build and maintain a cart bridge over the North River, near Barstow's bridge, then they shall be free from being charged toward the building or main- taining any other bridge out of their respective limits."
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This second bridge must have been a durable structure, as it served its purpose for more than a century and a half, and con- tinued of colonial importance; and, as late as 1764, nearly one hundred years after its construction, the town of Hanover chose "John Bailey and Nathaniel Sylvester, Agents for the said town, to join with Scituate, Marshfield, Duxbury and Pembroke to repair North River bridge."
The Barstow bridge was the first to span an important stream in the Colony; and, for nearly two centuries, the two inexpensive wooden structures referred to were the only ones to cross the river, as Union bridge was not built until 1800, while Little's bridge was not constructed until twenty-five years later.
In 1829, four years after the establishment of the office of coun- ty commissioner, the Board ordered a stone bridge to be erected at a point about one hundred feet easterly of the cart bridge re- ferred to, and assessed the county for one-quarter of the expense thereof, the towns of Pembroke and Hanover paying the balance of the cost. This bridge was about ten feet higher than the wooden bridge, and must have been considered a great public im- provement.
In 1873 the county commissioners ordered important changes in the bridge and highway, increasing the height thereof about five feet, and the width about ten feet. This was an unsatisfactory job and cost something more than one-half as much as the present structure. A part of this expense was assessed on the county, the balance being paid by the two towns aforesaid.
In 1903, Nathaniel Morton of Pembroke assumed that as the state had assisted Scituate and Marshfield in repairing highways and bridges injured by the storm of 1898, she should also assist the towns of Pembroke and Hanover in the reconstruction of this bridge, which, it was feared, had been weakened by the action of the same storm.
His presentation of the case won the attention of the legis- lative committee and an appropriation of $5000 was recommended. Representative Bonney of Scituate and Representative MacCartney and Senator Harvell of Rockland gave the matter their earnest and favorable consideration and the appropriation was granted. The county commissioners were instructed to do the work at an expense not exceeding $20,000, assessing the cost above the $5000 aforesaid on the county and such towns therein as shall be espe- cially benefited. Early in the year 1904 the commissioners, after proper advertising, awarded the contract to Thomas and Connor
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for $15,790. Some slight changes in the contract and some work not called for therein, together with the charges of the engineer and inspector and the cost of the tablets, carried the cost of the completed structure up to about $17,700.
The present bridge is an arch forty-five feet in length, with a span of forty feet and a rise of sixteen and one-half feet. The roadway is forty feet wide in the clear, and is four and one-half feet higher and ten feet wider than the structure which it super- seded. From the foundation to the top of the coping in the deep- est place is thirty-three and seven-tenths feet. Nearly one-half the retaining wall in cubic yards is underground. In digging for the foundation it was found that the stone work of the old bridge was laid on the Hanover side on the hard pan, about eight feet below the surface of the adjoining ground, while on the Pembroke side it was laid on timbers which rested on the solid foundation. The middle pier was laid on a raft of timbers, twenty- four in number, treble thickness, dovetailed together. It was an impressive moment when the last stone from the middle pier was removed and this raft rose gradually from the bed in which it was placed seventy-five years before, strong and sound as on the day of its submergence. Mr. Connor and two or three others were on the raft as it rose and floated away with the tide, Basil S. Simmons being the youngest member of the party. Later Dr. MacMillan secured it and moored it to his land, where it is to. remain as a landing for boats.
The foundation of the bridge on the Hanover side rests on ground which was occupied as a ship-yard, and, in digging for this foundation, large quantities of the chips made by the car- penters were thrown to the surface. In digging the trench for the retaining wall on the Hanover side a good many bricks were unearthed-relics of the "Ordinary" referred to, perhaps.
There are in the retaining walls of the bridge, including the belt course, thirty-two hundred and fifty cubic yards of masonry. The foundation of the bridge is of concrete and about two hun- dred and forty cubic yards of stone were used in the construction of the arch. There are about one hundred and thirty-eight cubic yards of masonry in the parapet walls and about fifty-seven cubic yards in the coping, making about thirty-six hundred and eighty- five cubic yards of masonry in the completed structure. About fifteen hundred cubic yards of earth were removed for the fill and three hundred and twenty-five tons of crushed stone were used in macadamizing.
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STREAMS AND BRIDGES.
Work on this bridge was begun about April first and it was fully completed about October fifteenth. Two bronze tablets have been placed on the top of the parapet over the middle of the arch. These tablets weigh about one hundred and thirty pounds each, are oval in form, about two feet high and three feet long and are supported by standards also of bronze. The inscriptions on these tablets are as follows :-
"NORTH RIVER BRIDGE BETWEEN PEMBROKE AND HANOVER.
First bridge erected 1656 by Wm. Barstow for "foot and horse." The second "a cart bridge" 1682. Both by order of the Colony Court.
These were situated 100 ft. above this structure.
The third bridge built by order of the County Commissioners inte
1829. Replaced by THIS BRIDGE.
Erected by the Commonwealth, County and Towns.
A. D. 1904.
Width of span, 40 ft., height above mean low water, 23 ft., width of roadway, 40 ft." "ON NORTH RIVER
Between 1678 and 1871 more than 1000 vessels of from 30 to 470 tons were built.
Of these, in 1772, Ichabod Thomas constructed the ship Bedford" and the brig Beaver. The former was the first vessel to display the United States flag in foreign waters off Trinity, England, February 6, 1783. The latter was one of the famous Tea Ships- of Boston Harbor.
THE SHIP COLUMBIA 212 TONS
mounting 10 guns, built by James Briggs in 1773, was the first United States vessel to circumnavigate the globe. In 1792 her captain, Robert Gray, discovered the Columbia River and it was- from this vessel that the river receivd its name."
At least twenty-five persons were employed on the structure all the time during its construction. The work was laborious and dangerous and was performed by men many of whom had at least one serious failing-but they wrought with diligence and patience- and, under skilful guidance to completion. More than once, as;
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HISTORY OF HANOVER.
the work progressed and the poor fellows struggled silently on, the writer found himself repeating these lines of Boyle O'Riley's : "I can feel no pride but pity
For the burdens the rich endure, There is nothing sweet in the city But the patient lives of the poor."
There were many interesting episodes during the progress of the work, only one of which will be mentioned here. The abut- ment wall next to the arch was not pointed for a long time after it was laid, and, while the Italians were on the staging doing the pointing, a little mouse ran along the top of the arch and by the side of the abutment, entering an opening in the wall which it had selected as its home. The writer, from the ground, tried to explain to the workman that this opening must not be pointed ; but neither language nor motions were understood and the fatal «cement went in and mousie's home became its tomb. Then came the thought of the horrible Pagan custom, when bridges of this kind were built, of walling in one or more living persons, to make sure that the work "would not fall down." The pity of it all ! "But, mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain ;
The best laid schemes o' mice and men,
Gang aft a-gley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief and pain, For promis'd joy."
To those of us who view the scene from the bridge or from the eminence on either side, enraptured with its picturesque beauty, how the imagination quickens as we think of the centuries that this fair picture-fairer then than now-lay unfolded but hidden save from savage view.
Who was the first white man-the first woman-to seek this crossing? What was his purpose and what her emotions? What would we give to know !
Mr. Eben C. Waterman of the Hanover Selectmen said with marked effect, before the legislative committee, that Daniel Webster always paused in admiration as he crossed this stream.
In the progress of our civilization, the former structures have ·one after another been discarded. Prophetic pencil fails to write when this too will pass away; but the writer as the work has pro- gressed, has looked forward to a time so remote that all persons now living, and all other structures now standing in the commu- nity are gone and forgotten; yet mellowed by age, this bridge still
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STREAMS AND BRIDGES.
endures, and he has dreamed that even then old men and maidens. will, as they too pause in admiration of the view on either side,. give a thought of reverence to the work and to the nameless work- men."
The letter from Mr. Simmons and that of Mr. Perkins which follow here, are given as being so characteristic of the writers and more especially in tender memory of the two who have so recently passed to the unknown.
"Assinippi, Nov. 14, '04.
My dear Mr. Dwelley :---
I am just in receipt of your very interesting and valuable sketch of North River Bridge. I have read it with interest. It is like you, carefully accurate and painstaking and closes with a beauti- ful little "dream" which would mark its authorship if nothing else did.
You can't help being a good deal of a poet. If you had been born in Italy instead of Massachusetts, your lips would have broken the seal that Yankeedom has placed on them-and you. would have sung.
Yours truly, JOHN F. SIMMONS."
"Rockland, Mass., Nov. 21, 1904.
My Dear Mr. Dwelley :-
Your article in last week's Standard concerning North River- bridge was most interesting, and, including the cut, should be- reproduced in the forthcoming history of Hanover. Especially should the pathetic fate of the poor little mouse have a place in the annals of the town.
Thanking you for your communication, as though written solely for me, I remain
Sincerely yours, L. D. PERKINS."
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HISTORY OF HANOVER.
CHAPTER XII.
!
PUBLIC BUILDINGS. OLD HOUSES
By Jedediah Dwelley.
PUBLIC BUILDINGS.
We give very briefly here the history of the public buildings in the town.
For one hundred years after the incorporation, the town meet- ings were held in the meeting house at the Center.
In 1826, the town chose a committee consisting of Melzar Cur- tis, Edward Curtis and Ebenezer Simmons, to construct a town house, the building to be "31 feet wide, 39 feet long and 11 feet between joints." Joshua Dwelley, Jr., was employed to do the work.
In 1837 it was voted to erect permanent seats in this building and in 1844 it was "voted that the Selectmen purchase a stove and build a chimney in the town house." Up to this time it had not been heated.
This building stood on the Parish land about ten feet west of the meeting house and is more fully described under the chapter on town meetings.
In 1863, the present town house, 60x40 feet, was constructed by S. Nathan Turner and in 1893 it was enlarged with additions made under plans and specifications prepared by J. W. Beal, archi- tect.
A description of the library building is given in a separate article, relating solely thereto.
A few words regarding the past and present school houses, be- ginning with those on Main street:
In 1748, the town voted to have a movable school and one of the places selected was near the dwelling house of Benjamin Stet- son, now owned and occupied by John S. Smith.
About this time a school building was constructed and this served its purpose until about 1775 when a new building was
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PUBLIC BUILDINGS. OLD HOUSES.
erected near the brook on the west side of Main street, nearly oppo- site where stands the house of the late Benjamin W. Bailey.
This building was abandoned as a school house about 1835, and one erected on the west side of said street, between Webster and Walnut streets. The growth of the village very soon demanded a larger building and, in 1854, one was erected on the corner of
Main and Webster streets. The earlier building was sold, re- moved and converted into a store by Mr. John S. Brooks.
The present building, known as the Curtis school building, was erected in 1896 and the one built in 1854 was abandoned for school purposes.
About 1836 a school house was erected on the east side of Main street, a few rods southwest of the house of Arthur W. Bailey. This was used for twenty years, when it was sold to Martin S. Bates; removed to Silver street, and converted into a dwelling house. Later this house was sold and removed to Liberty street, Rockland, where it still stands, near the cemetery, a very pretty cottage house.
In 1854 a new house was constructed just east of the one last named and this was used until the Curtis school building, named above, was constructed. This Curtis school was named in honor of Mr. John Curtis, who gave to the town the land on which the building stands, as well as the pictures which adorn the walls of the school rooms.
In the northwest part of the town there have been three school houses, all situated on the site of the present one, which was erected in 1879. The first building here must have been built previous to 1800.
In the southwest part of the town there was, as early as 1748, "a new school house at Silvanus Wing's." Probably this was on School street, or on Circuit street, near School street. As early as 1810 this school house was situated on School street, nearly opposite the house of William F. Stetson. This location was oc- cupied by school houses (the last being built about 1845), until 1889, when the present primary and grammar school house near the northerly end of King street was constructed.
In the northeast part of the town there have been at least three school houses ; the first one standing on the east side of Washington street, north of and near the dwelling house so long owned and occupied by Daniel Chapman, the last one standing on the west side of said street, where now stands the house of William B. Adams- said school house having been remodelled into a dwelling house. The
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HISTORY OF HANOVER.
first of the three schools here was erected before 1800, perhaps as early as 1772, and the last one about 1854. At the present time the Union Hall building, owned by Charles H. Killam and Herbert, L. Curtis is used by the town for its school in this place.
There is no record of any school house at South Hanover pre- vious to 1772 but there must have been one soon after that date. The school house or houses here previous to 1854 stood on a hill just opposite the house of Irving W. Kingman on Myrtle street. About 1853 a new school house was built just south of Mr. King- man's residence and, when the Hanover Branch Railroad was constructed, in 1867, this building was removed to its present lo- cation on Broadway.
Very soon after the incorporation of the town a school house was erected near what was called the Centre. Just where this stood is uncertain but it was probably near the meeting house. A later house stood on Center street. The house constructed soon after 1820 stood on the spot where now stands the house of Turner Stetson. This was abandoned about 1853 when the present school building was constructed.
There must have been three school houses at the Four Corners before the purchase of the Academy building by the town in 1900, since which date this has been used for the primary and grammar schools.
It is probable that all the buildings occupied the same site on Broadway. The last of the three was constructed in 1859, the school house yard being then enlarged. This last-named building was converted into a dwelling house by Mary E. and Sarah J. Flavell and is now owned by them.
The old school houses of a hundred years ago ! How small and barren they were! Without paint and without adornment, yet for how much they stood. When the boys and girls left them, at an early age, they had finished their education except such as the trials of the world could give.
"Poor old school house, long since become scattered ashes !" "Poor little tired backs with nothing to lean against !" "Poor little bare feet that could hardly reach the floor !" "Poor little droop headed figures, so sleepy in the long summer days, so afraid to fall asleep !" "Long, long since, little children of the past, your backs have become straight enough, measured on the same cool bed; sooner or later your feet, wherever wandering, have found their resting-places in the soft earth; and all your drooping heads have gone to sleep on the same dreamless pillow and there
CENTER HANOVER PRIMARY SCHOOL, ERECTED SOON AFTER 1850
ODD FELLOWS' HALL
HALL OF THE PHOENIX LODGE OF FREE AND ACCEPTED MASONS
WEST HANOVEI: LIBRARY ASSOCIATION BUILDING
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PUBLIC BUILDINGS. OLD HOUSES.
are sleeping." "And the young school teachers who seemed ex- empt from frailty while they guarded like sentinels those lone out- posts of the alphabet, they too have long since joined the choir invisible of the mortal dead." "But there is something left of them though a century has passed away : something that has wan- dered far down the course of time to us like the faint summer fragrance of a young tree long since fallen dead in its wintered forest-like an old melody, surviving on and on in the air without any instrument, without any strings."
The North River Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, was instituted in 1874. In 1888 they erected a two story Lodge- Room building which stands on Broadway, near the end of Church street.
The Phoneix Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons was instituted March 11th, 1874, and is located in the Phoenix building at the Four Corners, on Broadway, erected by the Phoenix Building Asso- ciation in 1899, upon the site of the store building of J. B. Bates & Company, which was destroyed by an explosion on the 11th day of November, 1898. The fire following this explosion caused the death of four of Hanover's most worthy citizens.
The West Hanover Library Association building stands near the West Hanover station of the Hanover Branch Railroad. This was erected in 1888 and is occupied as a library and as a public hall.
Joseph E. Wilder Post 83, G. A. R., was organized in 1869 and the Woman's Relief Corps in 1891. Both of the organizations hold their meetings in the town hall in rooms prepared for them.
In 1910 the North Hanover Fire Company purchased of Joseph E. Stoddard the building on Webster street, formerly occupied as a shoe stitching factory and converted the same into a Chemical Engine House. This building is fully equipped with wagon, lad- ders and chemicals.
In 1908 the Firemen's Association of Hanover Four Corners and vicinity erected on Broadway, near the end of Church street, a two story building for the storage of its apparatus. This building is also fully equipped with wagons, ladders and chemicals. Both of these Chemical houses have a spacious hall on the second floor.
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HISTORY OF HANOVER.
OLD HOUSES.
This space is devoted to a description of some of the old houses in the town. A few of the more modern ones are also described but, in this latter case, only when the house occupies the same site as a previous one whose history it seems proper to observe.
The subject has been an interesting one to the writer and is presented with the hope that it may prove so to some at least of the readers. Lack of space forbids notice of a larger number al- though a history of nearly double the number given, was prepared.
There is no house in the town a hundred years old but has an interesting history. Few perhaps of the dwellers in the older houses know who constructed them or who were their earlier oc- cupants :
"We have no title deeds to house or lands ; Owners and occupants of earlier dates From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands And hold in Mortmain still their old Estates."
Quite a number of the houses described herein have been so re- modelled and enlarged as to be hardly typical of the date given. The most of them, however, are but little changed. Mistakes have doubtless been made and some of them will be discovered but the writer with his assistant gave many weeks of painstaking work to this subject.
The dwelling house now owned and occupied by Rev. William H. Dowden, on Hanover street, was constructed as early as 1716, probably by Samuel Stetson, called on the records "Drummer Stetson," a grandson of Cornet Robert Stetson.
Samuel married in 1719, when he was forty years old and lived and died here. Barry says that "he was a somewhat noted man in his day, his house being a tavern stand and a famous place of resort." Religious meetings were held here before the construction of the first meeting house.
Turner Stetson, who was Selectman for twenty-seven years, was born here as were the nineteen children of Samuel Stetson who died in 1859.
Several houses in the town constructed near the date of its in- corporation resemble this one. We can have little conception of the manual labor required in their erection, as machinery played little part in the construction of that date.
The house of Andrew T. Damon, on Hanover street, was con-
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structed probably as early as 1740. In 1756, it was owned and occupied by Joshua Staples, who died in 1770; and, in 1780, his widow sold it to Luther Robbins. The latter, in 1786, conveyed it to Rev. John Mellen and it was occupied as a parsonage for nearly three quarters of a century; Mr. Damon purchasing it of the shareholders, on the retirement of Rev. Abel G. Duncan. All the clergymen who resided here were men of ability, as will be noted in another chapter.
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