USA > Massachusetts > Hampshire County > Middlefield > History of the town of Middlefield, Massachusetts > Part 13
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53
35 See illustration page S1.
139
EARLY FARMHOUSES AND THEIR BUILDERS
graphs reveal churches with the square tower at one end of a plain structure, identical in proportions with the farmhouses, two rows of windows and the main door in the middle of one of the long sides. Some of these were not far from Middlefield, such as the Northampton meetinghouse erected in 1737; the Springfield meetinghouse of 1752; the Hadley Church of 1751; that of West Springfield of 1800; of Farmington, 1771 ; of Wethersfield, 1761. In fact, the well-known Old South Meeting- house of Boston, built in 1730 is closely similar in plan, and may be regarded as the parent of all that type.36 Seeing that the three men who built the church were all Connecticut men, Church, of East Haddam, Pelton, of East Windsor, and Russell, of Somers, it is quite likely that they had such churches as those of Farmington and Wethersfield in mind and may even have consciously imitated one of them.
Within, the church was divided by a central aisle running from the east door to the pulpit. On either side was a double row of square box pews with doors opening into the aisle and seats built on the three sides. The outer rows of pews opened into the north and south aisles. Square pews lined the walls. In front of the pulpit was a seat reserved for the deacons.
The pulpit was small and perched high upon the west wall. It was reached by a steep flight of stairs which started west from the floor and when half way up turned north along the wall. Under these stairs was a seat which was reserved for negroes. The pulpit was surmounted by a huge dome-shaped, octagonal sounding board without visible means of support, so that the effect of the whole arrangement was to make the pastor seem at an infinite distance from his flock. The small pulpit had an ornamental, fluted front which must have excited some admira- tion, for in later years, after the dismantling of the old pulpit, it was used to adorn the gable of a local farm building.37
The gallery was reached by stairways from the northeast and southeast corners of the auditorium. A row of seats in the front part of the gallery and running around to each end was reserved for the singers, and the late Oliver Church could recall when the choir was large enough to fill the entire row. Back of these seats
36 See Embury Early American Churches.
37 The corn house of Frank Chipman.
140
HISTORY OF MIDDLEFIELD
and lining the walls were more square box pews where the youths and maidens sat on their respective sides of the gallery, and here also, to preserve proper decorum and to keep within bounds the gambols of the lambs, sat the tithingman.
Church-going in the winter time during this period was some- thing of an ordeal when it is recalled that no provision for heat- ing the meetinghouse was made for many years. The only means of comfort were the foot stoves which the worshippers brought with them, though it might be added that probably many an incipient case of pneumonia was warded off between and after services by stimulating drinks at the Blush and Mack Taverns.
From the houses shown in this chapter and in earlier ones it is possible to reconstruct a picture of the Middlefield of the days between 1783 and 1820, so far as the farm buildings were con- cerned; but as a whole the township must have presented a very different appearance from what it does to-day. Where forests now extend, farm clearings diversified every hill and the network of roads reached the remotest corners. In placing their farm- houses on these steep hill-slopes great ingenuity was often shown and the resulting situations were often strikingly picturesque, commanding sweeping horizons and overlooking deep valleys. So near together were the farms in those days that in haying time the shouts of the oxen-drivers could be heard from one field to another up and down the long roads where stretches of over- grown pasture or jungles of second growth woods now spread in unbroken silence.
-
CHAPTER IX
FACTORY VILLAGE, THE CENTER AND "THE SWITCH"
T HE period following the War of 1812 saw great changes in the economic life of Massachusetts, and nowhere were they more in evidence than in the inland hill-towns of the western part of the state. The rapid development of manu- facturing in the eastern cities which was given its stimulus be- fore the war by the Embargo Act, and which continued thercafter in spite of unsettled conditions, brought about the gradual rise of a new class of people, an industrial population. This condi- tion had a beneficial effect upon agriculture in that it created a demand for farm products, for which there had been hitherto no market. As a result, the use of new inventions now became profitable and much interest was taken in the improvement of farming methods generally.
Even in the hill-towns the "jack-of-all-trades" type of farmer began to disappear. As the time arrived when he could secure manufactured household goods and wearing apparel more cheaply by the exchange of his farm products than by making them himself, his house ceased to be a "factory on the farm," and he could devote his energies more particularly to agricul- tural production. Other farmers with a talent for trading could now specialize in the mercantile business. Still others with a ' bent for mechanics became manufacturers. In Middlefield these specialized branches of business activity were wool growing, beef raising, woolen manufacturing, paper manufacturing, and mer- chandising, and a noteworthy development in each line can be traced. As it was the interrelation of these pursuits that brought into existence the three communities,-Factory Village, the Cen- ter, and "The Switch,"-the story of their growth in a region where for forty years there had been only scattered farms will be of considerable interest.
-
-
. DAVID . HAMILTON
ABEL· CHEESEMAN . HARRY
DAN PEASE JR
SMITH HOLLOW
MEACHAM
·
HIRAM PARISH
DIODATE DICKSON
OBADIAH SMITH
HOLMES
JOB & JACOB ROBBINS
JOHN DAMON
OLIVER SMITH
AMBROSE NEWTON
. S.H
:
AMBROSE ROBBINS
, S.H.
CHARLES BILLS
· SAMUEL SMITH
AMBROSE SMITH
ISRAEL HALE
SAMUEL SMITH, J.R.
JAMES CHURCH
DANIEL ALDERMAN
ERASTUS JOHN · INGHAM
RUSSELL PEASE
JONATHAN MCELWAIN
ELIJAH® COLE
· HARVEY ROOT
· FREEDOM COATS
.
HIRAM. TAYLOR
.
UNO.
MCELWAIN
S. H.
U. CHURCH & SONS. UPPER MILL
URIAH STACY. &CHURCH ROOT!
S.ROOT-S J.SMITH,
ALEX INGHAM
MATHEW
SM
S.M.
. WN.D. SELDEN BLUSH. ROOT O.BLUSH
CONG. CHURCH T.It. & S.H.
.
MILTON A LEONARD
ALMOND BARNES 1
MADISON SMITH JAMES WALL
FACTORY VILLAGG
V. CHURCH & SONS
MAS. DOROTHY WRIGHT
AMASA GRAVES .
WMI WHEELER
DWIGHT GRAVES
SH
JOHN
·
METCALF
T. MORGAN
MRS . LUCY ELY
GM
HENRY HAWES
S.P
MILTON COMBS
SAMUEL VNGHADE
JOHN P .. LOVE LAND
HARLOW LOVELAND
JOHN L. BELL :
AMBROSE LOVELAND
AMOS CONE
JAMES GRANGER
GASTON .DICKSON
E.C. SMITH
N
HENRY STANTON
DANIEL FOWLER
STATION
DANIEL MCCARTHY
MIDDLEFIELD
W -E
-
MRS.L CANNON J. MASKINS
1850
JOHN MANN
S
a-WM.BLUSHWWW. & CO. MILL LEONARD ( BOISE, SMITH & ROOTLESSEES!
MILTON SMITH
BETHEL M.E. CHURCH
MATTHEW SMITH, JR.
GILES CHURCHILLO
LOWER STEPHEN & MILL
JOAN PEASE
NATHAN W. WHEELER
HIRAM LEACH
ANDREW MEACHAM
·ELDRIDGE PEASE
JESSE F. WRIGHT
ROOT
PEASE
BOSTON &
ALBANY
STACY COMBS
.
·
GEORGE · SPENCER
JOEL TAYLOR
. CF.LEONARD SMITH
NATHAN WRIGHT
WUNDERT WOOD,
· REY/E. CLARK
O.BLUSH? & CO. MILL
MILTON NASH DR.J. WARREN. O. SMITH ZKO OLIVER CHURCH
WELSON SPENCER
MRS. WM. CHURCH
BARTHOLOMEW WARD
WALTER METCALF
MRS. WEALTHY @ OLDS
LYMAN & JAS.T.
SUMNER CHURCH. V. CHURCH
JR.
· S.F.ROOT . L.D. BOISE OBAPTIST
MRS. POLLY OLDS
. AMOS W. CROSS
HORATIO · N. DICKSON
ALVAN HOLMES
EBENEZER SMITH
ORRIN SMITH.
ASA SMITH
ADDISON . EVERETT
R R.R.
DANIEL . ROOT
ARNOLD PRASE
S.H .
CHAPTER IX
FACTORY VILLAGE, THE CENTER AND "THE SWITCH"
T HE period following the War of 1812 saw great changes in the economic life of Massachusetts, and nowhere were they more in evidence than in the inland hill-towns of the western part of the state. The rapid development of manu- facturing in the eastern cities which was given its stimulus be- fore the war by the Embargo Act, and which continued thereafter in spite of unsettled conditions, brought about the gradual rise of a new class of people, an industrial population. This condi- tion had a beneficial effect upon agriculture in that it created a demand for farm products, for which there had been hitherto no market. As a result, the use of new inventions now became profitable and much interest was taken in the improvement of farming methods generally.
Even in the hill-towns the "jack-of-all-trades" type of farmer began to disappear. As the time arrived when he could secure manufactured household goods and wearing apparel more cheaply by the exchange of his farm products than by making them himself, his house ceased to be a "factory on the farm," and he could devote his energies more particularly to agricul- tural production. Other farmers with a talent for trading could now specialize in the mercantile business. Still others with a bent for mechanics became manufacturers. In Middlefield these specialized branches of business activity were wool growing, beef raising, woolen manufacturing, paper manufacturing, and mer- chandising, and a noteworthy development in each line can be traced. As it was the interrelation of these pursuits that brought into existence the three communities,-Factory Village, the Cen- ter, and "The Switch,"-the story of their growth in a region where for forty years there had been only scattered farms will be of considerable interest.
142
HISTORY OF MIDDLEFIELD
The period of readjustment immediately following the War of 1812 was quite uncertain for those interested in the woolen busi- ness. As soon as peace was declared a flood of English dress goods was dumped upon the American markets with the express purpose of destroying the competition offered by the American manufacturers. As Congress failed to enact a tariff bill which would afford adequate protection for the newly developed home industry, many concerns which had begun to make broadcloth were forced to shut down. Among these, perhaps, was Amasa Blush, who like many others had built a new factory following prosperous war-time conditions, but it is possible that the larger part of his business, as well as that of the Church plant, con- sisted of carding and finishing for the local weavers of homespun goods which continued without interruption.
Much more serious was the effect on the farmers who had taken up the raising of the Merino sheep. The closing of the broad- cloth factories brought an immediate fall in the high prices for fine wool prevailing during the war, and many flocks of Merinos which had been developed with painstaking care were ruthlessly slaughtered. As Middlefield was located within the principal wool producing area of the state, it is probable that some of its citizens shared in these losses.
There has appeared in print the statement that Uriah Church and General David Mack manufactured cotton goods during the War of 1812, and that, anticipating a severe decline in price at the conclusion of peace, they inaugurated an extensive sales cam- paign for the disposal of their surplus goods which reached even to southern New York State and Pennsylvania. Un- doubtedly General Mack was a financial backer of Uriah Church in the beginnings of his woolen (not cotton) industry, but this enterprise is supposed to have been in its infancy at this period. That the commuity's investment in wool growing and woolen manufacture was sufficient to require extraordinary efforts to dispose of their surplus products is an interesting possibility, but one which cannot be verified.
With the coming of higher tariffs in the decade beginning in 1820, the woolen business revived somewhat, but did not become really prosperous until 1830. This improvement, however, was exemplified in Middlefield by the commencement of manufacture
FACTORY VILLAGE, THE CENTER AND "THE SWITCH" 143
of woolen goods for the market by both Amasa Blush and Uriah Church. The former installed spinning jennies and power looms in his factory, which had been built in 1815, and he began mak- ing satinet, an inexpensive grade of cloth made of coarse wool woven upon a cotton warp. In 1823 Uriah Church built a three- story woolen mill just north of his carding shop, and aided by his cousin, Ambrose Church, who set up his spinning and weav- ing machinery, began the successful manufacture of broadcloth.
The prosperous period of woolen manufacture during the '30's brought about a tremendous demand for fine wool only a third of which could be supplied by the flocks of the state. A craze developed for the raising of Saxony sheep, a variety of the Merino which produced the finest grade of wool and the fleece of which brought a much higher price than that of the coarse-wool sheep. So much attention was paid to this industry that the dairy and cattle raising industry suffered. That Mid- (llefield farmers participated fully in this venture is shown by the statistics of sheep raising in Massachusetts for the year 1836 in which the Middlefield production is classed as "Saxony," although there is no doubt that a certain proportion of the native variety is included therewith. But the important fact is that there were in Middlefield in this year 9,678 sheep, a number which was exceeded throughout the state only by the towns of Hinsdale and Lanesboro. So great was the development of this industry in the western highlands that the number raised on the comparatively small acreage of Middlefield exceeded in this year even the production of any county east of Worcester County, except Plymouth.
As Hinsdale and Lanesboro were situated near the important mill towns of the Housatonic and Hoosac Valleys, the principal reason why Middlefield outstripped its neighbors in sheep pro- duction is found in the proximity of the woolen mills of Church and Blush, the owners of which were eager purchasers of all the wool which the farmers could raise. Even as a mill town Mid- dlefield was quite prominent at this date for outside the valley towns of Berkshire mentioned above, no other hill town in west- ern Massachusetts had four sets of broadcloth machinery in operation. Although Amasa Blush retired about 1830, the busi- ness was continued by his sons Oliver and William D. under the
144
HISTORY OF MIDDLEFIELD
name of O. Blush and Company. About 1834 their plant was extended by the erection of a new finishing shop south of the dwelling houses of the owners. By 1840 the partnership was dis- solved, and William Blush, taking possession of the finishing shop equipped it with a full set of woolen manufacturing ma- chinery for the production of broadcloth and satinet.
As the woolen business grew, the conservation of the water power of Factory Brook was a matter which demanded the at- tention of the factory owners in Blush Hollow. They soon learned that the stream, on account of the height of the hills
100000000
0
augs 8-1956
Factory Village Middlefield , Mass.
From a Sketch by Wm F. Church.
surrounding its sources, responded very quickly to heavy rains and necessitated a careful regulation of its overflow. A great freshet in October, 1833, carried off the dam of Uriah Church's woolen mill and damaged the lower one which furnished power for his fulling mill. In addition to the individual mill ponds belonging to the several mills, a storage reservoir was needed. In 1839 or 1840 the Blushes and Churches together constructed a short distance above the Church upper mill a large dam of uncemented stone, backed by earth and wide enough to allow
145
FACTORY VILLAGE, THE CENTER AND "THE SWITCH"
the highway from the Center to Becket to run along the top. The reservoir thus created covered a tract of fifty acres, and be- sides providing adequate water power for the mills, added much to the attractiveness of the Hollow.
By 1840, therefore, at the height of the broadcloth era in the woolen industry there had grown up in Blush Hollow a thriving manufacturing village. Forty-six people, including the mill owners, were engaged in the woolen business, and several tene- ments had been erected, among which was the two-story, upper, boarding-house north of the Church Mill. Uriah Church pur- chased the John Smith farm as an auxiliary to his business, and built just above the old house a dwelling for his eldest son, Sumner ; at the edge of the reservoir he also built a double house for the families of his younger sons, James Talmadge and Ly- man. The Blushes, in addition to maintaining a farm, remodeled their father's old fulling mill, which stood north of the Oliver Blush Mill, and opened a small store for the community. An- other of their houses,1 which now stands opposite the present schoolhouse, is said to have housed the first school in the village.
The introduction of the factory system into Middlefield did not at first directly affect the household industry of the com- munity, as the broadcloth and satinet goods manufactured were worn mostly in the cities. The prevalence of the home manu- facture of cloth for household use in 1821 was shown in an ex- hibit at the Pittsfield Fair of eight hundred yards of cloth,- consisting of fulled cloth, raw flannel, carpeting, table cloth and other linen goods, woven by a mother and her four daughters in one year. But during the succeeding years the manufactured goods of the eastern cities gradually eliminated the demand for the homemade articles, and some of the farmers' daughters in the vicinity of Middlefield, whose occupation had thus been taken away, obtained employment as weavers and spinners in the factories at Blush Hollow. No class distinction between em- ployer and employed, however, existed for many years. The marriage of one of Urialı Church's sons with a factory girl who was a farmer's daughter was not considered as differing in any respect from the marriages of his brothers with farmers' daugh- ters who did not work in the mills.
1 Now the dwelling of Fred Boyer.
146
HISTORY OF MIDDLEFIELD
In certain cases the Church and Blush mills did custom work for the local wool growers, taking their wool and making it into broadcloth or satinet according to specifications. One of their principal customers was Ambrose Newton who no doubt was able to resell the manufactured goods to his brothers who were mer- chants in Albany. According to an old receipt dated June 13, 1840, Uriah Church and Sons acknowledged the receipt of six hundred seventy pounds of unwashed wool from Mr. Newton which they agreed "to manufacture into broadcloths of such colors as he shall direct except blue, and to do it in a workman- like manner for ninety cents a yard."
The wool growing industry continued to prosper during the early '40's. In 1845 the number of sheep raised in Middlefield was 9,840-the highest official record for any one year, but the statement is probably true that there were some years when over ten thousand sheep were sheared. After 1846, however, this business began to decline. The tariff of that year reduced the duty on imported manufactured woolens and the new fancy worsteds introduced from England began to displace broadcloth in popularity. This affected the fine wool culture immediately and the Saxony breed which had been raised entirely for this purpose quickly lost favor. By 1855, therefore, many western Massachusetts towns had decreased their number of sheep to less than half of what they had raised ten years before. The fact that the local mills continued in more or less steady opera- tion was probably a factor in the smaller proportional decrease in Middlefield, for in that year the town with its 4,849 head of sheep again ranked third in the state.
In 1846 Factory Village appears in the town records as de- sirous of better conditions of transportation and schooling. At this date no station had been granted to Middlefield by the Western Railroad, and the woolen manufacturers hauled their goods and raw materials over the two ridges separating them from Becket. The West Hill Road caused much dissatisfaction both on account of its steep inclines and on account of its cir- cuitous route to the West Hill schoolhouse where the Hollow children received their education.
At the town meeting of April 13 of this year the town voted to accept a new road "to commence near Church's Factory and
S. U. CHIURCII AND BROS.' UPPER MILL S. U. CHURCH AND BROS.' LOWER MILL
SCENE IN FACTORY VILLAGE, ABOUT 1872, U. CHURCHI AND SONS' ORIGINAL, UPPER MILL IN THE BACKGROUND
148
HISTORY OF MIDDLEFIELD
to lead onto the West Hill,"-apparently through the Blush pasture to connect with the southern road to Becket. Town politics were much involved in this matter for on May 2 the action was rescinded, reconsidered, and again defeated. In-Sep- tember a road was accepted which would commence at the Reser- voir, but this road was never built. Probably the establishment of a railroad station at "the Switch" rendered this road less necessary. With the population of Factory Village doubled by" the erection of the lower Church mill in 1848, it soon was made a separate school district with its schoolhouse built south of the highway bridge where it stands to-day.
It is probable that the Blush factories did not prosper during the unfavorable conditions of the late '40's. No satinet was manufactured in the Oliver Blush mill by 1855. William Blush rented his mill to a company composed of John Smith, Lewis D. Boise and Solomon F. Root, who lived at Middlefield Center, which carried on the woolen business until 1851 when the mill was destroyed by fire with considerable loss to the renters. Blush did not revive his woolen business but a few years later he erected on the same site a wood-turning shop in which he made wagon parts, such as shafts, spokes and felloes.
The demand for the output of the Church mill, however, was such as to warrant the erection in 1848 of the large "lower mill," some distance south of the Blush factories. A sawmill was set up just above the new mill and the timber from the hill- sides readily converted into lumber to erect tenements for the additional employees. The Uriel Cone farm west of the highway was acquired and the homestead remodeled into what was known as the "old boarding-house." South of this was later erected the large white structure known as "the new boarding-house." In 1851 Uriah Church died and four of his sons continued business under the name of S. U. Church & Brothers.
For a few years conditions necessitated the manufacture of twills and other goods in which coarse wool was used to some extent, but under the management of Sumner Church a broad- cloth of superior quality was obtained by carefully grading the wool and by greater care in fulling and washing than was gen- erally exercised. This product, known in the markets of Bos- ton, Philadelphia and Washington as "Mountain Mills Gold
FACTORY VILLAGE, THE CENTER AND "THE SWITCH" 149
Band Cloth," possessed a soft finish and a brilliant luster, and sold for twenty-five cents more a yard than any other brand of its kind. The colors were black and blue and the goods became especially popular with the wealthy planters of the south. By 1855, 40,000 yards of broadcloth were made in spite of the fact that general prosperity in the woolen business did not return until 1858 when raw wool began to be imported free from South America and the Cape of Good Hope.
With the outbreak of the Civil War the woolen manufac- turers faced sudden changes. The market for the broadcloth made by the Church Brothers disappeared with the loss of the Southern markets. A special demand for army supplies, how- ever, was soon forthcoming, and the workers in Blush Hollow were soon busy night and day making army blankets for the Union soldiers. In this work, as in earlier times, the presence of a local suppply of coarse wool in the neighborhood was of mutual advantage to farmer and manufacturer. For a short time the price of coarse wool was as high as fifty cents a pound,- more than was paid for fine wool. Later, six months were spent in making cloth for uniforms. After two years, however, the scarcity of woolens for civilian wear brought about the resump- tion of the manufacture of broadcloth. Aided by the high pro- tective tariff and also by high prices, the Churches entered upon the most profitable period of their career which continued for six or seven years after the war.
The tangible evidences of this prosperity were seen in the new buildings in Factory Village which gave it the appearance of a modern manufacturing town. William D. Blush remodeled his house into a comfortable residence with a mansard roof. Near by Sumner Church built, in 1868, his spacious and imposing mansion with barn and carriage-house. James T. Church en- larged his house a year or two later into an attractive and com- fortable home. A number of other buildings connected with the mills had also been erected during the war and afterward. Chief of these was the Church Brothers store which furnished dry goods and groceries to the factory workers and which had previ- ously been maintained at the Center until about 1860. This building was erected just south of the Uriah Church homestead. The store was first kept by Myron Church, who was succeeded
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.