USA > Massachusetts > Franklin County > Whately > History of the town of Whately, Mass., including a narrative of leading events from the first planting of Hatfield, 1661-1899 : with family genealogies > Part 24
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POTASH was made near the residence of Col. Josiah Allis, by whom I do not know, but have supposed by Col. Allis. Then there was another potash works near the house of Paul Belden, but whether this was carried on by Mr. Belden, George Rogers or by some other party I have no means of determining.
NEEDLES. About 1806, Widow Elizabeth Phelps came from Northampton and bought the house where William Bard- well lived. Later it was sold to L. S. Wilcox and raised up a story. Mr. Phelps was a silversmith and from him their son, Edward, obtained much of his skill in mechanics. At one time he undertook to manufacture sewing needles. How long he continued in this business I do not know, or whether he con- sidered it a success. The writer has samples of his make, and I am certain the market for them now would be rather small.
DISTILLERIES. When cider became abundant in Whately, the market was quite limited. So to dispose of the surplus, dis-
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tilling became quite common. Cider brandy was sent by the boats to Hartford and by large vessels to New York. Some years the quantity was quite large, amounting to fifty barrels or more. The distillery on the east side of Gutter bridge, near where the road to South Deerfield branches off from Chestnut Plain street, was run for many years by Rev. Daniel Hunting- ton, Edward Phelps and Leonard Loomis. They were partners, running a general merchandizing and the distilling of cider brandy. They dissolved partnership about 1825 to '27, Phelps keeping the distillery. Prior to this, Reuben and Aaron Belden run a distillery some years, Zenas Field early in this century, Lieut. John Brown before 1820, Dexter and Noah Crafts, Jerre Graves, John E. Waite, G. W. and A. J. Crafts and now Luman S. Crafts. Possibly there were others, that I do not recall.
MERCHANTS IN WHATELY. Dea. Simeon Waite and his son, Gad Waite, kept a small assortment of goods and groceries where Calvin S. Loomis lives and sold intoxicating liquors, soon after he came to the town in 1760. They sold by the quart or gallon, or they mixed and sold flip by the mug, etc. Samuel Grimes opened a store, in 1797, where he kept dry goods, gro- ceries and liquors, mixed flip and sold to customers. Gad Smith opened a store in the Straits as soon as 1778, and David Stock- bridge about 1801. The Straits was, for many years, the most populous and enterprising part of the town. Levi Bush, Jr., came in 1823 or '24, selling dry goods and groceries, including intoxicating liquors, until about 1828. Eurotus Morton came about that time, 1828, and associated with him was Samuel B. White at the center, east of the old meeting-house. They kept an assortment of merchandise, including spirits. William W. San- derson sold dry goods and groceries, Samuel Lesure the same. The Whately Co-operative store was in existence several years, from 1859 or '60, to '66, then Ashley Hayden, Darius Stone, and since him A. W. Crafts, Micajah Howes and son, Ryland C., have had possession. E. H. Woods opened a store near Ashley G. Dickinson's, but soon went to the railroad station. After this there was a union store, with thirty or forty owners, then Caleb L. Thayer, Horace H. Hastings, Eugene E. Wood, John H. Pease, Henry C. Ashcraft and it is now owned by Arthur J. Wood.
At West Whately we first had a Mr. Lull on Poplar Hill, Reuben Winchell at the center, Childs & Jenney at the west
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part, then some one who bought them out whose name I forget. At the centre Huntington, Phelps & Loomis, and earlier still, at the center, Lemuel and Justus Clark had a store near the stockade monument. They bought out Dr. Perez Chapin who, I think, kept a grocery store. Elijah Allis and. Chester Wells run a general store, and after them Salmon White Allis, and perhaps others that I don't recall.
POCKETBOOKS. This branch of business was for many years a very important one, furnishing work for a large number of the women and children of the town besides those who were kept in constant employment at the factory. This, it must be remem- bered, was before the invention of the sewing machines and all the stitching upon thousands of dozens of pocketbooks, wallets and bill books had to be done by hand. This work was given ont to be done at the homes of our people, while the cutting, pasting and pricking the holes for the stitches was done at the factory, as well as other needful work in finishing and packing the work for the market. There was a force of from five to seven men and probably a dozen or more young ladies in con- stant employment, and a much larger force of stitchers scattered over the town. Col. Harwood was a great manager and under his management the town was much benefitted. True, the pay- ment to the outside help was paid from the store, yet many a boy and girl was able by their own labor to obtain many nice articles of wearing apparel, while the employment of their spare time and the earning of this money taught them a useful lesson, raised their self respect and exerted a refining influence that was far reaching. All of this will apply to the manufacturing by Stephen Belden and Lemuel Graves. They were each doing the same kind of business, but not on so large a scale. Between them all they probably had as many as sixty families engaged in the work of stitching, and were distributing thousands of dol- lars each year for this purpose. Aside from these there were some others from South Deerfield that used to send out a team with work to be done. Then our old friend, Miles B. Morton, was in the same business seven or eight years, and William F. Bardwell took contracts to manufacture for Luman Pease, I think of South Deerfield, and Samuel W. Steadman and his brother-in-law, R. B. Hawks, did some business in the same line.
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BROOM CORN AND BROOMS. Broom corn was planted, at first as a curiosity, as early as 1780 to '85. Sylvester Judd mentions its growth at these early dates, but its worth was not appreciated by the public, as they were apparently satisfied with their birch brooms. Broom corn is probably a species of sor- ghum, or guinea corn, with a jointed stem like the sorghum and Indian corn, and grows to the height of eight or nine feet according to the fertility of the soil. The head or brush pro- duces a seed like the sorghum plant only the brush is longer and, when allowed to ripen, is used for grinding with corn for provender. When the seed ripens the brush turns to a reddish color, and is more brittle and of less worth than when harvested in the blossom. The first one mentioned by Mr. Judd, to com- mence its cultivation with a view of utilizing it for manufactur- ing brooms was Levi Dickinson of Hadley. This was about 1797. His first brooms were sold by peddlers through the adjoining towns. Its culture soon spread through the river towns, and in 1805, several Whately men commenced to culti- vate it. The most prominent at this early period were Reuben, Aaron and Francis Belden, three brothers. They not only grew the corn, but essayed to manufacture the brooms, but they did not meet with popular approval on account of their poor manu- facture. They would soon get loose on the handle, and the women did not like them. The method of making them was to take a sapling of suitable size, peel off the bark and after it was seasoned they would attach a string to the side of the room, long enough to fasten the brush for a broom, then fastening the string to the handle commence to walk forward, rolling the broom around and drawing it as closely as the strength of the string would allow until sufficient brush was used to make the broom of the proper size. These were of course round and then to flatten them they used an axe or a heavy mall, and later flat- tened them under the cider mill press. About 1820, they began to use a spool, or as they termed it roller, some fifteen inches long. On this the twine was wound and the workman sat at his bench and held the spool under his feet and by properly placing the brush and using a suitable implement called a "pounder" the broom was made flat. This "pounder" was made of steel, about two and one-half inches wide and six inches long with edges a quarter of an inch thick, and weighed fully two pounds. This was used to crush down the stalks of the brush so as to fasten the broom so tight that it would seldom
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get loose. Then when sewed the broom was placed in between the jaws of the sewing horse and allowed to spread sufficiently to meet the wishes of the workman and then sewed with twine, as at present done.
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CHAPTER XIV.
AGRICULTURE.
It would seem passing strange if I, to the farin born, should neglect to say something upon this very important topic. The fact that Whately has always been, and now is, a farming town no one will for a moment dispute. Our first settlers were all farmers, obtaining their bread by industriously stirring mother earth to induce the best and richest returns in exchange for their tireless labor and watchful care.
The soil of course is varied, the eastern portion containing the rich alluvial meadows skirting the Connecticut river, and the second level all free from stone, but of a lighter and more sandy nature, yet warm, quick to respond to culture, and where it is fertilized is among its best lands. The ease of culti- vation induced its owners to sow it with rye continuously until it was ryed to death. Then they used to let it lay over a year and then sow rye again. If by chance a piece was planted with corn and from four to six loads of pretty poor compost put in the hill often twenty-five to thirty bushels of corn would be har- vested. But fearful that some of the manure used would leach from the soil the land would be sowed to rye again as soon as the corn could be put into the stook, and the much-abused land would yield eight or ten bushels of rye to the acre. Then the straw, for which there was no market, was often put in the barn- yard on top of the muck or soil, and at every clearing of the yard earth was removed.
The land was flat or level, not admitting of drainage, and the cattle and cows would go to the bottom at every step, so then
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the straw would be littered over the porridge-like barnyard, and by the time that it would freeze so as to bear up the cattle, the straw would be to some extent mixed with the muck and the droppings of the cattle. The cattle, by the way, were turned into the yard to drink at about ro o'clock a. m., and cold or storm, left there to hook and chase each other until the boys came home from school. Then they were tied up, and either hay or corn stalks were fed, the men going to the barn generally twice to feed after the boys were through.
The milking was not a long job. I very well recollect that my sister and I had to milk the four cows and the amount of milk would not exceed eight quarts in the morning and less at night. They were fed no grain or mess of any kind and the amount of butter fat would only make comment by its paucity. Most every year an old cow that had been to pasture out on the hills during the latter portion of the season was fed come fall and winter until killed, a peck basket full of small potatoes morning and night and I had to do that as part of my chores. The oxen when worked were fed corn on the ear. The horses were fed as much as two quarts of oats per day as a rule.
It was somewhat difficult to make what butter our large family wanted, but it had to go as none would be bought. Our methods were simply typical of many others.
The ground planted was fertilized by the manure drawn out of the yards in the fall, it being placed in piles, six or eight loads in each, so as to be handy for use in the planting time, and almost invariably used in the hill for all kinds of hoed crops.
Seventy to seventy-five years ago the principal thing sold from the farm was stock, cattle and pork, aside from a small amount of butter that was taken at the stores in exchange for goods. Then rye, corn, oats and broom corn were the principal crops. Some few raised flax, but that soon ceased. The broom corn was usually or quite frequently used on the farm, as broom makers were seemingly as numerous as shoemakers in Lynn, and it was thus turned into cash together with needful labor.
Tobacco from Virginia pressed into plugs sold at about five cents a plug or thirteen cents per pound. Butter in 1816 was twelve and one-half cents, in 1811 oats sold for 2s 6d, or forty two cents when sold by the single bushel, corn fifty cents, rye sixty-seven, wheat seventy-five. The market for grain was largely local, as there was no means of transporting it except by teams. As for butter, the stores would buy it at from ten to twelve and
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one-half cents. work it all over, pack it in firkins or tubs and send it by teams to Boston.
The people of to-day, with railroads traversing the country in every direction, even carrying milk by the thousands of cans to Boston and meats by hundred of car loads, also butter and cheese, at but a modicum of the former cost receive a much larger price for their commodities. Then there were only the local markets, now Northampton, Holyoke, Chicopee and Springfield afford excellent, as well as near-by markets, for any surplus products the farmer may have.
Formerly fruit was only raised for home use. Apples it is true yielded some income, as the cider would sell at from seven- ty-five cents to one dollar a barrel for drinking purposes and dis- tillation and large quantities of cider brandy were sent to Hart- ford and New York, going by boat down the river. Eggs were seldom sold for more than twelve and one-half cents a dozen and then only in the heighth of the season.
TOBACCO.
Tobacco was raised by most of the farmers to a greater or less extent from the earliest settlement of the Connecticut val- ley, and was a source of trade mostly confined to a sort of retail trade among the people living in hill towns. This was prepared for market by sweating it in a rather primitive manner. It seems that it was hung up to dry or cure for awhile, and then when it had begun to cure they took it down and piled it in smallish heaps to induce heat or fermentation until it was in condition for use, occasionally repacking it so as to secure as even a sweat as possible in that way. When the sweat was fin- ished the leaves were stripped from the stalks and done up in hands and packed away to keep moist until winter. Those who made a business of sending out peddlers would in the winter strip out the center stem and either braid it in rolls, or in some other way make it attractive and thus dispose of it.
After the Revolutionary war the crop was more extensively grown, and I recall the fact of a purchase of quite a large tract of land, some sixty acres, by Reuben and Asa Crafts, pay- able one-third in silver money, one-third in tobacco and the balance in stock. I have this from a son of Reuben Crafts, his uncle Asa taking the silver money and carrying it on his horse to some town in New York state and paid the first installment. This is in part the valuable lands now owned by the Hon. Lyman A. Crafts near the railway station in Whately.
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Mr. Sheldon says: Tobacco was raised in Deerfield in 1696, and Daniel Belden had hung a portion of his crop in the attic to dry before the Indians attacked Belden's house in Sep- tember of that year, and some of his children hid among it and they in that way escaped capture by the savages."
After the incorporation of the town, in 1771, we find that the young minister, Rev. Rufus Wells, was accustomed to raise quite a quantity, selling it to anyone wishing to buy. The price for the hand not stripped was usually six pence per pound. He however sold some to Parson Emerson, the Conway minister, for five pence, but sometimes his price was eight pence a pound.
Among the largest growers in town were Joshua Belden, his sons, Reuben and Aaron Belden, Dea. Levi Morton, Reuben and Asa Crafts and Perez Wells. It isn't probable that at that period the whole acreage devoted to tobacco culture would ex- ceed fifteen acres. After the introduction of plug or pressed tobacco from Virginia the growing entirely ceased, except in isolated instances where some one who was accustomed to the use of the leaf raised a supply for his own use.
About 1843, Stephen Belden procured some tobacco seed and raised a quantity of tobacco in 1844, shipping it to New York with his brooms. His tobacco was packed in barrels and he sold it for four cents a pound. This was the commencement of raising Connecticut seed leaf tobacco in Whately. The next year Lewis Wells, S. and H. Dickinson and Isaac Frary, Jr., each commenced with a small patch of tobacco and after it was cured they drove over to Hadley where they sold it for six cents a pound to Loomis of Suffield. The next year they had about an acre each, and Mr. Loomis came to Whately and bought their crops, paying about twelve cents for the wrappers and four cents for the fillers. The amount of money brought to these men for their crops induced others to commence its growth, and at the end of ten years there were about seventy acres devoted to its culture. Prices varied from ten to fourteen cents, average about twelve and one-half cents a pound. These prices stimu- lated its production. In 1865, we had some over 300 acres in cultivation.
Of course values were increased as a result of the deprecia- tion of our paper money, though if reduced to a gold basis they were very low. The price in 1865 was about twenty cents per pound in greenbacks, really less than ten cents in silver or gold. As paper depreciated the price rose so that one year I sold my
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crop at thirty-five cents and the world seemed to go wild over our profits and every effort was used to increase the acreage.
New and valuable buildings were erected for curing the crop, at great expense, in the place of old and tumbled-down structures and in this present year (1899) new and elegant buildings are being erected. It is claimed that ten large barns, of from seventy-five to one hundred and twenty-five feet by thirty, having a hanging capacity of at least forty acres, have been erected.
The methods of fertilization have kept pace with the march of investigation by our agricultural experiment stations and in- stead of fertilizing wholly with stable manures and Peruvian guano, they now use extensively cotton seed meal and potash in some available form as it is an absolute necessity to produce a leaf that can be used for a wrapper in order to obtain a price that will compensate the grower for his outlay of time and money. A good, desirable leaf always finds buyers and those that don't haggle over a reasonable price. This is by far the leading interest of our townsmen and we have occupied consid- erable space to trace its history.
Now I will close with a little incident of church inteference. Rev. C. N. Seymour came to Whately and was installed, 9 March, 1853, and remained about six years. He was a liberal preacher and well liked by the townspeople. During his stay in town the association of ministers met in Whately and among the ultra-pious men were many that believed it was an awful sin to use the vile Indian weed and of course that added the men who grew it to a sinful class. They discussed the question with much eloquence, and it ended in resolutions recommending the ministers in the tobacco growing towns to use every effort by prayer and exhortation to stop raising it, and they called on their good Brother Seymour to give his views. Until then he had maintained a discreet silence, but he arose and all eyes were upon him, and he very wittily remarked, "That he didn't particularly care what his parishioners raised if they would only raise his salary," and took his seat.
The panic of 1873 was successful in ruining most of the parties living in town who had entered into the trade in tobacco. Tobacco that cost nearly or quite thirty cents a pound dropped down to some eight or ten cents a pound, carrying most of the local dealers in Franklin and Hampshire counties into insol- vency. We mention this to show the unfavorable side of the tobacco trade.
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ABANDONED FARMS IN WHATELY AND THE CAUSES LEADING THERETO.
This is a topic on which there are a variety of opinions. We do not expect to solve the problem yet will give some salient reasons for at least a portion of them. It seems as though one hundred years ago the young men, not desiring to remove away from all their associates and relatives, sought to occupy lands wholly unsuited for a productive farm upon which they could support a constantly growing family, were afterwards actually compelled to seek some other location.
To illustrate my idea I will mention one instance: Daniel Wells born about 1749, marrying Aphia Dickinson, had a log house on the Easter road to Conway, on the west side of the road well to the north, near where Sylvester and Horace Graves' sugarhouse stood. His land ran west of the hill. His house stood on a small level spot, a part of the level patch being little better than a mudhole. They had one cow and before she dropped her calf, he let her have the run of the level patch at night. One morning he found her mired and dead and the calf also. He then remarked that "He would not live on a farm where there wasn't a suitable place for a cow to calve on." He removed and left an abandoned farm.
Very many of these abandoned farms were wholly unsuited for a farm, being fit only for woodland or pasturage. When the land was new and freshly burned over comfortable crops were produced for awhile, but the fertility was not kept up by the application of fertilizers. The places served simply as a shelter at night for those who were employed by neighbors who had lands suited for farm purposes. When the time came that farm machinery took the place of hand labor, then indeed was there an exodus to some factory village where a man and his numer- ous family could live comfortably.
As for an illustration : Before the mowing machine, tedder and the horserake, all of our larger farms gave employment to many hands to cut and make the hay. It was a common thing to see from three to five or more hands industriously swinging the scythe all the forenoon to cut over a piece of land that a man, and a pair of horses attached to a mowing machine, would easily cut in much less time. Then in the afternoon the rake and pitchfork had to be handled lively, while with the tedder and a single horse the hay is better turned than a man can do it.
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Then shifting to the horse rake the crop is soon in shape for drawing, and two men and a boy will put more hay into the barn than the five or six men, to say nothing about the boys, could do then. The result is that the labor that was formerly hired is dispensed with, and then the reaper and thresher came in to further lessen the need of so much extra help.
In the winter men were employed, usually on shares, to thresh out the rye and wheat crops, and the music of the flails was heard in many a barn from early morning until we would get home from school. These jobs now are gone, and the man living on a piece of land that would not furnish a family with but little beyond caring for a cow, or perhaps two cows, and potatoes, the buildings going to decay and ruin, has at last abandoned it, the land being sold for pasturage or to grow up to wood.
In 1888 I assisted in cutting white pines that yielded five 12-foot logs for boards, the butt cut making boards, square edged, 22 inches wide, from land that when I was a boy of ten years was used for a cow pasture, having formerly been culti- vated with corn and grain. About 1828 to 1834 there was a western boom that struck our town as well as others; such stories of the marvelous richness of those distant lands, that many sold off their farms and they were soon made into pastures, and the houses either torn down or removed.
I have one such instance in my thoughts now: A father had built a two-story house, but never plastered a room; went upstairs by means of a ladder, had no well, drew the water for the house with his oxen and sled or stone boat, letting the cattle go to the brook thirty rods away. They had twelve children. Then his son lived in the same way, same house, and also had in his family twelve children. Then they moved to another farm. The land was sold, the house taken down and set up again over two miles away, put into comfortable condition, and was recently sold to a young man who now has a comfortable home.
Other farms after the death of the owners, have been divided and subdivided and sold off in small strips, thus destroying the farm, the land being now added to the possessions of some well- to-do farmer. This will account for quite a number of aban- doned farms. If we go back to the tax list of 1771 we find that the seventy-one poll tax payers had ninety-nine cows. There was practically no sale for butter, and only enough cows were
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kept to supply the family. In 1810 the tax list shows that with 231 poll tax payers they had increased the number of cows to 307 ; they had also increased their population from 320 in 1771 to 890 in 1810. Butter was worth 8d in 1777, in 1810 about ten cents, and from 1825 to 1830 about twelve and one-half cents. It is probably true that I can name three men in Whately who manufacture and sell more butter than all that was made and sold in 1810, or it produces more money. Considering the con- ditions under which our people struggled, the wonder is that so few farms were abandoned.
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