USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Holliston > Holliston, Massachusetts bi-centennial celebration, 1724-1924 > Part 4
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to be pensioned, if he wants to get a living for his family. And so out of this disaster there came peace and concord, which have prevailed for over one hundred and fifty years.
The life of the colonies was greatly hindered by the treatment which was received at the hands of the Parliament of Great Britain. The states- men of both France and England accepted the same theory about the use of colonies, namely, that they were to be used to enrich the countries which possessed them. With this theory in their minds the Parliament began to persecute the colonies with petty taxations, and to restrict their trade on every hand. Freemen who had learned to rule themselves and to establish governments and churches on their own responsibility could not stand these oppressive acts. Massachusetts was foremost in her stand against tyranny.
Samuel Adams, James Otis and others kept the towns of the colony informed as to what was being done, and sought their co-operation in every measure proposed. Holliston was not slow in swinging into line. . Military stores had begun to be collected as early as 1731. Military companies were formed for training in the use of arms. Minute-men volunteered to take up arms at the sounding of the bell. Holliston voted to raise more hemp, flax and wool and to lessen superfluities. She sent delegations to Boston and Concord to attend conventions to deliberate on what action to take. She signed a pledge not to buy or use any goods of British manufacture until the so-called Boston Port Bill should be abolished. The town passed a resolution setting forth the rights of the colonies and the infringement of them by the British nation. At a con- vention in Concord, August 30, 1774, attended by Holliston delegates the question was raised "Shall we be content to be the most abject slaves of Great Britain and entail that slavery on posterity, or by a manly; just and virtuous opposition assert and support our freedom?" "No danger shall affright, no difficulties intimidate us; and if in support of our rights we are called to encounter death, we are yet undaunted, sensible that he can never die too soon who lays down his life in support of the laws and liberties of his country."
These resolutions were adopted by an almost unanimous vote, and sent to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia and highly applauded by the delegates and that body unanimously declared its approval of the acts, and its sympathy with the suffering people of Massachusetts.
The last town meeting held in Holliston under King Geoge's name was May 13, 1776. The next town meeting was held in the name of God and the people of Massachusetts.
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Our fathers were ready to march to Concord and Lexington but the British retreated so precipitously that the minute men did not have their opportunity, but they were present at the battle of Bunker Hill and witnessed the evacuation of the British from Boston as they were drawn up on Dorchester Heights with Washington's Army.
Of course we find in every war malcontents, critics, non-sympathizers with the sacrifices of those who give their best for a noble cause. Hollis- ton was not exempt and a few citizens were found of this kind. Local committees were appointed to see that everybody should do his part and lists of people were posted who refused to obey the restrictions laid upon the community. Acts of disloyalty were uncovered. In a document in possession of Mr. Joseph Dewing, five men of the town, whose names are connected with some of the best families, are mentioned as being suspected of disloyal acts. They were held in the sum of one hundred pounds each which they were to forfeit if they conducted themselves politically in a suspicious manner or in any way tried to counteract the struggles of the United States for liberty. They were warned not to aid directly or indirectly or abet the enemies of this country or communicate any intelligence to them or to persuade any person from opposing the enemies of the land. Some of these men must have fully repented for afterward they were elected to public office.
The number of men who enlisted from this town in the war of the Revolution was 248 out of a population of 800 people. Captain John Lealand, Capt. Staples Chamberlain, Lieut. Jacob Miller, Capt. Daniel Eames, Colonel Abner Perry, Colonel Simeon Cutler, Aaron Phipps, Thomas Russell, Daniel Mellen, Abner Johnson, Joseph Bigelow, Joshua Hemingway, Timothy Rockwood and Dr. Edward Durant, an army surgeon, were a few of the brave men who showed their patriotic spirit. Holliston was called upon for blankets, coats, underwear, money and men and it required a resourceful spirit to meet all the demands of this war for liberty.
These were our ancestors, vigorous, prompt, energetic, hardy toilers, courageous, manly men of whom the world was not worthy.
John Quincy Adams, the sixth President of the United States once said of them, "I would rather have one drop of Puritan blood in my veins than all the blood that ever flowed in the veins of kings and princes."
We come now to the third period in the life of Holliston.
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III. THE PERIOD OF FORMATION.
HE formative period of a town is the period when influences are at work to determine its future character. What kind of a town is Holliston to be? Will it remain a farming community? Will it be a mere village with few inhabitants and scattered houses along one main street? Will it be an industrial center, with busy factories, and stores and markets and warehouses? Will it be an aristocratic center, a rich man's town with beautiful houses and large estates? The next fifty years were to determine its character and to give an answer to these questions. They were quiet years, but years when men and women were growing in their ability to do; when men's minds were enlarging, when new forces were beginning to stir people to action. The population increased very slowly, there was only a gain of one hundred and fifty people in forty-five years, but the people were busy and the world was entering a new day. It was the beginning of the age of science, of new inventions, of new means of transportation.
The war of 1812 was unpopular with the people of Massachusetts. Holliston expressed her disapproval of it, and no company of men marched forth from the town to battle with the enemy. If any persons went forth from Holliston, they went as individuals and not in the name of the town. Dr. Fitch in his one hundredth anniversary address delivered only fourteen years afterwards does not speak one word in regard to it. Dr. Dowse in his Centennial Address of July 4, 1876 passes over it entirely and so does Dr. Adams in his historical address delivered in 1878.
In the colonial days, corn and grist mills had been erected along the streams, but previous to 1793, most of the people were engaged in reclaiming and tilling the land. The shoemaker, blacksmith, carpenter and storekeeper settled here only to meet the wants of the people and no more of that class of people were desired. Even these cultivated the land to meet the needs of their families.
In 1793 Colonel Ariel Bragg began the making of shoes. He may be called the father of this industry, which became a very flourishing busi- ness in the town, with the Bullards, the Rockwoods, the Batchelders, Currier, Littlefield, Johnson, Stone and Driscolls engaging in it, until at one time, 1874, a business of $1,000,000 a year was developed and over 600 men and women employed. In 1815 a woolen mill was erected near the junction of the Bogistow and Jarr brooks. In the same year a cloth industry, under the name of the Holliston Cloth Co. Hon. Elihu Cutler
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was greatly interested in the progress of his native town and helped many enterprises to settle here. In 1814 he formed a company and erected the first mill for the manufacture of thread; this afterward became the fac- tory of W. L. Payson for the manufacture of wood finish, church pews and settees. The manufacture of straw goods began in 1815, and was carried on by the Lelands, afterwards by Thayer, Slocum, Thompson, Mowry, Rogers & Co.
As we study this period ending with the first century, we find that the character of the town was undergoing a change. Everything pointed to the development of Holliston into an industrial center, which afterwards it did become. But it was to be an industrial community surrounded by farms and groups of men who tilled the soil. Holliston then was fast becoming a center for manufacture, with farmers on the circumference of the town to retain its old time features. Farming and manufacturing are good industries to have in the same town and this is what the forma- tive period did: It combined the two in harmonious relations. The close of the first century saw the erection of a new meeting house and the town well launched on its most prosperous period.
Dr. Fitch said in his address delivered to celebrate the first one hun- dred years, "The century, which at its commencement saw this town an infant and feeble settlement, sees it at its close populous, wealthy and respectable. May the century which has opened upon you so favorably see you through subsequent generations a united, holy and happy people, whose God is the Lord."
We now come to the
IV. PERIOD OF UPLIFT.
HE next fifty years from 1824 to 1874 was a period when the town was uplifted in its material, intellectual and spiritual life; we may call it also the Golden Age of the town. The closing ten years of the first century had seen many new enterprises started in the town and many of these became a great source of profit to the entire community. The four Batchelders came down from New Hampshire and began the manufacture of boots; William, Benjamin, John and George, each man putting himself into the life of the town. Honesty was the key-note of their lives and each was honored with a large degree of prosperity.
The town began to grow as never before. It gained in ten years as ยท much as in thirty years of the first century and from 1830 to 1850 the
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.
ST. MARY'S CHURCH
METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH
CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH
P
BAPTIST CHURCH
population almost doubled. A comb factory was started in 1834. A coach lace plant by Littlefield in 1827. A copper pump factory by Houghton in 1837 and carried on by the Wilders most successfully for many years. In 1866 a nail factory was successfully launched by Stetson and Talbot, and proved to be a great help to the town, and with these other factories which were started along in 1814 and 1815, the town received a new impetus. It was a great change and wonderful to see this quiet town of the first century transformed into an industrial center.
Of course this brought about other changes; the tide of life coming into this town compelled the people to look at affairs in a different light from their ancestors. No longer could church and town do business together. There were people here now who believed in a different form of church government from the Congregational. The church and town separated forever in 1836. The Methodists had erected a house of wor- ship in 1833. The Universalist Society organized a church in 1839. The Congregational Church came near to being divided into the Orthodox and Unitarian branches had it not been for the wisdom and good spirit of Hon. Elihu Cutler. The Baptist Church was started in 1860 and built a church in 1870. The Roman Catholic Church gathered into its fold all those of its faith in 1867 and finally dedicated a substantial house of worship in 1879. In 1864 an Episcopal Society was founded and continued for five years. In 1838 thirty people went out from the Con- gregational Church and joined the Mormons, among them Albert Perry Rockwood who went to Illinois and Missouri and was sent with a few others to Utah to spy out the land for a Mormon State. He must have been a man of iron to be able to go through the deserts and over the mountains at such an early date. It was in this period that all the churches received an impetus that brought them to their highest state of efficiency. In the first hundred years, the one church of the town had only four ministers; in the second hundred years nearly one hundred ministers were called to the different Protestant churches of the town and in spite of this fact, Holliston still lives.
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When the Boston and Worcester railroad was opened in the third decade of the nineteenth century, Holliston with its infant industries desired to have connection with it, and July 4, 1847 was an auspicious day for the town, as the first locomotive with a train of cars came into this region. It meant new life in many directions.
The awful famine in Ireland had driven millions of Irishmen to these shores, and the building of the railroads had been the means of giving the men plenty of work. In driving the railroad through the cut in
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Phipps Hill hundreds of these worthy toilers were employed. It was natural that many Irish families should settle in Holliston. They built comfortable homes here and settled down to happy and prosperous days. It was the first real influx that Holliston had received of a people differ- ing in religious doctrines, and in race and temperament. But the influx of the Irish proved to be of great benefit to the town. Like the natives, they were not ashamed to work with their hands and they helped to build up our industries, comported themselves for the most part with propriety and were a very important factor in the uplift of the com- munity. Many of the Irish families have sent forth young men and women into the world who have been of great assistance to society. Father Quinlan, the first shepherd of the Irish flock, labored here many years, served on the school committee and was respected alike by both Protestants and Catholics. Priests, doctors, lawyers, teachers and busi- ness men from these families have contributed to the welfare of the com- munity and nation.
The uplift of the town not only is seen in the industries and in the religious life of the community, but it is distinctively manifested in the educational life. Many of our ancestors were self educated men after being drilled in the rudiments. In the beginning of the second century schools and colleges were being considered as necessary to higher educa- tion. The ministers of the town had all been educated in the colleges of New England, either Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth or Brown, and they had awakened a desire in many of the young for a higher education. Lyceums, lectures, debating clubs, and even spelling matches were help- ing in this direction. Science and Politics were extremely fruitful sub- jects for debate. The slavery question was causing men to think deeply. Daniel Webster, the senator from Massachusetts, was helping people to read up on subjects that were of more than passing interest. Rev. Mr. Wheaton delivered a stirring sermon on "The Equality of Mankind and the Evils of Slavery," Fast Day, April 6, 1820, and all these things were helping people to become more and more interested in education. In 1831 the Holliston High School was organized, with William Gammell the teacher, who afterward became full Professor of History and Political Economy in Brown University, a position he held until 1864. Then Messrs. Ayer, Forbes, Tiffany and Stone filled the position until the fall of 1836 when Rev. Gardner Rice became principal for one term. He was so successful that he was induced to continue in this position for nine years. The school took the name of Holliston Academy in 1839. Mr. Rice began the school with seventy-six students and before the year
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closed one hundred and seventy-six were enrolled, pupils coming from surrounding towns as well as from Holliston. In 1842 the number was three hundred and sixty-one. The purpose of the Academy was to fit pupils for the common business of life, or for a higher course of collegiate or professional studies. The conference of the New England Methodists recognized the importance of the school and became a patron of it. Pupils came from all over New England and even from the Middle States. Rev. Gardner Rice was an educator by birth; a graduate of Wesleyan University and a student one year at the Newton Theological School. He was remarkably successful in the building up of Holliston Academy. At a reunion in 1875 nearly forty years after, two hundred former students honored him by a visit to his home in Shrewsbury and renewed their acquaintance with each other and told how Holliston Academy had influenced their lives for good.
About two thousand pupils attended this Academy during its existence. Hardly any of them are now living. One, Frances M. Whiting, a teacher in the Holliston public schools for over thirty years, is still with us, living in Belmont, Massachusetts, a woman ninety-five years of age and in good health and spirits. She remembers those schools days of long ago. Of course such an Academy as this would give a good name to Holliston, and it might have been a permanent institution if some wealthy man had given it a fair endowment. The school was kept in the Town Hall until Mt. Hollis Seminary was dedicated in 1851. A number of public spirited men had given nine acres of land for a school and Deacon Timothy Walker and Rev. Geo. F. Walker helped to erect the building, by raising the money as a corporation. Rev. Mr. Walker, a native of the town, had been to Master Rice's school and was greatly interested in educational work. He became the principal of the Seminary for a short time and afterward entered the ministry. He wrote the His- tory of Holliston in Drake's History of Middlesex County and was a man highly esteemed by his pupils and his parishioners.
The town had paid for the tuition of its scholars in the Seminary until 1863 when it purchased the Seminary building, and then used it for a High School until its destruction by fire in 1871. Another High School was built on the same spot in 1874, and additions have been made to the building from time to time as the town grew in size.
One of the most distinguished men from Holliston in the educational world was Elbridge Jefferson Cutler. His grandfather, Hon. Elihu Cutler had helped develop Holliston from a scattering village of a few hundred people to a real town of three thousand inhabitants. His great grand-
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father was Col. Simeon Cutler of Revolutionary fame, the husband of Elizabeth Rockwood, a woman of remarkable ability, who lived to be 96 years of age. Prof. Cutler's father was called "the first gentleman of Holliston." Elbridge Cutler attended Holliston Academy, under Master Rice, but later fitted for Harvard under the tutorship of Rev. T. D. P. Stone, pastor of the Congregational Church. He graduated in 1853 with Pres. Eliot in the same class. He was chosen class poet and wrote a remarkable poem for the class day exercises. Teaching in private and public schools he won the affection of all his pupils. There are men and women in town today who remember his fine qualities as a teacher and who received their inspiration from him when he was the principal of the Academy here.
Judge Kingsbury, a former pupil of Mr. Cutler, has written a very fine sketch of his life and it is on file in the Holliston Historical rooms.
Mr. Cutler's associations were with the prominent teachers and poets of the nineteenth century. For a time he was on the editorial staff of the New York Evening Post with Wm. Cullen Bryant. Henry Wads- worth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Russell Lowell and Prof. Francis Peabody counted him among their friends.
Intensely patriotic he was greatly interested in raising a company of volunteers at the beginning of the Civil War and fully expected to be captain of the company from Holliston. It was a cruel blow to him, when he returned to the town on the night before the departure of the company and found they had chosen another man for that position. His patriotism did not wane but sensitive in spirit, he confined himself to books and writing for a year. He had been invited to deliver a poem before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Harvard, a great honor and offered only to a few scholars of high rank. The poem was read by Prof. Cutler at Harvard a few days before the disastrous battle of Bull Run. Prof. Peabody says, "This was a remarkable production, both in itself con- sidered and in its effect on those who heard it; it was not surpassed, if equalled by any other of his productions. It has the genuine flavor of classical culture. It was from the beginning to the end, throbbing and glowing with patriotic feeling, earnest, intense, noble, grand. Many of those who heard him shortly afterward enlisted from the University in the national army."
"Wake, sons of heroes-wake! The age Of heroes dawns again. Truth takes in hand her ancient sword And calls her loyal men."
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He was appointed Assistant Professor of Modern Languages at Harvard in 1865, while he was studying in Europe. It was no small honor to this son of Holliston to be intimately associated with the bril- liant group of scholars at the University at that time. He was also asked to become President of the University of Missouri and Rev. Edward Everett Hale told me that Prof. Cutler would have been selected as President of Harvard had his health permitted. He became full Pro- fessor of Modern Languages in 1870 at Harvard but now was too feeble to enter upon his duties. He passed into the higher life on December 27, 1870 in Old Holworthy Hall, a young man of great promise, not having attained his fortieth birthday. Funeral services were held in the home of President Eliot and the next day were continued in the Con- gregational church in Holliston and attended by an illustrious company of scholars and devoted friends. The poem he wrote for a friend's funeral was sung at his own and concluded with these words:
"Farewell, our brother!
Not thankless tears we shed ; Knowing, brother, knowing Thou art not dead."
Holliston should keep fresh in memory this noble son of the town, in order that her youth may rise to heights of power.
His brother, Arthur Hamilton Cutler, also reflected great credit on the town. A graduate of Harvard, he opened a private school for boys in New York City, his first pupil being Theodore Roosevelt, afterwards President of the United States. Boys from his school entered Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Columbia for many years without conditions.
Another prominent son of the town was William A. Houghton, Pro- fessor in Bowdoin College for many years. For five years he was adviser of the Japanese Government in Tokio, Japan.
Arthur Irving Fiske, also a graduate of Harvard was Headmaster of the Boston Latin School for nearly his whole life. A remarkable teacher and inspirer of youth. Dr. Eliot says, "He was an admirable scholar, a man of gentle and winning manners and as Headmaster he exerted the best possible influence on his pupils."
Charles B. Travis, another illustrious son was a master in Boston English High School for many years and made a profound impression upon those who came under his instructions.
George Gilbert Pond was born in Holliston in 1861, graduated from its High School in 1877, received the degree of A.B. from Amherst in 1881, taught in the Holliston High School one year, then became an
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assistant in Chemistry at Amherst College for five years and was full Professor of Chemistry in the Pennsylvania State College for over twenty- five years. That college desired him to take the Presidency, but he declined, and died in full vigor of his powers.
Otis Brigham Bullard, a native of Holliston, was teacher of vocal and instrumental music in the Holliston Academy and other schools and afterwards went to Washington, D. C. and became the founder of the Conservatory of Music in that city.
There are many other Holliston men and women who have gone out into the educational world. Some of them like Miss Lizzie Wilder and Miss Frances Whiting who helped to make their own town schools better, some of them like Miss Adela Rockwood, have taught in the best schools of our best towns and cities, and some now living are teaching in Worcester Institute of Technology, in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Wellesley, Smith and other higher institutions of learning and all are reflecting much credit on Holliston.
Holliston can take much satisfaction as it looks over its long lists of men and women, who were born within her borders and have gone out into the world to become Ministers, Priests, Judges, Lawyers, Doctors; Teachers, Professors, Scientists, Explorers, Inventors, Merchants, Build- ers, some living and doing splendid work, others who wrought nobly having passed into the world beyond. Surely we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses to the value of education and religion. Who follows in their train?
These men and women were products of the Age of Uplift in Hollis- ton's history.
The firing on Fort Sumter produced the same explosion of patriotism in Holliston as in every community throughout the land. Party ties were forgotten in the common indignation against the attack upon our flag. With a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, the citizens of the town pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor. President Abraham Lincoln issued his call for seventy-five thousand volunteers in April 1861 and July 1st a full company of volunteers of one hundred men, marched forth from the town, dressed in uniforms, contributed by the gifts of citizens, which could not have cost less than twenty-five hundred dollars. It was one of the first companies to be made ready for service. The town showed its patriotism by appropria- tions of large sums of money and by giving of her sons, the best blood of these families, three hundred and fifty-four men in the prime of life; thirty-six of these loyal sons were called upon to make the supreme
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