USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Malden > Memorial of the celebration of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Malden, Massachusetts, May, 1899 > Part 25
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I am, with high regard, Faithfully yours, GEO. F. HOAR.
His Honor, CHARLES L. DEAN.
THE TOASTMASTER. - As the second toast I will propose : -
" The City of Malden ; prominent in colonial history, conspicu- ous in the stirring events of the Revolution, instrumental in shaping the modern course of the nation, and ever ready to assist in moulding its future destiny."
I will call upon one who needs no formal introduction to this gathering. I refer to His Honor Mayor Charles L. Dean.
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ADDRESS BY THE HON. CHARLES LEROY DEAN.
Mr. Toastmaster, Invited Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen : - It gives me great pleasure to welcome you this evening to the crowning event of all the auspicious occasions of our days of celebration. It has been a source of much enjoyment and profit to me to greet the many friends who have come from far and near to rejoice with us. Some of them have come back to the town of their birth and have found it grown almost out of their remembrance. Some who formerly called this home have returned for a brief period, and some have come to us because they revere the memory of father, mother, or friends, and all that they held dear.
One and all, we bid you a most hearty welcome to-night. We cannot any of us realize the actual length of time of two hundred and fifty years, except as we consider what has been accomplished in that time. Looking back over these two and a half centuries we find a rapid and steady growth.
The town of Malden, founded in 1649, then included in its terri- tory Melrose (soon to become a city), which became a separate town in 1850, and the present city of Everett, whose existence as a town began in 1870.
As a town, Malden always had a most honorable record, taking a high rank in the commonwealth, because its public affairs were well and ably managed. Our city charter was granted by the Massachu- setts Legislature of 1881, and on the first Monday in January, 1882, Malden entered upon its career as a city, with a population of about twelve thousand and five hundred souls, an indebtedness of about five hundred thousand dollars, and a valuation the following May of ten million, nine hundred and twenty-eight thousand, three hundred and fifty-nine dollars.
To-day, we have a population approximating thirty-three thousand, or an average gain of twelve hundred a year in seventeen years, with a valuation, May 1, 1898, of twenty-six million, one hundred and forty- seven thousand, six hundred and sixty dollars.
The public improvements made necessary by this rapid growth and increasing population have been many, requiring a large expenditure of money ; and this demand has been met by our several city govern- ments in a conservative spirit.
Since becoming a city, the total expenditures for public and per- manent improvements have been near two million, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I have not the exact figures, but they are about as follows : -
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School buildings and land for same,
$600,000
Fire stations and land for same,
42,000
Fire apparatus and police signal system,
25,000
Armory and almshouse,
15,000
Water construction and extension of service,
600,000
Sewers,
500,000
New streets and extensions, less assessments,
195,000
Brick sidewalks and edgestones,
115,000
Street and gutter paving and surface drainage,
54,000
Cemeteries, less receipts for sale of lots,
70,000
Public parks,
100,000
Brick stables and land for water and street departments,
75,000
These several items make, $2,391,000
They seem to me to be nearly correct, yet I have made an estimate of two million, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the purpose of these remarks, preferring rather to under than over estimate our expenditures for improvements.
The indebtedness of the city, Jan. 1, 1899, was : -
Municipal,
$435,050
Water,
571,500
Public parks,
100,000
Sewerage,
600,000
$1,706,550.00
Less sinking funds :
Water,
$136,523.26
Sewerage,
81,553.71
Public parks,
2,900.50
$220,977.47
Making a net indebtedness, Jan. 1, 1899, of
$1,485,572.53
Or a gain of indebtedness in the seventeen years of about one million dollars to offset the figures I have given (upwards of two and a quarter millions) expended for public and permanent improvements.
This has all been done with a rate of taxation averaging not over fifteen dollars per thousand, which is less than the average of the cities of the commonwealth (excluding Boston) during the same period.
The net result is an increase of debt of about one million dollars, and a gain in public property and improvements of two million, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, or more, an increase in population of nearly twenty-one thousand, and in the assessed valuation of about fifteen million, two hundred thousand dollars. I have stated enough to show the excellent financial condition of our city, and a record that our citizens may well be proud of.
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We are proud also of the record made by our predecessors ; and we feel that the condition we are in to-day proves that the affairs of the city have been well and ably administered, and that Malden has a high standing among the cities of the commonwealth.
Because of our close proximity to the great city of Boston, we may not have as extensive business blocks as if further removed, but what we may lack in this is more than offset in many other ways.
We have fine streets ; churches of almost every denomination are here, embracing some of the largest in the commonwealth ; we have a public library costing more than two hundred thousand dollars, the gift of our honored fellow-citizen, our first mayor, - Hon. Elisha S. Converse ; a hospital, which has also had large assistance from Mr. Converse, opened to the public in 1892; a Young Men's Christian Association building, costing upwards of ninety thousand dollars, dedicated in 1896; and a Home for Aged People. An important portion of the Metropolitan Park system, with its fine boulevards, is within our city, and one of our honored citizens is chairman of the commission. All these varied interests receive strong and hearty cooperation and assistance from our people. Our manufacturing interests are prospering, our merchants are doing a good business and are amply able to meet the needs of the people. Our banks are on a sound basis ; our railroad facilities (both steam and electric) have improved every year, and are giving us most excellent service.
Our health and police statistics also show that our city is a most desirable place of residence ; our religious and social institutions are a credit to the city, and are a strong inducement to choose Malden for a home.
Without intending to tempt the residents of other cities and towns to locate in Malden, we feel justified in commending our city to them as one of the best of the suburban cities around Boston ; and we assure them of a hearty welcome and hospitable treatment, should they decide to come among us.
In closing, I desire to make acknowledgment of the faithful and earnest work of the excellent committees that have arranged and carried to completion this celebration ; our citizens appreciate these efforts, and are proud of their accomplishment; and I, as mayor, and as a citizen, extend to them my sincere thanks and hearty congratulations.
THE TOASTMASTER. - The next toast which I have prepared is : " The industries and growth of Malden during the last fifty years," which will be responded to by him whom we delight in calling " Our First Citizen," - whose name, endeared to us all, will be ever cher- ished by the future inhabitants of our city for his numerous public
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and private benefactions, and his faithful and unswerving devotion to the general welfare of this community. I have in mind, of course, Malden's first mayor, the Honorable Elisha S. Converse.
ADDRESS BY THE HON. ELISHA SLADE CONVERSE.
Mr. Toastmaster, Ladies and Gentlemen: - I came to Malden in 1847, and although my residence was over the line in Stoneham and my business near-by, I identified myself with the First Baptist Church at Malden Centre, and most of my social and many of my business connections were here. I was at the celebration of the two hundredth anniversary in 1849, and soon after, I removed my residence to Malden. The establishment of the Malden Bank, in 1851, and of the Rubber Works at Edgeworth, in 1853, brought me still closer to the daily life and business of the town ; and I have had an opportunity to observe that growth in all directions, which seems so remarkable as we look back over the past fifty years.
When I came here, Malden retained many of the features which had characterized it during the preceding half-century. The iron and nail works, which had been important factors in the industry of the town, had ceased to exist. Barrett's Dye-house at the centre, and Baldwin's at the south, Cox's Last Factory, and some minor manu- factories of tin and britannia ware, shoes, and leather, remained of the town's earlier industries. The Wanalancet Iron Tubing Company, which remained a few years, had commenced operations at Edgeworth, in the building which is now occupied by the United States Govern- ment. Otis Tufts had just built the first wharf at the old landing- place, near the old burying-ground, and the Government was straightening and dredging the Malden River, which until then had remained in the extremely crooked channel in which nature had placed it. The Edgeworth Company had begun to open up the lands of the Newton Farm and those upon the Highlands, which are now occupied by a thriving population. Malden was just beginning to feel the prosperity which came from the opening of the Boston & Maine Railroad in 1845, which brought inhabitants and capital into the town.
The growth which then began has been continuous. Eliminating the population of North Malden, which was incorporated as Melrose in 1850, the town in 1849 did not contain over thirty-three hundred inhabitants ; but six years later, the population had increased to forty- five hundred and ninety-two. The largest growth was from 1870 to 1875, previous to which period the town of Everett had been in- corporated, when the increase was forty-seven per cent. Out of the little town which in 1840 contained but three thousand and thirty inhabitants, have come three prosperous and still growing cities,
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with a combined population of about seventy thousand souls. Malden itself possesses about thirty-three thousand inhabitants at the present time.
The growth of wealth has kept pace with the increase of the popu- lation, and it is well distributed. The valuation of a little more than three millions of dollars in 1854, when Everett was still a part of the old town, looks small beside the more than twenty-six millions of dollars which made up the valuation of the city of Malden in 1898.
There are matters which exhibit the comparative prosperity of a people which are as important as those of population and wealth. The high intellectual and moral condition of a people is superior to numerical strength and material wealth. In 1849, the town appro- priated three thousand dollars for the schools. Melrose had not been set off at that time. The school district system was in force, and the town was divided into five districts with ten teachers, of whom four were at the centre. The old brick schoolhouse, which few of those now here will remember, had been burnt, and the town had erected a new building in the old location on School House Hill. Of the rapid growth of our schools, both in number and efficiency, and of their high standing among the schools of the state, I need not speak. They have tempered and strengthened the intellectual life of the city ; and they have turned out many industrious and able, some brilliant, scholars, who have received college honors. The appropriation of 1849 is humble by the side of the one hundred and sixty-three thou- sand, four hundred dollars, which the city has recently appropriated for school purposes ; and the six hundred and seventeen scholars who in 1853 attended the town schools, those of the two Everett districts then included, were a little band in comparison with the sixty-five hundred children who are now enrolled in the city and parochial schools.
In 1849, nine churches ministered to the spiritual needs of the people. To-day, thirty churches and religious societies stand in the place of the four churches which, fifty years ago, occupied the terri- tory of the present city of Malden. These, through their numerous charitable and social organizations, exert a powerful influence upon the character and habits of the people, by the elevating and helpful methods which they employ.
Of the many secular associations formed for reform and relief or for social and intellectual purposes, I cannot speak. They are mostly products of the energy and progress of the last fifty years, and few of them came from the elder life of the town. They work in many and varied lines with success.
Though this was not my birthplace, Malden has been the home of my life ; and it is endeared to me by many sad and by many happy
PORTION OF SIXTH DIVISION (MELROSE)
THE REVIEW
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memories. In the midst of her people I have met all the varied joys and sorrows which come to the life of man. In the many friendships which have come to me here, I have found inspiration and strength. I feel all the loyalty to the good old town that a native can feel. Rejoicing in her past honor and her present prosperity, I pray that both honor and prosperity may continue with her to her latest day. In the far future may her children say of us, and of those who are to follow us, as we may say of the fathers who were before us : " They were wise and prudent in their day, and builded in the light of purity and truth."
THE TOASTMASTER. - I will now offer the following toast : -
"Our Country ; may she become the leader of nations, followed but not following, imitated but not imitating. May she at all times extend hope to the down-trodden and the oppressed."
To speak upon this sentiment I have the honor of calling upon our congressman-elect from this district, the Hon. Ernest W. Roberts.
ADDRESS BY THE HON. ERNEST W. ROBERTS.
Mr. Toastmaster, Ladies and Gentlemen : - As we sit about this bounteous board, participating in the closing festivities of a cele- bration that will ever be memorable in the annals of Malden, no doubt the minds of many of us are busied with sober reflection upon the undreamed-of and far-reaching consequences which attended that generous grant of " a belt of land extending three miles South of the River Charles and the Massachusetts Bay and three miles North of every part of the River Merrimack from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean," made by the Council of Plymouth for New England to John Endicott and his associates in the year 1628.
That grant was the foundation upon which was erected a super- structure of a new and wondrous beauty, that, as it slowly but stead- ily attained perfection, became a beacon sure and trusty for the guidance of the nation, a beacon destined to shed its ameliorating ray's into the uttermost parts of the earth. The principles of equality and civil liberty planted on these shores by the God-fearing Puritans fell on fertile soil, and gave forth an abundant and ever increasing har- vest, which to-day is the heritage and birthright of seventy-five millions of people.
The Puritans did not settle in this unknown wilderness to establish a place where each might worship God in whatever manner he wished. Themselves devout and pious Christians, although bigoted and almost fanatical in their religious views, they sought strenuously to engraft their particular belief upon the body politic. Fortunately for the suc-
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cess of other and grander principles enunciated by them, this effort proved an utter failure ; and the mighty work they inaugurated of building up a nation went on free from the blighting curse of a union of church and state.
Whatever may be said of the narrowness of the Puritans in re- ligious matters, however much we may condemn their harsh and cruel persecutions of those who sought liberty of conscience here in the new world, it should always be borne in mind that their bigotry and intolerance had no lasting or deterrent effect upon the national development, while untold blessings have flowed in an endless stream from their many good deeds, - blessings which, like a pebble when cast into the waters of a placid lake creating ever widening ripples, are now enjoyed by a whole nation, and are even extending to peoples beyond the seas. Of all the beneficent acts of the Puritans in New England, none have made a more enduring imprint on, or aided in a higher degree in, the growth and advancement of our country, than their early adoption and enforcement of the plan of universal education.
No sooner had Endicott and his company disembarked at Salem than they chose the " able, reverend and grave Francis Higginson of Jesus College, Cambridge," a teacher of the people. This event was the more noteworthy for the manner in which it was performed, for it was done by each writing in a note the name of his choice ; and then and there was originated the use of the ballot on this continent. From the election of Higginson sprang the custom; and in 1642 it became the law among the Puritans " to teach their children and apprentices so much learning as may enable them perfectly to read the English tongue." This was followed, five years later, by an order that in every township of fifty householders "one should be appointed to teach all the children to read and write," and when the town increased to one hundred families it should set up a grammar school with a master " able to instruct youth so far as they may be fitted for the university."
Prior to the enactment of these laws, public education had re- ceived a wonderful stimulus by the act of the General Court of 1636 which appropriated four hundred pounds towards the establishment of a college at Newtown. Two years later, upon the death of John Harvard and in recognition of his munificent bequests to the institu- tion, the General Court ordered it to be called in his name, and the name of the town to be changed to Cambridge. Not only did the generous donation of the General Court foster and encourage the de- sire for education, but it created and established the precedent of public education at the public expense, a precedent universally fol- lowed throughout our own country, and one that is rapidly extending
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over the civilized world. Great indeed is the debt of posterity to those rigid, austere Puritans who inaugurated that system of uni- versal education which has lifted so many millions of mankind from the darkness of ignorance and debasement and set them in the bright sunlight of knowledge and power.
But the free public school is not the only heritage that has come down to us from our Puritan ancestors. There is another, equally priceless, which is shared by the people of the whole country and which we are willing to impart to all humanity, the great principle of government of a people by and through their chosen representatives, which was established by the Puritans of New England at an election held in 1634. At the same time, the old practice of " erecting hands " in elections was abolished and the ballot-box introduced. With the exception that they had a limited suffrage, representative democracy was as perfect then as it is with us to-day. That one principle, es- tablished more than two and one half centuries ago, entitles the Puri- tans of New England to the eternal veneration of all lovers of equality, justice, and liberty, of every race and in every clime. These two great Puritanical doctrines, universal education and representative government, are the basis of our greatness as a nation and the bul- warks of our happiness and security as individuals. Let us guard them jealously, cherish them fervently, and extend them zealously, to the end that all the world may come under their benignant influences.
Mr. Toastmaster, in conclusion, I beg to trespass upon your pre- rogative and propose, with some slight modification, a toast offered in Faneuil Hall over half a century ago by an honored descendant of an eminent New England Puritan, - a toast which I am sure will meet with a ready response in the heart of every true, loyal, patriotic American : -
" Our Country ; whether bounded on the south by the Caribbean and on the west by the China Sea, or however otherwise bounded or described, and be the measurements more or less - still, Our Country, to be cherished in all our hearts, to be defended by all our hands."
THE TOASTMASTER .- The next toast will be : -
" The Metropolitan Parks; an achievement of the wisdom of this generation, and a source of perpetual comfort and happiness to generations yet unborn."
We are favored by having with us to-night one of our own citi- zens wlio has bestowed much time and study upon this subject, and I take pleasure in requesting William B. de las Casas, Esq., to re- spond to this toast.
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ADDRESS BY WILLIAM BELTRAN DE LAS CASAS.
THIS is a time of retrospection, comparison, and encouragement. We try to go back to the days when the first settlers came to these shores, and picture the sort of people they were and the way they lived. We mark each house, gather together carefully each implement, bit of china and household ware, each garment and adornment; and with these and the fragments of story and sermon and document, we piece out a picture of life from those days to the present. We endeavor to understand the spirit and thoughts which animated men, compare them with the spirit of to-day, and look forward hopefully to the morrow.
The self-consciousness of the Puritan was in some ways a weak- ness, and it did not always make him an agreeable companion ; but in a larger sense it was his strength. He had a mission to perform ; he knew it, and he did it. He came here in moral revolt against the wilful imperialism of aristocratic England for the express purpose of estab- lishing a better home. He set his face sternly and self-consciously to that work. He was not a separatist ; but he would not have the imperialism and formalism of king and church ; and so he adopted the simplicity and directness of control by the people which the separatist Pilgrims of Plymouth had set up in church and state. But, after all, he was an Englishman, from an English home and with a self-conscious, determined English mind. Habit and thought were English, and new conditions of danger and necessity only roused and added an alertness and ingenuity which he would never have gained at home.
The first settlers came to Salem and pushed their way cautiously from point to point along the coast. Some of them followed the in- land edge of the open marshes, where the Indian had made his trail, through Saugus and the eastern part of our town to the hills of Charlestown, and there rested and looked the country over. What a fair prospect it was before them ! The distant Blue Hills across the shining water of the harbor ; the nearer hills of Squantum, Wollaston, and Shawmut; the Neponset, Charles, and Mystic winding across the marshes to disappear among the western hills ; line upon line of nearer hills and forest to the northwest, and far-off Wachusett and Monadnock ; the nearer marshes cut by the little rivers which we now know as Malden River, Island End, and Snake Creek ; and here and there beyond, among the forests, green fields of Indian corn.
From the Charlestown hills they began their search for places to make their homes. Some went up the Mystic to the plains where now Burlington, Woburn, and Winchester are built, and became farmers.
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Some stopped at the ford across the meadows and began the busy village of Medford, with its brick-making, fishing, and ship-building industries. Governor Winthrop, himself, built his house upon the sloping hills of Somerville, close by where Wellington Bridge now crosses the Mystic. Nowell, and Wilson, and the agents of Cradock took the hills of Wellington and Everett, while Coytmore, and Hills, and Wayte, and Sprague, and others took up the smaller cleared spaces of Mystic Side, -our Malden. Others pressed on through Melrose to the open lands beyond Spot Pond at Charlestown End, now Stoneham.
They were Englishmen and they brought the English habits and customs. Each had his garden spot about his house, and together they held all the other lands in common. They established laws to protect these common lands from fire, to regulate the cutting of timber, to destroy animals of prey, and to protect animals fit for food. As they grew stronger, individualism began to assert itself more, and they gave up the common lands and divided them into separate holdings, and kept their common effort for action in church, and school, and affairs of state.
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