USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Hyde Park > Memorial sketch of Hyde Park, Mass., for the first twenty years of its corporate existence : also its industries, statistics, and organizations, together with the anniversary addresses delivered by Rev. Perley B. Davis and Rev. Richard J. Barry > Part 2
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Yet in this brief review of Hyde Park as it is to-day after its short existence of a score of years, it will be necessary to go a little beyond its corporate life and examine those influences to which it owes its being and the circumstances and surround- ings which attended its inception. One standing to-day upon the top of any of the small eminences which diversify the surface of the town, may, if the atmosphere is clear, sweep with his eye the lower harbor of Boston on the east ; the Blue Hills which skirt the horizon on the southeast ; the valley of the Neponset to the south glimmering through the green meadows, and to the west and north the elevated lands of the neighboring towns, while at his feet lie in thick profusion the hundreds of houses and miles of streets and avenues which go to make up the town of Hyde Park. The spires of churches, belfries, and tall chimneys of manufactories, the smoke of locomotives, and long
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lines of railways arrest the eyes, the hum of travel and traffic rises to the ear. Everything betokening the presence of nine thousand souls is manifest to the senses. But far different was the view which awaited the anxious vision of the examining committee of pioneers in 1856; then, indeed, the hills, the rivers, and the high lands were to be seen in the distance, but nearer at hand little to mark the presence of man. There was then no considerable village on the line of the Boston & Providence Railroad from Jamaica Plain to the Canton viaduct. The territory between was spread over with farms, woodland, and the meadows which fill the basin of the upper Neponset.
The following extract from an address delivered at the first annual banquet of the town officers of Hyde Park, March 9, 1872, by the venerable Henry Grew, one of the town's oldest as well as most esteemed citizens, presents such a graphic and truthful portraiture of the condition of things at and shortly before the time under consideration as to fully justify its insertion here :
" Having purchased a few acres of land in the summer of 1846, I commenced building a house, and moved to this place, then a part of Dorchester, on the first day of May, 1847. At that time most of this territory was occupied by farmers. There were on River Street (the old highway between Dor- chester and Dedham), within a range of a mile or a mile and a half, about ten houses, most of them small and occupied by farmers, with two exceptions, one a blacksmith and one a wheel- wright, with a population not exceeding fifty persons."
Also Sumner's mills and a few small tenements occupied by their operatives, and a small schoolhouse near the same.
"These were the only settlements in Dorchester. On the easterly side of the Neponset River, which was the boundary line between Dorchester and Milton (now Fairmount) all was woodland and pasture, the first settlement in that part of our town having commenced in 1855 or 1856. West of my house was an unbroken range of forest trees; on the northerly side, in West Roxbury, were three farms. My nearest visiting neighbor was two and a half or three miles distant; I was almost literally surrounded by woods, and my friends in Boston were much surprised at my going to such a wild and lonely place. There was, however, the Boston & Providence Railroad, on which cars passed within half a mile of my
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residence, running three times a day each way, to and from Boston. There was no station between Forest Hill and Read- ville ; occasionally the cars stopped at the crossing at West Street to take or leave passengers. After a while some of the trains stopped at Kenney's Bridge (now Hyde Park Station), but passengers were few, perhaps ten or twelve in the course of a week. No house of shelter or station-master. The signal for stopping the cars by daylight was made by the turning of a signal board by the passenger, and after dark by the swinging of a lantern."
In 1846 three farms, containing about 200 acres, and includ- ing what is now the most thickly settled and valuable part of Hyde Park, were purchased by three men, who proposed to build upon and occupy them. Two houses were erected, one the stone edifice, corner of Gordon Avenue and Austin Street, formerly known as the Lyman House, lately the residence of Charles A. White, and now owned and occupied by Col. John B. Bachelder, the Gettysburg historian ; the other was the old homestead of Gordon H. Nott, whose enterprise and liberality were largely contributory to the early growth of this town.
These three individuals then sold the remainder of their pur- chase to the Hyde Park Land Company. This company made some improvements and disposed of some of its land, but little was accomplished by it before 1856. The earliest recorded sale of some one hundred acres of the Commons was for five pounds colonial. The above sale to the Hyde Park Land Company was for the expressed price of twelve thousand dollars, or about sixty dollars per acre. Within the last fifteen years consider- able parcels of the same land, without buildings, have changed owners for a consideration of seventy-five cents per foot, and in two instances for one dollar per square foot. The portion of the town taken from Dedham was formerly known as "The Lower Plains," a title sufficiently descriptive of its topograph- ical characteristics. Away back a large part of it was owned by one Damon, in memory of whom the schoolhouse now in that locality received its name.
About 1850 it was named by its inhabitants Readville, in honor of Mr. Read, who was the principal owner of the cotton mill there. About this mill were some score of houses and ten-
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ements ; and farther away, but still within the district, were perhaps half a dozen other residences, among them the home- stead of D. L. Davis and that of the late William Bullard, both on the Milton road, still occupied by the then owners or their de- scendants, and the handsome, and for those days, elegant French cottage of William S. Damrell, then member of Congress. This stood, with ample and pleasant grounds around it, on a low hill rising back from the pond caused by the mill-dam. It is now owned and occupied by E. A. Fiske. Mr. Damrell, as the only congressman ever resident upon soil now included in our town, claims more than a passing notice. He was an in- tense anti-slavery man, bold and fearless in the expression of his convictions, a warm friend and supporter of Sumner, Banks, Hale, and the other foremost champions of human liberty. He was of indomitable will, and resolutely attended to his pub- lic duties during the years immediately preceding the Rebel- lion, although so disabled by paralysis of the lower extremities, occasioned by lead poisoning, as to require the assistance of a person upon either side to move from place to place. Three of his sons served in the army of the Union during the Civil War. One died in the service ; another died after the close of the war from disease contracted in the service ; the third and only surviving member of the family is Maj. A. N. Damrell, Engi- ncer Corps, U. S. A. In 1856, the time when the first of those enterprises which caused the growth and development of Hyde Park was begun, Readville contained the bulk of the population within its limits.
Fairmount was the spot selected for the experiment, and the credit of the first suggestion of, and of the greatest activity in pushing forward, the particular plan which led to the settlement there must be awarded to Alpheus P. Blake. He succeeded in getting a reasonable price fixed upon what he wanted, and then talked the matter up so well among his friends as to effect a formal organization of a number of them at a meeting held Sept. 1, 1855, at the residence of one of the members on Revere Street, Boston. Mr. Blake was made president of the company thus formed, and a committee was appointed to examine the locality suggested by him.
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Although the Midland Railroad then occupied the location now of the New York & New England, it was bankrupt and not in operation ; so the investigating committee were obliged to go to Mattapan, on a branch of the Old Colony Railroad, and thence walk some two miles to their destination on Fair- mount Hill. This experience, with the wild appearance of the country it was proposed to acquire and subjugate, so discour- aged several of the committee that they in disgust abandoned both the place and the enterprise, and thus forfeited their chances of future glory and profit. The remainder of the asso- ciates, however, to the number of twenty, "stuck," formed a trust company under the title of "The Fairmount Land Com- pany and Twenty Associates," purchased one hundred acres off the back part of the farms of the dwellers upon the Brush Hill road in Milton, and on the 15th day of May, 1856, the first blow toward the erection of the first house in Fairmount was struck. This building is the one now standing on the corner of Beacon Street and Fairmount Avenue, at present occupied by G. H. Peare. Henry A. Rich, David Higgins, and William H. Nightingale were the first mechanics. The latter died some years since; the two former are still among the prominent residents of our town.
It was the plan of the twenty associates that each should build and occupy a residence in the new territory. Most, if not all, of them did so, and three of them, Messrs. Fisk, Higgins, and Payson, still live in the houses then built by them. We present a copy of a wood-cut (page 8), originally printed in an illustrated paper of the date May 23, 1857. The association was made up of poor men, and great economy was necessary. The land was not fully paid for, the balance of the purchase price being secured by a ground mortgage.
At one time the project was on the point of being abandoned, by reason of the many obstacles encountered, but the firmness ' of the late D. B. Rich prevented this. The pioneers had a hard time of it. The nearest point at which railroad accommo- dations could be obtained was on the Boston & Providence, at Kenny's Bridge, and there but two trains each way per day stopped ; there was no depot, and to reach Fairmount from
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there it was necessary to cross the river in small boats, or on the stringers of the Midland Railroad bridge. The lumber and other material needed in the construction of their buildings was brought from Neponset by teams through Milton, and with much labor and difficulty transported up and over the crest of the hill. The mere preparation of roads, over which the material could be brought, was a work of no little amount on that rough hillside, then far more steep and uneven than now. The nearest store was at Mattapan ; the nearest post-offices at Milton and East Dedham. To accommodate the mechanics engaged upon the first houses, D. B. Rich opened a " boarding- house," in an old building, where the seats were boxes and kegs, and the other accommodations of like ostentatious mag- nificence. But the settlers were resolute and full of resources. They endured what they could not remedy, and made use of every means attainable to better their condition. Before long, by joint contributions and efforts, they constructed a foot- bridge across the river. Finding the Midland Railroad there at hand, they resolved to utilize it, and did so, again combining their means and buying a car with an engine in one end, in which they journeyed in and out of Boston with great rejoic- ing, though they had for some time to dispense with a depot.
In 1859 the Real Estate & Building Company was formed, and in 1861 incorporated. Under its efforts, and the enterprise of many individuals, the growth of the place was fairly pro- gressing, when the Civil War came, upsetting the plans of so many, and, by the doubt and uncertainty it engendered, para- lyzing to a great extent all enterprises. The most strenuous efforts were made by the company and others interested to overcome this incubus.
That these efforts were only moderately successful is appar- ent in the admission made by the building company in its prospec- tus of 1864, that during the mighty struggle of the nation for its existence special expenses for the purpose of carrying on its en- terprises had been mainly suspended by the company. Yet the growth of the town was not wholly arrested during this time, for we learn from a contemporary paper that in 1862 there were one hundred and fifty dwellings in the district between Brush Hill
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road and the Boston & Providence Railroad station at Hyde Park, which number had increased to two hundred in 1865. The end of the war, however, was the beginning of an era of truly wonderful activity and progress in this place, and for the next seven years it advanced at a marvellous pace.
New lands in large quantities were acquired by the building companies and by individuals, platted, sold, built upon, and oc- cupied with almost incredible rapidity. In the year 1867, not less than one hundred and six dwelling-houses were erected, to say nothing of buildings for business and other purposes. The price of lots trebled and quadrupled in value in a few weeks, sometimes in a few months increased twenty-fold.
The growth of the place from 1865 was largely due to its nat- ural attractiveness, which was now made to appear through the exertions of its public-spirited citizens. Through their efforts the establishment of manufacturing and other business interests of great importance was effected, social and moral needs were well provided for, and the unrivalled railroad possibilities devel- oped. Local trains were multiplied on both railways, and addi- tional stopping places secured. When the railroad managers doubted the expediency of establishing a new station and erecting a depot at any required point, enough citizens were forthcoming to furnish means to build a station-house at the place desired, and lease or give it to the railroad, on the condition of adequate train accommodation. So great was the demand for mechanics at this time that the most indifferent workmen demanded exor- bitant wages. This and other inducements held out attracted to the town a not inconsiderable number of equivocal characters, and, as the credit system was largely in practice, many a con- fiding trader was sadly victimized.
But such experiences are common to all new and rapidly grow- ing places, and under this froth of irresponsible adventurers, was an able body of earnest, energetic, industrious, laborious, wide-a- wake men, whose faith in Hyde Park was as firm as adamant, and who plied every instrumentality without cessation, tending to promote its prosperity. So well did they succeed that in 1867 they were in a condition to ask for incorporation. The first meeting looking to that end was called at Music Hall, on
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October 14th in that year, at which E. P. Davis was chosen to preside, and S. A. Bradbury and Charles A. Jordan as secreta- ries. A.committee was appointed to consider the advisability of forming a new town, and the meeting adjourned to the 22d of the same month, at which the committee reported in favor of the proposed action, describing the district desirable to include. Almost all the residents conspicuous for their interest in the place were warm advocates of the measure.
A formal petition to the General Court for incorporation of the district suggested in the committee's report was duly filed. As illustrative of the transitory nature of the residents of new places, it is interesting to note that of the sixteen men whose names are appended to this original petition but five are now among our inhabitants. The request for incorporation was variously viewed by the towns whose territory was affected. Dor- chester made no opposition ; Dedham refused to yield so much as was asked for, and succeeded in keeping a portion of it. Milton also objected strenuously, the contest here finally narrowing down to the question whether the petitioners should have the southeasterly line of their proposed town established as petitioned for, so as to include a portion of the Brush Hill road and some twenty-seven families resident thereon, or whether the line should run along the crest of Fairmount Heights, several hundred feet northwesterly from said road, and leaving the above-mentioned families to remain within Milton's limits. Over this the fight waxed hot and furious. In the legislative committee-room frequent hearings were had during a period of five or six weeks, which resulted at last in a report to the Legislature recommending a compromise line, giving the petitioners less than they asked, but more than the Brush Hill residents were willing to concede. The outcome of all this heated controversy was that the act of incorporation of the town of Hyde Park, passed and approved April 22, 1868, took about thirteen hundred acres from Dorchester, eight hundred from Dedham, and seven hundred from Milton, and left the old residents along the Brush Hill road still within the boundaries of Milton, and presumably happy. The new town promptly organized on the 30th day of the same
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month, Maj. William Rogers, formerly of Governor Andrew's staff, being chosen moderator of the first town-meeting.
The recipients of municipal honors were not elected without vigorous opposition. Hyde Park esteems the places in its gift too highly to bestow them easily. There were no less than five tickets in the field ; the regular caucus nominations being the successful ones. The custom thus inaugurated of lively competition for town offices has ever since been honored with implicit observance. A section of Capt. Baxter's Light Battery was present, and hailed the birth of the new town with a salute of one hundred guns. The citizens made a holiday of the occasion, and celebrated the event with rejoicings, and plentiful displays of fireworks in the evening. A fine rainbow at sunset was accepted as a propitious omen, significant of the future lustre of the town.
At this time there were in the town four schoolhouses, only one of which, however, was of any considerable size or value ; six religious societies, three of which worshipped in churches of their own, and the remainder in hired halls ; and of manufac- turing industries, besides the cotton-mill and the paper-mill, a woollen-mill, a vise-factory, iron-works, car-shops, and a needle-factory. The population was about three thousand five hundred, the number of poles seven hundred and seventy-four, and the valuation, as fixed on the Ist of May following, two million nine hundred thousand dollars.
One of the leading motives which had caused the mass of the residents of Hyde Park to respond so warmly to the project of incorporation, had been the feeling that their needs had not received sufficient attention from the parent towns of which it was previously a part. The school accommodations were very inadequate, the buildings insufficient in dimensions and incon- venient in location. Most of the streets had been made by the adjacent owners, and, as few of them had been accepted by the towns, they were of different widths, ungraded, and in many instances full of obstructions. Few of them were furnished with lights, and most of these were at private charge. There was no fire department, or any reliable means of subduing a conflagration. To remedy all these deficiencies, and number-
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less others, the citizens had asked for and obtained self-govern- ment. Many thoughtlessly expected that it would prove an immediate panacea for all their disabilities. So it will be well believed that for the first few years the town officers had no easy time of it.
All those things, usually the result of many years of quiet effort in towns of slow growth, were here crowded, as it were, in a moment upon the attention of the people and their official agents. The latter addressed themselves to meeting the demands thus made upon them, with creditable ability and success. Miles of streets were accepted, graded, widened, or re-located, and bridges built or extensively repaired, a good fire department organized and well equipped, and a suitable building constructed for its occupation, and many other things done to put the town on a proper footing. The number of school chil- dren increased so fast that within the first five years of its corporate existence, the town was obliged to erect four large buildings at a cost of about one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. All these improvements called for large expenditures, most of which were met by direct taxation, but a considerable amount by borrowing, which last expedient soon raised a debt of very respectable proportions. The burden thus incurred soon began to be felt very sensibly by the owners of land, which constituted seven-eights of the taxable property of the town, and soon all propositions looking to further outlays became fruitful sources of contest, protest, and more or less successful log-rolling. The town-meeting was the natural arena for the final fight on these matters, and Hyde Park town- meetings have always been considered particularly interesting, though it is said that of late they have lost somewhat of their. pristine brilliancy, and there are dark fears expressed that ere long they will become as unexciting and commonplace as those of less favored communities. But it is not to be understood that a niggardly policy has ever controlled this town; on the contrary, if it has erred at all, it has been in the opposite direc- tion. During the twenty years of its existence it has raised by taxation upwards of $1, 514,000, or an average of $75,700 per year. Of this, about $211,900, or a yearly average of
(From a photograph by W. H. Barritt.)
BANK BLOCK, EVERETT SQUARE.
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$10,595, has been expended upon streets and bridges (besides $20,000 each year for two years, for permanent improvements, and which has been added to the town debt) ; and not less than $618,000, an average of over $30,900 per year, has been devoted to the establishment and maintenance of public schools.
For several years the town business was transacted in rooms and halls hired for the purpose. This was felt to be inconven- ient, and a town building was desired by many. A controversy, probably the most intense of any which has ever agitated the town, and which certainly stands out most prominently in the recollection of the participators, arose in 1870, over a proposi- tion to purchase for the above named purpose, an edifice re- cently erected on the corner of Gordon Avenue and River Street, and known as Gordon Hall. Meeting after meeting was called to decide the vexed question, " Should or not the building be bought by the town ?" After much contention the property was finally purchased, but it was accidentally destroyed by fire March 8, 1883.
The year 1870 was quite prolific in notable events here. Then it was that another public demonstration was made in the dauntless attempt of some of its female citizens to storm the ballot-box and exercise the full powers of untrammelled suffrage, which carried the name and fame of Hyde Park into distant states and even beyond seas, and a failure to note which would render a sketch of the town's history undeserving the toleration of the fairer and mightier part of its population. For some time previous to the March meeting, 1870, there had been signs and portents of approaching trouble, which took visible form and shape when a placard appeared addressed to the women of Hyde Park, inviting them to attend a caucus, to be held March 4th, to select candidates for the various town offices, the same to be supported by the women at the polls. The caucus was duly held and well attended ; stirring addresses were made incit- ing the auditors to stand by the position they had taken in the front rank of the woman-suffrage movement, to make up their ticket and back it at the polls.
Election day fell that year upon March 8th, and proved to be a stormy one, snowy and blustering ; yet some fifty ladies as-
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sembled in the Everett House parlors, whence they proposed to make their descent in a body upon the voting-place. At this place a large number of voters had congregated, much excitement prevailed, and it was feared that unmanly measures might be adopted. But when the occasion arises the man for the occasion is generally on hand.
He was here and in the right place. The moderator's chair was occupied by Sylvanus Cobb, Jr., the well-known novelist, whose pen and voice were always ready to speed on reform, progress, and development, whose soul could not tolerate in- justice or oppression. His attitude, aided much undoubtedly by that high esteem and love for him which has always character- ized his fellow-citizens, produced a calm on the floor, and the ladies, without further molestation, advanced and deposited their ballots in a separate box, and at once left the room. The deed was done! The women had voted.
The call for aid to the sufferers from the great Chicago fire met with a liberal response from Hyde Park. Frequent meetings were held, and upwards of five thousand dollars, in addition to large supplies of clothing, bedding, and necessaries, were contributed. In this noble work the ladies were as usual untiring, Mrs. Dr. Edwards, Mrs. A. H. Brainard, and Miss Nettie Richardson being specially prominent.
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