USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Municipal history of Essex County in Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 30
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As to the present of boat-building, let it be recorded that there are now only two firms building vessels for the sea trade. These are Arthur D. Story and J. F. James & Son. The last named succeeded the old firm of Tarr & James, and they were preceded by Leonard Mckenzie. Ever- ett B. James is now at the head of this well known boat-building com- pany. In 1921 the firm built and launched the prize boat "Mayflower," in the month of April, when ten thousand people were present at the christening.
John Prince established the first printing office in Essex in 1843. Along with it was published a newspaper, known as the "Essex Cabinet"; it survived, however, only a part of the year. Later, a religious paper
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was issued, called the "Universalist Cabinet." Many years later the "Essex Enterprise" was established, but it was continued for but a short time.
Among the useful trades of Essex from an early time was that of tanning hides and pelts into leather. It is certain that in 1743, Joseph Perkins and father-in-law, Thomas Choate, Jr., bought for £928 twenty- six acres of land, known as Old Tenor, of Francis Cogswell, tanner, and Hannah, his wife: "One half of this land to go to said Thomas and the other half to the said Joseph." Joseph was engaged at tanning sev- eral years on this tract of land. He was succeeded in the same line by his grandsons, John and James Perkins. Their tan-vats were near the brook, in the rear of the old burying-ground. Captain Francis Burnham also had a tannery at the Falls for many years, on the same site on which the Francis Goodhue tannery was erected. With the change of times and the centralization of industries in larger cities, this industry was lost to Essex.
S. B. Fuller & Sons, with Frank E. Gilbert, in 1872 opened a shoe factory in Essex, in a building thirty-five by sixty feet, and three stories high; it was greatly enlarged in 1880. In 1888 there were about one hundred and twenty-five persons employed, the pay-roll amounting to fifty thousand dollars a year. Four hundred thousand pairs of shoes were made there annually in the eighties. For several years this indus- try has not existed in Essex.
Besides those already mentioned, Essex has had business interests in the successful handling of ice, hay, milk, butter, fruits and vege- tables, all of home production. While many of the former factories have been closed down, other enterprises have sprung up.
The business of the town of Essex in 1921 is chiefly confined to agri- culture, ship-building, clam digging and the making of fish-lines. The last-named business was established many years ago, when rope-walks and flax and hemp were used in the making of lines, cords and rope. The Mears Improved Line Company now makes a fishing line that is sold from coast to coast in large quantities. H. W. Mears is the present pro- prietor. There are now being taken from the sands along the coast of Essex no less than one hundred barrels daily of excellent merchantable clams. There are two saw mills in operation a part of the year, although timber is becoming very scarce in the vicinity of Essex.
Chebacco was set off from Ipswich in 1819, and incorporated as the town of Essex by an act of the legislature, February 5th that year. The committee of the town of Essex, in conjunction with another like committee from Ipswich, adjusted the settlement between the two places. The names of those serving from Essex were Georgee Choate, William Cogswell, Jr.,and Elias Andrews. The population in 1819 was 1,170, including twenty-one paupers. The late United States census re- turns for 1920 gives the number of inhabitants as 1,478. Other state-
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ments in other enumeration periods give the following: In 1860, it was 1701-the largest on record; in 1830 it was 1,333; in 1840, it was 1,432; and 1870 the total was 1,614. The town is now bounded by Ipswich on the north, Hamilton on the west, Manchester on the south, and Glou- cester on the south and east. The area is about 9,000 acres, 7,000 of which are divided into tillage, upland, fresh and salt meadows, woodland and highways. As late as 1890 there were 2,000 acres under water.
At the first town meeting in Essex, the moderator was George Choate, of the distinguished Choate family in New England and New York. Joseph Story, a Revolutionary War soldier, was the first town clerk; George Choate, Jonathan Story (4th), Elias Andrews, William Cogswell and William Andrews were chosen the original selectmen, assessors and overseers of the poor; Nathan Choate was first town treas- urer, and Rev. Robert Crowell and the selectmen were by vote of the town meeting designated as the first school committee.
The following is a list of the town officers (elective) for the year 1921: Moderator, George E. Mears; Town Clerk, Epes Sargent; Select- men: Caleb W. Cogswell (chairman), Aaron Cogswell; Secretary, Fred W. Andrews; Assessors: Fred W. Andrews, Leonard A. Story, Caleb M. Cogswell; Treasurer, Grove N. Dodge; Auditor, Charles M. Stevens; Tax Collector, Joseph N. Tucker; Overseers of the Poor: O. Perry Burnham William A. Lendall, John Wilson; School Committee: Alden C. Burnham Marshall H. Cogswell, Assie B. Hobbs; Tree Warden, Otis O. Story ; Con stables : Charles R. Lane, Stewart J. Hadley ; Cemetery Commissioners : Leighton E. Perkins, Alphonso W. Knowlton; Highway Surveyors : Frank E. Watson, George H. Paynter, David Mears, Welbus L. Cogswell, Ed- ward H. Burnham; Fence Viewers: A. F. Haskell, Benj. F. Raymond, Wm. A. Lendall, Enoch B. Kimball.
In common with many other towns in Essex county, Essex has a good library, of which the librarian's report in 1920 gave these facts: Bound volumes on shelves, 6,963; circulation, 16,320; volumes added, 165; cards in circulation, 484. The investment of funds belonging to the library was as follows: Bank deposits and Liberty War bonds, $20,664.64. The Burnham and Russ funds have been of great help toward carrying on this excellent library. The librarian making the above statement in 1920 was E. B. Story.
As a matter for future reference, it may be well to give the follow- ing figures from the town assessors' report in 1920; Value of assessed personal estate, $312,424.00 ; assessed real estate, $1,058,090.00; increase in 1920 over previous year, $37,807.00 ; tax on personal estate, $7,030.21; tax on real estate (1920), $23,807.78; tax on 458 polls at $5 each, $2,- 290.00. Concerning the last item, it may be said that three of the five dollars derived from the polls were paid to men who served in the War with Germany, as required by Chapter 283, Acts of 1919.
Sundry items from Report: Number of horses, 130; cows, 348;
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neat cattle other than cows, 142; swine, 70; dwelling houses, 620; acres land, 7,852; fowl, 4,426.
In 1819 a postoffice was established in Essex with Dudley Choate as postmaster. He was succeeded by the following in their order: Amos Burnham, 1826; Enoch Low, 1854; Charles W. Proctor, 1864; Daniel W .Bartlett, Sr., and Daniel W. Bartlett, Jr., 1868 to 1881; Leighton E. Perkins, 1881 to 1914, when he was succeeded by Clarence S. Perkins. The office has been kept in the present building since 1868. It is a third class office, with one rural route going from it. The last year's business of this office was about $1,700.
The town began very early to agitate the question of temperance in the matter of drinking spirituous liquors. Its first temperance society was formed in 1829, and in 1842 the Washington Total Abstinence So- ciety was organized. With the passing years and decades, as public sentiment changed regarding the handling of such problems, Essex has ever had her full share of worthy, practical, sensible temperance ad- vocates, even down to these later years, when the States and the Nation itself have decreed the dethronement of King Alcohol.
Essex was without a railway until 1872, the nearest railroad com- munication being Manchester, on the Gloucester branch road, more than four miles distant, with Wenham six miles away. July 1, 1872, the first train of steam cars was run over the tracks of the Essex Railroad, which extended from Wenham to Essex. The town appropriated a part of the necessary funds to secure this railroad, which was subsequently sold to the Eastern Railroad Company and is today a part of the great Boston & Maine system. The road was extended across the river and marshes to the Thompson Island community, in 1887, when a jubilee was held over the event. To the first promoter and president of the original rail- road company, Leonard Mckenzie, Esq., must be awarded the credit of dominating service and labors in the construction of the long-wanted and much-needed road.
Fully forty years after the first settlement by the English, which is placed at 1634, there was no preaching in what is now Essex, by any reg- ular ordained minister. Now and then, ministers from Ipswich would come over and hold a service, pray with the religiously-inclined and coun- sel with them. At funerals, these men of God also came to Essex, and after a brief service the remains of the deceased were taken upon the shoulders of the pallbearers to the burying-ground at Ipswich and there laid away to rest. Prior to 1667 there appears no record of any preach- ing at Essex. Early in 1668 Rev. Jeremiah Shepard, son of Rev. Thomas Shepard, of Cambridge, preached in private houses; he declined to act as a regular minister, on account of the church at Ipswich objecting thereto. This was no doubt due to the tax that always went with the organization of any new church. The first conference looking toward a second church was held in Ipswich, February, 1677. Two years later the
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interested men and women took matters into their own hands, regard- less of what might be said in Ipswich. These people were tired of traveling five miles weekly to worship God, hence they revolted. The frame of a suitable dimension for a church building was provided, with- out the sanction of the church or the State, as one might well term it, the work being carefully superintended by three energetic women who labored in secret with their husbands in this enterprise. Not many days after they had raised the frame for a church, three women-Mrs. Good- hue, wife of William Jr., Mrs. Varney, wife of Thomas Varney, and Mrs. Martin, wife of Abraham Martin, and Abraham Martin himself and his hired man, John Chub-were all placed under arrest, tried before a magistrate in Ipswich, found guilty of "contempt" in helping to raise a meeting-house at Chebacco, and bound over to the "Great and General Court" in Boston, where they made confession, and were allowed to go unpunished. Later they completed their meeting-house. The site of this structure served for the residence of Captain Joseph Choate. It was a very plain, well built structure, with a frame of white oak. The building had a cupola, and a fine toned bell hung within it.
The first minister was Rev. John Wise, a native of Roxbury, Massa- chusetts, born 1652. The father came from England in 1635 as a ser- vant of Dr. George Alcock. The son, Rev. Wise, graduated at Harvard College in 1673, then little better in educational standards than our pres- ent high or normal schools. He was a chaplain in King Philip's War, and later preached at Hatfield, Massachusetts ; he was married in 1678 to Miss Abigail Gardner. In the spring of 1680 he went to Chebacco to dedicate a church, the record states. He was finally ordained and settled here and preached in Essex for forty-five years. He died in 1725, aged seventy-three years.
It is not the intention in this chapter to dwell long on sundry points that might be thought interesting in a church history proper. In a gen- eral work of which this volume is a part, it is inexpedient to more than touch here and there, in an outline history. Hence the life and character of the numerous ministers will be very briefly mentioned.
The second minister in Essex was Rev. Theophilus Pickering, an officer of the Revolutionary struggle, and also a member of President Washington's cabinet, as well as in the administration of the elder Adams. After about sixteen years, Rev. Pickering and his flock dis- agreed over the preaching of that wonderful preacher and revivalist, Rev. George Whitefield, who in 1640 first preached in Ipswich, and visited Chebacco. He did not agree with Whitefield's methods of pre- senting his views, while his church, as a rule, held Whitefield up as a model. A considerable number in his church declined to stand by him. They consequently withdrew and formed a separate church, with Rev. John Cleveland as settled pastor. From this line of Clevelands came the late President Grover Cleveland.
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The third minister of the original church at Essex was Rev. Ne- hemiah Porter, a native of Hamilton, who filled the pulpit upon the death of Rev. Pickering. He was a Harvard graduate; remained here seven- teen years, and moved to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. He left two hundred descendants; the year of his death was 1820.
The Church of the Separatists was presided over by Rev. John Cleve- land until his death in 1799, over a half century. He was somewhat of an orator, and never afraid to speak his mind. Once in his church, it was bitter cold, while preaching one morning, and he suffered from the coldness. Finally, he stopped long enough to stamp his foot violently on the floor, and exclaimed, "O, God, who can stand before thy cold." (Psalm cxlvii). He then proceeded with his two hours' sermon. His successor was Josiah Webster.
All was orthodox preaching by the Congregationalists in Essex for over one hundred and seventy years after its original settlement. Then in 1809, a plain flat-roofed building, without steeple or tower, was erected upon the site of the Methodist church. It was thirty-five feet square, of pine, and instead of pews had long benches for seats. The Christian Baptist society occupied this plain meeting-house. The church had no written creed, the members styling themselves Christians, the same as the Campbellites after the death of Alexander Campbell. The society preferred to be known as the Church of Christian Baptists, or Christians. Their most distinguished preacher was Rev. Elias Smith. He founded the first newspaper in this part of the country-probably in the United States. Its first issue was pulled from the press in Sep- tember, 1808, eight years prior to the "Boston Recorder". Styled the "Herald of Gospel and Liberty," it had an existence of nine years. Its editor, Elder Smith, was first a Calvinistic Baptist, then Free Will Bap- tist, then Christian; later, he became a Universalist, and at last was counted with the Rationalists. He became a botanical doctor in Boston and died in his eighty-fifth year in 1846.
The Universalist Society was formed in 1829 by forty-three persons, who signed a constitution and agreed to a statement of belief. Various clergymen preached here, including Rev. Ezra Leonard, a Congregation- al preacher, who was converted to the Universalist faith. Other min- isters served, and in 1835 Rev. Joseph Banfield, a former Christian Bap- tist preacher, who now saw the faith as taught by Universalists, became the first regular pastor. The old Baptist church and sometimes the school house were occupied by this society for public worship. In 1836 a meeting-house was provided, under a committee which included Messrs. Jacob Story, John Dexter, Sr., Parker Burnham, Oliver Low and Samuel Hardy. The sale of the pews brought more money than the cost of the land, house and furniture, by $500. Since 1885 the pastors have been as follows: Revs. Closson, Sanger, Charles E. Petty, George Sanger and Wm. F. Rider, D.D. The present membership is sixty-eight. Since 1918 the Essex pastor has also served the church at West Gloucester.
HE NEW YORK UBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LENOX 1ILDEN FOUNDATIONS
MEMORIAL HALL, GEORGETOWN
OLDEST HOUSE IN GEORGETOWN, 1660; MODERNIZED
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February, 1874, saw the first Methodist Episcopal church formed in Essex. It was instituted by Rev. Daniel Sherman, presiding elder. In 1888 these Methodist people were still flourishing and worshiping in the Century Chapel. Recent records of this church show that at South Essex it has a successful work, with a membership of eighty-one and of preparatory members, thirty. In 1911 the church auditorium was re- built and remodeled. Since 1900 the Land Court has given the Methodist church a clear title to its property. In the summer of 1920 the vestry was completed at a cost of $2,500, counting donated work, of which the pastor performed a hundred days' labor himself. Recent pastors have been: Revs. Tillon, Pitman, Thornburg, 1917-19; and present pastor, Rev. Louis H. Kaub, 1919 -.
CHAPTER XXIII.
TOWN OF GEORGETOWN.
This section of the work was furnished by local writers, whose names appear in the introductory mention of contributors to the History, and may be relied upon as accurate.
HISTORICAL NARRATIVE
Georgetown is situated not far from the geographical centre of Essex County, and claims the distinction of containing within its limits the highest land of the county, Baldpate Hill. From the lookout which has been built on the top of this hill, the surrounding country within a radius of more than fifty miles can be seen. On the west and northwest are the mountains of Maine and New Hampshire; Monadnock and Kear- sarge, with Agamenticus, farther to the north; while looking east across the irregular roofs of the Baldpate Inn and the clustered houses of the village may be seen the white sand hills of Plum Island, and on the horizon's farthest verge the faint blue line of the Atlantic. An observer from this hilltop somewhat less than three hundred years ago might have seen the sunlight reflected from the white sails of the pinnace which brought to these shores the first settlers of our town.
In the autumn of 1638, Mr. Ezekiel Rogers, with a little company consisting of about sixty families, dissenters from the Church of Eng- land, "godly men and men of good estate," emigrated from the York- shire town of Rowley, England, seeking in the new world the freedom which was denied them in the old. "Large accommodations" had been offered by the General Court of Massachusetts to Mr. Rogers if he would settle here. These "accommodations" comprised an area extending from the Atlantic to Andover, and included the towns of Georgetown, Boxford, Groveland and parts of Haverhill and Middleton, as well as
Essex-15
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Rowley. It was all unbroken wilderness. Where now are broad high- ways, alive with motor cars, were then only narrow Indian trails, wind- ing in and out among the giant trees of the primeval forest. Instead of the shriek of the locomotive and the blare of the automobile horn was the scream of the eagle or the wild fowl's harsh note, while the only sign of human life was, perhaps, the curling smoke from some Indian camp fire.
It required courage to clear this wilderness and transplant a home from an old world to a new, but this courage our sturdy forefathers possessed; and here, near the coast in Rowley, the band of emigrants cleared a little spot in the all-surrounding forest and built their first homes. For a time all their energies were spent in the laborious work of clearing the land of the forest growth and tilling the soil, but prob- ably as early as 1645 the territory now known as Georgetown was gone over, the lands were examined, the lakes explored, and the brooks and streams, with the meadows through which they flowed, were appraised as of great value. The uplands were probably heavily wooded, but in these meadows was an abundance of grass, providing excellent pasturage for cattle in summer, as well as hay for winter use. The settlers of Rowley, however, seem not to have been in haste to take possession of these valuable lands in the western part of their plantation, partly, no doubt, because of the difficulty and danger of the enterprise, and partly because they were so fully occupied in the original settlement. Another possible reason for their delay has been given by Mr. Henry Nelson, in a newspaper article published in 1909. He says:
It is well known by antiquarians that Rev. Ezekiel Rogers and Oliver Crom- well, the Puritan leader in England, were close friends, and that there was an agree- ment between them that if Cromwell failed to conquer King Charles of England in parliamentary contests, he was to come to this country and join Mr. Rogers. Some- where in this broad area given to Mr. Rogers, extending from the River Merrimack to Ipswich River, was the selected spot for Oliver Cromwell .. It is a plaus- ible theory that land grants to individuals in that part of Rowley awaited the issue of the strife so fiercely carried on between Cromwell and Charles in the old home of the Rowley community. But all expectation of Cromwell becoming a citizen of Rowley becoming a thing of the past, the first grant of land was made out to Humph- rey Raynor, who a year or two before had aided in its survey.
Elder Raynor was a prominent citizen and church member in Row- ley, and was without doubt the first owner of land in the territory of Georgetown. His grant was in the southern part of the town extending from Baldpate pond perhaps nearly to Pen brook. A grant to Thomas Mighill followed in 1652. Under this date the records of the town of Rowley contain the following entry, the first having reference to the territory now Georgetown: "Twenty-three Akers at the place called the pen, where young cattell were formerly kept." This grant to Thomas Mighill included the farm formerly owned by Mr. Humphrey Nelson, and now the property of Miss Eleanor Jones of Haverhill. There was
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probably good pasturage here, and the place had doubtless been used for the pasturing of young stock for some years before the grant was made.
In 1661 extensive land grants were made to Samuel Brocklebank and his brother John. These grants extended southerly, including the farm now owned by Daniel P. Bond, and westerly toward Central street, in- cluding the Harmony cemetery. Upon this Brocklebank grant stands what is undoubtedly the oldest house in town, now owned by Mr. Melvin Spofford. In the same year, 1661, an allotment of land near and on Pen- tucket pond was made to Mary, the widow of Rev. Ezekiel Rogers, and included the land between Pentucket and Rock ponds. It extended to Groveland. In 1666 or 1667 a tract of land, called the three thousand acres, was laid out as village land. This tract included nearly all of Georgetown west of Pen brook, extending from what is now the centre of the town to Baldpate Hill. Soon the people of Rowley began to dis- cuss the encouragement of a settlement there. The following action is recorded in the Rowley town records: "It was agreed and voted that there should be a small farme laide out in the three thousand Acres of Land that was exchanged for land at the necke and the rest of the saide farm it is agreed that it shall be forever for the use of the min- istry, or for the towne's use." John Pickard, John Pearson and Ezekiel Northend was appointed "to make a bargon with any who should appeare to take the saide ferme, provided that they Let not above thirty Acres of meddow, or halfe of the meddow belonging to the thre Thou- sand Acres, provided allso that they put the town to no charges, pro- vided allso that they lay not out above thre score Acres of upland to the saide ferme."
It was not long before a "bargon" was made with one of Rowley's citizens, John Spofford, one of the original company of emigrants from Yorkshire. His name is found in the records of the division of lands into homestead lots in 1643. He had a house lot on Bradford street, near the centre of the present town of Rowley, and also owned land in the "fresh meadows, the salt meadows, the village lands, the Merrimack lands and shares in the ox pasture, the cow pasture, and the calf pas- ture."
This record is found under date of March 17, 1668: "Seventeenth day of March, in the year one Thousand six hundred sixty-eight, it was agreed and voted that John Spofforth, if he would goe to the farme that was granted to be laid out in the thre Thousand Akers, that he should have the benefit of penninge the cattell for the terme of seven years, he keeping the herde of the younger cattel as carefully and as cheape, as any other should doe." His lease was for twenty-one years, and he was to pay as rent for the first five years "three hundred feet of white oak plank, and after that time ten pounds each year, one-half in English corn at price current, or Indian corn, as he pleases, the other half in fat cattel
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or leane at price current." And so John Spofford, after living for thirty years in Rowley, left his home there and removed to the "Gravelle Plain, near the Bald Hills," now Baldpate, and thus became the first settler of the town of Georgetown. Why he should have left his home in Rowley for this wilderness is not known. It may have been that the "benefit of penning the cattel" was a valuable privilege. At the time of his re- moval he had eight children, four sons and four daughters.
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