USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Norwell > Narrative history of South Scituate-Norwell, Massachusetts > Part 11
USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Scituate > Narrative history of South Scituate-Norwell, Massachusetts > Part 11
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE - NORWELL
Chittenden Saw Mill
Further down the stream on the property of William E. Mills is the old dam which marks the site of a saw mill which was built very early and of which little is known. It was thought to have been built by one of the Bryants and that the old well and the cellar which are quite near indicate the location of his house.
Torrey Saw Mill
On Mill Lane is the dam where up to a few years ago stood the Torrey saw mill. This was used by the Torrey Bros., David, Willard and Everett for many years and earlier by Albion Turner and others. For a further de- scription see chapter on Mill Lane. The dam which is still standing was built on the location of an old beaver dam. Lemuel Turner, father of Albion, built it around 1800.
Samuel A. Turner Mill
North of Dead Swamp is the dam and pond where the Squire Sam Turner mill was located. This was in the Turner family for several generations. B. F. Atwood of Whitman and Ashburton Pinson were later owners. Ro- bert Fuller is the present owner of the property. This mill was used originally by Samuel A. Turner, who built it, as a shingle mill. J. Frank Turner added a saw mill and also manufactured lobster pots in his time. Samuel A. Turner built the mill in 1834.
Stockbridge - Hackett Mill
It is somewhat doubtful whether this mill was located in Scituate or in South Scituate, but it was generally thought to have been in both towns. This was situated in the Mt. Blue section on what was in old times called Groundsell Brook. Samuel Stockbridge moved into that district from the lower part of Scituate in 1752. He built the first mill there which was owned by the family for many years. Other local families have at times run it. Joseph Hackett, a Maine lumberman, later acquired
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BRYANT-TURNER-MERRITT GRIST AND SAW MILL On Second Herring Brook
MILLS AND FACTORIES
it, he and his son Wallace carried on business there for many years. Richardson Bros. were making boxes there in the early 1900's and were the last to occupy it, about 1917.
Galen Damon Mills
Galen Damon owned a saw mill just off Summer Street which was later purchased by Seth Foster and Charles A. Litchfield. John Whalen and Joseph F. Merritt who later acquired the site, sold it to the Scituate Water Company.
A short distance up the stream Mr. Damon built a grist mill which was reached by a cartway from Cedar Street. The old mill stones are now the door stones of his great grandson's house in Scituate.
Wind Mill
-
There was a wind mill a few rods south of the site of the present Unitarian church, which was built, according to Deane in 1726. It was torn down in 1830 at about the time the church was built.
Turner - Hatch Grist Mill
Margaret's Brook is a small brook which has its source in Hoop pole swamp and was so called for a woman whose farm was back in the woods from Professor Woods' place, in early times, the Benson farm. It finally flows through Old Pond into the Third Herring Brook. A little way up Pleasant street near the site of the Miles Turner House, which was burned on April 21, 1894, John Hatch had a grist mill in Revolutionary days. It later became the property of Elijah Turner and his son Bailey Turner, the father of Miles S. Turner. The Hatches and Turners were large land owners in that section in early days, but the Hatches disappeared seventy-five years before the Turners. The mill has been gone for a hundred years, but up to a short time ago the mill stones were resting in the stream where they dropped when the mill went to pieces.
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE - NORWELL
Jacobs Saw and Grist Mill
The Jacobs Mill at Assinippi on the boundary line of Norwell and Hanover was the furthest one up stream on the Third Herring Brook. It was both a saw and grist mill and was situated on both sides of the stream. It was built by Joshua Jacobs about 1730, and was burned July 4, 1920. The Jacobs family held possession of it for nearly two hundred years and it was a land mark that was greatly missed. The land is still in the possession of a lineal descendant, Dr. Henry B. Jacobs.
John Clapp Saw Mill
This mill was situated on the site of a very old mill said to have been built in 1653. John Clapp who owned the farm now owned by Gustaf Peterson was using the mill fifty years ago, but it has been torn down for twen- ty years. Alonzo Henderson used it for a time.
Samuel Church Grist and Saw Mill
This mill dates back to about 1690, and was originally built by the Curtis family. It came into possession of T. J. Gardner and was held by his heirs for many years. Samuel Church was the last to use it. He ran the grist mill long after all the other old grist mills in this section had been abandoned except perhaps the one at Greenbush. It is only this present year of 1937 that the old mill was burned, the last of the old time mills in town.
Cornet Stetson Mill
Just a little way upstream from Winslow's Bridge, at the junction of Tiffany Road and East Street, are the remains of the dam built for the Cornet Stetson mill that was built in 1656 and burned in the Indian raid of 1676. This dam, while standing, caused the flooding of an im- mense tract of low land known as "Old Pond," extending back for nearly a mile.
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OLD PLANE SHOP
River Street. Proprietors Tolman & Merritt. Shop stood near top of Delano Hill, for 60 years.
SALMOND TACK FACTORY
On Third Herring Brook, on a site where manufacturing has been carried on for 200 years. Still in active operation, under direction of Samuel Salmond Sylvester
MILLS AND FACTORIES
Tolman Tack Factory
A little below the bridge is the site of the Capt. Sam- uel Tolman Tack Factory, built by him in 1837. He also ran a saw and grist mill.
Charles Simmons Saw Mill
This mill, as water mills go, was of comparatively re- cent date. It was built by Charles Simmons about fifty years ago and was used by himself and sons, Charles and William. While the property of Walter S. Crane the mill was burned. This is the Jonah Stetson mill site, dating far back into Colonial days.
Tolman's Mill
Joseph R. Tolman built a mill on a tributary of Till's or Dwelley's Creek back in the early part of the last cen- tury. His son, Thomas J. Tolman, began to manufacture wooden planes and used this mill for several years. He later had a factory on the street near his house, with steam power, and abandoned the old water mill. In the days before the Civil War and for 20 years thereafter the Tolman planes were known all over the country and were used by both house and ship carpenters. Iron planes have now entirely supplanted them. Charles H. Merritt was a partner of Mr. Tolman for years and he, with the Tolman heirs, continued the business until 1893.
Lyman W. Lincoln Mill
Lyman Lincoln has a mill on Lincoln Street, Mount Blue. He has been in the lumber business for the past twenty-five years. His motive power is a Diesel engine.
Ashburton W. Pinson
Ashburton Pinson was in the lumber business for many years and handled a great deal of lumber. His mill on Winter Street burned a few years ago. Mr. Pinson em- ployed a number of men, and became to be known as an expert in timber products.
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE - NORWELL
Litchfield Shoe Factory
John R. Litchfield built a shop on Norwell Avenue, and began to manufacture shoes, about 1870. From time to time he enlarged this shop and did a thriving business. The business was later taken over by his son, George W. H. Litchfield, who continued to enlarge the building until he had an up-to-date, three story factory and employed over one hundred men. Mr. Litchfield senior died in 1889 and his son in 1901. The business was discontinued and the shop torn down.
Tilden Shoe Factory
The Alonzo Tilden shoe factory at the corner of Winter and Cross Streets was built by him in 1877. It was one of the middle sized factories of that period and employed about fifteen hands. The Tilden brothers and Wilbur Nichols carried on business for several years, but with the removal of Alonzo to Philadelphia, it was given up and Amos H. Tilden, one of the brothers, has owned the build- ing a number of years. It was destroyed by fire July 4, 1938
Accord Chemical Company
The plant of the Accord Chemical Company, manufac- turers of shoe factory specialties and other chemical pro- ducts was established on Washington Street by Alfred H. McLeod in 1928. It is a busy spot. The business has brought several families to town.
Sparrell Funeral Service
One of the oldest business enterprises in town and one that has been carried on by the same family for more than one hundred and eighteen years, was first establish- ed by James N. Sparrell about the year 1820. Mr. Spar- rell began making coffins at his place on Central Street. Later he did carpenter work and building, made shoe boxes and still continued to make coffins. His son who succeeded him established the Charles W. Sparrell Under- taking business carrying on until his death in 1906.
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MILLS AND FACTORIES
From this beginning the Sparrell Funeral Service, the largest establishment of its kind on the South Shore is now being conducted by a grandson of the original found- er, Ernest H. Sparrell.
Salmond Tack Factory
The site of this factory was first used for a grist mill that was said to have been built by Charles Stockbridge. The Stockbridge family played a very important part in the story of the mills in Scituate in early times. Recom- pense Tiffany later ran the mill and the street and pond are still known by that name. Capt. Zephaniah Talbot and Capt. Samuel Salmond later, about 1834, established tack works and Edmund Q. Sylvester, a son-in-law of Capt. Salmond, in time became a member of the firm. He finally became sole owner and at his death, his sons Joseph S. and Albert L., ran the business for a number of years. It is now carried on by Albert's son, Samuel Sylvester.
Through a long term of years the business has gone under the name of "Samuel Salmond & Sons." It is the only manufacturing industry that has survived in town for over a hundred years and is still going strong.
David Torrey Trunk Factory
This factory was located on River Street and was orig- inally the Universalist church at Duxbury which Mr. Torrey purchased and moved to South Scituate. After Mr. Torrey's death it was taken down again and removed to the National Fire Works in Hanover. For a number of years Mr. Torrey manufactured trunks employing from fifteen to twenty-five men regularly. The wages in those days ranged from $1.75 per day for foremen and $1.50 for skilled workmen down to 75 cents for young men. Ac- cording to an old pay roll book for the years, 1879 to 1882, the following townspeople of that time found regular employment there :
Martin S. Curtis, foreman; Joseph W. Briggs, Walter
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE - NORWELL
H. Briggs, Luther W. Flint, Charles Sylvester, Roswell Curtis, Urban Percival, Andrew Green, Michael Lynch, Fred Freeman, Seth H. Vinal, Lorenzo Bates, Lewis Ste- phens, Charles Walker, William Flint, Henry Litchfield, Andrew Green, Oscar Green, John Tilden, William Dan- forth, James Leslie, Patrick Leslie, George Bennett, Frank Baker, Edwin B. Torrey, Calvin Cromwell, Ira Sanborn, Seth O. Fitts, Frank Talbot, Thomas Leslie.
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CHAPTER XXIX
GUNDALOW DAYS ON NORTH RIVER
W THEN the settlers who first came into the territory bordering the North River began to keep cattle and horses, they were obliged to depend almost entirely on the marsh grass that grew along its banks, to feed them. We are told that there was very little cleared or open land in this section of the country, and it was all they could do for some years, to clear enough to raise crops for them- selves, without sowing any of the English grasses as for- age for the cattle. Thus the meadows and flats of the river were considered very valuable and were eagerly sought after in the allotment of lands that the "comitys" (committees) of the freemen of the towns of Scituate, and Marshfield apportioned to the different families. It was only a short time before every inch of meadow-land along the river was taken and as years went by the own- ers dug ditches to help drain the water off quickly, mak- ing them more valuable.
After a time transfers began to be made, and divisions of estates brought it about that in many instances people who owned the meadows lived some distance from them. They were for the most part surveyed and the rights of way many of them had over adjoining property were in many cases bones of contention and litigation and are even to this day.
Almost all of the old families have in their possession deeds dating back a hundred years or more showing where some of their ancestors purchased so many acres of mea- dow land on the "First Herring Brook", at "Wills Island",
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE- NORWELL
"Pincin Bank", or. some equally well-known locality of river history.
The price of meadows in those days was around $50 an acre, but today conditions have so changed that $5.00 an acre is in most instances all they will bring. Many are not assessed and numbers of people own meadows or parts of meadows they have never seen and could not locate if they wished.
The towns of Norwell and Hanover still own some flats on the lower river, which used to be good property but which are now just a taxable source of income for the Town of Scituate wherein they are located.
The meadows above Little's Bridge are in most instanc- es comparatively accessible from the shore, and the hay, after it was cut was bunched and poled to the upland where it could be carted away. Some of the meadows were harder and dryer than others and horses with large wooden shoes, called meadow shoes, bolted over the hoofs, could be used, which helped very much.
Below where the railroad bridge crosses the river, the marshes stretched for long distances from which the hay could not be conveniently poled or carted ashore, and here is where the gundalow figured.
Gundalows were in use on the river from very early times. They were large flat bottomed boats from 30 to 40 feet long and about 10 or 12 foot beam, sometimes square ended like a scow, and sometimes sharp at the bow like a boat. They drew very little water and would carry from 3 to 8 tons of hay. They were propelled by a pair of long oars or sweeps, near the bow, or by poles, and were steered by an oar over the stern. There was a short deck aft for the use of the steersman and another forward.
Some of them were equipped with a sail which some- times helped along and all of them carried a 20 foot gang plank over which the men poled the hay aboard and which held the boat away from the bank and prevented it get- ting aground if the tide was running out. A tow line
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GUNDALOW DAYS ON NORTH RIVER
could be used in coming up the river above Little's Bridge, but below, it was customary to row and push.
Either loaded or empty, they were unwieldly, and the crews tried to take advantage of the tide as much as pos- sible, even if it meant a long wait. There was no eight- hour day in the gundalow game of those days. A good crew was five men, one to steer and two on each oar, or if it was towing, one man in the bow to fend off and three on the tow line. Less than five was to be short handed and if there were a couple of boys to help and rake scat- ters, so much the better.
There were a number of men who made a regular prac- tice of gundalowing in the summer and who could be hired by the different farmers when making a trip. Some of them came to be regular fixtures of certain boats and ex- pected to be hired with the boat.
Charles Mann, who lived at the top of "Wilson Hill," did a great deal of this work for many years and Briggs in his "Shipbuilding on the North River," speaks of "Un- cle Jerry Gunderway" an old colored man who always went. Uncle Jerry lived at one time in a little shanty at the mouth of the Second Herring Brook, by the "Chit- tenden yard." It is a very beautiful spot with a splendid view up river. We are told by a very old lady that when she was a little girl an old woman said to be part Indian lived in this house and sold baskets through the village. Her name was Lucy Stewart. This house probably dated back to the days when the "Randalls" and "Chittendens" built there and was perhaps used by the workmen. It has long since disappeared. The well near by is still used by the present owners of the property, Mr. and Mrs. William E. Mills.
Many of the people at Assinippi owned flats on the lower river and in August and September the big ox teams of the Jacobs families and others, would crawl along the highways to the landings and the meadows in Scituate, early in the morning, and would come back over the "Hill" at South Scituate late at night with big loads of hay, the
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE-NORWELL
driver sitting on the wagon tongue, the team being head- ed for home and requiring no attention, two yokes of oxen and a horse on ahead; making a day of eighteen hours or more. Much of the carting by ox team in summer was at night as it was cooler for the oxen and green-head flies and mosquitoes near the marshes were at times almost unbearable.
In the early days, gundalowing was carried on way up river but it was soon abandoned and in later times Union Bridge was the last landing used for hay, accommodating the North Marshfield and South Scituate farmers, the bulk of the hay carried by scow being landed at "Little's Bridge" or "Cole's Landing."
The Duxbury and Cohasset Railroad Bridge was built quite close to the water and it was always a thorn in the flesh of the old river men as a loaded boat could not pass under at high tide. It is rather too bad that conditions that compelled the railroad to raise their road-bed over the meadow and their bridge, in order to save them, came too late to help the ones who would have appreciated it so much.
The grasses of the upper river were different from those of the lower. The up river meadows were usually referred to as blue grass meadows and down river there was grass, sedge, salt and prick ear with the black grass predominating. These were the names by which they were known to the farmers. The writer does not vouch for their correctness.
It was great fun for the boys to go on the trips as there was good fishing for perch and shiners, the fish following the boat to feed on the crickets and grasshoppers that were continually hopping off the hay into the water and the bathing in the brackish water of the lower river was better than that farthur up.
Chandler Clapp of Greenbush owned a gundalow that he rented and kept at what was known as "Cole's Landing" on the First Herring Brook. This landing was across the road from the Nicholas Wherity place and on what is
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GUNDALOW DAYS ON NORTH RIVER
now the location of the Boston Sand and Gravel Co. A great deal of hay was landed here.
Hatch Carver built and ran a boat from the wharf at Little's Bridge. This boat was lap streak, very service- able, and was in use for many years being in later times owned by Freeman Damon, who lived at this landing, and carried hundreds of tons of hay. At one time it was the only boat for hire on the river and was spoken for many days in advance. It went to pieces on the meadows, having been moored back of the Nelson Farm since the '98 storm.
Enos Stoddard had built for his own private use, by Arthur F. Rogers, a 30 foot lap streak boat. This he used for some years, but it was finally broken up.
Briggs tells of the three gundalows built by Cummings Litchfield at Union Bridge. They bore the fantastic names of Eureka, Red Rover and Sea Boy. The last one, the Sea Boy, was for many years on the landing near the bridge. It finally went to pieces.
E. E. Henderson of North Marshfield, when a young man owned a large gundalow and boated a great deal of hay to the Union Bridge Landing.
George and Charles Sylvester owned a small gundalow which they moored at the mouth of the Second Herring Brook and every year made many trips. It was unlike the usual type, had a keel and was quite narrow. It was very useful in navigating the small creeks and "guzzles" and could be taken where the larger boats could not go.
John Turner and son Frank built a very large square ended scow at Union Bridge. This they ran about ten years. It would carry two hundred bunches of hay and was locally known as the "Jumbo" after the big elephant Barnum had just brought from the London Zoo.
The Henderson boys, Fred and Bert, the ones who lost their lives in the '98 storm, had a large square ended gun- dalow built and used it for several years. They made a regular business of haying, the boat being big enough to
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE - NORWELL
carry the horses, mowing machine and rake to the flats. They were the only ones, I believe, to carry on the busi- ness in this way.
This was one of the last boats in use on the river and in the storm in which its owners were drowned, it went adrift and was the means of saving the lives of the Clapp boys of Greenbush who were in a little boat. They man- aged to overtake it and reach the railroad bridge and safety.
The word gundalow is not in the dictionary and many people have wondered at its derivation. Most agree that it is a local pronunciation of the word gondola, although it is a far call from the gondolas of Venice we read about, and the clumsy, useful boats of the river, but they filled their place in the early order of things. As gundalows they were known by the men that used them, and as gun- dalows they should be remembered, now that they are no more.
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CHAPTER XXX
FISHING ON THE RIVER
B Y a special act of the Legislature passed May 19, 1854, the inhabitants of Pembroke, Scituate, Marshfield and South Scituate were allowed to take, with ten seines only and on certain days, the herring and other fish that came up the river. Marshfield had four privileges and the oth- er towns two each. It was the custom for the towns at the annual town meeting to sell the rights at auction; they quite often brought a hundred dollars or more apiece and the competition was quite strong. Today the towns get perhaps from two to five dollars a right and the whole affair is regarded as a joke.
In those days at certain intervals along the banks of the river one would see little fish houses where the fish were cured, and clumsy windlasses or capstans to haul the seines, which were much heavier than those in use today.
Another method of fishing was by sweep net through the ice and the outfit consisted of an old-fashioned hand sled with a net about six feet in diameter and fastened to a twenty-foot pole. Two men would skate along drag- ging the heavy net after them until they came to one of the holes they wished to fish and they would then put in the net and sweep around. Working against the tide was hard work, but swinging with it was easy. If the fish- ermen had no luck in one place they would take up the net, cut a new hole and try in another place. Often the men would go nearly the whole length of the river in the course of an evening.
Sometimes good hauls of white perch were made and shipped to the Boston markets. Spearing for eels was another method of fishing and was sometimes done
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HISTORY OF SOUTH SCITUATE-NORWELL
through the ice and sometimes from a boat. Fifty years ago, leaning against the fences along the river, could be seen a number of these heavy nets and eel spears just where the owners left them when the river broke up. By the middle of March, just as soon as the ice left the ponds, the smelt came into the brooks and many of the old people who had lived along the river all their lives were accustomed to dip for them with a small, fine net about eighteen inches in diameter. The night had to be pretty dark in order to catch any as the fish were said to be very shy. This method of fishing was against the law, but the fish were never sold and the fishermen were not often molested, although it was the custom for the towns to appoint brook watches in those days. It was a pleas- ure for the old men to get together in the fishing shanties and swap stories of by-gone days, and it was a rare treat indeed for the boys who were sometimes allowed to lis- ten.
When the brook school of herring came, about the last of May or early in June, the youngsters had a great time as the ditches and brooks were at times absolutely filled with them. They would scale the wasteways at the mills to reach ponds above. It was the law that wasteways should be kept open between April 10 and May 15 to al- low the fish to reach their ancient spawning grounds. In Pembroke the town was obliged to carry a certain num- er of herring into the ponds above the dams. In the old Colonial laws the alewives or herrings played an impor- tant part.
Since the storm of 1898, which opened a new mouth to the river, more of the salt water fish have come up and during the past year of 1937, numbers of striped bass have been caught. The State Fish and Game Commis- sion have stocked the tributaries of both the Second and Third Herring Brooks with trout and have also released a number of herring in the upper ponds, of the Second Herring Brook.
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