USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Melrose > The history of Melrose, County of Middlesex, Massachusetts > Part 6
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46
HISTORY OF MELROSE.
in my other land but a few poles difference and which for several years haue been made use of both by the Town and Country My Humble request to this Honord Court is that the said way may be altered : to which end if this Court please the Towns mostly concerned may be ordered to choose such persons amongst themselves as they judge meet to reveiw the said way & having respect to the Countrys conven- iency and saffty with your petitioners and Towns concerne therein and to make return to this Court that they may determine therein as in there wisdoms they shall judge meet.
And your petitioner shall be bound to pray &c.
THOMAS LYNDE.
To the Flores County Court at chartyforum 20 :4:71 The poter of 250: Lyon of MalSon Humbly spousty . That whoEns formily a portamed Higginsay for by's Cometrue who was laid out Swags, a field of mine commonly called may furtsor forte. wh of to contamos made you of will be very progratiale to my joff epost's by reason of games fo lates Land Improviableto forat chod In as much as types may ar a way why my so forts in my other land but a four pulse siffror e which for good all yours. haus been made oye of boy by The Foun & Correctly My Harith Esquisito
His Howold Court is that typ to way mayer allfraid : Io wycle and if by's Court phage the Towns mostly contra may be ordering to charge such ffons Amongst bompolis as tory jogo most to covous to to way e savings Laspect to the Countrys continiousy elaffly
et maks wturns to this court that the may astroms tyron as in your wisdomany yet that says mood. what you portions god former In pray er
The Leme
FACSIMILE OF THE ORIGINAL, PETITION FOR CHANGE OF ROAD, DATED APRIL 20, 1671.
47
ROADS, STREETS AND HIGHWAYS.
That this petition was successful, and the road changed is made evident by the fact that the Court appointed "John Greene, Josiah Convers and Joatham Poole" to view the premises "against Thomas Lynds Land in Maulden " and that they "settled the same to pass under the Rock where it now lyeth" and that the Court accepted and approved; and from that time, instead of continuing on the east side of. Boston Rock, as formerly, it left the present Lebanon Street, at the junction of Grove, passing through Lynde Street, by the " Dolly Upham " house to the foot of Summer Street; ( Lynde Street, as now known, was not extended through to Main Street until 1857;) thence through Summer Street to Main to where Masonic Hall now stands; leaving Main Street soon after, it crossed the present Mount Vernon Street east of the "great rock" referred to later, and the houses of Edwin S. Small and others, continuing on between the present homesteads of Henry and the late D. Alvin Lynde, and on close beside the foot of Boston Rock, a portion of which road still exists, but unused, across the meadow in front of the Ensign Thomas Lynde house, then recently built, and on through the Pine Banks Park to the old road again to Forest Street, as orig- inally laid out.
It is almost impossible to obtain exact information as to some of the early roads. Many changes were made as time went on, and where first a road was travelled, after abandon- ment, and a new one utilized, the old became obliterated from disuse.
On a plan of Malden, surveyed by Peter Tufts, Jr., of Med- ford, in 1795, by authority of a resolve passed by the General Court in 1794, the only roads laid down in what was then North Malden, are, the main road as last described, called the "Reading Road," now Main Street, and the " Stoneham Road," which left this near where our Masonic Hall stands, and fol- lowed what is now our Wyoming Avenue, Hurd, Cottage, Foster and Vinton Streets, to the old county road leading to Stoneham, now Franklin Street. This "Stoneham Road" had been laid out five years before, in 1790. At the same time there existed, but not shown on this map, the road running towards the Chelsea line-Chelsea then bounded Malden on the east,-which grew out of the following action:
48
HISTORY OF MELROSE.
At a meeting held July 20, 1713, " It was putt to vote whethar ye Town will mend ye way yt Runs from ye country Road neere Sam !! Grouars To John Wilkinsons between ye Raig of lots. And jt past on ye negitiue." In consequence of this vote, John Upham, Jonathan Barrett, and other inhabitants of the northern portion of the town petitioned the Court for convenient highways from their houses to the meeting house ; and the Court ordered the selectmen " to look to such matters."s
Sept. 29, following, it is recorded:
yt ye select men doe lay out a contenant high way for Them . . 2 pols broad on ye northwardly side of That Raing of lots yt Runs from John Wilkinsons Land neer his hous down to ye cuntrey Road yt leads to Reding .- beginning at ye sd wilkinsons land.
"This was a confirmation to public uses of one of the rights of way which were laid out between the ranges of common land in 1695." Thus early was the higher land between our present Upham Street, long know as Upham Lane, and Long Pond, occupied by Wilkinson; and at that time or a little later, came others; among them Herring and Breeden. Evidently the road as laid out above to Chelsea ( Saugus ) line, was not, for many years, utilized only up as far as the Upham houses; for the following vote was passed many years later, laying out a new route for that end of the road:
At a Leagal Town Meeting in Malden Novm 29, 1796, the Town did accept of the Report of their Committe chosen to Consider of the Expedience of laying out a Road from Malden to Chelsea line which was that the Select Men Lay out a Road so as to accommodate Mr Jesse Upham & Mr John Edmunds in the Best Manner they can & Aprise the Damages.
True Copy of the Record.
Attest : EBENR HARNDEN, Town Cler Malden April 21st 1801.
This road left Upham Street turning to the south just beyond the present Parker Farm Houses, and ran up over the hill by the houses then existing, but which have now disappeared, and on down the hill again, over a still existing earth-bridge, through the woods to the level, striking the Upham Street, as since continued down by Mr. Doherty's and the romantic ledges, and boulders, -our Palisades.
The Breeden house stood not far from where the road turns
8 Corey, History of Malden, 442.
49
ROADS, STREETS AND HIGHWAYS.
to go to the Hood and Wyoming Kennels farms. It was built about 1730. In 1783, John Edmunds, the Revolutionary patriot, and grandfather of the late John Quincy Adams Avery, bought it, together with twenty acres of land, bounding east on Long Pond, on the outlet of which then existed a saw-mill. Mr. Edmunds died in 1846, aged eighty-nine years; and his grave is in the southern part of Wyoming Cemetery. Soon after his death the old house was burned, and nothing remains but the old cellar-hole, covered by a temporary shed.9
The exact location of the Wilkinson house is not known.
Soon after the Upham road was first laid out, action was taken by the town concerning another one, as follows:
The select men of malden mett ye 17. of feb 17212 And doe alow of ye Two pools jn bredth yt lieth Att ye south end of the first Raing of ye second Thousand acrs-from boston line to Reding Road To be a Town high-way :
The selectmen on the 15th day of nov !. 1754 opened A town road from mr James Barrets orchard to Chelsea line between the first and second range of lots in the second division.
Although the latter entries are nearly thirty-three years apart in time, they refer to a single way in North Malden which had existed as one of the rights of way between the ranges, and now became a settled road. It was formerly Barrett's Lane, and is now Porter Street, Melrose.10
From Upham's Lane, there ran another road not shown on this map, which wound up to the end of the present Spear Street, thence down through the woods, through Mountain Avenue, to the present Lebanon Street; thence northerly to the old Howard homestead, afterwards the Pratt place, now the Poor Farm, and then westerly on to the Wyoming Ceme- tery, joining the old 1653 road which went up over the hill between Wyoming and Forest Dale Cemeteries, through the present "Hillside Terrace" of the Pine Banks Park-east of the "Intervale"-to Forest Street. This was the way the Howards and Pratts of that section travelled to Malden Centre; and the road from Lebanon Street to the cemetery, through the farm, is very clearly defined at the present day.
9 John Edmonds, Malden. Cor- poral, Lieutenant-Colonel's Co., Col. Michael Jackson's regt. ; Con- tinental Army pay accounts for service from Jan. 1, 1780 to Feb. I,
1780. Massachusetts Soldiers and Saitors of the Revolutionary War. Vol. v., p. 220.
10 Corey, History of Malden, 444.
51
in
O.
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E
W
CHELSEA
S
Long Ponol
Stoneham
Nix E 390 poles5
Finde
Swains Fond
Reading Cloud.
Wait. Tavern
N12°€ 140 poles
bat Denters
Tufts Mills
Medford Good
Hatches House
MEDFORD
· Cuff Bradburys
about 120 acres
Charlestown Road
Part Birmauro
5 /32° & 8gu holes
THE
Medford River ford
Eel Pond 30. 1. 27 Long Pund 5:1.92
Swains Pond 6.0.24
Nº24 2.6.9.
...
STONEHAM
N8430'E 275 holes
Rond
Ed Fond
Caflex
Phineas /magueijo Wham
Emernous
N25 W993 Poles
Solen Road 1
CHELSEA
MALDEN RIVER
Chelsea Road
NS30 E 120 profes
PLAN .f MALDEY Contains 8826 Acers including Wiler and Roads Survey'd &D 1795 By Peter Tufts jun
Reading
51
ROADS, STREETS AND HIGHWAYS.
The various ponds are indicated on this map, including the no longer existing Dix, in the rear of the City Hall. A few of the houses then standing are rudely drawn thereon: On the old road, James Green, at the extreme north; Vining's next; then the William Emerson tavern, which "stood near the old well with a narrow cartway between the house and well; " 11 William Upham, on the present Lynde Street, opposite the "Dolly Upham " house; Benjamin Lynde, where now stands Henry Lynde's homestead, and the old Ensign Thomas Lynde House at the Fells, without a name. On the "Stoneham Road " appears the Phineas Sprague house which stood where now stands the residence of the late Mrs. Liberty Bigelow; then Captain Unite Cox, the old " Mountain House; " and last that of John Larrabee. This rude survey is the earliest repre- sentation of the topography of the town of which there is any knowledge. The present course of Main Street is indicated by the dotted lines. The dotted section on the northwest corner shows the portion set off from Stoneham in 1853, and added to the territory of Melrose.
Some roads were laid out at the time of the division of " The Commons," mostly in the "Scadan Fells," as will be seen by the following: A committee consisting of Lieutenant Joseph Wilson, Isaac Hill, Lemuel Jenkins and Nathaniel Upham, chosen April 9, 1695, made this report May 8, following:
Wee subscribers have done according to the town vote at our under- standing in staking of highwayes in the sheep paster and the three hundred accres namly two poles wide with stakes blazed one the in- side and pillers of stones at the bottom of them
1. as one the neck side from the Spragues Land, up through the neck unto John Greenlands lote in Charlestown bounds [ Washington Street, going north from the R. R. bridge in Malden.]
2ly. A Roade from Joseph Linds house [near " Reedy Pond " on Forest Street, heretofore described] through the sheep paster to dexters Rockes [the great ledges in the woods between the westerly side of Swain's Pond and Lebanon Street.] then through the lots to the second division and from the foote of Dexters Rokes northeste up Squiers hill through to the seckend diuision.
3ly. A Roade from Joseph floyds through the sheepe paster and three hundred accres to Swaines ponde into the seckend diuision. [heretofore referred to as coming from Upham Lane through Spear Street, and through the woods to Lebanon Street.]
11 MISS. letter from his son, Rev. Warren Emerson.
52
HISTORY OF MELROSE.
4ly. A Roade from Ezekell Jankens a longe in the sheep paster [the territory east of Wayte's Mt. through which Forest Street runs,] and crossing the Roade that comes up from Joseph floydes. and pasing on towards the @ [Round World; the territory west of Lebanon Street, in Maplewood, south of the Malden Poor Farm.] then winding to the left through lots into the seckend diuision.
5ly. A Roade from Leftent Spragues land up through to the Road that comes from Joseph floyds :
6ly. A Roade from haywards land branching out to dexters Rockes likewise branching up to Swaines pond brooke [the present Lebanon Street,] and through the lots to the Roade that comes from Joseph
JOSEPH WILLSON SAMUELL JANKENS. floyds :
NATHANELL UPHAM. ISACC HILL.
These roads, with the exception of the first, traversed the Scadan woods, but it is not easy to indicate, only in part, just where. One ran easterly from Swain's Pond Road, near Leba- non Street, over into the Salem Road. Two of the old ways, running from the easterly end of Swain's Pond, are still used to some extent; they lead towards the old road which for- merly ran from the Salem Road to the iron works at Hammer- smith on the Abousett, or Saugus River. The roads which have been described were the only ones laid out for many years; no new ways were granted until after the Revolution. In the earlier days, the scattered and isolated farm houses of the old-time residents west of the "Reading Road," noted on the 1795 map, were reached by various private paths and cart- ways, mostly unnamed. The original manner of reaching Malden Centre, from some of these western homes was a path- way which followed about on a line with our present Cleveland Street, crossing Spot Pond Brook, passing Capt. John Lynde's house to what is now Washington Street, thence down by the cliffs and cascade to Malden; and the "Stoneham Road," pre- vious to the time it was laid out in 1790, had been nothing more than private ways or paths, from house to house, on the west side of our present Main Street, beginning at the house of Jonathan Howard, Jr., which stood where Masonic Hall now stands, and before which grew a majestic buttonwood tree, well remembered by some now living.
One of these ways, which marks the origin of that part of our Main Street from above Island Hill, up along by the side of Pine Banks Park and Hog Island, was the subject of the following Town vote March 1, 17134:
53
ROADS, STREETS AND HIGHWAYS.
That Jose Line has libarty Granted to him and his haires To Raise the causeway yt Lyeth betweene ye medo formarly capt waits: und ye sd Lines medo so high as to flow ye sd lines meddo : and ye sd Lines doe oblige him self and his haires To maintain ye sd causway in good Repair suficant for both Town and country to pass : - so long as they se cause to flow ye sd medo Also ye said line has libarty to take earth and grauill on ye high way on ye Top of ye hill near ye sd caseway for ye ends aboue sd
This way accommodated some of the north end citizens with a "shorter cut" to the centre of the town.
These ways, or paths, were in such a condition in the year 1757, as to cause a petition to be drawn up "To the Gentlemen of the Selectmen of the town of Malden," asking them to lay out a highway from
near the house of M! Jonathan Howard Junr [at Masonic Hall] over his land westerly where the path now is that we usually pass on to the Land of phinehas Sprague and so over his land where the path now is near by his house [then on the site of the late Mrs. Liberty Bigelow's house,] to the land of Mr Samuel Sprague also over his land where we usually pass by his house [where L. Frank Hinckley now lives] and where Thos pratt ye 3d Dwells to our Land at the Gate near our house.
Among the reasons given were:
That Said way hath almost always been a Very wet muddy plungy and uncomfortable place for passing. Secondly our predecessors & we have been at a Very considerable expence in makeing and Repairing a Considerable Large bridge over Ell pond Brook, said bridge hath usually been a Dangerous place to pass over By Reason of its being Generally out of Repair. ... Thirdly another Difficulty we Labor under is a Number of uncomfortable Gates we are obliged to pass through the Chief of the year which when our wives ride through although with Children in their armes are obliged to Git Down to open said Gates or Else they are in Danger of their Limbs and Lives too.
Other reasons are given, but the conclusion of the petition is as follows:
Be So Good as not to Impose taxes on us or dont be uneasy if we wont pay any Rates or if we must pay Rates and not have a Rhode to Go to meeting to mill & to market on be So Good as to be willing that we should be Set off to another town that will find us ways.
Nevertheless, notwithstanding that these "Estates have been at so much of the cost of ways in the town both in purchasing and Repairing them for other people of the town to pass on
54
HISTORY OF MELROSE.
for above 70 years," it would seem that this road so earnestly prayed for was not built until a period of over thirty years had gone by, in 1790.12
A little later, a cart road over the present Lynde Street, was in use from the foot of Summer Street to the present Main Street, before the formal laying out and building of the same after the town was incorporated; and such was the case with other streets; Emerson Street, at the time William Emerson built his house on the corner of Main and Emerson Streets, was nothing more than a lane, with bars by his house, through which he drove his cows to pasture, which was situated west of our present central railroad station.
Howard Street, was laid out in 1788, and built through to Saugus, thus making a continuous County road from Stone- ham centre to Lynn.
Main Street, as it now exists, was laid out in 1806; when finally, the very crooked old road of 1653, and the successive changes that had taken place therein during the intervening years, was made a straight street, excepting a moderate bend at " Island Hill," from Malden centre to Greenwood, in Wake- field. After this, and until the Boston and Maine Railroad was built and opened in 1845, very little was done in the way of making new streets ; but soon after the town was incorpo- rated, in 1850, many new streets were laid out and built; among them Porter, Emerson, west from Main, Youle, Vinton, Myrtle, Walnut and Essex Streets; in 1852, a highway was built " from John Lynde's to Charles Pratt's Gate," now Leba- non Street; John Lynde's was the mansion on the corner of Grove and Lebanon Streets, and Charles Pratt's was our present Poor Farm; the gate being situated at the top of the hill, at the corner of Forest Street ; not long after this road was con- tinued "from Charles Pratt's Gate to Malden Line;" then by or before 1860, there followed other streets; among them Lynde,
12 Some years previous to this, in 1751, six residents of North Malden - Phineas Sprague, Na- thaniel Howard, Samuel Sprague, Thomas Vinton, Benoni Vinton and Phineas Sprague, Jr. - were allowed to work out, according to custom then in vogue, their high- way rates for three years, on the
private way from Jonathan How- ard's house to that of Phineas Sprague. When finally built it became what is now the easterly end of Wyoming Avenue, beginning at Main Street, thence througli Hurd and Cottage Streets to Foster Street.
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ROADS, STREETS AND HIGHWAYS.
Essex, Green, Grove, Foster, Cottage, Wyoming Avenue, Hurd, Trenton, Melrose, Tremont, Sylvan, first called Cemetery Street, Vine, Ashland, Linwood Avenue, first called Chelsea Street, East Wyoming Avenue, Poplar, Willow, Laurel, now Cedar, Winthrop, Mt. Vernon, Linden, Otis, Lake Avenue, Summer, Upham from Main to Lebanon, first called Church Street, Cedar Park and others.
As the town increased in population, new dwellings were erected, and new streets built, year by year, until the present time, when we have two hundred and eighty-seven streets, avenues, courts and places, and fifty-three and nine-tenths miles of streets and ways, forty-two and a quarter miles of which are public, or accepted streets; the balance are open to public use, but not accepted. Of these eleven and a half miles are county roads, and are included in the forty-two and a quarter miles of accepted streets.
In the early days it was a common thing to place gates across the roads; and the Malden records are full of votes that were passed concerning their construction and mainte- nance in the various parts of the town. "While travelling was entirely on foot, or on horseback, the inconvenience of gates was not great; but the gradual introduction of chaises and other vehicles rendered unobstructed roads desirable." B
SIDEWALKS. Melrose, if not the first, was one of the first towns to lay concrete sidewalks, under the provisions of an act of the Legislature, allowing appropriations especially for that object to be made, sidewalks built, and one-half the cost assessed upon the abutters. The first action, introduced on motion of Allen C. Goss, was taken at the Annual Meeting in March, 1878, when $1000 was appropriated for that purpose. Accord- ingly, $1000 was spent by the town, and as much more by the citizens in front of whose residences sidewalks were built; making $2000 worth of concrete walks, which were laid the first year; and the Selectmen said in their report:
We feel that this money has been judiciously expended, and that the construction of these walks has proved of great advantage not only as a convenience to our own citizens, but as an additional proof to strangers visiting our town, with the view to coming among us, that we are alive to the wants of the community.
From that day to this, year by year, an appropriation has 13 Corey, History of Malden, 462.
56
HISTORY OF MELROSE.
been made, expressly for the purpose of extending new walks; $1000 each year until 1887-except 1885, $900-$2000 each year from 1887 to 1894, with $500 additional for repairs; and for the last seven years the amounts have been: 1896, $3000; 1897, $3500; and 1898, $3500; 1899-1902, $2500 each; and the vote has been broadened so as to include either concrete or brick sidewalks; the amount to cover necessary repairs to old walks, and with the additional requisite that the applicant desiring a sidewalk be required to deposit one-half the esti- mated cost of same before building. In this manner, our town has now many miles of continuous sidewalks, which neces- sarily, is a source of great comfort and convenience, not only to our citizens, but quickly attracts the attention of anyone visiting our municipality with the view of becoming a resident. One thing is yet needed: an enforced ordinance making it obligatory upon each and every freeholder to clear off his sidewalk after snowstorms. That additional luxury will pro- bably be experienced in the near future now that " fair Mel- rose " has become a city!
Particularly connected with this subject of roads is the following unique description of travel from Malden to Boston, written before the incorporation of Melrose, and about the time the railroad was opened for regular travel, by John Hayward, in his New England Gasetteer.
Until the erection of Charles River and Malden bridges in 1786 and 1787, this town was as far " down east " in regard to its connection with Boston by roads and bridges as any town in the County of York, in the State of Maine, now is. In those days, a Malden lady wishing to visit Boston by land, had to rise early and travel by wagon, side-saddle or pillion, through Medford, Charlestown, Cambridge, Little Cam- bridge (now Brighton), Brookline, Roxbury, and over the Neck to the great metropolis, and when she arrived was so fatigued by her day's journey that she had to rest a day or two before she was able to make her calls. But now, how changed ! Those cruel. turnpike killers and despisers of horseflesh, the legislators of Massachusetts. have granted permission to a number of men to set up a long, narrow building on trundles. a sort of travelling meeting-house, with a bell to it, and a row of pews on each side of the aisle, drawn by a savage-looking beast that keeps puffing and whistling like a northeaster, and when started, seems as if Satan himself couldn't catch him. By this mode of travelling, a lady or gentleman at Malden may leave home at almost any hour, go down south to Boston, a distance of five miles, see their friends, do their errands, and return in one short sunny hour. There are now two
57
ROADS, STREETS AND HIGHWAYS.
delightful and flourishing villages in the town through both of which the railroad passes. The number of inhabitants in 1845, in the whole of Malden, was computed at 2700.
This picture of travel in those early days, partakes in part of the nature of romance; inasmuch as, previous to the time of building the Malden and Charles River bridges, the "Penny Ferry," crossing the Mystic River from Mystic Side to Charlestown had been established as early as 1640; and the ferry across the Charles River from Charlestown to Boston had existed since the year 1635. Thus a direct way for man and beast was made, by which a passage to and fro between Malden and Boston, could be made in a much shorter time than that described by Mr. Hayward.
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