Norfolk County, Massachusetts - Chapter 17: The Town of Foxboro, 1918

Chapter 17: The Town of Foxboro

In the early records relating to this town the name is spelled "Foxborough," which is still used by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, but the form adopted by the United States Government as the name of the postoffice, and in general use at the present day, is "Foxboro." The town is located in the southern part of Norfolk County and is bounded as follows : On the north by the Town of Walpole ; northeast and east by Sharon ; south by Bristol County ; west and northwest by the towns of Plainville, Wrentham and Norfolk. The surface is rolling and there are several lakes or ponds in the town. The large pond called Neponset Reservoir, the source of one branch of the Neponset River, is situated in the northern part; Cocasset Pond is in the southwestern part and Miramichi (commonly called Shepard's) Pond is on the line between Foxboro and Plainville. Cocasset and Miramichi ponds are drained by Furnace Brook, which flows in a southerly direction into Bristol County. In the eastern part is Billings Brook, which also follows a southerly course and crosses the southern boundary line of the county a short distance south of East Foxboro.

Early History

A part of the present Town of Foxboro was included in Dedham when the latter town was incorporated in September, 1635, but the greater portion of it was embraced in the "New Grant'' that was made to Dorchester in 1637. Wrentham was set off from Dedham in October, 1673, and included a small portion of what is now Foxboro. In December, 1715, the General Court erected "Dorchester South Precinct," which embraced the present towns of Canton, Sharon and Stoughton, and that part of the "New Grant" now within the Foxboro limits. Walpole was incorporated on December 10, 1724, and Stoughton on December 22, 1726. The latter included the greater part of Foxboro, all of Canton and Sharon, and a large portion of the original Town of Dedham. Sharon was cut off as the Town of Stoughtonham in June, 1765, and a small part of what is now Foxboro was included in the new town. Thirteen years later the Town of Foxboro was incorporated. John Shepard, a native of the town, was born on February 25, 1705, while the territory was a part of Dorchester, and lived to be over one hundred years of age. Through the various legislative changes above mentioned, the story became current that he had been ''a resident of three different counties and five different towns, yet lived in the same house all the time."

First Settlers

About 1669 one William Hudson received a grant of five hundred acres of land (now in Foxboro) from the Dorchester authorities, and on October 21, 1676, conveyed the entire tract to Thomas Platts of Boston for two hundred and seventy-five pounds. In the deed the land was described as "situate, lying and being in the wilderness, between Dedham and Seaconet, commonly called or known by the name of 'Wading River Farm.' ': Thomas Platts died in the summer of 1692 and the land passed to his son Thomas, who conveyed it to Jacob Shepard on July 11, 1704. So far as known this Jacob Shepard was the first white man to establish a home in what is now the Town of Foxboro. He was the father of John Shepard, above mentioned, who was probably the first white child born in the town.

Some years later the Morses and Boydens came from Medfield, the Capens from Dorchester, the Belchers from Sharon, and the Carpenters from Rehoboth. In 1713 the proprietors of the outlying lands in Dorchester were incorporated as "The Proprietors of the Undivided Lands," an organization which continued in existence for about sixty years, and through which the title to much of the land in Foxboro was obtained. The following list of residents on January 1, 1777, was prepared by Ebenezer Hill, at that time one of the selectmen of the Town of Stoughtonham (now Sharon) : Zuriel Atherton, Samuel Balcom, John Basset, Eleazer Belcher, Beriah Billings, Ebenezer Billings, Elijah Billings, Jonathan Billings, Jonathan Billings, 2nd, Samuel Billings, William Billings, Josiah Blanchard, Samuel Bradshaw, Nehemiah Carpenter, Timothy Clapp, William Clapp, Nathan Clark, Nathaniel Clark, William Clark, Stephen Cobb, John Comey, William Comey, Jacob Cook, Zebulon Dean, Josiah Farrington, David Forrest, Ebenezer Hill, Spencer Hodges, Jacob Lenard, Lemuel Lyon, Elijah Morse, Ezra Morse, Levi Morse, Nat Morse, Elizabeth Payn (widow), Jacob Payn, John Payn, Joseph Payn, William Payn, William Payson, Ezekiel Pierce. Thomas Pogge, Jeremiah Rhodes, Joseph Rhodes, Joseph Rhodes, 2nd, John Richardson, Thomas Richardson, Josiah Robbins, Daniel Robeson, Seth Robeson, Ephraim Shepard, Israel Smith, John Smith, John Sumner, Joseph Tifney, David White, David W'ilkeson, Job Willis, David Wood, Jethro Wood, Joseph Wood and William Wright.

Incorporation Of The Town

The total population at the beginning of the year 1777, based upon Mr. Hill's list, was 106. Toward the close of that year a petition was circulated and signed by a majority of the legal voters and taxpayers, asking the General Court to establish a new town. The petition was granted and Foxboro was duly incorporated by the act of June 10, 1778, the title of which is as follows: "An Act for incorporating certain lands in the County of Suffolk, formerly belonging to the Town of Dorchester, but now to the towns of Wrentham, Walpole, Stoughton

On June 29, 1878, Hon. E. P. Carpenter, in an address at Foxboro, gave the following account of how the town obtained its name: "Charles James Fox, born 1749, son of Lord Holland, in Parliament before he was twenty years of age, was already an eminent man when, in 1774, he opposed the Boston Port Bill and defended the conduct of the colonies. He said in 1775 °f Lord North, the prime minister of George III, 'The King of Prussia, nay, even Alexander the Great, never gained more in one campaign than Lord North has lost. He has lost a whole continent.' One of Fox's biographers says - 'During the whole American war, Mr. Fox successively protested against every measure of hostility directed against the colonies.' Of him the Foxborough soldiers, who marched in quickstep at the 'Lexington Alarm,' and to Bunker Hill and Dorchester Heights, had heard, and, whatever the faults of that famous British statesman, no friend of American independence need blush to bear his name."

First Town Meeting

On June 29, 1778, the first town meeting was held and the following officers were elected: Josiah Pratt, John Everett, Benjamin Pettee, Daniel Robinson and Joseph Shepard, selectmen; Swift Payson, clerk; Nehemiah Carpenter, treasurer ; John Comey, constable ; Joseph Pratt, John Everett, Josiah Mann, John Shepard, Jr., and Nathaniel Clark, assessors ; Benjamin Guild and Jacob Cook, tithingmen.

Adjusting The Boundaries

In the original act of incorporation it was provided that Eleazer Robbins, Daniel Morse, Elisha Morse, Mary Patten (widow), David Pratt, Mary Boyden (widow), Solomon Morse, LTriah Atherton, Samuel Morse, Josiah Hodges, Eliphalet Hodges, Josiah Blanchard, John Everett, Isaac Pratt, Joseph Pratt's heirs and Joseph Gilbert, "with their estates shall remain to the towns to which they now belong."

Some of those above named were inhabitants of Stoughton - a few living in that part afterward set off as Sharon - some lived in Walpole, and some in Wrentham. On March 12, 1793, the governor of Massachusetts approved an act of the Legislature, Section 1 of which provided that "Eleazer Robbins, Daniel Morse, Elisha Morse, Solomon Morse, Samuel Morse, Isaac Pratt, Ralph Thompson, widow Mary Patten, David Patten, Caleb Atherton, Eli Atherton, Abijah Pratt and Seth Boyden be, and they are hereby, set off from the Town of Stoughton and annexed to the Town of Foxborough, with their families and estates," etc.

Section 2 of the same act reads : "And be it further enacted that Shadrack Winslow and David Wilbore, with their families and estates ; also Levi Pratt, Jesse Pratt, Benoni Pratt, Alexander Doby and the heirs of Jonathan Wilbore, now lying within the bounds of Sharon and Stoughton, be, and hereby are, set off from said towns and annexed to the Town of Foxborough."

again altered by the act of January 30, 1833, and was located as it is at present by the act of February 28, 1850. In March, 1834, part of Foxboro was annexed to Walpole. The line between Stoughton and Foxboro was adjusted by the act of March 12, 1793.

Typical Pioneers

Seth Boyden, whose name appears among those annexed to Foxboro by the act of 1793, settled in Stoughton about 1738. Twelve years later he was collector for the second ministerial precinct in Stoughton, as shown by an old rate book still preserved by his descendants. The precinct included the present towns of Stoughton and Sharon and a large part of Foxboro. His descendants also have (or had only a few years since) "The Records of the Proprietors of a lot of land, being ye forty-fifth lot in ye Twenty-five Divisions of land (so called) lying and being in ye Township of Dorchester, and now in ye Township of Stoughton, in ye County of Suffolk, and is held in common by ye said Proprietors - Begun the tenth day of April, 1739, Seth Boyden, Proprietors' Clerk."

The lot of land to which this record refers was partly in what is now the Town of Sharon and partly in Foxboro. It contained a bed of iron ore which was worked for several years. In the warrant issued by Jonathan Ware, March 4, 1738, for a town meeting in Wrentham, the sixth article was "To determine in what manner ye Iron oar and stream in sd land shall be disposed of." At the meeting it was voted "That the iron oar now or hereafter found shall be reserved to ye proprietors according to their interest, each of whom may between the last Tuesday in August and October dige oar annually and at noe other time of the year." The stream is now known as Furnace Brook and was reserved likewise to the proprietors "to build a mill or dam on provided they do not raise such a head of water as to float ye adjacent lands or meaddows at any other time of the year than between ye' first day of October and ye 20th day of Aprile annually."

Lot No. 45 contained 437 acres, of which Seth Boyden received about 270 acres. According to his account, in the old record referred to, he received as his share of ore seventy-five tons between the years 1740 and 1755. Mr. Boyden held several offices before the incorporation of Foxboro.

John Everett was one of the first settlers in the town and was a blacksmith by trade. He was one of the first board of selectmen and one of the first assessors. In 1779 he was elected a representative to the General Court and the same year was chosen a delegate to the constitutional convention which framed the first organic law of Massachusetts.

Swift Payson, the first town clerk, was a son of Rev. Phillips Payson, at one time pastor. of the church at Walpole. In his address at Foxboro's centennial in June, 1878, Mr. Carpenter told this story of Swift Payson: "He was a humorous, whimsical, but kindly character. Passionately fond of music, his first accumulations as a boy were devoted to the purchase of a violin. Horrified at the sound of the instrument, accidentally heard after a long concealment, his father cried: "Where did you get that fiddle?' T bought it, sir,' was the apparently innocent reply. 'Then sell it at the first opportunity ; let me never hear it again.' Shortly after the Ministerial Association met with Mr. Payson, to whom, sitting in his parlor, demurely entered the lad with his violin. 'Gentlemen, would either of you like a first-rate fiddle? My father says I may sell it, and I thought it only right to give you the first chance.' It is to be hoped that the boy's wit saved his fiddle. It may have done good service in Foxborough, for tradition says our people, in the midst of hardship and privation, were yet gay and pleasure-loving and 'often danced on sanded floors to the scraping of the catgut.' ':

Aaron Everett was a carpenter; Joseph Everett a tanner and glove-maker; Joseph Comey was the village shoemaker; Eleazer Belcher, who lived near the northeast corner of the town, made potash and kept a small stock of goods, and Amos Boyden was a surveyor, who in 1779 was directed ''to take and award all ye highways or roads in your squardren ; also all ye other roads belonging to ye Town of Foxborough in that part late belonged to Stoughton."

The first house built at Foxboro Centre was the building long known as the "Old Carpenter House." It was built in 1749-50 by Nehemiah Carpenter, who came from Rehoboth, Bristol County, and stood on a way leading off from South Street and not far from the town house. Some years after it was built it was used as a tavern. It was torn down in 1880.

Town Hall

The early town meetings were held in a meeting house that was erected about 1763, fifteen years before the town was incorporated. In 1821 Rev. Thomas Williams, being about to leave the parish, offered the society five hundred dollars (the amount of his original settlement) if it would apply the money toward building a new meeting house. The offer was accepted and the work of tearing down the old church was commenced forthwith, without consulting the selectmen. On December 22, 1821, the selectmen issued a warrant for a town meeting, "to assemble at their meeting house on Monday, the 4th day of January, 1822, to see if the town will repair their meeting house, or do anything relative to the premises."

Before the time for the meeting arrived the meeting house had entirely disappeared, and the records of that meeting begin with the statement : "Pursuant to the foregoing warrant the town assembled on the spot where the meeting house stood. Voted, to direct their treasurer not to prosecute any person or persons on account of the parish taking down their meeting house."

From that time until November 14, 1836, town meetings were held in the Union Hall, over the school house, which had been built in 1793. It stood near the present Baptist Church. During the next eleven years the town meetings were held in Sumner's Hall, where the Union Building was afterward erected, then in Cocasset Hall until the spring of 1856, and from then until the completion of the town hall in the American Hall. The town hall was built in 1857, by a committee consisting of E. P. Carpenter, Otis Cary, Henry Hobart, F. D. Williams and Oliver Carpenter. A town meeting on March 14, 1857, voted to build the hall and the first meeting was held in it on March 29, 1858. The cost of the building and the ground on which it stands was $15,496.79. In 1874 an addition was built for school purposes at a cost of $26,244.31. Upon the completion of the new Savings Bank Building in the spring of 191 5, the town offices were moved to the second floor of the Bank Building.

Memorial Hall

In the warrant for a town meeting to be held on March 10, 1866, was an article in reference to a monument to Foxboro's soldiers who fell in the service of their country. At the meeting it was voted to refer the subject to a committee, consisting of E. P. Carpenter, William H. Thomas, Otis Cary, George T. Ryder and William Carpenter. This committee made an extended report on March 6, 1867, recommending the erection of a memorial hall, and ten days later the same committee was instructed to procure plans and estimates in accordance with the report. The hall was erected in 1868 at a cost of about thirteen thousand dollars, made up of town appropriations, subscriptions and donations. It stands near the center of the old cemetery, and was dedicated on June 17, 1868, the principal address being delivered by Hon. George B. Loring. At the rieht of the entrance is a marble tablet, with a medallion of flint-lock musket, powder-horn and cartridge-box in relief, and the names of those who served in the Revolution and the War of 1812. Upon the opposite side of the doorway is the "Roll of Honor," giving the names of those who served in the War of the Rebellion - 1861-65 - and on a separate tablet, facing the entrance, are the names of "Our Honored Dead,'' who lost their lives in that great conflict.

At a town meeting held on March 23, 1878, E. P. Carpenter, Virgil S. Pond, N. F. Howard, William T. Cook and Charles F. Howard were appointed a committee to consider the question of establishing a system of water supply for the town. This committee made a unanimous report at a subsequent meeting in favor of some system of waterworks, and suggested a plan by which the town could be supplied with water. The matter was then taken to the Legislature, and on April 4, 1879, an act was approved, Section 1 of which was as follows:

"The inhabitants of the Milage of Foxborough in the County of Norfolk, liable to taxation in the Town of Foxborough, and residing within a radius of half a mile from the center of the public common in" said village, shall constitute a water district and are made a body corporate by the name of The Foxborough Water Supply District, for the purpose of supplying themselves with pure water," etc.

Setcion 2 authorized the people of the district to use the waters of Governor's Brook, or any springs, natural ponds, brooks or other water sources ; Section 3 made the district liable for damages to property by the construction of dams, reservoirs, etc., and Section 4 authorized a loan not exceeding fifty thousand dollars.

Nothing further was done for about seven years. In the spring of 1886 the "Mansfield and Foxborough Water Company" was formed by F. D. Williams, Virgil S. Pond, William B. Crocker, John Q. Lynch, C. W. Hodges and George F. Williams of Foxboro, and a like number of Mansfield men. The company asked the Legislature to grant it a charter of incorporation, which was refused on account of the previous incorporation of the Foxborough Water District. The Mansfield Water District was then incorporated on June 28, 1886, with power to borrow $75,000, and the Foxboro people were left just where they were at the start.

State Hospital. Foxboro

On May 28, 1889, a meeting was held to take action on the question of increasing the loan $75,000, and a request to that effect was presented to the next session of the Legislature. By the act of April 2, 1890, the increased loan was authorized, provided it was approved by a two-thirds vote of the people living within the limits of the district. An election was held on May 14, 1890, at which the proposition failed to receive the support of the required two-thirds. On June 11, 1891, another act was passed by the Legislature relating to this subject. It repealed the feature of the act of the preceding year requiring a two-thirds vote, and substituted therefor a "majority vote.'' Under this act the people authorized the construction of the waterworks, which were completed about three years later. The town is now divided into two water districts - Foxboro and East Foxboro.

Fire Department

Xo one seems to know just when the first volunteer fire company was organized in Foxboro, but it was many years ago. On June 29, 1878, the town celebrated its centennial and the following issue of the Foxboro Times, in giving an account of the ceremonies, said : "At the present time we have a population of nearly thirty-two hundred souls ; a town house that cost nearly twenty-five thousand dollars, with a school house addition worth as much more ; six other school houses, valued at from six hundred to two thousand dollars each ; a thirteen thousand dollar memorial hall, with an excellent public library of nearly threethousand volumes therein; two commodious engine houses; fire apparatus (with an able department to use it), which cost not less than ten thousand dollars, and which is worth, when it is considered the amount of property it has saved to our citizens, a much larger sum."

That was written nearly forty years ago and in that period the efficiency of the department has been increased to keep pace with the growth of the town. The cost of maintenance for the year 1916 was $1,718.68, and during the year thirty-two calls were answered. In the warrant for the town meeting to be held March 6, 1916, Article 8 was "To authorize the treasurer, with the approval of the selectmen, to borrow money in anticipation of the revenue of the current financial year." The minutes of the meeting, relating to this article, show that it was "Voted, that the treasurer, with the approval of the selectmen, be and hereby is authorized to borrow the sum of four thousand dollars for the purpose of purchasing a combination auto truck for the use of the Fire Department, and to issue two notes of two thousand each, of the town therefor, payable one November 1, 1917, from the tax levy of that year, and one November 1, 1918, from the tax levy of that year, at a rate of interest not exceeding five per cent per annum."

At the same meeting Article 14 was passed by a vote of fifty-four to twentyfive, "To sell the chemical fire engine and purchase a combination auto truck, and raise and appropriate the sum of $5,000 therefor, as recommended by the board of fire engineers."

With the purchase of the equipment ordered by these votes, Foxboro has a fire department able to cope with any fire that is likely to occur. An appropriation of $100 was made by the annual meeting in 1916 for a fire lookout on Moose

Transportation

Not many towns of its class are better provided with transportation facilities than Foxboro. Two lines of the New York, New Haven & Hartford railroad .system pass through the town and on these lines there are four stations. East Foxboro is on the main line from Boston to Providence, and Foxboro, North Foxboro and Foxvale are on the line running from Taunton to Marlboro and Fitchburg. In addition to these roads there is a division of the Norfolk & Bristol electric line, with a branch from Foxboro to Wrentham.

According to the United States census, the population of Foxboro in 1910 was 3,863. The state census of 1915 reported a population of 3,755. This shows a decrease of 108 during the five years. There has also been a slight decrease in the assessed valuation of the property, that for 191 5 being $3,041,740, and the assessment for 1916 was $2,825,210. The town has two banks, a weekly newspaper (the Reporter), nine public school buildings, in which twenty-four teachers were employed during the school year of 191 5-16, a number of manufacturing establishments, churches of different denominations, hotels and mercantile houses, one of the prettiest commons in the county, and a large number of comfortable homes. It is one of the few towns of the state that have no bonded indebtedness.

At the beginning of the year 1917 the principal town officers were as follows: Orlando McKenzie, Jarvis Williams and Louis W. Hodges, selectmen and overseers of the poor; George R. Ellis, clerk and treasurer; Percy B. Richmond, John B. Hodges and Lewis Belcher, assessors ; Benjamin F. GifTord, surveyor of highways ; Franklin A. Pettee, tax collector ; Fred H. Richards, accountant ; William S. Kimball, Jarvis Williams and Fred N. Griffiths, board of health; Ernest A. White, Walter S. Keith and Richard W. Barton, engineers of the fire department and forest fire wardens ; Lucius A. Cady and Ernest A. White, constables ; John E. Warren, Miss Frances A. White and William R. Lewis, school committee.