Photograph by T.S. Custadio aka ToddC4176 at en.wikipedia, Public domain. Via
Wikimedia Commons.
National Monument to the Forefathers
Built in 1889. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1974. A historic map-sheet match is not published yet. The record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
From the record
“The National Monument to the Forefathers, formerly known as the Pilgrim Monument, commemorates the Mayflower Pilgrims. Dedicated on August 1, 1889, it honors their ideals as later generally embraced by the United States.”
Wikipedia article National Monument to the Forefathers, CC BY-SA 4.0.
one of 93 National Register listings in Plymouth County · listed in 1974 · category: Object · built in 1889 · one of 1 National Historic Landmarks in Plymouth County.
National Register reference number.74002033- the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.
In preparing the work the records of the town of Bridgewater, and of its several parishes and churches, have been the first and principal sources, whence the materials have been derived. The old Colony and Plymouth county records have furnished also valuable information. Judge Davis' improved edition of Morton's, New England Memorial, Farmer's Register, the Collections of the Mass. Hist. Society, and various local histories have also been advantageously consulted. But so many and so various have been the sources, both public and private, from which information and facts have been obtained, that it would be difficult, if recollected, to enumerate them. The loss of all the early records of Duxbury previous to 1G54, which are said to have been burnt, is greatly to be regretted, as it was the parent town of Bridgewater, the first home and residence in this country of most of our fathers and original settlers in this then Plantation. It may well be supposed those records would have furnished us with much valuable information. The Colony records of births and deaths previous to 1CI7 are also lost, some of the first leaves by time or accident having been destroyed, which to the antiquarian is a deprivation much to be deplored.
Bridgewater was originally a plantation granted to Duxbury. When the township of Marshfield became a separate and distinct corporation, Duxbury, from which Marshfield had been principally taken, applied to the Old Colony court, at Plymouth, for a grant of common land, or, as they expressed it, " an extension to the westward," as a compensation for the great loss of territory they had thus sustained. We find in the records the following order of court relating to it : -
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 331 fires within 5 miles of National Monument to the Forefathers between
2015 and 2020, burning about 101 acres in total. 3 started naturally. 4 were recorded as arson.
Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted
here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
Reported cause
Fires
Debris and open burning
217
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
65
Misuse of fire by a minor
30
Recreation and ceremony
5
Arson/incendiarism
4
Natural
3
Smoking
3
Equipment and vehicle use
2
Fireworks
1
Power generation/transmission/distribution
1
The most recent of
them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service
that recorded it.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. Museums hold 2,235 specimens
collected within 10 miles of National Monument to the Forefathers between 1816 and
1975: 1,566 Animalia, 415 Plantae, 181 Fungi, 53 Chromista, 14 Protozoa, 6 Unrecorded. 12 distinct Species records are shown.
Collected by -- Russell, A., A. C. Mathieson and others. Each is a
physical object with a catalogue
number, and each entry opens the museum's record. This is what was
collected and kept, not a survey of what lives here - nothing can be
concluded from a species being absent.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists
4 workings within 5 miles of National Monument to the Forefathers: 2 past producers, 2 producers.
2 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction. Distance is straight-line from the
map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring
settlement's page as well.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Plymouth, the town this property stands in, in 43 storm reports between 1997 and 2023: 13 hail, 10 thunderstorm wind, 7 heavy rain, 4 flood.
The reports record 1 death. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office
filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date
opens the federal record of that event.
Police reported a road flooded, with water half-way up the doors of a car. Street unspecified. Report relayed by amateur radio. The public reported 2.07 of rain with this localized storm.
No historic map-sheet match is published
for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs
a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
Browse the county's mapped places while that work is
pending.
From the nomination file
2,125 words on record
When this property was proposed for the
National Register, someone wrote the case for it: what the building is,
and why it matters. That document is a federal record in the public domain.
It is quoted below word for word, never summarised. The text was read off the scanned case file by machine, so the
occasional stray character is the recogniser's and the 1970s
typewriter's.
Description of the property
Moved - Unexposed (Check One) * Original Site The National Monument to the Forefathers is situated on the crest of a hill, surrounded by lawns and accessible by several brick paths. The Monument and the surrounding landscape designed to complement it are the work of Hammatt Billings, a Boston architect of some note. The scheme of the Monument is a "classical" one, consistent with Billings' attraction to and use of 'classical - i.e. Roman-- motifs in his work. Thecomgosition consists of five figures rep- resenting Faith, Morality,Education, Law, and Liberty placed on and at the base of an octagonal shaft of rusticated granite blocks. The largest of the five sculptures, Faith, is set on top of the 45' granite shaft, appropriately facing east.
She is portrayed with one foot resting on Plymouth Rock; her left hand holds an open Bible, her right is raised heavenward in a gesture of righteous- ness. The figure is colossal; it is 36' high, and is constructed of 14 blocks of granite which weigh a total of 180 tons. ia 36t nigh, an sa co A gift from Oliver Ames, a well- known Massachusetts philanthropist, it was completed in 1877, some three years after Hammatt Billings' death. m The four lesser sculptures of Morality, Law, Education and Liberty are seated upon buttress-like plinths which project from alternate faces at the base of the shaft. They were completed and the monument erected in 1889.
The modestly robed figure of Morality is seated at the northeast corner of the monument, - Z above a marble panel in bas relief depicting the Treaty with Massasoit. In her hands she holds the Decalogue and the Scroll of Revelation.
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 74002033, 11 pages, held by the National Archives in Record
Group 79. See the
catalogue record.
Listed places nearby
6 within 8 miles
Other National Register properties close
enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both
positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties
to their map sheets.
Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Specimens. Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), https://www.gbif.org/. Only records licensed CC0 or CC BY are used. Records licensed CC BY-NC are excluded because this site carries advertising. Images are checked individually and any whose licence is non-commercial, no-derivatives or unreadable is refused.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.
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