More information on this image is available at the Easton Historical Society in North Easton, MA
www.flickr.com/photos/historicalimagesofeastonma/albums
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The development by Oliver Ames and Sons Corporation of the factory and village land use in a rather organic manner with a mix work-related classes created an integrated geographic network. The housing on perimeter edge with factories and business affairs in the center creating the village concept in North Easton. Other important concepts were the Furnace Village Cemetery, Furnace Village Grammar School and the Furnace Village Store, which explains Furnace Village and other sections of Easton.
source: Massachusetts Historical Commission
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History of Massapoag Avenue and Borderland Historic District below
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System of Stones at Borderland
In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the system of stones and stonewalls was created by farmers for markings of the borders of their farming fields when tilling the land. This system of circulation and boundary markings remained the same during the conversion of the land from agricultural to recreational uses. The fields maintained by the farmers with the paths, forestry lines, fences and stonewalls of the agriculture pass the test of times. In 1906, while living at the Tisdale House at 697 Mountain Road, Oakes and Blanche Ames started buying parcels of land. In 1910, Oakes and Blanche Ames built the Mansion at Borderland with stones and rocks. They focused on making it as fireproof as possible using stones from the land and old stonewalls on the property which were not part of future design plans. In the 1880s, the stonewalls around the Mansion, were part of Currivan Farm, are composed of larger stones and are slightly square. The stonewall that runs along the service road to the west of the Mansion continued across the lawn behind the house. Oakes and Blanche Ames took down this wall during the construction of the Mansion. Some stones from the walls being used in the construction of the field stone Mansion. Walls at other parts of the land, are of rougher, and rounder stones. The Mansion is constructed of steel-reinforced concrete floors and ceilings and concrete and granite walls with a flat parapet roof, which gave the house a solid, fortress-like appearance. Trees have grown along these stonewalls between the Currivan Farm and the Wilbur Farm towards the south. The old three-story stone Mansion that Oakes and Blanche Ames lived in with their family, was the focus point of the estate called Borderland.
The most extensive areas of stones and rocks in Easton are found in the northwest of Borderland. The left overs of a small quarry massive boulders, glacial cliffs, and hills were made out of rock north of the Mansion. Before Oakes and Blanche owned the land, previous agricultural use by the Tisdale, Smith, Currivan, and Wilbur families had shaped the woodland into a series of fields, woodlots and farmsteads separated by a series of stonewall and fences.The fields, wetlands, and woodlands of Borderland were divided by stonewalls, with the fields once used for pasture and now a wildlife refuge. The Shooting Range was used for target shooting by friends and members of the family of Oakes and Blanche Ames. The range was in a ditch with a dry laid field stone bottom with a retaining wall and a pile of earth on one side. The range measured four-foot-wide, about five feet deep and one-hundred-feet long. Targets were put in the pit and the shooters shot at them from a distance in the woods. The Lodge was a one-story stone structure, and was designed and built under the supervision of Blanche Ames. Oakes and Blanche Ames used the same construction methods as used in the construction of the Mansion.
The George E. Wilbur Graveyard was located, about fifty rods from the George E. Wilbur Farmhouse, southwest of the Mansion at Borderland while its boundaries were marked by stonewalls on three sides of this cemetery. The two walls going east to west, seventy feet long and the other thirty-feet, in a north to south direction. Stonewalls represent the presence of numerous farmsteads within the boundaries of Borderland, with the numerous walls and fences to exist to delineate the land use rights. Tisdale Cemetery has stone-wall construction with one foot by six-foot upper stones, which could have been from excess stones from the Viaduct in Canton which was built in 1835. When Blanche Ames died in 1969, she left the seventeen hundred- and eighty-two-acres estate to her four children, who conveyed the property to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1971 following the wishes of the Ames family for a passive state park.
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Mansion at Borderland
Like other members of the Ames family in Easton building estates with multiple parcels of land, Oakes and Blanche Ames acquired twenty-seven individual properties to create the seventeen hundred and eighty-two-acre estate. The parcels of land were divided by stonewalls, wire fences, open spaces and forests. Borderland got its name from the location of both ancient tribal borders and modern-day town lines. In 1878, Blanche Ames, born in Lowell, her parents, Adelbert and Blanche Butler Ames, encouraged Blanche toward a higher education and equal opportunity. Exploring new opportunities in the Ames tradition, Blanche enrolled in Smith College, when few women attended college and gave the commencement address at her 1899 graduation exercises. In her address being attended by President McKinley, Blanche told the audience that we are fortunate to live in an age that, more than any other, makes it possible for women to attain the best and truest development in life. Blanche Ames’ husband, Oakes Ames, a member of the Ames family, owners of the Oliver Ames and Sons Corporation at 28 Main Street in North Easton. The son of Governor Oliver Ames, (1831-95) and his wife, Anna Coffin Ames (1840-1917), a great-grandson of shovel shop founder Oliver Ames (1779-1863), Oakes Ames was born in 1874.
In 1900, Oakes Ames grew up at 35 Oliver Street, married Blanche Ames, sister of his classmate Butler Ames of Lowell, two years after graduating from Harvard. On October 22, 1895, Oakes’ father, Oliver Ames, of 35 Oliver Street, passed away. In 1900, Oakes and Blanche Ames began their marriage by living at his childhood home at 35 Oliver Street in North Easton with his widowed mother, Anna Coffin Ames, his two sisters, Evelyn C., and Susan E. Ames. Later, Oakes and Blanche Ames were living at 355 Commonwealth Avenue, the former home of Oakes’ father, Governor Oliver Ames. Oakes and Blanche moved to 225 Bay State Road, also in Boston’s fashionable Back Bay neighborhood. While living on Bay State Road, they began planning for a country estate south of Boston.
In 1906, Oakes and Blanche Ames began their purchases and lived at the newly purchased Col. Israel Tisdale Farmhouse, at 697 Mountain Street in Sharon, located at the northeast of the existing Leach Pond. In 1906, Alice Buck Pratt, of 111 Rockland Street, sold the land to Oakes Ames in two parcels, on the northwest corner of Rockland Street and Allen Road. The first parcel consisted of sixty-nine and one-quarter acres that reserved the William Dean Cemetery – as it is now walled in – and the right to pass to and from the burial ground to Rockland Street. The second parcel was a seventeen and three-quarter acres parcel on the south side of Rockland Street. According to Anna Buck, one of George and Marion Buck’s thirteen children, her records verify Oakes and Blanche Ames rented 111 Rockland Street, her father’s childhood home, to Anna Buck’s family after they returned to Easton in 1911. In 1910, residing at the formerly called Col. Israel Tisdale Farmhouse at 697 Mountain Street were Oakes, a botanist, and his wife, Blanche B. Ames, with their two daughters, Pauline, Evelyn, their two sons, Amyas, and Oliver Ames, with seven servants. By 1910, Oakes and Blanche B. Ames purchased surrounding individual parcels, including a place called – Borderland, – which they called home. There they raised turkeys, pheasants, mink, and cattle. In 1910, the construction of the Mansion started with the building of the library. Blanche calculated the engineering measurements for the causeways and dams built on the ponds surrounding the Mansion. Ames Mansion was constructed on the site of the Currivan farmhouse, which was composed of larger stones and are slightly square. The stonewall running along the original entrance easterly, now a service driveway, continued across the lawn on the south side of the Mansion. Oakes and Blanche Ames used some of the field stones in the construction of the Mansion. Stonewalls in the other parcels were a rougher and round stone configuration. Blanche and Oaks, who wanted a fireproof house, became displeased with the work of their architect because of the challenges he faced with their design and engineering requirements. Dismissing the architect, Blanche took over the design and construction management of the Mansion and hired the Concrete Engineering Company to draw plans according to her specifications. In 1920, residing in the Mansion at 257 Massapoag Avenue were Oakes, a professor of botany, and his wife, Blanche B. Ames, an artist in her own home, with their two daughters, Pauline, and Evelyn, and their two sons, Amyas, and Oliver Ames, with six servants and two chauffeurs. Blanche Ames calculated the engineering measurements for the causeways and dams built on the ponds surrounding the mansion. Once the mansion was completed, Blanche set up a full-size studio on the third floor of the house and maintained a workshop in which she and her brother, Adelbert Ames, developed a scientific color system for mixing paints. Blanche became the sole illustrator of her husband’s botanical books, including a seven-volume treatise on orchids. Oaks Ames was a renowned authority on orchids and taught botany at Harvard from 1900 until his retirement in 1941. The rear of the Mansion had the tennis courts, rolling hills towards the fields and pool. The Mansion at Borderland featured landscaping around the immediate grounds. In 1930, living at 257 Massapoag Avenue were Oakes, a Professor of Botany at Harvard, and his wife, Blanche B. Ames, an artist in her Iron Studio, with their daughter, Evelyn, and their two sons, Amyas, and Oliver Ames, assistant manager at the Ames Shovel and Tool Company, Inc., with two servants. Plantings around the house include shrubs and shade trees and perennial flowers. A vegetable garden was located to the west of the house. The garden was bordered by raspberry bushes running along the tree line of the fields. Oaks and Blanche created a system of ponds and dams throughout their estate. The sculpted hedge along the circular drive was destroyed in the Blizzard of 1978, which was restored at the direction of Pauline Plimpton, Oakes and Blanche’s daughter. A formal rock garden, designed by Oakes Ames, was built to the north of the house, complete with stone paths, steps, and benches. In the 1970s, under the direction of Oakes and Blanche’s grandson, T. P. Plimpton, the rock garden was reconstructed with some of the original flowering trees. These include flowering crab trees, dogwoods, lilac, forsythia, and burning bush. The reconstruction was a recreation of the historic planting plan by Oakes Ames. In the center of the rock garden is a wooden trellis set on granite columns, on which climbs Borderland’s Great Wisteria. The circulation system of the Ames estate also remains intact, including the circular drive in front of the Mansion and several unpaved roads throughout the former estate. Oakes Ames was the youngest son of Governor Oliver and Anna C. Ames and was well known for his botanist and orchid expertise. At the age of fifteen, Oakes took an interest in orchids while studying in Easton on the origin of plant life in different regions or times. Following his graduation from Harvard in 1898, Oakes started the Ames Botanical Laboratory at Harvard, becoming a world-known center for the study of orchids and economic botany. In 1900, Oakes Ames started teaching in the field of botany at Harvard. Later, Oakes became Research Professor and Director of the Botanical Museum until his retirement in 1941. Blanche Ames; a scientific illustrator provided the illustrations for her husband’s book on orchids. Blanche Ames, was a multi-talented inventor and illustrator, who was involved in art, farming, engineering and politics.
Blanche Ames was a suffragist, an early advocate of birth control, and late in life Blanche wrote a biography of her father, Adalbert Ames. Blanche Ames was interested in farming working with the staff of the Borderland estate and devised plans for developing a larger, more disease-resistant turkey. Blanche was the co-founder of the Birth Control League of Massachusetts and the Treasurer of the League of Women Voters from 1915 to 1918. Blanche was well known for her political cartoons depicting the struggle for women’s suffrage. In 1939, Blanche, an inventor designed a hexagonal lumber cutter. In 1940, residing at 257 Massapoag Avenue were Oakes, a professor of botany, and his wife, Blanche B. Ames, with a son, Oliver Ames, a trustee, and one housekeeper. During World War II, Blanche Ames designed, tested and patented a method for ensnaring enemy airplanes in wires hung from balloons. It must be noted in history that Blanche Ames painted every painting in the mansion with one exception. In 1969, Blanche Ames received a patent for a water anti-pollution device. Borderland’s grounds were used in Massachusetts State Lottery commercials that showed men playing croquet on the lawn. Born in New York City in 1927, George Plimpton, son of Pauline Ames Plimpton, who was the daughter of Oakes and Blanche Ames, spent summers during his childhood at Borderland. George had a sister, Sarah Gay Plimpton, two brothers, Francis Taylor Pearsons Plimpton Jr., and Oakes Ames Plimpton. During the formative years of Borderland becoming a state park, Oakes Plimpton was a frequent visitor to the park noting the progress from an estate to a passive state park. George Plimpton, co-founder of the Paris Review, was known for his efforts in sports with the Detroit LIons in – Paper Lions, – Boston Bruins in – Open Net, – Willie Mays in – Out of My League, – pro golf in – Bogey Man, – and fought Archie Moore and Sugar Ray Robinson for articles in the Sports Illustrated. George was a classmate at Harvard University of Robert Kennedy and helped get the gun away from Sirhan Sirhan when Robert Kennedy was assassinated in 1968. A television documentary about Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt was filmed in the library of the Ames mansion. When Blanche Ames died in 1969, she left the seventeen hundred and eighty-two acres estate to her four children, who conveyed the property to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1971 following the wishes of the Ames family for a passive state park.
source; Massachusetts Historical Commission
source; Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of Conservation and Recreation
source; Borderland State Park
source: History of Easton, William L. Chaffin, 1886
source: Easton’s Neighborhoods, Edmund C. Hands, 1995
source; Massachusetts Historical Commission
source: Easton Patch, Michael Hardman, May 16, 2013
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Borderland Historic District
The Borderland Historic District in Easton/Sharon, Massachusetts is a twentieth-century estate preserving eighteenth-century farmland, forest, and waterways. The district, now largely Borderland State Park, includes several farm buildings, farmland, cemeteries and a 20th century estate, complete with mansion, pool (now filled in), gardens, and lawns. Located on the borders between Easton, Sharon, and Stoughton, the area has changed from tribal land of Native Americans to farmland of early settlers to the country estate of Oakes and Blanche Ames. The district as it stands today is largely defined being open fields, man-made ponds, stonewalls, and other site features.
source: Massachusetts Historical Commission
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Further down the brook (from Puds Pond), General Shepherd Leach, owner of the Furnace Village Iron Works in South Easton, cut down a stand of white cedar and mined the bog-iron ore from the exposed swamp. In 1825, he built the pond that bears his name to ensure a steady water supply for his iron works three miles downstream
source; Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of Conservation and Recreation
source; Borderland State Park
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Massapoag Avenue
Massapoag Avenue extends from Poquanticut Avenue, past No. Six Schoolhouse, to the Sharon line. The part north of Rockland Street was laid out in 1824, and after some delay was adopted. The rest of it was finally laid out in 1834.
