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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Description of the Furnace Village Area and Poquanticut Avenue below
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The story for this property will be shown upon completion of the research process.
source: Easton Historical Society
source; Massachusetts Historical Commission
source: Ancestry
source: History of Easton, William L. Chaffin, 18860
source: Easton’s Neighborhoods, Edmund C. Hands, 1995
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Harmony Hall
There is an air of mystery about Harmony Hall in Furnace Village. No. 1 mystery is how it acquired the name of "Harmony Hall"; No. 2 mystery is the exact date, the builder, and the original purpose of this building; and the big mystery is how one small building could have stood up after serving in so many capacities. Harmony Hall was probably built by Shepard Leach in the early 1800s, and a story has been handed down that it was originally a charcoal shed for the Iron Foundry. At that time charcoal was the medium used for melting the iron ore. The brick end of the building is said to be part of the old smelting furnace which was first built in 1752. Tax records of 1835 give the suggestion that this may have been one of the coal buildings owned by Shepard Leach at that time. Soon after 1835, its use for storage was discontinued and it was made, of all things, into a schoolhouse and fitted with desks and benches. At least, it served until a new school was built. One term of the high school was held here also. In those days the high school was conducted in three terms of eight weeks, each held in a different part of town, one in North Easton, one in South Easton, and the third in Harmony Hall at the Furnace. For many years, church services and evening prayer meetings were held here. In 1877, Andrew Hamilton organized a Sunday School with sixty members who met here for years. The school had a library of nearly fifty volumes. By this time the desks, and benches had been removed, a new floor laid, and the hall made ready for all sorts of social activities. Easton’s first military band, the Easton Brass Band, was organized here in 1841, and held its rehearsals in this building. It seems a fair bet that this part of the building’s career gave it its name. Harmony Grange was also organized here and took its name from the building. Some people have said that the hall was named from the Grange, but it was just the other way around. On the Assessors’ books of 1860, Captain Lincoln Drake was taxed with one Harmony Hall. About 1928, the Outlook Club acquired the building and the members have renovated and re-modeled it into a fine clubhouse and a valuable community center. In a paper written for the club many years ago, Mrs. Lottie Heath wrote, This building has witnessed many and varied social activities. Christmas festivities, when Old Santa was so generous that two trees were needed to bear up the burden of gifts. Catch-penny Fairs and Suppers and Sings, Dancing parties, frowned on by some Godly souls, and all the merry making of old and young took place here.
source, Easton Historical Society
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History of Harmony Hall
Some 12 to 15 years ago, I was asked by our then, President Mrs. Emerson, to dig out something of the history of our club house. She was not an Eastoner and had not been able to get any information about it. I suppose if she had asked me, I had said, Oh Harmony Hall! Why! it has always been here; it never wasn’t here! Well–I gleaned from Town records, histories of Town and county and various private sources of information, fragments of the ·history of our clubhouse. The iron industry in this part of Easton, had its beginning in 1751 and 1752, when a smelting furnace was started and later about the beginning of the last century a forge and blast furnace were in operation. The medium for melting the iron ore, at that time, was charcoal. It would seem from town records, that this building was built and used for storage of this material. Mrs. Daniel Belcher, the aunt of one of our club members, told one of her grandsons that this building was originally an old charcoal shed. Another person has told me that her father gave her the same information. The date of its erection I have been unable to tell, but that the heirs of Shepard Leach, in 1835 were taxed for three coal buildings, is shown by the tax records of Easton. Between 1835 and 1846, it was made over and fitted up with desks and benches for school purposes and housed the pupils of the village while a new building was being constructed. The beginnings of our high school were here, too. The first three terms of that school were in different parts of the town. One term in South Easton, one in North Easton, and the third term, of eight weeks, right here in Harmony Hall. There have been many terms of private schools also, held here. The towns people, for miles around, met here for many years, for evening prayer services, and a Sunday School was organized here November 18, 1877, by Andrew Hamilton, with about sixty members which was continued for years. The embers had access to a library of nearly five hundred books. The Easton Brass Band was organized and held its rehearsals here until a bandstand was erected nearer the street. Sometime in the eighteen seventies, as nearly as I was able to determine, the desks and benches were removed, a new floor laid, and general restorative applied. This room has witnessed many and varied social activities. Christmas festivities, when Old Santa was so generous that two trees were needed to bear up the burden of gifts. Catch-penny Fairs and suppers and Sings, dancing parties, frowned on by some Godly souls, and all the merry makings of old and young took place here. Harmony Grange was organized and held its meetings here for several years and bears its name. It has always been the home of the New England Order of Protection. How often we hear someone say, I have had many a good time in that old hall! I do not know when it was named or who were at the christening, the only mention I found in the town records was on the assessors’ books of 1860 and 1861, where Captain Lincoln Drake was taxed with Harmony Hall. Now after its many years of service to the community, it is its good fortune to be in the possession of this group of women. who will value and cherish it as old things have a right to be valued and cherished, to the end, at it may carry on, serving future generations as in the past!
Source, History of Harmony Hall, Mrs. Lottie Heath, Undated
source, Easton Historical Society
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History of The Outlook Club of Easton, Inc.
On January 24, 1888, five young women residing in Furnace Village decided to form a Shakespearean Club. Their purpose was to meet once a week and read Shakespeare’s plays. Miss Helen L. Drake was the originator of the plan, and the founder of the Club. The number of members increased and officers we.re chosen Miss Helen Drake, President; Miss Myrtie Leonard, Vice-President; Miss Mabel E. Belcher, Secretary; and Miss Clara A. Drake, Treasurer. Then they needed a Constitution, By-Laws and a name. They decided they would call themselves the Mystic Circle known to the outside world as O. M.C. During the years 1888-1889, they decided to read English history with a little literature in connection with it. The Constitution was drawn up saying its aim shall be the promotion of a social and intellectual spirit among the members. Among the By-Laws were meetings shall begin at 7:30 and in no case to extend later than, 10 P.M. No member shall be excused in taking part in these meetings. Each member is to correct and criticize each other’s reading. Any member who arrives at a meeting later than 7:30 shall pay a fine of two cents. The name of this society shall be All Men’s Curiosity Society otherwise known as the A.M.C. Each member shall pay an annual fee of ten cents, and any member absenting himself from any meeting shall pay a fine of five cents. The members responded at roll call with quotations from chosen authors. One of the first events held was a Washington Tea Party which was a annual affair with booths and a supper. They realized $52 from his undertaking. For the season 1892-1893, they decided to read Young’s History of Greece and other works on Greece. They then had eighteen members. They wrote and prepared and read biographical sketches, prepared answers to questions brought in by members the previous week. The Club had current events, beside reading the History of Greece, and the popularity of the Club showed an additional increase in the membership. In 1897, it was decided the Club should have a new name and a reconstruction of the Constitution and By-Laws. There were many suggestions. It was decided that the Outlook Club would be aristocratic enough to suit all. Between 1914 and 1917, within the club they had a sewing club and at this time did much Red Cross sewing. On March 28, 1922, the Outlook Club voted to join the General Federation of Women’s Clubs. At a special meeting on July 21, 1925, the Club voted to buy Harmony Hall for its meeting place. A committee was appointed to solicit funds for the first payment. It cost $450 and much was needed in the way of repairs. The members worked hard running card parties, suppers, and sales to raise the money. In April of 1927, the Treasurer burned the mortgage and the Hall became the property of the Outlook Club. Mrs. Robert Birnie suggested the club build a memorial fireplace in the front hall in memory of Helen Drake, founder, and first president. This suggestion met with hearty approval. Between 1930 and 1932, the Club received a certificate of membership in the American Tree Association for having planted a tree in memory of George Washington. The following Christmas, the tree was decorated and lighted and members of Harmony Grange were invited to join with the Outlook Club members to sing Christmas carols to shut-ins and afterwards to return to the clubhouse for a hot supper and social. This custom prevailed for many years. A fireplace was in the process of being built between the years 1934-1936 for the Helen Drake Memorial and on January 14, 1936, the fireplace was dedicated. Miss Henrietta Winchester, a long and close friend of Miss Drake’s, had a fire fork made in town and gave it to the Club. Miss Mary Swift presented the fire screen in memory of her mother, Mrs. Alice Swift. Mrs. John McDonnell, Miss Drake’s sister, presented the fire set. Mr. Clinton Rohdin gave the first load of birch logs to be used in the fireplace. Later the candelabras were presented to the Club by Mr. and Mrs. Roger McNamara. Again between 1944 and 1946, the club members were busy with surgical dressings, Red Cross sewing and British War Relief Work during the war years of World War II. During the years from 1954 through 1962, many changes took place. The scholarship fund was raised to $150. The by-laws were changed to accommodate the change made by the School Committee in transferring the children to schools out of the Outlook Club district. In 1963, the 75th anniversary of the Outlook Club took place and the honored guests were Mrs. Frederick Wood, President of the Massachusetts State Federation of Women’s Clubs, and Mrs. J. Fenno Derby, the Second District Director. So, you can see the members are justly proud of the Outlook Club and are at present conducting programs to earn money to paint and paper the clubhouse.
History of Easton, Massachusetts, Vol. II, M. McEntee, Easton Historical Society, ET AL, 1886-1974
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Furnace Village Area
The Furnace Village is an area about one-half mile in the four directions of Leach Foundry Office and Store at 559 Foundry Street, which is the intersection of Poquanticut Avenue and Foundry Street. The earliest settlers in Furnace Village were a mixture of village configuration of housing with industry and farming, being the livelihood of the early residents. By 1723, houses started to be built and industries started to appear in Furnace Village by 1742. By 1751, the designated name of Furnace Village became associated with this part of Easton being nationally known for its iron producing with the start of the furnace operations. During its time, events included the cannon cast at Perry’s Furnace and, like the Ames business district in North Easton, the three ponds, Keith’s Pond, New Pond and Old Pond, canals, raceways, and streams providing power for industries. Also, the canals were used for washing areas for the tannery industries. The Mulberry Brook was from Borderland through Furnace Village down by the Wheaton properties on Bay Road. In the early days, the Mulberry Brook served the industry purposes with mill power and water uses such as the Queset Brook did in the central part of the Town and the Dorchester Brook in the eastern part of Easton. In 1836, the Belcher Malleable Iron Company at 560 Foundry Street was established with a relationship to the Perry’s Furnace made the company being the oldest continually operating malleable iron foundry from the same location in the country. In 1763, some of the roads in Furnace Village started seeing paving and other roads created by 1741. The two cemeteries, Furnace Village Cemetery at 90 South Street and Dr. Edward Burial Ground at 23 Highland Street were the burial grounds for many of the residents within and outside Furnace Village as far back as the early 1800s.
info, Easton Historical Society
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Poquanticut Avenue
Poquanticut Avenue was laid out in 1763. At that time South Street was apparently a part of it, judging from the laying out as recorded in the town book. On or very near this street, north of the Hayward place, lived William Hack, Robert Randall, Jr., Thomas Drake, David Gurney, and Edmund Andrews, the latter’s house standing about where Henry Buck now lives. Like other streets this has undergone considerable alteration.
source: History of Easton, William L. Chaffin, 1886
FURNACE VILLAGE
Although the Furnace Village area possessed the highest degree of industrialization in the town in the late 1700s, it nevertheless remained to a large extent rural until after World War II. Secondary dirt roads slowly became paved starting in the late 1920s. Electricity only gradually made its presence known. A trolley line ran through the heart of Furnace Village, but it was primarily to service Mansfield with all of Easton. This line proved to be a financial disaster and did not exert a major influence on the inhabitants during its brief existence. The rural atmosphere made people very self-sufficient in their outlook, and in many ways they remained those ideal Americans that Thomas Jefferson spoke about. Small, self-contained farms symbolized much of this community. This lack of reliance on others made the area provincial in nature; Furnace Village felt little kinship with other sections of the town. Self-sufficiency appeared in many ways and forms. Furnace Village never voted for a water district, although the State Legislature passed enabling legislation in the 1930s. Quite frequently several vocations were practiced by the inhabitants, and most families had land to support a garden, a wood lot, chickens and even an occasional cow. The land seemed to have a great effect on this area, perhaps more than in other parts of town. The remains of charcoal pits off Prospect Street and Foundry Street indicate an early utilization of resources. Ice houses stored locally cut ice, and by 1900 at least seven could be counted. Woodchopper shacks were frequent throughout the area because the people used wood for fuel. There are many examples of the stone mason’s use of locally obtained stone. The best is the long dam at New Pond. The iron industry had developed because of the supply of bog iron in the area. But by the middle of the nineteenth century these supplies had proved insufficient, and iron had to be imported. Nevertheless, iron continued to be the major influence and the area received its name from the iron furnaces which melted down the ore. Most oi the men who were not country artisans worked in me of the two major foundries. The Drake Foundry, which had been carried on by that family since 1832, on the site of Capt. James Perry’s famous furnace that cast cannon for George Washington, ceased operation in 1890. Industry closer to the source of better raw materials won out when charcoal and bog iron could no longer be utilized appetitively. The Drake Foundry had made a major effort to convert to dern methods, but competition was too keen from foundries with better ashes. Belcher Malleable Iron Company, established in 1837, specialized in malleable in a highly specialized product, and thus survived the competition. Today it is a major producer of malleable iron with the distinction of being the oldest tinually operating malleable iron company at the same location in this country. These foundries trained generations of moulders and, when work lessened in area, they commuted to other foundries in the region, coming home only on we kends and during plant shutdowns. Lack of good transportation forced those worked out of town to take rooms during the week at their source of work. Fire was a major concern to foundry workers. Belcher Malleable Iron Company twice, in 1880 and 1919. The second fire destroyed the pattern use and the furnace itself, although the office building and annealing buildings escaped the blaze. Lack of fire-fighting apparatus was evident, for the North Easton Village District Fire Department had to be called for help. The abundance of wood in the Furnace Village area led other fire-utilizing the abundance of wood in the Furnace Village area led other fire-utilizing industries to be established. Hop kilns were operated near the Godfrey house on Bay Road near the Norton Line and brick kilns were built on the site of the present Pine Oaks Golf Course off Foundry and Prospect Streets. Several other industries were also in the area. Hayward’s Carriage Shop had started on Poquanticut Avenue in the 1830s by four Hayward brothers. Hayward built a new shop at Five Corners and moved the old Poquanticut Avenue building to the new location where it became the ell of the factory. Their quality carriages were purchased throughout the area, and many remember the butchers’ carts built for Will Leonard of Norton and Henry Heath, which made their rounds through the Furnace Village area. Their carriages won first prize at the Brockton Fair in 1900. More modern forms of transportation marked this industry’s death knell. Rollins’s Cider Mill, on Highland Street, drew customers from as far as Sharon, no small feat when nearly every farm had its own small cider press. Kimball’s Greenhouses, High Power Morrison’s Chemical Company, and Phelin’s Blacksmith Shop were other small local enterprises. Other industries included the thread mill established in 1834 across from Drake’s Foundry on Foundry Street. It was a red three-story building with a factory bell. The mill at Keith’s Pond, south of the Belcher Foundry and just west of South Street, during its long lifespan was a grist mill, a saw mill, an oil mill, a shingle mill, a thread mill, and a cotton batting factory. In 1878 it was purchased by James Belcher and was used again as a sawmill until the early 1900s. Its remains are still present, and the frugality of the former owners is noticeable by the mill stones built into the foundation after they had worn out. A sawmill just south of the oldest house in Easton on Bay Road was erected in 1844. It was the first belt-driven sawmill in the vicinity. Early in the twentieth century a gasoline engine was installed, but it ran only one day, and waterpower was returned to run the mill. Despite the relative sparseness of population, there was no shortage of stores. The largest store in the Furnace Village area was Swift’s Store, located across the street from the Belcher Malleable Iron Company. It also served as the local post office. The building, formerly the Drake Foundry offices, had been purchased from it on its closing in 1890. The store maintained a complete line of everything from dry goods to horse collars. To round out the atmosphere, one of the Swifts held the Veeley Automobile dealership in his garage for a short period of time. Orders were delivered throughout the area and the size of the business necessitated a daily trip to the Easton Center train station to pick up supplies. Its hours in the beginning were from 6:45 A.M. to 10 P.M. The store went out of business after World War II when automobile transportation and big stores changed the character of American buying habits. The Kimball family maintained a store for an number of years on Bay Road at the corner of Highland Street. Joel Drake had a store at Five Corners, which, in turn, became Jacobson’s Store and then Rohdin’s store before it was torn down to make way for a gasoline station in the late 1960s. Lemaire’s Store was just across the street between Bay Road and Depot Street and in it was housed Lindsay’s Barbershop. The area contained no church buildings, although Harmony Hall, behind Swift’s Store, did serve as a Sunday School in addition to its being a general gathering house1 The Sunday School was organized November 18, 1877, and continued for many years. The Hall contained school desks for a while, and at the time school was taught in three different parts of town it had served as a school. The Easton Brass Band practiced at the hall during its sixty years of playing and perhaps gave the hall its name. Furnace Village was an area where individualism was practiced and preached. Hermits, like Quantico Smith lived their own lives in this district. Neighbors were quick to help when assistance was needed but did not pry. This way of life began to disappear with the coming of the automobile and mass transportation and was changed even more by the post-World War II influences of housing and population growth. Gradually the area lost its distinctiveness and has begun to reflect the suburbanization of the greater metropolitan area. But a careful observer can still see that Furnace Village was a distinct settlement.
Source: History of Easton, Massachusetts, Vol. II, M. McEntee, Easton Historical Society, ET AL, 1886-1974
