There’s never been anything like the Internet for just wasting time.
This afternoon I stumbled on an 1889 book called King’s Handbook of Newton. It’s 346 pages of more than you ever wanted to know about early Newton history and has lots of very nice engravings of lots of old house and buildings. It was apparently one of a series of King’s Handbooks of various towns and cities.
The first paragraph of the introduction caught my eye:
This book has been prepared as a popular household companion for all the families who make their home in any of the fifteen villages which together form “The Newtons”, the garden city of Massachusetts.
So it appears that back in 1897, this blog would be called Village16. In their accounting, Elliot, Nonantum Hill, Woodland, and Riverside were all villages and Thompsonville was not. So some things haven’t changed, even back then the majority of citizens didn’t know about Thompsonville.
My favorite highlights of the section on Upper Falls were the tale of those dastardly “hydraulic bandits” in Dedham stealing the entire water flow of the Charles River before the governor stepped in and limited them to stealing only 1/3 of the water.
and this poem:
Newton Upper Falls is split in two parts
Where we learn the sciences and fine arts
We have all sorts of trades, all kinds of trash
Machine shops, cotton mills, but not much cash
This book is fascinating. Thanks for posting it!
Gail Spector should take a look for her Newton writing project.
Thanks Jerry, good find. Interesting read.
Not only is it available on the Internet, it’s available for circulation at the Newton Free Library. Yes, Hoss, I’ve been looking at it.
I’m curious about “Elliott” and where it was located. If it is “Elliott”, then it should be somewhere in Upper Falls since that’s the name of a 19th century businessman from that area for which Elliott Street is named. I haven’t read of the name Elliott being associated with any other prominent person in Newton. The other “Eliot” is generally associated with John Eliot the early colonial minister who supposedly preached to and converted local Indian tribes in what is now Nonantum. The Eliot Church, in Newton Corner, is named for him. So is Eliot Station on the Green Line. I assume the villages of Riverside and Woodland must have had something to do with communities that sprang up aside these train stops.
My guess is that Eliott Village was where Rt 9 crosses Eliott st. I think Chestnut Hill, Thomposonville, and Eliott were probably all conventional village centers along route 9 before Route 9 turned into a highway.
Jerry, I have been familiar with the King’s handbook for years – I am glad you stumbled upon it. It is a wonderful historic resource!
One of the more interesting (i.e., telling) use of adjectives in this book is where Native Americans are at points called “wild Indians” (p252, as example) and the Indians from Canada are at one point called “wild savages” (p294, as example). Wow.
@Jerry. I never heard the term Elliott Village when I was a kid, but I was beginning to think it had to be located exactly where you mentioned at the intersection of Route 9 and Elliott/Woodward. I remember there were 4 or 5 run down triple deckers and some stores where CVS and the Chinese Restaurant are now located. The Highland Pharmacy, a liquor store, dry cleaners occupied space on the Woodward Street side in the building that recently housed Huntington Electric. A Jenny Gas station was on the other side where the UPS store is located. You can still see the spike on top of the roof which used to identify Jenny Gas stations.
Jerry, it’s going to take me a while to find the reference, but I seem to recall the Elliot term being applied to Waban, where Waban really only developed as a village (and most real estate developed) after the railroad station came into being. In other words, I think the station and the station name came first, then the village.
Another bit of new info for me was that Quinnobequin (as in Quinnobequin Rd) was the native American name for the Charles River.
Also, there’s a great story about Newtonville “ne’er-do-well desperado and socialist” Tom Bulloughs (page 150)
Adam, yes when this book was written Waban was described “as famous for its rich pastoral beauty” and it sounded like substantial development was just really starting. The photo of the Waban train station looks like its in the middle of nowhere (page 233)
Elliot vs. Eliot?
My careless spellings. The village name in the book and the T stop is Eliot. The nearby street that meets Woodward at Rt 9 is Elliot.
The smokeless tobacco idea seems to have a long history in Newton where we had New England’s largest snuff mill. Did they do a bit of blow at BoA meetings?
Despite the fact that the introduction (above) said that there were 15 villages in 1897, inside the book they said:
The village that they call “Newton” is what we now call Newton Corner
@Jerry
I have also heard Newton Corner referred to as “Newton Proper”.
@Janet. Church Street has always been most proper
@Jerry, the landscape firm of Olmsted, Olmsted & Eliot did quite a lot of work in Newton. Charles Eliot actually designed Albemarle Road as a divided boulevard with Cheesecake Brook down the middle as a place for “walks and carriage rides.” He was also instrumental in developing the boulevards (ie Nonantum Road) along the Charles – that is why so many of them are parkways.
The Friends of Albemarle Park worked with a landscape design student from Radcliffe about 10 years ago and she found some most interesting history.
Margaret, what did the Radcliffe student find that was interesting? The Avery house on Crafts St. has been there since before the revolution.
@Margaret – I didn’t know about the olmsteds invovementvin Albemarle and Nonantum Rd but now that I do, it makes sense. They’re both nicely designed. I only learned a few months ago that the Olmsted firm also designed our beautiful City Halls grounds
@Colleen, lots of really interesting things. Cheesecake Brook was moved at one point to make better house lots (around Eddy Street). There was a dairy farm along the Charles right around where Cheesecake Brook enters the Charles. A great deal of north Newtonville were farms belonging to the Avery and Maynard families. Albemarle Park was a wetland where the local farmers grazed their cows. Cheesecake Brook had a dam at one point (near West Newton somewhere) and there was a popular swimming hole there.
I grew up on the other side of rt 9 from the Eliot train station in Newton Highlands. Between Meredith Ave and the train station there was a tunnel that went under the train tracks. That is how we accessed the station. It was part of Newton Highlands. Many people walked to that train station from Newton Upper Falls. Bob Burke described the area surrounding rt 9 and Elliot St perfectly. There was also a grocery store owned by a man named “Denney” Curtin. The Highland Pharmacy was owned by Joe Selden. I knew people that lived in those triple decker housing. They were not so run down then.
Joe Selden was a great man and Pharmacist. While I was in pharmacy school in the 70’s, I worked for Joe, and it is one of the best memories in my life. His Pharmacy was class, and so was Joe Selden! He was cool. He knew I was a professional jazz drummer and that I played nights in Boston. Joe would let me make my own schedule with custom hours. God bless him!