Bridgewater State University Virtual Commons - Bridgewater State University Bridgewater, Massachusetts: A Town in Transition Local History 2019 Bridgewater, Massachusetts 1910-1920 (Including Historical Background) Volume I Benjamin A. Spence Follow this and additional works at: https://vc.bridgew.edu/spence Part of the Cultural History Commons, and the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Spence, Benjamin A. (2019). Bridgewater, Massachusetts 1910-1920 (Including Historical Background) Volume I. In Bridgewater, Massachusetts: A Town in Transition. Monograph 10. Available at: https://vc.bridgew.edu/spence/10 This item is available as part of Virtual Commons, the open-access institutional repository of Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts. Bridgewater, Massachusetts 1910-1920 (Including Historical Background) Volume I Dr. Benjamin A. Spence 1 © (2018) 2 An Explanation For the last ten years or so, I have had the pleasure of delving into the history of Bridgewater, Massachusetts. My concentration is on the first quarter of the twentieth century, providing historical background when appropriate. Although my research and writing are ongoing, I have prepared drafts of a number of topics, which I have explored at length, with the hope that this material will be of interest to those interested in the long and rich history of this town. I request that credit be given if my findings are used by other writers or those making oral presentations. As my study has proceeded, many people have been helpful, and I hope to thank all of them as my research and writing continue. At this point, let me mention just a few who have been especially supportive. Many thanks to the Trustees of Bridgewater’s Public Library for allowing me access to the sources in the town library and for the professional help from the research librarians under the competent direction of Mary O’Connell. I also appreciate the kind assistance of staff members at the Bridgewater Town Hall in the use of town records. Without the constant guidance and patience of Dr. Steven G. Young, Professor of Music at Bridgewater State University, I would have been at a loss many times in the use of the computer. How can I fully express my thanks to Sylvia B. Larson who was willing since I started this project to spend numerous hours using her fine editing and writing skills to improve these drafts. Her probing historical mind and her sharing of my interest in Bridgewater’s history proved invaluable to me. Any errors in the text, of course, are solely mine. What a great joy it was to share my findings with S. Mabell Bates, who as a friend, head of the Special Collections at the Bridgewater State University Library, and member of the Bridgewater Historical Commission, provided me with valuable historical material and was a constant source of inspiration. My research has also been enriched by many conversations with Robert Wood, a member of the Bridgewater Historical Commission and the town’s leading authority on property deeds. He has been most generous in sharing his findings with me. Lastly, my research, particularly concerning Bridgewater Normal School, would have been far less interesting without my many conversations with David K. Wilson, long associated with public relations and institutional research at Bridgewater State University. I especially appreciate his sharing of his more than considerable historical knowledge of this institution, videotaping my tours of Bridgewater’s School Street and Central Square, and publicizing my essays, especially the one on the Gates House. In preparing my essays, I also owe a special debt of gratitude to James “Mike” Bois, George B. Rizer, and David R. Moore, citizens of Bridgewater who contributed in different ways to a collection of historical pictures of the town. Bois, one of the Bridgewater Historical Collectors, for many years gathered over 450 scenes of Bridgewater, many of which were included in the 1987 and 1994 pictorial histories prepared by the Collectors. Equally important was the contribution of Rizer, a professional photographer for the Boston Globe, who with his artistic skill reproduced all the pictures in these two works, “bringing to life some that were faded or in some way defective.” Thanks to the skillful and time-consuming work of Moore, chairman of Bridgewater’s Historical Commission, over 500 pictures, including many found in the two earlier pictorial histories, have now been placed on a computer disc, labeled the Rizer Collection. This project has created an historical treasure easily accessible to 3 those interested in the town’s rich heritage. I will continue to include pictures from the collection in future essays. A note concerning bibliography: At some juncture, I will add an essay on the sources used in my study. For now, the numerous footnotes will give readers a good idea of the research materials used in this historical account of the Town of Bridgewater. My essays on education, churches, stores and services, manufacturing, transportation, fire service, and the Parker-Gates-Shaw House in Bridgewater, Massachusetts, concentrate on the years 1900 to 1910. The two essays on law and order take this story to 1820, and hopefully a third essay will carry this important topic to 1925. This tenth essay is the first of two to discuss life in Bridgewater between 1910 and 1920, and a third one will explore the town’s reaction to and involvement in the Great War, 1914-1918, and the peace settlement that followed. Copies of my ten essays to date can be found in the public libraries of Bridgewater, West Bridgewater, and Brockton, as well as in the Maxwell Library of Bridgewater State University, the Memorial Building of the Old Bridgewater Historical Society in West Bridgewater, and the Old Colony Historical Society in Taunton, Massachusetts. An electronic version of my essays is available on Bridgewater State University’s repository Virtual Commons (http://vc.bridgew.edu/spence/). I was delighted when Michael Somers, Director of the Maxwell Library, proposed this project. Many thanks to Ellen Dubinsky, Digital Services Librarian, and her staff for so competently putting my essays on line. While this electronic source allows readers to see if a particular historical item is referred to in any of my essays, none of them included an index. Hopefully, this scholarly tool will soon be added to my on-line writings. 4 Table of Contents Pages Introduction 6 A Brief Look at Bridgewater’s Past 6 Geographic and Demographic Considerations 6-7 Agriculture and Manufacturing 7-8 An Evolving Transportation System Horses 8 Railroads 9 Bicycles 9-11 Electric Street Cars (Trolleys) 11-13 Motorized Vehicles (Emphasis on Automobiles) 13-20 Stores in Bridgewater (A Selective List) A Brief Overview 20-21 Hooper & Company 21 Henry T. Burrill & Co. 2l-22 H. H. Fairbanks Co. -- William S. Prophett and John E. Flynn 22-25 Ferguson’s Shoe Store 25 Wilcox’s Drug Store 25-26 Central Square Market-Simmons-Flynn 26-28 Cole’s Drug Store 28-33 Clark’s Jewelry Store 34-38 R. J. Casey Company 39 Bridgewater’s Fruit Stores (Emphasis on Balboni’s and Central Square Fruit Stores) 40-48 Central Square Grocery - Isaac R. Alden- Lysander H. Washburn 48-49 Churchill’s Dry Goods Co. 49-50 Hutchinson’s Lumber Yard 51-53 Scotton’s Dry Goods Store 53-56 Men’s Store-Arthur G. Locke-Arthur F. Caldwell 56-60 Leonard’s Market 60-64 Central Square Candy Store-Charles W. Faxon 64-67 Callahan and Flynn Block-Virginia Building 68-74 Dudley’s Drug Store 74-77 R. E. Purnelle’s Hardware Store 77-81 Gotschalk’s Clothing Store -The Fashion Clothes Shop 81-84 The Cloverdale 84-88 Neighborhood Stores-Sheehan’s-Tinkham’s 88-89 Introduction 5 None of the inhabitants of Bridgewater, Massachusetts, in the early 1920’s would have been able to give eyewitness accounts of the separation of the Old Bridgewater into four separate towns a century earlier. It became generally known, however, that this political development included the creation of present-day Bridgewater, once the Southern Parish of the old town. My research and writing, except for two long essays dealing mainly with law and order in the South Parish, has dealt with Bridgewater’s past between the late nineteenth century and the early 1920’s. While I hope to see an historian someday write an extended account of the town covering the better part of the nineteenth century, my documentation indicates reliance on earlier writers who provided me with important historical background on the topics I have written about at this point. By far the most important primary source aiding me in creating an image of Bridgewater as a “Town in Transition” was its local newspaper the Independent. From its inception in 1877 to 1925, this publication faithfully reported on virtually every aspect of the community’s life in varying degrees. By perusing its weekly editions for these years, it became evident that Bridgewater in a number of ways was a microcosm of an America undergoing great changes as it became more industrialized, urbanized, and ethically mixed. The following essay mainly deals with this town’s evolving transportation system and configuration of retail stores in the second decade of the twentieth century, albeit retaining some continuity with its long history as a small and quiet community. 1 A Brief Look at Bridgewater’s Past From 1656 until the 1770’s, the original and much larger Bridgewater was an integral part of the British Empire, first as the tenth town in Plymouth Colony and, after 1691, of the Province of Massachusetts. Despite the division of the old town into five parish-precincts between 1716 and 1743, Bridgewater politically remained intact after the American Revolution until four of these parish-precincts became separate political communities in the early 1820’s.