The Revere Barn is one of Canton’s most historic buildings and one of America’s most endangered historic sites. In this week’s installment of True Tales, town historian George Comeau makes his case for the Community Preservation Act.
Through the trees and across the Canton Corner Cemetery, the bell peals each Sunday. The sweet sound calls parishioners to the services at the First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church — the quintessential white steeple church alongside the burying ground where generations of Canton’s citizens have been laid to rest. And from this steeple, history sounds […]
Click here to go back to Part 1. The two gun-crossed lovers were married the next spring, and from then on they were inseparable. Mrs. Jones, “Gussie” as she was called in the camp, vowed she would shoot as well as the boys, and in fact she would become an expert huntress at Birch Point. […]
Click here to go back to part 1 of “Take a Hike.” As you walk under the ancient maple trees that lead to Ponkapoag Pond, you are on a 160-year journey back in time. This half-mile path leads directly to the pond, and as you near the Ponkapoag Dam Project (watch for signs), you will […]
You can live in a place your whole life and still find surprise in your own backyard. Over the past year I have been exploring the Blue Hills Reservation. Trekking from Quincy to Canton and sometimes back again, the 7,000 acres of woodland and marsh is majestic and exhilarating. Some of the greatest views in […]
Click here for Part 1 of George Comeau’s profile on Frederic Endicott. Perhaps water was in the Endicott family’s blood. There was a fairly antiquated water system in Canton developed in the late 1700s by William Crane. As it turns out, Crane was the great-grandfather of Endicott. The primitive system was constructed of wooden pipes […]
As you stand at the kitchen sink and turn on the water, reflect upon how that water makes its way through a complex system of pipes from deep wells and through a well-established network, ending at the glass of water in your hands. The person most responsible for our modern system of wells and clean […]
In the corner of my kitchen is a tube of reproduced historic maps of Canton. I use these maps regularly to help me write these stories. The best is dated 1855, a copy of an original that hangs framed in a back corner of the Historical Society. The map is actually a picture, a sketch, […]
We trace the arc of the seasons across the years, and the old adage quickly points out that the more things change, the more they remain the same. Looking back at Canton exactly 100 years ago, the year 1911, the observer is struck with the normalcy of life and the fact that things really don’t […]
The quintessential New England road is one that is overarched with gracious old trees and dotted with ancient stonewalls. There are a few notable candidates that spring to mind: Elm Street, Green Street, Chapman Street and certainly York Street. Of these, York Street is one of the oldest and most developed, and is considered a […]
