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Massachusetts Audubon Society Makes First Land Purchase
Massachusetts Audubon Society Makes First Land Purchase
On this day in 1922, the Massachusetts Audubon Society purchased its first parcel of land. For $8,000, it acquired 43 acres in the town of Sharon — the core of the Moose Hill Wildlife Sanctuary...
Office to Help Freed Slaves Opens in Worcester
Office to Help Freed Slaves Opens in Worcester
On this day in 1867, a Worcester newspaper announced that "in accordance with the desire of a number of citizens," a freedmens' office would be established to make it easy for white employers to hire...
Northampton Dedicates Sojourner Truth Statue
Northampton Dedicates Sojourner Truth Statue
On this day in 2002, a statue was installed in Florence, a village of Northampton, to honor Sojourner Truth, the former enslaved woman best known for the "Ain't I a Woman" speech she delivered in 1851....
Utopians Purchase Brook Farm
Utopians Purchase Brook Farm
On this day in 1841, a group of Boston-area utopians purchased Brook Farm in West Roxbury. The writer Nathaniel Hawthorne spent six months there and later wrote about his experiences in his satirical novel Blithedale...
Indian Rights Activist Born in Amherst
Indian Rights Activist Born in Amherst
On this day in 1830, an Amherst College professor and his wife rejoiced at the safe delivery of their second child, Helen Maria Fiske. A lifelong friend of Emily Dickinson and a talented poet in...
Town Meeting Auctions Poor Woman to Lowest Bidder
Town Meeting Auctions Poor Woman to Lowest Bidder
On this day in 1786, Malden's selectmen put up for "vendue" Mary Degresha, who was unable to support herself. They auctioned her off to the lowest bidder, who agreed to accept payment of six dollars...
Lydia Maria Child Dies
Lydia Maria Child Dies
On this day in 1880, Lydia Maria Child, whom abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison called "the first woman in the Republic," was buried in Wayland. A successful novelist and magazine editor and the author of a...
Millerites Await End of the World
Millerites Await End of the World
On this day in 1844, tens of thousands of people in Massachusetts expected the world to come to an end. They were followers of William Miller, a man who claimed to know the date of...
Boston Celebrates Opening of Aqueduct
Boston Celebrates Opening of Aqueduct
On this day in 1848, 300,000 people from all over New England gathered on Boston Common. They came to celebrate the completion of the city's first municipal water system. With the construction of an aqueduct...
Evangelist Billy Sunday Draws 70,000 to Boston Revival
Evangelist Billy Sunday Draws 70,000 to Boston Revival
On this day in 1916, 55,000 people came to hear Billy Sunday preach in Boston. An overflow crowd of 15,000 had to be turned away from the temporary tabernacle that had been erected on Huntington...