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79-561: By 1845, 31 textile companies—located in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and southern Maine—produced one-fifth of all cotton and wool textiles in the United States. With the capital earned through these mills, they invested in railroads, especially the Boston and Lowell . These railroads helped transport the cotton from warehouses to factories. These Boston-based investors established banks—such as

158-561: A gentle ten feet per mile at the maximum, and there were only three grade crossings over the entire 26-mile (42 km) distance. The path was close to the older Middlesex Canal path, but was straighter - as boats can turn more sharply than trains. To achieve this superior linearity, it needed small amounts of grade elevation in places. The route ignored Medford center entirely, going through West Medford instead, and totally bypassed Woburn and Billerica . This would have to be corrected later with various spurs (the one to Medford being built off

237-476: A household in the city was $ 52,476, and the median income for a family was $ 62,409. Males had a median income of $ 41,704 versus $ 34,948 for females. The per capita income for the city was $ 24,707. About 4.1% of families and 6.4% of the population were below the poverty line, including 5.7% of those under age 18 and 7.4% of those age 65 or over. Medford has three Public, educational, and government access (PEG) cable TV channels. The Public-access television channel

316-414: A particular neighborhood. Irish Americans have a strong presence in the city and live in all areas. South Medford is a traditionally Italian neighborhood. West Medford, the most affluent of Medford's many neighborhoods, was once the bastion of some of Boston's elite families—including Peter Chardon Brooks , one of the wealthiest men in post-colonial America and father-in-law to Charles Francis Adams —and

395-614: A representative to the legislature was chosen. The town got its religious meeting room in 1690 and a secular meeting house in 1696. In 1692, the town engaged its first ordained preacher, Rev. John Hancock Sr. . During his time of service, Rev. Hancock lived in Medford, serving until November 1693. One of his grandsons was John Hancock , who was a later notable figure of the American Revolutionary War and later elected as first and third governor of Massachusetts. The land south of

474-870: A social worker in 1925. Elizabeth Short , the victim of an infamous Hollywood murder and who became known as The Black Dahlia , was born in Hyde Park (the southernmost neighborhood of the city of Boston , Massachusetts) but raised in Medford before going to the West Coast looking for fame. Medford has sent more than its share of athletes to the National Hockey League ; Shawn Bates , though born in Melrose , grew up in Medford, as did Keith Tkachuk , Mike Morrison , David Sacco and Joe Sacco . Former Red Sox pitcher Bill Monbouquette grew up in Medford, as did former Major League Baseball infielder Mike Pagliarulo . Medford

553-593: A thirty-year monopoly on the right to have a railroad there. The people along the road and in terminal-end cities bought large amounts of stock , financing half the company. The Board of Directors of the Boston and Lowell Railroad, armed with a charter, now had the task of surveying and building the line. They brought in James Fowle Baldwin , son of Col. Loammi Baldwin , who had engineered the Middlesex Canal, to do

632-599: Is TV3 , The Educational-access television is channel 15, and 16 is the Government-access television (GATV) municipal channel. Medford is home to many schools, public and private. City Council School Committee The City of Medford has several local news and media outlets: Three MBTA subway stations are located in Medford: Wellington on the Orange Line , plus Medford/​Tufts and Ball Square on

711-627: Is a native burial site from the contact period, which includes the remains of a likely sachem, either Nanepashemet or Wonohaquaham. After the 1633 epidemic, Nanepashemet's widow, known only as the Squaw Sachem of Mistick , led the Naumkeag, and over the next two decades would deed large parts of Naumkeag territory to English settlers. In 1639, the Massachusetts General Court purchased the land that would become present-day Medford, then within

790-654: Is also home to a historic African-American neighborhood that dates to the Civil War. Between 2021 and 2022, the United States Census Bureau ranked Medford as having one of the nation's fastest-growing populations. As of the census of 2010, there were 56,173 people, 22,810 households, and 13,207 families residing in the city. The population density was 6,859.9 inhabitants per square mile (2,648.6/km ). There were 24,046 housing units at an average density of 2,796.0 per square mile (1,079.5/km ). The racial makeup of

869-498: Is land and 0.5 square miles (1.3 km ) (5.79%) is water. A park called the Middlesex Fells Reservation , to the north, lies partly within the city. This 2,060-acre (8 km ) preserve is shared by Medford with the municipalities of Winchester , Stoneham , Melrose , and Malden . The Mystic River flows roughly west to southeast through the middle of the city. People from Medford often identify themselves with

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948-541: Is thought to be the oldest all-brick building in New England. Another important site is the "Slave Wall" on Grove Street, built by "Pomp", an enslaved person owned by the prominent Brooks family. The Royall House and Slave Quarters , which once belonged to one of Harvard Law School 's founders, Isaac Royall, Jr. , is a National Historic Landmark and a local history museum. The house was used by Continental Army troops, including George Washington and John Stark , during

1027-416: The 54th and 55th Massachusetts regiments and the 5th cavalry. Medford was home to Fannie Farmer , author of one of the world's most famous cookbooks—as well as James Plimpton, the man credited with the 1863 invention of the first practical four-wheeled roller skate , which set off a roller craze that quickly spread across the United States and Europe. Amelia Earhart lived in Medford while working as

1106-492: The American Revolutionary War . George Luther Stearns , an American industrialist and one of John Brown's Secret Six . His passion for the abolitionist cause shaped his life, bringing him into contact with the likes of Abraham Lincoln and Ralph Waldo Emerson and starting The Nation magazine. He was given the rank of major by Massachusetts Governor John Andrew and spent most of the Civil War recruiting for

1185-520: The Boston and Maine Railroad ), but were always sources of annoyance to both riders and operators. The proposed route was accepted by the Board of Directors of the Boston and Lowell Railroad, and work began on the building phase. The road was begun from both ends at once, and some sources say that they both started on the right hand side of the right-of-way, missing in the middle and having to put in an embarrassing reverse curve to tide them over until they built

1264-614: The Essex Railroad at Peabody , along which it used trackage rights to Salem . The line was opened in 1850 and operated by the Lowell and Lawrence until 1858, when the B&;L leased it along with the Lowell and Lawrence. The Wilmington Branch, now known as the Wildcat Branch , was built just west of the original Boston and Maine Railroad alignment to connect the main line at Wilmington to

1343-718: The Manchester and Keene Railroad (Southern) and Peterborough and Hillsborough Railroad (Northern) met. In 1889 the BC&;M merged with the Concord Railroad to form the Concord and Montreal Railroad , taking it out of B&M control until 1895, when the B&M leased the C&;M. The White Mountains Railroad was chartered in 1848 and opened a line from Woodsville to Littleton, New Hampshire , in 1853. Along with extensions and branches, it

1422-672: The Mystic River waterfront on the north side of Charlestown. The Woburn Branch Railroad (aka the Woburn Loop ) opened in 1844, connecting Woburn to the main line towards Boston. The Horn Pond Branch Railroad was a short freight-only branch off the Woburn Branch to ice houses on Horn Pond. The northern loop, built in 1885, continued the line back north to the main line at North Woburn Jct. in South Wilmington. The Horn Pond branch line

1501-553: The Mystic River . Naumkeag sachem Nanepashemet was killed and buried at his fortification in present-day Medford during a war with the Tarrantines in 1619. The contact period introduced several European infectious diseases which would decimate native populations in virgin soil epidemics , including a smallpox epidemic which in 1633 killed Nanepashemet's sons, sachems Montowompate and Wonohaquaham . Sagamore Park in West Medford

1580-725: The Portland and Ogdensburg Railroad in 1875 as their Vermont Division. The line was finished in 1877, and in 1880 it was reorganized as the St. Johnsbury and Lake Champlain Railroad , which was taken over by the B&L as their Vermont Division. The line did not stay in the B&M system, and the easternmost part was leased to the Maine Central Railroad in 1912. The White Mountains and Vermont Divisions were connected at Scott's Mills, New Hampshire . The Connecticut and Passumpsic Rivers Railroad

1659-539: The Stony Brook Branch and the old main line north of Lowell. At Lowell, it shifts to the B&M's original Lowell Branch to get to the B&M main line towards Maine. Medford, Massachusetts Medford is a city 6.7 miles (10.8 km) northwest of downtown Boston on the Mystic River in Middlesex County, Massachusetts , United States. At the time of the 2020 U.S. Census , Medford's population

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1738-614: The Suffolk Bank —and invested in others. In time, they controlled 40% of banking capital in Boston, 40% of all insurance capital in Massachusetts, and 30% of Massachusetts' railroads. Tens of thousands of New Englanders received employment from these investors, working in any one of the hundreds of their mills. Mill locations established or improved by the Boston Associates: Despite being "shrewd, far-sighted entrepreneurs who were quick to embrace...new investment opportunities",

1817-616: The ford " in the Mystic River, or from two locations in England that Cradock may have known: the hamlet of Mayford or Metford in Staffordshire near Caverswall , or from the parish of Maidford or Medford (now Towcester , Northamptonshire). In 1634, the land north of the Mystic River was developed as the private plantation of Matthew Cradock , a former governor. Across the river was Ten Hills Farm , which belonged to John Winthrop , Governor of

1896-462: The 17th century, a handful of major public roads (High Street, Main Street, Salem Street, "the road to Stoneham", and South Street) served the population, but the road network started a long-term expansion in the 18th century. The Medford Turnpike Company was incorporated in 1803 and (as was reasonably common at the time) turned what is now Mystic Avenue over to the city in 1866. The Andover Turnpike Company

1975-466: The B&L Northern Division in 1884, when the B&L leased the BC&M. The Northern Railroad was also chartered in 1844, opening in 1847 from Concord to Lebanon, New Hampshire , and later extending to White River Junction, Vermont . The B&L leased it in 1884 as another part of its Northern Division. The only connection between the Southern and Northern divisions was at Hancock Junction , where

2054-629: The B&L and N&L agreed to operate as one company from 1860, and in 1880 the B&L leased the N&;L. The Stony Brook Railroad was chartered in 1845 and opened in 1848, connecting the Nashua and Lowell at North Chelmsford with Ayer . The N&L leased the Stony Brook in 1848. The Wilton Railroad was chartered in 1844. It opened a line from Nashua west to Danforth's Corner in 1848, to Milford in 1850 and to East Wilton in 1851. Since completion it

2133-407: The B&L were copies of the successful Planet class 2-2-0 built locally in Lowell. Another railroad was chartered in the early 1840s whose fortunes would be closely tied to those of the Boston and Lowell. This was the Boston and Maine Railroad . This railroad ran down from Portland, Maine , through a bit of southern New Hampshire , to Haverhill in northeastern Massachusetts, connected to

2212-545: The B&L's Lexington and Arlington Branch at North Cambridge Junction , and the company was reorganized as the Central Massachusetts Railroad in 1883. The B&L leased the line in 1886, a year before the B&M leased the B&L. The Boston, Concord and Montreal Railroad was chartered in 1844, and opened in stages from 1848 to 1853, eventually running from Concord to Woodsville, New Hampshire . That railroad, along with its branches, became part of

2291-583: The B&L. An extension west to the Nashua, Acton and Boston Railroad at Middlesex Junction was built in 1879. The Billerica and Bedford Railroad was built in 1877 as a narrow gauge line between the Middlesex Central at Bedford and the B&L at North Billerica . It was sold and abandoned in 1878, and the rails were taken to Maine for the Sandy River Railroad . A new standard gauge branch

2370-416: The B&M before it lost the opportunity. The B&M tried to deal with this in court, and got the judge to forbid the B&L from raising rates until the case was done, but by the time they were close to an agreement, the bypass was complete. With B&M business gone, the B&L realized how much they had been relying upon their renters. Additionally, the Lowell mills began to decline somewhat and there

2449-418: The B&M in court but failed because the monopoly granted in its charter was only good for traffic between Boston and Lowell. The shortcut, part of today's Haverhill/Reading Line , was started in 1844 and was in use by 1848. While the B&M was building it, they were still running their trains to Boston on the B&L. This made for a lot of conflict, with the B&L trying to squeeze every last penny out of

The Boston Associates - Misplaced Pages Continue

2528-702: The Boston Associates were also "committed to the ideals of the original Protestant ethic and Republican simplicity ". Indeed, the members established more than 30 "benevolent societies and institutions" between 1810 and 1840. Their investment in the Boston Manufacturing Company 's Lowell Mills project, which Henry Clay called a test for "whether the manufacturing system is compatible with social virtues", epitomized their worldview. Though not authoritative or necessarily complete, Robert Dalzell's 1987 book, Enterprising elite: The Boston Associates and

2607-410: The Boston and Lowell Railroad was large from the start (as was expected) with Lowell's textile companies bringing in raw materials and sending out finished goods. The high level of passenger traffic, however, was not anticipated. Trains traveled on unwelded rails which were laid on a granite roadbed, which made for an extremely bumpy ride. The railroad switched to wooden ties. The Boston and Lowell

2686-416: The Boston and Lowell Railroad, especially with the line still over granite, provided the extra impetus to double track and upgrade. In 1838, the B&L began two years of extensive track improvements, first laying a second track on wood, and with that one built, going back and re-laying the old track on the more forgiving wood as well. Boston and Lowell traffic continued to increase, and even with double tracks

2765-517: The Boston and Lowell in Wilmington , and then used Boston and Lowell track to Boston. This route was conceptualized in 1834, but took a long time to be built, mostly because, unlike the Boston and Lowell, it did not have a secure base of funding like the Lowell textile companies. It took two years to get to Andover , another year to get to Haverhill, three more to get to Exeter, New Hampshire , and did not get to Portland until 1852. This extra traffic on

2844-514: The Fitchburg from 1847 to 1859. The line was reorganized as the Lexington and Arlington Railroad in 1868, following the renaming of Arlington. The B&L bought the line in 1870 and built a new connection to their main line at Somerville Junction . The Middlesex Central Railroad was chartered in 1872 and opened in 1873, extending the line from Lexington to Concord . It was leased from completion to

2923-659: The Lowell line, along with the Haverhill and all other commuter operations in the Greater Boston area. Along with the sale, the B&M contracted to run the passenger service on the Lowell line for the MBTA. After bankruptcy, the B&M continued to run and fulfill its commuter rail contract under the protection of the Federal Bankruptcy Court , in the hopes that a reorganization could make it profitable again. It emerged from

3002-587: The Massachusetts Bay colony. In 1637, the first bridge (a toll bridge ) across the Mystic River was built at the site of the present-day Cradock Bridge, which carries Main Street into Medford Square. It would be the only bridge across the Mystic until 1787, and as such became a major route for traffic coming into Boston from the north (though ferries and fords were also used). The bridge would be rebuilt in 1880, 1909, and 2018. Until 1656, all of northern Medford

3081-500: The Mystic River, present-day South Medford , was originally known as "Mistick Field". It was transferred from Charlestown to Medford in 1754. This grant also included the "Charlestown woodlots" (the Medford part of the Middlesex Fells), and part of what was at the time Woburn (now Winchester ). Other parts of Medford were transferred from Charlestown in 1811, Winchester in 1850 ("Upper Medford"), and Malden in 1879. Additional land

3160-517: The Salem and Lowell at Wilmington Junction, providing a shorter route between Boston and Lawrence. The Lexington and West Cambridge Railroad was chartered in 1845 and opened in 1846, connecting the Fitchburg Railroad at West Cambridge to Lexington , although the "West Cambridge" in the name referred to what is now the town of Arlington . It was operated by the Fitchburg from opening, and leased to

3239-552: The United States is located in Medford, built by Biocell Center , a biotechnology company led by Giuseppe Simoni . Medford was the location of some infamous crimes: Medford is located at 42°25′12″N 71°6′29″W  /  42.42000°N 71.10806°W  / 42.42000; -71.10806 (42.419996, −71.107942). According to the United States Census Bureau , the city has a total area of 8.6 square miles (22 km ), of which 8.1 square miles (21 km )

The Boston Associates - Misplaced Pages Continue

3318-739: The Vermont Division, and the Passumpsic Division. Additionally, it leased the Central Massachusetts Railroad in 1886. The main part of the Southern Division was the mainline between Boston and Lowell . The Charlestown Branch Railroad was not itself taken over by the B&L, but as originally built in 1840 it was a short spur from the B&L to wharves in Charlestown . In 1845 the Fitchburg Railroad leased it and incorporated it into their main line. The Mystic River Branch served

3397-587: The boundaries of Charlestown , from the Squaw Sachem. Medford was settled in 1630 by English colonists as part of Charlestown , of the Massachusetts Bay Colony . The settlement was originally called "Mistick" by Thomas Dudley , based on the Massachusett name for the area's river . Thomas Dudley's party renamed the settlement "Meadford". The name may have come from a description of the " meadow by

3476-547: The city was 78.6% White , 8.80% African American , 0.2% Native American , 6.9% Asian , 0.01% Pacific Islander , 2.8% from other races , and 2.7% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 4.4% of the population. There were 22,810 households, of which 22.3% had children under 18 living with them, 42.5% were married couples living together, 11.4% had a female householder with no husband present, and 42.1% were non-families. 24.6% of all households were made up of individuals, and 11.1% had someone living alone who

3555-476: The company went bankrupt, and it was operated by the Connecticut River Railroad until 1882, when it was bought half-and-half by the B&L and the Concord Railroad . The Massachusetts Central Railroad was chartered in 1869 to build a line east–west across the middle of the state, between the Boston and Albany Railroad and the Fitchburg Railroad . The first section opened in 1881, splitting from

3634-402: The contract expired, they let the job go to Amtrak . From 1986 until 2003, Amtrak managed the entirety of Boston's commuter rail. It did decently, though at times had strained relations with the MBTA. Quibbles centered on equipment failures, numbers of conductors per train, and who took responsibility when trains are late. Because of these bad relations and Amtrak's repeated announcements that

3713-647: The contract was unreasonable, few people were surprised at Amtrak's decision not to bid again for the commuter rail contract when it came up for renewal in 2003. When the MBTA asked for new bids on the commuter rail operation contract, Amtrak did not bid, but Guilford and the Massachusetts Bay Commuter Railroad Company did. The MBCR ended up getting the contract and began operating the commuter rail in July 2004. Guilford's main line between Mattawamkeag, Maine , and Mechanicville, New York , now uses

3792-438: The court's protection when newly formed Guilford Transportation Industries (GTI) bought it in 1983. When GTI bought the B&M, commuter rail service was in jeopardy. The MBTA had owned the trains and the tracks since 1973, but it had outsourced the operation to the B&M. When GTI bought the B&M in 1983, it had to honor the B&M contract, but GTI management was very much against passenger rail, and, in 1986, as soon as

3871-452: The fixed routes of the railroads. The decline in both passenger and freight traffic occurred at a point when the B&M, like most other railroads, had just switched over to diesel locomotives , meaning that they had large debts. The pressure from the debts and the large infrastructure costs associated with operating a disparate passenger and freight network amongst declining traffic forced the B&M to cut costs. The most noticeable effect to

3950-453: The general public was the reductions in passenger operation. In the late 1950s, the B&M began to eliminate routes and substituted Multi-Unit diesel-powered passenger cars on many of its routes. The effort did not succeed, as the B&M was bankrupt by 1976. As its fortunes declined, the B&M shed its passenger operation in 1973 by selling the assets to the MBTA . The new state agency bought

4029-419: The ground if the rails did not have strong support. The first track was completed in 1835, and freight service began immediately. On May 27, 1835, it made its maiden trip to Boston, with Patrick Tracy Jackson , George Washington Whistler , and James Baldwin aboard. The solid granite roadbed proved to be much too rigid, jolting the engine and cars nearly to pieces. Repairs on the locomotives (there were two at

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4108-461: The hands of various private companies and went electric in the late 1890s when trolleys to Everett and downtown Boston were available. Streetcars were converted to buses in the 20th century. Interstate 93 was constructed between 1956 and 1963. In 1868, a French astronomer and naturalist, Leopold Trouvelot , was attempting to breed a better silkworm using spongy moths . Several moths escaped from his home at 27 Myrtle Street. Within ten years,

4187-511: The insect had denuded the vegetation in the neighborhood. It spread over North America. In Simpson's Tavern, a tavern and boarding house on High Street, in the late 19th century, resident James Pierpont is rumored to have written " Jingle Bells " after watching a sleigh race from Medford to Malden . There is also a claim that Pierpont wrote it while he was the music director at Unitarian Universalist Church in Savannah, Georgia . He copyrighted

4266-403: The legislature that the canal was inherently incapable of providing what they needed: reliable, year-round freight transport. Investors in the Boston and Lowell Railroad received a charter on June 5, 1830, with no provision for reparations to the Middlesex Canal's investors. It was a favorable charter because in addition to the right to build and operate a railroad between Lowell and Boston, it gave

4345-465: The line on January 1, 1887, three months before the B&M acquired the B&L. Over the next 70 years or so, things were reasonably stable and constant for the Lowell Line as a part of the B&M's Southern Division. Passenger train round trips per day hovered in the low 20s, and while freight from Lowell itself did not last too long, the Lowell line got some traffic from railroads that connected from

4424-465: The other side. Yankee and Irish laborers were hired to construct the railroad, which was made especially difficult and because the Directors wanted to make the road using the best techniques then known. This, for them, meant laying imported British iron rails with a 4-foot-deep (1.2 m) wall of granite under each rail. They did this because it was commonly believed that the train would sink into

4503-470: The schedule became tight enough that the Boston and Maine trains, as renters, began to be pushed around to annoying hours, often having to wait over an hour in Wilmington before being allowed to proceed on to Boston. The B&M soon tired of what they perceived as selfishness and decided to build its own track to Boston from Haverhill so that it would not have to rely on the B&L. The B&L tried to fight

4582-565: The song while there. Another resident, Lydia Maria Child (1802–1880), made a poem out of the trip across town to her grandparents' house , now the song " Over the River and Through the Wood ". Paul Revere 's famous midnight ride traveled along Main Street and continued onto High Street in Medford Square. An annual re-enactment honors the historic event. The Peter Tufts House (350 Riverside Ave.)

4661-500: The surveying, and charged him with finding a gently sloped path from Lowell to Boston, with few grade crossings and well away from town centers. This latter point ended up being quite inconvenient later on. No one had any idea of the future possibility of railroads acting as public transportation, or if they did they were not paid any attention by the builders or financiers of the road. The right-of-way that Baldwin surveyed did well in each of these characteristics. The path sloped up at

4740-419: The time) would sometimes take most of the night, trying to get them ready for the next day's service. The much poorer Boston and Worcester Railroad could not afford a granite bed and so was built with modern wooden ties . This turned out to be far superior, so the owners of the Boston and Lowell decided they would upgrade their entire roadbed to wood when they added a second track. The original Boston terminal

4819-576: The west. In the early 20th century, the economics of railroading began to change. With the advent of the internal combustion engine , trains slowly began to lose their advantage as a transportation option. Automobiles and trucks began to increase in popularity as highways improved, siphoning ridership and freight traffic off railroads. The advent of the Interstate Highway System tipped the economic balance by increasing mobility as factories and offices were now able to be located further away from

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4898-579: The world they made , enumerated the following businessmen as members of the Boston Associates social strata: Boston and Lowell Railroad The Boston and Lowell Railroad was a railroad that operated in Massachusetts in the United States. It was one of the first railroads in North America and the first major one in the state. The line later operated as part of the Boston and Maine Railroad 's Southern Division. The Boston and Lowell Railroad

4977-529: Was 59,659. It is home to Tufts University , which has its campus on both sides of the Medford and Somerville border. Native Americans inhabited the area that would become Medford for thousands of years prior to European colonization of the Americas . At the time of European contact and exploration, Medford was the winter home of the Naumkeag people, who farmed corn and created fishing weirs at multiple sites along

5056-439: Was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.38 and the average family size was 3.00. The population was spread out in the city, with 13.8% under the age of 15, 14.3% from 15 to 24, 31.7% from 25 to 44, 24.9% from 45 to 64, and 15.2% who were 65 or older. The median age was 37.7 years. For every 100 females, there were 91.5 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 89.4 males. The median income for

5135-446: Was abandoned in 1911, the northern loop in 1961, and the original line in 1982. The Stoneham Branch Railroad was built in 1862 to connect to Stoneham . The Lowell and Lawrence Railroad was chartered in 1846 to build a line between Lowell and Lawrence , which opened in 1848. In 1858 the B&L leased the line. The Salem and Lowell Railroad was chartered in 1848 as a branch from the Lowell and Lawrence at Tewksbury Junction to

5214-465: Was at the north corner of Causeway Street and Andover Street (halfway between Portland and Friend streets), at the westernmost edge of the current North Station . The bridge over the Charles River to access it was the first movable railroad bridge in the United States. [1] The original Lowell terminal was at the south corner of Merrimack Street and Dutton Street. The quantity of freight traffic on

5293-544: Was built by the B&L in 1885, mostly on the same right-of-way. The Lowell and Nashua Railroad was chartered in 1836 as an extension of the B&L from Lowell north to the New Hampshire state line. The Nashua and Lowell Railroad, chartered in 1835, would continue the line in New Hampshire to Nashua . The two companies merged in 1838 to form a new Nashua and Lowell Railroad , and the road opened later that year. In 1857

5372-454: Was chartered in 1852 and the Crane Theological School at Tufts opened in 1869. In 1865, the Lawrence Rifles volunteer militia company was formed in Medford during the Civil War . Medford was incorporated as a city in 1892, and was a center of industry, including the manufacture of tiles and crackers , bricks, rum , and clipper ships, such as the White Swallow and the Kingfisher , both built by Hayden & Cudworth. During

5451-436: Was faced with a new problem; it had a reputation for speed which made it very popular and highly competitive with stagecoaches. Many people wanted to go not only from Lowell to Boston but to places in between. The Boston and Lowell ordered another locomotive and cars for local passenger rail in 1842, and had them make six stops along the route. Passenger rail proved to be almost as profitable as freight. The first locomotives on

5530-412: Was home to Michael Bloomberg , American businessman, philanthropist, and the founder of Bloomberg L.P. He was the Mayor of New York City from 2002 to 2013. Mayor Bloomberg attended Medford High School and resided in Medford until after he graduated from college at Johns Hopkins University. His mother remained a resident of Medford until her death in 2011. The only cryobank of amniotic stem cells in

5609-448: Was incorporated in 1805 and turned what is now Forest Street and Fellsway West over to Medford in 1830. Other major commercial transportation projects included the Middlesex Canal by 1803, the Boston and Lowell Railroad in West Medford in the 1830s, and the Boston and Maine Railroad to Medford Center in 1847. A horse-powered street railway began running to Somerville and Charlestown in 1860. The street railway network expanded in

5688-515: Was leased to the Boston, Concord and Montreal Railroad in 1859 and consolidated into it in 1872, becoming its White Mountains Division. In 1884 the B&L leased the BC&M and the old White Mountains Railroad became the B&L's White Mountains Division. The Northern and White Mountains Divisions were connected at Woodsville. The Essex County Railroad (chartered 1864), Montpelier and St. Johnsbury Railroad (chartered 1866) and Lamoille Valley Railroad (chartered 1867) were consolidated into

5767-550: Was less freight traffic for the line to move. Over the next four decades, the B&L declined until the more successful B&M leased it on April 1, 1887. The B&L built or leased many branches to serve areas not on its original line. Immediately before its lease by the B&M in 1887, it had five divisions—the Southern Division (including the original line), the Northern Division, the White Mountains Division,

5846-441: Was no provision in Massachusetts state law for chartering railroads, all had to be chartered by special acts of legislature. This made it slow and inefficient to charter a railroad because the politicians had to agree; the issue would become partisan. This also meant that the legislature would not let the investors build the line unless they could show it was completely necessary. The investors were successful because they convinced

5925-641: Was operated by the N&L. The Peterborough Railroad was chartered in 1866 to continue the Wilton Railroad northwest to Greenfield, New Hampshire . In 1873 the N&L leased it; the road opened in 1874. The Manchester and Keene Railroad was chartered in 1864 and opened in 1878, continuing the Peterborough Railroad west from Greenfield to the Connecticut River Railroad in Keene . In 1880

6004-593: Was organized in 1846 and opened a line from White River Junction on the Northern Railroad to the border with Quebec , Canada , in 1867, junctioning the Northern and White Mountains Divisions at Wells River and the Vermont Division at St. Johnsbury . The Massawippi Valley Railway , leased in 1870, continued to Sherbrooke , Quebec, where it junctioned the Grand Trunk Railway among others. The B&L leased

6083-505: Was owned by Cradock, his heirs, or Edward Collins. Medford was governed as a "peculiar" or private plantation. As the land began to be divided among several people from different families, the new owners began to meet and make decisions locally and increasingly independently from the Charlestown town meeting. In 1674, a Board of Selectmen was elected; in 1684, the colonial legislature granted the ability to raise money independently; and in 1689,

6162-509: Was preceded by the Middlesex Canal . Converting the canal to a railroad would eliminate the issue of transportation being unavailable during the winter, when the canal froze. Patrick Tracy Jackson led the task of convincing the state legislature to fund the project. This proved difficult, as the investors of the Middlesex Canal were against building a new form of transportation designed to replace their canal. Because, prior to 1872, there

6241-527: Was transferred to Medford from Malden (1817), Everett (1875), and Malden (1877) again. The population of Medford rose from 230 in 1700 to 1,114 in 1800. After 1880, the population rapidly expanded, reaching 18,244 by 1900. Farmland was divided into lots and sold to build residential and commercial buildings, starting in the 1840s and 1850s; government services expanded with the population (schools, police, post office) and technological advancement (gas lighting, electricity, telephones, railways). Tufts University

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