b-- "^^^ >* .; ' ^t 0^ r ''" «5 • .<^ '<^^ ■^ T} r^ \^ ^ J- \J L rn n n AY. fl04- .Ca.Ca- Oi'dei^ of S^xei^di^e^ fof tl\e f)h.y. Sunrise, ...... Salute of 13 Guns, and ringing of Bells. PARADE To form under the Marshal, near the residence of D. H. Page, at 10.00 A. m. The Procession will consist of Officers of the Day. Collinsville Cornet Band. Citizens on foot. Allegorical Car. Saint Patrick's Benevolent Society. Mounted Soldiers in Uniform. Veteran Citizens. Allegorical Car. Veteran Drum Corps. Societee Saint Jean Baptiste. Deutscher Gegenseitigen Untersliitzung Verein. Deutscher Turner Verein. Sjukforeningen Norden. Public Schools. At 1 1 o'clock the Procession will move down Maple Avenue to Center Street ; thence south through Center and North Streets to Main; thence down Main to Center Street; thence south on Center to South Street; thence through South and Front Streets to Main; thence u]) Main to the Valley House; thence to the Grand Stand. At 12 o'clock, ......... Salute of 38 Guns, Mass Meeting at Grand Stand, ....... 12.30 p. M. PROGRAMME, Music, Prayer, Singing, Collinsville Cornet Band. I Rev. Edward E. Lamb. Chorus of loo Voices. (The audience is requested to rise and join in all singing.) Ill I. Lord ! while for all mankind we pray. Of every clime and co.ist, Oh, hear us for our native land, The land we love the most. H. Oh! guard our shore from every foe, IV With peace our borders bless. With prosperous times our cities crown. Our fields with plcnteousness. 4. Reading the Declaration of Independence, 5. Historical Address, .... 6. Singing, ....... I. My country! 'tis of thee, Sweet land of liberty, Of thee I sing: Land where my fathers died I Land of the Pilgrims' pride ! From every mountain side Let freedom ring. II. My native country, thee — Land of the noble free — Thy name I love ; I love thy rocks and rills. Thy woods and templed hills ; My heart with rapture thrills Like that above. Unite us in the sacred love Of knowledge, truth, and Thee ; And let our hills and valleys shout The songs of liberty. Lord of the nations, thus to Thee Our country we commend; Be Thou her refuge and her trust. Her everlasting friend. George W. Flint. William E. Simonds. Chorus of 100 Voices. III. Let music swell the breeze. And ring from all the trees Sweet freedom's song ; Let mortal tongues awake ; Let all that breathe partake ; Let rocks their silence break — \ The sound prolong. IV. Our fathers' God ! to thee. Author of liberty. To thee we sing: Long may our land be bright, With freedom's holy light; Protect us by Thy might. Great God, our King ! RECES.S. (During the recess a Collation will be served, while the audience remains seated.) 1. Music, ..... 2. Brief Addresses. 3. Singing, I. Oh! say, can you see, by the dawn's early light. What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming. Whose broad stripes and bright stars, thro' the perilous fight. O'er the ramparts we watched were so gal- lantly streaming; And the rocket's red glare, the bombs burst- ing in air. Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there. Oh ! say, does that star spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave ? II. On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep, Where the foe's haughty host in dread si- lence reposes. What is that which the breeze, o'er the tower- ing steep. As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half dis- closes ? Collinsville Cornet Band. Chorus of 100 Voices. Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam, In full glory reflected now shines in the stream. 'Tis the star spangled banner — oh, long may it wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave ! in. Oh! thus be it ever when freemen shall stand Between their lov'd homes and war's deso- lation. Blest with victory and peace, may the Heaven rescued land Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation. Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, And this be our molto : In God is our trust. 1 And the star spangled banner in triumph shall wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave. Sunset, Salute of 13 Guns. A large display of lire-works in the evening. EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE. Charles Blair, W. W. Hidwell, G. R. Shepherd, Ei>hriani Hoii.q;h, E. H. Sears, Chairman, A. L. Thayer, Secretary, Albert Williams. W. Edgar Simonds, Charles H. Blair, E. A. Hough, W. T- Soudaiit, W. S. Johnson, J. H. Thompson, Charles Blair, Levi Case, Ezra Adams, E. N. White, A. F. Alderman, J. E. Wheelock, Luke Chapman, S. F. Stevens, Giles Sisson, SPECIAL COMMITTEES. PARADE. W. W. Bidwell, Grand Marshal, Albert Williams. SALUTE. Wm. Edgar Simonds, Chairman, MUSIC. E. A. Hough, Chairman, LITERARY EXERCISES. George R. Shepherd, Chairman, D. B. Hale. COLLATION. Charles H. Blair, Chairman, Austin Beckwith. CONSTRUCTION. Ephraim Hough, Chairman, DECORATION. W. ]. Soudant, Chairman, FINANCE. Charles Blair, Chairman, B. F. Jones, Treasurer. PRESERVATION OF ORDER. E. A. Hough. Giles Sisson. A. F. Humphrey, E. H. Sears, A. W. Bristol, B. O. Higley, J. L. Andrews, C. H. Blair. W. S. Johnson, I. D. Marks. T. B. Flint, Albert Williams, W. H. Hawley, Alfred Allen, G. C. Calhoun. Ephraim Hough, E. K. Richardson, A. G. Hart, ADDRESS, My Friends : The history of the town of Canton contains little that is strange or startling, or greatly unlike the history of many other towns, but it is a history all our own ; and gathered here, as we are, to celebrate the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Declaration of In- dependence, a most notable event in our general history, it is a fitting time to glance backward over that series of local events which has resulted in placing our homes and ourselves where they and we are to-day. llie town of Canton is an outgrowth from the town of Simsbury, and is identical therewith in history till the year A. D. 1806; the town of Simsbury is an outgrowth from the original settlement of the town of Windsor; and at this writing the same family names prevail, to a great extent, in all three of these towns. A proportion of the inhabitants of this town, and a still larger proportion of the inhabitants of the towns of Simsbury and Windsor, can trace their ancestry to a band of English families which, under the pastoral charge of Rev. Mr. Warham, sailed from the mother ( ountry in A. D. 1630. They landed at Boston, remained at what is now Dorchester for five years, and, in the fall of 1635 and spring of 1636, journeyed through a hundred miles of primeval forest to the banks of the Connecticut river, and settled at Windsor. In those days there were great forests of stately pines on these mountain sides, among them a very extensive one surrounding what is now the village of Simsbury ; and, somewhere between 1640 and 1645, John Grififin came down there from the Windsor settlement and entered on the rude manufacture of tar, pitch and turpentine from these pines, living in a rude camp and occasionally visited by hunters lO HISTORICAL ADDRESS. of deer and bear, and fishers of salmon an(i trout, all of which then abounded there. The whole tract of land commencing at the bend in the Tunxis, now the Farmington river, nine miles south of us, and running to the Massachusetts line, was then known by the Indian name of Massacoe. In 1648 an Indian, Manahoose byname, kindled a fire which acci- dentally burned a large quantity of Griffin's combustible goods; thereupon Griffin laid hold of the offender and procured from him a rude deed of the whole territory of Massacoe, which deed may be found recorded in the town of Windsor. Griffin soon after procured a similar conveyance from two other Indians, and these deeds were afterward in some sort validated by a deed, given in 1680, in accord- ance with colony laws, Griffin being one of the grantees. The commencement of permanent settlements in Massacoe was as early as 1664; the territory was incorporated as Simsbury in 1670, at which time there were but twenty towns in the whole colony. In 1675 this settlement had grown to about forty families, dwelling in rude log-houses. Then the Indian troubles, known as King Philip's war, broke out, and the settlers were so much harassed by the savages that in March, 1676, acting by order of the General Assembly, they all deserted the settlement. Sunday, March 26, 1676, now two hundred years ago, the Indians came down upon the deserted village and burned it all ; the legend has it that King Philip himself sat upon the neighboring mountain, where the tower now stands, and with grim Indian satisfaction saw the log cabins disappear in flame. That mountain was ever after, till of late, called Mount Philip from this event. The poor exchange of this name for that of Talcott Mountain should never be recognized. The settlers at Simsbury, true to their puritan instincts, early took steps to establish a ministry and build a house of worship. These steps commenced in 1671, but the all-important question of locality came in and retarded the work many years. The town once decided to build the meeting-house on the east side of the Tunxis river, then at Hop Meadow (now Simsbury Street), then near the dwelling of the now deceased General Pheljjs, then again at Hop Meadow, and then HISTORICAL ADDRESS. II at Still another place. The matter was then left to Major Talcott and Captain Allyn, who chose Hop Meadow. The town refused to abide by this selection, and finally settled the matter by drawing lots, wherein chance favored Hop Meadow, and in 1685 the meeting-house was built in front of the burying-ground, then where it is now. At an ordination in 1697, as the records show, beef was furnished at three cents per pound, mutton at three and one-half cents, and rum at four and one-half cents a gill. In 1 725 an agitation commenced for the erection of a new meeting- house, and the bitter controversy waged over it lasted thirteen years. It was so violent as to separate friends and families ; it became so fierce and general that the ministerial association suspended the ad- ministration of the "Lord's Supper," and for three years the Gene- ral Assembly refused to appoint any justices of the peace. Locality after locality was decided upon in town meeting only to be rejected at the next meeting; committee after committee appointed by the General Assembly reported a location only to have the report rejected by the people. The controversy was settled at last by the division of the town into three ecclesiastical societies, each with a meeting-house for itself. The meeting-house for the Hop Meadow society was built in 1743. As you travel to Hartford, by the Connecticut Western Railroad, you may see an old church and burying-ground, just before you reach "Scotland" station. This is the Protestant Episcopal Church of St. Andrews, and owes its foundation, in 1740, to the bitter controversy waged over the building of the Congregational meeting-house in Simsbury. The best authority that can be had gives this quarrel as the reason and occasion of the settlement of what is now the town of Canton, then called West Simsbury. Those who care to see an easily accessi- ble instance of the use of this name, as well as of our colonial existence, under the rule of a king, have but to visit the old burying- ground, a hundred rods east of the Canton Center railway station, which was the first burying-ground within our town limits. The earliest residents settled at "Cherry's Brook," and there- 12 HISTORICAF. ADDRESS. about. "Cherry's Brook" was named from an Indian having his habitat in that locality, who frequently appeared at Hop Meadow, or vSimsbury Street, to whom the people there gave the sobriquet of "Cherry," from his fondness, I suspect, of the stimulant known by that name ; for I have it, on good authority, that on an election day afterward, he and other Indians entered the tavern of Oliver Humph- rey, in Canton Street, where he drank till he became noisy and quarrelsome, so that the landlord refused him any more liquor, where- upon he threatened to come of a night, take the landlord's scalp, carry it off to Canada, and "get great bank money" for it ; to which the landlord replied by seizing the Indian's brandished knife, kicking him out of doors, belaboring him with a black snake whip till he brought the blood, and bidding him begone. "Cherry" went, joined some far western tribe, and never re-appeared in these parts. His real name was Waquaheag, and is borne on a deed recorded in the State records. I am satisfied that "Cherry's Pond" was named from this Indian, and not, as is sometimes said, from the wild cherries on its banks, for — the cherries are not there. The earliest known settler of what is now Canton was Richard Case, who came from Simsbury in 1737. The site of his old house may still be seen, opposite the house of his descendant John Case, on the eastern slope of East or " Woodchuck " hill. He had ten sons and two daughters ; and his son Sylvanus, whom some of you before me have seen, was the first white child born within our town limits. Following Richard Case, in 1738, there came, from Simsbury, four brothers, Samuel, Thomas, Jonathan, and John Barber. Dr. Samuel I Barber lived on the premises now occupied by George Lamphear ; he had eleven sons and three daughters, all of whom lived to become men and women. Sergeant Thomas Barber lived on the premises since occupied by Hosea Case, now deceased ; the house was taken down by Giles Sisson. He had five sons and as many daughters. Jonathan Barber lived on land since owned by Gardner Mills, just HISTORICAL ADDRESS. I3 south of the house of Jesse L. Barber, and now owned by Alfred Humphrey ; he had but two sons and one daughter. He died in early life at the siege and capture of Louisbourg. John Barber lived in a house on the site of the one since occupied by Treat Lambert, and now, I think, occupied by Howard Rogers. In 1 740 came Deacon Abraham Case and settled on East Hill. In the same year came Amos Case, brother to Abraham, and also settled on East Hill, in a house near the present. residence of Myron Case. In 1 741 came Benjamin Dyer, a school-mate of Benjamin Frank- lin, from Boston, and settled on the premises now occupied by Daniel H. Page. The Page house is believed to be the oldest house in town, having been built, as is asserted, in 1747. In 1 741 Samuel Humphrey settled at Suffrage Street. His house stood near the spring back of the Connecticut Western Railroad sta- tion, and an old barn built by him is still standing. He appears to have been the first settler at Suffrage Street. The name of Suffrage was given this locality because of the sufferings and privations to which the earliest settlers there were exposed during the first winter of their settlement. The next settler at Suffrage was Dudley Case, who came in 1742 and settled on the site of the since well known Hosford House, which burned down in November, 1874. Dudley Case died in 1792, and Eliphalet Curtis kept the house a few years. Abram Hosford, from whom the house was named, commenced here as landlord in 1798, and kept the tavern for fifty years. Of late the inn has had an unsavory reputation. In the days of Abram Hosford, and before the day of rail- roads, this was a famous hostelry. It stood on the turnpike from Hart- ford to Albany, one of the most crowded thoroughfares in the whole country. Its fires went not out fr(un one year's end to the other ; parties were constantly arriving or departing, and the scene was one of uninterrupted life and bustle. Coaches, drawn by four or six horses, regularly drew up at the door, and their approach was always heralded by the merry winding of the driver's horn. The man who, fifty years ago, should have predicted that all this l)usiness and bustle would soon be done away with, by means of an invention then yet to 14 HISTORICAL ADDRESS. be made, would have been scouted as a lunatic. Various interestin legends hang about this old house, with more or less foundation ii fact. During the War of the Revolution a French officer, a paymaste bearing French gold for paying French troops, then stationed nea the Hudson, stopped over night at this house and departed in th morning, never to be heard of afterward, murdered, probably, fo the gold he bore. This murder doubtless gave rise to the traditio of a benighted traveler passing through the dark defile in the high way, just west of Lyman Higley's, and meeting a flying horseman dead and headless : and perhaps to another tradition of a diamonc vendor murdered in that dark pass and his headless body thrown int< Cherry's Pond. True or false, these stories have, I suspect, recurre( to some of us, more than once, when driving through that dark pas at night; and our horses have had to go a little faster whether or no The next settler at Suffrage Street was Captain Ezekiel Humphrey who came in 1744 and lived on the premises now owned and lateb occupied by Doctor Ben-Adam Kasson. I have the records of many other of the early settlers in Wes Simsbury, but, for want of time, these must suffice. About the year 1741, the people of West Simsbury, true puritans., commenced to hold religious meetings in private houses. The Gene ' ral Assembly erected West Simsbury into an ecclesiastical society ir 1750; the first pastor thereafter was Rev. Evander Morrison. The first meeting-house was built in 1763, occupied fifty-one years, taken down in 1S14, and the one now standing, built on tlie same spot; and dedicated in 1815. The dedication sermon was preached b) Rev. Jeremiah Hallock, pastor from 1785 to 1826, a period of fort> years. The interior of this church, at Canton Center, was remodeled into its present elegant shape in 1874. Jairus Burt was pastor of this church from 1826 till his death, in 1857. Rev. Mr. Hallock and Rev. Jairus Burt were strong men,( divines of the genuine Jonathan Edwards stamp, who strove to serve God with every fibre of their bodies and every faculty of their minds, struggling meanwhile with the doctrines of foreordination and free- HISTORICAL ADDRESS. 15 !, after a fashion that the present generation little understands, endance on this church in the olden time was no light matter, 3cially in winter. The pews were deep, square boxes, that a man Id but just see over, and the pulpit was high in the air. Tithing 1, armed with wooden rods, kept the sleepy from sleeping, and did scruple to soundly shake the boy who laughed or whispered. The sre and earnest religion professed by our fathers allowed no heat- of the meeting-house in winter, though the women and children [ foot-stoves and foot-warmers. After a while, the congregation de a habit of gathering, during the noon spell, at a building near which came to be called the "cider house," from the fact that it ays had a barrel of cider, free to all. The cider, with the sausages ich the people brought with them and roasted at a large fire-place :he cider house, doubtless served to enable the partakers to endure afternoon freeze with more equanimity. The instrumental music, at one time, was a violin, bass-viol, and rionet. The bass-viol was introduced during Mr. Hallock's pasto- t. Old Lydia Lewis, an early comer, heard its first strains, as the sician was tuning up. She hobbled up the steep gallery stairs, and, dng her cane over the offender, cried, " I've caught you with your lie, and I'll tell Mr. Hallock." Mrs. Eliza E. .Shumway, of Syracuse, N. Y., has in her possession lewter tankard, bearing this inscription : " Tankard used in the mmunion Service of the Society who Built the first Meeting-House West Simsbury, in the year 1763. Rev. Gideon Mills, Pastor." e tankard has a lid, and was passed to the communicants, each one nking from the top. It was Darius Moses, I think, who owned the first wagon which :r came into these parts, a vehicle of the "lumber-box" variety. did not dare, for a long time, to drive his family to church in because the community considered it frivolous. The common de of locomotion was on horseback, frequently upon a pillion. Some of these things seem odd and rather laughable to us, but if / one thinks that these men were not earnest, and God-fearing, and oily manly, that jjerson is greatly mistaken. The men who were l6 HISTORICAL ADDRESS. content to spend a lifetime in subduing a place in the forest, large enough to found a home and rear a family, and to endure p tions which would make life wholly miserable for us, were anim by lofty principle and deep religious convictions. In 1783 there seems to have been some sort of a dissension ir church at Cherry Brook, for at that time a meeting-house was bui the north part of West Simsbury, by a so-called " Independe Association — Deacon Elisha Graham being one of the leading sj — which applied to the General Assembly to be erected intc ecclesiastical society, but the petition, though pressed several y was never granted. For many years Rev. Seth Sage, who had 1 dismissed from the Cherry Brook church, in 1778, officiated as past ' the North-End church, but after his death services pretty much ce: : About 1835, Colonel Decius Humphrey bought the building, m it to the premises where Doctor Kasson lately lived, and used it s cocoonery at the time of the silk-worm fever. His speculation proved unsuccessful ; the late Elias Wood) bought the building, and, with the parts, built a dwelling-hous CoUinsville, a little southwest of his own residence, which is ( standing. In the same year, 1783, a number of persons in the south p^' West Simsbury seceded from the Cherry Brook society, and formi new society, under the name of "Separatists," of which church ^ James Bacon was the first pastor. Two years afterward, in 17 . schism arose among the "Separatists," and about one-half of embraced the Baptist faith. This was the beginning of the ); society at Suffrage Street, or Canton Village. Its meeting hou- built in 1805, and Rev. Jared Mills was the first pastor there, i The edifice stood on the village green. In 1838 it was remoi and moved to its present site. In 1836, ten years after Collins and Company commencolt manufacture of axes and other edge-tools, a Congregational nun house was built in CoUinsville, with four thousand dollars furni by The Collins Manufacturing Company. Rev. H. N. Brinsi HISTORICA I, ADDRESS. I J s the first pastor thereafter, and was succeeded by Rev. C. C. Van- delem. Rev. F. A. Barton was ordained in 1839, and remained I 1843. Rev. Charles McLean was ordained in 1843, ^^'^ officiated 1 1866, dying some years afterwards at Wethersfield, Conn. He 5 an eminent and blameless Christian, and added to his virtues the ices of a finished scholarship. The meeting-house was burned one iterly cold and snowy night, January 18, 1857, and immediately re- ilt, with six thousand dollars furnished by The Collins Company, e thousand dollars contributed by Samuel W. Collins, and two ousand dollars raised by general subscription. That edifice stands fore you. A small but neat Methodist Episcopal meeting-house was built in Drth Canton in 1871, and has had the usual services since. A Methodist Episcopal meeting-house was built in Collinsville in 68 ; its appearance and location are known to you all. A Roman Catholic church building was erected in Collinsville, on s west side of the river, in 1852, and has had the usual services ice. A Protestant Episcopal church building, named " Trinity Church," just finished in Collinsville; the society was legally organized in 75, but had been in existence two or three years previously. The ecclesiastical society of West Simsbury, containing about irteen hundred inhabitants, was incorporated as the town of Canton, act of the General Assembly, in 1S06. The name. Canton, — ggested by the late Ephraim Mills — is derived from a supposed eness to a Swiss canton, the meaning of the word being to divide set off, and the partition from Simsbury made the name appropriate. The first known settler on Collinsville territory was John Wood- -d ; the date of his settlement was about 1745. He built, in 1775, s house later known as the "Tim. Case Tavern," and still later as le Collinsville Hotel, now used as a tenement house, and standing ar the village station of the Connecticut Western Railroad; it is obable that Woodford's earlier log house stood on about the same site. The next known settler, in order of time, was Joseph Segur, who 3 l8 HISTORICAL ADDRESS. P lived on the west side of the river, near the present site of the hou of the late John Grady, and came over in a canoe to his grist-mi', built by him about 1765, which stood on the rocks near the prese? site of The Collins Company's box shop, and which was carried ( in the ''Jefferson flood " of 1801, and never rebuilt. The next mill built on Collinsville territory was a forge-shop f working pig-iron, brought from Canaan, Conn., into wrought. Tb forge was built about 1792, and stood on the present site of The Cc lins Company's old stone shop. It was built and owned by Colon George and Captain Fred. Humphreys, was ruined by a flood in 180 and never restored. In 1805 Captain Fred. Humphreys built a grist-mill on the pre ent site of The Collins Company's polishing shop, afterward sold 1 this Company, and taken down in 1829. In 1815 a saw-mill was built by Captain Fred. Humj)hreys a.\ Samuel Gridley, near by the last-mentioned grist-mill. When Collins and Company, in 1826, bought the water privile: and a few acres of land around, there were but four settlers on C( linsville territory, to wit : Correl Humphrey, who lived in the hou now occupied by J. B. Bodwell — built by Captain Fred. Humi)hre in 1789 ; Isaac P. Humphrey, who lived in a house built in 1792, n( Rodney Carr's wagon shop, which then stood some rods west of present location, alongside the road which ran on the bank of t river or race-way ; Timothy Case, who kept the already mention and not altogether reputable "Tim Case Tavern" ; and Langdon t miller, who lived in a house which stood just in front of the prese site of the Canal Railroad station. The history of Collinsville commences in 1826, and is identic with the history of Samuel Watkinson Collins, one of the nobl men of modern times, who passed to his rest April 30, 1871. 1 conception of the enterprise, which has eventuated in this vast mai facturing establishment, belongs to his brother, David Chittend Collins; but to Samuel W. Collins is due the credit of carrying t work from its first beginning to its present magnificent developmei as the largest of its kind in the world. HTSTORICA I. ADDRESS. I9 These men were the sons of a lawyer, Alexander Collins, resident t Middletown, Connecticut, but who lies buried in Brattleboro, Ver- nont, where he died while away from home on professional business. The son Samuel, early showing large business capacity, was taken nto partnership by his uncle, Mr. Watkinson of Hartford, and the irm of Watkinson and Collins did a good business till Mr. Collins left ;t for. the concern of Collins and Company. The brother David was, at an early age, employed in an iron house in Hartford, and before he was of age commenced the making of axes by hand, with a few men, in that city. Axes at that time were made by common blacksmiths ; they were rude, clumsy affairs, and required a half-day's grinding by the pur- chaser before using. David C. Collins conceived the bold idea of producing ground and polished axes, in large quantities, by machinery; and in looking about for a suitable spot whereon to commence this enterprise, fixed upon the present site of CoUinsville. He was just of age, Samuel was but three years older, and they associated with them another young man, their cousin, William Wells, each contributing five thousand dollars to the capital stock. The name of the partnership was Collins and Company. In 1826 they bought the saw-mill and grist-mill before referred to, and a few acres of land. In 1827 they tore away the old log dam, and built in its place a stone wall, west of where the old stone shop now stands. They also quarried the stone from the spot where the Company's office now stands, and commenced the old stone shop. The race-way in front of the long grind shop was then a part of the bed of the river. They also built a forge shop, a charcoal storehouse, and three houses, one now belonging to the heirs of the late Samuel Barbour, one now occupied by Luke Chapman, and the one next west long occupied by S. W. Collins, who this year boarded about a mile up the river, with Theodore Pettibone, in the house where Mr. Sage now lives. In 1828 Collins and Company built a trip-hammer shop — now a grind shop, just east of the old stone shop — commenced "drawing 20 HISrORICALADDRKSS. ax patterns," and put uj) the two boarding-houses. They offered tc give Doctor O. B. Freeman the land where James Spencer's hous^ now stands to build on, but the Doctor did not think it worth hi while, and settled down at Canton Village. Were it not that out good old friend has since thought better of Collinsville, I should deen: this a fitting opportunity to take our revenge upon him. In 1829 they erected the old "pine tree" shop, and started theii first anthracite fires. They removed the grist mill, and on its site, where the polishing shop now stands, built a grind shop ; also built the old "bit-drawing " shop, and a forge shop, about where the blacking shop now stands. Benjamin T. Wingate, a well-respected citizen im his day, now deceased, commenced work at forging broad-axes, and, as the record shows, lost not a single day in the whole year. He was; afterwards made overseer, and so remained till his deatli. In i and Luke Chapman, master mechanic since 1865. The territory of Canton has always furnished more than its quota when duty called to arms. In the French and the Indian wars, from 1744 to 1763, West Simsbury furnished some twenty men, of whom eight died at Louisbourg, Havanna, and elsewhere. In the War of the Revolution West Simsbury sent from seventy to eighty men. In the French war of 1798 West Simsbury furnished Oliver and George Humphrey, who were in the action between the United States frigate Constitution and the French 74-gun ship La Vengeance. In the war of 181 2 Canton gave fifty men. In the war of 1861-65 Canton sent two hundred and eight of her citizens, and of these she mourns more than the usual proportion of those of whom it may be said : "On Fame's eternal camping ground, Their silent tents are spread ; And Glory guards, with solemn round, The bivouac of the dead." Canton has an honorable record in the matter of her sons who have gone out from her ; the list includes college presidents, con- gressmen, mayors of western cities, lawyers, doctors and divines of good repute. Take her all in all. Canton is a town in which any of her children may well feel a fair measure of pride in pointing to as their place of birth. 24 HISTORICAL ADDRESS. ■ God grant that at the next Centennial, one hundred years from to-) day, when the daisies are waving over all our graves, as they to-day wave over the men whose deeds we now recall, the record of ouri native town may still be fair as now ! THE END. Personal. — The limited time — less than three weeks — given me wherein to prepare this sketch, happening at a time when I was more than ordinarily pressed by professional work, ])Ut it utterly out of my power to prepare a history worthy of the occasion. I have since thought of a deliberate elaboration of the subject, but a sur- vey of the field satisfies me that to do this requires an amount of careful research for i which I can not possibly find the time. I therefore print the address, word for word, as originally delivered. I take pleasure in acknowledging the obligations I am under to various of my present and former townsmen for information furnished, and particularly to Moses S. Dyer, Levi Case, and David B. Hale, Esquires. W. K. S. *i« 3477-226 Lot 21 Printed by Fowler, Miller & Company, 2 Sute Street, Hartford. ^^ ■•^^ i*- cO'o