History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts - citizen hylbom blog

Seaverns — contracted to erect and cover a frame
building thirty-one feet square. The building,
though unfinished, was first used October 1,178-i,
and was finished in 1788. July 14, 1789, a
church of sixteen members was recognized by an
ecclesiastical council. They had no settled min-
ister till January 30, 1811, when they united
with the church in Framingliam, and Rev. Charles
Train was ordained as pastor of the Baptist
Church of Christ in Weston and Framingliam.
They separated. May 3, 18:i6, Mr. Train remaining
with the Framingham church, the Wes-
ton church numbering at this time about forty
members. The present church-building was ded-
icated October 8, 1828. June 30, 1830, Rev.
Timothy P. Ropes, a graduate of Waterville Col-
lege in 1827, was ordained as pastor, and remained
three years. The parsonage was erected from the
material of the old church-building during the latter
part of his stay. From small beginnings the church
has grown to be the largest in the town. Since
Mr. Ropes the successive pastors have been : Rev.
Joseph Hodges, Jr., a graduate of Waterville Col-
lege, 1830, "settled in 1835, resigned in 1839;
Eev. Origen Crane, educated at Newton Theological
Seminary, settled in 1840, resigned in 1854;
Rev. Calvin H. Topliff, graduated at Brown University,
1846, settled in 1854, resigned in 1866;
Rev. Luther G. Barrett, graduated at Harvard Col-
lege, 1862, settled in 1867, resigned in 1870 ;
Rev.
Alonzo F. Benson, settled in 1870, died July 15,
1874; and Rev. Amos Harris, the present pastor,
settled January 1, 1873.
In 1798 a Methodist meeting-house — simjjly
a boarded enclosure, with a platform for the
preacher, and rough board seats — was put up in
the north part of the town, "about si.'cty rods
northeast of the present ilethodist Church, on the
Lexington road The circuit to which this
chapel belonged comprised, besides the town of
Weston, the towns of Needham, Marlborough,
Framingham, and Hopkinton ; the whole at first
under the charge of one preacher, Rev. John L.
Hill. The number of preachers was afterwards
increased to three. The first trustees of the Meth-
odist Church of Weston were Abraham Bemis,
Habakkuk Stearns, Jonas Bemis, John Yiles, and
Daniel Stratton. Their present church-building
was erected in 1828, and dedicated in 1829." By
an act of the General Court, approved by Governor
Lincoln, February 28, 1829, the trustees of the
495
incorporated. In 1833 this church was consti-
tuted a station, with a regularly appointed
preacher, Waltham and Lincoln being included
in the station for a few years. Waltham became
an independent station in 1839, and took away
some sixty members of the church, reducing the
number of members to about eighty.
A century ago there was thought to be more
travel over the " great road " from Waltham
through the middle of Weston, — it being the
post-road from Boston to New York, — than on
any other, of equal distance from any capital city,
in the Union. For many years this was the great
thoroughfare over which passed the supplies and
manufactures sent in from the northern and west-
ern sections of New England to Boston. By the
old meeting-house passed large droves of cattle on
their way to Monday's market at Brighton. Large
teams transported several hundred thousand chairs
annually to the city, and thousands of loads of all
kinds of country produce. The number of iims is
an index to the amount of travel through the town,
and of these there were four in the grouj) of houses
that, straggling along both sides of the road,
constituted the " Road Town " of early times. It
was not until after the opening of the West Boston
Bridge to Cambridge, and the Mill-dam Road, and
the establishment of railroads, that this stream of
travel was diverted to other channels, and with
the change the business of the taverns ceased to
be profitable, and they were closed.
When Washington visited the Eastern States in
October, 1789, he lodged and breakfasted at the
tavern of Captain John Flagg, where he was called
upon by several prominent citizens. Here Captain
Fuller's company of horse met him, and escorted
him through Waltham and Watertown to Cam-
bridge.
October 25, 1765, the town voted not to give
any instructions to its representative to do any-
thing concerning the Stamp Act, but later the
people became fully aroused. " At a Meeting of
the People of Boston, and the neighboring Towns,
at the Old South Meeting-House in Boston, on
Tuesday, December 14, 1773, and continued by
adjournment to Thursday, 16th of said Month,
occasioned by the perfidious Arts of our restless
enemies, to render ineffectual the late Resolutions
of the Body of the People, Mr. Samuel Phillips
Savage,' a Gentleman of the Town of Weston, was
chosen iModerator." Samuel Hobbs, of Weston, a
First Methodist Episcopal Society in Weston were farmer, and also a tanner and currier by trade, while