History of Lynn, Essex County, Massachusetts, including Lynnfield ...

3i6 Pictorial Addenda.
Next we present an engraving of the first rail-road depot in
Lynn
;
and a poor little one it was, as will be seen. It was
erected by the Eastern Rail-road Company as soon as they were
ready for travel, in
1838, and stood on the north-west side of the
track, occupying as much of the site of the present brick and
iron station, in Central Square, as its diminutive proportions
required. Half a dozen trains or so of small cars, not much
larger than old-fashion stage-coaches, and like them opening
only at the sides, passed up and down daily ; and the freight
transportation was but a fraction of what it now is. After ten
years' service it was in 1848 succeeded by the more capacious
and convenient but hardly more tasteful brick station, of which
a picture may be seen on page 40 ; and this latter, in 1872, gave
place to the well-appointed station that now adorns the Square.
FIRST RAIL-KUAD STATION IN
Central Square, 1838.
LYNN.
For a hundred and fifty years shoe-manufacturing has been the
leading mechanical industry of Lynn, and till within a few years,
the work was done by hand ; the buildings required were small
and very common in their appointments ;
but when ponderous
machinery was introduced substantial and capacious structures
began to appear. While the work was done by hand, the shoes
were cut out in small buildings occupied by the " bosses," and
thence taken by the "jours" to their own little shops, made
up and returned. These shops were to be seen in all quarters,
for they rather affected positions whence the incomings and
outgoings of neighbors could be observed ; and
the sprightly
music of the lapstone and hammer was well-nigh ceaseless.
In the picture of Market street, which precedes the title-