Bi-Weekly Newsletter

Upcoming: Today, Saturday December 2nd – EASTON GARDEN CLUB HOLIDAY GREENS SALE will be held from 9 to 12 at the Historical Society. Purchase some beautiful greens for your holidays! In addition, the RR Station is now decorated with festive white lights and the ‘official’ lighting will take place on the same day. The RR Station will remain open until 6 pm.

​Old Road
On Sunday November 19th Director Steve Anderson and I met up with members of the Stoughton Historical Society, led by Dwight MacKerron, off Roche Bros Way to access the railroad tracks. This section of track runs from the North Easton Station, behind Roche Bros Supermarket and on to Stoughton center to the Station there. We were looking for remains of an old road that connected Easton and Stoughton prior to the laying of the turnpike now known as Washington Street. It was a sunny and brisk day, but not too cold. It was a short walk to the tracks and once there we walked north toward Stoughton.

​One stone wall, one side of the old road.


Before long a very large glacial rock could be seen off to the east. Once beyond the rock Dwight pointed out the remnants of the old road. It runs for perhaps seventy-five yards and is bordered on both sides by stone walls. The road was originally discovered by Dwight MacKerron and members of the Stoughton Historical Society. According to him the road was shown on at least one old map. He believes the road- (the part we saw was in Stoughton)- probably swung east toward Washington Street. In the other direction it ran toward Easton. Exactly where is currently unknown.

Glacial rock.
​
On our walk we came upon a small animal skull laying on top of the ground- a bit of a surprise, a railroad spike, and telegraph/telephone poles (pictured below) from sometime after the railroad line went in. The Easton Branch Railroad opened from Stoughton to North Easton on May 16, 1855.

​Fallen pole.
Another Old Road
Chaffin in his History of Easton (Highways) writes that some of the early Easton roads were merely cart-paths and that “there are a number of abandoned roads in Easton that were once considerably used highways. There was one from North Easton village to Solomon Foster’s place, and so round east to the old Stoughton road, now Washington Street.” Solomon Foster lived close by the Stoughton line. In Chaffin’s time this road was “not yet obliterated.” Solomon R. Foster fought in the Civil War and is buried in the Washington Street cemetery.
In another passage (Old Abandoned Homesteads) Chaffin writes, “Not long after the incorporation of the town a few settlements were made up in the extreme northeast quarter, and an old road ran…. northerly from the village of North Easton nearly to the Stoughton line, and thence easterly, and so round by Washington Street.” In the village there was a road sometimes referred to as the Sol. Foster Road, that according to Chaffin did not fare well in the long run. The road was voted in 1744 and later in 1772, though little was done to maintain it. In Chaffin’s time “it was no longer a thorough-fare to Stoughton and was in fact very early superseded by the other two roads to that town.” Where Solomon Foster’s road was exactly is also unclear.
Thank you to Dwight MacKerron and the Stoughton Historical Society for a nice walk and great information.

            In granite cold, I

Follow rust-colored 
Fragments of old tracks 
Going nowhere
 
Anne Wooster Drury
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