World United States Massachusetts Saugus

Mike and Roxanne travel east

Saugus Iron Works Oct 4, 2007

Oct 4, 2007 49972 8:40

Leaving Salem and headed to Boston with a stop at the Saugus Iron Works.

Soon after Salem was settled in 1626 other settlers began going further into the frontier to set up other towns. One of these was Saugus. John Winthrop, Jr. a student of Metallurgy found significant ore deposits in the Boston area and was offered incentives to establish an iron works.

He sailed to England in 1641 to secure backers but after the initial effort at Braintree Winthrop was replaced by Richard Leader, an engineer, who picked Saugus because of its waterpower, water transport woodlands, and raw materials.

By 1646 Saugus was producing iron products for both Massachusetts and England with a level of technology reaching that of 17th century Europe. But in the early 1650's financial problems beset the iron works and it never recovered. 1668 was the last recorded blast from the Saugus Iron Works.

Financial problems were not all that beset Saugus. Puritans settled Saugus but the ironworkers were Scottish indentured servants, many with families.

Many of these indentured servants were offered incentives for hard work such as shorted work contracts. They then became independent workers, but not freemen. To be a Freeman required membership in the church, which in turn required a declaration of conversions. The ironworkers were here for financial gain not for religious purposes. They did not share the same belies as the Puritans.

The Puritans lived by a strict social contract enforced by a theocratic government. The ironworkers on the other hand, played hard and fought hard when not working. They were often called before the magistrate for drunkenness, absence from church, common swearing, domestic violence, physical assault, verbal assault and other things.

These things caused dissent in the town and often as an ironworker became independent he would move to another town or another forge.

The iron works at Saugus is a reconstruction of the blast furnace forge, and rolling and slitting mill over the original 14th century foundations. The area has been in renovations for over a year and is not fully open at this time.

We were able to watch a movie on the mill and view the furnace, forge and mill from above. In the next year the museum will be reopened and the river and wharf will be cleaned up and opened.

Items made here, other than iron bars were household items, such as pot and pans and nails for building homes and blacksmithing.

Saugus is one part of the Essex National Heritage Area which encompassed over 500 square miles North of Boston and includes settlements, maritime trades and industrialization areas.

12:15 After trying to enter the State Park through the "back door" we finally got set up and headed out to Quincy to the Adam National Historic Site. We were too late for the full tour which included the homes where John Adams and John Quincy Adams were born, but we were able to take the trolley past the homes for pictures and then were given a tour of the "Big House" where four generations of Adams have lived from 1788 to 1926.

In 1926 Brooks Adams, the fourth generation, gave the home to the historical society. The home has been standing since 1731 and the furnishings all belonged to one or another of the generations of Adams. Many of John and Abigail things are still in the home, furniture, pictures, and dishes. The same is true of each successive generation. There are not reproductions; the wallpaper is from 1840 and many of the rugs date before that.

Just outside the home is another structure and this was the library utilized by both John and John Quincy Adams. The library housed over 8000 volumes when John and Abigail lived there. It has a high ceiling with floor to ceiling bookcases. There is a catwalk around the top half of the room to reach the upper books. In the center is a huge table and the desk used by John Adams and a podium used by John Quincy Adams is there.

We then headed back to the RV and found the library in Hingham so we could get caught up on the e-mail and get the live journal and Kodak Gallery updated.

Tomorrow we head into Boston and will hit the National Park sites there, JFK National Site, Longfellow NHS, Boston NHS and if possible see some of the Freedom Trail, Bunker Hill and the Old North Church as well as the Constitution in the Boston Naval Yard.

Temperatures are still high, today was in the high 70's with tomorrow suppose to be the same. I am sitting here in the RV at 10:00 p.m., with all the windows open and the temp is 74°.