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"The History of Lynn including Nahant" by Alonzo Lewis, - The Lynn Bard

Chapter XII Shoemaking at Lynn - Tanneries - Morocco Manufactories - Fishery - Public Buildings and Societies - Climate - Sea Bathing - Census - Cottages at Nahant. Spare none but such as go in clouted shoon, For such are thrifty, honest men.                                                                     SHAKSPARE. The American foot shall be as celebrated as the Phidian nose.                                         WILLIS

 

     LADIES' SHOES began to be made in Lynn at a very early period; and that business has long been the principal occupation of the inhabitants.  Shoemaking is a very ancient and respectable employment, for we read in Homer, of princes manufacturing their own shoes.  They have been made of various materials - hides, flax, silk, cloth, wood, iron, silver, and gold - and in great variety of shape, plain and ornamental.  Among the Jews they were made of leather, linen, and wood.  Soldiers wore them of brass and iron, tied with thongs.  To put off the shoes was an act of veneration.  The Asiatics and Egyptians wore shoes made of the bark of the papyrus.  Among the Greeks, the shoe generally reached to the mid-leg, like what we now call bootees.  Ladies, as a mark of distinction, wore sandals - a sort of loose shoe, something like a modern slipper.  Xenophon relates that the ten thousand Greeks, who followed young Cyrus, wanting shoes in their retreat, covered their feet with raw hides, which occasioned them great injury.  The Roman shoes were of two kinds - the calceus, which covered the whole foot; and the solea, which covered only the sole, and was fastened with thongs.  Ladies of rank wore white, and sometimes red shoes; other women wore black.  The shoes of some of the Roman emperors were enriched with precious stones.  It was generally regarded as a mark of effeminacy for men to wear shoes.  Phocion, Cato, and other noble Romans, had no covering for their feet when they appeared in public.  In the ninth and tenth centuries, the greatest princes of Europe wore wooden shoes, or wooden soles fastened with leather thongs.  In the eleventh century, the upper part of the shoe was made of leather, and the sole of wood.  
     The Saxons wore shoes, or scoh, with thongs.  Bede's account of Cuthbert is curious.  He says: 'When the saint had washed the feet of those who came to him, they compelled him to take off his own shoes, that his feet might also be made clean; for so little did he attend to his bodily appearance, that he often kept his shoes, which were of leather, on his feet for several months together.'  (Bede, Vit. Cuthbert, p. 243.)  
     In the Dialogues of Elfric, composed to instruct the Anglo Saxon youth in Latin, we find that the shoemaker had a very comprehensive trade.  'My craft is very useful and necessary to you.  I buy hides and skins, and prepare them by my art, and make of them shoes of various kinds, and none of you can winter without my craft.'  Among the articles which he fabricates, he mentions - ancle leathers, shoes, leather hose, bridle thongs, trappings leather bottles, flasks, halters, pouches and wallets. (Turner's History Anglo Saxons, 3, 111.)
     In the year 1090, in the reign of William Rufus, the great dandy Robert was called the Horned, because he wore shoes with long points, stuffed, turned up, and twisted like horns.  These kind of shoes became fashionable, and the toes continued to increase in extent, until, in the time of Richard II., in 1390, they had attained such an enormous extent as to be fastened to the garter by a chain of silver or gold.  The clergy declaimed vehemently against this extravagance; but the fashion continued, even for several centuries.  In the year 1463, the Parliament of England passed an act prohibiting shoes with pikes more than two inches in length, under penalties to maker and wearer; and those who would not comply were declared excommunicate.  Even at a late period shoes were twice the length of the foot, or so long as "to prevent kneeling in devotion at God's house."  In the year 1555, a company of Cordwainers was incorporated in old Boston, England.  By their charter, it was ordered, "That no person shall set up, within the said borough, as Cordwainers, until such time as they can sufficiently cut and make a boot or shoe, to be adjudged by the wardens... that if any foreigner, or person who did not serve his apprenticeship in the said borough, shall be admitted to his freedom, he shall then pay to the wardens L3 2s. 8d.... and that no fellow of this corporation, his journeyman or servant, shall work on the Sabbath day, either in town or country."  (Thompson's History of Boston, Eng., p. 82.)
     Shoes in their present form came into use in the year 1633, a short time after the first settlement of this country.  The first shoemakers known at Lynn, were Philip Kertland and Edmund Bridges, both of whom came over in 1635.  The business gradually increased with the increase of inhabitants; and many of the farmers, who worked in the fields in the summer, made shoes in their shops in the winter.  The papers relating to the Corporation of Shoemakers, mentioned by Johnson, in 1651, are unfortunately lost; having probably been destroyed by the mob in 1765.  As the first settlers introduced many of their customs from England, the privileges were probably similar to those conferred, in 1555, on the Cordwainers of old Boston.  
     The term Cordwainer, as a designation of this craft, has long usurped the place of Ladies' Shoemaker.  This word had its origin from Cordova, a city in the south of Spain, where a peculiar kind of leather was manufactured for ladies' shoes.  The word in the Spanish is Cordoban; in the Portuguese, Cordovan; and in the French, Cordonan; whence the term Cordouaniers, or Cordwainers.  In the eighth century, the descendants of Alaric, in revenge at being passed by in the choice of a king, called the Arabians to their aid.  They came, and Roderic, the last of the Goths, fell in the seven days battle, at Tarik, in 711.  In 756, Abderrhaman made himself master of Spain, and established his caliphate at Cordova.  During the Arabian power, agriculture, commerce, the arts and sciences, flourished in Spain; and in that period, the celebrated Cordova leather was introduced.  It was similar to what is now known as morocco, and was altogether superior to any thing which had been previously used for the manufacture of ladies' shoes.  It was at first colored black, and afterward red, by the use of cochineal. 
     At the beginning, women's shoes at Lynn, were made of neat's leather, or woolen cloth; only they had a nicer pair, of white silk, for the wedding day, which were carefully preserved, as something too delicate for ordinary use.  About the year 1670, shoes began to be cut with broad straps; for buckles which were worn by women at well as by men.  In 1727, square-toed shoes, and buckles for ladies, went out of fashion; though buckles continued to be worn by men till after the revolution.  The sole-leather was all worked with the flesh side out.  In 1750, John Adam Dagyr, a Welchman, gave great impulse and notoriety to the business, by producing shoes equal to the best made in England.  From that time the craft continued to flourish, until it became the principal business of the town.  Fathers, sons, journeymen, and apprentices, worked together, in a shop of one story in height, twelve feet square, with a fire-place in one corner, and a cutting-board in another.  The finer quality of shoes were made with white and russet rands, stitched very fine, with white waxed thread.  They were made with very sharp toes, and had wooden heels, covered with leather, from half an inch to two inches in height; called cross-cut, common, court, and Wurtemburgh heels.  About the year 1800, wooden heels were discontinued, and leather heels were used instead.  In 1783, Mr. Ebenezer Breed introduced the use of morocco leather; and at the commencement of the present century, two of the principal shoe manufacturers, were Mr. Amos Rhodes and Col. Samuel Brimblecom.   Lynn is now the principal place in America for the production of ladies' shoes.  There are 130 manufactories, employing about 3000 workmen, and about as many women binders.  There are about Three Million Pairs of Shoes annually made, valued at nearly Two Million Dollars.
     Many improvements have, within a few years, been introduced into the manufacture of shoes.  Formerly all shoemakers sat at their employment, but that was found injurious to the health of many.  In 1804, Thomas Parker, of England, invented the 'Standing Seat,' as it is called, which at first was sold for two guineas.  Lasts were formerly made by hand, by a very slow process; but Mr. Richard Richards, of Lynn, now has a machine in operation, impelled by steam, in which lasts, of any  required pattern, are shaped with great facility.  The same gentleman has recently obtained a patent for a new Sole Cutter, which greatly relieves the labor of the mechanic.
     Many Shoemakers have become eminent.  Nilant has a book on shoes.  Baudoin, a shoemaker, has a learned work on the ancient shoe, entitled 'De Solea Veterum."  Hans Sack, a german shoemaker, wrote fifty volumes of prose.  Robert Bloomfield composed that delightful poem, the Farmer's Boy, while at work on his bench, and wrote it down when he had finished the labor of the day.  William Gifford, the editor of the London Quarterly Review, and the translator of Juvenal, served his apprenticeship with a cordwainer.  John Pounds, of Portsmouth, while engaged in his daily work, contrived to educate some hundreds of the neighboring children.  In our own country, Roger Sherman, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, was a shoemaker; and John Greenleaf Whittier left the manufacture of shoes for ladies' feet, to make verses for their boudoirs.  
     Poets, in all ages, have noticed the shoe as an important part of the dress, especially of a lady.  In the time of Chaucer, the vamps of ladies' shoes were fashioned in the resemblance of a gothic church window.  Shakspeare bestows an exquisite compliment on the dressing of the foot, when he says of a lady -
        
     'Nay- her foot speaks.'

Butler, in his Hudibras, makes the hero of that inimitable poem pay his devours to his lady-love, in the following terms -
         
     'Madam! I do, as is my duty, 
     Honor the shadow of your shoe-tie!'
A certain critic, of more learning than good sense, once undertook to bestow an unusual quantity of censure on two of our own lines, in the description of a lady's person
        
     'But if one grace might more attention suit, 
     It was the striking neatness of her foot.'

Now we think that every reader of good taste will agree with us, at least in admiring the idea which these lines are intended to convey.
     Genteel Reader - for I trust I shall have many such- are you aware that you are now perhaps trampling the industry of Lynn beneath your feet!  How often are we indebted to those of whom we think least, for many of our most valuable and salutary enjoyments.  Look at that young lady, who might be taken by Brackett as a model for one of the graces, reclining in an easy-chair; with her foot upon an ottoman.  See the delicate shoe which fits as if it were formed by the hand of Apelles!  Shakspeare, in his Romeo and Juliet, says - 'I would I were a glove upon that hand!'  How often have I wished - 'O, would I were a shoe upon that foot!'  Perhaps neither she who displays that elegant foot, nor the many who admire it, think that much of its grace is to be ascribed to some unknown individual on the shores of Lynn.  Yet there, by the sound of the rippling waters, are thousands of men employed in manufacturing all manner of outer vestures for the delicate foot, and as many women engaged in binding and trimming them.  There the belle of the city may suit both her form and taste with the newest and most delicately formed style, either for the boudoir or ball-room, with its classic shape and its Parisian title - there the rustic maid may procure the laced buskin which shall add a new grace to her modest beauty - and there the mother may find the substantial fabric, adapted to domestic comfort for her own foot; or the soft tissue, with its congenial trimming of gossamer and gold, for the foot of her loved little one.  So long as the foot needs to be protected, so long will the manufactures of Lynn continue to flourish. 
     The tanning of sole leather was commenced in Lynn at an early period.  In 1630, Francis Ingalls built a tannery in Swampscot, which was the first tannery in the United States.  In 1720, John Lewis opened a tannery in Boston street.  In 1820, there were six tanneries, but in consequence of the importation of leather from Philadelphia and other places, they were all discontinued before 1833.
     In the year 1800, William Rose introduced the manufacture of Morocco leather, in a factory by the brook, on the south side of the common.  There are now three tanneries and eight manufacturies of Morocco in Lynn.
     The other principal business of the town is the cod and mackerel fishery, which is very productive.  There are fifteen schooners and about one hundred boats employed in the business at Swampscot; and a few boats are also engaged at Nahant.  These two places supply Boston, and many country towns, with fish during the year; and, in summer, many hundred lobsters are daily sent into the markets.
     There are, in the town, three grist mills, one mill for chocolate and spices, an establishment for the manufacture of paper hangings, a dye house, two factories for printing silks and calicoes, a manufactory of sashes, blinds, and bedsteads, a planing mill and a manufactory of cutlery and shoemakers' tools.
     Lynn has thirteen churches, nine principal school houses, an academy, post office, lyceum bank, two newspapers,  (the Washingtonian, and Essex County Whig,) an institution for savings, two insurance companies, eleven fire engines, a social and circulating library, a natural history society, a temperance society, an anti-slavery society, two ladies' benevolent societies, several societies for providing watchers for the sick, and ten hotels.  There are three military companies; the Lynn Artillery, Lynn Light Infantry, and Lynn Mechanics' Rifle Company, - all in a good state of discipline.
     The climate of Lynn is generally healthy, but the prevalence of east winds is a subject of complaint for invalids, especially those afflicted with pulmonary disorders.  That these winds are not generally detrimental to health is evident from the fact, that the people of Nahant, surrounded by the sea, and subject to all its breezes, are unusually healthy.  From some cause, however, there are a great number of deaths by consumption.  Formerly, a death by this disease was a rare occurrence, and then the individual was ill for many years, and the subjects were usually aged persons.  In 1727, when a young man died of consumption at the age of nineteen, it was noticed as a remarkable circumstance; but now, young people frequently die of that disease after an illness of a few months.  Of 316 persons, whose deaths were noticed in the First Parish for about twenty years previous to 1824, 112 were the subjects of consumption; and in some years since, more than half the deaths have been occasioned by that insidious malady.  There is something improper and unnatural in this.  It is doubtless owing to the habits of the people, to their confinement in close rooms, over hot stoves, and to their want of exercise, free air, and ablution.  It is owing to their violation of some of the great laws of nature.  To one accustomed, as I have always been, to ramble by the sea shore, and on the hill top, to breathe the ocean wind and the mountain air, this close confinement of the shops would be a living death. Were it not for the social intercourse, I would as soon be confined in a prison cell as in a room twelve feet square, with a hot stove, and six or eight persons breathing the heated air over and over again, long after it is rendered unfit to sustain life.  If mechanics find it convenient to work together in shops, they should build them longer and higher, and have them well ventilated.  The subject of bathing, too, requires more attention.  There are many people in Lynn, as there are in all other places, who never washed themselves all over in their lives, and who would as soon think of taking a journey through the air in a balloon, as of going under water. How they contrive to exist I cannot imagine; they certainly do not exist in the highest degree of happiness, if happiness consists in the enjoyment of that free and buoyant mind which is nourished by pure air and clean water.  Some of these water haters, a few years since made a law, that boys should not bathe in sight of any house; yet they have furnished no bathing houses; and there are no secluded places, excepting where the lives of children would be endangered.  Thus they not only refuse to bathe themselves, but prevent the young, by a heavy penalty, from enjoying one of the purest blessings and highest luxuries of existence.  Perhaps nothing is more conducive to health than sea bathing.  I do not wish for a return of the 'olden time,' with all its errors and absurdities, but I do desire a return to that simplicity which is born of purity. 
     By the census of 1840, Lynn contained 9,375 inhabitants.  It is the second town in Essex county, the seventh in Massachusetts, and the thirty-sixth in the United States.  The annual expenditures of the town are about $18,000, of which $6,000 are appropriated for the support of schools.  Education has received considerable attention, but much remains to be done.  The roads are good, the houses neat, and the inhabitants moral and industrious.  In respect to the beauty of the scenery, and the equality of the people, there are few places where a resident is more desirable.  The great mass of the people are in comfortable pecuniary circumstances.  None are very rich - few are very poor.  Probably there is no town of equal population in the world, where the inhabitants are more on an equality.  They are remarkable for their temperance, and much is annually expended in relieving the poor.  If the people are wanting in aught, it is perhaps in their appreciation of services rendered purely to the public, and not to party or sect.  The two men who did the most for the manufactures of the town died in the poor house.  Mr. Whiting, who gave a name to the place, has no stone to mark the spot of his interment; and the four men who fell at Lexington, boldly battling for freedom, when liberty was almost as hopeless as a dream, have no monument to their memory.  Perhaps there is no greater injustice than that men, who have employed their abilities for the benefit of mankind, and the attainment of honorable purposes, should be allowed to slumber in the dust of neglect; and that those should engross every mark of attention and every profitable trust, whose hearts never felt a throb of love for their native country, and whose deeds leave no inheritance to humanity.
     Perhaps it will be an interesting curiosity to some to mention, that the descendants of several old families are still very numerous.  The following are the principal names, with the number of legal voters:

Newhall, 82	Chase, 31	Mansfield, 21	Moulton, 15
Breed, 68	Phillips, 30	Rhodes, 20	Tarbox, 15
Johnson, 55	Ingalls, 27	Oliver, 18	Collins, 14
Alley, 48	Parrott, 26	Bachiler, 17	Mudge, 13
Lewis, 40	Stone, 26	Smith, 16	Perkins, 12
Brown, 33	Richardson, 24	Hawkes, 15	Fuller, 12

     It would doubtless be gratifying to some of the early settlers, if they could return and witness the advancements which the town has made in the space of two hundred and fifteen years - to see the dark wilderness filled with the abodes of industry and happiness; and to behold Nahant, which was then 'the portion of foxes,' now annually visited by the best and fairest in the land.
     Nahant has always been a place of interest to the lovers of natural scenery, and has long been visited in the summer season by parties of pleasure, who, when there were no hotels, cooked, their chowders on the rocks.  Few of the numerous visitors at Nahant have any idea of the place in its primitive simplicity, when its advantages were known and appreciated by a limited number of the inhabitants of the metropolis and neighboring towns.  Accommodations for visitors were then circumscribed, and food was not very abundant.  A chicken, knocked down by a fishing-pole in the morning, and cooked at dinner, served to increase the usual meal of fish, and was regarded as one of the luxuries of the place.  But notwithstanding the inconveniences to which visitors were subjected, several families from Boston passed the whole summer in the close quarters of the village.  The Hon. James T. Austin, the late William Sullivan, Hon. William Minot, Charles Bradbury, Esq., Rufus Amory, Esq., and Marshall Prince, were among those who early and annually visited the rock-bound peninsula with their families.  At this time, Nahant did not boast of a house from Bass Beach round by East Point to Bass Rock.  The whole of the space now dotted by luxurious cottages and cultivated soil, was a barren waste, covered by short, brown grass, tenanted by grasshoppers and snakes.  The straggler to East Point, Pulpit Rock, and Swallows' Cave, found his path impeded by stone walls - while the rest of the island, excepting the road through the village, was a terra incognita to all, save the old islanders and a few constant visitors.  Subsequently, Rouillard opened a house in the village, which accommodated the numbers who were beginning to appreciate the beauties of the place.  At this time, no artificial rules of society marred the comfort of the visitors.  There was no dressing for dinners - no ceremonious calls.  No belles brought a wardrobe, made up in the latest fashion of the day; and no beaux confined and cramped their limbs with tight coats, strapped pants, and high-heeled boots.  Visitors shook off the restraints of society, and assimilated themselves in some degree to the rugged character of the scenery around them.  Parties were frequently made, and whole days passed by them in the Swallows' Cave and on the adjacent rocks - the ladies with their sewing and books, while the men amused themselves in shooting or fishing, and the children in picking up pebbles and shells on the beaches. One of the first improvements made at Nahant, was a bathing-house at the southern extremity of Bass Beach, built under the direction of James Magee, Esq., whose name became associated with most of the early improvements.  Since the citizens of Boston took Nahant into their patronage, its improvement has been rapid, and it now presents the appearance of a romantic town, sparkling in the ocean waves.
     Among the benefactors of Nahant, no one is deserving of higher commendation than Frederic Tudor , Esq., who has built one of the most beautiful rustic cottages in the country, and has expended many thousand dollars to improve and beautify the place, by constructing side-walks, and planting several thousands of fruit and ornamental trees, both on his own grounds, and in the public walks.  He has converted a barren hill into a garden, which has produced some of the richest and most delicious fruits and vegetables that have been presented at the horticultural exhibitions.  Citizens of Boston who now have rural cottages at Nahant for their summer residences, are the following:

Hon. Thomas H. Perkins	Frederic Tudor, Esq.	Geo. Crowninshield, Esq.
"    Edward H. Robbins	Henry Codman, Esq.	Joseph G. Joy
"    Stephen Codman	John A. Lowell, Esq.	Mrs. John Phillips
"    William Prescott	Samuel Hooper, Esq.	"    Gardner G. Greene
"    David Sears	Benj. C. Clark, Esq.	"    John Hubbard
"    Benj. W. Crowninshield	John E. Lodge, Esq.	"    Samuel Hammond
"    Samuel A. Eliot	Thomas G. Cary, Esq.	Francis Peabody, Esq. }
"    Nathaniel P. Russell	John H. Gray, Esq.	Salem  }

     There are three houses on Nahant for the accommodation of parties and boarders in the summer season - the Nahant Hotel, kept by Phineas Drew; the Village Hotel, by Mr. Albert Whitney; and the Mansion Hotel, by Mr. Jesse Rice.  The visiting season usually commences about the first of June, and continues four months.  During that time, Nahant is thronged with visiters from all parts of America, and many from Europe.  A summer residence at Nahant is regarded as a refined luxery.  A ramble round the beaches, and among the coves and grottoes, is a delightful recreation; but it should be done thoroughly to be truly enjoyed.  Those who drive over the middle road, and return in an hour, may possibly go away disappointed.  Those who spend a few days, or a longer time, in examining the curiousities of the place, always express satisfaction and delight.
     The Lynn Mineral Spring is a place of agreeable resort at all seasons of the year.  It is in a highly picturesque and romantic spot, by the side of an extensive pond, or lake, surrounded by hills and wild woodlands.  The first white man who selected this delightful retreat for his residence, was Caspar Van Crowninshield, Esq., a gentleman from Germany, ancestor of the respectable family of Crowninshields, of Boston.  He built a cottage here about the year 1690, and several of the old apple-trees, planted by him, are still standing in the garden.  A neat and commodious hotel is open here for the accommodation of boarders and visiters, kept by Mr. Otis King .
     In 1836, a new place was found for the admiration of the lovers of sea-breezes and rural scenery, at the New Cove, Swampscot.  In that year, a convenient house was erected by Mr. William Fenno, of Boston.  It commands a fine view of the ocean and Nahant on one side, while on the other the land is clothed with the drapery of abundant foliage.  It combines the advantages of fishing and bathing, with quiet retreat and cooling shade, and almost rivals Nahant in its attractions.
     The oppurtunities for the sportsman are not so frequent nor so great as in the early days; still there are occasionally some fine chances among the birds.  Mr. Ebenezer B. Phillips, of Swampscot, has killed forty-seven shags at one shot - that is, with a single and a double barrelled gun, fire in succession.  He also killed, with one gun, twenty-seven black ducks, which he sold in Boston for twenty-four dollars.
     The Lynn Hotel, situated on the crossing of several great roads, and in the midst of a pleasant neighborhood, forms a convenient and agreeable boarding place.  The Saugus Hotel, two miles westward, in a thriving village, commands a beautiful view of variegated and picturesque scenery.  Five miles northwest from the Lynn Depot, is the Lynnfield Hotel, kept by Mr. John Andrews.  It is a pleasant seclusion from the noise and heat of the cities.  The verdant forest, and the woodland lake, with its romantic island, will be appreciated by every lover of nature.
     The inhabitants of Lynn, during two centuries, will not suffer in comparison with any equal number of people, in regard to morality and industry.  For one hundred and seventy-nine years from the first settlement of the town, there was no lawyer in the place; and even now, with the population of about ten thousand, it supports only two.  Though that profession is respectable, still it tells well for the honesty and accomodating disposition of the people, that they have conducted so large a portion of their affairs without recourse to law.  They indulge somewhat too much in detraction; and there is, with many, too much fondness for excitement, and too great a love for change.  I doubt if there be any more rational and solid piety and virtue among those who change their preachers every season, than there was when the minister remained forty or fifty years, and grew old and respected among the affections of his people.  My own experience has taught me that teachers are changed quite too often for the benefit of scholars.  It would be well, before worthy and devoted teachers are censured, that the inquiry be honestly made, whether the fault may not be with the children, perhaps with yourselves.  And if the teacher be censurable, do not rush to the ward meeting, and turn him out, without notice; but inform him of your objections, and give him the oppurtunity for improvement.  I never knew any people to suffer for rewarding merit; nor was any thing ever lost by candor, honesty, or benevolence.  The spirit of improvement is evidently upward and onward; and people are beginning to find out, and to practice on the knowledge, that in educating the poor, in relieving the needy, and in elevating the miserable, they are consulting their own happiness.  Truth dwells only in Love.

     In preparing this book, I have endeavored to make it as correct as the nature of the case would admit, and in so doing, have been fortunate in obtaining the services of a good Overseer, Mr. Nathan Sawyer, and a first rate Proof Reader, Mr. George P. Oakes, who are employed in the establishment where the printing was executed.  It is not impossible, however, that in such a multitude of facts and dates, a few errors may be found; but I have discovered none which are essential.

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