Edward B. Haskell

Edward B. Haskell was a Billerica farmer who held one town office or another for some fifteen years at the turn of the twentieth century, most of them on the Select Board. The town reports say little about his family or origins. The jury lists of 1899 to 1903 describe him as a farmer, he sold hay to the town year after year, and in 1899 the highway surveyor recorded gravelling the main road "between William Crosby's and Haskell's."

His first public service was with the fire department. From 1888 he was one of the engineers of the fire department, signing the engineers' annual reports as assistant engineer, and he stayed on that board through the 1890s. In 1890 he took George F. Colson's seat on the board of selectmen beside Ebenezer Baker and Coburn S. Smith, and like the other selectmen of that time he also worked as one of the town's highway surveyors. He sat on the Select Board for twelve years, and with it on the Board of Health and among the fence viewers, and he was often paid for special police duty. At the town meeting of March 1894 he ran for assessor and overseer of the poor and lost by a handful of votes: Colson and John E. Rowell had 172 votes each for assessor, Haskell 168 and Sears J. Cook 167. In 1899 he became one of the overseers of the poor as well.

When Rowell declined re-election in 1900, the new board organized on April 5, 1900, with Charles H. Kohlrausch as chairman and Haskell as secretary. He was an active voice on the town meeting floor. In 1899 he moved that the "Old Turnpike" be opened at Francis Bowman's from the Lexington road to the Bedford line, and that the town buy a street sprinkler, which carried on a rising vote of 82 to 63. In 1900 he moved that firemen be paid $20 a year and that hourly payments be abolished, and with A. W. Proctor he served on a committee that tried, without success, to get a five-cent electric car fare to Lowell. In September 1901 he signed, with Kohlrausch and Josiah Wright, the selectmen's call for a memorial service in the Town Hall for the murdered President William McKinley, and he was on the committee that drew up the town's resolutions.

At the election of March 1902 he finished fourth for selectman and third for overseer of the poor, and left both boards. That October he was drawn with Herbert A. King as a traverse juror for the Superior Court at Lowell. In 1903 the town elected him one of its two constables, with Martin Conway Jr.; from May of that year he drew a monthly salary in the police department, and he was also truant officer for Precinct 1. His name last appears in the town reports in the list of dog licenses for 1906, and the reports do not record his death.

References

1. Report of the Engineers of the Fire Department, signed by E. B. Haskell as Assistant Engineer (Town Report 1891)
2. Selectmen's accounts, services as Selectman and Highway Surveyor (Town Report 1891)
3. Town meeting of March 19, 1894, election of assessors and overseers of the poor (Town Report 1895)
4. Jury list with occupations, 1899 (Town Report 1899)
5. Town meeting of March 1899, Articles 26 and 27 (Town Report 1900)
6. Report of the Selectmen, 1901 (board organized April 5, 1900)
7. McKinley memorial service, September 1901 (Town Report 1902)
8. Truant officers, 1903 (Town Report 1904)