Harnden Road

Harnden Road runs south-southwest from Boston Road near the Burlington line in Pinehurst, meeting Kennedy Avenue on its west side and Short Street on its east side, in the Riverbank Terrace neighborhood.

It was laid out on the plan of Riverbank Terrace drawn by C. A. Thayer, engineer, in May 1911 and recorded on August 17, 1911 (Plan Book 29, Plan 25). The plan shows Harnden Road in the southeast corner of the tract, running south from Short Street beside Lawn Avenue, between house lots 25 feet wide. The town directories of 1916 and 1919 describe it as running "from Boston rd n Burlington line westerly." The name was already in local use. The 1919 directory lists "Harnden's Corner" on "Boston rd n Burlington line," and in 1934 an article for the town meeting asked for a marker at Harnden's Corner "to designate the birthplace of Thomas Ditson, Patriot." George F. Harnden, a farmer, appears in the town reports from the 1880s. The highway accounts of 1900 to 1903 record road work "near G. F. Harnden's," and he died on February 18, 1910, at the age of 75. No record found states whether the road was named for him, for his family, or for the corner.

A water main was laid in 250 feet of Harnden Road in 1933. Articles to accept the road as a town way were put on the warrants for the meetings of 1956 and 1957, and in 1957 the town spread gravel on it. In 1959 the Pinehurst Civic Association asked the town to pave it 24 feet wide, with drainage and curbs, "between Boston Road and a point 200 feet west of Short Street." The meeting voted on March 24, 1959 to take no action. On March 26, 1960 the annual town meeting accepted the layouts of "upper Harnden Road a distance of 560 feet" and "lower Harnden Road a distance of 845 feet" as town ways, with betterments to be assessed. The money for building these and other streets was voted together under Article 57. The town hot-topped Harnden Road in 1973 and did drainage work on it in 1973 and 1974. It was repaved in 2008.

References

1. Annual Report 1911: deaths recorded in 1910, George Flint Harnden, Feb. 18, aged 75
2. Annual Report 1933: water main extended on Harnden Road for 250 feet
3. Annual Report 1934: warrant article for a marker at Harnden's Corner, birthplace of Thomas Ditson
4. Annual Report 1955: warrant article to accept Harnden Road as a town way
5. Annual Report 1957: gravel on Harnden Road, Adelman Road and Dale Street
6. Annual Report 1958: warrant Art. 70 to pave Harnden Road, submitted by the Pinehurst Civic Association
7. Annual Report 1959: March 24, 1959, no action on Art. 70 (Harnden Road)
8. Annual Report 1959: warrant Arts. 53-56 to accept upper (560 ft) and lower (845 ft) Harnden Road
9. Annual Report 1960: annual town meeting accepts Arts. 53 and 55, upper and lower Harnden Road
10. Annual Report 1973: Harnden Road hot topped with Type I bituminous concrete
11. Annual Report 2008: Harnden Road repaved under the roadway paving program