The Canal Block

The Canal Block
The Canal Block
Circa 1973 by MACRIS
Also Known As Wooden Housing Row
Address 1-7 Elm St
MACRIS ID BIL.92
Built 1835
Demolished 1984


The Canal Block was a long two-story wooden row house of four tenements at 1, 3, 5 and 7 Elm Street (now Old Elm Street) in North Billerica, on the northwest side of the street beside the mills at the falls of the Concord River. It was built for mill workers by the Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal, probably in the 1830s, and was the last surviving building the canal company put up. It burned in 1984 and its lot is now a parking lot for the mill.

The land was part of the mill seat at the falls. On October 4, 1708 the town granted the falls and land on the west bank to Capt. Christopher Osgood for a mill, on conditions (a passage for fish, a bridge below the dam) that were repeated in every deed of the property for the next 150 years. When Capt. Osgood died in 1739 his estate included a grist mill, saw mill, fulling mill and half an iron works, and a homestead of 41 acres "Bounded ... westerly one the Road to Brod meadow and notherly by the way and mill yard to the River". The widow's third was set off, and the committee found that dividing the rest "will discommode or spoile the whole", so the two thirds went to his son Christopher, a miller. His will of 1748 ordered his real estate sold, and his executors sold "about forty acres of Land ... on the west side of Concord River" with "two Thirds of the Mills commonly known by the name of Osgoods mills" to Nicholas Sprake in 1749. Sprake sold to William Kidder in 1757, and Kidder in 1759 to John Carleton, a miller from Boxford, after whom they were called Carleton's Mills. After Carleton's death his heirs sold their two thirds to Thomas Richardson in 1783, and Richardson bought up the widow's dower, so that in 1794 he could sell the whole, "commonly known by the name of Richardson's Mills", with about forty acres to the committee of the Middlesex Canal.

The canal company rebuilt the mills in 1833. A millwright, George O. Wilson, testified in 1845 that "I took away the old mills and built the new mill gates, flumes, and wheels" in the summer of 1833. According to the reminiscences of Charles H. Kohlrausch Jr., quoted in the 1974 survey form, the Canal Block was built by Levi Wilson "in the early thirties", with Forrest Coburn as master builder, and "the east end was occupied by Boss Wilson who in 1848 built the Wilson House". The block stood on canal land between the road from the mills to Lowell and the canal. John Mixer's 1845 deed of the lot just to the west to John McCurdy runs only to "land of the Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal", but McCurdy's mortgage to Daniel Wilson of September 1847 puts his east line "two feet Easterly from the west end of the Canal Block", the earliest record found that names it. The 1830s date rests on Kohlrausch and the rebuilding of 1833; the deeds prove only that the block stood by 1847.

On September 22, 1851 the canal corporation, winding up its business, sold eleven parcels at Billerica Mills to Charles P. Talbot of Lowell and Thomas Talbot of Billerica for $20,000, with a plan by R. H. Eddy. Parcel C ran from the river bridge past the saw mill, "crossing the Canal and partly by land of John Mixer" to "the County road leading to the Mills" and along the road to the canal bridge, "with all the buildings thereon standing"; the Canal Block was one of them. Family tradition, recorded in 1974, holds that Thomas Talbot brought his second wife to live in the block in 1855. The house passed with the mills to The Talbot Mills corporation in 1884 and stayed mill housing for eighty years. On the Talbot Mills division plan of 1936 it is the long building on Lot 71, 10,514 square feet next to the mill yard; the company sold most of the neighboring lots to their tenants in 1936 to 1940 but kept Lots 70 and 71.

The mill property passed to Talbot Mills, Inc. in 1944, to a new owner of the same name in 1956 and to Fabricon, Inc. in 1965. In February 1966 Fabricon sold Lots 70 and 71 "with the buildings thereon" to private buyers, and the block became a privately owned rental. A savings bank foreclosed on Lot 71 in 1969 and sold it at auction, "the buildings on said premises are now numbered 1-3-5-7 on said Elm Street". The owners recorded on the 1974 survey form held it until February 1984, when they sold it for $95,000 to CRT Development, the partnership that owned the old mill. That year the Billerica Historical Commission recorded "with regret" the loss to fire of "the Canal Block, 1-7 Elm Street, North Billerica, last surviving structure built by the Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal (1835)". The lot went with the mill to Cambridge Tool & Mfg. Co. in 1997 and to L&P Aluminum Holdings in 2008, and today it is a parking lot, assessor's parcel 9-207.

The 1974 survey form's references "MdxND 18/136" and "18/389" are pages of the Billerica copy books (Southern District Book 480, Page 546 and Book 517, Page 204).



The Canal Block
Plan of a Portion of Property belonging to The Talbot Mills, North Billerica, Mass., showing division into lots, Plan B (J. C. & W. T. Monahan, surveyed 1926-27-36): Lowell and Elm Streets, Lots 55-71, 1936 (Plan 60/28)


References

  1. MACRIS BIL.92
  2. Billerica assessor, parcel 9-207-0 (Old Elm St): 0.241 acres, no building, parking for the mill; sales 1984, 1997, 2008
  3. National Register nomination 83003996, Billerica Mills Historic District (1983): the Canal Block (no. 649, 1830s), "oldest multi-family block"


Title References

Date Type Grantor Grantee Summary Recorded
1740 Administration and Division Estate of Capt. Christopher Osgood of Billerica, intestate His widow Elizabeth Osgood (thirds) and his eldest son Christopher Osgood, millwright, administrators Probate #16264
1748 Will Christopher Osgood of Billerica, miller His executors William Stickney and Thomas Kidder, to sell; widow Sarah Osgood Probate #16268
June 1, 1752 Executors' Deed William Stickney, yeoman, and Thomas Kidder, gentleman, of Billerica, executors of Christopher Osgood (Sarah Osgood, widow, releasing dower) Nicholas Sprake of Billerica, clothier 50/578 (South)
June 1, 1752 Mortgage Nicholas Sprake of Billerica, clothier Oliver Farmer and John Pollard of Billerica, his sureties 50/580 (South)
January 13, 1757 Deed Nicholas Sprake of Billerica, miller (Judith Sprake releasing dower) William Kidder of Billerica, gentleman 53/541 (South)
June 11, 1759 Deed William Kidder of Billerica, gentleman (Sarah Kidder releasing dower) John Carleton of Boxford, Essex County, miller 56/413 (South)
1782 Will and Division Estate of John Carleton of Billerica, yeoman (Hannah Carleton, widow, executrix) His widow Hannah (thirds) and children Nathan, John, Moses and Solomon Carleton, Elizabeth Todd, Hannah Laws and Lydia Mears Probate #3943
March 31, 1794 Deed Solomon, Moses and Nathan Carleton, Jesse Manning, Thomas Todd, Thomas Laws and Thomas Mears, heirs of John Carleton, with their wives Thomas Richardson of Billerica, gentleman 115/271 (South)
March 31, 1794 Quitclaim Solomon Carlton of Fitchburg, yeoman, heir of John Carlton Thomas Richardson of Billerica, gentleman 115/274 (South)
April 21, 1794 Deed Thomas Richardson of Billerica, gentleman (Judith Richardson releasing dower) Ebenezer Hall of Medford and Samuel Jaques of Wilmington, a committee for the Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal 115/259 (South)
November 28, 1845 Deposition George O. Wilson of Gardiner, Maine, millwright, deponent (at the request of Charles P. Talbot) Perpetual remembrance (petition of C. P. Talbot; Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal objecting) ?/?
April 10, 1846 Deed John Mixer of Billerica, yeoman (Nancy Mixer releasing dower) John McCurdy of Billerica, victualler 480/546 (South)
September 20, 1847 Mortgage John McCurdy of Billerica (Margaret McCurdy releasing dower) Daniel Wilson of Billerica 517/204 (South)
October 23, 1851 Deed The Proprietors of the Middlesex Canal, by Ebenezer Chadwick, President Charles P. Talbot of Lowell and Thomas Talbot of Billerica, manufacturers and copartners 618/97 (South)
September 30, 1944 Deed The Talbot Mills, a Massachusetts corporation of Billerica Talbot Mills, Inc., Billerica 1013/89
1956 Deed Talbot Mills, Inc., by Thomas T. Clark, Treasurer Textile Subsidiary Corporation, Billerica 1355/526
1956 Merger Textile Subsidiary Corporation (merged) Talbot Mills, Inc., formerly Textile Manufacturing Corporation, Billerica 1359/525
1956 Consent to Name Talbot Mills, Inc. (incorporated 1944), by Thomas T. Clark, President Textile Manufacturing Corporation 1361/219
November 1, 1965 Deed Talbot Mills, Inc. (all its stock held by Massachusetts Mohair Plush Company, Inc.), by Ernest V. Horvath, President Fabricon, Inc., a Delaware corporation 1724/23
February 24, 1966 Deed Fabricon, Inc., by John S. Dickson, President Two private buyers, tenants in common 1740/82
December 22, 1969 Foreclosure Deed Arlington Five Cents Savings Bank, by Paul A. Cameron, Treasurer, holder of the mortgage of June 22, 1966 A private couple of Hyannis 1909/332
February 16, 1984 Quitclaim A private owner of Wakefield CRT Development, a limited partnership, Faulkner Street, North Billerica 2698/158
July 17, 1997 Deed CRT Development, a Massachusetts limited partnership of 67 Faulkner Street, by its general partner Cambridge Tool & Mfg. Co., Inc. (c/o Leggett & Platt, Incorporated, Carthage, Missouri) 8673/213
April 4, 2008 Warranty Deed Leggett & Platt, Incorporated, a Missouri corporation, successor in interest to Cambridge Tool & Mfg. Co., Inc. L&P Aluminum Holdings, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company (c/o Pace Industries, Fayetteville, Arkansas) 22079/41

Recorded is Book/Page at the Middlesex North Registry of Deeds unless noted; Probate # is a Middlesex probate case, Ctf a Land Court certificate of title.