George P. Greenwood

George P. Greenwood (1851-1921) was a Billerica farmer who served the town for more than thirty years, as chairman of the School Committee, as a Bowers Fund Commissioner, as one of the town's auditors and as a member of its Finance Committee. He was born on September 5, 1851, the only son of Moses P. Greenwood and Lucy Jennison of Natick; his father, born in Needham, farmed near the Concord River and the Bedford line and was one of the deacons of the church. George married Alice R. Harding on April 14, 1880. Their son Laurence Jennison Greenwood was born on October 15, 1894, when the birth record gave the father's occupation as farmer.

He was elected to the School Committee in 1887 and was its chairman in 1889 and 1890, with Charles H. Kohlrausch Jr. as secretary and Joseph S. Holt as auditor, taking personal charge of the Crosby, Spaulding and Hill schools. The committee's report for that year, signed by Greenwood as chairman, describes the enlargement of the Talbot School, the start of regular music teaching under J. Avison Baker of Lowell, who visited every school once a week, and the new child labor law. It closed: "Billerica schools are slowly but surely improving, under the more liberal policy of the last few years. Let us continue the good work."

In 1896 town meeting chose him a member of the Bowers Fund Committee for five years. From 1898 he was one of the town's three elected auditors, and was chairman of the board by 1916, and he sat on the Finance Committee from its early years through 1920. In 1920 he served with Thomas F. Sheridan and Herbert A. King on the committee that conferred with the American Legion about a memorial to Billerica's soldiers of the Great War; it suggested a Legion trophy room in an extension of the Town Hall, but advised waiting "until building prices are reduced to a normal basis."

George P. Greenwood died on December 16, 1921, aged 70 years, 3 months and 11 days.

References

1. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), Genealogical Register p. 65: Moses P. Greenwood family; George P. born 1851, married Alice R. Harding 1880
2. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883): Moses P. Greenwood among the deacons of the church
3. Billerica Town Report 1890, organization of the School Committee (George P. Greenwood, Chairman)
4. Billerica Town Report 1890, School Committee report (music instruction begun under J. Avison Baker)
5. Billerica Town Report 1890, School Committee report signed by George P. Greenwood, Chairman
6. Billerica Town Report 1895, births recorded in 1894 (Laurence Jennison Greenwood, son of George P. and Alice)
7. Billerica Town Report 1896, town meeting chooses Geo. P. Greenwood to the Bowers Fund Committee
8. Billerica Town Report 1916, list of town officers (George P. Greenwood, Chairman of Auditors)
9. Billerica Town Report 1920, report of the committee on a war memorial signed by Geo. P. Greenwood
10. Billerica Town Report 1921, deaths recorded in 1921 (George P. Greenwood, Dec. 16, aged 70)