Man About Canton: Welcome to Canton

DID YOU KNOW …

MAC is out of town in Florida so this week’s column will again consist of facts and information contained in Canton’s History and Demographic Report, which is full of basic town information that you may or may not know but should.

For instance, today’s Canton was originally part of the large colonial grant of Dorchester, settled in 1630 and set off as Ponkapoag in 1650. It was separated from Dorchester as the town of Stoughton in 1727, and in 1797, when Samuel Adams was governor of Massachusetts, Precinct 1 of Stoughton separated to become the town of Canton.

The total area of Canton is 19.6 square miles, which includes 18.9 square miles of land and 0.6 square miles of water. Our elevation above sea level has been measured at 100 feet at the Town Hall.

According to the town clerk’s office, our 2012 population was approximately 20,708, a number that has not fluctuated too much over the last 10 years. This results in a density of 1,056 persons per square mile. There are 8,254 households, 5,579 families, 1,278 condos, and 34 apartment complexes in Canton. Presently, there are about 14,240 registered voters.

Canton is bound by the towns and cities of Milton, Randolph, Stoughton, Sharon, Norwood, Westwood, Dedham, and Boston. Our town lies at the foot of the Great Blue Hill. The Canton River flows through the center of town, linking a chain of small ponds and lakes, including Bolivar and Forge Ponds, and flows into the Neponset River.

Ponkapoag Pond is a hidden jewel of Canton. It is the largest pond in Canton and is situated in the northeasterly part of the town. The dividing line between Canton and Randolph passes through it. The pond is more than a mile long and nearly a mile wide, and it contains 217 acres, most of it in Canton. Its altitude is 148 feet above sea level.

Canton has the open town meeting form of government, and each spring all registered voters of the town may attend the town meeting to discuss such matters as construction, schools, public works, recreational facilities, the budget, taxes and bond issues.

The five elected members of the Board of Selectmen serve as the chief executive officers of the town to oversee the day-to-day operations, and they are assisted by a town administrator, a title formerly known as executive secretary.

The first elected selectmen in the town of Canton were Deacon Benjamin Tucker, Nathan Crane and Elijah Crane. They were elected on March 6, 1797.

Revolutionary War hero Paul Revere (1735-1818) lived in Canton from 1801 until his death in 1818 on what is now Revere Street. He started his rolled copper and bell foundry business here at what is today the former Plymouth Rubber Company industrial plant on Revere Street. The company, which is now known as the Revere Copper & Brass Company, moved from Canton many years ago. Revere, who was the father of 16 children, affectionately called his home “Cantondale” and composed a poem about his love for the town.

Revolutionary War hero Roger Sherman (1721-1793) grew up in Canton before moving to Connecticut as a young man, and as a member of the Second Continental Congress, he was part of the elite five-member committee — along with Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Robert Livingston — to draw up the Declaration of Independence. Sherman has the distinction of being the only person to sign all four of the most important documents in early American history: The Articles of the Continental Association (1774), the Declaration of Independence (1776), the Articles of Confederation (1777), and the United States Constitution (1787).

Canton was also the birthplace of Commodore John Downes (1784-1854), who sailed on the first cruise of “Old Ironsides” as a 14-year-old waiter and made the Navy a career. He was a hero of the war with the Barbary Pirates at Tripoli and also the War of 1812. As commander of the USS Wasp, he captured two English military frigates for which he received a presidential citation.

The naming of the town of Canton was the whim of one individual, the town’s first moderator and part-time surveyor, the Honorable Elijah Dunbar, who said that Canton was directly antipodal to Canton, China, “and for that reason should be so called.” On February 23, 1797, Canton was made a separate town from Stoughton, and it was approved by the then governor of Massachusetts, Samuel Adams.

Today, there are 23 Cantons in the United States, but Canton, Massachusetts, was the first named Canton out of the 23.

For years, the Gridley School has stood in Canton as a monument to General Richard Gridley of the Continental Army. A close associate of George Washington, Gridley was appointed by him as the first general of American Artillery and also chief of the Corps of Engineers. He was wounded at the Battle of Bunker Hill while supervising the fortification he had engineered.

In the early 1830s, Henry David Thoreau, American author, poet, and leading transcendentalist, lived on Pleasant Street and taught in the Canton Public Schools. The Transcendentalist Movement, which had in these years begun to achieve international interest, probably had much of its start in Canton.

The Canton High School drama club will present “I Never Saw Another Butterfly” on Friday, March 15, and Saturday, March 16, at 7 p.m. in the Morse Auditorium. Tickets are $10 for adults and $8 for students and seniors.

This play by Celeste Raspanti is based on real-life events that occurred in the Terezin concentration camp near Prague. It tells the story of Irena Synkova, who risked everything to run a clandestine school for the children in the camp. The narrator is Raja Englanderova, who was one of Irena’s students and the only member of her family to survive the Holocaust.

There are times when forgetting can be just as important as remembering — and even more difficult.

This is all for now folks. See you next week.

Joe DeFelice can be reached at manaboutcanton@aol.com.

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