Holyoke High School - Annual Yearbook (Holyoke, MA)

Page 22 text:

of about one million dollars. Almost three tons of paper were made at first, but business grew so fast that a second mill was built from profits of the first years. The capital in 1887 was three million dollars, but the original invest- ment was only one million. As of 1887, Hol- yoke produced over half of the fine paper made in the United States. The second wooden dam, built in 184-9, gave excellent service until 1894 when a mod- ern masonry dam was started. This project took six years to complete and cost approxi- mately six hundred thousand dollars. Because it was the largest stone masonry dam in the United States, it was called the 'cmillion dollar dam. The structure, as it exists today, meas- ures 1,020 feet between abuttments and is thirty feet high from the river bedrock. Its granite facing insures against the constant 20 view of the Dam and Canal system 119645 erosion of the water and abrasive forces of ice and driftwood throughout the year. The downstream curve of the dam is truly para- bolic. Following the construction'of the great dam in 1900, Holyoke continued to prosper and has rightfully been called the Industrial City of Western Massachusetts. Even though Holyoke has no centuried past to recall, no crumbling landmarks to cherish, no ancestral memories to venerate, its memories dwell chiefly on the daring and foresight of the- group of men who harnessed the Connecticut River and whose engineering triumphs brought about the birth of our city. There are very few cities in the East that can show such a swift, and at the same time such a substantial growth as Holyoke has enjoyed over the past century.

Page 21 text:

-,...,.-.- iutone' fp-muff at ,QW ,,.N,,,,, .. i 5' , ,.- v Mn., ips, 3' yy, ..,..f 0, . may 1. 'Q ., '97 .:?g,d,!E2WK? Av-new-'

Page 23 text:

Education Through the foresight of our founding fathers, an educational system was initiated in Ireland Parish, a village which eventually came to be known as Holyoke. In 1677 Will Madison was employed as a schoolmaster receiving three pence a week for each child he taught to read, and four pence a week if writing was added. It is generally accepted that the first house was built in 1679. It was 77 feet by 17 feet, 81f2 feet high and consisted of one chamber. The appellation of grammar school throughout the whole code of school laws from 1647 to 1825 was under- stood to be one in which the Latin and Greek languages were taught, and where young men prepared to enter college. For each child en- rolled in the school, a parent had to supply a cord of wood. The main function of the school administrators, a moderator, clerk, and com- mittee, was the acquisition of wood for the school fire which warined both teacher and pupil during the cold winter months. As early as 1730, Joseph Ely Senior con- ducted a school which was in Ireland Parish. Ely's own home near Plum Tree Knoll was probably the location of that school. The first evidence of the town of. Springfieldis spend- ing money for the maintenance of a school at Ireland Parish to a committee rather than to a resident of that parish was noted in the town records of Springfield on November 1, 1731. And, on November 2, 1773, the first indication of the existence of an actual school Parson Thomas Rand house at Ireland appeared: there was granted the sum of 5 Cmoneyl for the building of a school house in that part of the town where Aaron livethf' This part of town is now the lower end of Ashley Ponds. Some of the earliest records of formal ed- ucation in Ireland Parish ,date back to 1802 when the mother town of West Springfield opened a school in what is now Elmwood. The prominent village elders furnished room and board for the teachers. Miss Sally Clapp and Miss Lovina Humeston, the two teachers in service in 1802, resided at the home of Caleb Humeston. Reading, writing, and cipher- ing were taught at the school. Through the efforts of Reverend Thomas Rand, Caleb Humeston, Austin Goodyear, Noah Woolcut, and David Bassett, a school 2l