On Farming

By Kevin Delaney with excerpts from Anne Shaughnessy’s 1974‬‭ History of‬ Sherborn. Sourced from the Sherborn History Center and Museum.

Dating back at least as far as the mid-17th century, when the first English colonists moved into Nipmuck tribal land intending to “subdue the land”, farming has been a Sherborn mainstay. Indeed, lasting well into the 20th century, agriculture was a primary means of local existence, and remains an important element of the community’s economy of the 21st, as celebrated by our 350th Farm Day.

Reading the multiple Sherborn histories is instructive, as agriculture was so embedded in every aspect of life that rarely makes an appearance as a segregated entity. Gunsmithing? Yep. Cider? Sure. Whips and willow baskets? You better believe it. But farming? It was simply woven into the fabric of being, so it hardly gets a focus but is nevertheless everywhere in the texts, as though readers would just know implicitly that it's so.

Here’s one exception, an excerpt from Anne Shaughnessy’s 1974 History of Sherborn :

“Sherborn’s swales and bogs provided ideal conditions for growing cranberries and

 several farmers accumulated good sums of money from harvesting them. A man could

 rake from one to two barrels a day. The wagonloads were dumped on the floors of the

‘cranberry houses,’ subsequently barreled and sold for $28.00 per barrel. The farmers

 in town averaged about a hundred barrels a season and these were shipped throughout

 New England. As early as 1870 there were eight farmers in town who were taxed on

 their ‘cranberry meadows’ and ‘cranberry houses.’ Albert P. Ware, the last of his family

 to reside in the old homestead at 102 South Main Street, which included the eastern

 part of the Sewell meadow, teamed up with the Grouts, whose homestead lands at 42

 Washington Street covered the western half of Sewell’s meadow. In 1830, the historian

 Biglow had written of the very palatable sauce converted from the cranberries of that

 particular meadow. Albert’s family had constructed a special building for storing the

 cranberries, but the Grouts at the time owned the Captain Sam Sanger House (60

 Washington Street) and, as it was vacant, they used this to spread their berries in all

 the rooms. Here the sorting was done, quite generally by the women and children. The

 cranberry harvest was an important crop for the successful Sherborn farmer, and

 freight cars passing through the center of town made shipment expedient and

 reasonable.

“Good Sherborn milk was shipped from town in the same way. The farmers carted

 their huge cans by wagon to one of the three stations in town, some making use of the

 Holliston station just over the town line on Washington Street. Cans that didn’t make

 the early morning milk train were refrigerated by being hung deep in the large

 spring-fed wells, such as the one still in use at 27 Hollis Street. Two hundred cans

 arrived daily at the station in the center of town and the railroad hired a gang of men

 to prepare a new building to be used as a milk shed.

“Sherborn’s orchards are unsurpassed in beauty in their spring flowering and in the

 fruit which they produce. From the time that the first Sherborn fruit trees were

 planted by Thomas Holbrook on his grant near the Charles River, every farm had its

 orchard and many had large ones, so that it was common practice to couple ‘orchard

 and tillage’ when listing a man’s holdings. In 1750, the Porter Apple was produced on

 the farm belonging to Rev. Samuel Porter, a minister of the First Church, who lived in a

 small house where 8 Washington was later built. The Porter was described by William

 Kenrick in his book, American Orchardist , printed in 1846, as a “fruit above medium

 size, light yellow with a pale blush next to the sun, its flavor sprightly and pleasant. A

 popular fruit in the Boston Market and very beautiful.” In 1973, the Porter Apple Tree

 would be one of those planted at the Old Sturbridge Village orchard which would

 include only varieties originating in this area.

“Many families were well established in raising and selling fruit, so that after the first

 engine had steamed through town on Thanksgiving Day in 1869, the freight cars were

 soon to be loaded with fruit. A few years later the Framingham Tribune noted that

“Joseph Perkins has an enormous crop of peaches to gather. If he is successful in

 chartering a peach train to run daily to Chicago, he will be able to supply that city with

 delicious fruit the coming season.

”Apples, however, were the choice of most of these Yankee farmers, for they kept better

 and there was such a ready market at hand for bruised or orchard-run fruit —

 Sherborn’s cider mills. And in 1870 there were 20 such mills (which were by now even

 importing carloads of apples from the south) listed on the Assessors’ books!

“It was so successful a production that G. F. Clement, whose cider mill was at the

 center of town, rented it to a large Boston concern, Hard and Wilkinson, who made

 cider and did an extensive business in pickling and relishes for the markets. Other

 Sherbornites preferred to run their own mills; James Salisbury was situated next to

 where the Memory Statue now stands, and here along with his paint shop he had his

 cider and vinegar mill — his vinegar was said to be superior. The Holbrook Brothers

 Cider Mill, later owned and operated by P. McCarthy & Son, was situated on Forest

 Street, near the railroad crossing. In 1892 the Framingham paper noted “Holbrook

 Bros, recently shipped 1 ,000 barrels of refined cider to Europe. It required a powerful

 locomotive to draw the train over the Old Colony Railroad.”That year they shipped 

 19 carloads to England, and they were reputed to be the largest cider mill in the world!

“With Sherbom’s orchards so well known, it was quite proper that in 1893, the town

 would establish an “Award for the apprehension and conviction of a thief of fruits,” so

 think twice were you pick in another man’s orchard!”

For more than 200 years the Dowse family has farmed the gently rolling land in Sherborn, offering the results of our hard work at the Farm Stand since 1919.  Our Farm Stand offers fresh fruits and vegetables, flowers and sweet cider produced here on the farm from our fields and greenhouses from May until January every year.

Our Christmas tree fields were started in the 1950’s, and we have harvested our trees every year since.  We have developed growing techniques that enable us to produce several trees from the same root system without replanting.  Ask one of our field associates to point out the process.

Since 1853 the Dowse family has operated a cider mill, an activity for which Sherborn has been noted.  The current apple presses have been in operation since 1947, and each year they turn our pure, fresh apple cider with no additives or preservatives.  Several apple varieties are carefully blended in the cider presses for the best tasting cider in the area.

The Dowse family was recently honored with a prestigious Silver Medal from the Massachusetts Horticultural Society for Service to Agriculture.  We are pleased to be recognized for our 200 year commitment in production agriculture and open space preservation.

Source: www.dowseorchards.com/history.htm