On the Massachusetts North Shore
Underneath the Town scene, in the blue water, are the large gold letters that read: "The Birthplace of American Independence - 1687." In the border around the Town scene, are the large gold letters that read: "Ipswich Massachusetts - Incorporated 1634."
"Millend" was the west side of the settlement, including today's Topsfield Rd. and Washington St. Home of Samuel Appleton and John Whipple, it was separated from the east side by a wetland. In1717, Capt. Beamsley Perkins was taken to court for blocking their path to the Meeting House.
Rev. John Hale of Beverly participated in the witch trials until his wife was accused. Hale later published an analysis in which he asserted that Satan had tricked the Puritans, and made a plea for forgiveness.
A landmark we're probably all familiar with was the old mill building on the Hamilton side of the Mill Road bridge. The abandoned sawmill was last used in 1919 and was demolished in late February 2024.
Massachusetts has the highest probability of all of the states to be hit by an ocean storm, which includes hurricanes and nor'easters.
In 1652, the Town of Ipswich voted "For the better aiding of the school and the affairs thereof," building a grammar school and paying the schoolmaster. By the 19th Century there were 10 grammar schools spread throughout the town, and a high school.
"It was a poor time in which to build a dam. The winter was very severe and at times the temperature was below zero. The center of the dam was soon washed away, and by spring the new structure had almost disappeared."
Among America’s most beloved 19th century renderings of Thanksgiving Day are Currier & Ives lithographs, Grandma Moses’s paintings, and Lydia Marie Child’s famous poem/song “Over the River and Through the Wood.” In the 20th Century, Norman Rockwell depicted an idealized version of American Thanksgiving. By Helen Breen
In 1896, the first trolley from Beverly arrived in Ipswich, and a year later, the Georgetown, Rowley and Ipswich Street Railway opened. By 1919, Mr. Ford's Model T ended the brief era of the street railway.
The former Ipswich Mills, now owned by EBSCO, was the site of one of the most closely guarded secrets of the Second World War.
In 1950, Republican senator Joseph R. McCarthy gained a large national following as he began using his chairmanship of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations to hunt for Communists in government. He baselessly charged that hundreds of Communists had infiltrated the State Department and that homosexuals working in foreign policy could be blackmailed by the… Continue reading “This Is No Time For Men To Keep Silent”
Prejudice disguised as patriotism repeats itself in American politics. In 1854, the "Know Nothing" American Party formed in opposition to Irish immigration and carried local elections in New England communities. They swept the state of Massachusetts in the fall 1854 elections but were defeated two years later.
On May 23, 1692, a complaint for witchcraft was filed against Sarah Buckley and her widowed daughter Mary Witheridge. The "bewitched" girls of Salem Village claimed that the women's specters had attacked them. Held in shackles in the cold crowded jail, both were acquitted in January,1692
High Street originally continued straight until the first bridge over the railroad tracks was constructed in 1906. From 1900 when the first trolleys came to town until the bridge was built, passengers had to unload here to switch from the trolley from Newburyport to continue through Ipswich.
In 1803, a group of Newburyport investors incorporated as the Newburyport Turnpike Corporation in a commercial venture to build a straight toll road from Boston to Newburyport (the highway we call Rt. 1).
On October 30, 1789, Washington passed through Ipswich on his ten-day tour of Massachusetts. Adoring crowds greeted the President at Swasey’s Tavern (still standing at the corner of Popular and County Streets) where he stopped for food and drink.
Historic Ipswich 