On June 9, 1954, before a nationwide television audience, Joseph Welch of Waltham replied to Joseph McCarthy, "Until this moment, Senator, I think I have never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness."
Category: People
350 years on Grape Island
Grape Island was once a small but thriving community, and briefly a popular summer resort. In 1941, 3000 acres of Plum Island including Grape Island were purchased by the U.S. government to establish the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge.
Samuel Symonds, Gentleman: Complaint to Salem Court Against His Two Servants, 1661
Philip Welch and William Downing, both children, were kidnapped from Ireland in 1654, and sold to Samuel Symonds in Ipswich. After 7 years they refused to continue working on his farm and demanded their freedom. They were arrested and brought to trial.
Anne Dudley Bradstreet, the Colony’s First Published Poet
Often alone in Ipswich while her husband Simon was engaged in government, Anne Bradstreet wrote a collection of poems published in London in 1650 titled, "The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung up in America...by a Gentlewoman in these Parts."
Sarah Goodhue’s Advance Directive, July 14, 1681
On July 14, 1681, Sarah Whipple Goodhue left a note to her husband that read: "Dear husband, if by sudden death I am taken away from thee, there is infolded among thy papers something that I have to say to thee and others." She died three days after bearing twins. This is the letter to her husband and children.
The Witchcraft Trial of Elizabeth Howe, Hanged July 19, 1692
Elizabeth Howe and her husband James resided on outer Linebrook. She was charged with bewitching her neighbor’s child and was arrested on May 28, 1692. She was one of the five women hanged in Salem on July 19, 1692.
The Labor in Vain Farm of Thomas & Elisabeth Emerson of Bishop’s Stortford, England, and Ipswich, Massachusetts
During the first two centuries of the Ipswich settlement, the tidal stream known as Gould's Creek was known as "Labor-in-Vain Crick." Having rowed against the incoming and outgoing tides passing under Gould's Bridge, it's quite obvious how the creek got its name. For about a mile flowing inward, it saturates the salt marsh between Labor… Continue reading The Labor in Vain Farm of Thomas & Elisabeth Emerson of Bishop’s Stortford, England, and Ipswich, Massachusetts
The Rev. John Wise of Ipswich
The concepts of freedom about which Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence originated from the pen of the Rev. John Wise of Ipswich: "The origin of civil power is the people...and when they are free, they may set up what species of government they please."
Restoring the Old Post Office with Bill Barton
What Should You Do With Your Old Home? by Tamsin Venn, North Shore Magazine, February/March, 1989 Elliott Krause spent two years restoring what may be the oldest standing building ever used as a post office in the United States. The crumbling structure, built in the 1720s, stood next to the Federal-period home he and his… Continue reading Restoring the Old Post Office with Bill Barton
The Hanging of Ezra Ross and Bathsheba Spooner, July 2, 1778
In 1778, sixteen-year-old Ezra Ross of Ipswich was condemned to death for the murder of Joshua Spooner of Brookfield. Spooner's wife Bathsheba became the first woman executed in the newly-created United States of America. Ezra Ross is buried in an unmarked grave at the Leslie Road Cemetery.
Homes of the Descendants of Richard and Ursula Scott Kimball of Rattlesden, who Settled in Ipswich
The common ancestors of many of the Kimball family in America are Richard Kimball Sr. and his wife Ursula Scott of the Parish of Rattlesden, England who moved to Ipswich in 1635. Four of the First Period homes of their descendants are still standing.
Haselelponah Wood
Obadiah Wood married 35-year-old widow Haselelponiah, whose scriptural name means "A shadow falls upon me," the only person in modern history with that name. Haselelpony Wood's tombstone is located at the Old North Burial Ground in Ipswich.
General Daniel Denison
Daniel Denison became Major General of the colonial forces and represented Ipswich in the general court. He was remembered with high esteem by the people of Ipswich well into the 19th Century. You can visit Denison's grave at the Old North Burial Ground.
Early American Gardens
Isadore Smith (1902-1985) lived on Argilla Road in Ipswich and was the author of 3 volumes about 17th-19th Century gardens, writing under the pseudonym Ann Leighton. As a member of the Ipswich Garden Club, she created a traditional seventeenth century rose garden at the Whipple House.
Lucy Ardell Kimball
Born in the Hart House, Miss Kimball was a graduate of the Manning High School, class of 1894. She died in 1980 at the age of 105, after teaching first grade for 45 years.
Abbott Lowell Cummings, Author of “The Framed Houses of Massachusetts Bay”
Abbott Lowell Cummings was the leading authority of Seventeenth and early Eighteenth Century (“First Period”) architecture in the American Northeast and author of The Framed Houses of Massachusetts Bay.
Historic Ipswich 