John Strong's Northampton Massachusetts

According to Wikipedia, Northampton Massachusetts has a population of roughly 28,000, if you count its outer villages of Florence and Leeds, and is known as an academic, artistic, musical, and counterculture hub. The now defunked website Epodunk rated Northampton as the most politically liberal medium-size city in the United States. Northampton has a high proportion of residents who identify as gay and lesbian, a high number of same-sex households and is a popular destination for the LGBT community. To call Northampton funky, cool and hip is not an understatement. But Northampton was not always that way. The City has a long history and has evolved, going through high points and low.

Native Americans knew Northampton as "Norwottuck", or "Nonotuck", meaning "the midst of the river". The Pocumtuc confederacy, a group of Native American tribes, occupied the Connecticut River Valley from what is now southern Vermont and New Hampshire into northern Connecticut. But through the early 1600’s rival fighting among the tribes coupled with the small pox epidemic that arrived with Dutch traders and English settlers decimated the Native American presence. It was in this context that the land making up the bulk of modern Northampton was sold to settlers from Springfield.

When my 8th great grandfather, Elder John Strong, arrived in what he and others would eventually incorporate as Northampton he was likely drawn to the fertile, flat, easily tilled and productive land that makes up this portion of the Pioneer Valley. Northampton’s location beside the Connecticut River also placed it along established trading routes. The original plans of Northampton show that John owned land close to the Mill River, a tributary to the Connecticut River. Whether he was a merchant, a professional or maybe a farmer, is unclear but his land was in the center of town, close to the common, and directly on what was then, and what remains, Main Street.

John was born in 1605 and arrived in colonial America around 1630 after sailing from England on the “Hopewell”. His first wife, Margery Deane died soon after arriving in the colonies. John soon took a second wife, Abigail Ford, with whom he had 15 children. Though my direct ancestor, Thankful Strong, married and moved away, if headstones at the Bridge Street Cemetery are an indication, many of John’s descendants stayed in Northampton.

Like many communities in New England, Northampton prospered through the 1700s and into the 1800s. The train came to town bringing with it increased trade and access to markets, further easing travel to growing cities like Springfield, Hartford, Worcester and Boston. Clarke School for the Deaf was founded in 1867 and Smith College, also known as Smith Female College, was founded in 1871. The land once owned by John Strong was the center of infrastructure. Some of his land was used for the Town Hall. Other land near the river was used for railways and rail sidings where goods and coal were offloaded and stored. On a portion of his property was constructed the Northampton Gasworks where coal was gasified to produce coal gas, that was piped to homes for power and light. A gasholder, a large vessel used to store the highly explosive coal gas, was also located on the property. As an aside, after Boston’s Great Molasses Spill in the early 1900’s, many recognized the danger of storing highly explosive gasses in the center of cities and towns. Northampton’s gasholder was located just feet away from City Hall, the High School, the Memorial Hall and several churches.

Northampton circa 1873 (above) and 1884 (below)

Northampton continued to grow into the early 1900s. The gasworks expanded and an inn was constructed next to City Hall where Calvin Coolidge, the man who would become a Senator and eventually the President of the United States, did his work as the mayor.

Today, the land once owned by John Strong is a microcosm of the rest of the City.

City Hall remains but the gasworks is long gone. Apartment buildings and an office building, one built at the location and in the style of the railroad roundhouse, have replaced the railyard.

A wood-fired kitchen restaurant, a used bookstore and coffee emporium occupy the side streets that once bordered John’s land. Northampton is a cool little city with brew pubs, funky restaurants, consignment shops and all manner of quirky business. The influence of Smith College as well as Amherst College, Hampshire College, Mt. Holyoke College and the University of Massachusetts provide a young and decidedly hip vibe.

It is hard to know what the future holds for Northampton but whatever it is the land once owned by John Stone will likely be in the midst of it.