Ironstone, Massachusetts

Infobox_nrhp | name =Ironstone Mill Housing and Cellar Hole
Uxbridge, Massachusetts
nrhp_type =

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caption =
location= 136 Ironstone Street, off Massachusetts Route 146A
Uxbridge, Massachusetts
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built =1815
added = November 7, 1983
governing_body = Private
mpsub=
refnum=83004135 cite web|url=http://www.nr.nps.gov/|title=National Register Information System|date=2007-01-23|work=National Register of Historic Places|publisher=National Park Service]

Ironstone is a village or subunit of Uxbridge, Massachusetts, United States.cite web |title= "Walking tours - Uxbridge"|publisher= Blackstone Daily |url= http://www.blackstonedaily.com/Outdoors&Nature/WTuxbridge.htm |accessdate= 2007-09-23]

"Ironstone Mill Housing and Cellar Hole"

In the very earliest beginnings of the industrial revolution, there was a mill, mill village and housing which developed at Ironstone and was significant to the textile industry of Uxbridge.cite web |title= "Walking tours - Uxbridge"|publisher= Blackstone Daily |url= http://www.blackstonedaily.com/Outdoors&Nature/WTuxbridge.htm |accessdate= 2007-09-23] Today this is known as Ironstone Mill and Cellar Hole, and it is one of several examples of Mill worker housing and a mill village in the upper Blackstone Valley.cite web |title= "Walking tours - Uxbridge"|publisher= Blackstone Daily |url= http://www.blackstonedaily.com/Outdoors&Nature/WTuxbridge.htm |accessdate= 2007-09-23] The historic site of the "original Ironstone cotton mill", the "Ironstone Mill Housing and Cellar Hole", is a National Historic Site. The site, at 136 Ironstone Street, is just north of exit 1 on Massachusetts Route 146, the principal limited access highway between Worcester, and Providence, Rhode Island, and is located off Massachusetts Route 146A, the "Lydia Taft Highway". For a complete listing of the National Historic Register listings in Uxbridge, see the link below. The original Mill, built in 1815, burned down and was rebuilt by David and Seth Southwick in the 1850's. It burned again, and all that remains is the cellar hole. The mill is a forerunner of America's Industrial Revolution which began here in the Blackstone Valley in 1793 with Samuel Slater and his mill, at Pawtucket, Rhode Island. Pawtucket is about 17 miles to the SE of Ironstone.

Ironstone mill housing and history

The Ironstone mill housing at 135 Ironstone Street was built by the Ironstone Cotton Manufacturing Company which produced cotton yarns.cite web |title= "Walking tours - Uxbridge"|publisher= Blackstone Daily |url= http://www.blackstonedaily.com/Outdoors&Nature/WTuxbridge.htm |accessdate= 2007-09-23] William Arnold built this mill in 1815 to make yarn from raw cotton which was then woven into fabric by area families operating as cottage industries. Around 1820, Arnold added this housing when he increased the factory production by increasing water power and installing power looms. The first power looms in America were those used in Uxbridge.Due to the goods needing transport, this became an important stopover for various transportation carriers - the stagecoach, the train. A post office and store were shortly established on the mill property. In the 1850's this mill under the management of the Southwick brothers, Seth and Daniel, made denim fabric for Kentucky Blue Jeans. In the 1870s, David Southwick created Conestoga wagon wheels in his blacksmith shop in nearby south Uxbridge and Ironstone, which were used by pioneers traveling west. The mill, was finally lost after it burnt down in 1875 after two earlier fires had led to rebuilding the mill.

History of Ironstone

The village of Ironstone may have been among the first settled regions of Uxbridge, in the early 1730s. Here is a brief paraphrase from the Blackstone Valley Daily which describes the influence that Ironstone had in the life of this community. 'The historic Ironstone School' is an an historic building and was used a recently as 1948 as a traditional one room schoolhouse. The original building dated from 1797 and had eight grades and one teacher. Ironstone was influential in Uxbridge's historical transformation from agriculture to manufacturing. Circa 1734, Benjamin Taft, a member of the famous American Taft family, started an early iron forge, bog iron mine, and later Caleb Handy added a triphammer operation for making tools, guns and scythes at this site.cite web |title= "Walking tours - Uxbridge"|publisher= Blackstone Daily |url= http://www.blackstonedaily.com/Outdoors&Nature/WTuxbridge.htm |accessdate= 2007-09-23] The Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad even came to the Ironstone area in the 1860s for shipping goods to the markets west and east. The Buxton family, from just across the border in Slatersville, Rhode Island, was prominment in this community in the 1700's including Captain James Buxton who fought in the Revolutionary War. A re-creation of a Fife and Drum Corps at Uxbridge has taken the name of Captain James Buxton. cite web |title= Martial Musick in Uxbridge Massachusetts 1727-Present |publisher= www.anglefire.com |url= http://www.angelfire.com/music2/uxbmarmusic/ |accessdate= 2007-09-23]

Other features nearby the historic sites

There is a one room schoolhouse here which is now a historic building, and is known as the Ironstone School. Ironstone and Uxbridge are part of the Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor of the National Park Service. The Blackstone Valley is the oldest industrialized region of the United States. The Ironstone section of the Town of Uxbridge has other alternate names and dispersed villages which include: Chockalog, south Uxbridge, Albee, Scadden and historically indluded Quaker City, and Aldrich village. Nearby is a very historic "Friends Meetinghouse" (see also listed below).

ee also

*Uxbridge, Massachusetts
*List of Registered Historic Places in Uxbridge, Massachusetts
*Friends Meetinghouse (Uxbridge, Massachusetts)
*Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor
* [http://www.blackstonedaily.com/History&Heritage/Ironstone%20school.htm Uxbridge- its history of schools; lists photos of Ironstone School and description of history]

Notes