Enslavement in the Puritan Village: The Untold History of Sudbury and Wayland, Massachusetts
By Jane H. Sciacca
Foreword by Rachael Robinson
Colonial Sudbury, Massachusetts, was designated the Puritan Village by author Sumner Chilton Powell in his 1964 Pulitzer Prize–winning history of the founding of this quintessential New England town in 1638. Yet this quiet rural village also had a darker history that is often overlooked. Sudbury’s Puritan inhabitants, including some of the most prominent citizens in town, held and sold enslaved Black people throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Stories gleaned from preserved records highlight the lives of men, women and children held in bondage, including a court case involving an enslaved boy repeatedly beaten and left scarred by his master less than thirty years after the town’s founding, as well as the bill of sale of Phebey, age two, to a woman in another town. Local author Jane Sciacca uncovers the hidden side of suffering in this New England town.
Available: Locally at The Wayland Depot or Sudbury Historical Socieity or on Amazon.com
The Puritan Village Evolves: A History of Wayland Massachusetts First Editionby Helen F. Emery (1981)
A chronological history of the town from 1638 to 1980, written by a local historian and scholar.
$ 20.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Edited by Barbara Robinson (Paperback)
The story of Wayland’s first three centuries told through three historical tours.
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Click here for a free PDF version.
Wayland A to Z (2004)
by Evelyn Wolfson, Dick Hoyt (Paperback)
THE book to own if you can have only one Wayland history – full of meticulously researched stories and details about the town of Wayland, MA
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Legendary Locals of Wayland (2015)by Evelyn Wolfson (Paperback)
A multitude of photos accompanies visionaries who have influenced both Wayland and the country, along with current town folks who continue in their footsteps.
$18.67
Available: Amazon, Arcadia Publishing, Wayland Depot.
Growing up in Wayland: Life in a Massachusetts town during the Depression (1997)by George K Lewis (Paperback)
Beautifully written memoir of a very active and observant boy who grew up to be a professor of geography at Boston University and local historian.
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
This is Wayland 375th anniversary year’s celebratory recipe book, written for town residents (including those from centuries past). Linking the 17th to 21st centuries with popular foods, drinks, and “this and that” (i.e. boiled hot soap or teething cookies), this book contains more than 250 recipes.
$ 15.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Unframed 18 x 24” copy of map made by James Sumner Draper (1811-1896) of what he thought Wayland was like in 1775/6. The original is owned by the Wayland Historical Society. There was no Boston Post Road, (Route 20), west of the First Parish Church in Wayland Center, nor did Commonwealth Avenue, (Route 30), go west of the School Street intersection in Cochituate.
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
DVD: by Zander Cowen and Jacob Sussman
Our most ambitious work, Five Miles Astride the River is a 20-minute film exploring the development of our hometown, Wayland, Massachusetts. Showcasing the village’s evolution over 375 years of history, the film explores three distinct eras of American life and illustrates how the town’s past has shaped its present.
$15.00
Available: Pelham Island Pictures, Wayland Depot
by George Lewis (Paperback)
More than 200 photographs, selected primarily from the extensive collection of the Wayland Historical Society, of farmers, factory workers, trolleys, and schools help to tell the unique and fascinating history of Wayland’s two separate neighborhoods, Wayland Center and Cochituate Village.
$21.89
Available: Amazon, Arcadia Publishing, Wayland Depot
uritan Village: The Formation of a New England Town (1963)by Sumner Chilton Powell
A detailed account of the early government and social organization of the town of Sudbury, Massachusetts, present- day Wayland.
$ 20.84
Available: Amazon.com
Memorial Day 2021
Memorial Day Address at Lakeview Cemetery On Monday May 31, 2021 residents of Wayland gathered at Lakeview Cemetery to commemorate Memorial Day in a ceremony planned by Wayland’s Public Ceremonies Committee (PCC). The Ceremony, witnessed by hundreds of Wayland’s...
Kevin Delaney
WAYLAND HIGH SCHOOL HISTORY TEACHER KEVIN DELANEY TO RETIRE By Kate Jenney Kevin Delaney, history teacher extraordinaire, will be retiring this June after teaching in Wayland for 29 years. I came to know Kevin as liaison for the Wayland Historical Society and the high...
Wayland Celebrates: 100 Years of Women’s Suffrage
August 26, 2020 Celebration At 9:30 AM at North Cemetery, a group gathered at the gravestone of Lydia Maria Child (1802-1880) to honor her advocacy for gender and racial equality, note newly registered Wayland women voters of the era, and to enjoy a display about...
Song of Wayland
Chris is one of three brothers who lived on Draper Road along with their cousins David and Steve Rowan Chris, Lorin and Peter all live in Marin County and Sonoma county north of San Francisco. Chris writes that “growing up in Wayland was so special! With our Rowan...
Child – Jacobs
Original Post Wicked Local This article was written in honor of Race Amity Day, which is held annually in Massachusetts on the second Sunday in June, this year on Sunday, June 14. Lydia Maria Child (1802-1880) was a noted 19th century author and social reformer who...
Crossing the Sudbury
The Sudbury River and its associated wetlands provide a lush source of food that supported Native Americans, European settlers of the 1600’s through the farmers of the twentieth century. After the last ice age when the glaciers retreated, a river system with its...
Zaandam Cruise
From the now-ill-fated Zaandam cruise ship back to Boston, just missing the worst of it The morgue would hold three people. As a passenger last month aboard the cruise ship Zaandam, and as a retired engineer and lifelong boater, I leaped at the opportunity to get a...
History Repeats Itself
History Repeats Itself Or Why we have a TP shortage 1973 was marred by shortages – gasoline, or electricity or onions, so Americans cultivated a “shortage psychology.” Like most scares, it started with an unsubstantiated rumor. In November 1973 news reported a...
Covid-19
Although our doors are closed to the public to slow the spread of COVID-19, we at the Grout-Heard House Museum will be available at the regularly posted hours to respond to emails and phone calls. info@waylandmuseum.org or 508-358-7959. We look forward to answering...
Open House 2019
We joined the Library, First Parish in Wayland, the Wayland Depot and the W Gallery for our annual Wayland Center Open House. The Grout-Heard House was at the center of activities that included music, activities for kids, caroling, refreshments, and inventive seasonal...