Assabet River National Wildlife Refuge - history

 SUMMARY: Once upon a time, the Assabet River National Wildlife Refuge was a federal "Superfund" clean-up site. This was a consequence of the land being seized for World War II military munitions storage in 1942, and then used for military training and equipment testing until 1990. Roughly two-thirds of the 3.5 square mile refuge became open to the public in 2005 (the rest still closed off), with a visitors' center added in 2010. See ws.gov/refuge/assabet-river. 

Archaeological evidence confirms the presence of indigenous people dating back more than 7,000 years. Unlike much of what became Maynard in 1871, the southern third was more favorable for farming and had ponds that provided for year-round fishing. At the time of arrival of European colonists, what is now central Massachusetts and northern Connecticut was the territory of Nipmuc Native Americans. European diseases and colonial expansion decimated and displaced the native population, the tail end of this punctuated by King Philip's War of 1675-78. Surviving natives were either clustered in Christian convert "praying villages" or chose to move to native communities north and west of this region. When Sudbury was incorporated in 1639 and Stow in 1683, those contained all of future Maynard. There is a granite block in the Refuge on the Tri-Town Trail that makes the position where Maynard and the size-reduced Stow and Sudbury meet. 

As Maynard grew, most of the people settled in close proximity to the ever-enlarging woolen mill (1847-1950). By the 1920 census the population was a tad over 7,000 and it stayed close to that up to the eve of World War II. However, even as the downtown density grew, the southern third was mostly farm homesteads, mainly settled by immigrants from Finland who preferred farming to factory work. Much was grown for family consumption, but there were also orchards, dairy cows, hogs and chickens. Sales were made to stores in Maynard and neighboring towns, and there was an early morning 'milk train' to Boston. 

"THE AMMO DUMP: A Taking of Heritage" (2023)
by Paul V. Boothroyd Sr., Paul V Boothroyd Jr.
and Todd E. Boothroyd. Image courtesy of
Maynard Historical Society.

The evictions - when they came - were sudden. The United States entered the war in December 1941. By March of 1942 the Army had identified about 3,000 acres primarily in Maynard but extending into Hudson, Stow and Sudbury, as suitable for a munitions waystation. Munitions and other war supplies could be held there until Boston harbor was ready to load ships bound for Europe. As documented in "The Ammo Dump," some 80 homesteads received notice in April that their land was being taken be eminent domain, with as little as ten days to vacate. The government calculated what it estimated as fair market value to pay the evicted families, but many of those families felt they were being underpaid, as it fell on them to also sell or dispose of furniture, farm equipment, animals, etc. And find a place to live. And jobs. If there were any promises that people could return after the war those were not in writing and never happened. Sixty years later - for those still alive - there was a bittersweet opportunity to visit once the Refuge was open, perhaps to find the site where there house and barn and fields had been, now a forest.

One of the most interesting features of the Refuge are the World War II era ammunition bunkers. The site was chosen to be convenient to railroad shipping to the Boston Navy Yard yet far enough inland so that a German battleship could not shell the area. Each of the 50 bunkers, officially referred to as “igloos,” has inside dimensions of 81x26x12 feet, with a curved roof. Sides and roofs were mounded with dirt for extra protection and disguise. [However, air view disguise and Maynard's airplane lookout tower atop Summer Hill were overkill, as Germany never completed several attempts to build aircraft carriers.] Today, from all but the door end, these bunkers resemble small hills, complete with trees growing on top. Bunker #303 is sometimes open for tours.

After WWII this site, referred to as the Fort Devens-Sudbury Training Annex, served as a troop training ground, ordinance testing and chemical laboratory disposal area for Natick Labs, i.e., the U.S. Army Soldier Systems Center. A 1980s assessment led to this being categorized as an EPA “Superfund” clean-up site in 1990, as the site was contaminated with arsenic compounds (sprayed along the railroad tracks as a herbicide) and other chemicals, including flame retardant and firefighting chemicals now known to contaminate water supplies. Extensive clean-up efforts continued for years. The cost exceeded $20 million. The Superfund designation was ended in January 2022, after removal of underground fuel tanks, 55-gallon barrels of chemical waste and tons of contaminated soil. Monitoring of groundwater contamination continues. Most of the site was turned over to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service in 2000. The Assaber River National Wildlife Refuge was opened to the public in 2005, with a visitors' center added in 2010. 

Entrance to the FEMA facility, Maynard, MA.
Courtesy of WCVB5, Boston television (2021)

A 72 acre portion of the land adjacent to the end of Old Marlborough Road was transferred to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Here, FEMA maintains a Regional Response Coordination Center for natural and man-made disasters. It includes an underground bunker designed to provide shelter and support for several hundred people during a limited nuclear war. See https://coldwar-ct.com/FEMA_Regional_HQ_Maynard.html for exterior and interior photos. 

The Refuge covers 3.5 square miles. In combination with the other seven eastern Massachusetts wildlife refuges, these preserve land for mammals, reptiles, and local and migratory birds. There is a wonderfully informative, child-friendly, Visitor Center at 680 Winterberry Way, off of Hudson Road. For people who just want to park and roam, a north parking lot is accessed from White Pond Road, reachable from Route 117 in Stow. There is also a small parking area at the end of Old Marlborough Road, but the trail accessed from that entrance is often flooded in winter and spring. Within the Refuge there are 15 miles of old roads and walking trails, with the roads (which are in poor repair) open to bicycling. No dogs allowed anywhere in the Refuge, no other pets, no horses, no fires, no overnight camping, no ATVs, no dirt bikes, no snowmobiles. Catch-and-release fishing is allowed, but only from the Puffer Pond dock.

Whitetail deer fawns lose their white-spot camoflage
in the fall as they grow their much thicker, all-brown
winter coat. Other pre-winter adaptations include
storing more body fat and slowing metabolic rate.
Still, winter weight loss can exceed 20%.  

Hunting is allowed for deer, turkey, grouse, woodcock, coyote, rabbits and squirrels. This feels countradictory given the word "refuge," but without apex predator wolves and mountain lions, deer can become a serious over-population problem. The state's population is estimated at 175,000, with the eastern half of the state more than double the targeted density of 12-18 per square mile. Eastern coyotes - although larger than western coyotes for having historically bred with wolves during the eastern expansion - are still not very successful in preying on adult deer. During the fall/winter deer-hunting season hunters harvest about 15,000 annually. Refuge visitors are perhaps wise to wear orange or restrict visiting to no-hunting Sundays.

To learn more about the refuge, see ws.gov/refuge/assabet-river and the Friends of Woodlands and Waters website, which has a downloadable trail map at  https://www.woodlandsandwaters.org/assabet-river/trails. For history, see the Boothroyds' book "The Ammo Dump". It's major focus is the families that were evicted, but it also covers the military use of the area between the end of World War II and subsequent conversion to the Refuge.

Click on photos to enlarge. To access hundreds of past columns from The Maynard Voice and the Beacon-Villager, visit www.maynardlifeoutdoors.com There is an index.

History of federal and local holidays

SUMMARY: The U.S. federal government has established eleven federal holidays, the most recent being Juneteenth. The initial four - New Year's Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas - were 'top down', i.e., initiated by Congress. Some of the others were 'bottom up', meaning that they began informally in communities, then recognized by an increasing number of states, until the federal government finally made those national. Two went through name changes. 

Santa Claus has been arriving by helicopter for
Maynard's Christmas parade since 1966

The US federal government, over a period spanning 150 years, has established eleven federal holidays. This all began in 1870 during the presidency of Ulysses S. Grant with the creation of federal holidays for New Year's Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. Wait - if the First Amendment states that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..." how did we end up with a religious (Christian) federal holiday? This very question has been brought to the Supreme Court several times. The defense rests on the actual wording from 1870 - a decree that along with three new secular holidays, "December 25th...commonly called Christmas Day" would join them. There was no requirement that people attend church or pray on that day, nor any financial benefit to Christianity. In contrast, Good Friday is a state holiday in some states, but not a federal holiday. 

Once the concept of federal holidays became a reality, other joined the list. Washington's Birthday, established as a federal holiday in 1879, fell on February 22nd. In 1968, Congress passed the "Uniform Monday Holiday Act". It provided for observances of some federal holidays on Mondays, so as to create three-day weekends. After that, it became the third Monday in February. The concept of referring to it as "Presidents' Day," recognizing both Washington (Feb 22) and Lincoln (Feb 12), gained popularity, but officially, it is still "Washington's Birthday."

Memorial Park dedication ceremony, November 15, 2025. 
Three photos courtesy of Maynard Historical Society

Soon after the end of the Civil War it became common in both the North and the South to honor the war dead by decorating graves with flowers and flags. This evolved into communities and then states establishing Decoration Day as a time to hold parades that finished at cemeteries with speeches. Decoration Day became a federal employees' holiday in 1888, became one of the three-day weekends in 1968, i.e., last Monday in May, and was then officially renamed Memorial Day in 1971. The story goes that the end of May was originally chosen not to commemorate any specific Civil War battle, but rather a time when flowers would be in bloom in northern states. Today, Memorial Day is seen as the unofficial beginning of summer - and of yard sale season. 

Armistice Day 1919

Veterans' Day is the other military memorial holiday, differing in that it honors all who have served in the armed forces rather than only those who died. The date - November 11th - stems from the signing of the treaty that ended the war in Europe in 1918, hence the original name "Armistice Day." Somber, solemn celebrations on this date started occurring as early as 1919, but it was not until 1938 that it became an official U.S. federal holiday. In 1954 the name was changed to Veterans' Day. 

On November 15, 1925, the Town of Maynard dedicated Memorial Park in honor of the 361 citizens who had served in the Great War, including the eight who died in that service. Previously, the site had been occupied by the Maynard Hotel, which had burned in 1921. Information honoring those who served in World War II and subsequent military actions have since been acknowledged.

Labor Day falls on the first Monday of September and is considered the unofficial end of summer and the beginning of the school year. Toward the end of the 1800s along with the maturation of the Industrial Revolution, trade unions and labor unions gained strength. Demands for a 40-hour work week gained ground, often after industry-wide or city-wide strikes. There arose a clamor for a holiday to recognize labor. State by state, labor was becoming honored with parades, picnics and political speeches, until in 1894, Congress acted to make it a federal holiday.

Columbus Day had its origins in celebrations by Italian Americans in cities with significant Italian immigrant populations, such as New York. By 1934, Congress had persuaded the President to annually identify October 12 as Columbus Day. In 1971 the holiday was upgraded to official federal holiday and shifted to the second Monday in October.

Late to the list are the Birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. and Juneteenth. The former, often referred to as MLK Day, is celebrated on the third Monday of January. It was signed into law in 1983 and first celebrated in 1986. At the states level there was resistance, especially in the South (surprise!). Approval in the Senate was by a 78-22 vote and in the House by 338-90. Several states still refer to it as some combination honoring both Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert E. Lee. "Juneteenth" is a portmanteau of 'June' and 'nineteenth', as that was the date in 1865 that slavery was ended in Texas, the last of the Confederate states to surrender. Known also as Freedom Day and Black Independence Day, celebration and state recognitions ebbed and flowed for decades, until finally, support coalesced into federal recognition in 2021. Unlike MLK Day, this passed unanimously in the Senate and opposed by only 14 votes in the House. It was signed into law by President Biden.

National Flag Day is a wannabe. The stripes and stars design of the U.S. flag was established by the Continental Congress on June 14, 1777, while the Revolutionary War was still in progress. Celebrations of Flag Day grew toward the end of the 1800s, finally approved by Congress in 1949 , but not as a federal holiday. Coincidently, President Trump's birthday is June 14th. On February 14, 2025 a member of Congress proposed that "Trump's Birthday and Flag Day" become a federal holiday. As of early 2026 there has been no further Congressional action on this proposal. 

Holidays - even federally established holidays - are not immutable. Many states and cities have replaced celebration of Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples' Day, Native American Day, or other variations on this theme. Massachusetts deems it to be Columbus Day, but Boston and many other MA cities and towns have decided for Indigenous Peoples' Day. MLK Day and Juneteenth are under pressure from President Trump during his second term. DEI programs have been terminated, the Confederacy re-recognized as a honorable part of U.S. history, and displays about slavery in national museums removed as being too negative about American history. National Parks are free admission on federal holidays, but for 2026 these two have been dropped from that list and Flag Day (not a federal holiday) added. It would take an act of Congress to officially remove a federal holiday, a process which has never happened yet, but the whitewashing of Black history is ongoing.

Stow Minutemen firing a rifle volley. The flag, with a British
Union Flag in the upper left corner, combined with 13 red
and white stripes to represent the colonies, was called the
Grand Union Flag, used by Washington's Army  in 1776.

Closer to home, in 1894, Lexington proposed the anniversary of the Revolutionary War battle of April 19, 1775 be honored as "Lexington Day." Concord countered with "Concord Day." Governor Greengalge wisely countered with "Patriots' Day," ever since then a Massachusetts holiday. Locally, Patriot Minuteman reenactors march from Stow to Concord, passing through Maynard shortly after 5:00 a.m., pausing at the intersection of Concord Road and Route 27 to fire a rifle volley. The Boston Marathon had its first in 1897 (a year after the Olympic Games revival in 1896), and has continued to be held ever since. The Town of Maynard was created on April 19, 1870. The town acknowledges (but fails to celebrate) the date as Founders' Day.

P.S. If holiday sales shopping is your thing, check out https://www.dontpayfull.com/explore/shopping-sales-calendar for the types of items that go on sale during major holidays - also minor holidays, such as April 2nd being National Burrito Day. 

Click on photos to enlarge. To access hundreds of past columns from Maynard Voice and the Beacon-Villager, visit www.maynardlifeoutdoors.com There is an index.

 

Maynard's water needs, past, present and future

SUMMARY: Maynard initiated town water in 1889 with White Pond (Hudson/Stow border) as the source. Wells were added starting in 1965 and White Pond discontinued in 1990. Maynard currently operates seven wells at three well fields. Its water needs going forward depend on population predictions; stay under 12,000 (currently about 11,000) and the town can probably make do with adding wells at existing sites, but grow more than that and it may need to either revive White Pond or connect to the Quabbin Reservoir system. Regardless of sources, the existing treatment facilities need upgrading.

Undated aerial photo of Maynard's two water tanks atop Summer
Hill before a roof was added to the original, 1889 tank.
Photo courtesy of Maynard Historical Society Archive.

During the early 1800s Assabet Village was a small community flanking the Assabet River, with bridges crossing at what are now Route 117 and Mill Street. Water supply was via wells that reached aquafers at depths of 30-80 feet. Wells were either private or else public wells that homeowners could visit with barrels on wagons or sleds. Starting in 1847 the village grew rapidly with the beginning and expansion of the woolen mill, reaching a population of 2,700 by the 1890 census. Delivering piped water directly to homes and businesses and fire hydrants had started just a year earlier. 

That system involved water flowing from White Pond to Maynard, then being pumped to an open-to-the air tank able to hold 1.5 million gallons constructed atop Summer Hill. From that high point, gravity provides the water pressure to all parts of Maynard. The original pipeline was replaced in 1942. The town's annual reports describe the expansion of the water system as the population grew through decades, including adding a roof to the original tank and construction of a second water tank in 1972. The mill had its own, smaller, water tank, near Amory Maynard's mansion.

Water is provided to hundreds 
of fire hydrants. Color indicates
water flow capacity, with blue 
best, then green, yellow and red.

Maynard was drilling test wells as early as 1957 to supplement pond water. Massachusetts suffered a multi-year drought in the early 1960s, causing a perilously low water level at White Pond. Toward the end of 1964, Robert Quirk drilled a successful well in the Old Marlborough Road area and started selling water to the town. In following years land was seized by eminent domain so as to create well fields and water treatment plants (WTPs) at Old Marlboro Road (OMR) starting in 1967, and Green Meadow (GM) in 1975. These accessed shallow aquifers at depths under 80 feet. In 2000, a third well field and treatment plant were added at Rockland Avenue (RA) to access bedrock water at 400 feet. Collectively, there are seven active wells that have a capacity to deliver an average of 1.1 million gallons per day (MGD), which exceeds Maynard's current needs.  

Each WTP faces unique challenges, including aging infrastructure, water quality issues, and regulatory compliance requirements. The primary water quality concerns include discoloring iron and manganese, and also per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in the water supply, as well as elevated chlorine disinfection byproducts (DBPs) in the distribution system. These water supply issues have caused operational difficulties at the WTPs, leading the Town to limit rate of withdrawal of well water in order to improve water quality. 

PFAS, sometimes referred to as "forever chemicals," have for decades been used in food packaging and household products, stain-resistant furniture and fire extinguishing foam, and subsequently widely contaminate food and water supplies. Exposure to PFAS appears to have multiple, serious, health consequences. Massachusetts has a current upper limit of 20 nanograms per liter (also described as part per trillion) for PFAS in water supplies. Town reports show Maynard is below that limit (roughly one-half of MA communities - mostly in the east - are not). However, the federal Environmental Protection Agency is considering enforcing a lower limit of 10 ng/L in the future. There are commercially available PFAS filter system for use at the municipal level and for residences that reply on private wells. All of Maynard's WTPs would need to be improved to comply with the proposed limit. 

Map of central Massachusetts showing
Quabbin Reservoir and Framingham, with a 
pipeline needed from Framingham to Maynard

Currently, usage is about 50 gallons per person per day. Pipe leakage is under ten percent (a significant improvement from 10 or 20 years ago). Additions to housing in the form of single family homes, town houses, condominiums and apartments are either in progress, planned, or projected. There are contradictory estimates of the extent of this future demand. Current population is a tad under 11,000. One report predicts a population plateau at about 11,500, in which case existing wellfields - perhaps with adding a well or two - will suffice. However, the more recent report, a 50-year MasterPlan, at https://www.townofmaynard-ma.gov/DocumentCenter/View/4162/Maynard-Master-Plan-2025-Final-w-appendices?bidId= projects out to 2075 and anticipates for a much higher population, on the order of 16,000 to 19,000 (modeled on past population increases in Waltham). 

A second rationale for increasing capacity is to have redundancy in case an existing well fails. Either reason would mean adding either a Quabbin Reservoir connection north from Framingham or reactivating White Pond. Quabbin does not have measurable PFAS contamination but the same cannot be said for White Pond. These options would be at least 20 years in the future at a cost exceeding $50 million. Included in that would be creation of a new water treatment plant to process water from OMR, GM and the new pipeline. 

In recent years, Maynard has issued a mandatory "Seasonal Water Use Restriction" either time-of-day limiting or prohibiting non-essential outdoor water use, i.e., lawn and garden watering, from May through September. The purpose of time-of-day restriction that still allows watering either before 9:00 a.m. and after 5:00 p.m. is to curtail peak daytime use; otherwise Maynard would have to extract a higher volume per hour with the consequence of higher iron and manganese content that requires more demineralization to prevent discolored water. Last year, because of regional drought, the restriction started in April and prohibited any watering Monday through Friday.    

During a low-water moment, summer of 2015, yours
truly stepped into the Assabet River at the Rail
Trail bridge and walked to the Mill Street bridge.
Sights along the way included an active beaver lodge.

Water in, water out. The great majority of water supplied to Maynard ends up as wastewater, either to septic systems or processed and discharged to the Assabet River. As described above, the town's centralized water supply system dates back to 1889, but Maynard did not create a wastewater collection and treatment system until about 40 years later. The system was upgraded in the 1970s, but still inadequate, as were the discharges from several wastewater treatment facilities in upriver towns. 

In 1982 an author described the dam-created pond north of Powdermill Road on the Maynard-Acton border as "...the river smell is nauseating, reeking like an unpumped-out campground outhouse times ten." Upriver newspapers referred to the river as the "state cesspool." Key to the problem was the Assabet being less of a river and more of a series of ponds created by factory mill dams. Industrial discharges and wastewater nitrogen and phosphorus were trapped in the ponds' sediments rather than being flushed by spring floods, leading to eutrophic algae blooms, rotting plant matter and fishkills. Major wastewater treatment upgrades starting in the 1980s now mean that wastewater discharges are cleaner than the river it is put in to, and the net effect up and down the river is boatable and approaching swimmable. 

Learn more about the Assabet, Sudbury and Concord rivers at https://oars3rivers.org/ 

 

Maynard's Main Street bridge status

Maynard's Main Street bridge is tentatively scheduled for replacement starting the summer of 2028. The estimated budget is $8.4 million, a far cry from the $20,000 that the bridge it will be replacing cost back in 1922 (or the original, $1,310 in 1849).

A bridge is rated “structurally deficient” if its deck, superstructure, or substructure is rated in poor condition, which is a rating of 4 or below on the National Bridge Inspection Standards (NBIS) rating scale. Per website https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/bridge/nbis.cfm, "...the NBIS are the standards established over the safety inspections of highway bridges on public roads throughout the United States. The U.S. Congress originally required the Secretary of Transportation to establish these standards in 1968. The original NBIS was published in 1971, creating our Nation's first nationally coordinated bridge inspection program. Periodic and thorough inspections of our Nation's bridges are necessary to maintain safe bridge operation and prevent structural and functional failures. Updates to the standards have been made over the years, most recently in 2022. These updates recognize technological advancements, research results, and experience in administering the inspection program."

Plaque on the Main Street bridge (click to enlarge).
This plaque and one for the Walnut Street bridge
were installed on Armistice Day, November 11, 1923,
 in memory of those who served in the named wars.  

The mass.gov website https://gis.data.mass.gov/datasets/MassDOT::bridges/about has a link to a map of all bridges in Massachusetts with reports of the most recent inspections for each bridge. Maynard has three Assabet River bridges that are more than 100 years old: Walnut Street, Main Street and Route 117/62 toward Stow. The latter is also known as the Ben Smith bridge, as it is not far downstream from the Ben Smith dam. (The dam so-named because it was Ben Smith who sold the land to Amory Maynard and William Knight to build the dam that would power their mill.) These were all constructed as rebar-reinforced concrete bridges, with an expected lifespan of 50-75 years. The Walnut and Route 117/62 bridges were recently scored as six overall, i.e., "Fair", with no four or lower scores for deck, superstructure or substructure. In contrast, the Main Street bridge - constructed in 1922 - had an overall score of four, i.e., "Poor", with a four score for deck and superstructure and five for substructure. The image shows some of the deteriorating concrete.

A search for proposed bridge projects identified #604564 as a replacement of this bridge (#M-10-004), with a planned start date as summer of 2028. The existing bridge has a curb-to-curb with of 36 feet with 6.8 foot sidewalks of both sides. The plan calls for full-depth reconstruction of 300 feet beyond the bridge itself on both approaches, which would include not just Main Street but also the Walnut Street connection. The demolition, removal and replacement will be conducted in stages to always allow one lane of traffic in both directions plus pedestrian access during all of the demolition and construction, much as was accomplished for the Waltham Street bridge a few years back. This may require a temporary sidewalk bridge, as did Waltham.

The 1872 Main Street bridge, standing on Walnut Street and
looking west. The farthest building was "Assabet House",
 a large boarding house demolished in 1962 to make room
for the present-day post office, which opened in 1963. 
Photo courtesy of Maynard Historical Society. 

The estimated cost of the project is on the order of $8.4 million, to be funded primarily through the Federal Transportation Improvement Program. Bridge replacement projects are notoriously slow - state records show initial consideration dating to 2005, then the Notice To Proceed (NTP) to begin negotiating a contract issued in 2022, with actual work-start scheduled for 2028. 

The history of a Main Street bridge over the Assabet River dates back to 1849, with replacements in 1872 and 1922. The 1872 bridge was of steel construction, as was the Walnut Street bridge of the same year. Both were replaced with rebar-reinforced concrete bridges. The contract was awarded to F.B. Saunders of Framingham, who had bid $34,485 to do both bridges, in August of 1922. (The smaller Florida Street bridge had been replaced in 1919 for $6,000.) In the photo, the tracks were for the electric trolley that serviced Hudson, Stow, Maynard and Concord, with a branch to Acton, over the years 1901-1923. 

Main Street bridge (built 1922) photographed from the rail
trail bridge, with the mill buildings in the background. The mill
processed raw wool to make cloth and blankets (1846-1950),
later the home for Digital Equipment Company (1957-1998).

The first bridge owed its existence to the woolen mill. Under the auspices of Amory Maynard and William Knight, a woolen mill was constructed in 1846. At that time there was a railroad line passing through South Acton, connecting Fitchburg to Boston, that had become operational in 1844. The mill, however, was on the south side of the Assabet River, with no convenient way for horse-drawn wagons to bring raw wool in and finished goods out from the railroad station at South Acton. This wooden bridge across the Assabet was completed in 1849 at a cost of $1,310.* It allowed wagons loaded with wool or other goods to more conveniently connect to the road north to South Acton. That road (now Route 27) also crossed Concord Street, thus providing a connection to Concord to the east and Stow to the west. The east/west road was ancient, as on April 19, 1775, Stow Minutemen had marched on it toward Concord to confront the British troops that had forayed out from Boston to seize guns and other militia supplies.  

*By 1850, with a lot of lobbying by Amory Maynard, a railroad spur from South Acton reached what was then informally named Assabet Village (later incorporating as Town of Maynard in 1871), and then extended to Marlborough in 1855. This is now the Assabet River Rail Trail. In Assabet Village, a short railroad spur was created directly into the woolen mill. In addition to transporting raw wool and finished goods, after the Civil War the railroad was delivering coal, and in that way allowing the Assabet Mill to convert from water power to coal-fueled steam engines. The mill also had a coal gasification facility to provide gas for gaslight for the mill and for the town's streetlights, and then later a generator for electric lights. Over the following decades Maynard's mill became the largest woolen mill in New England. It closed in 1950. The mill buildings complex have had various tenants and owners since then, most famously Digital Equipment Corporation (1957-1998), and later, Monster.com.