Maynard Automobile History

Dr. Frank U. Rich and his daughter in his second automobile

The men of Maynard were not just buying a car - they were buying cars! Dr. Frank U. Rich is pictured in his second car, and he bought a third steam-powered car in 1909. The Harriman brothers went through multiple cars, with selling their slightly used cars to Stow or Maynard residents. New cars came with more horsepower and new features such as steering wheels, fenders and headlights.  

The first automobile owned in Maynard, a Stanley Steamer, was purchased by Dr. Frank U. Rich in 1899. He bought another Stanley Steamer in 1906. Rich lived in a house on Summer Street that was later moved to the north end of Florida Street (still standing) to make room for a new school around 1915. A photo in the collection of the Maynard Historic Society shows Rich in a Waltham Steam car (his third car), at his house, with his family and John Adams, his chauffeur, the first African American to live in Maynard.

The Stanley Motor Carriage Company was started by twin Stanley brothers in Watertown, Massachusetts. Until around 1912, steam car technology was superior to internal combustion engine gas technology despite the inconvenience of having to heat the boiler (with non-explosive kerosene) before starting the car. The Stanley brothers even advertised that their cars were safer than “internal explosion engine” cars. But the technology of the latter kept improving, so that the steam car era came to an end in the 1920s.

Rich (1857-1912) had been involved in an interesting murder case. Chester S. Jordan was convicted in May 1909 of murdering his wife in 1908. Just days after the conviction, Willis A, White, one of the jurors, was committed to an insane asylum. Jordan’s lawyer appealed on the grounds that White was insane during the trial. Rich testified that as White’s family physician, he, White’s wife and neighbors agreed that White’s mental health had been failing for some time, perhaps a consequence of an earlier head injury. Countering this, the prosecuting attorney interviewed the other 11 jurors, who testified that White had participated in all aspects of the one day of jury deliberation that it took to convict, without any indication of a deteriorating mental state. The verdict stood. Jordan was executed in 1912.

Persons' 1904 Ford Model A on Main Street. Note trolley tracks
and in the background, the Naylor Building before it burned in 1917. 

Charles H. Persons, Town Clerk, member of the House of Representatives, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, president of the Assabet Savings Bank and owner of C.H. Persons, Pianos, Organs and other Musical Instruments, purchased the first Ford in town in 1904. This was a Ford Model A, equipped with an 8 horsepower gas engine and providing a top speed of 28 mph. Photos in the collection of the Maynard Historical Society show the car as driven by Fred Persons (brother? son?) wearing a cloth cap while Charles is in the back seat, sporting a bowler hat. Unlike the later Model T – initially available only in black – the Model A was available only in red. Ford reused letter designations, so that A (1903-04), B (1904, a luxury car) and C (1904-05, an economy model) came before the famous Model T (1908-27) and the subsequent popular Model A (1927-31).

Persons’ car bore the license plate numbered 5986, issued in 1904. Massachusetts first began issuing licenses and registration plates in June of 1903 as a result of Chapter 473 of the Acts of 1903.The first plate, featuring the number "1" printed on it, was issued to Frederick Tudor in 1903 and is still held as an active registration by a member of his family. The same law also required that drivers have a driver’s license. 

The Harriman brothers, of Harriman Bros. New Method Laundry Co. also initially went in for steam-powered vehicles, but gas engines were a coming thing. Frank and Rowland, sons of John and Harriet Harriman, had an ice cream shop in their father’s building on Main Street, where Bud’s Variety store is now located, then in 1890 launched their ‘dry cleaning’ laundry business. Over time they expanded until it employed 75 people and completely occupied all 15,000 square feet of the three-story building. Dirty laundry was picked up by horse-drawn wagons, later gas-powered trucks, at households, then delivered a few days later cleaned, ironed and folded.

Frank and Rowland were big fans of cars. Frank is recorded as purchasing his second car in 1903. Rowland bought a car in 1904, two in 1906 and another in 1910. Frank is mentioned as being car sales agent for E.M.F. automobiles in 1909. The brothers later sold the laundry business and moved to Florida.

By 1910, there were two car dealers in town, repair shops, gas stations, car rental businesses, attempts to control speeding, and the first reported accident (Frank Harriman driving, small boy hit, bruised but otherwise unharmed). By 1925 the town’s annual report numbered 879 motor vehicles in Maynard. The horse count had dropped from a peak of 256 in 1899 to 70. A few horses were still in Maynard into the 1950s. As of 2025, there are two used car dealerships, two rental businesses, four gas stations and several car or truck repair and parts establishments. No horses.

Leapin' Lena, in repose

An article about automobiles cannot be complete without mention of Leapin’ Lena. Residents with long memories can tell tales of a tricked out car that participated in Maynard parades from the 1927 into the early 1960s. Lena was built through the efforts of Frank Parks, Ray Carruth, Joseph Dineen, Eddie Johnson and other men associated with the local American Legion Post #235. Frank and Ray had been inspired by a stunt car they saw at a performance of the Barnum & Bailey Circus. The American Legion crew started with an open-topped Ford Model T. The wheelbase was shortened. The car body was shifted back. Concrete was used to add weight to the rear, and steel skid plates were bolted to the underside of the back end.

With two people seated in front and three in back, Lena was so carefully balanced over the rear axle that a bit of acceleration combined with the occupants leaning back would pop her nose up to a twenty-degree angle. She could be driven a short distance in this nose-up position, then be slammed back down to the pavement with a touch of brakes. Hard on the occupants! Over years of hard-pounding parade performances many of Lena's original Model T parts failed and Model A parts were spliced in as replacements. The frame became a cross-cross of welds over welds. Motors burned out and replacements made. Lena spent the World War II years in hidden storage to avoid being swept up in the war's metal drives.

Maynard's Lena had the words "Original Leapin' Lena" painted across the back. As it turns out, quite a few American Legion and Shriner parades featured modified Model T cars - almost always named Leapin' Lena or Leaping Lena. But Maynard claimed to be first. A prolonged restoration led to a last attempt at a public appearance for the 1971 Maynard Centennial Parade. She performed well in a Crowe Park rehearsal, but broke down partway through the parade. Somewhere, parts of Lena may remain to this day, but like Humpty Dumpty, unlikely she can ever be put back together again.

Addendum: The Maynard Area Auto Club was founded in 1988 and at one time had more than 200 members, a newsletter, events, logo jackets, patches and other 'merch'. The Maynard Historical Society archives has photos of numerous items found via a search on "auto club". It appears that the club's existance came an end in 2019, although confusingly, the Massachusetts Association of Auto Clubs continues to list events for the Maynard club in 2025. 

Sculpture for the Assabet River Rail Trail

Sculpture, ready for installation. Length and height
5.5 feet. Design and construction and painting by students
at the Assabet Valley Regional Technical High School.

Fall 2024, a group of Maynard residents proposed to the Town of Maynard that sculptures be added to town land adjacent to the Assabet River Rail Trail. Of the other communities that ARRT passes through, Hudson has several wooden and metal sculptures and murals, Marlborough none, Acton none, Maynard six painted posts (see below) The proposal was submitted to the Maynard Cultural Council for 2025 funding for one sculpture. MCC approved the proposal, with a grant of $760. Installation and a dedication event set for July 19, 2025.  

When the 3.4 miles of Trail in Acton and Maynard were officially opened to users in August 2018, art had no part in the project. The budget had included some landscaping, meaning specifically the planting of hundreds of trees adjacent (but not TOO close) to the pavement. Subsequently a non-government organization - Trail of Flowers (www.trailofflowers.com) - was started in the fall of 2018 with the intent of beautifying the Trail via planting flowering bulbs, and pollinator-friendly flowering shrubs and trees adjacent to the Trail. As of mid-2025, TOF has raised and spent about $12,000 for plantings primarily in Acton and Maynard, with some daffodil and grape hyacinth bulbs planted in Marlborough, and intention to expand to Hudson in the future.

Painted posts salvaged from the ArtSpace Pollinator
Meadow project and getting a fresh coat of varnish
before installation along ARRT north of Summer St.

In October 2023, the ArtSpace Honeybee Meadow project offered to donate six painted posts to the Town of Maynard for relocation along the Assabet River Rail Trail. The Honeybee Meadow had been created in 2016 on ArtSpace property with a combination of donor and state governemnt grant funding. Later renamed Pollinator Meadow in recognition that many insects other than just honeybees required flowering plants to provide nectar and pollen, the project was let go fallow after ArtSpace closed in 2020. Each post - six feet tall when installed with the bottom anchored in gravel and soil - includes a pollinator-informative plaque at the top. Users of the Rail Trail find the artwork and information to be pause-worthy. The same east side of the Rail Trail has been planted with Forsythia and pollinator-friendly Beauty Bushes, all chosen to obscure the view of Enterprise Rent-a-car and Emerald Acres. 

My idea for first-year sculpture

For this initial sculpture project, the idea is that the Maynard group would meet with metal shop students enrolled at the Assabet Valley Regional Technical High School to design a work that was within the students' capabilities. Maynard volunteers would then be responsible for pouring a concrete slab as an anchor for the sculpture. The Town of Maynard has liability insurance covering injuries that occur in town parks; the Rail Trail, being on town land, would also be covered. Of course, design and placement would need to assure that there would be no sharp edges too close to the pavement of the Trail. 

One of the proposed ideas is of a combination of a bicyclist knocking down a pedestrian (sketch). More conservative opinions prevailed, so the approved design was of an abstract of a person on a bicycle. 

Another modest idea would be a 'wheel' six feet tall, with the spokes being flat strips of metal with Maynard history facts laser cut into the metal. Examples: Amory Maynard 1804-1890; Woolen mill 1846-1950; Town of Maynard April 19, 1871; Lorenzo Maynard 1829-1904; Digital Equipment Company 1957-1998; Clock Tower built 1892; Electric trolley 1901-1923; Monster.com 1998-2014; and so on. This could also be done for Acton, Hudson and Marlborough. 

If the first year's proposal succeeds, the group is considering a much more ambitious sculpture plan for future years. All that would call for corporate and government donations, requests for proposals from established metalwork sculptors and professional installations. Thinking big!!!

DONATIONS FOR TRAIL OF FLOWERS

Tulips at Marble Farm site blooming spring 2024

If you have enjoyed use of the Assabet River Rail Trail and the flowering installations, please consider donating to Trail of Flowers. Funds are needed to continue to add plants in all communities bordering the Trail, including the daffodil display at the Marble Farm Historic Site  (across Route 27 from Christmas Motors, Maynard). In the fall of 2023, tulips were added inside the fence at the Marble Farm site with great success - an additional 125 bulbs will be added fall of 2024. Elsewhere along the Rail Trail volunteers will be planting 1,000 daffodil bulbs. The bulbs were purchased as a mix of early-, mid- and late season blooming so as to stretch the bloom period.

So, please, as individuals or families, donate $20 or more via PayPal to damark51@gmail.com or via Venmo to www.venmo.com/u/DavidAMark51. Businesses are asked to donate at least $100. Whether you donate or not, if you wish to be kept informed of TOF volunteer planting opportunities then send an email to damark51@gmail.com. Thank you.      

Maynard Hurricanes

 Much of this is a repeat of a 2017 column in the Beacon Villager (Maynard'd former newspaper)

With all the recent news about hurricanes Helene and Milton, what is the history of hurricanes hitting eastern Massachusetts? 

1938: Trees damaged in Glenwood Cemetery

1938: The practice of naming Atlantic hurricanes with women’s names did not begin until 1947; or retiring names of major storms after 1955, or having men’s names rather than only women’s starting in 1979. Thus, the storm of 1938 came be known as the Great New England Hurricane, also the Long Island Express. Mistakes in interpreting weather data had led to a prediction that this storm would dissipate to gale force before making landfall. Instead, on September 21, 1938, it reached Long Island with hurricane force winds and a significant storm surge. More than 600 people died – mostly in Rhode Island. The oldest residents of Maynard and Stow remember vast numbers of trees being blown down, blocking streets and damaging buildings.    

1954: A double-header! Hurricane Carol also crossed the east end of Long Island, reaching landfall as a Category 2 storm. In Boston, high winds destroyed the steeple of the Old North Church. Hurricane Edna crossed Cape Cod as a Category 2 storm just ten days after Carol had tracked a bit farther west. Locally, rainfall of 5 to 10 inches on ground already saturated by the passage of Carol flooded basements and rivers. Combined, the storms destroyed much of the peach and apple crops just weeks before harvest time.  

1955: Hurricane Diane waltzed ashore in the Carolinas, wandered across New Jersey and southern New York, before heading eastward across much of Massachusetts. By this time it was weak wind-wise, but very, very wet. Much of southern Massachusetts, from its border with New York to the ocean, experienced flooding. Half of Worcester was under water. Locally, an estimated 15 inches of rain fell in four days. The Assabet River crested at 8.93 feet, the highest it had been since 1927 and the highest since. (The flood of 2010 crested at 7.1 feet.) Main Street flooded, as did the first floor of the mill building closest to the river. No bridges were lost.   

1991: Hurricane Bob was an August event. It skirted the coast before making landfall at Newport, Rhode Island as a Category 2 hurricane. Forecasting was good, so Rhode Island and Connecticut were able to declare of emergency before the storm hit. The storm crossed eastern Massachusetts fast and relatively dry, so most of the damage was due to high winds and storm surge along the coast. Provincetown reported sustained winds exceeding 100 miles per hour. Locally, downed trees and minor damage to buildings. The name “Bob” was permanently retired, joining Diane, Edna and Carol as other New England hurricane names we will never hear again.

An explanation of ‘storm surge’: Coastal flooding can be severe during hurricanes (and also northeasters). The push of wind across long distances of water for prolonged periods of time not only generates large waves, but pushes water. When this reaches shore at times of high tide, the water can be five, ten, fifteen, even twenty feet above normal high tide. The greatest storm surges are always to the right of the eye of the hurricane. In fact, on the left side, as the hurricane comes ashore, the winds are blowing away from the coast, causing the opposite of a surge. With Milton coming ashore south of Tampa, water was blown out of Tampa Bay, lowering sea level by about five feet. The Galveston, Texas hurricane of 1900 pushed a storm surge of 8-12 feet across a city that was mostly less than 10 feet above sea level, flattening the city and resulting in a loss of an estimated 8,000 to 10,000 lives, making it the deadliest natural disaster to every strike the United States. See Wikipedia article "1900 Galveston hurricane."

Digital Equipment Corporation - a 41 Year Arc

On Saturday, January 4th, 2025, I presented in-person talk titled “All Things DEC” to a standing-room only audience - many of them DEC alumni - at the Maynard Public Library. This was be taped by Maynard High School's WAVM and will be posted to the library's Youtube channel.

Founder and president Ken Olsen
multi-tasking while donating blood

The talk’s description will be the same as when I gave this lecture in 2021 as part of celebration of Maynard's 150th anniversary. The description at that time: “Digital Equipment Corporation (digital, DEC) had a glorious arc that started with some rented space in the mill complex in 1957, furnished with office furniture bought on credit from Gruber Bros. Furniture, then rising to make Maynard the 'Minicomputer capital of the world', as a multi-billion dollar company second only to IBM. Mark's talk, with many images from the archives of the Maynard Historical Society, will span the origin, rise, peak and decline of DEC. He will touch on the work experience of women at DEC, and the company's commitment to diversity training.” Registration (free) is at the Maynard Public Library website."

After ten years of NOT writing about DEC in my weekly history columns in the Beacon-Villager, I finally started a series of articles about DEC in November 2019, with an origin story. All this stretched to a last article in March 2020 about DEC’s approach to anti-discrimination and diversity training. In between, the columns (all posted at www.maynardlifeoutdoors.com) covered not just the rise, peak and fall, but also DEC’s faltering and flawed efforts to be in the personal computer business, and then the impact on Maynard once DEC was gone. DEC was headquartered in Maynard for 41 years, and at its peak employed thousands of people in Maynard (a fraction of the 100,000+ employed worldwide).

Clay model for a never-made stature intended to honor DEC
founder Ken Olsen (at Maynard library, referred to as "Mini-Ken")

DEC’s demise was not unique. The myth is that DEC missed the advent of mini-computers because of president Ken Olsen’s blind spot, but in reality, there were multiple, major, corporate missteps. And not just at DEC. Just in the greater Boston area Data General, Wang Laboratories, Prime Computer, Lotus Development Corporation and Apollo Computer faded, and either folded or were acquired. This trend of short corporate lifespan actually continues today and extends beyond tech. An interesting report by Innosight [https://www.innosight.com/insight/creative-destruction/] observed that the average lifespan of large companies has been declining for decades, either because they lose to the competition (Monster, Yahoo) or are acquired by larger companies (Monsanto, Aetna, Time-Warner). Locally, our example is Acacia Communications, headquartered in Maynard’s mill complex, which started in 2009 with about the same building space as did DEC back in 1957, expanded, expanded more, went public in 2016 with a valuation of several billion dollars – and then was acquired by Cisco Systems in 2021. As of 2024, Acacia continues to exist as a branded company within the Cisco family.

 For most of its history, Maynard has been a company town, in the sense that its survival and prosperity depended almost entirely on one company. From 1847 to 1950, that was wool industry, turning bales of fleece into cloth. A period of diversification began in 1953 when the empty mill complex was bought and repurposed as Maynard Industry Incorporated, with dozens of industry and office space tenants. DEC started renting space in 1957, expanded over the years, until buying the complex in 1974, reverting Maynard to a one-company town again. DEC closed operations in the mill complex in 1993, then the Parker Street complex and the corporate headquarters on Powdermill Road in the years following. At the mill complex, Wellesley Rosemont (Clock Tower Place; 1998-2015) reverted to the practice of multiple clients, which carried over to current-day, Mill & Main operations. Looking forward, the Town of Maynard hopes to sustain the idea of being a commercially diversified community rather than hitch its wagon to one star. But it would still be helpful if the mill complex was 100 percent rented.    

Heat deaths more than all other weather combined?

U.S. government data shows heat-related deaths per year are more than the combined deaths from cold, tornado, hurricane, other wind events, flood, drowning due to ocean rip currents and lightning. 

Furthermore, while heat-related deaths officially reported as averaging around 1,200 per year, indirect estimates put the number as exceeding 10,000 per year. The discrepancy exists because autopsy reports that state cause of death as heat-related are much lower than the spike in total deaths during the heat wave versus the average for the same time of year without hot weather. In Chicago, mid-July 1995 saw temperatures above 100 degrees for five days. During that period, more than 700 deaths above average occured, and hundreds more were hospitalized and survived. Details are explained at a Wikipedia article titled "1995 Chicago Heat Wave."See also the general article titled "Heat wave."

People at risk are the elderly, infants, indoor workers at facilities without air conditioning, outdoor workers, outdoor athletes and hikers, and the homeless. Dehydration increases risk. In addition, evidence supports that use of methamphetamine puts people at higher risk.

The other weather-related deaths are dying from cold, hurricane, tornado, wind (not hurricane or tornado), flood, lightning or rip currents near ocean shoreline caused by storm-generated waves. Each of these, except in extraordinary years, cause fewer than 100 deaths per year. Furthermore, deaths from these causes are not trending up or down, whereas since 2015 the number of heat-related deaths per year have more than doubled. 

On a larger scale, according to the World Health Organization, between 2000 and 2019 there were approximately 500,000 heat-related deaths each year, with close to 80% of that total from Asia and Europe. Lack of air conditioning - also lack of electricity - combined with longer periods of extreme temperatures and inadequate medical care for heat stroke, contribute to these deaths. 

Wildfire smoke

Another under-estimated contribuion to premature deaths is wildfire. In the U.S. deaths directly attributed to wildfire, as distinguished from building fires, numbers in the single digits or teens for most years, with spikes when people are unable to escape when a wildfire sweeps into a residential area. However, indirect causes of death that can be attributed to wildfire smoke is an entirely different story. For people with existing respiratory, cardiovasuclar, kidney and other diseases, are at increased premature death risk when exposed to wildfire smoke. Even suicide rates increase! As with heat-related deaths, smoke-related deaths are under diagnosed and under reported. A recent study published by researchers at Yale University estimated that wildfire smoke-related deaths are at 30,000 per year. As with heat-related deaths, the elderly, outdoor workers and people who cannot afford indoor air filtration machinery are at greater risk.  

After the hurricane is gone

The 2 October 2024 issue of Nature magazine (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07945-5) has an interesting article titled "Mortality caused by tropical cyclones in the United States." The key point is that for years (years!!) after a hurricane has passed through an area, there is a long-term increase in deaths above expected. The research tracked deaths following 501 hurricanes over the period 1930-2015. The report estimated that the average hurricane generated 7,000–11,000 excess deaths over a multi-year follow-up, which is far inexcess or the average of 24 immediate deaths reported in government statistics. These indirect deaths - from many causes - had the greatest effects on the very young, the elderly and the impoverished. Often the indirect causes include less access or ability to afford health care, resulting in increased risk of cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and others (but not repiratory diseases, vehicle accidents or others). For the hurricane-targeted states stretching from Texas to Maryland and Deleware, indirect storm-attributed deaths put the death rates in those states at 5-10% above national average. Although not mentioned in this study, tornado damage may also cause a long-term increase in deaths.