Charles A. Nelson , A. M., Waltham, past, present and its industries, with an historical sketch of Watertown from its settlement in 1630 to the incorporation of Waltham, January 15, 1739.

[88] Lane), there still stands the house once the property of Isaac and Benjamin Hagar. In 1798 William Fiske was the owner of this house and 40 acres of land. From him it passed to his youngest daughter, Caroline, who upon her decease, devised it to the town of Waltham. It is among the oldest buildings if not the very oldest standing in the town. Full particulars in reference to this devise will be given further on.

Jonathan Stearns, in 1798, occupied a house just below where the Prospect House now stands, the property of the heirs of Jonathan Hagar, long since gone.

Further west stands a house which, previous to 1798, had been occupied by successive blacksmiths whose shop stood near by. It passed through several hands and finally became the property of Seth Wellington.

Above this is the residence of Hon. Nathaniel P. Banks, built by Jacob Gale and owned by him in 1798. It was purchased by General Banks of J. Baker. A few rods above the barn on this estate, previous to 1795, there stood a small house owned and occupied by Amos Harrington,¹ probably built by his father Daniel, who kept the Harrington Tavern at this point. Above this is an old road running over Prospect Hill, which, from the records, appears once to have been a public road between the Harrington and Stratton Farms. The latter was in the northwest part of the town beyond the hills, near the junction of West and Winter Streets.

Above Moody Street, on the south side of Main Street, was a house once occupied by a Captain Thayer, a carpenter and wheelwright, and then by Leonard Williams Cushing, a son of the clergyman, who sold it to Nathan Upham. It was afterwards the property of Jonas Clark, hatter, who removed to a farm east of Lexington Street, where he died at the age of 85, and this house came into the hands of Joseph Hoar.