Historic leaves, volume 1, April, 1902 - January, 1903

[20] testify to the genuineness of his greeting and the abundance of his table. In addition to these, there were the late Edward Cutter, whose residence is still standing near Cross street, and known as the Wyman place, Calvin Kinsley, John Sanborn, James Shute, Godfrey B. Albee, Benjamin Hadley, and George Foster, who did business on the turnpike. The last two are the only living representatives of the original brickmakers on the ‘Ten Hills Farm.’

Joseph P. Sanborn manufactured near the corner of Austin street and the turnpike, being the nearest yard to the toll-house. His son, William A. Sanborn, succeeded to the business of his father, and has the distinction of being the last maker of bricks, not only along the turnpike, but anywhere in Somerville. His yard has but just been cleared up, and with it the brick industry vanishes from our midst. Yes, true it is that what was, twenty years ago, a leading industry in Somerville has gone forever. The brickyards, too valuable to be worked as such, have given way to the march of improvement and are mostly occupied for other uses, or have furnished room for the homes of our ever-increasing population. The old smoking kiln-houses, the unsightly grinding-mills, the woodpiles, the workmen in their abbreviated costumes, the slop of the yard, and the half-dried bricks have slipped away from us, but the clay of ‘Ten Hills Farm,’ purified by fire, is still much in evidence in the great city yonder, and, in fact, all about us. The brickmakers have this at least to their credit, that out of it all, out of the digging and the grinding, and the striking and the carrying-off, and the haking — up process, out of the labor by day, and the vigils around and about the burning kilns by night, resulting at last in the perfect brick, they have been instrumental somehow in building up a great metropolis, and have literally and permanently painted that metropolis red.