About Connections: Love it or hate it, history is a map. Those who hate history think it irrelevant; many who love history think it escapism. In truth, history is the clearest road map to how we got here: America in the 21st century.
One of my grandmothers called it “the back of beyond”; the other called it “where the devil says goodnight.” Neither is a pejorative; they simply meant an out-of-the-way place that might also be a highly desired destination. In Berkshire County, we call it Hinsdale.
With an altitude of 1,431 feet, it is higher than Pittsfield (1,039) and only slightly lower than Monument Mountain (1,739). Hinsdale is farther, higher, and always colder than more central Berkshire towns. Its permanent population is 1,900, making it substantially larger than Monterey, Sandisfield, Tyringham, or Otis.
Hinsdale was first settled in 1763 by the three Miller brothers from Connecticut. It was considered a district of Peru. By the time it was incorporated as a separate town, in 1804, the Millers were all but forgotten, and it was named after the Rev. Theodore Hinsdale.
Five years earlier, Hinsdale oversaw erection of its church. He raised the money needed, but not without difficulty. He proposed to auction off the pews. This was common practice in the early days. Folks would compete to be permanently seated in a particular pew, sometimes with their name affixed. There was an understanding which were the best pews, and those went to the highest bidder.
Somehow, this common practice got out of hand in Hinsdale. The story goes that there was liquor involved, but whatever the reason, amounts bid per pew were astronomical and far beyond the bidders’ ability to pay. Folks awoke the next morning with headaches and debt far beyond their means. It prompted a mass exodus from Hinsdale. It was a flight by those who could not pay and did not want to try.
Those remaining labored to pay the debt; one man was forced to sell his cow to meet the obligation. Another man, whose only possessions were a saddle and tools, stared at his $100 pledge in disbelief. The church was completed in 1799 — exactly how, no one knows — only to be moved a few years later. The railroad, so coveted in Sandisfield, did come to Hinsdale. The immediate result was they moved the town green closer to the train station, and then moved the church to the new town green.
A less controversial Hinsdale tale is told with more pride. Israel Bissell was a post rider. These were men who collected and delivered letters. From 10 a.m. on April 19, 1775 until 5 p.m. on April 23, Bissell rode. He spread the news of the Battles of Lexington and Concord — the shot heard round the world.
For four days and six hours, stopping only to change horses, he reached Philadelphia. He carried a proclamation, “A Call to Arms.” It spread the word of revolution. Today, the proclamation he carried is in the archives of the Historical Society of Philadelphia. To great civic pride, Bissell settled in Hinsdale, spent the rest of his life in the backwoods hamlet, and is buried in the Maple Street cemetery.
In the early 19th century, they called him the Squire. He was Charles Plunkett who came from Ireland and founded the Plunkett Woolen Mill in Hinsdale. He also owned half the houses and the Plunkett Mill Store. It was a sad invention of 19th century industrialization — the company town. Actual cash money all but disappeared. The bill at the store and the rent for housing was deducted from the salary check. If salaries were ever increased, then so were rent and the cost of food and goods in the store. Employees did indeed “owe their souls to the company store.” There was very little turnover. Employees could not afford to leave.
Worse, perhaps, if employees had any cash or net earnings, they were not given it. They were encouraged to invest it in the company rather than putting it in a bank. The closest banks were in Pittsfield, nine miles away. It was a prodigious distance by foot or by a horse that trotted leisurely at six miles per hour, or a mule that was even slower. When the Plunkett Mill went out of business, the mill workers of Hinsdale were left with nothing.
Hinsdale had industries and then, all at once, it didn’t. At the turn of the century, with almost all closed, Hinsdale reinvented itself as a “health resort.” The absence of industry became an asset, as did the remote location. Travelers could get away — way away — where clean air and clean water would heal what ailed them. Hinsdale was doing okay, and then came Mr. and Mrs. George Page.
In the midst of this 1899 tourist trade, George Page struck gold. Page and his wife “mined” the investors more than any hole in the ground. They limited their labor to issuing stock certificates and public statements, praised their own labors, and upbraided any doubters. They had experts, professors, and the successful California miner “California Jack” all supporting their claims. By 1901, even the Pages were exhausted, and they lit out of Hinsdale, both richer and relieved they had avoided being strung up. The great wisdom in a con is to know when to quit.
But Hinsdale had residents of whom they could be proud. Nancy Hinsdale was first Head Mistress of the Emma Willard School, and R.H. White founded a very successful department store, one of the first, in Boston. Francis E. Warren left home and became governor of Wyoming. Due to his successful efforts with irrigation, he was called the Father of Reclamation. Finally, Thomas Frissell, old enough to remember that famous auction of the pews, became the leader of the Temperance Movement in Berkshire County.
Once a center of industry — with five mills, a cotton factory, a tannery, two bedstead factories and sawmills, then a health resort, and after that, the largest supplier of Christmas trees — today Hinsdale’s 21 square miles, 1,900 people, and unspoiled lakes and forests are part of the Pittsfield statistical district.
