About Fairhaven

A Historical Timeline of Fairhaven Massachusetts.

The 1600s

1652, November 29: Thirty-six Plymouth colonists buy the territory that makes up present-day Fairhaven, Acushnet, New Bedford, Dartmouth, Westport and parts of Tiverton, RI, from Wampanoag chief Massasoit and his son Wamsutta. The tract is divided into thirty-four shares. Each share equaled more than 3,300 acres. One of the purchasers was John Cooke, who had come to America with his father Francis aboard the Mayflower in 1620. For several years the territory, known as “Cushena,” remains unsettled.

1660: Three men pay taxes in “Cushena”--Arthur Hathaway, James Shaw and (probably) Samuel Cuthbert. Arthur Hathaway, a son-in-law of John Cooke, settles on the east side of the Acushnet River in present-day Acushnet.

1661: Arthur Hathaway buys one-half share of land from Samuel Cuthbert. Massasoit dies. Wamsutta becomes sachem.

1662: Taxes are paid by Arthur Hathaway, James Shaw, Samuel Cuthbert, William Spooner, Samuel Jenney, John Russell and (probably) Ralph Earle. Samuel Jenney is appointed constable of “Acushena.” It is probably in this year that John Cooke, his wife Sarah and three unmarried daughters move here from Plymouth. Wamsutta dies. His brother Philip becomes sachem.

1663: It is likely that by this year (Lt.) Jonathan Delano, son of Philipe De La Noye, has settled in the Nasketucket area, where he built a mill on the Nasketucket River.

1664, June 8: The territory is incorporated as the township of Dartmouth.

1666: William Palmer is appointed constable. He is said to have lived in the vicinity where Fort Phoenix was later built. John Cooke is appointed Representative to Plymouth Court, a position held by either Cooke or John Russell during the town’s first twenty years.

1667: Arthur Hathaway, John Russell and Samuel Hickes are selectmen. Hester Cooke, daughter of John and Sarah Cooke, marries Thomas Taber.

1670: John Cooke is elected selectman and will serve in this office nine times between now and 1683, with consecutive terms broken only by the destruction of the town during the King Philip War.

1672: By this year, Thomas Pope and his wife Sarah (Jenney) had moved here, settling near Sconticut Neck. John Cooke is given Ram [Pope’s] Island by the town in return for services.

1673: Jacob Mitchell, son-in-law of Thomas Pope, is appointed as constable and is named an ensign-bearer of the militia.

1675, June 20: The King Philip War begins when hostile natives controlled by Wampanoag sachem Philip attack and kill settlers in Swansea. In July, Dartmouth is attacked and all thirty homes within the township are destroyed. William Palmer, Jacob and Susannah Mitchell and John Pope are killed. The town is abandoned for about three years. (Lt.) Jonathan Delano serves under Benjamin Church during the war.

1678, June 20: Dartmouth holds its first Town Meeting since the beginning of the King Philip War.

1685: Plymouth Colony is divided into three counties. Dartmouth is part of Bristol County.

1695, November 23: John Cooke, the last surviving male passenger of the Mayflower, dies at the age of 88. Cooke’s grandson, Thomas Taber Jr., inherits Ram [Pope’s] Island.

The 1700s

1713/14, March 25: John Jenney deeds land to “the people of God called Presbyterians” for a burial ground next to the meetinghouse at the village of Acushnet.

1724: A road is laid out from Susannah Hathaway’s orchard to the vicinity of Lt. Seth Pope’s house. It will be known as the Back Road and Head-of-the-River Road before getting the name Alden Road.

1726, March 17: Lt. Seth Pope dies at the age of 79.

1728, February 25: A road is laid out from Susannah Hathaway’s orchard southward along what is now northern Main Street and Adams Street to about Spring Street.

1760, October 20: Elnathan Pope sells twenty waterfront acres of his farm to Noah Allen and thirteen other investors. Divided into 40 lots, the “Twenty-Acre Purchase” develops into Fair-Haven Village.

1760, December 12: William Wood sells Elnathan Eldredge 6 acres of land on the Acushnet River west of present-day Cherry Street. This “little town at ye foot of William Wood’s homestead,” with its thirty lots, becomes the nucleus of Oxford Village.

1765, May 30: Elnathan Pope sells whaling merchant Joseph Rotch about 86 acres of farmland directly east of Fair-Haven Village. The Rotch family will keep this land off the market for about 65 years.

1775, April 21: Two days after the “Lexington Alarm,” three companies of Dartmouth militia march to Roxbury to join forces from throughout New England who are gathering outside Boston.

1775, May 13-14: Under the command of Nathaniel Pope and Daniel Egery, a group of 25 Fairhaven minutemen aboard the sloop Success capture two British vessels in Buzzards Bay. This is the first naval battle of the American Revolution.

1775, June: Construction begins on a fort at Nolscott Point under the supervision of brothers-in-law Eleazer Hathaway and Benjamin Dillingham.

1778, September 5-6: The British land 4,000 troops on the west side of the Acushnet River. They burn ships and warehouses in Bedford Village, skirmish at the Head-of-the-River bridge, and march through Fairhaven to Sconticut Neck, burning several homes along the way. The fort is abandoned and it is destroyed by the enemy troops. An attack on Fair-Haven Village is repelled by militia under the command of Major Israel Fearing who had marched from Wareham with additional militiamen.

1787, February 23: The town of New Bedford, including Fairhaven and Acushnet, is incorporated.

1790, June 7: The proprietors of a Congregational meeting house purchase a lot on the northeast corner of Main and Center streets from Benjamin and Joseph Church for the construction of a church. The Second Church of Christ is built in 1794.

1795: A bridge is built across the Herring River and Main Street is extended northward from Fairhaven Village to Oxford.

1796: Construction of the first Fairhaven-New Bedford Bridge begins.

The 1800s

1800, May 1: The New Bedford (later Fairhaven) Academy opens. This private school is located on the west side of Main Street, north of Bridge Street.
1807, April: A fierce spring storm brings tides up to ten feet higher than normal, causing a great deal of damage to the Fairhaven-New Bedford Bridge.
1807: The Methodist Episcopal Church of Fairhaven is organized and meets at Head-of-the-River.
1808: Fort Phoenix is reconstructed with granite walls.
1812, February 22: The town of Fairhaven, including Acushnet, is incorporated. Joseph Tripp is the first Town Clerk. Selectmen are Stephen Tripp, James Taber and Benjamin Tripp.
1814, June 13: In the early morning hours an attack on Fairhaven is attempted by landing boats launched from the British raider Nimrod. The militia gathers, alerted by the firing of the guns at Fort Phoenix. The British do not come ashore.
1815, September 23: A hurricane destroys the Fairhaven-New Bedford Bridge, Samuel Borden's bridge from Eldredge Lane to Crow Island, and a great deal of other property along the shore. Town Clerk Levi Jenney's office is washed from Union Wharf and the first three years of Fairhaven's official records are lost.
1824: The town buys property in North Fairhaven from Noah Spooner for use as a “Poor Farm.”
1828, March 17: A contract is signed by a committee from Oxford Village, for the construction of a stone schoolhouse in District No. 11. The building on North Street is the first of the district schools to be built in Fairhaven.
1828, June 30: The town pays Enoch S. Jenney $75 for about an acre of his property on Main Street in North Fairhaven for the creation of Woodside Cemetery. Jenney sells burial lots privately on a second acre immediately to the south.
1830: A Methodist church is built on the west side of Main Street south of Oxford Village.
1831, April 19: The Fairhaven Bank (later the National Bank of Fairhaven) is incorporated. The following day, Ezekiel Sawin is elected as the bank president.
1831, November 26: The town votes to hold future Town Meetings at the Fairhaven Academy.
1832, February 10: The Fairhaven Institution for Savings is incorporated. Ezekiel Sawin is elected president of the bank.
1832, December 15: Built with funds provided by Warren Delano I, Jabez Delano Jr. and Joseph Bates Jr., the Washington Street Christian Meetinghouse on the northwest corner of Washington and Walnut streets is dedicated. (This will later become a Unitarian church.)
1838: This year Fairhaven is ranked the second largest whaling port in America. Twenty-four vessels sailed from town during the course of the year.
1840, January 29: Henry Huttleston Rogers is born to Rowland and Mary E. (Huttleston) Rogers.
1840, October 14: Joseph Bates Jr. participates in the first “General Conference on the Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ,” held in Boston.
1841, January 3: Herman Melville sails from Fairhaven aboard the new whaleship Acushnet.
1841, March: At the invitation of Joseph Bates Jr., William Miller presents a series of lectures on the Second Coming of Christ at the Washington Street Christian Church. A number of worshippers break from the church and form a Second Advent Society.
1843: A new Town House is built on the northeast corner of Main and Hawthorn streets for $2,300. It is the location of Town Meetings until it is burned in 1858.
1843, May 7: The whaleship John Howland, Captain William H. Whitfield, returns to port with young Manjiro Nakahama, who had been rescued from a Pacific island during the voyage. Manjiro becomes the first Japanese person to live in America and later gains prominence upon his return to Japan.
1845, September 3: The new, brick First Congregational Church on the northwest corner of Center and William streets is dedicated.
1850, July 7: River-Side Cemetery is consecrated. It has been created on property donated by Warren Delano II, whose father becomes the first president of the cemetery’s board of trustees.
1851: The town purchases the former Methodist Church on Main Street, at a cost of $1,000, for use as a high school. Another $4,500 is spent to adapt and outfit the building.
1852, January 26: Classes begin for the first time at Fairhaven High School.
1853, April 29: Iron arrives from Newport, Wales, for the construction of the Fairhaven Branch Railroad.
1853, September 29: Phoenix Hall is dedicated. The upper story had been the original Congregational Church, built in 1794. The building was jacked up, turned 90 degrees, and stores were built below.
1860, February 13: The northern part of Fairhaven is incorporated as the Town of Acushnet.
1861, September 30: Twenty -one year old Henry Huttleston Rogers leaves Fairhaven to seek his fortune in the oil fields of Pennsylvania.
1864: The American Nail Machine Co. of Boston purchases the former Rodman Wharf property on Fort Street.
1867: The American Nail Machine Co. is reorganized as the American Tack Company.
1869, September 8: Between 4:00 and 7:00 p.m., a hurricane strikes, destroying the Fairhaven-New Bedford Bridge. The one-hundred foot wooden spire atop the First Congregational Church is blown down. This has been an important landmark to mariners returning to port.
1872, February 6: The New Bedford and Fairhaven Street Railway is chartered and horse drawn trolley service to Fairhaven begins in September.
1872, December 12: The Concordia Masonic Lodge is formed.
1879, February 18: Charles D. Waldron begins publishing the weekly Star from his home on Oxford Street.
1880, October 7: At Algonac, the Delano family estate at Newburgh, NY, Sara Delano, daughter of Warren Delano II, becomes the second wife of James Roosevelt.
1883, January 29: The constitution and by-laws are adopted for the Fairhaven Improvement Association. The first president is Edward Dana.
1885, September 3: Rogers School is dedicated. It is the first public building donated to the town by Henry Huttleston Rogers.
1890: Construction begins on the Coggeshall Street Bridge.
1893, January 30: On what would have been the 20th birthday of Millicent Gifford Rogers, the deceased daughter of Henry H. Rogers, the Millicent Library is dedicated.
1893: The town sells 30 acres of the “Town Farm” west of Main Street to developers who intend to build homes for mill workers.
1893: Henry H. Rogers founds the Fairhaven Water Company and construction of the public water system is begun.
1894, February 22: The Fairhaven Town Hall, a gift of Abbie Palmer (Gifford) Rogers, is dedicated, with Henry Huttleston Rogers’ friend Mark Twain delivering a humorous speech. Three months later on May 21, Abbie Rogers dies in New York following surgery for stomach cancer.
1895: Electric trolley cars begin service in Fairhaven.
1896, June 1: The Selectmen and School Committee award a contract for the construction of Oxford School to Brownell and Murkland of New Bedford.

The 1900s

1902: The new Fairhaven-New Bedford Bridge is completed.
1905, May 21: The first Catholic Mass in Fairhaven is celebrated at Phoenix Hall by the Fathers of the Sacred Hearts.
1906, February 11: The original St. Joseph’s Church, on the southwest corner of Spring and Adams streets, is dedicated.
1906, April 11: In an informal ceremony on the 50th anniversary of his graduation from Fairhaven High School, Henry Huttleston Rogers, with family, close friends and town officials, dedicates the new Fairhaven High School, the last public building he donated to his hometown.
1908, June 21: The cornerstone is laid for the Church of the Sacred Hearts at the southwest corner of Main and Dover streets.
1911, September 10: Sacred Hearts Academy opens on Main Street in North Fairhaven.
1917, June 26: The town appropriates $38,000 for the building of the Job C. Tripp elementary school.
1918: July 4: In a ceremony at Fairhaven High School stadium, Japanese Ambassador Kikujiro Ishii presents a samurai sword to Fairhaven on behalf of Dr. Toichiro Nakahama, the son of Manjiro Nakahama.
1920, September: The original Fairhaven High School on the west side of Main Street opposite the new High School is demolished.
1921, October 15: Construction of the 8-room Edmund E. Anthony Jr. elementary school is completed.
1924: Fairhaven establishes a Planning Board and begins the process of zoning properties.
1925, March 1: The first Mass at St. Mary’s Church in North Fairhaven is celebrated by Fr. Charles De Baetselier.
1925, May 3: The new St. Joseph’s Church on the northwest corner of Spring and Adams streets is dedicated.
1929: New Bedford businessman John Duff sells 90 acres on the west side of Mill Road to Sound Airways, which will operate an airport serving Fairhaven and New Bedford.
1935, September 3: Passenger service of the Fairhaven railroad line is discontinued.
1936, October 21: President and Mrs. Franklin Delano Roosevelt pay their last visit to the Delano Family Homestead at 39 Walnut Street following a campaign speech in New Bedford.
1938, September 21: The “Great New England Hurricane of 1938,” the region’s worst storm of the century, strikes Fairhaven, destroying about 400 homes.
1940, June 8: The last Fairhaven electric trolley line, North Fairhaven, is replaced with a bus route.
1943, November: The Fairhaven Boys Club is granted permission to use the first floor of the former Washington Street School.
1946, January 19: The Centre Methodist Church on the northeast corner of Center and Walnut streets is destroyed by fire.
1953, March 30: Railroad days in town come to an end when the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad closes the Fairhaven line.
1958, July: Congress authorizes the construction of the New Bedford-Fairhaven-Acushnet Hurricane Barrier to protect the inner harbor from destructive tidal surges during storms.
1962, July 29: The Fairhaven Sesquicentennial Parade and an evening band concert in Cushman Park cap a week-long celebration of the Town of Fairhaven’s 150th Anniversary.
1967, June 1: Fairhaven Junior High School officially becomes Elizabeth I. Hastings Junior High School in honor of its principal, who celebrates her 69th birthday the same day.
1968, March 14: Charles Pittle sells to Berdon Inc. the property which will become Fairhaven’s first large-scale shopping plaza. Mammoth Mart opens in Berdon Plaza later in the year.
1968, September 28: An agreement is signed allowing the town to take over the Fairhaven Water Company. The company's stock, held by the Millicent Library, is transferred to the town.
1972, April 25: The 4th Old Dartmouth Militia, a historical re-enacting group formed by Donald R. Bernard, is incorporated.
1977: The Fairhaven K-Mart opens.
1981, June: The Job C. Tripp elementary school is closed.
1987, October 4: Japanese Crown Prince Akihito and his wife Princess Michiko visit Fairhaven.
1990, February 21: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency places the 20-acre Atlas Tack property on its National Priorities or "Superfund" cleanup list.
April 1, 1991: Ruth Galary becomes the first woman in the town’s history to be elected to the Board of Selectmen.