Pynchon: 300 years of history

[Burns, Erik]

300 years of history
CHICOPEE PLUS
STEPHEN JENDRYSIK
STAFF
1047 Words
05 June 2003
The Republican
CHICOPEE/HOLYOKE
P01
English
Copyright (c) 2003. The Republican All Rights Reserved. 
 
ART: PHOTO; MAP
 
Sixty-five years ago, the city celebrated the 300th anniversary of
the arrival of the first European settlers on the Chicopee Meadows.
 
Today, the city of Chicopee encompasses 25.7 square miles. It is
bounded on the north by Holyoke, the northeast by South Hadley and
Granby, the east by Ludlow, the south by Springfield, and west by the
Connecticut River. The river that runs through it is called the Chicopee
River.
 
Chicopee lies in Hampden County of Massachusetts, halfway between
Albany, N.Y., and Boston. The highest point is near the Jewish Cemetery
on upper Pendleton Avenue. The lowest point in the city is near the
Buxton Company on Plainfield Street on the Chicopee-Springfield city
line.
 
Chicopee historian Bessie Warner Kerr tells us that the Pendleton
Street site is 245 feet above sea level, and that Plainfield Street is
63 feet above sea level, while the average height above sea level in the
city is 154 feet.
 
In 1945, Kerr, writing for the Chicopee Herald, wrote that the
greatest width of the city area, north to south, is 5.33 miles. The
greatest length, from east to west, is 6 miles. In 1945, the average
climate in September was 64 degrees.
 
Forty-eight years ago, Kerr was the head librarian in Market Square
and the city's unofficial historian. That year she was helping to launch
a revitalized local newspaper. In her first column, titled "Chicopee:
Geographical Facts," she provided a unique, in-depth and often
fascinating look at the bedrock of Chicopee.
 
According to Kerr, "the city contains much sand and gravel, and that
only 20 percent of the land is fit for cultivation." Nonetheless, the
region's first settlers, out of necessity, were farmers. The debate over
when the first settlement actually took place has gone on for over 300
years.
 
In 1636, Puritan William Pynchon led a small group of settlers from
Boston. They established the first settlement as an outpost on Agawam
meadows on the west side of the Connecticut River. Local legend had the
settlement of the Chicopee meadows two years later. However, Pynchon
didn't buy Chicopee's land from the Nipmucks until 1641.
 
At first, settlers merely used the northern part of Springfield as a
pasture for their livestock. Early geological maps show meadows and
flats along
 
the banks of the two rivers were used as grazing land for cattle and
swine. In 1938, Kerr expressed her disapproval when Mayor Stonina
organized and staged a Tercentenary Parade to commemorate the first
settlement of Chicopee.
 
Winthrop McKinstry, in his book "Glimpses of the Past," writes that
"on April 20, 1641, William Pynchon and others made the purchase of land
which is so important to us." It includes "the land along the east side
of the 'Quettecot' River from the mouth of the 'Chickuppy' River up to
the 'Smale Riveret' called Wollumansuk..."
 
When William Pynchon returned to England in 1653, his son, John,
continued purchasing land adjacent to both rivers. When the Indians sold
their land, they simply moved westward. They always reserved the right
to fish in the Connecticut River when the shad and salmon were running.
 
What is clear is that the Pynchon land dealings did not result in any
actual settlement on the east side of the Connecticut River until the
1660s. As the region's prime land owner, John Pynchon owned land on both
sides of the Connecticut and Chicopee Rivers, but prior to 1660, the
settlers lived on the south side of the Chicopee River.
 
Clara Skeele Palmer's book "The Annals of Chicopee Street," which was
published in 1876, clearly indicates that the son of William Pynchon was
the first owner of the Chicopee meadows. Palmer, Chicopee's first
historian, writes that the first grant of land in Chicopee was in 1659.
A quote from the actual document:
 
"One farme Given to Mr. John Pyncheon, Lying over Chicuppy river,
with the Islands of said River, below the plaice called the wading place
with the Medow on the South side, also a swamp betwixt the Medow and the
River; this farme is by us bounded viz, to run up the Grate River,
Northward to the Brook called Willomansett, so up the brook to a foot
parthy goes To Squannungunick and to follow the parth that goes to
Squannungunick to the mouth of the Chickuppy River."
 
Since the 1641 land transaction was never legally registered,
tradition says that Deacon Samuel Chapin gave his sons land on the north
and south sides of the river as early as 1646; Palmer reports that
Rowland Thomas and Lyman Beamon were granted lands near the falls of
Chicopee near Skipmuck, in the year 1656. What is certain is that John
Pynchon, in 1659, registered the sale of 200 acres on the north side of
the Connecticut River (Chicopee Street) to Japhet Chapin. Pynchon also
sold five acres of Meadowland on the south side of the river, and two
islands near the mouth of the Chicopee River to Japhet's brother Henry.
Henry Chapin agreed to pay 20 pounds of wheat, in four payments.
 
In his early life, Henry Chapin had been a sailor, had fought the
Dutch and had commanded a merchant vessel plying the route between
London and Boston. He returned to Springfield in 1659 and purchased the
land in Chicopee between what we now call Emerald, Exchange, and West
streets, where he built his home, receiving permission to build in 1661.
The first two houses in Chicopee were built according to the pattern of
their old homes in England. They were large, square, two-story houses
with a kitchen ell or "lean to."
 
Bessie Warner Kerr, researching the old Springfield records,
discovered that taxes were frequently abated for Chicopee's first
settlers. In those old records, Chicopee is spelled Chick, Chicabe,
Chickabee, Chicopy, and Chickuppi. Kerr would be the first to admit that
the early records regarding the city's settlement were certainly flawed.
 
CUTLINE: Bronze statue of Deacon Samuel Chapin by American sculptor
Augustus Saint-Gaudens, located on Merrick Terrace in Springfield.
 
(PHOTO 2) OLDEST HOUSE IN CHICOPEE. BUILT ABOUT 1730 BY LANDLORD ABEL
CHAPIN.
 
NOTE: See microfilm for staff map - Chicopee and its neighborhoods.