The “Ten-Footer” Shop Shop of Essex County was truly a cottage industry. In David Johnson’s “Sketches of Lynn” (1880), he describes the “Ten-Footer” as one measuring ten feet in length by ten feet in length with the maximum size fourteen by fourteen. In all likelihood the average size was probably closer to twelve by twelve. The attic was left unfinished and used mostly for storage.
In the age before the Industrial Revolution many Essex County residents had home shops in the yards where family and neighbors could earn extra part-time money by doing piece work on shoes. Women sewed the uppers and men pounded wooden pegs into the soles. These cottage industry shoe workers were paid for each pair of shoes delivered to the local distributor.
Help add to this list of ten-footers by Essex County city or town! If you know of ten-footers in Essex County, please let us know. Feel free to use the list of questions to the right as a guide.
Hi Folks,
We have received your intriguing mailing and had a chance to discuss it at tonight’s commission meeting. I decided to be the person to contact you as I’m working on a local collection of papers from the Foster / Herrick family.
I’m just about done unfolding the roughly 2,000 documents and getting them into archival sleeves. We began knowing nothing about these papers as we found them initially in a clean out of our storage space. An earlier incarnation of the H. S. must have handled them and there are penciled notes on some. We found a notation that indicates that they were donated by a woman descended from Deacon George Herrick. We know that he spoke at Lynnfield’s Bicentennial celebration in 1914. (We are celebrating three hundred years next year and are all busy with planning and outreach.)
My research on the genealogy of the Foster family indicates that Reginald Foster came from Exeter, England in 1638. His son lived in Ipswich. In the fourth generation of the family, Benja. was born in 1715. His father, Samuel, died in 1762 “at an advanced age”, having acquired much land in Reading near the Wilmington line.
The focus of the collection begins with Benjamin’s son, James. He was born in 1742, the oldest of eight, and the cousin of Edmund Foster who was at the Battle of Lexington and a member of the State Constitutional Convention in 1820. Captain James Foster, Gentleman, as he is often referred to, is the prime individual of the collection. His son Aaron and grandson Aaron figure extensively also. The grandson, occasionally referred to as Captain Aaron Foster, was, I believe, the one to keep the collection going. He is named in many papers as the secretary of school committies and other organizations. The 1856 Superintendent of State map shows a Captain Foster in South Reading just over the Lynnfield line. Benjamin, James, and Aaron are all listed as Selectmen in the history of Wakefield (South Reading).
Most of the papers deal with the time period between the Revolution and the Civil War. They detail Court cases, and hops dealing including shipping, and all sorts of family business down to shopping lists. There are muster orders, and letters from distant sons, and one farm diary. Most of the dealings have to do with people in the Brookdale part of what is now West Peabody. Some have Lynnfield prominent on the page, such as what must have been some of the first crop of tax bills sent out after Lynnfield became a Town in 1814 (as opposed to a Parish or District). Others relate to Salem, Boston, Eastport, Providence, and Philadelphia.
In this collection, there are many references that might relate to the information you are looking for. Support of the poor is documented several times. Aaron was involved in setting up a “winter school”, and other documents we have follow the setting up of a school in Lynnfield, down to the receipt for a wood stove authorized by committee. The Foster collection and other collections describe outwork done for the shoe industry. Lynn being the shoe town before any other, and some two thirds of the population involved in the outwork business around the 1820’s, meant that the daughter Town of Lynnfield had many farm families involved as well. Many of our Civil War enlistees were described as shoe workers. We have one shoe shop we are hoping to focus attention on before it crumbles, on Chestnut St. here in town. I could show you the stone foundation of another on Main St.
It would be easier to document the underground railroad than the lives or deaths of slaves here in Lynnf., but the other four of your topics are things we would be glad to contribute to, and learn from. We are using PastPerfect Software to form a digital record of our collections but are still in the beginning stages of development. Most of the Foster collection has not been scanned and none cataloged, but we do hope to get it all online eventually. All of us here in the Lynnfield Historical Community are dedicating a lot of our energy to the public awareness programs we are involved in for the up coming year’s Bi- and Tri-centennial celebrations. That said, we want to send you copies of scans as we can, if you would like them.
Please get back to me at my address or find us at lynnfieldhistoricalsociety.org, thanks,
Roy
Hi Roy, Amazing amount of work you’ve done already on the Foster family. Years ago I worked at the Lynnfield Public Library and appreciate the dedication to genealogy in the community. In addition to the valuable info you’ve already provided, we would certainly welcome any scans or info would that add to the body of knowledge on records of the poor and the shoe industry.
Best-
Kevin
We would love it if you would give us a shoutout regarding pictures you took of our “Ten Footer” Shoe Shop here in West Newbury. the first two pictures on your site are of our shop (front and back view), and also graces your masthead. The shop was given some TLC with a Community Preservation grant from the Town.
Received your mailing. Great idea and I will present to our BOD.
Sincerely,
Jane W. Wild, President, West Newbury Historical Society
Hi Jane,
Thanks for the heads-up. We’ve updated the info. It looks like they have been beautifully preserved!
Kevin
So great that you are doing this. I have been watching them disappear for years. Here are a few locations. I could not tell where the ones listed are located so I may duplicate some.
Ipswich on the grounds of the Whipple house moved from the Bradstreet farm on the Rowley line. FIREPLACE
Ipswich in the yard at 311 High St. (route 1A and 133) Chimney removed to below roof line
Boxford at the Holyoke French house, historical society
Essex the Shipbuilding Museum is acquiring one to be moved from Beverly(?) to Essex
Rowley near the corner of Main and Railroad Ave, 1A with addition on the back
I think there are others in Rowley, Georgetown and West Newbury that I am forgetting.
Great project. Years ago Yankee Magazine did a short piece on ten footers in which I was qouted.
Pru
Hi Prudence,
Thank you so much for letting us know about these locations. We’ll look for the Yankee Magazine article, and we’ll be in touch. Best-
Kevin