Upton

Upton has special appeal as a small residential community, maintaining a rural sensibility yet with easy access to the high tech belts along routes 495 and 128 to the east. Home values trend higher here, compared to other Blackstone Valley communities. The school system, which it shares with neighboring Mendon, is rated in the top 1/3rd in the State.

Each community in the Blackstone Valley has a rich heritage that can be traced to its development prior to the Industrial Revolution. Upton is no different. Though shoes and boots gave Upton its foothold in the Industrial revolution, it would be the production of hats that would take it to the top.

Created in 1735 from the outlying areas of four towns: Mendon, Sutton, Hopkinton and Uxbridge, Upton began as any typical New England town of the 18th-century. Nuclear families worked small farms, with the woman spinning wool, making candles, and preserving food, while the men plied some supplemental specialty such as blacksmithing, shoemaking, or repair work.

By the dawn of the 19th-century, handcrafts began to develop into industries in New England. In Upton, a half-dozen streams provided waterpower for small mills, but the power was not sufficient for the large scale manufacturing that was emerging in other towns in the Blackstone Valley. Undeterred, Upton proceeded to build a prosperous boot and shoe industry.

Growing side by side with Upton's shoe trade was the straw hat business. Upton women had been braiding straw for hats in their homes for many years, and small hat shops dotted Upton's streets. But it would take an entrepreneurial genius, William Knowlton, to make Upton the home of what would ultimately become the largest hat factory in the world.

Upton was also a stop on the famous underground railroad, that elaborate system of concealment which moved slaves through designated housed in towns stretching from the deep South to freedom in Canada. One such house was owned by Polly Dean Bradish, an ardent abolitionist who is said to have moved more than 500 slaves, despite the $1,000 fine imposed on anyone caught aiding slaves in this manner. The home, still standing on North Main Street, contains a hidden staircase that leads to the room where the fugitives were concealed.

Upton today has become a bedroom community mainly for employees of high tech industries. The former hat factory has been converted to apartments. But, continuing in the tradition begun by housewives of long ago, many Upton women still make hats at home for wholesalers and for retail sales to buyers who use them for decoration and display. Upton remains a town steeped in Yankee ingenuity and tradition.