328 HIS TOR V OF COHA SSE T. 



farm produced, and furnishing an exchange for the gossip 

 of idle hours. 



There was an industry then thriving in this town which 

 is now rarely seen in farming communities ; it was tan- 

 ning. The old John Wheelwright on Turtle Island whom 

 we remember as a soldier in the Louisburg expedition of 

 1745 was still living at the year 1800, carrying on a tan- 

 nery there in Beechwood at the age of eighty years. He 

 lived to be ninety-eight years old, and the hollows in his 

 tanyard where his vats were dug can still be seen. 



But a more thriving business was the one carried on by 

 Francis Lincoln at his tannery at the mouth of Bound 

 Brook.* His father, Deacon Uriah Lincoln, had developed 

 a good business there at about the time of the Revolution- 

 ary War, and now Francis carried it on until he lost the 

 sight of one eye and was compelled to abandon the works 

 in the year 181 5. 



His old account book from 1802 to the end gives us a 

 detail view of his work. In it we find, for example, a long 

 list of charges to the shoemaker Obediah Nichols for 

 various kinds of leather — calf, sheep, woodchuck, and 

 cow. From May, 1802, to May, 1803, the total bill is 



In March, 1805, four bushels of hair were charged, 

 sixty-seven cents. The- hair was evidently a by-product 

 scraped from skins and sold for making plaster. One of 

 the scrapers from this old tannery and two samples f of 

 tanned sheepskin are in the town's historical collection. 



Another shoemaker who bought leather here was Joel 

 Willcutt, whose little old shop is now standing in C. F. 

 Bennett's yard on the north side of Elm Street. 



In April, 1805, Joel Willcutt was charged with 1^1.92 

 for "dressing one half a hide," and this hide probably was 

 the commodity given to the shoemaker in payment for 



* See the sketch of that neighborhood on p. 216. 

 t Used to cover two books. 



