HISTORY OF GRANVILLE, MASSACHUSETTS.

By Albion B. Wilson '95. HartfordConnecticut: Privately Printed, 1954. 381pp.

Granville is a hill town in the eastern edge of the Berkshires, not far from Springfield. Its story is little different from that of a dozen others of its kind in the region between the Connecticut and the Hudson. Those who settled it in 1735 were subsistence farmers, and, though most of the .soil was poor, they and their successors made a go of it till after the Revolution. In 1800 its population was 2309. But living standards rose, the decline typical of such towns set in, and in 1940 the census showed only 668. To the rest of the world Granville is known only as the place where they make drums. About 1850 Silas Noble decided to try making them. The little workshop started in 1854 has grown to the Noble & Cowley Drum Factory, which turns out a half a million a year, mostly toy drums to be sure, but many real ones. It is rather a miracle of continuity, especially in such an unlikely place.

Town histories have often been swollen by biographical sketches and genealogies till they occupy a couple of fat volumes and are quite unreadable by outsiders. This one is concise, written lucidly and with touches of humor! The author was a lawyer, specializing in real estate and probate law. This made him unusually well fitted to untangle the early town records, so largely concerned with such matters, and make them intelligible. There is here a real contribution to American colonial history, especially since he knew how to evaluate evidence.

Mr. Wilson had family connections with Granville, and spent many summers there. He graduated from Dartmouth in 1895, retained a keen interest in the College, served on the Alumni Council. He died before this book could be printed, and Mrs. Wilson, a native of Granville, saw it through the press. One chapter tells in unusual and entertaining detail the story of the development of the public library of the town. The Wilsons were interested in this town library, and in Dartmouth. It is perhaps not surprising therefore that Mrs. Wilson has recently given a considerable sum to the College, the income therefrom to be used for the purchase of rare books by Baker Library.