About Marlborough
A Brief History
In the 1650's, several families left the nearby town of Sudbury, just 18 miles west of Boston, to start a new town. They named their new community Marlborough after the market town in Wiltshire, England and, in 1660, received permission from the Massachusetts General Court to incorporate their town. The early settlers survived the rigors of frontier life, including clashes with the local Native Americans, to become a peaceful farming community.
As population, business, and travel grew in the colonies, Marlborough became a favored rest stop on the Boston Post Road. Many travelers stopped at its inns and taverns, including George Washington, who visited the Thayer Tavern soon after his inauguration in 1789.
In 1836, Samuel Boyd, known as the "father of the city," and his brother Joseph, opened the first shoe manufacturing business - an act that would change the community forever. By 1890, with a population of 14,000, Marlborough had become a major shoe-manufacturing center, producing boots for Union soldiers as well as footwear for the civilian population. Marlborough became so well known for its shoes, that its official seal was decorated with a factory, a shoebox, and a pair of boots when it was incorporated as a city in 1890.
The Civil War resulted in the creation of one of the region's most unusual monuments. Legend has it that a company from Marlborough, assigned to Harpers Ferry, appropriated the bell from the firehouse where John Brown last battled for the emancipation of the slaves. The company left the bell in the hands of one Mrs. Elizabeth Snyder for 30 years, returning in 1892 to bring it back to Marlborough. The bell now hangs in a tower at the corner of routes 85 and Main Street.
Around that time, Marlborough is believed to have been the first community in the country to receive a charter for a streetcar system, edging out the city of Baltimore by a few months. The system, designed primarily for passenger use, provided access to Milford to the south, and Concord to the north. As a growing industrialized community, Marlborough began attracting skilled craftsmen from Canada's French-speaking provinces, as well as from Ireland, Italy, and Greece.
Shoe manufacturing continued in Marlborough long after the industry had fled many other New England communities. Famous Frye boots were manufactured here through the 1970s, and The Rockport Company continues to maintain its corporate headquarters in the city. In 1990, when Marlborough celebrated its centennial as a city, the festivities included the construction of a park in acknowledgment of the shoe industry, featuring statues by the sculptor David Kapenteopolous.
The construction of interstates 495 and 290 and the Massachusetts Turnpike has enabled Marlborough to begin its third hundred years on the cutting edge of a new industry: high technology and specialized electronics. Today, thousands flock here to work at Fidelity, Raytheon, Compaq and the many other electronics and computer firms that provide the strong business community in the city. Because of the city's central location with easy access to major highways and the pro-business, pro-development policies of the city government, the population of Marlborough has more than doubled in the last 25 years to over 32,000 at the time of the last census.
Request my Free Marlborough, Southboro and Northborough Relocation Package. It's packed full of useful and important information about the Marlborough, Southboro and Northborough, Massachusetts area. Don't move here without it! Remember: I'll send it to you for free and without obligation. Just fill out the form and I will send it right out...
- NUMBER1EXPERT™ 
