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The Town of Uxbridge
Mass lies on the southern border of Massachusetts at the Rhode Island line.The
community is industrial, agricultural and residential in nature and both
the Blackstone River, two of its major tributaries and several large brooks
run through town. Established as a town in 1727, Uxbridge's bountiful water
power provided the basis for large scale industrial development beginning
as early as 1775.
Uxbridge was the site of a Nipmuck
Indian village as well as of one of the Christian Indian settlements established
to protect Indian converts. Quakers from Rhode Island established a colony
in the town and built the earliest meetinghouse in Uxbridge in 1770, a
building which still survives. Residents established the Uxbridge Social
and Instructive Library in 1775 and a grammar school in 1788.
Good quality iron ore, which had
been mined since the 1730's, supported a forge and a triphammer. In that
era the town was primarily a prosperous agricultural settlement with dispersed
farms, but it was also the site of saw and grist mills and a gin distillery.
0, textile manufacturing had been introduced when Daniel Day erected a
small carding and spinning mill, which was the second textile mill on the
Blackstone River and the third one in the state.
Uxbridge Mass is located in Southern
Massachusetts, bordered by Northbridge on the north; Mendon and Millville
on the east; Burrilville and North Smithfield, Rhode Island on the south;
and Sutton and Douglas on the west. Uxbridge is about 15 miles south of
Worcester; 38 miles southwest of Boston; 25 miles north of Providence,
Rhode Island; and 175 miles from New York City. |