The Lost Mill Village of Middlesex Fells

One of the earliest mill communities in the Massachusetts Bay Colony formed along Spot Pond Brook, a few miles north of Boston. Thomas Coytmore built the first mill in 1640 at the brook’s downstream end in “Mistick Side” (present-day Malden). Other mills sprang up along the brook as well. Today, most of Spot Pond Brook is hidden in culverts beneath the busy streets of Malden and Melrose. However, remnants of the lost mill village of Haywardville—foundations, millruns and ponds and waterfalls—are preserved within Middlesex Fells Reservation, part of Boston’s world-famous Metropolitan Park System. Authors Douglas L. Heath and Alison C. Simcox trace the history of this thriving early American community.