The county before the cottages

I. What is on the sheet

The map is nineteen thousand pixels across at the scan’s full size, and it is three documents at once. The county map itself names the occupant of nearly every house in Berkshire, roadside by roadside. Around it run forty-nine plans of villages at a scale close enough to draw the shops one by one. And in the lower right corner, set in type rather than engraved, are a business directory and a page of census figures.

The directory and the census panel are transcribed in full below, and so are all 3 village plans — 270 householders, each one pinned to the corresponding house.

II. The business directory

Two hundred and forty-eight entries in eleven towns. Six towns are broken into trades — editors and printers, attorneys, physicians, dry goods merchants, druggists, hardware, jewellers, clothiers, boots and shoes, sash and blinds. Five are set as a single undivided list, which may mean only that they bought less space: the North Adams section carries a sub-heading reading Subscribers, and a directory that names its subscribers is partly an advertisement.

The reading is given first. Where the plate is damaged or repeats itself with ditto marks, the printed form follows in small type — Gazctte for Gazette where the e lost its right side, Gocds for Goods, assortinent where the m lost its left arch.

Map of the County of Berkshire, Massachusetts, from actual surveys under the direction of Henry F. Walling, 1858. Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division, g3763b la000307. Public domain.

III. The census of 1855, and what the panel got wrong

Beside the directory the map prints a panel headed Statistics from the State Census of 1855 — population by town, the county’s agriculture in bushels and tons and head, and thirty-one manufactured articles in dollars.

The population table is sound. Its thirty-one towns add to the 52,791 it prints, exactly, and thirty-one was the whole county: Adams had not yet split from North Adams, and would not until 1878.

The manufactures, and the $3,684,879 that is not there

The panel lists thirty-one articles and prints a total of $12,756,264.. The thirty-one add to $9,071,385. The total exceeds its own components by $3,684,879.

Two things explain it, and neither is a transcription error. The missing money is the farms: the 1855 act counted farm produce and livestock as branches of industry alongside manufactures, and summing every agricultural line printed for Berkshire in the published county return gives $3,667,121 — within half a per cent of the gap. The panel’s own agriculture table, printed alongside, is that same produce in bushels and tons, never priced. The two panels are two halves of one return.

The second thing is worse. Reading all thirty-one lines against the published Berkshire figures, twenty-four match exactly and two are correct sums of two census lines. But Cotton Goods and Soap are the wrong county’s numbers — both are Bristol’s, and in the census table Bristol is the row directly below Berkshire. Someone compiling the panel read one line too low, twice. Berkshire’s cotton was $821,478, not $2,382,621; its soap was $260, not $58,401.

It is worth seeing what the mistake does to the county. As printed, Cotton Goods heads the panel and is Berkshire’s largest manufacture by a wide margin — more than wool, more than paper. A hill county on the Housatonic, out-spinning the Commonwealth. Put the right figure back and cotton drops to third behind woolen goods and paper, which is what a county of sheep, water power and paper mills ought to look like. The $2,382,621 belongs to Bristol County — Fall River, New Bedford, Taunton — where the cotton actually was.

The soap line is smaller and funnier. The panel credits Berkshire with $58,401 of it. The county’s assessors returned 1,050 pounds of hard soap, worth two hundred and sixty dollars, from two towns: Adams made fifty pounds of it and Pittsfield the other thousand. Half a ton of soap for the whole of Berkshire in a year.

So the panel is printed here as the document, with the published county figure beside every line that differs, and the page it is on.

Francis DeWitt, Statistical Information Relating to Certain Branches of Industry in Massachusetts, for the year ending June 1, 1855 (Boston: William White, 1856). Internet Archive. Not in copyright. Berkshire town returns pp. 22–68; abstract by counties pp. 570–633. The volume prints no county grand total anywhere, so the panel’s total was compiled, not copied — and it is within a tenth of a per cent of the county’s complete aggregate of every printed value, $12,741,543. The two wrong-county figures were then checked a second way, against the town returns rather than the county abstract: adding every cotton cloth value the Bristol County towns returned gives $2,382,621, the panel’s figure to the dollar, and the Berkshire towns give cloth $561,688, yarn $205,440, batting $4,350 and pelisse wadding $50,000 — $821,478. The soap is the same: Adams $200, Pittsfield $60.

IV. The village plans

Forty-nine of them ring the sheet, from Pittsfield at four thousand pixels across down to East Otis at eight hundred. Each draws its village building by building and names the householder beside almost every one. All 3 have now been read — 270 names, every one carrying the pixel position of its own building.

Grouped by the municipality each village is in today rather than by the name on the plate, so Curtisville and Glendale sit under Stockbridge and Pontoosuc under Pittsfield. The county’s own lines have moved once under these plans: North Adams was part of Adams in 1858 and has been separate since 1878, so the North Adams and Blackinton plans are filed here under North Adams and only South Adams is left under Adams. The underlying transcription still says what the sheet said. The figure is how many names a plan carries.

Each plan has an address of its own — 1890s.net/maps/1858/#lee, #north-adams — so a single village can be linked to on its own, and the plans below run in the same order as this index.

Every name carries the pixel position of its own building on the plan, so a name here is a place on the map and not only a line in a list. Search a plan and it moves to the house.

Walling’s county map, 1858 − Fit + Close

Drag to move. Scroll or pinch to zoom. Arrow keys pan, + and − zoom, Esc closes.

South Egremont − Fit +

All 48 names on this plan

1. A. Hull
2. G.W. Mirick
3. C.S. Lawton
4. J.A. Benjamin
5. H.G. Curtis
6. Academyschool
7. S Bacon
8. J Meach
9. Saw Millmill
10. Block Tin Shopshop
11. S Bacon
12. Rev J B Cleaveland
13. Chapelchurch
14. Cong. Churchchurch
15. L Hare
16. W OConnell
17. N Benjamin
18. Miss R Karner
19. C Goodale
20. Grist Millmill
21. Storestore
22. J Bacon
23. Mrs Upson
24. Store by J.A. Benjaminstore
25. R.T. Brown
26. D Dalzell
27. M Fuller
28. R P Brown
29. N. K. Bills
30. C. Shopshop
31. L B Warner
32. B. Shopshop
33. J Bacon
34. Mrs S. Stanton
35. S Hadley
36. M B Wilcox
37. J.I. Gardner
38. Mrs Woodruff
39. Cemeterypublic
40. Schoolschool
41. P Millmill
42. Saw Millmill
43. Mt Everett Househotel
44. Wm A. Forbeshotel
45. Machine Shopshop
46. Saw Millmill
47. R.N. Karnerother
48. O.A. Branch

Lenox Village − Fit +

All 102 names on this plan

1. J. Cook
2. Poundpublic
3. Cemeterypublic
4. Cong Churchchurch
5. M.S Wilson
6. A.P. Squires
7. E. Post
8. E. Loomis
9. L.M. Shepardson
10. E. Post
11. J S Smith
12. Cong Parsonage
13. Rev E K Alden
14. Miss E Dunham
15. Mrs Warner
16. Bangs
17. Mrs Benton
18. C Bang
19. J. Davis
20. Z. Davis
21. F.D. Farley
22. H. Cook
23. Mrs Williams
24. Mrs Washburn
25. W.H. Hill
26. Capt. Osborne
27. E. Washburn
28. Rev J. Hotchkins
29. Haddock
30. Mrs Sadler
31. Mann
32. J. Grant.
33. M. Colbert
34. Mrs Hastings
35. Miss Hickok
36. J. Mackey
37. G Robbins
38. Shopshop
39. Schoolschool
40. Academyschool
41. W Smith
42. G J. Tucker
43. J. Stanly
44. Librarypublic
45. W. Washburn
46. J C Arnold's Boarding Househotel
47. W A Phelps
48. M Sears
49. G. Carpenter
50. O Peck
51. M Sears
52. I Machoncy
53. R. Cone's Hotel & Jail Househotel
54. Mrs Tanner
55. Wagon Shopshop
56. S Washburn
57. W. O & J B. Curtis
58. Court Housepublic
59. R. Mills
60. Mrs Eddy
61. Summerwood
62. Mrs S G Lee
63. Washburn's Shopshop
64. L Baker
65. W. M Clark & Co Storestore
66. O Sabins Est
67. E. Pierpont
68. Epis Churchchurch
69. O Sabins Est
70. W. O. Curtis Hotelhotel
71. W. Smith
72. Geo. Wells
73. D. E. Bangs
74. Storestore
75. Town Hall, Store & P.O.public
76. Meth Churchchurch
77. Store & Book Binderystore
78. H. W. Bishop's Res
79. S S Flint's Shopshop
80. H. W. Taft
81. Miss A Benton
82. Mrs S. Cook
83. Mrs D H Ouincy
84. Geo O Peck
85. Dr M. Sabin
86. W. Holden
87. Mrs D H Ouincy
88. Judge W P Walker
89. D Robinson
90. O.P. Tanner
91. E. Spencer
92. Wm. Ellery Sedgwick's Res
93. Jos Tucker's Est
94. W. S. Tacker
95. J. Lymann
96. Mrs Sedgwick's Schoolschool
97. Benj. Parsons
98. Mrs Chas Sedgwick's
99. The Hive
100. J. G Stanley
101. Benj. Parsons
102. O. Haggerty

Stockbridge − Fit +

All 120 names on this plan

1. J. Godwin
2. J. Stafford
3. J.M. Wheeler
4. N. Pratt
5. Miss S Pratt
6. E C Brinton (Est.)
7. E C Brinton (Est.)
8. C. Shopshop
9. Cemeteryother
10. J Webster
11. J Webster
12. E.R. Galpin
13. J. Dwight
14. Cong Churchchurch
15. Town Housepublic
16. N A Waters
17. H I Carter
18. G A Prindle
19. Mrs Curtis
20. Dr L S Adams
21. Rev Dr D D Field
22. Miss Hoxie
23. Mrs Dresser
24. Mrs Dresser
25. S Tucker
26. Miss M Sheldon
27. Dr C Mc Allister
28. Reid & Hoffmann'sother
29. Edward's Plate Schoolschool
30. Miss Pomeroy
31. C M Owen
32. Insurance & Law Officeother
33. J E Field Esq
34. Episcopal Churchchurch
35. Shoe Storestore
36. Post Officepublic
37. S Rockwell
38. Mrs Cable
39. S Seymour
40. D R Williams Res.
41. Miss L Ingersoll
42. E W B Canning's Family Schoolschool
43. W. Whitney
44. P. Williams
45. M Van Dusen
46. L. Bassett
47. Judge Byington Estother
48. Mrs T Sedgwick
49. Miss Ashburner
50. W. Darbehotel
51. Mrs C Bills
52. Stockbridge Househotel
53. Bankother
54. Storestore
55. Storestore
56. B Kimball
57. B. Pilling
58. C Whitaker
59. Miss A Kilduff
60. Schoolschool
61. Rev A H Dashiell Jun
62. Mrs J Sedgwick
63. A Stafford
64. T Curtis
65. Hon J Z Goodrich
66. C Curtis
67. J E Field
68. B Fenn
69. B Shopshop
70. Mrs Hoffmann
71. S Byington
72. N. Connelly
73. N. Moore
74. Miss J Dooley
75. Mrs Webster
76. J. Uhle
77. M L Miller
78. Tin Shopshop
79. Mrs F Dwight
80. Academyschool
81. B Kimball (Principal)school
82. D.D. Field
83. T. Sedgwick
84. Stockbridge Depotpublic
85. S.W. Jones
86. G P R James
87. F Keyser
88. J. Caffre
89. Mrs Smith
90. Mrs Tallar
91. D. Stanton
92. D. Stanton
93. D Stanton
94. W.B.S. Ha[...]
95. L Huntley
96. N Rathbone
97. L Sinegal
98. P. Quigley
99. C Miller
100. B. Shopshop
101. P. Lawless
102. W. Moles
103. D R Williams
104. S P Lincoln
105. Mrs Williams
106. A S Yale
107. J Flinn
108. J Hacket
109. H Brace
110. Saw Millmill
111. Mrs Barnam
112. Saw Millmill
113. W.P. Walker
114. Rev J Brewer
115. J.W. Kingsley
116. L. Goodrich
117. H Lincoln
118. W. Young
119. E Collins
120. E Turner

This searches all 270 names across every town at once. Click one and the plan it came from moves to that building.

V. On the reading

None of this came from an optical character reader. The type on the directory panel is small and worn and the village names are engraved italic script; every line was read at magnification and checked, and the places where the plate is damaged are reproduced as damage rather than repaired. Nothing on this page is marked illegible, because nothing on it was.

The directory and the village plans were read separately, off different parts of the sheet, and eleven surnames appear in both for the same town — Geo. Wells, D. E. Bangs, E. Spencer, N. A. Waters, M. Van Dusen, B. Pilling, J. E. Field, E. C. Brinton, H. W. Taft, D. R. Williams and W. Darbe. That last one settled a question: the Stockbridge plan draws a large building with a leader running to the name W. Darbe, and it was not clear whether the building or the name belonged to the Stockbridge House drawn beside it. The directory prints Stockbridge House, W. Darbe, Proprietor. Same premises.

Map of the County of Berkshire, Massachusetts, from actual surveys under the direction of Henry F. Walling, 1858. Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division, g3763b la000307. Public domain.