Mother Brook
Mother Brook is an artificial waterway in Dedham, and Hyde Park, Massachusetts, and the first man-made canal in the present-day United States. Constructed in 1639 by settlers of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, it diverts water from the Charles River to the Neponset River and was originally designed to power water mills. Its creation helped establish Dedham’s early economy and laid the foundation for over 300 years of continuous industrial use.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, Mother Brook powered a succession of grist, saw, paper, textile, and woolen mills, fueling the rise of East Dedham as a densely populated mill village. The brook was central to legal disputes over water rights and served as a key industrial corridor well into the 20th century. As the textile industry declined after World War I, the mills closed or were repurposed, and parts of the brook were redirected or covered.
By the mid-20th century, decades of industrial waste had severely polluted the brook. State and federal agencies have since undertaken extensive remediation efforts, and water quality has improved significantly. Today, Mother Brook is part of a flood-control system that diverts water from the Charles River to the Neponset River. It is monitored by the Neponset River Watershed Association, and its banks include parks, trails, and conservation land. It remains a rare example of a colonial-era engineering project that continues to influence the modern urban landscape.
Early history
Origins
was first settled in 1635 and incorporated in 1636. The settlers needed a mill for grinding corn, as hand mills required significant effort. Windmills had been attempted, but the wind was too unreliable, and the North End, where a windmill was moved in 1632, was too far away. In 1633, the first water-powered grist mill was established in Dorchester along the Neponset River at a dam erected just above the tidal basin.By the late 1630s, the closest watermill was in Watertown, 17 miles away by boat. Small amounts of grain could also be milled into flour using labor-intensive handmills. Neither transporting the grain to distant mills nor producing small amounts in a handmill were attractive options, and so the colonists looked into creating their own mill.
Abraham Shaw, who—like many other Dedhamites—came from Watertown, arrived in Dedham in 1637. He was granted of land on the condition that he erect a watermill, which he intended to build on the Charles River near the present-day Needham Street bridge. Every man in the town was required to help bring the large millstone to Dedham from Watertown. Shaw died in 1638 before he could complete his mill, however, and his heirs were not interested in building the mill.
Although the initial settlement was adjacent to the Charles, the river in that vicinity was slow-moving, with little elevation change to provide power for a water wheel. A small stream, then called East Brook, ran nearby—about from present-day Washington Street behind Brookdale Cemetery—and emptied into the Neponset River. In the spring, the Charles would occasionally flood into a swamp at Purchase Meadow between its banks and East Brook.
East Brook had an elevation change of more than 40 feet over its 3.5-mile course from near the early Dedham settlement to the Neponset River, which was sufficient to drive a watermill. However, it had a low water flow, making it inadequate for mill operations on its own. The drop in the first mile alone is.
Creation of Mother Brook
A year after Shaw's death, the town was still without a mill. A committee was formed, and "an audacious plan" was devised to divert some of the plentiful water from the placid Charles River into the steep but scarce East Brook. On March 25, 1639, the town ordered a 4,000-foot ditch to be dug at public expense. A tax was levied on the settlers to fund the project. The settlers may have been influenced by the draining of the Fens in The Wash, a region in England near many of their hometowns.The town was so confident in the project that work began before a new miller had been found to replace Shaw. There is no record of who dug the ditch or how long the task took. The available labor force would have been limited to the 30 men who headed households in the town at the time, along with various servants and male relatives. Tools likely included iron spades, axes, and shovels, and oxen may also have been employed. Excavated earth, clay, rocks, and other materials were transported overland to build a dam and form a mill pond. A sill was also constructed to regulate the flow of water from the Charles River into Mother Brook.
While the exact completion date is unknown, water was flowing through the ditch by July 14, 1641. Originally referred to as "the Ditch," it has been known as Mother Brook since at least 1678. There is no record of any celebration marking its completion. At a meeting on July 14, 1641, Jonathan Fairbanks, Francis Chickering, and John Dwight were tasked with laying out a cartway from the village to the mill.
The creation of Mother Brook took place alongside other foundational efforts required to establish a town in the wilderness: felling trees, building homes, planting crops, clearing fields, and more. Its construction has been described as "an inspiring expression of profound communal purpose." Digging the brook made Boston and some surrounding communities an island, accessible only by crossing over water, leading one commentator to refer to Mother Brook as "Massachusetts' Panama Canal."
The first mill
The town offered an incentive of 60 acres of land to anyone who would construct and maintain a corn mill, provided that the mill was operational by "the first of the 10th month" .In 1641, John Elderkin, a recent arrival from Lynn, built the first corn mill on a dam across East Brook, near the present-day Condon Park and the intersection of Bussey Street and Colburn Street. In return, he received three acres of land along the brook. Elderkin, a highly sought-after builder, left Dedham in 1642, only months after opening the mill. He sold all of his land to Nathaniel Whiting.
This mill is considered the first public utility in the United States. Settlers could grind their corn at the site in exchange for a tithe, which helped support its maintenance. The town relinquished rights to the brook in 1682, and placed a commemorative marker on the site in 1886.
Also in 1642, Elderkin sold half of his interest in the mill to Whiting, and the other half to John Allin, Nathan Aldis, and John Dwight. The four partners operated the mill in what was described as a "rather stormy partnership" until 1649, when Whiting became the sole owner. The town criticized Whiting for the "insufficient performance" of the mill under his management. In 1652, Whiting sold his mill and town rights to John Dwight, Francis Chickering, Joshua Fisher, and John Morse for £250, but bought them back the following year.
Whiting and his wife, Hannah, had 14 children. Five generations of Whiting descendants operated the mill from 1641 until its sale in 1823. The family retained ownership of other land along Mother Brook until the 1830s.
Conflict with a second mill
Whiting took sole possession of the mill in 1649—the same year the town began discussing the construction of a second mill. In January 1653, the town offered land to Robert Crossman to build a mill on the Charles River where Shaw had originally planned. Crossman declined, but Whiting, displeased by the prospect of competition, offered to sell his mill back to the town for £250.For 15 years, there were "many complaints being made by several inhabitants of much damage by deficient grinding of corn at the present mill." As Whiting’s performance failed to improve, the town authorized Daniel Pond and Ezra Morse in 1664 to construct a new grist mill upstream, at the present-day intersection of Maverick and High Streets. The agreement required the mill to be operational by June 24, 1665. It was completed in 1666, with Morse as the sole proprietor. The new mill was located closer to the town center than Whiting's.
Whiting was incensed by the competition for both water and customers. One historian wrote that he "made something of a crusade of opposition" to the new mill. Town records indicate that considerable time was spent attempting to mediate the dispute. After a meeting with the Selectmen, both parties agreed not to interfere with one another’s business. Two years later, Morse was instructed not to restrict the water flow to such an extent that it impaired milling at Whiting’s site.
The town resolved that "in time of drought or want of water, the water shall in no such time be raised so high by the occasion of the new mill, that the water be thereby hindered of its free course or passage out of the Charles River to the mill." At the same time, Whiting was prohibited from raising water levels in his pond so high as to cause backwater damage to Morse's mill. He was also told to repair leaks in his own dam before filing further complaints.
Disputes between the two mills continued for more than 40 years, culminating in a lawsuit. In 1678, the Town Meeting voted to stop entertaining Whiting’s complaints. Even after Whiting’s death in 1682, his heirs attempted to sue but were unsuccessful.
By 1699, the town had grown weary of the conflict. Morse’s dam was dismantled, and he was compensated with 40 acres of land near the Neponset River at Tiot. The idea appears to have been Morse’s. He established a new mill at the Tiot site—now in Norwood, Massachusetts—adjacent to a sawmill built in 1664 by Joshua Fisher and Eleazer Lusher.
In the early 18th century, Joseph Lewis, Whiting’s son-in-law, constructed a leather mill at the former Morse dam site.
New mills at the third privilege
The next mill on the brook was constructed in 1682 near present-day Saw Mill Lane. Although the privilege had originally been requested by Jonathan Fairbanks and James Draper, it was ultimately granted to Draper and Nathaniel Whiting instead—likely to avoid further conflict with Whiting. The resulting fulling mill—the first textile mill in Dedham—did not require a dam, and its downstream location did not pose a threat to Whiting’s upstream operations.Whiting died on January 15, 1682, the same day the selectmen granted him the privilege. The town added a provision that if it later chose to erect a corn mill on the brook, it could do so—unless Draper and Whiting did so themselves, at their own expense. Timothy Whiting, Nathaniel’s son, later signed the agreement with Draper and his son. This mill, like the one upstream, remained in the hands of Whiting’s descendants for 180 years.
A grist mill and sawmill were later built on the site and powered by the same waterwheel. Timothy Whiting constructed the sawmill in 1699, though the construction date of the grist mill was not recorded. When one of the mills burned in 1700, the town loaned Whiting £20 to rebuild.