Hawley, Massachusetts
A Short History of Hawley
From a 1760 hill settlement called the Hatfield Reserve, to a town named for a leader of the Revolution, to the state forests that now cover much of its land, Hawley has always been a small town that governs itself in one room.
Plantation Number 7
Hawley was first settled in 1760 as Plantation Number 7, by a group of families from Hatfield down in the Connecticut River valley. For its early years the settlement was known simply as the Hatfield Reserve, and it was not until 1792 that it was officially incorporated as a town. The new town took the name of Joseph Hawley of Northampton, a local leader in the American Revolution. When the legislature later carved Franklin County out of the northern part of Hampshire County, Hawley became a Franklin County town, and it has been one ever since.
A Town That Once Held Its Neighbor
In its first decades Hawley was larger on the map than it is today. The land that became the town of Plainfield was originally part of Hawley, and split off to form its own town in the early nineteenth century. Hawley’s early economy ran on forestry, the timber of its steep hills, and over time that gave way to recreation as the forests grew back. Today the town has very little industry: a few farms and artisans, and residents who mostly work from home, for the town, or over the hills in the valley.
The Forests That Cover the Town
Much of Hawley’s land is now protected woodland. The Kenneth Dubuque Memorial State Forest spreads across the town with recreation sites for every season, and Parker Hill rises within it. The Mohawk Trail State Forest reaches into Hawley’s northwest corner from Charlemont and Savoy, and between the two forests sits the Stump Sprout Cross-Country Ski Area. For a town of a few hundred people, the map is mostly trees, trails, and open space, held for everyone.
How the Town Remembers Itself
Hawley keeps its history close. The Historical Commission looks after the town’s four town-owned cemeteries and its historic places, working alongside the Sons and Daughters of Hawley, the town’s historical society, whose members and the commission’s often overlap. In a town this small, the record of who lived here and how they governed themselves is kept by neighbors, the same way the budget is voted and the roads are cleared.
Sources: Wikipedia, Hawley, Massachusetts; Town of Hawley (townofhawley.com); U.S. Census Bureau.