Phillipston, Massachusetts
A Short History of Phillipston
From a 1751 hill settlement, to twenty-eight years spent under the name Gerry, to a rural town that guards the northern edge of the Quabbin Reservoir and still votes its own budget in a room.
The Town That Was Named Gerry
Phillipston was first settled in 1751 and set off from Templeton as its own town on October 20, 1786. Its first name was not Phillipston: the town was incorporated as Gerry, after Elbridge Gerry, the Massachusetts politician and future vice president whose habit of redrawing election districts to favor his own party later gave English the word gerrymander. The town carried that name until February 5, 1814, when it was renamed Phillipston after William Phillips, Jr., the tenth Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts. It has been part of Worcester County throughout.
A Small Town That Grew Back
Like many hill towns, Phillipston shrank through the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as its young people left for the mills and the cities. The turn came late. The town counted 872 residents in 1970, then nearly doubled to 1,621 by 2000, and reached 1,726 at the 2020 census. The town’s own account credits easy access to Route 2, which made Phillipston an affordable place to live for people working along the Route 2 and Route 495 corridors. The town that results has grown while keeping its open fields, its stone walls, its Town Meeting, and a government run by the neighbors it elects.
Forests, Laurel, and the Quabbin
Phillipston is rural and heavily wooded, bisected by Route 2, and it serves as a northern gateway to the Quabbin Reservoir, the vast protected watershed that supplies drinking water to metropolitan Boston. In 1941 a stand of mountain laurel here, Elliott Laurel, was given to The Trustees of Reservations and is still open to the public. Queen Lake, with its public beach and its own town bylaws, anchors recreation on the other side of town.
Places Worth Keeping
The town has taken care to protect its own history. The Phillipston Center Historic District, the town common ringed by nineteenth century homes and municipal buildings, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1999, and the Searles Hill Cemetery followed in 2011. The Historical Commission keeps watch over both, one more working board that any resident can join.
Sources: Town of Phillipston (phillipston-ma.gov); Wikipedia, Phillipston, Massachusetts; U.S. Census Bureau.