Herding Sheep on Main Street

The inscription on the back of this photograph, looking northeast along Main Street, claims that herds of sheep were a “familiar sight on Main St. every spring in early days up to 1914-15.” Main Street was not paved until 1916. The corner of the Methodist Church is on the far left, and it and the small white house in the center are the only two buildings that survive. The columns on the large Greek Revival home were removed in the 1950s, and the building housed the Upstreet Boutique when it burned in 1973. The YMCA on the corner on School Street was built in 1906 and razed in 1972. The tall steeple on the right belonged to the Second Congregational Church. The steeple was removed in 1931 after years of listing precariously. The building itself was torn down in 1958 after the church moved to its current home on Hillside Street.