committee insisted he be paid. He
also gave $1,000 to the BHMA. His first proposal as superintendent was to purchase the ledge of granite from Gridley Bryant,
which the association did for $325, a nice profit for Bryant. During the winter Willard finalized the drawings for the obelisk,
increasing the size of the building blocks from eighteen inches to thirty-two inches tall.
Transportation presented the central snag for Willard. How would he move blocks that weighed up to six tons across the twelve
miles of swamp, forest, and farms that separated Quincy from Charlestown? Willard favored either a completely overland route
or moving the stone in winter, when sledges could carry the blocks to the Neponset River, four miles north. A barge would
transport the stone through Boston Harbor to Charlestown, which formed a peninsula on the north side of the Charles River,
due north of downtown Boston. Gridley Bryant had another idea. Six years younger than Willard, Bryant was born in Scituate,
Massachusetts. In recalling his childhood, Bryant wrote that he had a “mechanical and inventive turn of mind . . . I was generally
at the head of the young urchins of our neighborhood, and when there was a fort to be constructed . . . I was always appointed
the chief engineer.” Despite his friends’ high regard, his mother pushed him out of the house at fifteen to apprentice with
a leading Boston builder. Six years later he headed out on his own and by the early 1820s, Bryant was one of the foremost
masons in Boston, including a stint working for Willard. 16
In late 1825 Bryant suggested a railway as the best means to transport granite from the quarry to the Neponset River. He came
up with the idea after hearing about English railroads transporting stone from quarries. The BHMA rejected his plan as too
ambitious. Not to be thwarted, Bryant presented his idea to several businessmen, including Thomas Handasyd Perkins, who although
a member of the association, was open to Bryant’s proposition. 17
Perkins, a Boston merchant and philanthropist who had made a fortune in the China trade, not the least of which was from opium,
endorsed the project. He knew about railroads from trips to England and recognized their moneymaking potential. With Perkins’s
prompting, a group made a petition to the state legislature on January 5, 1826, to establish a railroad. The bill passed on
March 4 chartering the Granite Railway Company with Perkins as president. (In a letter, Perkins wrote “I think I may safely
call it my road, not only because I set it agoing, but because I own 3/5ths of it.”) 18 The Perkins group hired Bryant as superintendent and designer. On April 1, 1826, he broke ground on what was called, and
is often still called, the first railroad in the United States.
“If you use enough adjectives, you can get it right,” said Vic Campbell, who has spent the past forty years researching the
history of the Granite Railway, locating its route, and telling people about it. 19 “The Granite Railway was the first chartered, commercial railway in the United States.” He noted that Fred Gamst, a former
anthropology professor at the University of Massachusetts, determined that the Granite Railway was actually the twelfth American
railway. The first was in Boston, ran about one-quarter mile, and carried dirt off Beacon Hill to fill the Back Bay. Built
in 1805, the Beacon Hill Railroad would have been running when a displaced Scituate teenager arrived in town. Gamst speculated
that such an unusual operation would have attracted the attention of a young Gridley Bryant despite his later claim that “all
the cars, trucks, and machinery are my original invention.” 20
Campbell stood just below the site of Willard’s ledge, or what was left of it, since any rock that enticed Willard is now
twelve miles away in the monument. A ledgy granite hill covered, probably as it was in 1825, by pine trees and
also gave $1,000 to the BHMA. His first proposal as superintendent was to purchase the ledge of granite from Gridley Bryant,
which the association did for $325, a nice profit for Bryant. During the winter Willard finalized the drawings for the obelisk,
increasing the size of the building blocks from eighteen inches to thirty-two inches tall.
Transportation presented the central snag for Willard. How would he move blocks that weighed up to six tons across the twelve
miles of swamp, forest, and farms that separated Quincy from Charlestown? Willard favored either a completely overland route
or moving the stone in winter, when sledges could carry the blocks to the Neponset River, four miles north. A barge would
transport the stone through Boston Harbor to Charlestown, which formed a peninsula on the north side of the Charles River,
due north of downtown Boston. Gridley Bryant had another idea. Six years younger than Willard, Bryant was born in Scituate,
Massachusetts. In recalling his childhood, Bryant wrote that he had a “mechanical and inventive turn of mind . . . I was generally
at the head of the young urchins of our neighborhood, and when there was a fort to be constructed . . . I was always appointed
the chief engineer.” Despite his friends’ high regard, his mother pushed him out of the house at fifteen to apprentice with
a leading Boston builder. Six years later he headed out on his own and by the early 1820s, Bryant was one of the foremost
masons in Boston, including a stint working for Willard. 16
In late 1825 Bryant suggested a railway as the best means to transport granite from the quarry to the Neponset River. He came
up with the idea after hearing about English railroads transporting stone from quarries. The BHMA rejected his plan as too
ambitious. Not to be thwarted, Bryant presented his idea to several businessmen, including Thomas Handasyd Perkins, who although
a member of the association, was open to Bryant’s proposition. 17
Perkins, a Boston merchant and philanthropist who had made a fortune in the China trade, not the least of which was from opium,
endorsed the project. He knew about railroads from trips to England and recognized their moneymaking potential. With Perkins’s
prompting, a group made a petition to the state legislature on January 5, 1826, to establish a railroad. The bill passed on
March 4 chartering the Granite Railway Company with Perkins as president. (In a letter, Perkins wrote “I think I may safely
call it my road, not only because I set it agoing, but because I own 3/5ths of it.”) 18 The Perkins group hired Bryant as superintendent and designer. On April 1, 1826, he broke ground on what was called, and
is often still called, the first railroad in the United States.
“If you use enough adjectives, you can get it right,” said Vic Campbell, who has spent the past forty years researching the
history of the Granite Railway, locating its route, and telling people about it. 19 “The Granite Railway was the first chartered, commercial railway in the United States.” He noted that Fred Gamst, a former
anthropology professor at the University of Massachusetts, determined that the Granite Railway was actually the twelfth American
railway. The first was in Boston, ran about one-quarter mile, and carried dirt off Beacon Hill to fill the Back Bay. Built
in 1805, the Beacon Hill Railroad would have been running when a displaced Scituate teenager arrived in town. Gamst speculated
that such an unusual operation would have attracted the attention of a young Gridley Bryant despite his later claim that “all
the cars, trucks, and machinery are my original invention.” 20
Campbell stood just below the site of Willard’s ledge, or what was left of it, since any rock that enticed Willard is now
twelve miles away in the monument. A ledgy granite hill covered, probably as it was in 1825, by pine trees and
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