Stockbridge, Massachusetts Stockbridge, Massachusetts Official seal of Stockbridge, Massachusetts Location in Berkshire County and the state of Massachusetts.
Location in Berkshire County and the state of Massachusetts.
Stockbridge is a town in Berkshire County in Massachusetts, United States.
The populace was 1,947 at the 2010 census. A year-round resort area, Stockbridge is home to the Norman Rockwell Museum, the Austen Riggs Center (a noted psychiatric treatment center), and Chesterwood, home and studio of sculptor Daniel Chester French.
Stockbridge was first settled by English missionaries in 1734, who established it as a mission for the Mahican Indian tribe known as the Stockbridge Indians.
First chartered as Indian Town in 1737, the village was officially incorporated on June 22, 1739, as Stockbridge.
Although the Massachusetts General Court had assured the Stockbridge Indians that their territory would never be sold, the agreement was rescinded.
Even with the aid by the tribe amid the Revolutionary War, the state forced their relocation to the west, first to New York State, then to Wisconsin.
Since 1853, Stockbridge has benefited from the existence of the Laurel Hill Association, a village beautification society.
The Stockbridge Bowl Association maintains and preserves the natural beauty of Stockbridge Bowl and the encircling Bullard Woods.
Stockbridge was the home of Elizabeth Freeman, a freed slave, late in her life.
Also working in the homehold was Agrippa Hull, a no-charge black veteran of the war, who became the biggest black landowner in Stockbridge.
Freeman was buried in the Sedgwick family plot at the Stockbridge Cemetery.
In the Curtisville area, now known as the Interlaken part of Stockbridge, Albrecht Pagenstecher, an immigrant from Saxony, established the first wood-based newsprint paper foundry in the United States, in March 1867.
Norman Rockwell painted many of his works in Stockbridge, home to the Norman Rockwell Museum.
Stockbridge Town Offices in 1914 school building According to the United States Enumeration Bureau, the town has a total region of 23.7 sq mi (61.3 km2), of which 22.7 sq mi (58.9 km2) is territory and 0.93 sq mi (2.4 km2), or 3.97%, is water. Stockbridge is bordered by Richmond to the northwest, Lenox to the north and northeast, Lee to the east, Great Barrington to the south, and West Stockbridge to the west.
The town is positioned 13.5 miles (21.7 km) south of Pittsfield, 35 miles (56 km) southeast of Albany, New York, 45 miles (72 km) west-northwest of Springfield, and 130 miles (210 km) west of Boston.
Set among the Berkshire Mountains, Stockbridge is drained by the Housatonic River, which runs through the center of town.
The river is fed by a several marshy brooks and lakes, including Mohawk Lake to the west, Agawam Lake to the south, Lake Averic in the northwest, and Lake Mahkeenac, also known as the Stockbridge Bowl, to the north.
Stockbridge Bowl is the site of a town beach, a boating club, and a summer camp, Camp Mah-Kee-Nac.
To either side of the bowl lie West Stockbridge Mountain and Rattlesnake Hill.
To the south, Monument Mountain peaks on the Great Barrington town line, and Beartown Mountain peaks to the east, closer to the Lee town line.
The town is nearly bisected by Interstate 90, the Massachusetts Turnpike.
There are exits in neighboring West Stockbridge and Lee.
Route 7 all pass through town, with Routes 102 and 7 sharing a short stretch in downtown Stockbridge, and Routes 102 and 183 meeting in the village of Larrywaug.
The town lies along a Berkshire Regional Transit Authority (BRTA) bus line, which provides service between Pittsfield and Great Barrington.
Climate data for Stockbridge, Massachusetts (1981 2010 normals) Source: United States Enumeration records and Population Estimates Program data. By population, Stockbridge rates twelfth out of the 32 metros/cities and suburbs in Berkshire County, and 285th out of the 351 metros/cities and suburbs in Massachusetts.
In the town, the populace was spread out with 15.2% under the age of 18, 6.3% from 18 to 24, 22.5% from 25 to 44, 33.5% from 45 to 64, and 22.5% who were 65 years of age or older.
Stockbridge is governed by open town meeting, held annually on the third Monday in May, and by an propel three-member Board of Selectmen. The town operates its own police, fire and enhance works departments, with two fire stations and two postal services.
On the state level, Stockbridge is represented in the Massachusetts House of Representatives by the Fourth Berkshire district, which covers southern Berkshire County, as well as the westernmost suburbs in Hampden County.
In the Massachusetts Senate, the town is represented by the Berkshire, Hampshire and Franklin district, which includes all of Berkshire County and Hampshire and Franklin counties. The town is patrolled by the First (Lee) Station of Barracks "B" of the Massachusetts State Police. On the nationwide level, Stockbridge is represented in the United States House of Representatives as part of Massachusetts's 1st congressional district, and has been represented by Richard Neal of Springfield since January 2013.
Massachusetts is presently represented in the United States Senate by senior Senator Elizabeth Warren and junior Senator Ed Markey.
The first school in Stockbridge was opened in 1737 under the direction of John Sergeant, a missionary to the small-town Mohican Indians.
During the pre-American Revolutionary War years, a several small schools were established to serve the kids of new pioneer scattered further outside the village. The beginning of the semi-private Academy after the Revolutionary War marked the beginning of a more structured commitment to secondary education in the town.
In the early and mid-1800s Stockbridge schools earned the distinct ion of educating three Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States who served on the high court at the same time.
All educated in Stockbridge, Stephen Johnson Field, Henry Billings Brown and David Josiah Brewer served together as Associate Justices from 1891 to 1897.
Former Bancroft-Curtisville Hotel in Interlaken, one of Stockbridge's small villages Students from Stockbridge, its small villages of Interlaken, Glendale and Larrywaug, and from the close-by town of West Stockbridge attended the town's Williams High School, established in 1872.
After the state refused in 1964 to help fund a new high school building, Stockbridge voters allowed a regionalization plan to join Great Barrington and West Stockbridge in a merged school district. In 1968 Stockbridge students joined those from Great Barrington's Searles High School in transferring to a new county-wide high school positioned in Great Barrington. The building of the former Stockbridge Plain School, instead of in 1914, was shared by the elementary school and Williams High School, until the opening of Monument Mountain Regional High School in 1968.
Stockbridge Plain School for a several years then became one of the elementary schools in the new Berkshire Hills Regional School District.
Today, Stockbridge, along with West Stockbridge and Great Barrington, remain members of the Berkshire Hills Regional School District.
All students in the precinct attend school in Great Barrington, with elementary students attending Muddy Brook Regional Elementary School, middle school students attending Monument Valley Regional Middle School, and high school students attending Monument Mountain Regional High School. In addition to enhance schools, there are private and theological schools positioned in the neighboring towns.
The nearest improve college is the South County branch of Berkshire Community College in Great Barrington.
The nearest state college is Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams, and the nearest state college is the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Sedgwick Pie, unique family plot at the Stockbridge Cemetery Stockbridge Bowl, aka Lake Mahkeenac Stockbridge Bowl, looking southeast to Rattlesnake Hill Stockbridge Casino, home of the Berkshire Theatre Festival Longtime Stockbridge resident Norman Rockwell illustrated the town in his 1967 painting, Main Street, Stockbridge at Christmas.
He incessantly used Stockbridge inhabitants in his drawings and paintings, such as William Obanhein's appearance in the advertisement "Policeman with Boys." Stockbridge was the locale of Alice's Restaurant in the song of the same name by Arlo Guthrie which describes the town as having "three stop signs, two police officers and one police car". Inspired by the river amid his honeymoon, the American classical music composer Charles Ives wrote The Housatonic at Stockbridge as part of his composition Three Places in New England.
"Geographic Identifiers: 2010 Demographic Profile Data (G001): Stockbridge town, Berkshire County, Massachusetts".
"TOTAL POPULATION (P1), 2010 Enumeration Summary File 1".
"Massachusetts by Place and County Subdivision - GCT-T1.
"1990 Enumeration of Population, General Population Characteristics: Massachusetts" (PDF).
"1980 Enumeration of the Population, Number of Inhabitants: Massachusetts" (PDF).
"1950 Enumeration of Population" (PDF).
"1920 Enumeration of Population" (PDF).
"1890 Enumeration of the Population" (PDF).
"1870 Enumeration of the Population" (PDF).
Populations of Cities, Towns, &c.
Populations of Cities, Towns, &c.
Loraine Anderson Devoe & Kathleen Wayne Oppermann (1984), Williams High School Alumni Association, History and Directory, 1872-1968, pg.
Forgotten Man in a Tumultuous Time: The Gilded Age as Seen by United States Supreme Court Associate Justice Henry Billings Brown, ''Michigan Journal of History'', Retrieved September 24, 2015 Loraine Anderson Devoe & Kathleen Wayne Oppermann (1984), Williams High School Alumni Association, History and Directory, 1872-1968, pg.
Loraine Anderson Devoe & Kathleen Wayne Oppermann (1984), Williams High School Alumni Association, History and Directory, 1872-1968, pgs.
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Town of Stockbridge official website History of Stockbridge, Massachusetts Stockbridge Bowl Association Municipalities and communities of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States
Categories:
Stockbridge, Massachusetts - Populated places established in 1734 - Towns in Berkshire County, Massachusetts - Towns in Massachusetts
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