Dorchester Illustration no. 2255 A.T. Stearns Lumber Company
A.T. Stearns Lumber Company bronze paper-weight celebrating 75 years of business at Neponset. The company owned much of what is now the public property on Port Norfolk that is part of the Greenway. The lumber yard buildings stood just east of the railroad bridge that carries the T’s red line to Braintree.
The following is from: Men of Progress. Boston, 1896.
Stearns, Albert Thomas, of Neponset, lumber merchant and manufacturer, was born in Billerica, April 23, 1821, son of Abner and Annie (Russell) Stearns. He is a direct descendant of Isaac Stearns, whom came to New England from England in 1636. His grandfather, Lieutenant Edward Stearns, was in the Concord fight of 1773, and took the place of Captain Wilson who was killed. His uncle Solomon Stearns,then a lad of seventeen, was also there. He was educated in the public schools and at Phillips (Andover) Academy, which he attended one year, about 1834. He was trained for active life at home, in farming carpentering, and in saw and grist mills. Leaving home at the age of eighteen, he engaged in a variety of pursuits the next few years, at length settling into that of a builder; and from this worked naturally into the lumber business which, with manufacturing, has been the principal occupation of his life. He started in this business in1843, in Waltham, where F. Butrick’s lumberyard now is, and leaving therein 1849, came to Neponset, where he has since remained. During this long period he has been engaged in a large and prosperous trade, and has become widely known among lumber men. He is a member of the Home Market Club and of the Norfolk Club. In politics he was first a Free Soiler, and since its organization has been associated with the Republican party. He has not been ambitious for political honors, and his only public service has been as a member of the Boston Common Council one term, 1879. Mr. Stearns was married in June, 1843, to Miss Salome Maynard, of Sudbury. They have had seven children: Albert Henry, Waldo Harrison, Frank Maynard (deceased), Anne Russell (deceased), Frederick Maynard, Salome (deceased) , and Ardelle Augusta Stearns.