Maps

This twentieth-century map shows the names of the original settlers of the town. (Note that north is to the right on this map and that the roads are shown as the modern roads.) The three farms at the top of Cricket Hill are listed (from left to right) as Nathaniel Marble, Capt. Abel Dinsmore and William Gates. On the northwestern slope, site of the Town Farm and Maynard Cemetery, are Solomon Goodale and Malachi Maynard’s farms.

This map is from 1858 and has a “t” added in error to Cricket. Hard to discern much beyond the developing road system.

By this 1871 map, things are more recognizable. The names associated with the three farms at the top now include “Lee,” still an important one today. The map notes roads from Cricket Hill directly to both of the primary villages of the town, a schoolhouse and the cemetery. Also, note the solid north-south line veering slightly westward as you head north. When looking at the map in its entirety, you can see that this line is labeled Proposed Rail Road. The top edge of the map shows the more-than-proposed Troy and Greenfield Rail Road running along the Deerfield River on the town’s border with Shelburne. The proposed route would have joined up with the existing route and run northwest along the river as well.

This joined-together view of Cricket Hill on the edges of two quadrangles from the 1887 topo survey shows how rapidly the road system had been evolving . Also how all those hills speeded the water through all those mills. The town had over 200 mills in its first 200 years. On or near Cricket Hill there were sawmills on Roaring Brook, Avery Brook and Poland Brook.

Capt. Dinsmore’s headstone is prominent in Cricket Hill Cemetery.

Thanks and credit to: Town of Conway, Gordon E. Ainsworth Associates (settlers map), and to Conway 1767-1967 by Deane Lee, 1967.