1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Milford (Massachusetts)

MILFORD, a township of Worcester county, Massachusetts, U.S.A., about 16 m. S.E. of Worcester. Pop. (1890), 8780; (1900) 11,376, of whom 3342 were foreign-born; (1910 census) 13,055. Within its area of about 15 sq. m. are a large rural population and the village of Milford, on the Charles river, about 33 m. S.W. of Boston, served by the Boston & Albany, the New York, New Haven & Hartford and the Grafton & Upton railways (the last named having its passenger department operated by electricity and its freight by steam, and connecting Milford with North Grafton), and by inter-urban electric lines. The village has a memorial hall, housing the public library, and in the township there is an excellent hospital, the gift of Eben. S. Draper. The village is a shipping point for an agricultural and manufacturing district. In 1905 the value of the township’s factory products was $3,390,504 (32·8% more than in 1900). The most important manufactures are boots and shoes; the industry was established in 1795, and for many years the special product was brogans for Southern negroes. In 1908 there were 12 large granite quarries in the township (north and north-east of the village). Milford granite is the typical stone of an area reaching into Rhode Island south of the southern boundary of Providence county; it is a biotite granite of post-Cambrian age, is generally pinkish-gray in colour (owing to the large proportion of feldspar among its constituents), and is widely used for building purposes. The township was the east precinct of Mendon until 1780, when it was incorporated; in 1835 parts of Holliston and Hopkinton were annexed; in 1886 a part was separated as Hopedale.

See Adin Ballou, History of Milford (Boston, 1882); and T. Nelson Dale, The Chief Commercial Granites of Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Rhode Island (Washington, 1908), Bulletin 354 of the U.S. Geological Survey.