A Walking Tour of Historic Saxonville

While driving through McGrath Square in Saxonville, where Concord Street and Central Street intersect, you've no doubt glanced over at the looming red brick mill buildings that once housed the Roxbury Carpet Company. Perhaps you've wondered about the history of the mill and the surrounding buildings with their ornate architectural features. Or maybe you even know a bit about the history of the village, which is the oldest settled area in Framingham, and still retains many of the vestiges of its boom times as a classic 19th century New England mill village.

But it's probably a sure bet there's still a lot you don't know about the history of the village, and that unless you live in the neighborhood, you have not explored it on foot. The view from the sidewalk at two miles an hour is dramatically different than the one you get through your car's windshield at thirty miles per hour.

The Friends of Saxonville offers guided walking tours of the village once or twice a year (usually conducted by yours truly), typically in June or September, as part of their annual Discover Saxonville event.

But now you can easily take the tour on your own, with the new brochure in hand that Friends of Saxonville has published. It contains a map, photos, and descriptions of the village's historic buildings and sites, and is being distributed at various points around town, including the McAuliffe Library branch on Nicholas Road in Saxonville. You can also download a copy at http://www.saxonville.org/walk.htm or request that a printed copy be mailed to you.

So the next nice day that you've got a spare hour or two, or perhaps some out of town guests who want something to do, forget Boston, forget the Freedom Trail, take a look at what your town has to offer in terms of walkable history!

Autumn Fun at Hanson's Farm

The rural country roads in northwest Framingham are one of my favorite places in town to bring visitors, particularly those who think of Framingham only in terms of the asphalt sprawlscape of Route 9.

In my opinion there's no better time than autumn to enjoy the scenic vistas in this undeveloped corner of town, as the changing leaves offer a painter's palette of colors, and the air is crisp and cool after the heat of summer has passed.

While Hanson's Farm and and its popular farm stand, at 20 Nixon Road, is a pleasant destination in the summer months for pick-your-own berries and fresh produce and flowers, autumn is when things really get fun. In addition to picking your own pumpkin out of the fields, you can go for a weekend hayride, or get lost in the Amazing Maize Maze. And every Friday and Saturday night in October, the Haunted Hayride is very popular as well.

In these days when family farms are becoming a rarity, the century-old Hanson's has wisely diversified to make their beautiful property a welcome destination for much of the year, for those who want a taste of the town's agrarian past.

Support your local farmer!

The Ice Cream Stands of Summer

Is there a summer pleasure more sublime than eating ice cream outside on a warm evening? Of standing in line in shorts and sandals, pondering the plethora of flavors listed while you wait your turn at the counter?

Framingham is lucky to have several seasonal ice cream stands where you can indulge and sit outside in the warm months.

Mad Willie's on Route 9 in Framingham Centre is a favorite during the school year for students from Framingham State, right across the street, and attendees at the popular Friday night summer concerts on the town green, just a short stroll away.

Mad Willie's has 20+ flavors, plus other food, including a raved-about lobster roll. There are tables and chairs out front for al fresco enjoyment, although the parking lot and Route 9 beyond are not exactly a quiet and picturesque setting.

Sunshine Farm is technically just across the border from the Ham by a couple of hundred feet, in Sherborn at 41 Kendall Street, but is frequented by many Hamsters, since it's located near the Beaver Street area of the South Side, a short walk from this beautifully located vegetable/fruit/ice cream stand and its adjoining farm.

A third generation family business set on 100 acres, this is by far the most rural setting you'll find to lick a cone around Framingham. Sunshine Farm offers about 30 flavors, including some exotic fruity ones like Pomegranate Chip and Orange Pineapple. Sunshine Farm has picnic tables for outside seating, and offers peach, strawberry, and raspberry toppings made from fruit grown on the farm, which also can be obtained at the farm stand or by picking your own in season.


Gerard Farm on Water Street, midway between North Framingham's villages of Saxonville and Nobscot, has a charmingly rustic ice cream stand that adjoins the take-out food store of this former turkey farm. With more than 30 flavors you're sure to find a favorite. Chocolate Raspberry Truffle was a hit on a recent Hamster research mission.

While turkeys are no longer raised here, you can get roasted-daily turkeys and ducks and other hearty fare to enjoy at home. With ample outdoor seating and a pavilion where you can wait out any passing rain showers, Gerard's also offers a Thursday evening outdoor chicken and ribs barbecue special that attracts plenty of locals.

Framingham Makes Newsweek List of Top U.S. Public High Schools

Now Newsweek's readers know what many people in the Ham have long believed: Framingham High School offers a high quality education to its students. In the shadow of the more affluent towns around it, Framingham's reputation sometimes suffers, unfairly, because of the diversity of its residents. But as Newsweek notes in its recent article Framingham High is 1,038 on its 2008 list of the top 1,300 public high schools in the U.S., ahead of its neighbors Holliston (1,293) and Ashland (1,050) and even the pricy town of Winchester (1,368).

Massachusetts as a whole appears to offer some of the best high schools in the country, with 34 schools from the Bay State making the Newsweek list. Interestingly, some of our other neighbors, including Natick, whose schools are sometimes seen as being better than Framingham's, did not even make the list. Most of the schools on the list are the usual suspects--the very affluent and exclusive towns that are renowned for their schools, such as Weston, Wellesley, and Newton, where the price of entry--if you want to own a home in the town--is exceeding high, and beyond the reach of many in the middle class.

That Framingham is in such company is good news for the vast majority of people who do not have incomes in the demographic top 5-10% for the country. The ideal of the American public school system has been that everyone's children should have access to a free, high quality education, an ideal that sadly has become less common in the past few decades. So once again, Framingham, the frequent underdog of MetroWest, has becoming a shining example of a town that can offer both a reasonable cost of living and high quality education. More proof of the veracity of the Boston Magazine article where Framingham is listed as being one of the metropolitan area's biggest bangs for the buck.

Newsweek's formula for determining the top schools admittedly is limited -- a ratio of the number of Advanced Placement, Intl. Baccalaureate and/or Cambridge tests taken by all students at a school in 2007 divided by the number of graduating seniors. This calculation is used to create a list of what Newsweek says is the top 5% of public high schools in the country. While some may rightly argue that there are many other measures of excellence, the number of students taking Advanced Placement classes and tests is often seen as a good indicator of future success in college. In a nutshell, taking the academically rigorous AP classes is important preparation for the degree of difficulty found in college courses.

Framingham High has long had a policy of offering numerous Advanced Placement classes, and allowing a wide variety of students to take them, unlike some schools that limit access to only the top echelon of students.

Principal Michael Welch, and all of the excellent teachers at Framingham High, take a well-deserved bow!

Framingham's Most Walkable Neighborhoods

I am a big fan of walking instead of driving whenever possible. When I think back over all of the places I've lived, and visited, the ones I enjoyed most were places where everyday life was not ruled by getting in a car to go someplace. Unfortunately, suburban America has made a car a necessity for leaving your home in many communities.

Framingham, as it is in so many things, goes from one end of the spectrum to the other when it comes to being a walkable town. My fellow Framingham blogger Sharon Machlis Gartenberg has been writing about this for years on her excellent Planning Livable Communities blog.

From the pedestrian nightmare that is the Golden Mile stretch of Route 9, to the pedestrian friendly streets of downtown, Framingham has a little of everything for those traveling on foot.

Some of the principles of walkability include safety for pedestrians, attractiveness of the streetscape, and proximity to desirable destinations. In general, the south side of town is far superior to the north side in terms of walkability, if we use Route 9 as the dividing line.

Downtown Framingham, whatever its faults may be, has a lot of good streetscape; plenty of sidewalks, many street-level businesses for visual interest, and lots of key destinations within close proximity, including town hall, the library, commuter rail, the Danforth Museum, restaurants, entertainment venues, and shops. And hundreds of residences within easy walking distance.

But the north side has its highly walkable areas as well. The villages of both Nobscot and Saxonville offer stores, restaurants, banks, schools, churches, parks, a branch library (in Saxonville), and other services and amenities within easy walking distance of hundreds of homes. In Saxonville, for the eight years I lived there, and now in Nobscot, where I moved last year, I can accomplish many everyday tasks on foot. I can drop my car off for repairs, get a haircut, go to the bank, get a cup of coffee or something to eat, pick up a pharmacy prescription, and enjoy countless other small pleasures in the community.

What are the enemies of walkability? Lack of sidewalks. Distance from key destinations. Or, even when sidewalks are present and desirable destinations nearby, unappealing streetscapes, due to traffic, esposure to the elements, or just plain bad design. Just think of Route 30. Not exactly the kind of place you'd venture down for an afternoon stroll.

Some parts of town that are considered very beautiful and prestigious are terrible in terms of walkability. Miles from anything but other houses or major roadways. Situated on streets without sidewalks that you would be risking your life to walk down, particularly in bad weather or after dark. I daresay even many long-time residents have probably never ventured beyond their driveway unless they were in a car. Or met many of their neighbors. Is this what we truly want, or what we've been conditioned to believe we want?

Could it be that the Natick Collection and Shoppers World are so crowded because people just want to be able to stroll idly, look in store windows, interact with other people, and do the kind of everyday things other generations did in the walkable neighborhoods of years past?

Good Drama Lives in Unexpected Local Places

Despite all of the portable digital, and at-home visual entertainment options, from iPods to DVDs to cable and satellite offerings on demand, live theater still continues to attract audiences. The intimacy of a live performance, the audience reactions, the excitement as the lights dim and the curtain rises, and perhaps a multitude of other reasons, make live theater the entertainment of choice for many people.

But if you don't want to travel to Boston, pay outrageously high ticket prices, and need binoculars to see the facial expressions of the actors, consider your drama options right here in the Ham.

Community theater, with its often amateur casts and limited budgets sometimes gets a bad rap, but there are sometimes gems to be found right in your proverbial back yard.

The Amazing Theater Company puts on several plays a year at the Amazing Things Arts Center. A recent production of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie garnered rave reviews. The troupe will be staging Ivan Menchell's The Cemetery Club in April.

Framingham Community Theater makes its home at the Framingham Civic League building next to town hall downtown. This theater company has been around about three years. It produces a variety of types of plays, from A.R. Guerney's classic Love Letters last year, to a 2006 production of Nunsense, to a murder mystery dinner theater in 2005.

The Performing Arts Center of Metrowest, located in the same building as the Danforth Museum on Union Ave., has a lively children's theater company that produces several plays a year.

They also offer a summer musical theater program for kids. This is the place to be for young thespians who can't get enough of the drama bug acting in their school productions.

Speaking of school-based theater, the Framingham High School Drama Company puts on great productions that far exceed the quality of the average high school play.

And it's not just their parents who think so. Framingham High won the state-wide high school drama competition in 2006, and has advanced to the semi-finals this year. Go FHS Drama!

Alternatives to the Cineplex for Film Buffs

Are you dispirited to look at the listings for the only movie theatre in town, to discover there's absolutely nothing you want to see on any of the sixteen screens?

Sure, there's always Netflix, the library's excellent DVD collection, or the local movie rental store, but some people still pine for the get-out-of-the-house, communal feeling of sitting in a dark room with a lot of other people and watching a movie on a big screen.

There are alternatives in The Ham, if you know where to look.

Framingham State College offers an international film series, with several screenings during the academic year in the College Center. Next up is the Danish film After the Wedding, on March 27. Check out the FSC events schedule for more information.

The Framingham Public Library has a frequent and varied schedule of free films screened at the main library downtown. On March 6 the award-winning American independent film Sweet Land is scheduled. Check the library events schedule for more information.

Amazing Things Arts Center has a very cool Indie Film Night on the third Wednesday of every month. This series features local, independent film makers, who both introduce their works and answer audience questions afterward. If you've never had this opportunity, it can open up a whole new aspect of the cinematic experience for you. And popcorn is included in the admission price!

So next time you're in the mood for a good film and the cineplex offerings don't cut it, plan ahead a little and have an alternative cinema experience in The Ham!