PETER TUFTS, JR. (1774-1825)
The earliest surveyor represented in the Perkins Collection, Peter Tufts, Jr. was engaged by the Chelsea Board of Selectmen to do a comprehensive survey of the town in 1800. He mapped the Charlestown Peninsula in 1818 and South Row in Cambridgeport in 1822. He bought the Powder House in Somerville, Mass., (then in Charlestown) from his father, a historic facility which the Continental Army had used as its first munitions depot during the Revolutionary War. In 1804, he made a beautiful map locating the building and the surrounding property, now known as Nathan Tufts Park. (The locals still call it Powder House Park.) His maps of Somerville and Medford, which he made in 1807, illustrate the rural landscape of the time, showing ponds and rivers, as well as farms, noting the names of the people who owned them. Tufts Street in Cambridge is named for him. He lived around the corner on Magazine Street. His cousin Charles founded Tufts University.
 

KIMBALL WEBSTER (1828 -1916)
Kimball Webster lived a very exciting life as a young man. After working as a rock quarryman, he became one of the famous 49ers, heading west from his native New Hampshire when he was not yet 21 to join the California Gold Rush of 1849. He later wrote a book on his experience as a gold miner. During his western years, he did land surveying in Oregon and then in Missouri for the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad. At age 30, he returned to New Hampshire, got married and moved to Hudson, where he lived for the rest of his long life, becoming a leading citizen of the town, farming and doing land surveys of the area into the 20th Century. He fathered 10 children and outlived five of them.
 

WILLIAM A. MASON (1816-1882)
William A. Mason, at one time the city engineer of Cambridge, Mass., founded what would become a very successful engineering and land surveying business which later included his son, Charles. The company, W.A. Mason & Son, played a major role in the development of Cambridge. He made the plans for some of the buildings at Harvard University. In his early life, he worked on the plans for the canals at Lowell and Lawrence, Mass., and Nashua, N.H., as well as the Erie Canal.
 

CHARLES A. MASON (1851-19??)
In 1893, the Cambridge Chronicle called Charles A. Mason "an acknowledged leader in his profession," as he continued to expand the W.A. Mason engineering firm after the death of his father, William. With his father and after him, he conducted most of the public land surveys in Brighton, Brookline, Cambridge, Somerville and Watertown. He did the ground work for most of the dormitories built at Harvard University in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries.
 

CHARLES D. ELLIOT (1837-1908)
Charles Elliot's family distinguished itself in America's greatest wars. His great-grandfather, Joseph Eliot, was a Minuteman who fought at the Battles of Lexington and Saratoga during the American Revolution. One ancestor took part in the Boston Tea Party and others fought in the Indian Wars. He himself served in the Civil War as a topographical engineer, designing fortifications on battlefields throughout the south and compiling the official maps of the Siege of Yorktown and the Battle of Sabine Pass. He later became the first city engineer of Somerville, Mass., and laid out the Mystic Valley Parkway and Broadway Park as well as nine miles of sidewalks in the city. He worked for railroads and construction companies, and made the plans for the Arlington Water Works and the Cape Cod Canal.
 

DANA EDSON PERKINS (1861-1934)
Dana E. Perkins graduated from the Massachusetts State Agricultural College (now the University of Massachusetts at Amherst) in1882, when college degrees were far less common than they are today. A scientist as well as a surveyor, he invented a personal waterwheel and turbine engine designed to allow every home to generate its own power and bypass the electric light company which he felt was charging outrageous fees for electricity. He patented the device, and, with a group of investors, formed the Edson Turbine Company. Unfortunately, the treasurer stole all the money, causing the business to go bankrupt. He and his partners took the man to court, but Dana Perkins died before the case could be resolved. He did all this while running a civil engineering and land surveying company which he had founded in 1882. He took his son, Dana F. Perkins, into the business, sometimes pedaling to jobs with him on a bicycle built for two, starting out at 5 o'clock in the morning. He surveyed a good part of Metropolitan Boston and worked on major national projects including the survey of the Mississippi River.
 

DANA FIELDING PERKINS (1887-1962)
Dana F. Perkins began his surveying career when he was only 10, working with his father Dana E. Perkins. When he was 20, he signed on as a transitman for the Boston Elevated Railway and later as a draftsman for the Boston and Maine Railroad. In 1919, he opened his own land surveying firm in Wakefield, Mass., and, when his father died, took over his business and incorporated it into his own. In an interview with the Boston Post Magazine, published March 18, 1951, he said that surveyors had to carry guns in the early years for protection from suspicious property owners who didn't like people "nosing around" their boundaries. He relocated to Reading right after World War II, and remained there for the rest of his life, developing land and building many homes in the Andover and Tewksbury areas. His company has passed down to his descendants and is still operating today in Tewksbury under the name Dana F. Perkins, Inc.
 

Other Surveyors in our collection:

• Joseph Bancroft, Est. 1829
  Reading, North Reading, Stoneham, Wilmington
  
• James A. Bancroft, 1867-1919
  Reading, Stoneham, Wakefield, Lynnfield, Wilmington
  
• Charles J. Elliot, 1910-1935
  Somerville, Medford, Arlington, Winchester, Lexington, Waltham
  
• William Whitney, Est. 1860
  Boston & Vicinity
  
• George F. Hartshorne, Est. 1870
  Wakefield, Winchester, Reading, Stoneham, Wilmington
  
• E. F. Bowker, Est. 1873
  Cambridge, Brighton, Brookline, Newton, Somerville, Boston
  
• Fuller & Whitney Corp., 1880-1912
  Boston & Vicinity
  
• Charles W. Whitney, 1890-1920
  Boston & Vicinity
  
• Walter C. Stevens, Circa 1900
  Saugus
  
• Clarence E. Carter, 1910-1919
  Reading, Wakefield, Billerica, Stoneham, North Reading
  
• William M. Smith, 1920-1947
  Boston & Vicinity
  
• Dana W. Clark, 1930-1959
  Chelmsford
  
• Richard L. Monahan, Circa 1900
  J.C. & W.T. Monahan
  Lowell
  
• Warren M. Mirick, Circa 1930
  Stoneham