Blackstone Valley

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  Blackstone Valley sits between Worcester, Massachusetts and Providence, Rhode Island, and it carries a distinction that few American regions can claim: the Industrial Revolution began here. Not in a factory city, not in a port, but along a river that the original Native American inhabitants called the Kittacuck, meaning "the great tidal river." The river ran thick with salmon and lamprey long before a single mill wheel turned. Then, in 1790, a man named Samuel Slater opened the first successful water-powered cotton mill in America at Pawtucket Falls, and the valley was never the same. How did a stretch of New England river become the cradle of an entire industrial nation? And what happened to that river once the mills were done with it?

• 2. William Blackstone and the River's Name

  ›

  William Blackstone, whose name was originally spelled Blaxton, arrived in Weymouth, Massachusetts in 1623. Two years later, in 1625, he became the first European settler of present-day Boston. He did not stay long. In 1635, he relocated again, this time to Rhode Island, and built his home on the river that would eventually bear his name, in what would become the town of Cumberland. The river Blackstone settled beside had already been charted by others. Adriaen Block mapped Narragansett Bay in 1614, and from that year through the Hartford Treaty of 1650, the Blackstone River and the Providence River together formed the northeastern boundary of Dutch territorial claims for New Netherland. The river Blackstone chose for his home was, in a quiet way, a border of empires.

• 3. The Mill That Started a Nation

  ›

  Samuel Slater's mill at Pawtucket Falls drew its power directly from the Blackstone River's current. From that single point of origin in 1790, manufacturing spread northward along the valley toward Worcester, and then outward across the country. The John H. Chafee Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor traces exactly this path, running from Worcester down to Providence and following the route that industrialization took. Congress recognized the valley's historic weight in November 1986, designating the corridor as a National Heritage Corridor comprising twenty-five towns and cities across both states. A further recognition came in 2014, when the Blackstone River Valley National Historical Park was formally established, following a 2011 report recommending the region for full National Park status. The price of that industrial productivity, however, accumulated quietly in the water. By the end of the twentieth century, the Blackstone River had been identified as the primary source of pollution in Narragansett Bay.

• 4. The Canal and the Rivalry

  ›

  Providence merchants were the driving force behind the Blackstone Canal. They wanted direct access to the farming country of Worcester County and to the goods of the valley, goods that were then traveling overland to Boston by road. Worcester-area farmers wanted better prices for their produce. Both sides had reasons to build. But Massachusetts commercial interests, unwilling to see trade flow away from Boston, stalled the project for years. Finally, in 1823, the Blackstone Canal Company was organized through an act of the Massachusetts legislature, with a Rhode Island company following soon after. Construction started in 1825 at a cost of $750,000, which was twice the original estimate. The canal opened on the 7th of October 1828, when the packet boat Lady Carrington arrived in Worcester as the first vessel to complete the journey. Farmers' profits rose, mills multiplied especially in Worcester, and the slow rough roads of the era gave way to a two-day water route with an overnight stop in Uxbridge.

• 5. Boston Fights Back

  ›

  The canal's success alarmed Boston. In 1835, Boston merchants opened three railroads simultaneously: one to Lowell, one to Worcester, and one to Providence. Rail was still very new technology, but it was faster than canal boats, and Boston used it deliberately to pull the trade flowing down the canal back toward the city. The counterattack worked. In 1847, the Providence and Worcester Railroad began parallel operation along the same corridor the canal occupied. The canal closed in 1848, less than twenty years after the Lady Carrington first docked in Worcester. What the canal left behind was not failure but precedent: the Blackstone Canal is listed in the National Register of Historic Places, and Route 122 in Massachusetts still runs through the region's mill villages today under the name Blackstone Canal Heritage Highway.

• 6. The Valley Today

  ›

  At the 2010 census, the population of the Blackstone Valley stood at 848,725 people spread across its towns and cities. Providence, with 190,934 residents recorded in 2020, and Worcester, with 206,518, anchor the corridor at either end. Between them lie smaller communities: Pawtucket with 75,604 residents, Woonsocket with 43,240, and East Providence with 47,139. Two MBTA Commuter Rail lines, the Worcester Line and the Providence Line, both run through the valley with direct service to Boston's South Station. Providence station also connects to Amtrak's Northeast Corridor, providing service to New York City. Route 146 cuts through both states, and upgrades on the Massachusetts side have brought measurable economic benefits to the towns along it. The valley that once drew power from the Blackstone River now draws visitors to Purgatory Chasm State Reservation in Sutton and the Blackstone River and Canal Heritage State Park in Northbridge and Uxbridge, where the old canal towpaths run beside the water that started everything.