I suppose it is fair to put upon me the mantle of “Townie” as it describes my relationship with the Town of Easton, past and present. 

I was born in 1963, and am a native of Easton, and have lived almost all my life here.  I am involved civically it the town.  I study the history of the community, and I have been all around, up and down, and through its almost 30 square miles.  I have driven over and ran along perhaps hundreds of its miles of roads. 

Starting as a kid growing up on Andrews Street in North Easton Village, I began to explore its woods, paths, streams, ponds and swamps.  I never stopped exploring the area.

For the person who doesn’t dig deep into Easton, and does not travel extensively within it, there are so many places you will never know about.   These places are hidden – and you have to do some hiking, get your feet and ankles wet, and perhaps part some branches and other vegetation to get to them.  

Remarkably, and I need to come clean here, there are countless areas in town that are unfamiliar to me, that I have not visited.   Really, when I review the Easton Conservation Commission brochure (attached here) with its descriptions and a map of conservation land in Easton – all designated management areas – I say to myself, “Never been there … and never been there … and, yep, never been there.” 

I am not sure I have ever walked a step within the 256 acres of the Poquanticut Management Area.  

Found in the mostly swampy 54 acres of the South Easton Management Area is “Settler’s Pond.”   I don’t know if I’ve been to Settler’s Pond. 

I’ve have though been to “The Muck.”   How many of you reading this know where The Muck is located?   Even more, who reading this has hung out at The Muck? 

The Muck is a soupy and dark colored pond found just to the east of the railroad track bed that is roughly behind the Covenant Congregational Church on Center Street.   Not sure if this is the case today, but when I was kid and teenager, The Muck teemed with shiners, small fish, that we would pull of the pond and use for bait when we went fishing. 

Years ago, during the winter, when The Muck was solidly frozen, spirited ice hockey games were held on its ice. 

Maybe eight or nine years back, for the first time I came face to face, deep in the woods, with an iconic structure from Easton’s history.   I was walking through the Flyaway Pond/Long Pond Management Area – whose 318 acres include Long Pond, Tufts Farm, Pout Rock, and the marshy remains of what was once Flyaway Pond – and there it was:  the broken and cracked dam; the Flyaway Pond dam that gave way in early spring 1968 and resulted in a flood that left 100 people homeless in North Easton. 

As I have written in this space, when my buddies and I were in grade school, we explored what had once been the majestic Italian gardens behind the Ames Free Library and adjacent to Queset House, which had become overgrown and bound in branches and vines.  It was lost civilization.   Of course, today, thanks to the Friends of the Ames Free Library and the members of the Easton Garden Club, and others, the gardens have almost been totally restored to the grandeur of their prime. 

Morse's Pond. I have several times been on the Central Street dam that abuts Morse's Pond.  But it has probably been more than 20 years since I was any place else along the banks of that pond.   I don’t have much of a history with Morse's Pond. 

The 95-acre Dorchester Brook Management Area is found off of Elm Street Extension.  On that parcel is Monte’s Pond, where was located the last commercial ice harvesting business in New England.   This is historic property – property with which I have yet to acquaint myself.  

Spring is soon upon us.  With warm days – and prior to the clouds of summer insects emerging, it is a nice time of year, as is fall, to do some investigating and examining and traveling through local nature. 

Over the next few months, I am going to expand the writ of land and property in Easton that I have visited and walked along and enjoyed.

After all, that’s what it’s there for.