4. The Concord Mill Dam Company, 1826
In his book Houses and People in Concord, 1810-1820, under the heading, “General Condition of the People,” Edward Jarvis wrote: “All the stores and mechanic’s shops which were in town previous to 1830, have been destroyed or converted into dwellings or other uses.”
In the center of Concord, the transition from a haphazard collection of colonial businesses to an orderly early-nineteenth-century commercial area was brought about by the Concord Mill Dam Company, a real-estate partnership incorporated in 1828 that sought to develop the center of town. Documentation lists the incorporators as Nehemiah Ball, John Keyes, Ephraim Merriam, Abel Moore, and Daniel Shattuck. With an initial budget of $20,000, the company bought land on both sides of the milldam. They drained the mill pond, widened the former site of the dam, and built a road.
The construction of the Concord Bank-Middlesex Mutual Fire Insurance Company building (1832) is a significant example of the Mill Dam Company’s activity in Concord center. The present Anderson Market building was part of the original phase of development, making it one of the oldest buildings in the center of Concord.