(birds chirp) - [Presenter] In 1899, B.A Andrews, a resident of Slatersville, contacted one of the most well respected physicians in the world to report the precise location of a home.

Enclosed with the letter was this photograph, which was said to have been the birthplace of another physician whose life's work was becoming forgotten.

A biography was being written about this man, whose accomplishments and humanity were once known throughout the world, but not so much in his hometown.

In fact, this photo wasn't found in Slatersville at all, it was discovered to be saved in a city 65 miles to the north.

(dramatic music) - To understand Lowell, you have to understand why the city's here and it's really because of the Meramac River, which drops 32 feet in a mile.

(water rushes) And that created tremendous hydropower.

And that's why these industrialists chose to build their mills here.

(machines clatter) Very rapidly within 15 years, they went from one mill to eight mills and by mills, I mean like mill complexes with multiple buildings each.

One of the founders of Lowell was Nathan Appleton.

He felt that the Rhode Island Mills had made great profits during the War of 1812, because there was no English cotton coming into America.

But then he also felt that they had not reinvested their profits in the technology.

A lot of the ways that they were doing things, he felt, Appleton felt were outloaded.

The ties and the knowledge of what was going on in Rhode Island had a great influence on what subsequently happened in Lowell.

- [Presenter] Like Appleton and the city's founder, Francis Cabot Lowell, another pioneer who had a profound impact on Lowell, was a man named Elijah Bartlett and his long list of achievements was incredible for a man whose life was so short.

- Elijah Bartlett was a physician and a philosopher and a politician and poet and a peripatetic professor.

- [Narrator] "I came to the city "at the close of the year 1827.

"At that time the population was 3,500.

"I have been ever since that time, a constant resident here.

"I have born my humble part in most of the various "and active duties of citizenship "among the people where I live".

- Bartlett was in charge of the city at a time of perhaps the most rapid growth in the city's almost 200 year history.

To be able to synchronize the needs of the mill owners with the workers, with the waves of immigrants that were starting to arrive in the city at that time required great skill.

- [Presenter] And that skill might have been something he learned in his youth.

Little is known about Elijah Bartlett's childhood, but this is what we do know.

In 1804, he was born in Smithfield in the area that would become known as Slatersville.

He was schooled by Quakers, just over the state line in Uxbridge.

He witnessed a great deal of death and suffering amongst its children and its mill working population, which greatly influenced his path in becoming a doctor.

After graduating from Brown University in 1826, he sailed for Europe where he passionately studied medicine and began researching the causes of tuberculosis and typhoid fever.

And he attended lectures by some of the most distinguished doctors and surgeons of the day across England, France and Italy.

Two years later, he settled in Lowell, Massachusetts, where he lectured at the Lowell (indistinct) and gained popularity from his repeated talks on philosophy, sanitation, hygiene and temperance.

- [Narrator] "Alcohol standing like Satan "amid the fallen host, alone and preeminent "in its terrible and disastrous energies".

- [Presenter] But at the age of 25, he would return to the village where he was born and raised to marry Elizabeth Slater, daughter of John and Ruth Slater.

This is the only image we have ever seen of Elizabeth, who was just 16 years old at the time of this painting.

They would move to Lowell.

Once there, Dr. Bartlett became a member of the school committee where he would play a role in founding Lowell High School in 1831.

- Lowell High is notable because it is the first co-ed and integrated public high school in Massachusetts.

And that took place while Dr. Bartlett was on the school committee.

And so I think we can't dismiss his influence on that important social accomplishment.

- [Presenter] Over 40 years after Elijah Bartlett's death, a doctor named William Osler felt the need to write a biography about this man who he so admired.

At the time, the Canadian native was regarded as one of the most well-respected physicians in the English speaking world.

He chose to write and address his work in Rhode Island.

And he laid out a pretty firm reason for doing so.

- [Narrator] "Elisha Bartlett, whom you may claim "as the most distinguished physician of this state, "has left no deep impression on your local history "or institutions.

"Here, he was born and educated.

"And to this, his home, he returned to die.

"But his busy life was spent in other fields "where today his memory is cherished more warmly "than in the land of his birth".

(dramatic music) - [Presenter] At the start of the 1830s, Samuel Slater was in his final years of life.

Over a span of 40 years, he had built an empire of mills from Pawtucket, Rhode Island to his home in Webster, Massachusetts, to Jewett City, Connecticut, and Manchester, New Hampshire, making him one of the wealthiest men in America.

- When we're getting into the 1830s and 1840s, when immigrants are coming in, a lot of these manufacturers, such as Slaters, feel that they no longer have to cater to the workers.

There are so many workers available, you can do what you want, you see the conditions in these communities declining.

- [Presenter] But due to his own declining health, he had already begun to pass responsibilities onto his brother, John.

- When you really think about the affairs of the family, you have to assume that they greatly respected one another.

- Not only the brothers were so close, like John and Samuel, but those cousins, the cousins were close and the affection is just so obvious.

- Here's John buying those investments in around 1832, a few years before Samuel dies.

You have to assume that right up to his death, the brothers did get along.

- [Presenter] In June of 1833, President Andrew Jackson toured the Northeast corridor.

Having run his own cotton spinning industry in his home state of Tennessee, he wanted to see all that was happening in the Blackstone Valley and beyond.

On this trip, he was very ill, suffering from pleurisy and fever.

As a medical treatment of the 1830s, he would be bled in specific parts of his body in order to reduce inflammation.

But for his first stop, President Jackson visited the city of Pawtucket where he called upon Samuel Slater, who he named the distinguished father of cotton manufacturing in America.

We do not know if John was present, but the ripple effect of their success was certainly felt up north where the president was headed next.

- In 1833, Andrew Jackson came, he brought his vice president, Martin Van Buren along with him.

They stayed overnight and toured the mills.

Jackson said that he'd never imagined seeing anything of this scale in his entire life.

- [Presenter] When he arrived in Lowell the next day, his entourage was reportedly greeted by over 5,000 mill girls.

- [Narrator] "The procession of factory girls at Lowell "to welcome President Jackson must make an era "in the annals of the sex.

"There was said one paper, a mile of girls.

"They all were neatly dressed in white "with girdles of colored ribbons.

"They were divided into companies and proceeded by banners "designating to what factory they belonged.

"They wore no bonnets, "but were protected from the sun by parasols.

"Some of the companies were adorned with lace caps.

"This, if not, the March of Intellect "was the March of Beauty".

- The very first labor strike in Lowell, they called it a turnout by the mill girls.

Their resistance to the increased demands, eventually laid management to replace them with Irish immigrants who had come here in great numbers to build the mills and dig the canals.

He tried to reach this sort of accommodation between labor and management.

I found no evidence that he took strong positions on either side.

He clearly was a member of the mill owner management class.

There's a neighborhood called The Acre because when the Irish came, the mill owners gave them an acre of swamp land to the west of the mills to set up their shanties.

And they did and that's become the neighborhood where each successive immigrant group into Lowell has resided.

- [Presenter] And it's right in the middle of The Acre that the legacy of Elisha Bartlett's time in Lowell is seen today, with a school named after him that was originally founded in 1900.

But let's get back to Slatersville for a moment.

John and Ruth Slater had 11 children, but only four had made it to adulthood, two daughters and two sons.

The youngest living son was William Smith Slater who would be successor to his father, John in running the Slatersville mill and other business endeavors throughout the state of Rhode Island.

Before him, there was John Fox Slater who would be sent off to run the Connecticut mills at the age of 17.

Years after their daughter Elizabeth had married Dr. Bartlett, their youngest daughter Minerva married another doctor from Lowell, Dr. John Orne Greene in 1833.

But once again, in the following year, another tragedy would occur.

- [Narrator] " Slatersville December 10th, 1834.

"My dear brothers and sisters, "our family have again been called to drink the bitter cup "of affliction by the death of our beloved daughter, "Minerva Greene, who died on the first day of this month.

"The event was unexpected as it was afflicting.

"She was very comfortable, but in a few hours, "unfavorable symptoms appeared.

"She rested quite well through the night, "awoke with headache and considerable fever "and grew gradually worse until Monday.

"During that time, although the ease seemed doubtful, "yet there was some hope that she might be spared, "but these hopes were vain.

(soft music) "On Saturday morning, there was a very sudden change.

"It was evident that the hand of death was upon her.

"She grew gradually weaker and on Monday at two o'clock, "her spirit returns to God who gave it.

(soft music) "Our dear child retained her senses perfectly to the last "and have decided evidence that she was prepared "for the great change.

"On the evening I was sent for, "knowing it was not expected she would live until morning, "she left messages with Elizabeth, "who was with her during her sickness and had been with her "several weeks and gave particular directions "with regard to her funeral.

"It was astonishing that she could with so much composure, "speak of death.

"It was her request to be brought to Slatersville "to be buried.

"She expressed it to be laid on that pleasant green spot.

"She wished very much to see her father and brothers, "and she was gratified.

(soft music) "Her last words were, I am going, I am going to heaven.

"The babe was a fine, healthy boy.

"And for several days was very well.

"On Wednesday it was taken suddenly ill "with the same disorder its mother had and died "Friday evening.

"Minerva had named him John Orne after Dr. Greene.

"His little body was placed in the same coffin "with his mother's and brought to Slatersville on Tuesday.

"How the affliction is very heavy, "but we feel to sympathize with Dr. Greene.

"To him, it must be much more terrible.

"To him, the world must truly appear desolate.

"With love to all, "I remain your affectionate sister, Ruth Slater".

(soft music) - "Smithfield, (water rushes softly) "April 21st, 1835.

"It is with regret that I have to communicate to you "the death of my brother, Samuel.

"He departed his life about six o'clock last evening.

"I received information on Sunday morning "of his severe indisposition and went to Webster same day.

"I found him very low, some difficulty of breathing.

"I was with him the last 24 hours.

"He was unable to speak many words "so as to be understood after I got there.

"He breathed shorter and shorter and apparently went off "easily at the last.

"Funeral is Thursday two o'clock at Webster.

"Yours respectfully, John Slater".

- [Presenter] One year later when his biography was released, many in the press were not so kind.

- [Narrator] "The Louisville Journal contains "a flattering account of George White's life "of Samuel Slater.

"That work is a book making concern "and Samuel Slater was not a liberal man "and deserves not one 10th of the extravagant encomiums "that his book making biographer has lavished on him".

(soft music) - [Presenter] Then in 1837, a depression followed, one that would affect everyone across the country.

Crops were lost, wheat prices quadrupled, and the banks stopped giving out loans.

- [Narrator] "It will be a hard time "to get through this summer, harder than I've ever seen "since I came to this country".

- [Presenter] Knowing how this economic depression was impacting his business and the lives of his workforce, the timing of John Slater's next big addition to Slatersville would be odd, but unifying.

- [Barbara] To have a community without a church is non-traditional.

You just didn't do it.

And people here are raised with the congregational church, period.

- Mrs. Slater, she was a congregationalist, he was a Presbyterian.

And she wanted a church so he built this church for her.

And the strange story about it is.

- That Mr. Slater in some of his business cronies from the mill, went to Connecticut one week.

- And as Slater got back from his one month excursion on business, he was very disappointed.

He says, what's the idea of building this in a pasture where the cows scraps?

- Mr. Slater, couldn't get over why would you have a church facing a cow pasture?

- It's one of those things they make a big deal about it.

But if you're gonna park a church somewhere, this is pretty much where you would've parked the church.

I mean, you wonder how much of that is fanciful story and how much of is just, yeah, the boss is away, but where else would you put the church?

- [Commentator] Church was laid out by a man named Amos Lockwood and the son of John Slater, William S. Slater.

They laid out the church and the common in 1837 and the church was built in 1838.

Every piece of wood that went into the church was examined by Amos Lockwood.

- Slatersville church is very, very, very proud of its heritage.

Ruth Slater and with her husband, John was very, very interested and she was the one that really got the church going.

She wanted a church in this town.

- Ruth was really beloved.

(church bells chime) This was truly her church, her church home.

So her love is in these walls.

(choir sings softly) (church bells chime) I am the first settled woman pastor of this church.

And it is truly an honor to have been called here, to serve these people.

♪ Hallelujah ♪ - [Presenter] In 1836 at the age of 32, Elisha Bartlett became the first mayor of Lowell.

- It's always interesting to speculate what it would be like to meet someone and election Bartlett is someone I would really like to meet, because I really get a sense of his humanity coming through in everything he does.

He cares about people.

He cares about the patients he's taking care of.

He's intellectually curious.

Bartlett was quite interested in public health.

And of course the mills and Lowell are prominent and a lot of young people working there and they're hard conditions.

There's a lot about medicine that we know now that they didn't know then.

- [Presenter] In 1839, a Boston Times reporter wrote a scathing article.

- [Narrator] "The law is evaded by cruel "and mercenary owners of the children, "who keep them nine months in one factory "and then take them directly to another, "with a lie in their mouths that the children "have had three months schooling.

"And when the mills are short of hands, "superintendents are not very anxious "to ascertain the truth, nor do they care much "for the welfare of the children or obedience to the law".

- [Presenter] Dr. Bartlett responded with a lengthy title.

- [Narrator] "In the year 1828, "the population was 3,500, girls in the mills 1500.

"During that whole year, "there was not a single death in the city "among these 1500 girls.

"The manufacturing population of the city "is the healthiest portion of the population.

"And there is no reason why this should not be the case.

"They are but little exposed to many of the strongest "and most prolific cases of disease".

- This is a type of shuttle called the suction shuttle or kissing shuttle.

It was also nicknamed the kiss of death.

- [Narrator] "Is the physical condition "of these 7,000 females so good "that there is nothing to be complained of "and no improvement to be wished or desired or attempted?

"Is there no ill health among them?

"Are there no cause of disease "connected with their situation and occupation?

"Far be it from me to pretend that everything "is so satisfactory".

- This shuttle has an eye.

The weavers would refill the shuttle with bobbins of thread, place their lips over the eye of the shuttle, sharply inhale to pull the thread through.

This contagious practice unwittingly spread infectious disease through the mills, infecting mostly women and young girls, leading to the spread of the epidemic of tuberculosis.

- [Narrator] "I wish a more rational and healthy system "of diet was generally adopted.

"I wish that every girl would consult her health "and comfort in providing herself with an umbrella, "India rubber over shoes, a warm cloak, woolen stockings "and flannel for the winter.

"I wish the number of hours devoted to labor "could be abridged.

"It's the same here as in any other "manufacturing establishment throughout New England.

"Any change which is made in this matter "must be common to them all.

"All this is gravely asserted and argued, "but a purer piece of fiction was never generated "in the brain of all lunatic.

"There is no such class here.

"Those who have been longest and most steadily at work "in the mills are quite as healthy as the newcomers.

"And they constitute the best, "the most independent and the most highly respectable "portion of this part of our population.

"I assert these things broadly, qualifiedly, absolutely".

- In the 1830s and 1840s there's really no conception of bacteria as we know them today.

So in tuberculosis, for instance, that was first described by Koch in 1872, was known as Koch's Physalis, but not until 1872.

- [Presenter] By the 1840s as industrial centers like Lowell were dealing with these problems, Slatersville was continuing to expand.

This is when its commercial blocks were built.

(dramatic music) - First, there was one stone building, but then a little later on the second building was built.

- They are reportedly in the style of Quincy Market in Boston.

- The main room here.

- [Irene] One of them has a large hall on the top.

- [Presenter] This space was once called the Music Hall.

This is where the mill owners held banquets, theatrical performances and public meetings.

And it's also said that mark Twain once read a short story here on this stage, back in 1869.

- You can see the outline of the stage.

You can see where the old wood or coal stoves were.

You can see the gas pipe from the gas chandelier at one time.

- Creating a barrel vaulted ceiling is its own accomplishment.

And whether it's 1843 or 1850 or 1870.

- Or 2015.

- It's a pure south face, okay?

So it maximizes the benefit of the sun, obviously during the day, maximizes sunlight.

On the north face, the walls are thicker, substantially thicker.

There are fewer windows.

So they were designing if you will, for passive solar and for north winds, cold north winds or the impression we have it was the last building built of the complex, right?

So it benefit from all that they'd learned and maybe had all the best ideas about what they needed or what they were lacking at that moment, if this was gonna be the final build out.

- [Presenter] Everyone was demanding more space, even the minister at the Congregational Church was complaining.

- [Narrator] "Dear sir, I wish to hire a house "with other necessary buildings, "including a small barn and a little plat of ground, "which I may cultivate in the summer.

"As there is no house in the village "suitable for a parsonage, "allow me to petition for their erection of one.

"Allow me to add that I consider it inexpedient "for a minister's family to occupy the same house "with other families.

"Their circumstances, pursuits and commentary "render improper that they should.

"I am dear sir, yours with much respect, "Timothy Alden Taylor".

- [Presenter] And that very task was one of the last that John Slater ever approved.

(birds chirp) (soft music) - Bartlett served two one year terms as mayor of Lowell and was elected for two terms, I believe in the Massachusetts Legislature.

And I think he realized that his heart really was not in politics.

- [Narrator] "I do not know of any short of heroic "and perilous daring or religious martyrdom, "and self-sacrifice higher and nobler "than that of the physician.

"His daily round of labor is crowded with beneficence "and his nightly sleep is broken, "that others may have better rest.

"His whole life is a blessed ministry of consolation "and hope".

- [Presenter] Years earlier, Dr. Bartlett had been a professor at Berkshire Medical Institute in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, a position he kept during his time as mayor.

Later, he served at eight colleges and universities in Vermont, New York, Maryland and Kentucky.

He worked with celebrated physician and poet, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and released several additions of his findings on fevers, hailed as one of the most successful medical works of literature.

- [Narrator] "Typhoid fever has been very widely prevalent "in many parts of Kentucky for the past year.

"There were it is said 200 deaths in an adjacent county "last summer and fall.

"It is evidently the common fever of this country, "with all the features so familiar to us in the east".

- [Presenter] And he accomplished all that while traveling to deliver and attend lectures throughout America and Europe in the 1840s.

- Bartlett encounters something very different in Paris.

The numerical method of a man named Pierre Lue.

Going to the hospital, look at patients, keep numbers, keep records, keep statistics.

And that is Bartlett's real contribution.

He's really setting the stage for scientific medicine as we know it later on.

So he's really the first one to put this out systematically in his book, "A Philosophy of Medical Science".

- [Presenter] But in 1841 at the age of 37, Dr. Bartlett wrote his wife, Elizabeth about symptoms he had been experiencing on a regular basis.

- [Narrator] "Dear Lizzy, yesterday, I got very tired.

"I dined rather hardly with Dr. Greene "and about five o'clock I began to have chills "and flying ticks in my arms and legs.

"These were very severe for about four hours.

"I think I never suffered so much with them.

"However, I was pretty confident "it was occasioned by fatigue and a bad stomach.

"I took a gram of morphine and pretty soon the pain "and chills began to go off.

"I have been in bed all the four noon "and have only got up now to write this letter.

"I only feel now the effects of the medicine "and shall be well tomorrow, I presume.

"Goodnight my dear Elizabeth, "your affectionate husband E Bartlett".

- If I had to guess this was a slowly progressive disease that caused weakness, while it preserved his intellectual capacities.

It could be something like what we today know as a myotrophic lateral sclerosis, ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease.

- [Presenter] But he continued to work and was later appointed to a chair at New York University.

When there he received a pleasant letter from a writer he had once met back in Lowell.

(soft music) (birds chirp) - [Narrator] "Devonshire Terrace, London, "December 26th, 1850.

"My dear sir, except my brief but cordial Christmas greeting "in return for yours.

"I will not wait for time to write a longer note, "but write on the receipt of your welcome communication.

"I suppose I may congratulate you on your appointment "to a chair in the New York University.

"It has a pleasant sound in my ears, "and I like to think of you as a teacher, "for I assume you are a good one.

(soft music) "When I look back upon the Western waters "and the thundering Niagara, "it is delightful to me to think of you "as reading the "Child's Dream Of A Star".

"Have you read "David Copperfield" by the same author?

"They tell me that he bestowed a great little time upon it "and with an unspeakable interest and pleasure "in its composition.

"My dear, sir, very faithfully yours, Charles Dickens".

(soft music) - [Presenter] After residing in Lowell for two decades, Elisha and Elizabeth returned to Slatersville where they would build a new home and live out their remaining years together.

More than half a century later as Dr. William Osler was writing his biography on Dr. Bartlett, he wrote the north Smithfield town clerk requesting a photograph of his birth home.

- [Narrator] "William Osler, dear sir, "I send you under separate cover a photograph of the house "in which Dr. Elisha Bartlett was born.

"At the right hand end is a part of the old stone chimney.

"It is a fine location, but it looks lonesome.

(soft music) "The house that the doctor lived and died in "stands just to the right "and you see a small part of the yard.

"The party that now owns it "are not keeping it in good condition.

"Yours truly, Byron A. Andrews".

- [Presenter] The home of John and Ruth Slater, which originally sat in the center of the village was moved several yards away to the right of the congregational church, so their daughter, Elizabeth could build this one on green.

Although it was built by the Slater family, it has always been known first as the Bartlett house.

- Beautiful, beautiful house.

He built it and of course money was no object in those days.

And it had the best of everything in it.

(water trickles softly) - [Narrator] "A small wooden bridge across the stream, "where now it is span by an arch of stone, "a high ledge arose near the site of the Western Mill "while huge boulders of granite "lay scattered about through fields and woods".

- But further down on School Street, less than half a mile away, a whole new village had slowly been taking shape.

What Slatersville didn't manufacture, this place did.

(dramatic music) And as the railroad made its way across America and into the Blackstone Valley, more opportunities for manufacturing and distribution would become possible.

(dramatic music) In 1824, Newton Darling, an artisan from Millville, Massachusetts opened a scythe works operation.

Two decades later, it was taken over by the partnership Mansfield and Lamb.

By 1850, they had 50 employees.

in 1856, Newton died suddenly, but the business he had founded kept growing and growing to the point where those who remained, knew they needed to build a mill of their own.

- [Narrator] "The work of building a cotton mill "at Mansfield and Lambs Scythe Works, "near Slatersville, Rhode Island is progressing with vigor.

"The name of Forestdale has been given to this locality".

- [Presenter] And with that announcement, the Forestdale Mill was completed in January of 1861, three months before the first shots were fired at Fort Sumter in South Carolina, (bomb sounds) just in time for the start of the American Civil War and for a lucrative government contract to be acquired.

- [Narrator] Mansfield and Lamb of Forestdale have received another government order for 10,000 sabers.

- [Presenter] With the work of 150 employees, that number would grow to 30,000.

By the early 1870s, the Slaters would purchase the Forestdale Mill and use it as another one of their cotton spinning operations.

This mill would eventually be destroyed by fire over a century later.

(fire crackles) As the young man of the north went off to war, mills across the Blackstone Valley saw a rapid decline in workers.

With massive orders coming in for blankets, tents and uniforms, they were desperate to find new labor, and that's when mill recruiters went searching even further to the north, as in Canada.

And that's also why we need to talk about Woonsocket.

(soft, bright music) - One of the things with religion that I've not fully understood is the emphasis on a single church.

(soft, bright music) Traditionally in New England this is what you did have.

You had usually one church in a community.

Then you had the great awakening and congregational church would split, first and second congregational, but it's still the congregational church.

There is a lot of prejudice against certain denominations.

And I know when the Methodists come in, there's a lot of animosity, even toward them.

Catholics, we don't even wanna talk about because they even burn down Catholic churches and they attack wagons because they think they're carrying guns when they're only carrying an organ.

I mean, so there is I think a traditional animosity that is anti certain religious groups.

(soft, bright music) Maybe it's because some of them don't have a (indistinct) clergy.

And I think with the Methodists and the Baptists, you have to feel the calling.

With the congregationalists, you have to go to Yale, you have to go to Harvard, you have to be ordained.

And those who wanted it, could go and find it.

And that's gonna become more important as time goes on, 'cause the Slaters are not gonna be able to control religion, believe it.

The Catholics are coming whether they want it or not.

(soft music) - Oh, we knew we were from Slatersville because my grandmother used to talk about Slatersville all the time.

My grandmother is a Tessier.

- This is a picture of the Tessier family, this Auclea right here and this is her whole family.

Mother, father, sisters, brother.

You notice everybody's tall except my grandmother?

Hence my.

- 4'9".

(soft music) Family history, trying to decipher where these people went, where they came from, why they came down here, who went where, why.

- It's fascinating because he sees how they get to Quebec City and then generation after generation, they move further and further down eventually to the States.

And all four sides of the family end up in the Woonsocket Greater Area.

(upbeat music) - I was born in Woonsocket in 1937, right in the middle of the depression, but being born then I don't remember any of the depression material.

But I do remember once I got to grammar school at St. Anne's in Woonsocket, World War II.

(upbeat music) The war was on and for those years I remember very vividly what was going on, the mills the morning we'd walk by.

You could hear the mill whistles from the different mills, especially in the social area.

(upbeat music) When the people came to Woonsocket from Canada, one of the things they brought with them was their religion, Roman Catholicism.

They weren't the first, the Irish brought Roman Catholicism to New England, but the French Canadians came with their religion, but also in a different language.

- (speaks in French) (soft music) - In 1860, politically, a lot of things happened in Woonsocket.

One of the big things of course, was the arrival of Abraham Lincoln during his campaign for the presidency, stopped in Woonsocket and spoke at Harris Hall.

- The next major wave is really during the Civil War era.

We're seeing the beginnings of steam power, so mills will be able to get bigger.

We no longer have to build right on the river so we can have more mills.

- [Ray] With the onset of the Civil War, more and more workers were needed.

- At the same time, a lot of the young men are going off to fight in this war that's going on.

So there's a labor shortage at the same time that there's new mills being built.

And of course all these orders for uniforms and blankets and tents and all these other things.

- Manufacturers hired mill agents who went to Quebec.

Many of them were either Quebecois themselves or they were American French Canadians.

- People having 15, 16, 17 children.

The oldest gets to farm.

What do the rest of 'em do?

- Right.

- So they had to do something to make a living.

(machines clang) - (speaks in French) - Quebec lost one third of its population to the New England states.

One third.

- (speaks in French) - [Presenter 2] In the Northern part of the state is the wool manufacturing city of Woonsocket.

Were you to visit Woonsocket today, you might think you were in a foreign land where almost everyone in the city speaks French.

A large portion of the population being of French Canadian descent, signs, newspapers, local radio and movies are usually in the French language.

And until recently, English was taught in Woonsocket schools as though it were a foreign language.

- (speaks in French) - So they came to better themselves.

Some came from very large families.

In some cases, the families moved in total.

- Then when they moved from Canada to the States, they lived in little pockets, Woonsocket, Manchester, New Hampshire, Slatersville, Rhode Island.

- Many of the priests, religious leaders in Canada were concerned that they would lose their religion when they got to the states.

There was a saying in those days that to this day, (speaks in French), he who loses his language, loses his faith.

- (speaks in French) - The arrival of French industrialists and Belgian industrialists in the early part of the 20th century gave Woonsocket a unique population.

It's where the minority became the majority, where the community was changed and the community changed them.

Ultimately they became Americans.

(soft music) - [Narrator] "At Slatersville, J and W Slater "have just put two of their mills in operation.

"Another will be in full operation in a short time.

"The employees hired at the new starting of this well known "establishment are chiefly French Canadians "and the proprietors find the experiment "in the highest degree satisfactory.

"The work of the mill being done throughout "in a more intelligent and thorough manner.

"And in a manner at once creditable to the employees "and profitable to the employers".

- They put up two new what we used to call boarding houses.

They were located on Railroad Street, one on each side of the road just before the railroad tracks.

That would ensure that they had enough labor to operate the mills properly.

On the other side of the street was Church Street because there was a church up in the corner.

- [Ray] In 1872 thereabouts, there was a change in the creation of a new diocese called the Diocese of Providence, which was severed from the Archdiocese of Hartford.

And it's during this time, I believe that St John the Evangelist was created.

(soft, gentle music) - It was actually a Slater made, an Irish Slater made that wanted a Catholic church in Slatersville.

- I think it was John Slater's son.

He's sold it to his Irish cleaning lady for $1.

He didn't sell it to the church directly for whatever reason.

- [Ray] And she in turn, turned the property over to the diocese for the creation of the first Catholic parish in Slatersville.

- I made my first communion there, my confirmation, I was married from there and my parents and relatives they're in that cemetery.

(soft, gentle music) - The Tessiers ended up in Slatersville because Michel Tessier moved to Woonsocket area in 1835.

And four of his sons came down here and ended up working in Slatersville.

And they ended up populating Slatersville with a whole bunch of little Tessiers.

(machines clang) - If a Tessier died, the mill has to be closed because there was no one else left to work.

That's how many Tessiers were actually working in the mill at that time.

(machines clang) They were fertile.

- Fertile.

(laughs) - [Presenter] Over 60 members of the Tessier family are buried in St. John's cemetery.

(soft music) - [Narrator] "Out of a population of the 12 to 1500 "in the village and its immediate vicinity, "about 150 enlisted, several enlisted two or three times, "and were in the service most of the time "from the first battle at Bull Run "'til after the surrender of all the forces "of the common enemy.

"Few of our homes were desolated "by the casualties of the war.

(soft music) "A few buried with the honors of war "sleep in soldiers' graves in our own quiet cemetery.

"But the remains of most of those who died in the service "rest near the fields where they fell".

(soft music) - [Presenter] Two years after the Civil War, Ruth Slater came to the end of her life.

Life years earlier, Reverend Timothy Taylor wrote these words in his book, "Our Holy Hill", which he dedicated to Madame Ruth.

- [Narrator] "Very familiar have you long been "with the path to the village cemetery.

"There rests the remains of your husband "And of the great majority of your numerous family "of sons and daughters.

"There too slumber children in-law and grandchildren.

"But in respect of all of these, "you entertain a reasonable hope "that the trumpet of the archangel will call them "to shine forth in the kingdom of their father".

- [Presenter] And long before that, Elisha Bartlett would write his friend, John Orne Greene on the loss of his wife, Minerva.

- [Narrator] "My dear brother, "what shall I say to the melancholy illusion "in the close of your letter to the death "of our dear Minerva?

"What poor words of mine can be of any service "to one on whom the hand of the great chastener "has been so heavily laid?

"Has not bereavement been a guest in the dwelling "of my childhood?

"Has not death been a familiar visitor, "amid the scenes of my early friendships and happiness "and hopes?

"We but follow each other through the furnace of affliction "as we follow each other to the grave.

"The sweet sister, the affectionate daughter, "the beautiful bridge, and the young mother "was taken away in the clear, unclouded morning of her life.

"Taken away, but where and by whom?

"Taken away by her father from a far off country "where she was only a (indistinct) or Pilgrim, "to her beautiful and eternal home.

"Take these thoughts into your heart "and they shall lighten up or drive away darkness "of the past and what is better, they shall again "cheer your future with the once familiar forms "and faces of happiness and hope".

(soft music) - [Presenter] He would only live to the age of 50.

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