‘New’ older resident chronicles Natick’s recent changes

Enter James W. Morley, who will be 90 in July and is a newcomer to Natick by townie standards. He moved there in 1999.

Morley turned his academic training on the town to find out how and why Natick evolved from a working-class immigrant community centered on its downtown to a more affluent, spread-out suburb buoyed by lucrative shopping and technological areas.

The result was a book, “Hometown Natick 1945-2000,’’ which offers Morley’s analysis of how social dynamics influenced key people who had the gumption and vision to change the community.

“The country has changed enormously, and Natick has changed enormously. This was farmland not that long ago,’’ said Morley, motioning to the landscape around his South Natick home.

Morley, the former head of Columbia University’s political science department and East Asian Institute, said the book is much more than just a collection of facts. He described it as a meditation on the worthiness of documenting what some may consider mundane, and said recent history is just as important as a past that no longer exists.

While researching the book, he learned that a branch of his 17th-century ancestors, the Drapers, settled on Pegan Hill, which straddles the Dover-Natick line.

“When we moved here, we didn’t know anything about Natick,’’ said Morley. When he found out about the family connection, “I thought, ‘I belong here. This is my town.’ ’’

Morley was raised in southern New Jersey, and moved to Natick with his late wife Barbara to be closer to their daughter, a Wellesley College professor.

As head of the Natick Historical Society and author of the new book, he has learned a bit about the town, like how the railroad allowed industry centered on shoes to spring up downtown. There, immigrants from countries like Italy, Ireland, and Canada found jobs in factories, and walked to their nearby homes.

Thanks to the post-World War II population boom and developers like Martin Cerel, homes and commercial districts spread out onto former farmland, and Natick became the more affluent suburb it is today, he said.

As its population increased — from 13,851 residents in 1940 to 28,831 in 1960 — the town needed similar growth in its housing stock and job opportunities.

“What does that do to the school system? The whole school system has to be redone,’’ he said. “It gets very expensive. Everything has to be done rapidly, and puts pressure on politics.’’

As years passed, newcomers pushed on entrenched political players to change how the town was run, and advocated for a new town charter. Though it was resisted for years, residents approved the change by 421 votes during the 1980 town election.

And eventually women like Sue Salamoff and Erica “Ricky’’ Ball became vital participants in the town’s politics.

“To a great degree, it was men who ran for office. Women got together, they learned about the way things were,’’ Ball said. She had been president of the local League of Women Voters chapter — “I came out of that tradition,’’ Ball said — for years when she ran for and won a seat on the Board of Selectmen in 1975.

“By the time I was active, there was more of a feeling that it was OK to do more than study, to get involved,’’ she said.

Ball said Morley’s history illustrates how Natick’s changes were a microcosm of larger forces. The book “allowed those of us who lived through it to see the currents we were riding, to see the patterns that were there,’’ she said.

Other societal dynamics are also reflected in the Natick that’s visible today, according to Morley.

As major advances in health care added years to people’s lives, Natick realized its senior citizens needed a communal space, and created a drop-in center in 1968. Last spring, voters approved the construction of a $10 million combined community and senior center with ample amenities for all age groups.

And as the population boomed, traditional sources of charitable support like churches could no longer fulfill the need alone. Thus, in 1962, the Natick Service Council was formed to act as the town’s central charity organization.

Even the Vietnam War gets a mention in Morley’s book. He said that right after the war ended, concerns about aimless youths hanging out downtown spurred George Ames to create what would become the Natick Community Organic Farm. During its first summer in 1974, 100 teens were employed growing and selling produce.

“These transformations are very important. If you don’t know how it was before, you take it for granted, said Morley.

He said the only way to get the whole story is to talk to people who lived through the history, since meeting minutes don’t often show the political maneuverings, debates, and rationales setting up the final vote.

History “gradually disappears if it doesn’t get written,’’ he said.

By documenting Natick’s history, Morley said, he found something for which he’s always yearned: community.

As the son of a Methodist minister who moved frequently throughout New Jersey, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, Morley said, he never felt like he had a hometown.

“I think if one wants to be happy, one needs to belong,’’ said Morley. “To feel that belonging, you’ve got to reach out and know your community.’’

Morley said writing the book and finding his ancestral connection to the town has allowed him to feel Natick is his true home. That’s why he prefers the term “homesteader’’ to such alternatives as “carpetbagger’’ when describing his residency status.

“Homesteader — I think that’s the truth,’’ he said. “I feel like I belong now.’’

Megan McKee can be reached at megan.mckee@gmail.com.