L.A. Foster Preserve
PDF Map
Spotlight on the Foster Preserve
Stonehill project and history of the copper works.
Map 28 Parcel 1 5.05 Acres Taunton Avenue Rear
Copperworks Canal and Pond. Part of the donation tied to the lease purchase deal with Marjorie and Barbara Foster. The 19th-century copperworks used waterpower at first to make, among other things, the copper blanks for large U.S. pennies, which were shipped to the Philadelphia Mint for stamping. The Wading River was diverted into a pond by a canal, and the earthworks for that make a pathway on the south side of the pond leading west to the original diversion point. The pond is bordered by woodland to the north. To the south, it was quarried for gravel. Near the rest of the pond there are remnants of stone that are part of the water control for the Copperworks across Taunton Avenue. An overgrown roadway leads in from Taunton Avenue. From the earthworks one can look down into the Wading River's course, which is mostly abutted by wetlands.
Map 28 Parcel 28 3 Acres Taunton Avenue
The Foster Wildlife Refuge. It was originally to have been named the Leighton Foster Preserve. Gift of Marjorie and Barbara Foster (Leighton's widow). It borders the Wading River across from the old copperworks, and was once part of the copperworks. The old roadway, with a much lower bridge, went through it, as well as old trolley line tracks. It can currently be reached by a steep roadway off Route 140 on the Taunton side of the Wading River bridge. SIGNED $72,100.00
valuation, this is lumped with #42)
Map 28 Parcel 148 21.7 Acres Taunton Avenue
L.A. Foster Wildlife Refuge. Given by Marjorie and Barbara Foster, it comprised the main part of the gift of land along the Wading River downstream from the dam and pond and across from the main copperworks buildings. Occasionally old penny blanks are turned up on the land. It is currently overgrown. A land swap with a landowner for a protruding triangle of the Woodward land that enabled Officer Garriepy to put in a driveway without crossing wetland, enabled the society to trade a couple of acres for five acres bordering the Wading River so that the Foster land now is joined to the Woodward Forest land. Signed. (For valuation see #52)
Map 28 Parcel 13-02 17 Acres Taunton Avenue
Old Copperworks Pond. The remainder of the gift-lease-purchase deals with Marjorie and Barbara Foster. The land borders and includes the old pond that supplied the copperworks. See Map 28, Parcel 1 above. The pond has been used for skating by local people, though it is hard to access down a steep bank. December 23,1992.
Map 28 Parcel 28-01 .85 Acre Taunton Avenue
L. A. Foster Wildlife Refuge. Barbara Foster gift to add to the Refuge. The entire Foster gift-reverse deed-lease arrangement was worked out by Harry Burbank, who at that time owned the house and land of the Copperworks that was across the Wading River from the L.A. Foster Wildlife Refuge. Signed. (For valuation see #52)
Narrative for Map 28
The Foster (Copperworks) Land is owned by LPS. It connects by an easement to conservation restriction land around the Fordham Drive development off Barrows Street, but is entered from Taunton Avenue. The land on the west side of Taunton Avenue includes a dike to increase the fall of the Wading River into Copperworks Pond, and a gravel pit. The actual copperworks were on the east side of Taunton Avenue and that land joins the Woodward Forest land. Negotiations still continue for other Foster land.