The Murphys sell to Alexander and Agnes Herron
The Herrons, of Rye, New Hampshire, hold the house for six years.[source]
Alexander T. and Agnes E. Herron
1887–1982 (Alexander) — Alexander: born 7 May 1887, Lawrence; died 1982 (compilation, citing a published biographical sketch and genealogical records). Agnes: born Lawrence, late 1880s.
Also recorded as: Alexander Thomas Herron; Agnes Ellen (Manderson) Herron.
Owners from 1951 to 1957, who sold the house to the Battles Home.[sources]
Attributed profile. Drawn mainly from a research compilation (2025) and secondary sources that we have not yet checked against the originals. Treat the detail as leads, not settled fact; the “Research leads” section says what needs confirming.
Life
The Herrons bought the house in 1951 and sold it six years later to the charity that would run it for half a century. The deeds are the only records of them read for this site. The compilation, drawing on a mid-century biographical sketch, describes Alexander as a Lawrence mill-superintendent’s son, trained at the Lowell Textile Institute, who rose through the dye-houses of the Arlington and Renfrew mills to run one of the oldest cotton mills in America, in upstate New York, for a quarter of a century before retiring — it seems — to Lowell.
If that is right, the house was bought by a man at the end of a long textile career, at the moment when New England textiles were leaving; and six years later he passed it to a home for the aged. The Herrons’ own reasons, and whether they lived in the whole house or kept the apartments let, are not yet known.
On the timeline
The Battles Home buys the house
The Herrons convey the property to "The Battles Home, a Corporation duly established by law and located in Lowell". Newspaper accounts from 2001 and 2011 say the home moved in 1956; the 1956 directory still shows private tenants here and the home on Rolfe Street, so the move came late in 1956 or in 1957. By 1966 the directory lists the home, its officers and five retired residents at this address.[sources]
What is uncertain: 1956 (press) versus 1957 (deed) for the move; not yet resolved.
What remains uncertain
- Everything beyond the deeds: the identification with the New York Mills superintendent; their life in the house; why they sold in 1957.
Research leads (not yet verified)
Clues gathered from the research compilation and from secondary sources. Published so that others can follow them; none has yet been confirmed against an original record.
- Compilation details for Alexander: Lawrence High School 1906; summers at the Pacific and Lawrence mills from age 13; Wood Worsted Mills; Pemberton Company; Massachusetts Cotton Mills, Lowell, c. 1910; Arlington Mills 1913–20 (in charge of cotton dyeing); Renfrew Manufacturing, Adams, 1920–27; New York Mills Corporation from 1927, general superintendent from 1928, about 2,000 employees; a Freemason (Liberty Lodge No. 959, Scottish Rite, Ziyara Temple). Source given as a published county biographical sketch on the Internet Archive.
- Agnes Ellen Manderson, daughter of James and Rachel (Guild) Manderson of Lawrence; siblings Clarence James (b. 1884) and Ruby E. (b. c. 1886).
Records consulted
- Mortgage (1949) and deed, Thomas J. and Grace L. Murphy to Alexander T. and Agnes E. Herron of Rye, N.H. (February 1949; 10 January 1951)
- Deed, Alexander T. and Agnes E. Herron to The Battles Home, "a Corporation duly established by law and located in Lowell" (1 April 1957)
- Lowell city directories, 1886–1966 (Atherton at "170 Fairmount" and the Bonneys at 355 Merrimack, 1886; the Lilleys at 80 Sherman and a coachman at 236 Fairmount, 1894; Judge Lilley’s household — nurse, housekeeper, coachman — at 236 Fairmount, 1900; apartments at 236 from 1931; the Murphys 1946; the Battles Home at 93 Rolfe St 1931–56 and at 236 Fairmount by 1966) (1886, 1894, 1900, 1931, 1936, 1946, 1950, 1956, 1966)
Help us get Alexander right
This page is a working record, not a finished one. If you are a descendant, a collector, a local historian or an archivist and you hold anything connected to Alexander T. and Agnes E. Herron — a photograph, a letter, a diary, an object, a family story, a document we have misread — we would like to hear from you. We publish nothing without permission, credit every contribution, and correct the page when the evidence says we should.
We are especially looking for:
- Photographs of the house in the early 1950s; the Herrons’ own papers or descendants.