Job Cushing (1785-1867) was the first son of a Cohasset, Massachusetts farmer and Revolutionary War veteran of the same name. In 1819, he married Elizabeth Lincoln (1794-1882), also the child of a local farmer and Revolutionary War veteran. The couple had seven children, six of whom survived childhood.
Cushing's ledger includes customer accounts, records of services performed (such as plowing up and hauling field stones to the wharf, and carting wood, merchandise, and iron), products he sold (potatoes and calves), and documentation of a hired Irish-born laborer.
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Job Cushing (1785-1867) was the first son of a Cohasset, Massachusetts farmer and Revolutionary War veteran of the same name. In 1819, he married Elizabeth Lincoln (1794-1882), also the child of a local farmer and Revolutionary War veteran. The couple had seven children, six of whom survived childhood.
Cushing's farm was located near the center of the thriving shipbuilding and fishing town of Cohasset, between Hingham and Scituate. His accounts reflect his ability to earn extra income by plowing up and hauling field stones to the wharf for use as ballast by the schooners using Cohasset Harbor (see, for instance, his accounts with Eleazar James, the Cove Meadow Corporation, and Capt. William Kilburn). In the History of Cohasset (1898), one schooner captain reminisced that the ballast consisted "of field stones that the old glacier left in our drumlins, and which 'Uncle Job Cushing' or some other farmer hauls down to the wharf at one dollar per ton."
Most of Cushing's other accounts consist of the use of his team for plowing or carting wood for neighbors and for carting merchandise to the store of Morgan Stetson or transporting iron to the blacksmith shop of Amos Tilden. The principal products from Cushing's farm were potatoes, which he sold widely, and calves, which he sold primarily to the butcher Elliott Stoddard. While never especially prosperous (his property was valued at $3,900 in 1850), Cushing was able to hire an Irish-born farm laborer, Patrick Mulvey, as he advanced in years.
The inside front cover of the account book contains writing by Thomas Lothver of Hingham, dated 1756, which includes part of a prayer and a draft of a letter asking for the payment of a debt.
The collection is open for research.
Acquired from Charles Apfelbaum, 1987.
Processed by Ken Fones-Wolf, September 1988.
See also the account book of Timothy Cushing of Cohasset (MS 485bd), Job's uncle.
Encoding funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Cite as: Job Cushing Accounts (MS 207bd). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries.
