Artemas Ward took ownership of the saltbox house and moved in with his family. Prior to this point they had been living in a different house in the center of town.
Thomas Walter Ward II died heavily in debt, and the Worcester County Institution for Savings foreclosed on the Ward farm. Henry Galbraith Ward, a relative who had summered at the house as a child, bought the 135 acre farm and its buildings for $4500. He neither lived at the house nor planned to...