McCluskey Conservation Area/Bradley Pond

Wm J McClusky Park, 7 Bulow Pl, Hingham, MA 02043, USA

Owned By: Town of Hingham

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This small pond and wooded hillside is nearly hidden behind the Walgreen’s on Route 3A. The best access is from the cul-de-sac at the end of Bulow Place. Ice skating on the pond in the winter.

Features

The tiny McCluskey Conservation Area was donated to Hingham Conservation by the family of William J. McCluskey. The pond and hillside were once part of the Bradley Estate.

According to the Hingham Public Library, around 1860, William Bradley established a company in Boston’s South Bay that produced commercial grade fertilizers for farmers. It was so successful that expansion was required. Bradley moved his factory to Weymouth Neck (including today’s Webb Memorial State Park). It was incorporated in 1872 as the Bradley Fertilizer Co., and had branches in New York, Ohio, Maryland and Georgia, plus phosphate mines in South Carolina and Florida.

Bradley established an estate on 100 acres of land in Hingham, which included the family home, as well as “private homes for the head farm workers and servants, a large greenhouse containing exotic plants, fields for growing crops, extensive gardens, riding and walking trails, large barns, and grazing pastures for farm animals.”

William eventually turned the fertilizer business over to his sons, Robert and Peter. He remained at his estate until his death in 1894. By then, Peter had purchased multiple plots of land adjacent to his father’s estate. A fan of Arabian horses, he brought at least 12 of them to Hingham, establishing the Hingham Stock Farm, where there was a race track, polo field, and barn. Peter bred thoroughbreds, standardbreds, and hackney horses, and served as the President of the Arabian Horse Club in the 1910s.

Peter succeeded his father as president of the Bradley Fertilizer Company. After the Weymouth factory burned down in 1899, the company merged with the American Agricultural Chemical Company. Peter was its president, and he remained involved with the company until his retirement in the 1920s. Still living on the family estate, he died in 1933.

This land is within the region of the Massachuseuk (or Massachusett) Native American tribe.

Habitats and Wildlife

The waters of Bradley Pond and the wetlands that surround it flow downstream into Broad Cove, and onward to Hingham Bay.