A VISIT TO HIGH ROCK TOWER

Halloween around here is a month long celebration. I've been going to some of the local places of interest for the season. Posting pictures of my latest visit. 

My first stop was High Rock Tower in Lynn. It's an observatory but it's built on High Rock Hill, where John Murray Spear constructed his New Motive Power, an electric messiah meant to usher in a new age for mankind. Murray was a spiritualist who stayed in a gothic cottage on the property in the mid-19th century where he claimed to receive instructions for his mechanical creation from a distinguished group of spirits that included Benjamin Franklin, John Quincy Adam, Thomas Jefferson, and quite a few more. Lynn was a hub of the spiritualist movement at that time, and he attracted a number of followers. The new motive power was birthed in dramatic fashion but, by most accounts, destroyed by an angry mob. 

I first heard about the Electric Messiah when I interned at the Lynn Historical Society. Since then, I've found the spiritualist movement in Lynn quite interesting. But there isn't much about this if you go visit High Rock Tower. There are people who know about it, but isn't something that gets much attention. 

The tower itself is pretty impressive. It's a pretty unique feature in Lynn, as definitely stands out and isn't something you'd expect to see. While there was a wooden tower around the time John Murray Spear was there, that was dismantled and later replaced by the stone tower that is there today. High Rock Tower is an observatory and open to the public. The tower and the hill afford a tremendous view. 

The view of Lynn from the Tower
Green Block is to protect privacy of a person enjoying the park

I tried, and failed, to capture the scope and beauty of this view. The above view is right into the heart of downtown Lynn, beyond which you can see the ocean (think you can even see Nahant in the distance there). The view below is of a view from another direction into another part of the city. 

The tower itself is fairly simple, with a spiral stairwell that leads several stories up to the observatory. Personally I found the walk up a little vertigo inducing (its perfectly safe but you can see through gaps in the metal steps). 

Red brick is extremely common around here, and even inside the gray stone tower there is a central wall of red brick. 

This spot is a fun place to visit. I went there with friends, and when we got to the park they were organizing a clean-up with volunteers. The only thing I didn't enjoy was the vertigo. After we finished here we headed to Danvers (old Salem Village). I'll post about that in another entry.