Books, maps, and DVDs we recommend
The Puritan Village Evolves: A History of Wayland Massachusetts First Edition
by Helen F. Emery (1981)
A chronological history of the town from 1638 to 1980, written by a local historian and scholar.
$ 20.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Wayland Historical Tours (1976); revised 2013
Edited by Barbara Robinson (Paperback)
The story of Wayland’s first three centuries told through three historical tours.
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Click here for a free PDF version.
Wayland A to Z (2004)
by Evelyn Wolfson, Dick Hoyt (Paperback)
THE book to own if you can have only one Wayland history – full of meticulously researched stories and details about the town of Wayland, MA
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Legendary Locals of Wayland (2015)
by Evelyn Wolfson (Paperback)
A multitude of photos accompanies visionaries who have influenced both Wayland and the country, along with current town folks who continue in their footsteps.
$18.67
Available: Amazon, Arcadia Publishing, Wayland Depot.
Growing up in Wayland: Life in a Massachusetts town during the Depression (1997)
by George K Lewis (Paperback)
Beautifully written memoir of a very active and observant boy who grew up to be a professor of geography at Boston University and local historian.
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Wayland’s 375 Cookbook (2014)
This is Wayland 375th anniversary year’s celebratory recipe book, written for town residents (including those from centuries past). Linking the 17th to 21st centuries with popular foods, drinks, and “this and that” (i.e. boiled hot soap or teething cookies), this book contains more than 250 recipes.
$ 15.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
Map: 1881 Copy of James Sumner Draper’s 1776 Map of Wayland
Unframed 18 x 24” copy of map made by James Sumner Draper (1811-1896) of what he thought Wayland was like in 1775/6. The original is owned by the Wayland Historical Society. There was no Boston Post Road, (Route 20), west of the First Parish Church in Wayland Center, nor did Commonwealth Avenue, (Route 30), go west of the School Street intersection in Cochituate.
$ 10.00
Available: Wayland Historical Society, Wayland Depot
FIVE MILES ASTRIDE THE RIVER (2014)
DVD: by Zander Cowen and Jacob Sussman
Our most ambitious work, Five Miles Astride the River is a 20-minute film exploring the development of our hometown, Wayland, Massachusetts. Showcasing the village’s evolution over 375 years of history, the film explores three distinct eras of American life and illustrates how the town’s past has shaped its present.
$15.00
Available: Pelham Island Pictures, Wayland Depot
Wayland: Images of America (2002) 
by George Lewis (Paperback)
More than 200 photographs, selected primarily from the extensive collection of the Wayland Historical Society, of farmers, factory workers, trolleys, and schools help to tell the unique and fascinating history of Wayland’s two separate neighborhoods, Wayland Center and Cochituate Village.
$21.89
Available: Amazon, Arcadia Publishing, Wayland Depot
P
uritan Village: The Formation of a New England Town (1963)
by Sumner Chilton Powell
A detailed account of the early government and social organization of the town of Sudbury, Massachusetts, present- day Wayland.
$ 20.84
Available: Amazon.com
Lydia Maria Child: The Quest for Racial Justice (Oxford Portraits) (2002)
by Lori Kenschaft (Hardcover)
This dynamic nineteenth-century writer who, through her pen and at great personal cost to her literary career, spoke out for those silenced in society — slaves, Native Americans, women, and the poor—lived in Wayland for much of her life.
$32.95
Available: Amazon.com
Crossing the Sudbury
The Sudbury River and its associated wetlands provide a lush source of food that supported Native Americans, European settlers of the 1600’s through the farmers of the twentieth century. After the last ice age when the glaciers retreated, a river system with its...
Zaandam Cruise
From the now-ill-fated Zaandam cruise ship back to Boston, just missing the worst of it The morgue would hold three people. As a passenger last month aboard the cruise ship Zaandam, and as a retired engineer and lifelong boater, I leaped at the opportunity to get a...
History Repeats Itself
History Repeats Itself Or Why we have a TP shortage 1973 was marred by shortages – gasoline, or electricity or onions, so Americans cultivated a “shortage psychology.” Like most scares, it started with an unsubstantiated rumor. In November 1973 news reported a...
Covid-19
Although our doors are closed to the public to slow the spread of COVID-19, we at the Grout-Heard House Museum will be available at the regularly posted hours to respond to emails and phone calls. info@waylandmuseum.org or 508-358-7959. We look forward to answering...
Open House 2019
We joined the Library, First Parish in Wayland, the Wayland Depot and the W Gallery for our annual Wayland Center Open House. The Grout-Heard House was at the center of activities that included music, activities for kids, caroling, refreshments, and inventive seasonal...
Joanne Davis
Joanne Davis was a longtime volunteer and valued member of the Wayland Museum & Historical Society. In 1996 she not only stepped into Jo Goeselt’s large shoes as Curator but kept vigilant watch over all furnishings, systems, cookie supplies, visitors-- and woe to...
Rails to Trails
Rails to Trails in Wayland Exhibit Fall 2019Click on the image above to view the presentationWayland Railroad Interpretive Site Master Plan 2005Click on the image above for a copy of the reportWeston Historical Society’s Bulletin Spring 2018Click on the image above...
“Two Sudburys” Tour
Sunday, October 6, 2019 - Members from the Wayland Museum & Historical Society and the Sudbury Historical Society led a bus tour of “colonial-era Sudbury”, later known as Sudbury and East Sudbury, before becoming today’s Sudbury and Wayland. Tour participants...
Petitions
by Jane SciaccaSusanna Grout and her daughter Susan, who lived in today’s Grout-Heard House Museum, were two signers of a women’s petition to the US House of Representatives in 1837 decrying the “sinfulness of slavery.” They joined with 47 other Wayland women...
Skating at the Mill Pond
SKATING AT THE MILL POND Molly FaulknerWith thanks to Gary Chase, Bob Dorey, Mike Lindemann, Mike Lowery, Mark Shepard.This winter, 2018-19, has so far yielded some great pond skating in Wayland after conditions haven’t been good for years. The days...