Incorporated in 1755 and located in the Commonwealth's south-central quadrant, the Town of Charlton is 50 miles or less from five major New England cities; Boston, Worcester, Springfield, Hartford and Providence.
The town's history includes James Capen Adams (1807-1860), better known as "Grizzly" Adams, one of the last of the mountain men. When he headed west in 1852, Adams was a discontented 45-year-old cobbler. During his eight years in the Rockies, he became a friend and slayer of grizzly bears. He survived several hand-to-fang encounters and did a successful tour with P.T. Barnum. He died with his boots on and is buried in the Old Burying Ground in Charlton. His headstone, a carved relief of the buckskin-clad "Grizzly", was ordered by Barnum himself. The cemetery, now known as the Bay Path Cemetery, also contains three photographic stones, headstones with small glass-covered niches in which were placed daguerreotypes of the deceased. Once the vogue, few of these curious stones now remain.
On Charlton Common is a memorial to Dr. William Thomas Green Morton (1819-1868), the man whose experiments with ether first made anesthesia possible during surgical operations. Working with a dentist, Dr. Morton made the first extractions of the deep roots of teeth using ether in 1846 and one month later performed a major operation at the Massachusetts General Hospital with an etherized patient.
Easy access to major highways such as I-90, I-84, I-290 and I-395, as well as Charlton's abundant available land, have changed the size and character of the town in the last decade from wholly rural to rural/residential.
