William & Betsey Gay Craftsman and Homemaker

William S. Gay (1813-1892)

Betsey Harlow Gay (1815-1887)

Henry W. Gay (1836-1837)

William S. Gay was born in 1813 in Dorchester. On December 2, 1835, he married Betsey Harlow of Sharon. The couple had two sons. Henry W. Gay was born in 1836 and died a year later in 1837. Their second child, William Harlow Gay was born in June of 1840 in South Dedham. He lived to adulthood and served in the Civil War.

Gay was a cabinetmaker by trade but for many years worked for Ellis D. Draper as a pattern maker. In the late 1860s, William Gay and his son, William, opened a glue factory. According to a contemporary newspaper article, they manufactured “all kinds of the best glues in general use” from a two-story factory on Fulton Street. Much of their product was for use in the manufacture of furniture. The glue factory was closed after a few years and his son, William H. Gay, eventually went to work in the tannery.

Betsey Harlow Gay died on November 26, 1887 of peritonitis. Her husband, William S. Gay passed away on June 14, 1892 due to heart disease. He had been in failing health for some time. He was 78. He was survived by his son, William H. Gay, and his sister, Mrs. James Fairbanks.

A charter member of the Orient Lodge of Masons, William S. Gay was one of its first board of trustees when the lodge purchased the Village Hall building. According to his obituary in the Norwood Advertiser and Review, “He was always cheerful in appearance and social in manner and feeling. A kind and obliging neighbor, a faithful citizen, intelligent and well-informed, of irreproachable character, he will be missed by a much larger circle of friends than belongs to his own household.”