Natick

Natick was first settled in 1651 by John Eliot, a Puritan missionary born in Widford, Hertfordshire, England who received a commission and funds from England’s Long Parliament to settle the Massachusetts Indians on both sides of the Charles River, on land deeded from the settlement at Dedham. They were called Praying Indians - Eliot was best known for attempting to preserve the culture (minus the religion) of the Native Americans by putting them in thirteen planned towns where they could continue by their own rule, with Natick as the political and spiritual center.