History of Wellesley, Massachusetts

The Swellesley Report

Wellesley history

A brief history from the official town Web site tells us that "More than 350 years ago, when a handful of men first settled the area around the Charles River that is now known as Wellesley, they were so delighted with their new town that they named it 'Contentment.'"

Wellesley Historical Society

Notable people who have lived in Wellesley

Roger Babson (father of financial forecasting, founder of Babson College and onetime presidential candidate)

Emily Greene Balch (1946 Nobel Peace Prize recipient)

Katharine Lee Bates (Wellesley professor, wrote "America the Beautiful")

Horatio Hollis Hunnewell (railroad financier during the 1800s; the town and college are named after his estate, which is named for his wife's maiden name of "Welles."

Dr. William Morton (pioneering use of ether as an anesthetic in 1846)

Dr. James Muller (1985 Nobel Peace Prize winner for creaton of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War)

Dr. Joseph Murray (organ transplant pioneer, Nobel laureate)

Vladimir Nabokov (writer, taught at Wellesley College)

Sylvia Plath (poet, author)

Jack Sanford (major league baseball pitcher, 1950s-60s)