Historic Sites in Norfolk County

History of Norfolk County

Norfolk County, south and west of Boston, was created in 1793 from towns that had been part of Suffolk County, with Dedham as its seat. Dedham's Fairbanks House, with timbers tree-ring dated to 1641, is among the oldest surviving timber-frame houses in North America.

Quincy was the birthplace of John Adams and John Quincy Adams, whose family homes are now Adams National Historical Park, and in 1826 it opened the Granite Railway, one of the first railways in the country. In Milton, the Suffolk Resolves were adopted in 1774 at the house now known as the Suffolk Resolves House, and Blue Hill Observatory has kept weather records since 1885. Brookline was the birthplace of John F. Kennedy in 1917.