With 123 total steps, Lawson Tower truly is a magnificent structure. The tower stands at 153 feet tall with a scenic view of the town library and the soccer field. Thomas Lawson, who found great success in the stock market, moved to Scituate in the early 1900s because of his love for the stunning landscapes and scenic views. Soon after, he bought over 1,100 acres of land. In dedication to his wife, Lawson built an amazing compound on this massive piece of land. It included a horse racing academy, race track, post office, fire station, blacksmith shop, and even multiple barns for his hundreds of animals. His wife fell in love with their new home until a humongous water tower was built next to theirs. She continually told her husband to have it covered up, as it ruined the views of their property. Soon after, Lawson hired an architect and sent him to Europe to look for new designs to cover up the unattractive water tower. He soon found one in the Rhine River and with Lawson’s approval, he began construction in 1902.
Bob Chessia, a member of the Scituate Historical Society, has been involved with Lawson Tower from a very young age. “My parents started the Lawson talk, they had a friend who had pictures from Lawson’s professional photographer,” Chessia said. “People would just give them lots of stuff from the estate and they began to do talks about it at the churches and the schools.” The Chessia family has continued the tradition of educating townspeople about the rich history of the Lawson Tower.
In recent years colored lights have been added to Lawson Tower to represent different events. “We used to do it for just holidays,” Chessia said. But then Chessia came up with the idea to create light schemes based on holidays: “We had all these lights and I thought that we could do different things with them,” Chessia said. “We did red and green for Christmas, red for Valentine’s Day, green for Saint Patrick’s Day, I also put them up in yellow and blue for the second anniversary of Ukraine…When we do Halloween we get lights all over the place, it’s crazy.”