Middlesex County commissioners were authorized to build one or more truant schools per St 1892, c 273. Such a school was opened in 1894 at Chelmsford, later being moved to Lowell. Per St 1898, c 496, the Middlesex County school was to accept inmates from Revere, Winthrop, and Chelsea, while the Boston parental school (St 1886, c 282) functioned as the truant school for the rest of Suffolk County. Under the 1898 act (amended by St 1903, c 330), children defined as habitual truants (between seven and fourteen), habitual absentees (between seven and sixteen), and habitual school offenders (under fourteen; under sixteen per St 1913, c 779 s 8) could, if boys, be committed for up to two years at a county truant school ; or, in the case of absentees or offenders, to the Lyman School for Boys. (Girls were committed only to the State Industrial School for Girls at Lancaster.) County commissioners could grant and revoke parole from the truant schools. Truant school inmates guilty of gross misbehavior there could be sent (under fifteen) to the Lyman School or (fifteen or over) to the Massachusetts Reformatory.
St 1904, c 220 removed the two-year limit of truant school commitment, but specified sixteen as the latest age of release. St 1906, c 389 provided for commitment only to county truant schools of habitual truants, absentees, or school offenders. St 1913, c 779, s 11 provided that boys in county training schools (as they were now called per St 1908, c 103) guilty of gross misbehavior if over fifteen be sent to the Industrial School for Boys at Shirley rather than to the Massachusetts Reformatory.
In anticipation of the repeal of current law providing for the institutionalization of school and other youthful offenders (St 1973, c 1073, s 2), the Middlesex County Training School was closed in Feb. 1973.
NAME AUTHORITY NOTE. Series relating to the agencies described above can be found by searching the following access points for the time period stated: 1894-1908--Middlesex County Truant School (Mass.); 1908-1973--Middlesex County Training School (Mass.)
From the description of Agency history record. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 84275710
