Ski Ward: a possible 1939 opening on the Ward family's Union Hill

In September 1965, Ward Hill Ski Area Corp. was established by Robert Martin, Brenda DeCoteau, and Paul O'Connell, with Edwin Fedeli named Treasurer; the entity was "reportedly established in conjunction with long time operator" Robert "Bob" Rochette, per New England Ski History. That same month, the newly formed corporation entered into a 15-year lease with Florence B. Ward and her son Bruce B. Ward for the 40-acre ski area, and a new Mueller T-Bar was installed for the 1965-66 season, financed through Guaranty Bank & Trust Company of Worcester. Ski instructor Steve Morrow, son of another Ward Hill ski school director, Bill Morrow, was named to the PSIA Demonstration Team in the late 1960s while teaching at Ward Hill, before later moving on to run a program at Sugarloaf. Ward Hill entered "the chairlift age in 1983-84, when a used Mueller double chairlift was installed in front of the lodge." In the fall of 1990, the LaCroix family formed Ski Ward, Inc. and took over Ward Hill; John LaCroix of that family briefly expressed interest in also taking over Blue Hills' ski area in 2000, helping the Metropolitan District Commission develop lease proposals -- an expression of interest, not a completed takeover. After twenty years of service, Ski Ward's Mueller double chairlift was retired following the 2002-03 season, replaced by a new Partek triple chairlift, while the original lattice Mueller towers were retained. Ski Ward entered into a new 20-year lease with the Ward family for the same 40-acre tract in April 2007, continuing the leasing relationship first established in 1965.

Bruce Ward, whose family had leased the land to the ski area since 1965, died in 2012 at the age of 90; three years later, in 2015, his granddaughter was married atop Ski Ward, per New England Ski History. In the early 2010s, Ski Ward built out summer operations including tubing, a terrain park, a BigAirBag, and volleyball, further diversified with "the inception of the Shrewsbury Farmer's Market in 2014." John LaCroix's son Mikey began making headlines in the 2010s as a teenager notching wins in national snowboard competitions, and was named to the US Ski and Snowboard Team in 2019. Ski Ward hosts the Central Massachusetts Conference Ski League, whose own page lists member teams from Algonquin, Ashland, Hopkinton, King Phillip, Medfield, Medway, Millis, Nipmuc, St. John's, Shrewsbury High, Westborough High, and Wachusett Regional High, with races "held regularly on thursdays."

The General Artemas Ward House, opposite Dean Park at 786 Main Street, was built in 1727 by Nahum Ward to house tenants on his farm; per Wikipedia, his son Artemas Ward, later a Revolutionary War major general and Massachusetts congressman, moved into it in 1763. The General enlarged the house in 1785, "raising the roof and nearly doubling its size," and his son Thomas Walter Ward enlarged it again in 1820, adding a two-story ell. The main structure was occupied by Ward family members until 1909; a second structure behind the house was then occupied by descendants until 1954. The property's four-story barn "was created by joining two separate barn structures in 1848." The Ward family donated the property to Harvard University in 1925, and it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 4, 1976; it "is now operated by Harvard as a museum and is open to the public for limited hours during the summer months." Hebert Candies, per its own history page, was started in 1917 by founder Frederick Hebert, who "purchased a copper kettle, knife, table, thermometer, and a slab of marble for the total price of $11"; the company later bought the Hillswold Mansion on Route 20 in Shrewsbury; per Hebert's own history page, "Opening in 1946, The Candy Mansion became the first roadside retail confectionary operation in the United States." Per Wikipedia's own Hebert Candies article, "Hebert Candies became the first roadside confectioner in the entire United States" after that 1946 move. Hebert's own history page separately states that founder Frederick Hebert discovered "white coat" candies while traveling in Europe and "used the recipes he discovered to formally introduce white chocolate to the United States"; Wikipedia dates that discovery to 1956, stating Hebert "was the first to do so." Hebert's sons Gerald and Raymond grew the business to nine retail outlets in New England and shipped candy worldwide; Gerald later bought out Raymond and assumed sole ownership. In 2004, Hebert Candies sold its chocolate-bar manufacturing equipment and fundraising business to LaMontagne of Canada, an arrangement that broke down when "LaMontagne and the new owner of Hebert's, Pete Perkins of Sabrosa Foods, could not come to terms." In 2005, per Wikipedia, the investment firm Longmeadow Capital Partners LLC acquired Hebert Candies and launched a rebranding campaign; in the spring of 2012, Hebert Candies became part of American Gourmet Group, LLC, also a Longmeadow Capital Partners company.