The History behind Undergrounding of Lines in Downtown Newburyport

 

"It's not what you know, it's who you know," Byron Matthews said. "It's all about people, not about how brilliant you are."

To prove his theory, Matthews explained it was a sometime golf buddy, the chairman of the board and president of Massachusetts Electric, who eventually got on board with the concept of burying all the downtown utility wiring, something relatively avant-garde for the time.