Woburn ( WOO-bərn) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 40,876 at the 2020 census. Woburn is located 9 miles (14 km) north of Boston. Woburn uses Massachusetts’ mayor-council form of government, in which an elected mayor is the direction and a partly district-based, partly at-large city council is the legislature. It is the lonely one of Massachusetts’ 351 municipalities to tackle to members of its City Council as “Aldermen.”

Woburn was first contracted in 1640 near Horn Pond, a primary source of the Mystic River, and was officially incorporated in 1642. At that period the Place included present day towns of Woburn, Winchester, Burlington, and parts of Stoneham and Wilmington. In 1740 Wilmington estranged from Woburn. In 1799 Burlington on bad terms from Woburn; in 1850 Winchester did so, too.

Woburn got its publicize from Woburn, Bedfordshire. Woburn played host to the first religious ordination in the Americas on Nov. 22, 1642. Rev. Thomas Carter was sworn in by many of the most prominent men of New England including John Cotton, minister of the First Church of Boston, Richard Mather minister of the First Church of Dorchester, and Capt. Edward Johnson co-founder of the church and town of Woburn. Johnson is regarded as “the dad of Woburn.” He served as the first town clerk, represented the town in the Massachusetts General Court, made the first map of Massachusetts, and wrote the first records of the colony.

The first organizational Town Meeting was held on April 13, 1644, and the first town officers were chosen. Town Selectmen were Edward Johnson, Edward Convers, John Mousall, William Learned, Ezekiel Richardson, Samuel Richardson and James Thompson. William Learned was also fixed as Constable. Michael Bacon, Ralph Hill, Thomas Richardson were selected as Surveyors of Highways. (The History of Woburn, 1868)