Whether you call it Pine Point, Old Pine, Onkowam, Pine Neck, or Onset, Onset Village is rich in history. You can pick up a brochure at the Onset Bay Association office at 4 Union Avenue or the Wareham Public Library entitled "Tour the historic Victorian Village of Onset." A detailed map and description of historic sites will lead you on your own walking tour and provide you with even more history.

Onset really started to flourish in 1848 when trains arrived from Boston to carry industrial goods to market, thus introducing Bostonians to Onset. Cottages were built, hotels constructed; and as the tourist population grew, the tourists arrived daily by train, sailboat, and steamers. Onset was once a major terminus for the old side wheeler steamboat ferries. The route included New Bedford, Woods Hole, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket.

Tourists enjoyed hotels (the Oak Crest and Anchor Inn on Onset Avenue were the filming sites for the movie, "Kennedys of Massachusetts"), restaurants, theaters, stores, shops, trolley cars, and a casino where people danced to the likes of Tommy Dorsey, Cab Calloway and Duke Ellington. The bathing pavilion had the capacity to give 1,000 bathers woolen suits (word has it tourists rented the suits), comfortable dressing rooms and large Turkish towels.