In 1637, Nonantum was the name given by the General Assembly of the Massachusetts Bay Colony to a village in what is today Newton Corner that it set aside for converted Native American as a result of missionary work by John Eliot at the home of Waban, often identified as the first Massachusett to convert to Christianity, although there is no evidence of his conversion.

[2] European settlers claimed ownership of this land and forced Waban and his people to relocate to Natick, then divided it into small farms.

Industrial work brought Irish, French Canadian, Italian, and Jewish immigrants to the village.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s natives of Castelvenere, a town and comune in the Province of Benevento, Campania region, Italy, settled in Nonantum, the first Italian immigrants.

Many people in the village now who claim they were the first to discover the "Lake" are descendants of natives of San Donato Val di Comino in the Province of Frosinone, Lazio, Italy.