1930s Archives - Page 60 of 84

Dr. H. O. Pease House, Springfield, Mass

June 3, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The duplex at 27-29 Dartmouth Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

This large duplex was built in 1894, and was originally owned by Dr. Herbert O. Pease, a physician who had his medical practice here in Springfield. He lived on Maple Street, but rented this house out to two different families. During the 1900 census, the unit on the left, number 29, was rented by Frederick Bardwell, a telegraph operator. At the time, he was living here with his wife Anne and their two young children, Gladys and Leland. The family proved to be particularly long-term tenants, and even after Anne’s death in the 1920s, Frederick continued to live here. The 1930 census shows that he was paying $60 per month in rent, and was living here with Gladys, who had become a teacher. They were both still living here when the first photo was taken, as well as during the 1940 census, more than 40 years after Frederick first began renting from Dr. Pease.

The unit on the right side was, by the 1900 census, rented by Sarah Blake, a 68-year-old widow who lived here with her two adult daughters, Mary and Delia. The latter worked as a bookkeeper, and Mary was a dentist, which was a rather unusual career path for a Victorian-era woman. She was the first female dentist in the city, and enjoyed a long career that extended into the 1930s, although she only lived here in this house until the 1910s. By 1920, the right side of the house was rented by physician George H. Davis and his wife Margaret, and in 1930 it was rented by Fred Ward, who was the clerk of the city’s school superintendent.

By the 1970s, the building was abandoned and boarded up, and its two-story front porch was gone. It became a part of the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places in 1976, and was finally restored in the 1980s. Since then, it has been well-maintained in its original appearance, providing an excellent example of Queen Anne architecture on one of the finest streets in the neighborhood.

George Nye House, Springfield, Mass

June 2, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 1120 Worthington Street, at the corner of Ingersoll Grove in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

When the McKnight neighborhood was developed in the late 19th century, it attracted a wide variety of prosperous Springfield residents. Among them was George Nye, a wholesale meat dealer whose house was built in 1888 at the northeast corner of Worthington Street and Ingersoll Grove. Some 40 years earlier, when this area was very sparsely settled, Major Edward Ingersoll had an estate here on the north side of Worthington Street. His house was located around this spot, and he owned a large amount of land behind it, which became known as Ingersoll’s Grove. This land was subdivided and developed in the 1880s, and the street Ingersoll Grove was opened through the property.

Major Ingersoll’s old house was demolished as part of the development, and George Nye’s house was built in its place, with a Queen Anne-style design that reflected the architectural tastes of the era. George and his wife Martha had previously lived on Florence Street in the city’s Six Corners neighborhood, so the move brought them a new, larger, more stylish home, as well as a far more desirable location. They lived here for many years, and after George died in 1907, Martha remained here for another 15 years, when she sold it in 1922, two years before her death.

The house was purchased by attorney David B. Hoar, who married his wife Marion several years later. The couple raised their seven children here, and like the Nyes they lived here for decades. They were living here when the first photo was taken in the late 1930s, and they remained here even as the neighborhood entered a decline in the mid-20th century. Unlike many of the other large houses in the area, it was never converted into a boarding house, nursing home, group home, or similar use. David and Marion Hoar finally sold the house in 1968, but it remained a single-family home, and eight years later it became part of the McKnight District on the National Register of Historic Places. Today, it is well-preserved, and like many other historic homes in the neighborhood it is nearly indistinguishable from its appearance in the first photo.

Samuel F. Newell House, Springfield, Mass

June 1, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 69 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The scene in 2017:

As mentioned in the previous post, Nelson and Samuel Newell were brothers who owned the Newell Brothers’ Manufacturing Company. Originally located in Longmeadow, they later moved their factory to a site along the Connecticut River at the end of Howard Street in Springfield. Around 1873, they built matching houses here on adjoining lots on Bowdoin Street, and Samuel lived in this house until his death in 1878 at the age of 56. He and his wife Augusta had five daughters, three of whom were still living here with their mother in the 1880 census.

Augusta Newell would remain in this house for many years, usually living with a variety of family members. By 1900 her daughter Caroline was divorced and was living here with her mother along with two of her own children. A decade later, the house had become more crowded. Caroline was still living here with Augusta, along with her daughter Edith, sisters Mary and Alice, Alice’s husband William, and a servant.

After Augusta’s death in 1915, the house was sold to Robert Ingersoll, whose father James lived in the neighboring house to the left. Robert’s wife Florence was the daughter of Milton Bradley, the founder of the toy company that bears his name. Robert himself was a part of his father-in-law’s company, holding positions such as secretary, vice president, assistant general manager, and assistant treasurer of Milton Bradley. They were still living here by 1930, and that year’s census listed the house as being worth $25,000. This was a considerable amount of money during the Great Depression, equivalent to over $350,000 in 2017.

Like so many other large houses in the McKnight neighborhood, though, the Great Depression saw its transition from a mansion to a group home. It was used as a nursing home for many years, apparently as early as 1940, when the census listed eight lodgers here, all but one of whom were over the age of 65. Over time, the building became a boarding house, and was eventually abandoned. It sat vacant for many years before being heavily damaged by a fire in 2010 and subsequently demolished. The carriage house, which is not visible from this angle, still stands on the property, and the large tree is recognizable in both photos, but otherwise the lot remains vacant.

Nelson C. Newell House, Springfield, Mass

June 1, 2017May 31, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 57 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The scene in 2017:

Nelson C. Newell was a button manufacturer who entered the business in 1849 with his father-in-law Diamond Chandler, who had a factory in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. Soon after, his older brother Samuel joined the firm, and the two took over the company upon Chandler’s retirement in 1855. By the 1860s, they had moved their factory to Springfield, and were operating as the Newell Brothers’ Manufacturing Company. They made buttons from a variety of materials, including cloth, rubber, and vegetable ivory. Nelson served as president and oversaw production, while Samuel was the treasurer and worked primarily with the company’s finances.

Around 1873, the brothers moved into matching, newly-built Second Empire-style homes in adjoining lots here on Bowdoin Street. Samuel’s house at 69 Bowdoin Street is partially visible to the left in the first photo, and the two houses shared a driveway as well as a carriage house, which straddled the property line on the far right of both photos. Samuel died only a few years later, but Nelson would go on to live here for many years. He was a widower when he moved in, having lost his first wife Mary to typhoid fever in 1856 and his second wife, also named Mary, in 1871. In 1880, though, he married his third wife, Helen Grant.

Nelson and Helen remained at this house for the rest of their lives. At the time of their marriage, they lived here with two of Nelson’s adult sons from his first marriage, Howard and Charles. A third son, William, moved into a nearby house at 103 Bowdoin Street by the early 1880s. By 1900, Nelson and Helen were living here alone except for two servants. Although he was 14 years older than her, Nelson ended up outliving Helen, although only by a few months; she died in May 1915, and he died he following November at the age of 91.

By the 1920 census, William Newell had sold his home and was living here along with his wife Martha and two children, plus a boarder. A decade later, it was being rented by a middle-aged couple for $100 per month. By 1940, only a year or two after the first photo was taken, it was a lodging house, and the census indicates 13 such residents, predominantly young men in their late teens and early 20s. Many other large homes in the neighborhood had been put to similar use around this time, but for this house the decline continued even further in the following decades.

In the late 1960s, this former mansion of a Gilded Age industrialist became a halfway house for juvenile offenders, and was known as the Dexter House. It sustained considerable damage during this time, including a fire, and was subsequently abandoned. It finally collapsed in 1988, and the lot remains vacant ever since. The matching house at 69 Bowdoin Street is also gone, after having been destroyed in a fire in 2010. Today, the only remnant of these two houses is the carriage house, which in partially visible on the far right of the second photo, still straddling the property line nearly 150 years after the Newell brothers moved here.

James C. Ingersoll House, Springfield, Mass

June 2, 2017May 29, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 79 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

The Ingersoll family has a long history here in the McKnight neighborhood, which predates the large-scale development of the area by many decades. In the mid-1840s, Major Edward Ingersoll purchased property on the north side of Worthington Street as his estate. He landscaped the property, which became known as Ingersoll’s Grove, and owned it for about 20 years. During this time, Major Ingersoll was the paymaster and storekeeper of the U.S. Armory, a position he held from 1841 to 1882. Near the end of his life, long after he had sold his estate on Worthington Street, the property was purchased and developed by William and John McKnight, and the street Ingersoll Grove was named in his honor.

Major Ingersoll and his wife Harriet had six children, including James C. Ingersoll, who moved into this house when it was built around 1874. It was only a short walk from his father’s old estate, although at this point the neighborhood was changing rapidly from what it would have looked like during his childhood at Ingersoll’s Grove. James Ingersoll’s house was part of the first wave of large-scale development in the neighborhood, and as a result its architecture is significantly different from most of the later homes. Unlike the highly ornamented Queen Anne homes that would follow, Ingersoll’s house had simpler Italianate architecture, and was built near the end of this style’s popularity.

James and Ellen Ingersoll moved into this house soon after their marriage in 1873, and they raised three children here, Robert, Elizabeth, and Raymond. They lived here for many years, and during this time James worked as a bookkeeper. Robert married Florence Bradley, the daughter of toy manufacturer Milton Bradley, and the couple later moved into the neighboring house at 69 Bowdoin Street. Raymond never married, and lived with his parents for the rest of their lives. According to the census records, he worked as a lithographer for a toy company, presumably Milton Bradley. Ellen died in 1925, and James in 1937, more than 60 years after he moved in.

When the first photo was taken, Raymond was still living here, and the 1940 census indicates that he also rented space in the house to two lodgers. He lived in this house for his entire life, until his death in 1960 at the age of 79. At some point in the mid-20th century, the house was covered in asbestos siding, but it otherwise retained most of its Italianate design, including the bracketed cornice. It was restored in the 1980s, though, and today it looks essentially the same as it did when the Ingersoll family lived here. Along with the other houses in the area, it is part of the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places.

Charles D. Rood House, Springfield, Mass

June 2, 2017May 28, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 93 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

This house was built in 1883, around the same time as the neighboring house at 103 Bowdoin Street, and has a very similar Queen Anne-style design. It was the longtime home of businessman Charles D. Rood and his wife Caroline, who were living here by the late 1880s if not earlier. Charles Rood was born in Ludlow in 1840, and got his start in business as a teenager, working as a clerk at the Indian Orchard Mills. He subsequently worked for a New York City jewelry company, eventually becoming a partner in the firm. This, in turn, led to Rood entering the watchmaking industry, and in 1877 he was one of the founders of the Hampden Watch Company. He later purchased the Aurora Watch Company in Illinois and the Lancaster Watch Company in Pennsylvania, and consolidated them into the Hamilton Watch Company.

In the midst of his watch business, Rood made a brief foray into the burgeoning bicycle industry in the 1890s, becoming the president and treasurer of the Keating Wheel Company. This Holyoke-based company was run by inventor and onetime major league baseball player Robert Keating, whose inventions included baseball’s first rubber home plate. His bicycle company had been floundering, until Rood bailed it out with a sizable investment in 1894. It proved to be a poor decision for Rood, though,with the company later suffering yet another financial crisis.

After losing money in the bicycle industry, Rood returned to the Hamilton Watch Company, and also invested in commercial real estate, building up a significant fortune in the process. However, he made another financial blunder in 1911, when he sold his interest in the company and entered the communications business. He invested in the American Telegraphone Company, becoming its president and general manager. The telegraphone, which was patented in 1898, was an audio recording device that used magnetic wire to record sound, and was intended to compete with the older phonograph, which used etched grooves to play back sound. In the long run, magnetic data storage would prove successful, such as in modern computer hard drives, but in the short run the company failed, and Rood faced serious accusations from disgruntled shareholders over his management of the company. Ultimately, Rood returned to watchmaking and real estate, and in 1924, at the age of 83, he again became president of the Hampden Watch Company.

Throughout these many ups and downs in his career, Rood remained here at his home on Bowdoin Street, where he and Caroline raised their three children, Madeline, Gladys, and Charles Dexter. Caroline died in 1930, and things only got worse after that. The Great Depression was hurting the value of his real estate holdings, and at the same time his son took him to court, trying to have him declared senile in order to take control of his business. The judge denied the request, though, and the elder Rood retaliated by contesting Caroline’s will, which had left most of her estate to the children. However, the original will was upheld, with Rood receiving only a fraction of his wife’s estate.

Charles D. Rood’s business career spanned from the beginning of the Gilded Age to the depths of the Great Depression, and he lived in this house for most of that time. Around a half century after he first moved in, died here at his home in 1934, at the age of 93, only a few years before the first photo was taken. The house remained in the family afterwards, and during the 1940 census his daughter Madeline was still living here. However, it was subsequently sold, and the house that had once been the mansion of a Gilded Age capitalist was covered in cheap asphalt siding and converted into a rooming house. It was heavily damaged by a fire in the early 1980s, and was nearly demolished. However, it was restored instead, and today it is virtually indistinguishable from its appearance when the Rood family lived here some 80 years earlier. Along with the rest of the neighborhood, it is part of the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places.