Harold G. Duckworth House, Springfield, Mass

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The house at 368 Longhill Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:


In the first half of the 20th century, the southern section of Longhill Street was one of the most desirable parts of Springfield, and was the home of many of the city’s wealthiest residents. Located just south of downtown Springfield, on a ridgeline above the Connecticut River, many of these homes enjoyed spectacular views, and were situated right next to Forest Park, the largest park in the city. In keeping with architectural tastes of the era, a number of the homes, including this one, had Tudor Revival-style designs, evoking the appearance of an aristocratic English country estate.

Nearly all of the mansions here on Longhill Street were built before the start of the Great Depression, and this house, completed in 1931, was among the last to be built. It was designed by the architectural firm of B. H. Seabury for Harold G. Duckworth, a chain manufacturer who had previously lived in a more modest home on Forest Park Avenue. He and his wife Alma had two children, James and Susan, and they were all living here when the first photo was taken later in the decade.

Harold died in 1961, and Alma lived in this house until 1983, when she sold the property. She was in her 70s at the time, but she would go on to outlive both of her children, and she died in 2003, just a few weeks shy of her 104th birthday. In the meantime, her former house has remained well-preserved, with no noticeable changes between the two photos. Along with the rest of the neighborhood, it is now part of the Forest Park Heights Historic District, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.

Harry B. Slingerland House, Springfield, Mass

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The house at 283 Longhill Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:


This elegant English Revival-style house was built in 1927 for Harry B. Slingerland, a stock broker who also served as vice president and general manager of the General Ice Cream Company. During the 1930 census, he lived here with his wife Etta, their two daughters, and a servant, and the house was valued at $60,000. Equivalent to nearly $900,000 today, this value was comparable to the value of most of the surrounding homes, which were located on what was one of Springfield’s most desirable streets.

By the time the first photo was taken in the late 1930s, this house was the home of Dr. Alfred M. Glickman and his wife Rose. A Springfield native, Dr. Glickman graduated from Tufts in 1921 and worked as a surgeon here in Springfield. He also served as chairman of the school committee, becoming the first Jewish person to hold the position, and he later became the namesake for the Alfred M. Glickman School in Ashland Avenue. Rose was also very involved in civic life, and served as a director for a number of organizations, ranging from the Massachusetts Health Council to the Girls Clubs of America.

Dr. Glickman died in 1954, but Rose continued to live in this house until her death in 1980. Since then, very little has changed with the exterior of the house, and it it continues to stand out among the predominantly Colonial Revival and Tudor Revival mansions on Longhill Street. Along with the other homes in the neighborhood, the house is now part of the Forest Park Heights Historic District, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.

Clifford B. Potter House, Springfield, Mass

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The house at 267-269 Longhill Street at the corner of Cherryvale Avenue in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

Springfield’s Forest Park Heights neighborhood includes a number of elegant late 19th and early 20th century homes, but some of the finest of these can be found here on Longhill Street, where some of the city’s leading residents lived. This large house was built in 1898 for Clifford B. Potter, a manager for the Springfield Knitting Company. He lived here with his wife Caroline and their two young daughters, Gladys and Anna, and the family also employed a governess and a servant, both of whom lived here.

Potter remained with the Springfield Knitting Company for 16 years, but in 1906 he started his own company, the Potter Knitting Company. The firm specialized in “fancy knit goods,” and by the early 1910s they had become, of all things, the nation’s leading producer of infants’ underwear. Potter built a new factory on Main Street, just north of Mill Street, and he served as the company’s president and treasurer for many years. By 1920, the company was still growing, and was listed as manufacturing “infants’, children’s and ladies’ ribbed underwear and union suits.”

The Potter family continued living in this house during this time, but Caroline died in 1925. Clifford remarried to his second wife, Martha, and lived here until his death in 1935. Martha was still living here a few years later, when the first photo was taken, but she sold the property in 1947, to attorney Samuel Goodman and his wife Ruth. At some point over the years, the house was converted into a two-family home, but on the exterior it is essentially unchanged. Along with the rest of the neighborhood, the property is now part of the Forest Park Heights Historic District, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.

Holy Name Rectory, Springfield, Mass

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The Holy Name Parish rectory at the corner of Dickinson and Alderman Streets in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The scene in 2017:

This building was originally built as three separate homes, with one on Dickinson Street, one on Alderman Street, and one in the middle at the corner of the two streets. The oldest of these was the Alderman property, which was built sometime in the 1890s, and the other two were built in the first decade of the 20th century. Although they were intended as private homes, the corner house was purchased in 1910 to serve as the rectory for the newly-established Holy Name Parish, which had just built a school and chapel on an adjacent lot.

The Forest Park neighborhood grew rapidly in the early 20th century, and so did the Holy Name Parish. Because of this, in 1920 it purchased the neighboring house on Alderman Street, connected the two buildings, and covered the exterior in stucco. Then, in 1934, the Dickinson Street house was purchased as well, and was integrated into the rest of the rectory. These two views show the property from the Dickinson Street side, with the original rectory on the left, the Dickinson house on the right, and the Alderman house partially visible beyond it on the far right.

Despite nearly 80 years in between these two photos, not much has changed in this scene. The school itself has since been closed, after having been consolidated with four other Catholic elementary schools, and the buildings are now rented to the city of Springfield. However, Holy Name is still an active Roman Catholic parish, and this building still serves as the rectory for the church, which is located on the other end of the block at Grenada Terrace.

Holy Name School, Springfield, Mass

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The Holy Name School on Dickinson Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The school in 2017:

At the start of the 20th century, Springfield’s Forest Park neighborhood was growing rapidly, and in 1909 the Diocese of Springfield established a new Catholic parish to serve the area’s residents. That same year, construction began on this building, on Dickinson Street between Alderman Street and Grenada Terrace, just north of the “X.” It was completed in 1910, and originally served as both a chapel and as the Holy Name School, which opened in the fall of 1910 with 200 students.

Over time, both the parish and the school grew, and by the time the first photo was taken a second school building had been built, on the far left side of the photo. Beyond it was the church itself, and just out of view to the left was the rectory. A little over a decade later, in 1951, a social center was built on Alderman Street, followed in the late 1960s by a new church at the corner of Grenada Terrace. Throughout this time, the Holy Name School educated many thousands of Springfield children, including former mayor Charles V. Ryan, who was probably attending the school around the time when the first photo was taken.

Nearly 80 years after the first photo was taken, the Holy Name Parish is still an active church, although the school has since been closed. In 2009, it and four other Catholic elementary schools were consolidated into one school, St. Michael’s Academy in East Forest Park. The century-old Holy Name School did not remain vacant for long, though, because since the fall of 2009 the school buildings have been rented to the city of Springfield. From 2009 to 2013, the campus was the home of New Leadership Charter School, and it is now the home of the Liberty Prepatory Academy.

Grenada Terrace, Springfield, Mass

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Looking east on Grenada Terrace from Dickinson Street in Springfield, sometime in the early 1900s. Image courtesy of Jim Boone.

The scene in 2017:

The Forest Park neighborhood of Springfield was very sparsely developed up until the 1890s, when trolley lines were built through the area, providing a direct connection to downtown Springfield. This section of Forest Park, just to the northeast of the “X”, was developed by the Sumner Avenue Heights Company, and featured streets with names associated with warm climates, such as Ventura, Sorrento, and Pomona. The centerpiece of this development was Grenada Terrace, which was built parallel to Sumner Avenue and featured a wide street with a landscaped median.

The street itself was laid out by the late 1890s, but none of the houses were built until the first decade of the 20th century. Nearly all of the homes had been completed by 1910, and the first photo was probably taken around this time. Most of these homes were owner-occupied, and the 1910 census shows residents with a wide range of middle-class professions, including a clerk, contractor, building inspector, stenographer, traveling salesman, and an Armory employee.

A century later, nearly all of these homes are still standing, although most have been altered with modern changes such as enclosed porches and artificial siding. Two brick apartment buildings, visible in the distant left of the 2017 photo, were built in the 1910s, but the neighborhood remains predominantly single-family, two-family, and three-family homes. Otherwise, the only significant change to this scene is the left side, where four of the homes were demolished to make a parking lot for the Holy Name Church, which is partially visible on the far left.