WPA Archives - Page 54 of 70 - Lost New England

Lydia T. Conner House, Springfield, Mass

May 18, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 163 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939 and 2017. Historic image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

Lydia T. Conner was the widow of William Conner, a businessman who worked in the insurance industry for many years, including 15 years as the first secretary of the Springfield Fire and Marine Insurance Company. He died in 1880, and in 1887 Lydia had this house built in the new, fashionable McKnight neighborhood. She lived here with her only child, also named William, until her death in 1903. William never married, and died in 1914 at the age of 65, with “chronic alcoholism” being listed as a contributing factor in his death certificate.

By the 1920 census, the home was owned by Thomas and Harriet Downs, who lived here with three adult children, three grandchildren, and Harriet’s sister. Thomas worked as a pressman for a printing company, and his son Frank also worked as a printer, while his daughter Madeline was a stenographer. He was still living here in 1930, although the house was far less crowded at this point. Harriet had died in 1928, and by 1930 the only other residents were Madeline, who at this point was on a different career path as a dietitian, and his 21 year old grandson Robert, who was continuing the family tradition as a printer.

In 1940, shortly after the first photo was taken, the house was crowded again. It was owned by Katherine Leonard, a 60 year old Irish immigrant who lived here with four of her siblings and her brother-in-law, plus a lodger. Since then, almost nothing has changed in the exterior of the house. It is still a single-family home, and is well-maintained on the outside, with a multicolor paint scheme that emphasizes the Queen Anne details. Like the other houses in the neighborhood, it is part of the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places.

Charles Loring House, Springfield, Massachusetts

May 16, 2017May 15, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 175 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

This house, completed in 1885, is about a decade older than most of the surrounding homes of Bowdoin Street, and both the house and the lot itself are much larger than many of the neighbors. It was originally the home of Charles and Elizabeth Loring and their two daughters, Violet and Ethel. Elizabeth died in 1894, and Charles remained here until 1903, when the house was listed for sale in the Springfield Republican. It was sold to Horatio and Carrie Bellows, who by 1910 were living here with their three children, plus Carrie’s mother Melissa and two servants.

Carrie, Melissa, and two of the children were still living here in 1920, but by the 1930s the building had been converted into a convalescent home for children. Several decades later, it became a nursing home, and was used as such for many years. At some point after hevfirst photo was taken, the exterior of the house underwent some changes, including the one-story addition to the right side. Along with this, much of the Queen Anne detail was lost when the original clapboards were replaced with asbestos shingles, although the front porch remains mostly unchanged. Despite these alterations, though, the house still stands as one of the oldest houses in this part of the neighborhood, and it is part of the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places.

Jesse Bailey House, Springfield, Mass

May 16, 2017May 13, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 181 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

Built in 1894, this house was the home of Jesse H. Bailey, a bookkeeper who was originally from West Brookfield, Massachusetts. He and his wife Eliza were in their mid-30s when they moved into the house with their three children, Roscoe, Fred, and Clifford. However, Jesse did not live here for very long, because within a few years he found himself in the far less elegant accommodations of the York Street Jail. During his time as a bookkeeper, he had been the assignee of Spalding & Pepper, a bankrupt bicycle manufacturer in Chicopee, but was fired in early 1900. It was soon discovered that he had embezzled over $4,200, and after pleading guilty he was sentenced to five years in the county jail.

Eliza and the children were living in the house during the 1900 census, but the family’s troubles continued a year later, when 17 year old Fred died of heart disease. According to the 1910 city atlas, she still owned the house in 1910, but was apparently renting it to Arthur A. Birchard, who is listed here in that year’s census along with his wife Grace and their eight children, who ranged in age from 2 to 20. By 1920, it was owned by Mary Harrigan, a 49 year old widow who lived here with her three adult daughters. The house became a little more crowded by 1930, when two of her daughters were still here, plus her son-in-law and two grandchildren.

Mary Harrigan and her family were still living here when the first photo was taken, and very little has changed in the house’s appearance since then. It does not have the same multi-color paint scheme that it would have had in the 1930s, but most of the Queen Anne-style details are still there. The only significant difference is the first floor porch, which has lost its original posts and railings. Along with the other homes in the neighborhood, it is part of the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places.

Herbert Ashley House, Springfield, Mass

May 16, 2017May 13, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 187 Bowdoin Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

This house was built in 1893 as part of the development of the McKnight neighborhood, and was originally the home of Herbert and Cornelia Ashley. Herbert appears to have had a variety of jobs, and even received a patent for an electric trolley wire support. According to his patent application, which was filed in 1895, his invention would ensure that broken wires fall to the ground, rather than “dangling as a menace to man and beast.” It does not seem clear whether or not his invention became widely adopted, but by 1910 he had sold this house, and he and Cornelia were living in his mother’s house on Spring Street.

By 1910, this house was owned by John Lundy, a grocer who was living here with his wife Anne and their three adult children, plus a boarder. Both John and Anne had been born in Ireland, but immigrated to the United States as teenagers and married a few years later. They had a total of six children, but only three were still living in 1910. John died in 1915, but the rest of the family remained here for many years. None of the three children, Mary, John, and Catherine, ever married, and they were still living here with Anne when the first photo was taken in the late 1930s. After her death in 1943, the three children continued to live here together. Mary and Catherine died in the 1960s, and John finally sold the house in 1973, several years before his death in 1976 at the age of 94.

The same year that John died, his former house became part of the newly-established McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places. Like many of the other houses in the neighborhood, the house has been beautifully restored, complete with a paint scheme that emphasizes the Queen Anne details of the home. If anything, its exterior is probably more historically accurate now than it had been in the first photo, since the second-story porch had probably not originally been enclosed when the house was built.

Mary McKnight House, Springfield, Mass

May 16, 2017May 12, 2017 by Derek Strahan

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

The house in 2017:

The McKnight neighborhood was largely developed by John and William McKnight, two brothers who were born in Truxton New York but later moved to Springfield. Here, they first worked as dry goods merchants, before ultimately entering the real estate business. John died in 1890, but his wife Mary continued to be involved in real estate, and built this home on Ingersoll Grove in 1896. Most of the other houses in the neighborhood have Queen Anne architecture, but because this house was built somewhat later, its design reflects the Colonial Revival style, which was coming into popularity at the end of the 19th century.

By 1900, Mary McKnight had sold this house to Cooper Robeson, who lived here with his wife Josephine and their children, Rebecca, Dorothy, and James. They moved to Boston around 1910, and sold the house to woolen manufacturer Edwin H. Pinney. Originally from Stafford Springs, Connecticut, he was the son of Edwin C. Pinney, who was a state legislator and the president of a woolen company. When he and his wife Jennie moved to this house, they joined the many other business and industrial leaders who lived in the McKnight neighborhood, and they would remain here for many years. They were still living here when the first photo was taken in the late 1930s, and not much has changed in the house’s exterior appearance since then. Today, along with the rest of the neighborhood, it is part of the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places.

Lyman Besse House, Springfield, Mass

May 16, 2017May 7, 2017 by Derek Strahan

The house at 29 Ingersoll Grove in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Image courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

The house in 2017:

The life of Lyman Besse was a classic Gilded Age rags-to-riches story, beginning with his birth in Wareham, Massachusetts in 1854. His father was a farmer, and died when Lyman was just 11, and five years later he left school and traveled to West Virginia, where he found work as a clerk in a general store. By the time he turned 18, he was back in Massachusetts, earning six dollars a week while working for a clothing merchant in Taunton. In 1876, he came to western Massachusetts to work for C. B. Harris & Company, but the following year, at the age of 23, he decided to go into business for himself.

Working with business partner J. E. Foster, he opened his first clothing store in Bridgeport, Connecticut in 1877. The business was a quick success, and he soon began opening stores in other cities across the northeast. In 1879, he married his childhood friend, Henrietta Segee, and they lived in Bridgeport for the next nine years. However, as his business empire expanded, he decided to move to Springfield, which had a more central location. In 1888, he and his family moved into this newly-built house on Ingersoll Grove, in one of the most desirable locations in the McKnight neighborhood.

Like most of the other houses in the neighborhood, Besse’s mansion had Queen Anne-style architecture, although this has been somewhat altered over the years. The property also included a massive carriage house in the backyard, and a driveway that connected to both Ingersoll Grove as well as Clarendon Street behind the carriage house. The grounds were well-landscaped, and beyond the backyard was the McKnight Glen, a section of undeveloped parkland owned by the city. As described in an 1893 volume of The National Magazine, “Mr. Besse’s home is situated in the most picturesque section of the delightful and healthful ‘Highland’ region of Springfield, and is one of the most pleasant and attractive homes in the city.”

When the Besse family moved into the house, Lyman was just 34 years old, but he had already achieved considerable success in his clothing business. His company became known as the Besse System, and would ultimately include nearly 50 stores across the eastern United States. In the process, he helped to pioneer the idea of a chain retailer. The same article in The National Magazine declared that he had the largest clothing business in the world, and noted that his ability to buy in such large quantities from his suppliers gave him a considerable advantage over smaller competitors.

Lyman and Henrietta raised six children in this house, and they also regularly employed at least two servants who lived here with the family. After Henrietta’s death in 1926, their daughter Florence moved back to the house to care for her father. Florence was recently divorced from her husband, and she lived here with her two children, Mary Brewster and Kingman Brewster, Jr. Lyman died in 1930, and Florence and the children moved out soon afterward. Kingman, Jr., who was 11 when they left, would go on to gain prominence as the President of Yale University from 1963 to 1977, and then served as the United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom during the Carter administration, from 1977 to 1981.

At some point in the early 20th century, the house lost much of its original Queen Anne appearance. The exterior was covered in stucco, and the open wooden porches were rebuilt with granite and enclosed. The chimneys were also rebuilt of granite, and the front facade gained some symmetry when a dormer window on the left was converted into a gable, matching the original gable on he right side of the house. Otherwise, though, the basic structure of the house remained the same, and both the porte-cochere on the right and the carriage house in the distance have survived. In addition, the interior, with nearly 10,000 square feet of living space, has retained much of its 19th century appearance.

In the early 1930s, the house was sold to James D. Gill, a retired art dealer and bookseller who, among other things, had published King’s Handbook of Springfield in 1884. His wife, Emily Frances Abbey Gill, was a prominent philanthropist who, among other things, gave significant contributions to Springfield College to build a women’s dormitory, which is the current Abbey-Appleton Hall. James was already in his 80s when he moved into the house, and he died only a few years later in 1937. Emily was still living here when the first photo was taken, and she remained here until her death in 1950 at the age of 94.

Since Emily’s death, the house has been variously used as a dress shop and as a nursing home, but it is now a single-family residence again. Like many of the other mansions in the neighborhood, the home has been well-preserved. Although the exterior has changed since it was first built in 1887, there is virtually no difference in its appearance from the first photo, and it is an important contributing property in the McKnight Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places.