God -> Movies -> Books -> Food -> Education

From Dave Brigham:

My only experience inside this amazing architectural specimen in Boston's Back Bay was when it was a Waterstone's book store, back in the 1990s. I don't remember whether I bought anything at the store, and I can't recall anything about the interior of this place, which is on the corner of Newbury and Exeter streets.

Over the past few decades I've heard and read about how this place was a movie house in a previous life. But until I stood in front of it with camera in hand, I had no idea that it started life as a church.

"FIRST SPIRITUAL TEMPLE" is what that fancy script says.

Built in 1884-85 by the architectural firm of Hartwell and Richardson, the former church is a fine example of Richardsonian Romanesque. This design "is a style of Romanesque Revival architecture named after architect Henry Hobson Richardson," per Wikipedia. "The revival style incorporates 11th and 12th century southern French, Spanish and Italian Romanesque characteristics."

The Richardson who designed the temple is no relation of the much more well-known H.H. Richardson.

The temple was built for the Working Union of Progressive Spiritualists (!), which was founded in 1883 by Marcellus Ayer, a wholesale grocer, according to the Back Bay Houses web site. The congregation continued to use the building in whole or part until 1975, when the church moved to nearby Brookline. Since late 2018, the First Spiritual Temple has gathered in a leased building in West Harwich, on Cape Cod, per the church's web site.

From 1914 to 1984 the building housed the Exeter Street Theatre. Ayer and his wife, Hattie, operated the theater until 1930 (Marcellus died in 1921). The theater, which screened movies, had nearly 1,400 seats. In subsequent years, businesses inside the building included not only Waterstone's, but also TGI Friday's Restaurant, IdeaLab and Conran's Furniture. A fire that started in TGI Friday's in 1995 seriously damaged the building.

Currently Joe's American Bar & Grill occupies the basement and greenhouse level, and the main part of the building is home to the Kingsley Montessori School. On September 22, 1985, the First Spiritual Temple celebrated its Centenary Anniversary. The building's cornerstone was removed and the contents of original time capsule were given to the church, per the church's web site. A new time capsule was placed behind the cornerstone, to be opened in September, 2085.

A Little Boston Street With Big History

From That Same Old Guy:

As I've mentioned elsewhere on the blog, I had jobs in the 1990s for which I spent a fair amount of time walking through Boston's Financial District and other downtown areas (and man do I wish I had a camera and the backside inspiration then....). So I've been familiar with a lot of the main roads and side streets of the city for nearly three decades. But every once in a while I stumble across a nook or a cranny that I don't recall ever treading upon before.

Spring Lane is just such a hidden gem.

(Looking west from the Devonshire end of Spring Lane. On the right is the Winthrop Building, which was the first skyscraper in Boston erected with a steel frame.)

Little more than an alley connecting Devonshire Street in the Financial District with Washington Street in Downtown Crossing, Spring Lane has an unmatched pedigree in the annals of Boston history.

"HERE WAS THE GREAT SPRING," reads the plaque above, which hangs on the side of the Winthrop Building. For more than two centuries, the sign continues, the spring provided water to the growing city of Boston. Eventually, as the city grew and other water sources were created or discovered, the Great Spring was covered up and paved over (I wonder if this area of the city has weird water issues once in a while). The lower plaque is for the Winthrop Building.

Two plaques of notable locations in one somewhat claustrophobic alleyway -- the oldest street in Boston -- is remarkable enough, but there is a third marker along this little lane that most people pass on by.

Located on the opposite side of Spring Lane, tacked on to the side of 111 Devonshire Street (which dates to 1911), the Mary Chilton marker memorializes the "only Mayflower passenger who removed from Plymouth to Boston." Chilton -- who may or may not be related to power pop icon Alex Chilton of Box Tops fame -- married John Winslow in Plymouth about 1624 and the pair "came to Boston about 1657 and bought a house on this site in 1671," per the plaque. "John Winslow died here in 1674. As a passenger on the Mayflower in 1620 Mary Chilton came to America before any other white woman who settled in Boston."

As if all that Colonial and architecture history isn't enough to inspire you to seek out Spring Lane, there is also a very cool book and old prints store called, strangely enough, Books & Old Prints (actually it's called Commonwealth Books).

"We have extensive holdings in art monographs, decorative arts, poetry, history, and literature, among others," says the store's web site. "Our antiquarian selection is quite strong. We also offer bins of old prints and engravings spanning from the 1600's to 1940's." I'm not sure how long the store has been in business, but it feels like it's been there forever. Even if musty old books and maps aren't your thing, it's worth springing in for a quick visit.

More Than Medieval Manor

From Dave Brigham:

I never went to Medieval Manor in Boston's South End, which I regret. I had a hazy idea of what went on there: a stage show about a king and his court and perhaps food that echoed the times, or at least a Monty Python version of it. You know, mead and legs of lamb and potatoes and puddings and such. And Spam.

I was right about the stage show, but wrong about the food. If friends had ever asked, "Hey, would you like to sit at long tables with hundreds of strangers and eat pizza, salad, ribs and soup? And drink a half-gallon of Michelob or PBR?" I might've taken them up on that offer.

Opened in 1973 in the basement of the former Eliot Hotel in Boston's Back Bay neighborhood by brothers Don and Mark Akin, the dinner theater "became an off-color draw for birthdays and other celebrations," according to this 2015 Boston Globe article. "While diners gather at communal tables, actors stage a spoof of medieval times in which a king wakes to find his court — a minstrel, jester, oaf and, of course, wenches — having a party without him."

Medieval Manor closed in late 2015, a combination of lowered revenues and slacking enthusiasm for the business dealing a fatal blow. Oh yeah, and the Jabberwocky.

Still, the company's web site lives on.

With all the development going on in the South End, and Boston in general, you'd think perhaps the old Medieval Manor site would be slated for the wrecking ball, to be replaced by a gleaming tower of wretched excess for new types of kings and queens.

But it hasn't. Not yet, anyway. Nope, it's the Boston outpost of the More Than Words bookstore, a "nonprofit social enterprise that empowers youth who are in the foster care system, court involved, homeless, or out of school to take charge of their lives by taking charge of a business."

I hope things stay that way in the Modern Times Manor.

Going Mobile

From Dave "Electric Book-a-loo" Brigham:

The New England Mobile Book Fair is a Greater Boston institution. Founded in the 1960s, the warehouse-sized book store in 2017 moved out of the above location on Needham Street in Newton, Mass., and into a new, smaller space just up the road. Unfortunately, the new location is sited in a shopping plaza that is slated for redevelopment in the near future. All signs point to the book store needing to seek out yet another location some time this year. For pictures of the old mill site at Oak and Needham streets that occupies part of the redevelopment zone, see March 1, 2018, "I Seek Newton, Part VIII: Upper Falls (Section 1)."

I took the above picture while the store was winding down operations at its former location. Here's what the site looks like as of late 2018.

So what's to become of the site?

Located at 82-84 Needham Street, and built in 1930, the building is currently available for lease for retail use.

I think somebody should install a Tommy Bahama or a Quiksilver store. Seems ready for that, don'tcha think?

OK, for those of you who didn't figure it out, here's the inspiration for the title of this post: