A Towering Discovery in Tobacco Country

From Mr. Nutmeg State:

For years I've passed this old water tower on the way to and from my mother's house in Windsor, Conn., the top just visible above the tree line as I zoomed along Route 291. I planned to check it out in November, but was having car trouble and didn't want to risk stopping for a look and finding out my car wouldn't start again. But earlier this month, the stars aligned and I made the side trip on my way back to Massachusetts, and boy was I glad I did.

I expected to find the tower in the middle of a field, where I would take a nice shot under a beautiful sky, and then mosey on back to the highway. What I discovered, instead, was that this striking rural spire sits next to a beautiful shingled building located in a historic district that I instantly fell in love with.

The Windsor Farms Historic District "is a 2-1/2 square mile area on the east bank of the Connecticut River which comprises the historical center of South Windsor," according to this web site. "Main Street, the principal street in the ...[d]istrict, runs in a generally northeasterly direction, bisecting open fields under cultivation by the tobacco farmers of this rural village for several centuries."

This property sits on the corner of Main and North King streets, a few steps from a small farm selling pasture-raised beef, lamb and pork. Heading north along Main Street in this historic district, there are several beautiful old homes and other small farms, some of which still grow tobacco. South Windsor is located in the Connecticut River Valley, long known for its tobacco crop.

For more about this tobacco-growing region, check out these posts: February 27, 2020, "Shoot It If You Got It"; September 20, 2017, "One-Stop Barnstorming Tour"; and July 19, 2016, "Tobacco Road".

As you might imagine, tobacco farming in the valley has decreased signficantly in recent decades. "In the 1930s, Connecticut had 30,000 acres of farmland dedicated to tobacco production; by 2006 this acreage had dwindled to less than 2,000 acres," per this Connecticut History article. "Much of the former tobacco farmland is now used to grow nursery stock or has been developed into residential communities and shopping centers."

So it's cool to see some small farms still in operation in South Windsor. As I've noted in the previous articles linked above, I grew up in Simsbury, Conn., which was also a tobacco-growing town, so I feel a connection to this shrinking industry. When I was young, there were still a few old barns located at the fringes of my neighborhood. Those are long gone, but there are still some scattered througout my quiet hometown.

I'm amazed at how well preserved this building is. I'm not sure its former use: perhaps a dormitory for migrant workers, as one friend suggested when I posted a photo on Facebook. More likely, though, is a warehouse. That's what the article about the historic district that I linked to above suggests, without mentioning this building specifically.

Doesn't matter to me what this building was used for; I'm just happy it's still standing in such great shape.

I Seek Newton, Part IX: Nonantum (Section 2)

From Dave Brigham:

Welcome to the second installment in my three-part series about the Nonantum village of my adopted hometown of Newton, Masss. In the first post, I covered historic plaques, statues, parks, murals, former mills and more (see September 24, 2020, "I Seek Newton, Part IX: Nonantum (Section 1)"). In this edition, I will take on funky buildings, bars, restaurants, stores, backside elements and other things.

For links to the previous 10 installments (covering eight villages), see the bottom of this post.

There's a lot to cover, so let's get to it....

Like most of Newton's villages, Nonantum has a commercial strip, and a pretty good one at that. Stretching along Watertown Street from Hawthorn Street to the west to Faxon Street at the eastern end, are dozens of shops, restaurants, small businesses, service stations and other outfits, many of them in buildings dating to the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Per a Historic Newton brochure, Watertown Street at the beginning of its commercial period "was crowded with trolley lines, horses and delivery wagons." The merchants included a tinsmith, a grocery, a druggist, a barber, a tailor, a tavern and stables, among others, per the brochure.

I'll start from the eastern end, hitting most of the buildings. But first, a caveat: I'm not sure whether all of these places are still in business as we battle the pandemic.

The Boston Jewelry Co. at 291 Watertown Street is squeezed between a house next door and Faxon Street. The Newton assessor's office lists the two buildings under one heading; a Zillow listing for the the house indicates it was built in 1897. I assume the storefront was erected a little later than that. I'm a bit frustrated that the city doesn't separate these sites and provide information about the commercial property. Oh well....

Heading west, across Faxon Street, is a low-rise brick building housing a convenience store, a nail salon, a computer repair shop, a sub shop and Steamers, a highly regarded seafood market. The assessor's database indicates this building dates to 1920; MACRIS says 1910.

The next stop is across Dalby Street from the Steamers building. The anchor tenant at 317-319 Watertown Street is Antoine's Pastry Shop, which has been baking and selling Italian and French pastries -- and making the locals fat and happy -- for at least 57 years (their web site might be out of date, I'm not sure). This building also dates to 1920, per the assessor.

Next to Antoine's is an empty storefront (right in photo above) and the legendary DePasquale's Market (left), which is known locally for its amazing sausages. The company dates to the 1920s, when Nicola DePasquale opened a market elsewhere in the neighborhood, according to this Boston.com article. As for the building, it dates to 1885.

The building at the corner of Watertown and Chapel streets, above, home to a bridal alterations store and a salon, may not look like much, but it has a long history. Built in 1870, per MACRIS, the structure is an old wooden barn from which "James B. Murphy ran a general store," per the Historic Newton brochure. I don't know how long that store was in business, or how many businesses have used the building since, but I'm impressed at the makeover of this place, which, as far as brick renovations go, doesn't look that bad. Digging a little into the MACRIS listings for Watertown Street, I discovered that Mr. Murphy lived in the house next to the Boston Jewelry building.

Continuing west...across Chapel Street from James Murphy's old general store we are at 337-363 Watertown Street, below.

Businesses here include Busy Bee florist; high-end home goods store, Greentail Table; Tommy Doyle's, an Irish bar/restaurant; and Swartz Ace Hardware store. Built in 1905, the long, low building offered a new concept in retail: stores without the owners' apartments above, according to the Historic Newton brochure.

(Bricked-up door and old, empty sign from the side of 337-363 Watertown Street.)

Let's hop to the other side of Watertown Street, working our way west to east. On the corner of Adams and Watertown streets stands a building housing a few restaurants, offices and other businesses. I'll cover this place, known historically as Columbus Hall, in the next installment of this series.

(Columbus Hall is visible at the right of the above photo. The building in the center of the photo no longer stands.)

Currently, the lot adjacent to Columbus Hall is a hole in the ground. A very sad pit, where once stood one of my favorite takeout joints: Johnny's Pizza and the Brick Smokehouse. Next door was Salvi's Barber Shop. The scissor masters moved around the corner, but Johnny's has gone the way of the dodo bird. The building's owner announced a plan to knock the place down, erect a new structure with a level of apartments above retail/restaurant space. The guy who owned Johnny's told me he hoped to move back in once the space was available. Well, I don't know what's going on, but there's been nothing happening in this gaping wound along Watertown Street for quite some time. As you can tell, I ain't happy.

Continuing along, we come to 382 Watertown Street, below. The building dates to 1890, per MACRIS.

The building is currently home to a realtor, among other businesses.

Next door the businesses include Vape Daddy's and Baseball Etc., which sells baseball cards and other hobby-related products.

This place has an interesting past, per MACRIS, having served as an American Legion post, in addition to featuring storefronts and apartments. The building dates to the early 1890s.

Next door is the building that currently houses La Sposa Bridal.

It was built in the 1880s as a residence.

Across West Street from La Sposa, along Watertown Street, is the visually striking building above. Built in the 1890s and designed in what MACRIS calls the Victorian Eclectic style, this place was home in the early 20th century to a dry goods business, a baker, a clothier and a sailmaker, per MACRIS. Currently, tenants include The Antique Shop, Avani Salon and a RE/MAX realtor.

Continuing east, we come to Colonial Drug.

Established in Harvard Square in the late 1940s, Colonial Drug moved to this location in 2013, in a partnership with Stoddard's, a cutlery specialty shop that was founded in 1800. Stoddard's closed in late 2017 or early 2018, but Colonial, which specializes in fine fragrances in addition to offering pharmacy services, continues on. The store has great little statues out front.

Next to Colonial Drug, on the corner of Chapel Street, is a building known historically as the Morgan Mahoney Commercial Block, below. Mahoney was a dry goods merchant in Nonantum; I believe he lived on the second floor of this building.

Built in either 1910 (Newton Assessor) or the 1890s (MACRIS, which I tend to believe), the Mahoney block was home to Silver Lake Liquors and Maria di Napoli restaurant when I moved to this area 17 years ago. In recent years those businesses have shuttered, and Moldova Restaurant has taken over the spaces.

Below is a picture of the former liquor store sign, taken before the restaurant expanded into the space.

There are other commercial establishments along Watertown Street, as well as a post office and a service station. None of them particularly caught my eye. What did stop me in my tracks as I walked around many months ago was the small building below at the back of a residential lot.

The sign above and to the left of the door says "Upholstery Today." I don't know if this little shop is still in business, but even if it isn't, there's still a great story here. Built in 1895, the house is named after John Beale, who was the original occupant...and also a tailor. So perhaps this little workshop behind the house has been used to mend and make clothes and textiles for more than a century and a quarter.

Off the main drag, I found plenty of bars, restaurants and other businesses, as well as oddball spaces that once were home to small ventures.

West Street Tavern opened in 2008, and is a place I've been to many times. It's small, but in the olden times it was always jam-packed with revelers. I've seen a few bands here -- squeezed into the space by the front window. Once I was there to celebrate a neighbor's birthday and a police bagpipe and drum band walked in at full blare.

Anyway, the building dates to 1930. When I moved to Newtonville this bar was something else, the name of which escapes me now. I'm not sure if it's been a saloon since birth, but it certainly has been for quite some time. Unfortunately, this place seems to have closed down.

Along Adams Street, which is the heart of "The Lake" (see part one for more on this nickname), there are some interesting old buildings. One of the newer businesses in Nonantum, pizza-and-pasta joint The Landing/L'Approdo, below, is located in an early 20th century structure at #223 that was added to a circa-1880 home.

At 203 Adams Street is Shaking Crab, below, a restaurant specializing in hands-on boiled seafood, fried food and sandwiches. Opened in 2016, this eatery succeeded Francesca's, an Italian restaurant that had been here for a few decades.

The building dates to 1930, per the assessor's database.

The last place I want to showcase on Adams Street is DePasquale's Deli.

Squeezed onto a lot featuring a circa-1895 apartment house, the market has been around since 1972, I believe. I'm not sure when the building was erected; I'm guessing the 1930s.

Now for something a little bit different.

As soon as I saw this building on West Street I knew it must have an interesting history, as it didn't't look as though it was built as a residence, it looks like nothing else around it. I put the question out on Facebook. One person said it may have been a meat processing plant at one point. Another said it was a meat market and grocery. A third person said in the '80s it was used as a karate studio. According to the Redfin realty web site, this little place is now a home, with one bedroom and two bathrooms in 880 square feet.

Nonantum is the type of village where little shops like this are still in use, but there aren't as many of them as they're used to be. There's another intriguing little building on West Street, directly across from the former butcher shop.

Located on the corner of West and Green streets, this structure is listed in the MACRIS database as the Richard Dunbar House. "This large end-gabled double house has undergone several changes," per MACRIS. "Apparently a house owned by Richard Dunbar, a mason, stood on this lot as early as 1873. This double house, probably constructed in the late 1880's, evidently replaced the earlier building. A single-story, cement block store was then added in the 20th century." Two stores across the street from each other, both of them now residences. I'm not sure if the Green Street property is a separate apartment or part of the main house.

This neighborhood still maintains a fair amount of its Italian flavor, which includes well-tended garden plots.

Located on Adams Street, this plot is larger than most in the village. In these gardens, folks grow fruits and vegetables, sunflowers and other beautiful plants. And some, as with this one, are decorated for various holidays.

Before moving on to more commercial establishments elsewhere in Nonantum, I want to highlight two apartment houses out of the many in the village, as well as two random properties that stand out for me.

As I noted in the first installment in this series, Nonantum was home to several factories. Much of the housing stock in this village reflects the population, many of them immigrants from Italy, that worked in the industrial sites. On the corner of Hawthorn Street and Murphy Court is the building below.

The place dates to 1915, per the assessors database, and currently contains three apartments. Not too far away, on West Street, sits a more traditional type of factory worker housing.

This six-unit row house dates to 1890, per MACRIS, and is one of very few examples of this building type in Nonantum. These types of buildings aren't what most local folks think of when they think of Newton, which is a very well-to-do town overall. A neighbor who grew up in the wealthier southern part of the city in the 1980s told me that when he came to Nonantum as an adult, he thought he was in neighboring Waltham or Watertown. He was unaware that Newton had an industrial past with blue-collar housing stock.

Shifting gears....

Along Crafts Street, sandwiched between a municipal heavy equipment facility, a junkyard and several body shops, is the former service station below.

For many years, the right side tenant was an antique store called Trinkets & Treasures. Currently a limo service occupies at least part of this building. I make note of this property because, like many older industrial sites in Newton, it is a potential development site. Mark Development, which over the last few years has purchased, cleared and redeveloped a site at the corner of Walnut and Washington streets in nearby Newtonville, has designs on this area of Nonantum, as well as many other sites in West Newton and Newtonville. While not currently on Mark's wish list for redevelopment, this site sits just outside a proposed site that would include many new apartments and retail/office spaces.

Back over on Watertown Street, tucked at the back of #421, is an old barn that I've wondered about for quite a few years.

The house on the property dates to at least the 1880s, per MACRIS. But with its pinkish stucco and modern facade, it looks nothing like it did more than 100 years ago. There have been offices in the main house, and perhaps apartments. As for the outbuilding in my photo, it was a carriage house that was converted to commercial use. For a long time, it has appeared to be too dangerous for occupation of any kind.

Directly across Watertown Street from the old carriage house property is Central Drapery and Dry Cleaners.

Per MACRIS, the building dates to 1947; per the Newton assessor's database, 1940. I don't know what was here, if anything, before the dry cleaning business. There is a large vault directly behind the front counter, where you conduct business. Maybe there was a bank here at some point.

I'm going to finish this post by looking at several commercial establishments along California Street, at the northern edge of Nonantum. I will work west to east.

The building at the corner of California and Bridge streets, and its trash-strewn empty lot aren't much to look at. Home to catering company La Bonne Maison (and prior to that, other similar businesses) and the Grocery Garrison convenience/liquor store, the building at 367 California Street was erected in 1971, per MACRIS (I was quite surprised to see a listing for this rather new, ugly building). I haven't found anything on old maps indicating anything was here prior to the '70s. Perhaps, given its location across Bridge Street from the Bemis Mill complex, and next to the Charles River, it was a spot for local workers to eat lunch and take in the views, or do some fishing.

Next on the tour is the former headquarters of event planner Hopple Popple, which is no longer in business.

Owned by the landscaping company whose buildings surround the property, this site dates to 1940, per the Newton assessor. I'm sure there have been a variety of stores and businesses here over the last 80 years.

Two doors down, on the corner of Faxon Street, is another building that looks a bit like an Old West storefront.

This place is quite a mystery. It is #274, but sits on the property of #268, which is listed in MACRIS as the John Shorton House. Shorton was an employee of the Silver Lake Company, per MACRIS. Neither MACRIS nor the Newton assessor's database mentions a second building on the property. I assume it was once a store or perhaps an office (a quick search found a modern-day John Shorton, an attorney with an office approximately at this location); it could also be a residence.

Continuing east, on the south side of the street:

Home to Koko Bakery and the Sakanaya fish market, this building dates to 1950. That's all I got on this place.

Directly across the street is a circa-1930 building whose businesses include Signs by Tomorrow, Tail Waggerz and Arsenal Cabinets.

I'm not sure what businesses have been here over the years. Next door is the home of Kickspace, Inc.

This place also dates to 1930, according to the Newton assessor.

Last, but certainly not least, on this tour of retail space, is the home of the Chung-Shin Yuan restaurant, at the corner of Los Angeles and California streets (I don't know how this area of Newton ended up with streets named after California, Los Angeles, Nevada and Wyoming).

The assessor's office says this building dates to 1900, which, as I've said before, is an oft-used default date. So it could be older, although I doubt it. Could be newer. The restaurant has been there for many years. I'm guessing another eatery was here before that. I'd love to find out what was here when the place was built.

This restaurant is across the street from the LA@CA condominiums mentioned in the first post in this series, and perhaps 100 yards from another apartment complex set to rise on Riverdale Avenue.

OK, thanks for making it this far! Come back soon for part three, in which I will cover churches, social clubs, funeral homes, municipal buildings, former schools and more.

Here are links to the previous posts about Newton's villages:

I Seek Newton, Part VIII: Upper Falls (Section 3)

I Seek Newton, Part VIII: Upper Falls (Section 2)

I Seek Newton, Part VIII: Upper Falls (Section 1)

I Seek Newton, Part VII: Thompsonville

I Seek Newton, Part VI: Chestnut Hill

I Seek Newton, Part V: Oak Hill

I Seek Newton, Part IV: Waban

I Seek Newton, Part III: Highlands

I Seek Newton, Part II: Auburndale

I Seek Newton, Part I: Lower Falls

Union Square, Somerville, Part II: Factories and Housing

From Dave Brigham:

A preface to this series: most of my explorations of Union Square took place several months ago, and some things may have changed in the interim. Also, as much as I've researched Union Square and the changes that have already taken place and those that are coming, I realize that a few walks through the neighborhood and some poking around online can't match the breadth of knowledge earned by folks who live and work in Union Square. I'm just sharing what I saw and what I think.

Hello, and welcome to the second installment of my five-part series on Union Square in Somerville, Mass. The first part -- Union Square, Part I: New Purposes & Grease Monkeys -- covered auto body shops, murals, repurposed buildings, an egregious architectural gaffe and more. In this segment, I will discuss former factories and related housing, including a former industrial space that is now a very cool residence, as well as some rather large and beautiful rooming house/condominium buildings.

Somerville is still a place where people manufacture things (at places including Artisan's Asylum, which I'll mention again below, Bomas Machine Specialties and Peter Forg Manufacturing, the latter of which I'll also get to later) but the city at one time was jammed full of industrial spaces.

In the 1820s, the first "significant industrial complex," the Middlesex Bleachery and Dye Works, moved to Somerville, according to this economic development overview from Wicked Local. The Fitchburg Railroad came to the city in the 1840s and a decade later companies including American Tube Works (about which much, much more below) and Union Square Glass had sprung up. By the 1860s and 1870s, meat packing at an industrial level was thriving in Somerville. These businesses continued to grow into the 20th century. From the 1920s through the 1950s, Ford Motor Co. operated a plant in Assembly Square, which over the last few years has been totally transformed (see January 30, 2019, "Assembly Required").

As in countless industry-heavy cities across the country, since the 1950s many of the manufacturing jobs in Somerville have vaporized. In more recent years, the massive brick buildings in many such cities have either been torn down, left abandoned or, if the right combination of funding, planning, zoning and moxie are achieved, been converted to other uses, ranging from condos to space for tech start-ups, breweries, rock climbing gyms and much more. Union Square is abuzz with new uses for most of its former industrial space, I'm happy to report.

Alright, let's get to it.

American Tube Works was once a dominating force in Union Square. Founded in 1851, the company, which manufactured seamless brass and copper tubes, at its height controlled 20 buildings along Somerville Avenue, Dane Street and Lake Street.

"[B]y 1865 [American Tube Works] was the second largest employer in Somerville with 175 employees and a production output of $1.2 million worth of brass and copper tubing....By the 1880s, the American Tube Works expanded its production and its plant in Somerville to meet the growing demand for domestic pipes," per the City of Somerville's National Register Proposal for the American Tube Works Complex, dated December 1, 2014.

"Increasing urbanization in the post-Civil War years and a growing sense of the importance of sanitation systems led to an increased demand for plumbing and other domestic fixtures....The growth experienced by the company in the early 20th century allowed them to completely rebuild their production plant. All of the original buildings...were demolished. Beginning in 1890 and continuing until at least 1920, they completely rebuilt the complex and modernized their production facilities....[T]hey acquired all the land between Dane Street, Somerville Avenue, Church Street, and the railroad tracks, with the exception of the City’s cemetery. Residential buildings were demolished. Between 1900 and ca. 1920, the company constructed four large drawing mills, a rolling mill, a foundry, and pattern and blacksmith shops, all arranged around three sides of the cemetery."

There are only seven of the second-generation buildings left, some of which I will now discuss.

440 Somerville Ave. was the administrative office for the tubing manufacturer.

Now this building is home to Be in Union Yoga and Union Press, a letterpress print shop. Enlarge this photo of the side of 440 Somerville Ave. and you can see the date of "1913" carved in stone over the door in the middle of the shot.

444 Somerville Avenue was the drawing mill at Tube Works. I don't have a picture of this building.

460 Somerville Avenue was American Tube Works' rolling and drawing mill. It is now an ExtraSpace Storage facility.

438R-440R Somerville Avenue was where the blacksmith/machine/pattern shops were located.

Above is 438R Somerville, which is now home to the Little India Market. Below is a close-up of one of the partially covered mural portraits on the front of the building.

My first guess was that this guy is a boxer, as he looks tough and stripped to the waist. Turns out I was right. Per a Somerville News blog post from June 2010 about Little India taking over this space, previous tenants at this old tube works building include a paper supply store and a boxing club - the aptly named Somerville Boxing Club. I' not sure, but I believe the man in the portrait is John Ruiz, who trained at the club and was WBA heavyweight champ in 2001 and 2005. I'm not sure who painted the portraits or why they are covered up.

Below is the backside of 440R Somerville Ave., former home of American Tube Works blacksmith/machine/pattern shops.

The building is now home to Cambridge Hackspace, a makerspace catering to "software, electronics, woodwork, or knitting" enthusiasts, per the web site.

Another business in this old mill complex is Boss Organ, which repairs and sells new and vintage Hammond organs and Leslie speakers. The joint has been run by Tyler Drabick since 2005.

Below is the boneyard referenced in the City of Somerville's National Register Proposal text above.

Known as the Old Cemetery and Milk Row Cemetery, this burial ground is the oldest in Somerville, dating to 1804, and is in front of Little India and adjacent to the yoga studio.

The Tube Works complex also included 24 Dane Street, below, which was a boiler house.

This building was most recently home to a law firm.

The final building in the old manufacturing area is 40 Lake Street, which was a warehouse and garage.

Built in 1912, this place is now home to HD Chasen Company, a wholesale distributor of industrial machinery and equipment. Below is a view from the other side of the railroad tracks.

After American Tube Works went out of business during the Great Depression, various businesses moved in over the ensuing decades, with some of the buildings used by the Whiting Milk Company, for a time, according to the web site of advocacy group Union Square Neighbors (USN). Other tenants over the years have included a metal fence manufacturer, paper retailer, a plumbing supply company, a printer, multiple auto repair shops, self-storage and other commercial offices, per USN. In October 2015, clean tech incubator Greentown Labs announced an $11 million expansion into one of the old Tube Works buildings. I believe the American Tube Works complex is on the National Register of Historic Places.

Ames Safety Envelope was another, more recent major employer in this area. The company, which used at least one former Tube Works building during its lifetime, was founded in 1919. Ames made envelopes, file folders and boxes at its Union Square location until 2010, when the company was acquired by Tab Products, which integrated the Ames work into a Wisconsin facility.

After renovations, this complex is now known as Ames Business Park, which has become "the entrepreneurial epicenter of Somerville," per this August 2014 Boston Globe article. Businesses located here now include Aeronaut Brewing, Artisan's Asylum, Harvard Book Store, L3 Open Water Power and Somerville Chocolate.

Looking down an alley at Ames Business Park toward Aeronaut Brewing. On the left is Brooklyn Boulders.

Another building in Ames Business Park.

Just on the other side of the train tracks sits Peter Forg Manufacturing.

Founded in 1881, the company makes custom metal stampings. Below is the back of the building.

Just around the bend from the rear of Forg Manufacturing, on Village Street, sits this funky brick building.

I could tell it had undergone some major renovations and had morphed from a warehouse or small factory building into a private home. But on my first trip past here, I somehow missed the coolest feature of the exterior. It wasn't until I was doing some research about this place and looking at Google Street View that I realized I needed to get my ass back there pronto!

Turns out this place is a former bronze foundry. Architect Adele Naude Santos turned a place that once was filled with fire, boiling hot metal and tools of all sorts into an amazing abode/work space in this slice of Union Square known as Duck Village. To see beautiful photos of just what an astounding transformation was made, inside and out, check out this page on the Santos Prescott and Associates web site.

Following Village Street across Dane Street, I found myself looking at the back of an odd-shaped and uniquely colored building on Dane Avenue.

Currently occupied, at least in part, by wholesale flooring products distributor L. Bornstein & Co., Inc., this building has two sections, one built in 1900, the other in 1935. The current tenant was founded in 1959. I don't know what used to be here.

There are surely other former industrial sites in Union Square that I missed, but there's one place that, when I took a picture of it, I didn't realize it had a history as a work space. Frankly, I had no idea what the heck this place is or was.

Located at 24 Webster Avenue, this place flummoxed me when I searched online for information. I thought maybe it was a post office. Folks who commented when I posted on Instagram guessed a bank or a Moose Lodge.

So via email I sought out Jessica Eshleman, executive director of Union Square Main Streets, an advocacy group that highlights the artistic and ethnic strengths of the neighborhood in order to drive commercial and economic development, per the group's web site.

She passed along information from the owner of the building in question, Marc Rudnick. The building "was the girls’ parochial school of Saint Joe’s church across the street, until it was converted into a factory around 1960. The school closed when the new parochial school was built, which is now the Prospect Hill Academy Charter School. The boys school was around the corner on Washington Street."

Never in a million years would I have guessed that's what this building was. Via email, I asked Rudnick what the long-term plans are for the building, given the changes coming to the Square. "At least for the time being we are committed to our artisan tenants, our long-term plans are somewhat unknown." His tenants include woodworkers, a boat builder, a bookbinder, an upholsterer, other artisans and tradespeople.

"So what sort of factory was this after the girls' school moved?" I asked via email. "The earliest businesses there seems to have been a sand candle factory, and an African import business," Rudnick wrote. "There was also a business selling self-hypnosis lessons! Sometime later the building was bought by a woodworking company, and my innovation contracting business was his tenant, until we bought the building from him in the 90s."

All of the work I do here at the Backside of America is informed by my past life as a journalist. I am constantly curious about the built environment around me, and thanks to Google I often no longer need to wonder, or even talk to actual people to find my answers. Still, it's great to get information from primary sources. I wish I had more time to speak with people to get deeper information when I'm working on this blog.

OK, that's it for industrial spaces. Now on to some large apartment buildings in the Square that I'm guessing decades ago housed factory workers.

The apartment building below, located on Somerville Avenue, appears to me to be former factory housing.

I haven't been able to confirm that these units, part of a much larger building that is directly opposite the former American Tube Works facility, were once populated by workers at the complex. I just have a hunch. The properties date to at least 1900.

Heading southeast on Somerville Ave. toward the square I found this beautiful building.

Built in 1892, the Bennett Block was constructed in the Queen Anne style. I haven't found anything confirming my belief that this place was once home to factory workers; current tenants include a preschool and, incongruously, a smoke shop.

Just up the street sits another amazing Queen Anne-style apartment building, this one much bigger.

This is just a small portion of a V-shaped building that fronts both Somerville Avenue and Bow Street. Built in 1898, the Drouet Block was designed by Aaron Gould and featured retail space and an apartment-style hotel, per Wikipedia. That description gives me some hope that my supposition that some of these stately old buildings once housed factory workers for American Tube Works and Ames Envelope.

Around the bend on Bow Street sits the Richmond.

Now home to Mount Auburn Healthcare, 33 Bow Street was also built in 1898, per Wikipedia, and, like the Drouet, featured commercial and apartment/hotel space.

Damn, is that place gorgeous, or what?

Lastly, around the corner from these Queen Anne-style buildings, on Bow Street, I spied something pleasantly different.

Located at 39-49 Bow Street, this rounded brick stunner was built in 1910 and features 18 one-bedroom apartments. Again, I haven't found much about the building's history, but, well, you know what I think.

OK, stay tuned for part three, in which I will feature social clubs, bars, restaurants, coffee shops and more.