From Dave Brigham:
In the spring of 2022, a friend and I went to the Fitchburg Art Museum to see an exhibit called American Roadsides: Frank Armstrong's Photographic Legacy. I had never heard of Armstrong before stumbling across mention of the show, but I could tell from the write-up on the musuem's web site, that he was a kindred soul - and a quite talented one at that.
Check out the video below from Clark University, where Clark served as a photography professor from 1999 to 2021. In it, he talks about his photos and his approach to life. "Photography was the excuse," he says in the video. "I was really going out there to be in that country."
I thoroughly enjoyed the exhibit, which featured plenty of gorgeous images of the sort that I make of small towns and medium-sized cities alike. I totally connect with Armstrong's sentiment about using photography as an excuse to explore the world. I haven't traveled outside of the United States much, but I've made up for that a little bit by going on adventures in cities and towns in New England, largely in Greater Boston.
I had never been to the museum, nor to Fitchburg, so the opportunity to check out a new city while peeping some great art really appealed to me. After our museum visit, my friend and I went looking for a place to eat. We ended up at the Moran Square Diner, which looked amazing from the outside, and served good food in a hip atmosphere.
Ever since that trip, I'd wanted to get back to Fitchburg. In late September of 2025, I made that trip, and of course my first stop was the diner.
Below are a few images I made back in 2022:
How about that shiny enamel facade?! And the lettering for the name of the diner, and the remnant of what I imagine was once a very cool neon sign?!
Below is a shot of the interior:
LPs above the counter - never seen that before, and I loved it. Miles Davis, Real Estate and the Postal Service. Eclectic and smart choices. The owners, Brittany and Adam Willoughby, launched a Kickstarter campaign in 2021, looking to raise funds to restore the diner and add new features, such as a deck in front and a refurbished sign. "The diner was built in 1939 by The Worcester Lunch Car Company and has remained open until 2018 when it was permanently closed," the Kickstarter page indicated.
I knew none of this when I ate there; I'd just happened upon the place and insisted to my friend that we had to eat there.
I'm not sure what happened between my first visit to the diner and my second. This eatery is now known as Royal Chicken. Based on the menu available online, it appears to be a Middle Eastern affair.
Below are images I made in September 2025:
I was saddened to see the beautiful Moran Diner script sign covered up. This happens a lot with these historic diners, which change hands and names every so often. I didn't go inside. I hope the counter and booths are intact.
From there I headed west along Main Street. In relatively short order I walked past a trio of ghosts of retail past.
The top one looks like it says "MILLER'S." I found mention of Rome's on a Fitchburg-oriented Facebook group, but nothing about Miller's or a store called Lewis. I'm always happy to stumble across these old tile entryways.
Speaking of stumbling...let's check out the Rollstone Boulder!
I walked past all sorts of old buildings, some in good shape, others not, some with ground-floor tenants, others not. I checked out a ghost sign I'd learned about in my pre-search, but it was too faded to interest me. Then, at the top of the Upper Common, located in a showcase triangle where Main Street splits to the west of downtown, I spied a GIANT ROCK.
The Rollstone Boulder was "carried by the last glacier from Mt. Monadnock New Hampshire to the summit of the hill whose name commemorates it," according to a plaque on the big stone. Rollstone Hill is situated about three-quarters of a mile southwest of this spot.
The boulder "was for centuries a land mark to Indian and settler," the plaque's text continues. "Threatened with destruction by quarrying operations, it was saved by popular subscription, and reassembled here, 1929-1930."
I have to say I find that story fascinating and inspiring. The stone weighs 110 tons and is made of porphyritic granite.
A few doors down Main Street, heading west, I was taken by the groovy sign and sad facade for The Recovery Room.
The upholstery store has been closed for quite some time. I noticed the peaked roof sticking out above the brick building, but didn't think much about it. MACRIS tells us that the original part of this building dates to 1833 and was at its completion the city's first Baptist church.
On the side of the former house of worship is a cool old sign.
Littlehale + Fisher was a construction contractor. I'm not sure what years the company was in operation.
Around the corner, heading southeast on Main Street is another former church building.
Built in 1797 (!), this was Fitchburg's second meeting house. It was originally located near the corner of Main and Prospect streets, near where the Unitarian Church now is, according to MACRIS. "When the affairs of the church and town were divided, the meeting house was moved to its present location."
A few doors down, on the side of the historic Joslin House where both The Break Bicycle Shop and The Boulder Cafe (established in 1934) are located, is a massive promotional poster for the Fitchburg Longsjo Classic, an annual bike race.
From Wikipedia: "The race was founded in Fitchburg...in 1960, as the Arthur M. Longsjo Jr. Memorial Bicycle Race, in memory of Fitchburg native and resident Art Longsjo. In 1956 Longsjo competed in the Winter Olympics as a speed skater and at the Summer Olympics as a cyclist, making him the first American to compete in Summer and Winter Olympic Games in one year. In 1958, Longsjo perished in a car crash in Vermont, while driving home after winning the 180-mile long Quebec-Montreal Road Race."
In 1991, "the race expanded to a four-day stage race format, which continued through 2010," Wikipedia continues. "Stages included a time trial, a circuit race on a 3-mile loop in the Fitchburg State University area, a road race in Princeton and Westminster that finished atop Mount Wachusett, and the traditional downtown Fitchburg criterium. As a stage race, the event was one of the largest pro-am bicycle stage races in the country and part of the various national calendar races of the period."
The race was canceled in 2011 and 2012, but revived in 2013. The final race was held in 2019.
At 781 Main Street is the Phoenix Building, a Renaissance Revival building completed in 1893 for the Fitchburg Mutual Fire Insurance Co.
Today, the building is occupied by the Fitchburg Historical Society.
Next door is the unusual-looking Proctor Block.
This building dates to 1832. It was designed in the Federal style, MACRIS indicates, but in the 1880s, a man named H.M. Francis remodeled it in the Victorian Eclectic mode. "[T]he only remaining features from the earlier design are the parapet end walls and the asymetrical bay spacing of the street level shops," MACRIS indicates. "The building maintains many character defining features of its Victorian Eclectic Style, including the decorative brick patterns, terra cotta panels and capitols, door transoms, parapet gable dormer, and the cast iron pilasters along the street level shop fronts. The building's main feature is the semicircular masonry opening in the center bay of the third story."
That semicircular opening sure is eye-catching. Prior to the remodeling, tenants included a grocer, a jeweler and a photography studio. More recent occupants included a pharmacy, a card shop and a tailor. Today, tenants include Grizz Gang Forever Studios, a music recording business.
At 721 Main Street is the Quinlan Building, which opened in 1913 (or 1929, depending on which source you check) with theater, commercial and office space.
The theater operated under at least a few names -- Saxony Theatre and Estre Cinema, per MACRIS -- over the years. Cinema Treasures indicates that it closed in the 1980s. Antiquity Echoes says there are 1,700 seats in the auditorium (click that link to see some photos from the now times as well as the past), and that in its heyday the theater featured films, live acts and musical performances.
Cinema Treasures indicates that Fitchburg State University purchased the building in 2018, and that the school began renovations in 2022 with the goal of turning it into a performing arts space. As you can see in the photo above, however, there is a sign under the marquee that indicates, as of late September 2025, CONSTRUCTION STARTING SOON.
In January 2023, the university received $2 million in federal funding "toward the development of a 'black box' theater to be constructed adjacent to the main theater building in the downtown performing arts center," according to this press release fron U.S. Rep. Lori Trahan of Massachusetts. "The new construction will be used for university productions and the public, with the restoration of the historic theater to follow in a future phase of construction."
Fingers crossed.
Just up Main Street is what surely is one of the most beautiful buildings in Fitchburg.
In 1883, George Fay had this Victorian Gothic home built, after he had amassed a fortune through his investments in Massachusetts railroads, per MACRIS. "In 1894, [Fay], along with others, helped establish Burbank Hospital. When he died in 1895 his daughter, Lucy Fay, inherited the $100,000 home and several million dollars. With these funds Lucy helped Fitchburg working girls by providing room and board at several homes belonging to the Helping Hand Society for Working Girls."
Upon marrying and moving to California in 1910, she donated her home to the Park Club, of which her father had been a founding member. One stipulation was that the club change its name to the Fay Club. The stable was converted to a gymnasium.
The organization still exists, although it shut down in 2015, only to reopen the following year. From what I can gather at its web site, the club exists as a place for members to eat, drink and be merry. I suppose there may be charitable efforts made.
Across Main Street is the Classical Revival Fitchburg Gas and Electric Light Company building.
Currently home to Italian eatery Dario's Ristorante, this place dates to 1925 and "is the best example of Neo-Glassical architecture on Main St.," according to MACRIS. The company eventually was merged into Unitil Corp.
A few blocks east, on the north side of the street, is a fantastic former YMCA building.
Completed in 1894, the Y building was originally five stories, according to MACRIS, but two were removed at some point. The facility featured a boy's reading room, an association hall, a gymnasium and bowling alleys, MACRIS indicates. The building was later home to a branch of the Worcester County National Bank. I'm not sure if there are currently any tenants.
Next, I made a quick detour heading south on Putnam Street, and I'm glad I did.
I'm not sure the details of Putnam Street Lanes (how long it's been open, info about the building), but I'm glad it's still in business. Whenever I'm researching towns to explore, I look for diners, old theaters, ghost signs and bowling alleys first.
Speaking of ghost signs:
I passed plenty of old buildings along Main Street, but I only caught sight of one faded advertisement. Located on the side of the Coggshall and Carpenter Block, the sign is unreadable. If anyone can read it or knows the history, let me know.
As for the building, it dates to 1877. Tenants over the decades have included, according to MACRIS: Albee, Lyons & Company, which sold trunks, valises, & bags; LH Pratt & Co, watchmakers and jewelers; the tailor shop of Charles Clement and John Holland; a dry goods store known as Nichols & Frost; Royal Hat Co.; and many more. The upper floor was a hall used by various groups over the years, including Fitchburg Lodge of BPOE 847; the Spanish War Veterans; the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States; Lawrence Ayers Post 794 and the American Legion Post, Fitchburg No. 10.
Current tenants - I'm not sure.
After making that image, I scooted down Mill Street, a pedestrian-only way that skirts behind several Main Street buildings. The street was renovated and decorated by local artists in 2019. I dug the look of Eddy's Music.
I swung up Cushing Street and back to Main Street. The JL African/Caribbean Food Market is located in the Drury Building, at the corner of Blossom Street.
Fred Drury built this place in the 1920s to house his grocery store. Whelan Drug was in this space from the 1930s to 1960s, MACRIS indicates, while St. Paul Catholic Book and Film Center occupied the first floor later in that decade. Upstairs tenants, according to MACRIS, have included the Knight Templars Education Foundation; several attorneys; The Morrill Photography Studio; Fitchburg Conservatory of Music; American School of Music); Gagnon & Fitzpatrick real estate; The Pink Salon beauty Shop; Francis J O'Connell real estate; P Fusco, a music teacher.
My final stop was on Day Street - a former hotel and one-time mansion.
MACRIS doesn't have a lot to say: "Unique (to Fitchburg) row-houses along Cherry Street, and brick mansion and large hotel section along Day Street. Hotel Raymond, named after Raymond Dwyer, was for years most important hotel in town. Henry A. Hatch erected Mansard section along Cherry Street (by 1875)....Hatch ran a grocery business."
The Fitchburg Historical Society Facebook page offers some color commentary: "In the early 1900s the Hotel Raymond at 35-41 Day St. was owned and operated by J. Raymond Dwyer. Besides being the proprietor of the hotel, Dwyer was also in partnership with Andrew H.M.. Hawthorne in owning bowling alleys and pool tables at 16 Putnam St."
So the bowling alley mentioned above has been around for more than 100 years. That's cool to find out.
One more tidbit from that Facebook page: "The Hotel Raymond on Day Street was the playing site of one of the earliest nationally rated chess tournaments held in Fitchburg. The event was the 4th annual Central New England Open Chess Championship, sponsored by the Wachusett Chess Club of Fitchburg, the second-oldest chess club in Massachustts, and held in June 1965 in the hotel's ballroom."
These buildings are now apartments.
