The Hadley Falls Company Housing District is a residential
historic district
A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries or jurisdictions, historic districts receive legal protection from c ...
encompassing a compact tract of factory worker housing in
Holyoke, Massachusetts
Holyoke is a city in Hampden County, Massachusetts, United States, that lies between the western bank of the Connecticut River and the Mount Tom Range. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 38,238. Located north of Springfield ...
. Built in 1847-48, it is one of the earliest and largest surviving examples of company-built worker housing in the state. It includes five rowhouses facing Center, Lyman, Grover, and Canal Streets. The district was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
in 1972.
Description and history
The Hadley Falls Company Housing District is located on the north side of Holyoke's former industrial core. It consists of five brick rowhouses, two of which face each other on Center Street between Canal and Lyman Streets. The other three are adjacent to those two, and face Canal Street, Lyman Street and Grove Street. Each rowhouse has between eight and ten units, and is 2-1/2 stories in height, with a gabled roof. Four of the five buildings have a series of pedimented gable dormers in the roof. Chimneys are set at the ends and at every other party wall, and the unit entrances are grouped in pairs at the other party walls.
The rowhouses were built by the Hadley Falls Mill Company, which was established in 1847 in a bid to recreate the success at Holyoke of the industrialization effort at
Lowell, Massachusetts
Lowell () is a city in Massachusetts, in the United States. Alongside Cambridge, It is one of two traditional seats of Middlesex County. With an estimated population of 115,554 in 2020, it was the fifth most populous city in Massachusetts as of ...
. They were built by engineer John Chase and contractor Charles McClallan. The exteriors were rehabilitated in 1974-75. The buildings were at the time one of the largest concentrations of company-built worker housing anywhere in the state, and were of a notably higher quality than other such housing built in the 1840s and 1850s.
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See also
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References
{{National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts
Historic districts in Hampden County, Massachusetts
National Register of Historic Places in Hampden County, Massachusetts
Buildings and structures in Holyoke, Massachusetts
Geography of Holyoke, Massachusetts
Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts
Company housing