The Memorial Church Parish House, at 2309 Main Street in Springfield, was built in 1894-1895. Is is a Classical Revival building, designed by Francis R. Richmond. Both Memorial Church and the Parish House were acquired by St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral in 1940. In the 1970s, the Parish House was sold and converted into apartments.
The Village Library Association was founded in South Deerfield in 1871 and in 1893 it became the South Deerfield Village Library, supported by town funds. The library had several homes, moving from a room in a private building to a newly erected room in the Congregational Chapel in 1876, it moved again in 1906 to the ground floor of Tilton’s Grocery Store. Chauncey B. Tilton, a local grocer, had died in 1900. The Supreme Court of Massachusetts later ruled that money he had left for charitable purposes could be used for literary or educational purposes. This enabled the construction of Tilton Library, built in 1915-1916 as a permanent home for the South Deerfield Village Library. In the late twentieth century, Tilton Library merged with Old Deerfield’s Dickinson Library to become the town of Deerfield’s public library.
F.W. Lathrop was a Springfield real estate dealer. In 1899, he supervised the construction of his own house at 188 Sumner Street from plans executed by Carroll H. Pratt, who was the assistant of architect Louis Frank Newman. The house has an American Foursquare form with Colonial Revival and Neoclassical architectural features. The house later became the first home of Sinai Temple, which moved to a new building at 1100 Dickinson Street in 1950. The house was next home to Lubavitcher Yeshiva Academy and then to an artist who ran “The Mansion House” art school in his home. For 17 years the house was owned by the Griffin family and most recently by an owner who in 2003 opened a bed-and-breakfast in the house called the Lathrop House B&B, which closed last year.
Built in 1911, the William May House is a dramatic example of a Neoclassical Revival style residence. The house is located at 150-152 Sumner Avenue in Springfield.
The building pictured above is at 225 High Street in Holyoke, diagonally across the street from city hall. It was built in 1898 and known as the Ball Block (or Realty Building). It was later altered on its lower levels to become the Holyoke National Bank Building. Recently renovated (and winning a Preservation Award from the Massachusetts Historical Commission in 2005) the building is now known as the Latino Professional Building.
The Academy of Music, in Northampton, is a theater built in 1891 and designed by William C. Brockelsby of Hartford, CT. The theater was built in 1891 by philanthropist Edward H.R. Lyman, who gave it to to the City of Northampton the following year. It was the first municipally-owned theater in the nation and continues as a venue for live performances and film screenings.
At 195 State Street (at the corner of Maple Street) in Springfield is the former headquarters building of the Springfield Fire and Marine Insurance Company. The company was founded in 1851 and had previously been located at Fort and Main Streets. Seven private estates were purchased and demolished to make way for the limestone Classical Revival-style structure, completed in 1905 and designed by the renowned architectural firm of Peabody and Stearns. The building was later used as the offices of the Springfield School Department, but due to various problems, including the lack of air circulation in the summer resulting in oppressive heat, the school offices were recently moved elsewhere. Last year, the antiquated building was sold to a developer who will undertake major renovations and convert it into at least 30 market-rate apartments.
