![\"\"](\"http:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/10\/Wisteriahurst.jpg\" "\\"Wistariahurst\\"")
<\/center><\/p>\nWilliam Skinner<\/a>, who left England for America at the age of nineteen in 1843, became a successful silk and saten manufacturer<\/a>. The mills<\/a> of Skinner\u2019s company<\/a>, the Unquomonk Silk Company<\/a> in Williamsburg<\/a> (where his employees lived in a community called Skinnerville), were destroyed<\/a> when the Mill River Dam<\/a> gave way on May 16, 1874. The Holyoke Water Power Company<\/a> then offered Skinner a prime canal site, where he could rebuild his mill<\/a> in Holyoke. They also offered him land to build a house and it was to there that he moved his home<\/a>, called Wistariahurst<\/a>, which he had built in 1868 and which had survived the flood. The house<\/a> still stands at 238 Cabot Street in Holyoke. His company<\/a>, called William Skinner and Sons<\/a> after 1883, was continued by his sons after his death in 1902. It became the largest producer of satin linings in the world. The Skinner family<\/a> were also great philantrophists: William Skinner supported various institutions in Holyoke and donated to Mount Holyoke and Vassar<\/a> Colleges. His daughters, Belle<\/a> and Katherine, founded<\/a> the Skinner Coffee House<\/a> to serve the needs of immigrants who worked in the mills and factories. The Skinner family sold the company in 1961. The house<\/a> remained in the family until 1959, when Katharine Skinner Kilborne<\/a> gave it to the city of Holyoke for cultural and educational purposes<\/a>. It is open to the public<\/a> for tours as the Wistariahurst Museum<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" William Skinner, who left England for America at the age of nineteen in 1843, became a successful silk and saten manufacturer. The mills of Skinner\u2019s company, the Unquomonk Silk Company in Williamsburg (where his employees lived in a community called Skinnerville), were destroyed when the Mill River Dam gave way on May 16, 1874. The Holyoke Water Power Company then offered Skinner a prime canal site, where he could rebuild his mill in Holyoke. They also offered him land to build a house and it was to there that he moved his home, called Wistariahurst, which he had built in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[170,8,56],"tags":[18],"class_list":["post-3435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-holyoke","category-houses","category-second-empire","tag-museum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3435"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3435\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3493,"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3435\/revisions\/3493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mass.historicbuildingsct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}