Major Bibliographical References (Cite the books, articles, and other sources used in preparing this form on one or more continuation sheets.) Previous documentation on file (NPS): HPCA # 17137 - preliminary determination of individual listing (36 CFR 67) has been requested - previously listed in the National Register - previously determined eligible by the National Register _ designated a National Historic Landmark _ recorded by Historic American Buildings Survey Primary location of additional data: x Massachusetts Historical Commission/SHPO - Other State agency Federal agency x Local government - University x Other Name of repository: Westfield Atheneum, Westfield, MA; Conn. Valley Hist. Museum, Springfield, MA _ recorded by Historic American Engineering Record # NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 1 HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE The Prospect Hill School, erected in 1897 and expanded in 1919, is an institutional building that retains integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling, and association. It meets National Register Criterion A at the local level for its association with early modern educational reform. It meets National Register Criterion C at the local level as a prominent example of the Colonial Revival style designed by two local architects.
The two-story, brick Colonial Revival structure reflects the evolution of Westfield's school system in the late 19" and early 20"h centuries from a network of ungraded wood-frame one- and two- room district schoolhouses to a modern school system of graded regional elementary schools housed in substantial masonry buildings and providing education according to a uniform community-wide curriculum. The Prospect Hill School served as a focal point for the Prospect Hill neighborhood, which was one of Westfield's first settled areas. Overlooking Depot Square, Westfield's 19th-century transportation hub, the Prospect Hill residential neighborhood developed in tandem with the North Elm Street commercial and industrial district below.
Initially a district of scattered farmhouses, Prospect Hill became home to a succession of immigrant groups, from Irish to Italians to Poles, whose children attended Prospect Hill School and often stayed on in the neighborhood to become lifelong residents. Prospect Hill residents remembered their school as a "second home," which influenced many former Prospect Hill students to seek careers in education (Skantz, Leslie, "Prospect Hill history recorded by 'Bunch," Springfield Republican, Jul 17, 1991). In addition to its role as a neighborhood and community institution, the Prospect Hill School reflects the work of two local architects: Augustus W. Holton (1850-1911) and Malcolm B. Harding (1885-1950).
Working primarily in the Colonial and Classical Revival styles, Holton and Harding both made a specialty of institutional projects and were responsible for several of Westfield's school buildings. Colonial Period (1640-1790) When Englishman William Pynchon traveled west from Roxbury, Massachusetts, in 1636 to establish a settlement along the Connecticut River, one of his goals was to establish a fur trade with the natives of the area. The region known as Woronoco or Wauwunockoo (meaning, according to some sources "it is fat hunting" [Dewey, Ancient Westfield, p. 2; Copeland, Vol. 2, p. 321], and "the country with windings," according to other sources [Lockwood, Vol. 1, p. 31]) quickly attracted Pynchon's attention. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 2 Nestled between the Westfield or "Great" River and the Little River and surrounded by mountains, Woronoco was a rich source of hides and fish. Woronoco (which eventually became Westfield) soon became the western outpost of the Massachusetts colony. While the earliest well- documented European settlement of the area took place around 1658, evidence indicates that there were trading outposts in Woronoco as early as the 1640s (Everts, p. 939, Dewey Ancient Westfield, p. 4). The native peoples, the Woronocos and Pochassics, were members of the Algonquin nation and sold furs and fish to early European traders. Salmon and shad were plentiful in the Westfield and Little Rivers, while Woronoco's forests abounded with fur-bearing game, such as beaver.
The floodplains and escarpments set in the juncture of the Westfield and Little Rivers formed some of Westfield's best agricultural land (Heyl & Hamberg, p. 2). During the late 17" century, Westfield was primarily an agricultural community, producing crops and livestock for its residents' own use as well as raising cattle, which were driven east for the Boston markets. In May 1669, Westfield was incorporated, receiving its name because the new town was the westernmost settlement in the Massachusetts colony. Early transportation routes generally followed native trails. The oldest route through town appears to have been the north-south road leading from Northampton to Hartford, which passed through Westfield along the route taken by today's routes MA 10 and US 202.
In 1673, the highway to Springfield (now US Route 20) was improved, with a new bridge built across the Westfield River at Frog Hole. Westfield's population at that time was about 150. Early development in Westfield was concentrated near the confluence of the Westfield and Little Rivers. Settlers cultivated the fertile topsoil in the broad meadowlands immediately adjacent to the two rivers. In 1671, Thomas Dewey and other early settlers summoned Edward Taylor (1642-1729), a Harvard-trained minister, to become Westfield's first permanent minister. Edward Taylor was a vital force in Westfield's religious life for nearly sixty years. An English-born and Harvard-educated scholar, Taylor was a physician who is also recognized as one of America's finest 17h century poets.
In 1676, when King Philip's War threatened Springfield's outlying settlements, Reverend Taylor was one of several Westfield residents who protested the governor's order to abandon the western settlement and relocate its residents to Springfield's main plantation on the Connecticut River. After 1700, settlement expanded outward from the center of the town. Construction of a new Great River Bridge (Elm Street Bridge) in 1753 improved the link between the north and south sides of (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 3 town. (The bridge was rebuilt again in 1800 when it became a toll bridge.) Westfield's population of 1,324 in 1765 had increased to 2,224 residents in 1790.
Colonial Schools In 1676, Westfield allotted land for its first teacher, Daniel Denton. The earliest schools seem to have been kept in private homes. In 1701, the town had its first schoolhouse, constructed near the meetinghouse on Main Street. A school was established south of the Little River in 1706, first in a private home. By 1716, the southern school had its own schoolhouse as well. Nehemiah Bull, a young minister who came to Westfield to assist the aging Edward Taylor, became the town's grammar school teacher in 1724. The early grammar school appears to have had no fixed location, but was held at different sites throughout the town so that higher learning could be made available to families no matter where they lived. In 1774, the town voted to stop moving the grammar school from place to place.
Settlement of outlying areas was usually followed by the establishment of a district school, whether in a private home or in a building created just for that purpose. By 1731, a school was added at Munn's Brook, and by 1737, a school had been built on the north side of the Westfield River. The latter was the first "Great River" district school. It was the first of the town's district schools to be built in the Prospect Hill area, although its exact location is unknown. Like most Massachusetts towns in the 18th century, Westfield was divided into school districts, with each district managed by a prudential committee elected by the district's residents. Schools were funded partly by monies collected within each district and partly by funds raised town-wide.
This policy meant that schooling throughout the community depended on the financial resources and interest of each individual district, so that the quality of district schools tended to vary widely throughout the town. The situation was not remedied until the mid 19th-century. The closing decades of the 18'h century saw a reconfiguring of school districts and the construction of a number of new schools. By 1794, the town had sixteen districts. In 1818, when town records show a complete list of districts, there were seventeen district schools. Federal Period (1790-1830) After a late 18'-century growth spurt, growth stalled in Westfield during the first two decades of the 19"h century, with the population remaining stable at around 2,100 residents. During most of its early history, Westfield had relied primarily on agriculture for its income.
Historian John Lockwood speculates that the brief check in the town's growth may have been due to a shortage of new arable land. Given the (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 4 mountains hemming Westfield in to the west and east, much of the best agricultural land was probably already under tillage after nearly a 150 years of settlement (Lockwood, Vol. II, pp. 246-247). Recovery was not long in coming, however. In the early 19th century, Westfield began its transition from an agricultural community into an industrial one. The community's new industrial base evolved around three principal products: whips, cigars, and paper.
Early Industrial Period (1830-1870) Transportation, as well as manufacturing, increased Westfield's prosperity. In 1822, Westfield's citizens approved the construction of the Westfield portion of a canal that would join the Farmington Canal to create eighty miles of navigable inland waterways opening to Long Island Sound at New Haven (Lockwood, Vol. II, p. 283). By 1829, the new canal was open from Westfield to New Haven, Connecticut (Lockwood, Vol. II, p. 293), and by 1835 the link between Westfield and Northampton was complete. The new canal brought cheap transportation and gave Westfield a direct link to the sea. During the construction of the canal, Westfield's population began to change to include more and more new ethnic groups. Irish immigrants were brought in to do the heavy labor of digging and masonry work required for canal construction.
Many of them stayed on to work in the new whip and cigar factories (Lockwood, Vol. II, p. 358). The number of Irish residents in Westfield grew to the hundreds, reaching nearly 1,000 by 1850. These new immigrants tended to settle on Meadow Street south of the Westfield In spite of a brief flurry of initial profit, the new canal never achieved its expected success. It was difficult to maintain and was quickly displaced by the railroad, which used some of the canal beds and rights-of-way (Lockwood, Vol. II, pp. 294-298). While the canal was still operating for north-south transportation, the Western Railroad (later the Boston & Albany Railroad) was building an east-west line in the 1840s, opening service from Westfield to Chester in 1841. The Western Railroad linked the town with Springfield to the east and Albany to the west.
By 1852, the Northampton & Westfield Railroad had been formed to build a new rail line along the old canal right-of-way. By 1855, the Canal Railroad (later the Hampshire & Hampden Railroad, and finally the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad) was completed from New Haven to Westfield, although the Northampton branch had not yet been finished. That same year, telegraph service was initiated between Springfield and Westfield (Lockwood, Vol. II, pp. 317-321). (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 5 The coming of the railroads brought commercial development to the North Side.
The two railroads intersected on the north, rather than the south, side of the Westfield River, providing transportation to and from all four compass points. The railroad companies built freight and passenger depots in the shadow of Prospect Hill, near the intersection of North Elm and Pochassic Streets. By 1860, Westfield had a population of 5,055. Westfield's primary economic base was still agricultural, but the manufacture of whips and cigars was rapidly taking over as the town's leading income generators. During the Civil War, the town's industrial base included 22 whip companies, nine cigar manufacturers, four paper manufacturers, a foundry, a distillery, two gunpowder manufacturers, Johnson's organ factory, a gas manufacturer, a machine shop, a steam engine factory, and a carriage maker (Harding, Malcolm B., Jr. "Westfield in the Civil War" in Janes & Scott, pp. 183-184).
Education in the 19t Century As Westfield's population grew, so, too, did its need for schools. One of Westfield's prominent early 19t*-century educational institutions was the Westfield Academy, established by a vote of the State Legislature in 1793 "for the purpose of promoting piety, religion, and morality, and for the instruction of the youth in such languages and such of the liberal arts and sciences as the trustees may direct." The school was a quasi public-private venture. It received some public funding from the state and the town, but was neither free of charge nor open to all applicants. The Academy was the first of its kind in Western Massachusetts. With the Academy serving as an example of the highest academic standards, Westfield's early 19"-century educational advocates continually sought to bring the town's public schools up to a similar level of excellence.
School Committee, and later School Superintendent annual reports document a desire to keep up with the most modern trends in educational facilities and teaching methods and a strong push for excellence and high standards that was frequently at odds with continuing demands for economy from taxpayers. Although the number of district schools providing elementary education had grown, the town's original grammar school appears to have been neglected. In 1818, the state fined the town for not maintaining a grammar school as required by state law. Until the establishment of the community's own high school, town officials often contended that the nearby Academy fulfilled the legal requirement that the town have a school for secondary and college-preparatory education. The Academy, however, was an exclusive private institution, and the state law required provision of public grammar schools.
(continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 6 In 1824, Westfield's first School Committee was formed. However, the committee had little authority to do anything but make recommendations, as ownership and control of the schools continued to lie with the district prudential committees for another forty years. In 1828, with the establishment of Boston English High School, a new form of public secondary education appeared: the first public high school in the The importance of education seemed especially significant to the School Committee in light of Westfield's growing industrial base.
Predicting that New England's agricultural economy would give way to an industrial one, the committee raised concerns that "the natural tendency of the increase of manufactures, without any counteracting influence, is to encourage the growth of ignorance and vice." Anticipating that children who once might have spent their youths growing up on farms would soon be spending their childhood and young adulthood tending machines in factories, the committee warned against allowing Westfield's children "to be herded together, like the operatives of despotic countries, with an imperfect school-education, ignorant, alike, of their duties, and their rights." Without a proper education, children in an industrial society would find that "their evil propensities will increase by contact, and they will become, at once, a disgrace to their friends, and a scourge to their country" (School Committee Report, 1836-1837).
The committee bemoaned the deficiencies of its own common schools, noting that a common school education should be sufficient for most people looking to engage in the "ordinary business of the farmer or mechanic." In reality, the committee claimed, the town's schools did not meet even this standard. Conscientious teachers were stymied by having to deal with too many scholars of varying ages and abilities. The committee recommended establishing high schools as a way to separate the beginning students from the advanced and to provide both with a better education. "...[LJet us have primary schools. Let not their usefulness be perverted, by making them half-and-half high schools, or half-and- half academies, and, in consequence of such perversion, leaving our youth half-and-half educated" (School Committee Report, 1836-1837).
In 1836, the town had a total of about 480 students, with about seventy pupils per school district. The committee suggested that, by employing more women, who were paid less than half of what male teachers received, the teacher-pupil ratio could be reduced and the school year extended. They recommended removing the older pupils to a high school and leaving the younger students to the care of female teachers. The committee concluded by reminding the town that its per-pupil spending was only about 40% of what most towns in the Commonwealth spent. "Let us not be backward," the committee urged (School Committee Report, 1836-37). (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 7 While the School Committee was pleading for a high school, one of Westfield's most significant educational institutions was being created. Boston industrialist Edmund Dwight had offered a $10,000 gitt to establish a state-supported school for teacher training in Massachusetts. State Board of Education Secretary Horace Mann persuaded the legislature to match the donation, and a Normal School was established at Barre's Town Hall in 1839 (Knight, Adeline, "The State Normal School At Westfield," Alma Mater). Presided over by Samuel P. Newman, the Normal School, now Westfield State College, became the first state-sponsored, co-educational teachers' college in the United States.
The death of its president in 1841 put the school into a tailspin and caused its closing. A statewide search began for a new site that was more convenient to rail lines and that could garner matching funds from the host community. Westfield bid on the school, led by Emerson Davis, pastor of the First Congregational Church, former principal of Westfield Academy, and School Committee member, and attorney William Gelston Bates. Davis and Bates won their case, and the new school opened in 1844, sharing quarters with Westfield Academy, and supervised by Davis. Throughout its history, the State Normal School worked closely with Westfield's public schools. In 1846, the construction of the new State Normal School facility on Washington Street included a "Model School" for practice teaching.
About 75 Westfield children from the ages of four to sixteen were taught there, with the town paying the State $1,500 for the cost of managing the model school. A series of model schools, also called observation schools, practice schools, or training schools, were operated by the Normal School through the 19* and well into the 20* century, providing practice teaching opportunities to Normal School students, while relieving the Westfield public schools of a number of surplus pupils. In 1840, the School Committee won over the town's voters to the idea of a high school. Construction plans for the new town hall in 1837 had included provisions for a high school, but the plans do not appear to have been carried out until 1840, when the community voted to finish a room in the new town hall for high school use.
The school seems to have been short-lived, however, or it did not live up to expectations. In its 1854-55 report, the School Committee once again complained of the lack of an adequate high school in town and worried about the condition of the town's primary schools. The committee remarked: "It is evident that our schools are not what they should be...There is nothing attractive about many of our school houses; the location of some of them is very unpleasant; they are small and inconvenient... We recommend that our school system be re-modeled, modernized and adapted to the wants of the age, which can be done, and when done, it will make them more efficient" (School Committee Report, 1854-55). (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 8 The committee argued for a break from the traditional one- and two-room practice of schooling, in which children of all ages and abilities were thrown together with only one teacher to deal with them It has been found by experiment in many towns in the state, that the grading of the schools imparts new life and vigor, especially in those that are required by law to sustain a High School. We recommend, therefore, that first of all, provision be made for a High School, free, like all the others, and open to all the children that have made certain specified attainments at the lower schools...
There should be at least, three grades of schools; (1.) The primary school, in which only the first rudiments shall be taught; (2.) The Intermediate, in which they shall be advanced as far as they now are in our best schools; and (3.) The High School... (School Committee Report, 1854-55, p. 1) The committee also lobbied for an end to prudential committee management of district schools, which made it impossible to ensure a uniform education for all students in the community. The committee concluded its report by recommending the establishment of a high school, the hiring of teachers by the School Committee rather than the prudential committees, and the grading of schools wherever practicable.
The Westfield School Committee's concerns reflected the recent passage of Massachusetts' first compulsory attendance act in 1852, the result of State Board of Education Secretary Horace Mann's efforts to improve education statewide. The new law required children between the ages of eight and fourteen years old to attend at least 12 weeks of school each year, with six of those weeks to be consecutive. (In 1873, the law was updated to require 20 weeks of attendance; truant officers were appointed to enforce the new regulations.) At the time of the School Committee's report, the Prospect Hill School was one of two schoolhouses in the Prospect Hill/Union Street area. The two schools were known as Great River West and Great River East. The Great River West School, located on the Prospect Hill School site, may very well have been one of those "unpleasant...small and inconvenient" schoolhouses.
The two-room, wood-frame schoolhouse had 76 pupils, split into two groups by age during the summer session. Three teachers -- Nancy W. Shepard, Laura E. Fowler, and Maria Dewey -- managed the scholars, who included "two or three troublesome boys." The school was operated at a cost of $247.44 for the year, or about $3.25 per pupil. Great River West School also housed one of Westfield's earliest (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 9 school libraries.
In addition to the subscribers-only Westfield Social Library, two school libraries were set up in Westfield: one on Union Street and one at the Great River West School, where one of the teachers served as librarian (School Committee Report, 1854-55). (The two school libraries were eventually consolidated and given to the Street Improvement Society on Union Street.) In 1855, the town appropriated $1,000 to set up a room in the Town Hall basement for the high school, which ran for two eleven-week terms. That year, there were 920 students in the town's public schools. The School Committee reiterated its recommendation that the Prudential Committees no longer select teachers, but that they yield that task to the town School Committee. In 1855-1856, the number of pupils at Great River West had gone down. Only 58 children studied there, at a cost of $203.
The division of the Great River district into western and eastern schoolhouses had apparently been unpopular with North Side residents, although the School Committee's report does not specify the causes of the dispute. The report simply stated: "The location of the school house has been and still is the occasion of much friction in this district." Perhaps both schools were in bad shape, and the committee sought to consolidate the two to carry out its goal of creating a graded school. The committee recommended: "If Districts No.'s 7 and 8 were again united in one, and a good house was erected on Union St., having a primary and grammar school in the same building, it would put an end to many evils that now exist" (School Committee Report, 1855-56, p. 10). The Committee would struggle for 40 years to see its proposal enacted.
In 1861-1862, a total of 926 scholars attended the town's schools. The School Committee wanted to modernize all schools with the purchases of globes, blackboards, crayons, and maps, but lamented the absence of even such basics as "the water pail and dipper." Rather sardonically, the committee noted that the high school and a new schoolhouse at West Farms were "the only improvement to be reported...other than that which is at work in the natural progress of decay..." With rather satirical optimism, the committee noted that "...
the increasing dilapidation of the school-houses of some of our largest districts we are obliged to accept as the most cheering evidence that something will finally have to be done." The committee went on to give a scathingly humorous description of the state of the district schools before recommending that a town-wide plan be developed for modernizing or replacing decrepit schoolhouses. The committee strongly recommended grading the schools to prevent "scholars of eighteen or twenty years of age" sitting in the same class "with those of four or five" (School Committee Report, 1861-62). The committee continued to complain of district-level hiring of teachers and school management, which led to many inequalities among the district schools. The committee again asked the town to permit (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 10 town-wide management of schools by the committee. With the present system, not only were there no uniform hiring standards, but also no uniform school year. Length of school terms ranged from 15 to 41 weeks. In the Great River West district (Prospect Hill), the School Committee noted problems with overarovidis to Dver ped ar meiveratiated of crow tie eseventy ofive guendes ihly arousc huitefr owearye.
building a new house, and by way of making it easy, it is proposed to divide the district." Attendance at Great River West, the report stated, had been reduced by sickness, which was "clearly traceable to the foul atmosphere of an over-crowded school-room." The committee itself, however, did not favor separation. Instead, they again recommended joining the North Side schools into a single graded school with older and younger scholars taught in separate classrooms (School Committee Report, 1861-62). In 1863, the district management of schools was finally replaced by town-wide management. The committee succeeded in lengthening the school year from six or seven to nine months, and standardized the opening and closing days as well.
The quality of schools had been brought up to a similar level throughout the town, with the committee noting that children "in every part of the town have equal advantages." There was, however, the problem of surrounding towns drawing "away our teachers by offering them higher wages" (School Committee Report, 1863-64). The newly replaced Great River West School (District #8) became known as Prospect Hill, which was the name commonly used by neighborhood residents. Great River East [District #7] became Union Street School. The school had 97 pupils, with one primary class, one intermediate class, and one class of mixed level students (School Committee Report, 1865-1866). In 1866, Westfield had 1,116 students under the age of 15 attending its schools, with 25 district schools taught by 28 teachers.
Attendance had improved, the committee was requesting appropriations to raise teacher salaries to a level competitive with other towns, and "there has been less corporal punishment than formerly." Suspension rather than switching was beginning to be used for disciplinary problems. Although education at the high school level was praised, the school's quarters needed improvement. The grading of schools had become a success, with each grade specializing in a different segment of the child's education. That year, the Prospect Hill School lot was improved with a covering of topsoil and grading, and fencing was proposed for the next year. The school had three teachers at the intermediate and primary levels and one assistant to manage one hundred pupils. In 1867, the school received a new stove, and the school's old wood-burning stove was moved to the Town Hall.
(continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 11 By 1867, Westfield's educational situation had changed so much over the previous generation that the School Committee commented with pride: "[S]uch is the esteem in which our schools are regarded abroad, that many persons move into the town to avail themselves of their advantage, while others manage to send in their children, if they do not come themselves" (School Committee Report, 1866-67). In its 1868-69 report, the committee requested funds to paint all the wood-frame schoolhouses in town, since they had not been painted since the abolition of the district management system.
The high school had become a four-year institution and graduated its first regular class that year. The Prospect Street School by then had 41students in its intermediate class and 50 in its primary class. It had received substantial repairs and improvements totaling $4,646 that year. The town's 1869-1870 School Committee report reflected on the controversial decisions to abolish the district school management system in favor of town-wide management and to tax property to pay for schools, and noted that the decisions had proven wise.
"Parents are flocking here for the education of their children, and many who come here for a temporary residence only, find it for their interest to make Westfield their permanent home." The funding requested for painting schoolhouses had been granted, and workers were beginning to repair the Academy building for the high school's use (School Committee Report, 1869-1870). Late Industrial Period (1870-1910) By 1870, Westfield had a population of 6,679, with nearly 15% of them foreign-born. The town's population had tripled in the previous hundred years. Business districts on both the north and south side of the river did a brisk trade. The 1873 Westfield Directory proudly proclaimed, "A large number of stores, representing diversities of trade, give its business streets a city aspect, and everything betokens thrift and enterprise" (p. 5).
In December 1878, a heavy snowfall followed by a twelve-hour rainstorm swelled the Westfield River. The dike along the river collapsed in several places, sending floodwaters rushing through downtown Westfield, covering an area bounded by School Street, the Westfield River, Elm Street, and Charles Street with three to ten feet of water. The town recovered, however, and through the 1880s, Westfield continued to grow. The Great River Bridge was once again rebuilt, and a new dam and dike constructed to provide waterpower to the factories on the river's banks. Telephone lines were installed in 1880. The 1880-1881 Westfield Directory describes the town in glowing terms: (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section number 8 Page 12 OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA The village is a lively bustling and thriving place, and wears an air of solid thrift and substantial comfort, while its broad, handsome and well shaded avenues -- thickly adorned with stately elms, make it, especially in the mild seasons of the year, a delightfully inviting retreat. ... Westfield is not surpassed by any other village of its size in New England for natural beauty, business enterprise, and congenial society -- all of which combine to give promise to a bright and prosperous future (p. 6). The 1880s saw several new groups of immigrants moving to Westfield. Bohemian Czechs and Slovaks from South and Central Europe came to America, fleeing conscription in the Austrian Empire's military. Many of them found employment in the tobacco industry, either on farms or in factories.
Czech- Americans established their own Bohemian Hall athletic club on Meadow Street. In 1888, Lithuanians joined the Czechs and Slovaks looking to escape religious or political persecution under either Austrian or Russian rulers. The next year, Westfield's first Polish émigré arrived to work on a tobacco farm. Like the early Irish, many of the Polish immigrants settled in the Meadow Street area. Others moved to the north side of town, near the factories where they worked. Prospect Hill residents found jobs in the factories and shops along North Elm Street. Westfield's downtown business district continued to grow through the 1890s.
The 1895 directory conjures up an image of a bustling, diverse retail center: It will be sufficient to say that the retail trade of Westfield meets all the requirements of its rapidly-growing population, so that it will not be found necessary to go outside of its corporate limits for the necessaries or luxuries of life, which are furnished at the lowest New York and Boston prices (p. 89). As the 19" century closed, the "bright and prosperous future" that had been predicted in the 1880-81 directory was firmly grounded in industry, rather than agriculture. In 1897, Westfield added bicycle manufacturing to its industries, becoming home to the Pope Manufacturing Company, which eventually became the Columbia Manufacturing Company. Pope originally made bicycles and motorcycles, but quickly began to specialize in bicycles.
The Woronoco Cycle Company also took advantage of the turn-of-the-century cycling craze. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 13 Education and the new Prospect Hill School As it had periodically before, the School Committee in 1870 once again railed against truancy, citing the Commonwealth's recently passed Truant Laws, which required parents of children fourteen years of age and under to send them to school or be fined up to $20. If appealing to their wallets wasn't sufficient, the committee also appealed to parents' religious sentiments.
"Learning," the committee reminded its readers, "is the handmaid of Christianity." Truants, the committee reminded its readers, fill "our jails and penitentiaries; this class is a moth upon the industry of others, a dead weight upon society." With one-sixth to one-fifth of its student population chronically absent, the committee advocated removing control of truant students from their parents and handing it over to town or state authorities. Another method for dealing with parents unwilling to participate in the education of their children was for the town to purchase and distribute schoolbooks. Previously, parents had been responsible for buying their children's books, although at times the committee had purchased books wholesale to provide to students at a discount. In the 1870-1871 report, however, the committee recommended that the town take over the purchase of schoolbooks.
It would take another fourteen years, however, before the town finally began providing free textbooks to students in 1884, in response to a new state requirement. At Prospect Hill, a well had recently been dug to supply water to the school, "probably the deepest and most expensive one in town." It was the first in a series of wells that were provided for schoolhouses throughout the town (School Committee Report, 1870-1871). In 1871-72, Westfield had 1,212 children attending school. The town's schools had grown to such an extent that the committee recommended hiring a School Superintendent. Two members of the committee opposed this step as premature, objecting to the expense of hiring a person with the proper credentials, and fearing that "an old political hack; broken down minister, lawyer, doctor or teacher, would seek and often obtain the position" (School Committee Report, 1871-72).
The committee majority persisted in its request for nearly twenty years before the town finally approved hiring George H. Danforth as the town's first school superintendent in 1889. In 1875, the School Committee made its first attempt at creating a uniform town-wide curriculum. A set of rules and regulations and course of study was published for the town's teachers. The committee challenged a recent town meeting recommendation to reduce teacher salaries. The committee conducted a study of teacher salaries across the state and concluded that the wages of Westfield's faculty were well below the state average (School Committee Report, 1875-76).
The issue of teacher compensation was an annual source of debate for the community, with school committees and superintendents constantly pleading for higher wages to attract and keep talented teachers, and town residents and officials repeatedly denying those requests. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 14 The old Prospect Hill School was in adequate, though not ideal, condition in the 1870s. According to the 1876-77 School Committee Report, "The house on Prospect Hill is not a "thing of shows that Prospect Hill teacher Mrs. F. A. Dewey earned extra money by cleaning the school (School Committee Report, 1876-1877).
By 1880, Prospect Hill School's slate roof was leaking and needed to be re-laid, and blackboards needed to be re-slated (School Committee Report, 1880-81). In 1886, the relocation of Montgomery Street left the Prospect Hill School sitting on the edge of a steep gravel bank and facing the wrong way. The old wooden building was moved to orient it along the new road, and the site was re-graded. The $1,300 project also paid for the school to be repaired and painted. The re-grading and landscaping provided the school with an acre and a half of tree-shaded land (School Committee Report, 1886-87). State and local laws relating to school attendance reflected concerns for both public safety and limited concerns for child labor. By 1890, all students were required to have vaccination certificates and were not to attend school if they had a contagious disease.
All children from eight to fourteen years old were required to attend 30 weeks of school each year. Ten absences unrelated to illness were permitted; parents who kept their children out of school more than ten days could be fined up to $20. Children under thirteen could not work in factories, shops, or stores while school was in session (when school was out, however, there were no restrictions on child labor). Children under the age of sixteen needed an "employment ticket and certificate" to work, which could only be obtained with the permission of the child's father. Illiterate children under the age of fourteen could not work at all unless they also attended school, either in the day or evening. By the 1890s, Westfield's public school system was once again stretched to its limits. In 1890, Westfield had a population of 9,805, with a school-age population of 1,590.
The student population had increased an average of about 50 students per year over the previous five years. Additional desks were crammed into existing schools to accommodate additional pupils, and students were transferred from crowded schools to less crowded ones. Superintendent G. H. Danforth noted that it was only the opening of the Model School at the State Normal School that relieved some of the pressure. The school system was in a crisis. While the student population was growing, appropriations for schools had decreased every year from 1892 to 1894.
The committee presented their dilemma thus: We recognize the need of rigid economy in view of the heavy expenses necessarily incurred in the administration of town affairs, but at the same time we realize that it is false economy to endanger the health of our children and to limit the efficiency of our schools by crowding more pupils in a building than sanitary laws allow.... We therefore (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 15 recommend the immediate erection of a six-room building on the north side of the river, n accordance with general plans which we shall be ready to present at the adjournes own meeting in April (School Committee Report, 1894-95, p.
9) At the 1896 town meeting, the town declared its agreement with the School Committee and Superintendent Danforth. $18,000 was appropriated for an eight-room schoolhouse (the new Prospect Hill School) on the north side of the river. A building committee of five members was appointed. The selected architect was Augustus W. Holton (1850-1911) of Westfield, "who has given careful and conscientious supervision to the erection of the building." Herder C. Wood (d. 1941) of Westfield was hired as the building contractor, with Thomas Little (1839-1914) as masonry subcontractor. Lambson & Rothery provided woodwork and furnishings, and Westfield merchants Snow & Hays supplied curtains. After some initial debate over the building's site, construction began.
The School Committee expected that the new school would "be the best school building, outside of the High School, in the Town, and from its location, upon the elevation where it stands, will be conspicuous as a testimonial to the generosity of the citizens of Westfield and of their loyalty to her schools." The new school was expected to seat 294 students from the Prospect Hill and Union Street districts, for an average of about thirty-seven students per classroom (School Committee Report, 1896-97, p. 6). Augustus W. Holton was one of Westfield's most prominent architects, and appears to have learned his trade partly through working as a carpenter's apprentice and partly through self-training. Born in Northfield, Massachusetts, in 1850, Holton came from a family with a long history in New England. Holton's father was a farmer and a carpenter.
Following in his father's footsteps, Holton apprenticed as a carpenter when he was seventeen, learning from Jonathan Turner of Keene, New Hampshire. Upon turning twenty, Holton bought out Turner's business, running it for a short while before moving to Springfield, Massachusetts, where he continued as a carpenter for about two years. In 1872, Holton moved to Westfield, where he worked for furniture maker C. K. Lambson and at the Johnson organ factory. He moved on to work for mason T. J. Green before setting up his own office in the Parks Block on Elm Street. Holton was active in town government, serving as Assessor in 1894 and as a School Committee member from 1904 to 1910. He was also a director of the Westfield Co-operative Bank and chairman of the Security Committee.
According to the profile of him written for Biographical Review, "He was gifted by nature with great mechanical ability and the quick eye and artistic perceptions of one born to the trade; and during the years he has been engaged in his chosen work he has made a constant and thorough study of the art of building, and has proved himself a competent and skilled workman" (Biographical Review, p. 83). He specialized in institutional and commercial buildings, with projects that (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 16 included the Colonial Revival Pine Street School in Northfield (now the Northfield Historical Society Museum, ca.
1903, NR); the Colonial Revival Deacon Elwin Hills House (26 College Highway, Southwick, 1906); the Romanesque Revival Ashley Street School (Westfield, 1898; Holton featured this school in many of his advertisements in the Westfield City Directory); the Romanesque Revival Saint Mary's Parish School (1898, Bartlett Street, Westfield); the Lozier Auto Plant (Cycle Street, Westfield, ca. 1900); the Italianate ca. 1900 Bismarck Hotel (16 Union Ave., Westfield); the Renaissance Revival Westfield YMCA (105-109 Elm Street, ca. 1900, NRDIS), and his own elaborate Italianate house at 71 Orange Street (Westfield, ca. 1880), described in Biographical Review as "a very pleasant, modern-built residence" (p. 84). Builder Herder Cutler Wood (d. 1941) was one of the most prosperous contractors in western Massachusetts.
In addition to the Prospect Hill School, he built Drury High School in North Adams, the North Adams Post Office, Westfield's Ashley Street School, and the Granville Library. Besides his Westfield operation, he set up a contracting business in Portsmouth, Rhode Island. Like Holton, Wood was active in town affairs, serving on the Board of Assessors from 1925 to 1938. During his tenure on the Board, Wood was credited with creating a comprehensive map of all properties in the city (Springfield Daily News, 12 Feb 1941, p. 22). Mason Thomas Little (1839-1914) was a Brooklyn native who moved to Westfield with his family at the age of thirteen. He apprenticed with Westfield mason and brick manufacturer L. B. Walkley until the Civil War, when both Walkley and Little enlisted in the Union Army.
Little served on Westfield's town Appropriation Committee and on the Board of Water Commissioners and was a director of the Westfield Power Company and the Westfield Co-operative Bank (Springfield Union, 25 Jul 1919, p.4). The new Colonial Revival Prospect Hill School was 2½ stories in height, with a hipped roof and twin gabled pavilions at the front façade. A slightly recessed entryway between the pavilions was shaded by a small columned and pedimented portico. The brick building was trimmed with rough-cut sandstone water table, lintels, and sills. The school opened in time for the 1897-1898 school year, with a student body of 300 occupying seven of the eight new rooms. Seven teachers were in charge of classes from grade one to nine.
The School Committee concluded: "Never in the history of our schools have they held a higher place in the estimation of our people than at present, and never have they been more worthy of it" (School Committee Report, 1897-98, p. 7). The workmanship in the new school was not exemplary, however. In 1901, defective ceiling plaster in the new school needed replacement. Architect Holton was called back to take care of the work, along with mason Thomas Little. The next year, it was discovered (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 17 that the sewer line had been improperly laid out, and had to be replaced at a cost of about $100.
In 1907, the school had more problems with defective plaster ceilings, which were replaced with metal ceilings. Superintendent Danforth saw the new Prospect Hill School as the beginning of the transformation of Westfield's public school system from a network of ungraded one- and two-room wood-frame choolhouses packed with students of all ages and levels to a smaller group of consolidated grade hools with substantial masonry construction and small class sizes. In his report for 1896-97, th Superintendent outlined his standards for classroom size and level; he wanted no more than two grades to a room, with no more than 45 pupils per room. He proposed replacing all one- and two-room schoolhouses with larger structures of at least four rooms, and for kindergartens to be established (School Committee Report, 1896-97, p. 20).
Superintendent Danforth envisioned Westfield's schoolrooms as more than utilitarian spaces. Space, light, and ventilation were important, he argued, but so was beauty. Schools should do away with the "non-artistic and often positively ugly school room of the past." Not only fine woodwork in trim and desks (perhaps like that provided by Lambson at the Prospect Hill School), but "artistic treatment" of walls and ceilings was called for with "harmonious colors suited to the conditions of light being substituted for the plain white and for the more objectionable crude coloring which sometimes displaced it. Add good pictures and your school rooms may become positively beautiful, and therefore more useful in the best sense" (School Committee Report, 1896-97, p. 24). Prospect Hill's spacious, high-ceilinged rooms, well-lit by banks of windows, no doubt met with his approval.
In 1900, with a total population of 12,310, Westfield had 2,068 children between the ages of five and fifteen. A total of 1,902 of those children attended public schools, 257 went to parochial schools, and 149 went to the Model School at the State Normal School. The town had 22 schoolhouses with a total of 74 rooms. One hundred and eight students went to evening school, with 75 of them over the age of fifteen. In 1900, Westfield expended $45,499.57 in tax revenues on its public schools, placing it roughly in the middle of spending for towns of similar size throughout the state. That year (1900), School Superintendent Danforth was succeeded by Stanley H. Holmes. With the assistance of the State Normal School, Holmes instituted a program to standardize the curriculum for schools throughout town, using the Normal School's Model Training School curriculum as a prototype.
He recommended creating a school lunch program. He proposed further consolidation of rural districts, with students from Pochassic School to be sent to Prospect Hill and East Farms students shifted to Middle Farms and Prospect Hill. Prospect Hill now had a kindergarten, with two teachers in charge of the class (School Committee Report, 1900-01). (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 18 In 1902, just five years after opening and two years after getting its kindergarten, Prospect Hill was already crowded. Its kindergarten class moved to a rented building on Columbia Street, off North Elm Street.
Even without the kindergarten, the school was above its capacity, with classes ranging from 27 to 54 students, for a total of 363 pupils (School Committee Report, 1902-03). In 1902, Superintendent Holmes looked back with pride on improvements made the previous year. Total expenditures from all sources for schools had tripled in the two decades from 1880 to 1902, going from $19,122.86 to $61,797.60, with the town spending $16.45 per student in 1880 and $33.87 per pupil by 1902. Holmes looked forward to re-equipping the schools with new adjustable chairs and desks, and new blackboards for the older schools. Elementary school structure had been changed from nine grades plus kindergarten to eight grades plus kindergarten.
Holmes concluded his report by saying, "We have conditions in our schools to-day, which, if not ideal, are at least excellent - good buildings, good equipment, modern text-books, a strong teaching force, a well arranged and well adapted course of study - a loyal and appreciative public sentiment and generous financial provision. For several years to come the aim of the school management should be not to introduce further innovations or radical changes, but to let well enough alone, and to so direct the school work as to get the largest and best results under the present conditions, and increase their capacity for useful service" (School Committee Report, 1902-03, p. 17). Prospect Hill by this time had 369 students, and once again had a kindergarten, albeit a small one of only nine pupils. The rest of the school's classes ranged from 29 to 54 students.
The eight-year-old school was well beyond its capacity of 294 pupils. The Superintendent's report described its "upper four grades in particular being taxed to their utmost capacity" (Westfield Town Report, 1905-06, p. 187). That same year, a law was passed raising the age of compulsory school attendance for illiterate children from fourteen to sixteen. With a population of 13,610, the town now had a school population of 2,285. In 1907, both the School Committee and superintendent commented on Westfield's growing immigrant population. The School Committee reminded taxpayers: "The importance of the school system and its possibilities for good are enlarged in these days of unusual immigration" (Westfield Town Report 1906-07, p. 170).
Superintendent Simmons wrote about the problems created by the "rapidly increasing population, the influx of many nationalities of diverse characteristics and customs, the necessity for their assimilation into our body politic, the more complex and exacting conditions of life." (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 19 Early Modern Period (1910-1958) During the early 1900s, Westfield began to see itself as a city rather than a town. Business and industry, rather than agriculture, had dominated its economy for several decades. Concerns for civic health, improvement, and beautification prompted the establishment of a town Planning Board in 1914.
In 1920, a charter committee successfully presented a proposal to Westfield voters, and the town officially became a city, with a population of 18,604 (Adams, James R. "Westfield History 1920-1940" in Janes, pp. 304-305). With the turn of the 20th century, the population mix on Prospect Hill had changed from primarily Yankee to a mixture of Irish, Italian, and Polish residents, most of whom worked in the shops and factories on and around North Elm Street. In a 1969 reminiscence of life in the North Side in the 1890s and early 1900s, former Mayor George W. Searle recalled a prosperous business district along North Elm Street below Prospect Hill, with St. John's drug store, the Greek Revival Foster House, the Bay State Hotel, Jesse Cleary's barber shop, a hardware and farm machinery store, Joel Clark's grocery store, a restaurant, a blacksmith shop, livery stables, Henry G.
Taylor's tobacco warehouse, and a fire station. The neighborhood's changing ethnic mix was reflected in the names of its businesspeople, with the Italian community represented by cobbler Rocco DePopolo and barber Manuel Pachico, and Irish represented by butchers Ben Callahan and John Shea, barbers John Teahan, Jesse Cleary, and John Kelly, and saloon keeper Joe McGowan (Searle, "The North Side," in Janes & Scott, pp. 407-410). In 1920, Westfield's new mayor faced a severe challenge. By the end of World War I, the industries which had fostered Westfield's growth were struggling to survive. The coming of the automobile made the whip industry obsolete (Heyl & Hamberg, p. 15). By fall of 1921, about 15% of the male population was unemployed.
Industrial activity through the 1920s was mixed, as manufacturers throughout New England began to feel pressure from companies taking advantage of cheaper, non-union labor in the South. Some companies moved South; others closed altogether. Referring to the recent "industrial depression," in January 1922, Mayor Searle noted that revenues from water bills had fallen off because the consumption of water had declined with the closing of some factories. The City Almoner commented that the industrial depression had strained poor relief resources, with 565 persons needing assistance due to unemployment (Westfield Town Report, 1921-22). In 1927, a national building slowdown affected local manufacturers, and the plants began to reduce workweeks and lay off workers. By 1930, with the onset of the Great Depression, more than 800 men were out of work in Westfield. The City Almoner, Morrell H.
Moore, noted that providing reliet to the unemployed was growing more and more difficult as cases became more numerous. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 20 Federal and state projects under the auspices of the CWA, ERA, WPA, and CCC went some way toward relieving the unemployment situation. Expansion of the State Sanatorium, bridge building, an armory, and a CCC camp on Hampton Plains to deal with gypsy moths were among the projects that brought jobs to Westfielders, but industrial jobs continued to go elsewhere. Major floods in 1936 and 1938 hit Westfield and the rest of Hampden County hard.
While the rising Westfield River closed the Great River Bridge in both cases, damage along Elm Street appears to have been limited. The worst flooding occurred to the east of the central business district. Perched high above Union Street, the Prospect Hill neighborhood was spared any major damage. Like most communities, Westfield made a turnaround with the coming of World War II. The war years brought some jobs back to town, although a few businesses had to cut production because they could not get materials. The surplus of workers quickly became a shortage. Stanley Home Products expanded, taking over the former Textile Manufacturing Company plant on North Elm Street; bicycle manufacturer Columbia Manufacturing shifted to bomb making and won an Army-Navy E Award for its war production, an accomplishment quickly repeated by American Abrasive. United States Whip Company (U.S.
Line Company) went from making fishing lines to producing nylon and silk cord for parachutes and silk and nylon surgical sutures. After the war, Westfield's manufacturing sector seemed diverse and prosperous. Producers of boilers, radiators, bicycles, and paper products were still going strong, as were textile and thread manufacturers. Other products included brushes, mops, fish lines, celluloid products, brick, boxes, grinding wheels and abrasives, hardware, greeting cards, precision tools, plumbing supplies, electrical motors, and even prefabricated houses. Brick, lumber, and woodworking products were also being made, and the city's marble quarries were still in business. Prospect Hill School The 20"* century witnessed an expansion in the roles of public schools. Schools were now seen as responsible for children's physical health as well as their intellectual well-being.
Annual eye and ear testing of students began in 1906. Referring to a 1906 state law requiring school committees to appoint one or more school physicians, Simmons urged the town to comply with the law, arguing its wisdom in preventing the spread of infectious diseases and alerting parents to possible health problems in their children (Westfield Town Report, 1906-07). With its 1908-09 annual report, the School Committee began to look beyond the school buildings and out to the schoolyards. Noting a recent trend to encourage pupils to use schoolyards as playgrounds, (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 21 the committee recommended making schoolyards larger and more pleasant, with the addition of shade trees, lawns, and space for ball playing, swings, lawn tennis, and other games. Simmons referred to a recent Massachusetts statute requiring towns with populations over 10,000 to maintain at least one playground. He argued strongly for the benefit of playgrounds in preventing delinquency and improving the health of Westfield's children. In its 1909-1910 report, the School Committee pronounced an experimental playground set up at the Bartlett Street School a success and recommended that playgrounds be created at other schools as well. In 1909, Prospect Hill had nearly 400 students.
The School Committee's 1910-1911 report noted that Prospect Hill needed two teachers in some of its classrooms to handle the number of students. With the prospect of an H. B. Smith foundry expansion on the north side of the river attracting new residents to the area, the committee feared the school would be overwhelmed. Even without the foundry expansion, the committee worried that another room would need to be opened in the nearby Union Street School to handle the overflow from Prospect Hill. Although the committee hoped that the imminent opening of a parochial school connected with Holy Trinity Church would help matters, it would only be a temporary fix and a poor policy to rely on "private enterprise to furnish school facilities." With a population of 16,044 in 1910, Westfield had 2,820 children attending schools, with 75 teachers now employed (Westfield Town Report 1910-11, p. 188).
In 1912, James A. McDougall replaced Simmons as School Superintendent. That year, school attendance became mandatory for all employed illiterates below the age of twenty-one. The new law increased attendance at the evening school, which included courses at the new Industrial School. New classes were added to prepare immigrants for citizenship (the state would eventually provide funds for citizenship classes in 1919). In its annual report for that year, the School Committee noted that the school census had risen from 2,099 to 2,888 children in the previous ten years. The Prospect Hill School was so crowded that hallways were being used as classrooms. With a capacity of 280 students (by McDougall's figures), the school had 419 pupils.
Student numbers at Prospect Hill had fluctuated from 345 to a high of 466 over the previous ten years, and had not met McDougall's figure of 280 since the school opened (Westfield Town Report, 1912-13). In 1913, the town voted funds to build two new schools, including one on Prospect Hill, and to grant teachers their long-awaited raises. The overcrowded schools resulted in "impure air, nerve tension and brain fag on the part of teachers and children," according to Superintendent McDougall. Prospect Hill School was not expanded for another six years. Upon reviewing the recent census data, McDougall discovered that about half of school-age children under fourteen had non-English speaking parents. He stressed the importance of teaching them the fundamentals of the American political system as well as the English language.
The evening school, which had begun with a majority of American born students, (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 22 was increasingly becoming a school for immigrants trying to learn English and prepare for citizenship. Only thirteen American-born students attended in 1913. The majority (197) were Poles, with Italians a distant second at 38.
The remaining students were a mix of Bohemians, Slovaks, Germans, Greeks, Hungarians, Russian Jews, Lithuanians, Danes, Finns, and Ruthenians from Galicia (Westfield Town Passage of a new child labor law in 1913 compelled children between fourteen and sixteen years of age to be either at school or at work, making for erratic educations for children who only went to school between periods of employment and did not attend the evening schools as required. That same year, the state legislature instituted a Teachers' Retirement Law to provide pensions for teachers over the age of 70.
A bill providing for permanent tenure for teachers who had served one year and been re- appointed was also passed, though it was less well-received by the School Superintendent, who noted that there was no provision for "the elimination of the inefficient." (Westfield Town Report 1913-14) A new facet in outdoor education was added with the institution of a school garden at the Prospect Hill School. Foundry H. B. Smith Company donated an acre of land for that purpose. McDougall was cautiously optimistic about the experiment, expressing concerns about "boys and young men who generally do not consider it anything out of the way to destroy gardens and fruit trees." Students who worked in the garden would be allowed to keep the produce that they grew. McDougall saw the garden as a way to introduce students to agricultural work as a possible future career (Westfield Town Report 1913-14, p.
204). The addition of playgrounds and gardens to school yards and an increasing interest in health programs for students were part of a national trend that began to regard healthcare and physical education as important school functions. In 1914, McDougall was replaced by C. Edward Fisher as School Superintendent. Fisher complained that no grade schools except for the new Abner Gibbs School had either hot running water or artificial light. Westfield's student population had grown to 3,834, including children at the State Sanatorium, showing gains ranging from 40 to 65 students a year. In order to accommodate the Prospect Hill overflow, the town rented the basement of the Lutheran Church and a store at a cost that, according to Fisher's estimates, would be sufficient to pay for an addition to Prospect Hill.
Spending on education in Westfield had fallen far behind state averages, with Westfield spending $28.45 per pupil, compared to an average of $37.64 state-wide and $46.43 in nearby Springfield. Westfield ranked 193rd in the state in per-pupil spending. Fisher expressed concerns over the high costs of transportation, whether by streetcar or wagon. He also worried over the adequacy of the annual medical inspection, advising the town to hire a school nurse to make better use of the inspection funds. Fisher recommended new schoolhouses near Main and (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 23 Elm Streets, portable schoolhouses for the Franklin, Ashley, and Davis Schools, the purchase of land on Bartlett Street for school construction, electrifying and providing hot running water to all schools. The construction of an addition to Prospect Hill School for manual training, kindergarten, cooking, and sewing classes, was also part of his recommendation. He also recommended adding a sidewalk, curbing, and fencing at Prospect Hill School, citing dangers from the four-way intersection and horse traffic that frequented a nearby watering trough (Westfield Town Report, 1914-15). Fisher set up a system of standardized testing, using a test he had developed himself in order to encourage a more uniform curriculum.
He recommended buying dictionaries for all grammar school students, and reported that the Athenaeum had agreed to add a copy of every public school textbook in use to its collection. In 1915, the first diplomas were granted to eighth-grade students, complete with graduation ceremony. About three-quarters of eighth-grade students graduated. The PTA had assisted by raising funds for a hot lunch program at the new Moseley School, installation of electric lights at Court Street and Ashley Street Schools, and the purchase of Victrolas for Court Street, Ashley Street, and Prospect Hill Schools (Westfield Town Report, 1915-1916). In 1915, a Superintendent of Buildings was appointed for the School Department, providing a full-time person to manage maintenance and new construction. By this time, the Prospect Hill School had 499 students, an average of more than 60 students per room.
Commenting on the continuing problem with overcrowding at Prospect Hill School, Fisher complained in his 1915 report that a store had to be rented to accommodate the kindergarten, and that the sidewalk and curbing he had requested earlier had still not been installed. Superintendent Fisher called for the Superintendent of Buildings to oversee a complete overhaul of all school buildings to put them "in first class condition." C. Nelson Seymour, the new building superintendent, made a long list of recommendations for Prospect Hill: improved fire alarms, metal ceilings in the basements, new floors in corridors, new treads on stairs, new blackboards, metal weather-stripping on windows, electric lights, new coal bins, the addition of eaves troughs and snow guards, and new sidewalks (Westfield Town Report 1915-16, p. 219).
In 1918, Seymour reported the completion of the work, with installation of metal ceilings in the basement, additional electrical work, resurfacing of sidewalks, and new window shades. In his 1916-1917 report, Fisher pointed out that over the previous decade, Westfield's school population had increased 42%, in contrast to a statewide average of 22%. Yet Westfield's per-pupil expenditure was still 202'd out of 353 towns. Still, he believed that Westfield's students made a strong academic showing, thanks to a uniform town-wide curriculum. He cited academic achievements and improvements in the physical fitness of students due to improved playground facilities and sports equipment. In order to improve monitoring of student health, Fisher requested that the part-time school (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 24 nurse be made full time. Fisher recommended reorganizing the school system with institution of a junior high, for a "six-three-three" plan (six years of grade school, three years of junior high, and three years of high school). At Prospect Hill, the kindergarten class was still housed in a store because the school building vas overcrowded, even though enrollment had been reduced to 348 with the opening of the nearb: 1oseley School. But the Superintendent of Buildings reported that many of the improvements he ha proposed had been made, including new coal bunkers, fire alarms, electric lighting, and the painting and varnishing of walls and woodwork, at a cost of $779.66.
In the 1917-1918 School Committee report, overcrowding at Prospect Hill was again lamented. The student body had grown again to 368 students. Weather-stripping had been added to increase the fuel efficiency of the school. Superintendent Fisher again recommended the addition of metal ceilings in the Prospect Hill basement and the installation of new radiators to save on fuel. In 1918, Fisher was replaced as Superintendent by Chester D. Stiles. With America's involvement in World War I, Stiles ordered a change in curriculum so that upper grades could study the geography and history of the conflict, and he suggested that arithmetic problems center around Liberty Loans and War Savings Stamps. Stiles also promoted increasing the courses in domestic science available for girls, especially in light of the food conservation and rationing programs then in place.
In order to improve the quality of medical inspections, Stiles recommended hiring a full-time school physician. Stiles resurrected Fisher's plan for standardized testing, but with nationally developed tests. He began the use of Courtis Arithmetic Tests, Ayres Spelling and Writing Tests, and Thorndyke English tests in Westfield's schools (Westfield Town Report 1918-19). The School Committee wrote with pride in its 1918 and 1919 reports that it had never requested special town meetings for budget woes and had always managed to work within its budget. It emphasized that, even though it had taken great efforts to economize, all the buildings were now in good condition, though repairs were anticipated to keep them so for the coming years.
The committee went on to complain of the compulsory attendance laws that sent children to school sporadically from the age of fourteen on, if they were temporarily out of work, and recommended that the age of constant attendance be raised to fifteen or sixteen. In 1919, Prospect Hill School grew yet again, with an addition at the front that created a new façade, still in the Colonial Revival style. The addition cost $26,577.05 and was designed by Malcolm B. Harding (1885-1950), who received $1,483.30 for his services. (Although the architect is not named in the report, a payment to Malcolm Harding is listed in the 1919-1920 Treasurer's report; the amount (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 25 matches that listed for "Architect's fees" in the Prospect Hill School figures.) The addition included two new classrooms and an auditorium. In the 1919-1920 report, the new Prospect Hill addition was praised as "not only improv[ing] the appearance of the former building but it makes ample provision for conditions in the Prospect Hill section for many years to come." A new boiler greatly improved winter comfort, and a new assembly hall "will be one of the finest in town and will render that section of the community a special service, both to the pupils and the public" (Westfield Town Report, 1919-1920, pp. 179-180).
At Prospect Hill in 1921-1922, $701.73 was spent to complete the new addition with painting and the installation of additional electric lights. The school now accommodated 407 pupils. Superintendent Stiles recommended adding manual training and domestic science to the curriculum at the newly renovated Prospect Hill School. He also recommended creation of a summer school to deal with children working below their grade level. Born in Hatfield in 1885, architect Malcolm B. Harding moved with his family to Southwick and attended Westfield High School. After graduating, he moved to Springfield and worked as a draftsman for architects E.C. and G.C. Gardner. He furthered his architectural apprenticeship in New York City, where he worked for Dodge & Momson and studied at the Pratt Institute and Columbia University. He moved to Westfield in 1914, becoming a partner in the firm of Fowle & Harding.
West Springfield High School was his first design project. Harding seems to have made a specialty of designing public schools. He also designed Westfield's High School, the Fort Meadow School (1916, White Street), Longmeadow's Center Elementary School (1928, 811 Longmeadow Street, Colonial Revival), the Russell Elementary School (1923, NR, now the Russell Library and Fire Station, 162 Main Street, English Revival), and the Art Deco Southwick Consolidated School (1927, 456 College Highway, now the Southwick Community Center). Non-academic buildings in Westfield include the Westfield Women's Club (1926, 28 Court Street), the new Westfield Athenaeum building (1927, 6 Elm Street), the Third National Bank (1924, 8 Elm Street), and the White apartment block (1919, 32 Noble Avenue), all in the Classical Revival or Colonial Revival styles.
Harding also designed the Granville Town Hall (1927, Colonial Revival). Harding also guided development in the city, serving on Westfield's Board of Survey and Building Code Board of Appeals (Westfield News Advertiser, Feb 3, 1950, p. 3). The renovated school continued to be a focus for the Prospect Hill neighborhood. By now a predominantly Irish enclave that also included a small number of Polish and Italian residents, the neighborhood had developed an identity as a close-knit working-class community. The school's new meeting hall gave the building an added dimension as a community center. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 26 By the 1921-1922 school year, concerns about the health of Westfield's children prompted several changes. The schools' healthcare staff included a nutrition worker, a school nurse, examining physicians, and a dental clinic. Arrangements were made to provide students with milk from the Farmers' Cooperative Milk Exchange and crackers from the National Biscuit Company for healthy snacks. ectures on nutrition and proper hygiene were added to the school curriculum, and posters promotin ood health were displayed in the schools. Two special health classes were organized, one at the Abne Gibbs School, and one at Prospect Hill, because of the large percentage of underweight children in both schools.
Home visits were also made to students of particular concern. In the 1922-1923 school year, the health program was increased by addition of hot lunches at Abner Gibbs, Moseley, and Prospect Hill Schools. The dental clinic, established in May 1921, examined 1,918 children and found that more than 75% of them needed dental treatment. Those who could not afford a regular dentist were treated by the school clinic (Westfield Annual Report, 1921-22, p. 220). With residential development moving further from the city center, school transportation was a continuing problem. School wagons and buses were usually full, and trolley transportation was getting expensive. Stiles recommended adding more buses to deal with the problem. He also recommended providing a car for the Superintendent of Buildings. By the 1923-1924 school year, Prospect Hill had 400 pupils enrolled in ten classes.
The city as a whole had 4,823 school-age children, a larger school enrollment than similarly sized communities throughout the state. In his report for that year, Superintendent Stiles noted the importance of extension and evening trade courses for career education. He recommended adding vocational education to the grammar and high school curricula. He also proposed using the Continuation School for placement of girls and boys with employers. Noting the crowding at all school levels, he recommended construction of a new high school and using the old high school building for a junior high school and for manual training, domestic science, and for the academic classes of the Continuation School. Stiles addressed the role of the schools in meeting students' healthcare as well as job training needs.
He praised the success of the recently instituted medical inspections at controlling contagious disease and providing an early warning system for identifying sick and needy children. Chapter 71 of Mass. General Laws had recently been changed to require "indoor and outdoor games and athletic exercise" in the public schools and the appointment of a director of physical education. Stiles recommended that these requirements be attended to quickly in order not to risk losing state funding. (Westfield Annual Report, 1923-1924). (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 27 While the census had shown an increase of four percent in population from 1920 to 1925, the school population had increased nine percent. Classes generally had 42 pupils or more, up to a high of 58, at a time when school officials recommended maximum class sizes of 35 students. Schools had been filled to capacity for several years, and the high school was so crowded that classes were conducted in split hifts. or a "two platoon svstem. Dofer oraiteo platotne y arem iKeite lyrneled aharoi ite saere aeceolear or our sceror ee vere no conspiring to defeat the calculations of men" (Westfield Annual Report, 1923-24, p. 28).
By 1925, with its addition only five years old, Prospect Hill's lower four grades were crowded. Superintendent Stiles suggested reopening the old Union Street School to remedy the situation. In his 1927 report, the School Superintendent compared schools of 1927 with those of 40 years earlier. A larger percentage of school-age children were actually attending school, with a school year nearly 40 days longer than that of the 1880s.
The basic curriculum of the "three R's," supplemented with a little geography, history, and science, and, if the student was lucky, perhaps some art and music, had expanded to include literature, government, citizenship, "morals and manners, nature study, cooking, sewing, manual training or industrial arts, thrift, safety first, accident and fire prevention, health and physical education." Pedagogy that had focused on memorization had changed to emphasize "developing higher moral character, better health habits, civic efficiency, command of fundamental processes, worthy home membership, vocational efficiency and wholesome use of leisure time" (Westfield Annual Report, 1926-27, p. 35). In 1928, Mayor Putnam reported the addition of more sidewalks on Montgomery Street and paving Crown Street in the Prospect Hill area.
In 1928 and 1929, Pochassic Road was paved between Parker and Atwater Streets, and the northern end of Montgomery Street resurfaced with new gravel (Westfield Town Reports, 1927-29). When the high school moved out of its Broad Street building in 1930, a new intermediate school moved in. The old high school building was immediately condemned by the intermediate school's principal as being too small and ugly. This change was the culmination of a trend toward eliminating one- room rural schools and consolidating district schools into larger regional or city-wide schools, a process that had begun with the construction of Prospect Hill School in 1897. By 1931, only a single one-room schoolhouse remained in the city, and Superintendent Stiles recommended closing that one (Westfield Town Reports, 1929-31).
With the Depression, Superintendent Stiles recommended keeping children in school longer so that they would be better prepared to compete for jobs when they finished. He also recommended adding an adult education program for commercial and trade subjects to assist unemployed residents to learn new trades. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 28 In 1932, Superintendent Stiles proposed setting up a pre-school at Prospect Hill, using "vacant rooms" (perhaps in the basement, since the rest of the school seems to have been full to capacity).
Some of the school's space problems had been resolved by relocating seventh graders to the Intermediate School and transferring some pupils to the Training School. A newly instituted baseball program for the elementary schools involved Prospect Hill and Moseley School students. That year, the two-year-old high school was already near capacity (Westfield Town Report, 1932-33). In 1940, an independent consultant was hired to review the city's departments. The consultant found that the total school-age population had been going down over the past five years, from 3,923 in 1935 to 3,094 in 1939, a reversal of a decades-long trend. It is not clear if the decline was due to a loss in overall population, or to parents keeping their children out of school in response to the economic hardships of the Depression.
About 13% of Westfield's school children were in private schools, "a considerable relief to the financial burden placed on the taxpayer for the support of public education," the study noted (Griffenhagen, p. 12). The study revealed that many Westfield teachers lacked bachelor's degrees, with 59 out of 80 elementary school teachers having gone through two years of normal school, but not completing a degree. In the trade school, only four out of fourteen teachers had college degrees, and two had not completed high school. The report recommended requiring all teachers to have bachelor's degrees. In Westfield, it was noted, teachers had an average class size of more than 28 students in 1935. Noting that the national average was actually closer to 30 students per teacher, the study recommended increasing the student- teacher ratio to save on employee salaries.
Prospect Hill School's student-teacher ratio was slightly above the average, with about 31 students per teacher. During World War II, Westfield schools contributed to the war effort. As women went to work to take over the jobs of absent servicemen, the need for childcare facilities became apparent. Prospect Hill School and Abner Gibbs School became pre-school childcare centers. Hot lunches were served in schools to make it more convenient for mothers to work. School hours were changed to allow children to work on farms, where labor shortages were most keenly felt. At Prospect Hill, the school continued to be an essential part of the neighborhood's tight-knit identity. At a 1991 reunion, former residents fondly recalled the school as a childhood hangout during the 1930s and 1940s, where they gathered to play after school hours.
George Kelleher described the school and its surrounding neighborhood as a "playground of learning." Kelleher and his neighbors, Charles Hagan and Robert Andrews, who all grew up in Prospect Hill during the 1930s and 1940s, "said the neighborhood was so self-contained, there was rarely a reason to leave it." (Skantz, Leslie, "Prospect Hill bunch getting together" Union-News, Feb 8, 1991). "It was such a tight-knit neighborhood, and even if (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 29 people left the area, they still kept in touch," former resident Maureen Morrissey Oleksak said in a 1991 interview (Skantz, Leslie, (991) W (sin the eisle,hod), Proplpeplanil chool burcam into talgate pamty " r chidreevis, May 16, kindergarten through sixth grade," inspiring many of them to go on to careers in education (Skantz, Leslie, "Prospect Hill history recorded by 'Bunch,'" Union-News, Jul 18, 1991). The public school population, which had declined during the 1930s, rose again in the postwar years. Westfield's total population went from 18,793 in 1940 to 20,962 in 1950. In 1957, Superintendent of Schools Thomas Abernethy brought up the perennial problem of school overcrowding.
From 1953 to 1957, the student population had grown from 3,688 to 4,742. The elementary schools were filled to capacity, with some juggling necessary to distribute students from different parts of the city among the grade schools. The superintendent encouraged the School Committee to consider building a new junior high school, hoping to have approval to begin construction in 1960. Abernethy commented on the recent Sputnik launch, and how it had generated increased interest in improving math and science education. Sounding much like his successors fifty years later, Abernethy lamented that, in contrast to Russian children who were pushed to achieve, American children "have been sheltered from failure, and the entire process has been made as easy and as sugar-coated as possible." He encouraged parents to "practice...
saying 'No,"" and "banning the TV set while the home work is being done" (Westfield Annual Report, 1957, pp. 49-51). With the passage of the National Defense Education Act in 1958, federal funds became available to improve science, math, and foreign language instruction in the schools. Recent History (since 1958) The construction of the Massachusetts Turnpike in the 1950s and Interstate Route 91 in 1967 encouraged traffic to bypass city centers for suburban residential and business developments. In 1956, an Industrial Development Commission was established to encourage new development and sponsor special events to attract businesses and customers to town. The commission eventually became the Industrial Development Corporation, which managed the city's first industrial park. In 1958, the opening of that park near the Turnpike proved a boon to Westfield.
The park was expanded in the late 1960s. Although the business climate stagnated during the late 1970s and early 1980s, city officials and members of the business community worked together to turn things around during the next two decades. In 1989, the city conveyed more than 200 acres of farmland on the North Side to WestMass Development Corporation to create a high-tech industrial park. In 1999, the Westfield Community Development Corporation created a small business incubator. These two projects were followed by a string of suburban commercial developments, as national retail and restaurant chains added franchises along Route 20. This (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 30 combination of new industrial and retail establishments helped reverse the downward employment spiral of the 1970s and 1980s. More than 3,500 new jobs were created in Westfield between 1997 and 2000, raising the city's total employment from 15,237 to 19,843 (Westfield 5 Year Consolidated Action Plan). Although population increases were not quite as profound in the 1980s and 1990s, Westfield's opulation still grew, reaching 38,372 in 1990, and 40,072 in 2000. An influx of Russian immigran Ided yet one more group to the city's ethnic mix. While the city's housing stock had grown, new housing tended to be fairly upscale, single-family suburban homes, with little new housing created for low- and moderate-income residents.
A 2004 action plan prepared by the Westfield Community Development Department found a critical shortage of affordable housing (Westfield 5 Year Consolidated Plan). Westfield's historic downtown continues to struggle in the face of suburban commercial development. Since the 1970s, city planners have targeted the downtown area for redevelopment, with planning studies and consultant reports proposing improvements from landscaping to increased parking to the creation of a downtown pedestrian mall. As in many communities, only a few of the revitalization plan's recommendations were implemented. Retailers like J.J. Newberry, Eaton's, and Fine's Clothing, which had been downtown fixtures for decades, closed in the 1980s and have not been replaced.
While a number of service and financial-related businesses continue to operate downtown, Elm Street has only a handful of retail establishments occupying its storefronts. The Westfield Community Development Corporation began work on an Elm Street Area Revitalization Project in 2004 with improvements to sidewalks and other public amenities, while the Westfield Home Improvement Program (WHIP) targeted housing in the downtown area for rehabilitation. The Community Development Department's 2006-2007 action plan involved creation of a downtown Business Improvement District. A downtown transit center, an upscale hotel, and the enlargement of the Green are all slated for construction over the next few years.
Funding has also been approved for renovation of the Great River Bridge and construction of a new "sister bridge" similar in design to the 1939 Great River Bridge; the old bridge will be renovated as a three-lane structure for southbound traffic, while the new bridge, to be constructed east of the old one, will carry three lanes of northbound traffic. (Westfield 5 Year Consolidated Action Plan; Springfield Republican, May 26, 2006; Paving and Traffic Congestion Management projects list, Westfield City Engineering Department). Prospect Hill School Issues of school crowding continued into the 1960s and 1970s, as the city's population jumped more than 5,000 residents each decade, going from 20,962 in 1950 to 26,302 in 1960, to 31,433 in 1970, (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 31 to 36,465 in 1980. The increase appears to have been due to a combination of new immigrants from Puerto Rico, and suburban transplants from surrounding communities. In her report of 1964, School Superintendent Lynn Clark projected an increase of 1,000 pupils from 1961 to 1970. Teacher-pupil ratios were still high (by current standards), with 35 students per teacher. In the early 1960s, interscholastic and intramural sports programs were initiated in the new Junior High School and in the elementary schools. Abner Gibbs Elementary School was expanded, and classroom space was increased at Prospect Hill by installing a folding partition in the rear of the auditorium.
Playgrounds at many schools had been paved, which Superintendent Clark had advocated as an improvement for recreational use of the sites. Enrollment had been increasing steadily over the previous ten years, with an increase of two to three hundred students per year for most of the decade. The 1950 citywide enrollment was 2,927 students; in 1960 it was 5,359. In 1964, though, the superintendent noted a gradual decline in the birth rate after the "big baby crop of the 1940 and 1950 decades," and expected enrollments to level off (Westfield Annual Report, 1964, p. 91). Prospect Hill continued as a regional school into the 1980s, and was upgraded in 1989 with the addition of computer equipment. However, by 1990 the city was considering selling several of its turn-of- the-century schoolhouses. The construction of the new Paper Hill and Munger Schools had made the old schools obsolete.
Prospect Hill, Moseley, and Smith Avenue Schools were three that the city proposed to surplus out as part of a redistricting plan. In 1991, Prospect Hill School was closed, and the School Committee turned it over to the city for disposition. The next year, however, overcrowding again became an issue. The recently closed Moseley School was reopened, but Prospect Hill was considered too outdated to be refurbished. The closing of the school became an occasion for nostalgia and reminiscence among Prospect Hill's current and former residents. School alumni organized a reunion of past and present Prospect Hill students and neighbors that drew more than a thousand people, some from as far away as Alaska, California, and Texas (Skantz, Leslie, "1,000 return home; Prospect Hill ties renewed," Sunday Republican, Jul 16, 1991).
The event included tours of the well-loved school and inspired the creation of a series of videos with interviews of former Prospect Hill residents. Over the next fifteen years, the property languished unsecured, provoking neighborhood concerns about vandalism and safety. In 1997, City Councilor Lenard C. Burlingame described the neglected school as "probably the biggest eyesore in the city...It's a city building," Burlingame continued, "and it deserves a lot more attention than it is getting, which is zero right now" (Hodgson, Kevin, "School building cleanup planned; Volunteer effort in the works, "Union-News, Aug 21, 1997). (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 32 Later that year, the overgrown school grounds were cleared, and the property became the site of a National Guard training exercise. Several possible new uses for the building were proposed over the intervening years, including a Christian school, a dance studio, office space, and Recreation Department headquarters, but none ever came to fruition. In the summer of 2004, Westfield invited developers to submit proposals to renovate the property. Nonprofit agency Domus, Inc. proposed to renovate the school for twenty-one units of affordable family housing in garden-style and townhouse units. The organization had previously rehabilitated the Hotel Westfield into low- and moderate-income apartments.
The Prospect Hill proposal consisted of two- and three-bedroom units with both low-income and market-rate rentals. "It's a beautiful piece of property and a beautiful building," Domus, Inc. Director Ann Lentini said. City officials expressed concern that action needed to be taken quickly. "It's gotten to the point where we really need to use it or in effect lose the building, which would be too bad," Mayor Richard K. Sullivan, Jr., said. Referring to the Domus proposal, "It's probably our Hail Mary to save the building," said Community Development Director James M. Boardman, who had himself attended the school as a child (cited in Graham, George. "Former school attracts agency," Sunday Republican, 19 Dec 2004). In February 2005, the City Council accepted the Domus proposal. Domus hired Carloson & Schmitt, Inc.
as project architects for the rapidly deteriorating building, which by that point had water coming in through the roof and standing water in the basement. Tarpaulins were placed on the roof to reduce the damage. The rehabiliation plan would preserve the exterior's historic appearance, while creating an addition at the rear for an elevator for handicapped access. Parking would be available on-site. Renovations were expected to cost around $5.3 million. Domus's proposal to the Massachusetts Department of Housing and Community Development specified that sixteen of the units would be set aside for tenants making 60% percent of the state's median income, or about $38,400 for a family of four. Tenants would be selected by lottery, with the first eight units reserved for people who lived, worked, or had been educated in Westfield, or had family in the city.
The new project was identified in the Westfield Community Development Department's 2004 Action Plan as one of several that would help alleviate a critical shortage of low- to moderately priced housing in the city (Westfield Consolidated Action Plan, p. 9). With the city's housing stock below the state's recommended ratio for affordable housing, the project was expected to garner state approval. The scarcity of affordable housing also meant that the project would not require rezoning. The project was expected be financed as a public-private venture with low-income tax credits offered to investors. The developer applied to the state Department of Housing and Community Development for public funding and received approval for CDBG grants for the project. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 33 In March 2005, the proposal went before Westfield's Zoning Board of Appeals for review of a "affordable" housing meant that residents would be working citizens. On Mar 31, the Zoning Board of Appeals approved the permit. In January 2006, state funds were approved for the project. Lentini coordinated funding from five state and federal sources for a total of $5.7 million. Work has begun to stabilize and dry out the building. Construction began in 2007 and was expected to be completed the following year.
Summary The Prospect Hill School reflects the evolution of Westfield's school system from a nineteenth- century network of one- and two-room rural schoolhouses haphazardly maintained and employing diverse curricula to a twentieth-century system of graded regional schools equipped with modern conveniences and providing a uniform education to all of the community's students. It represents the culmination of a nearly fifty-year struggle by the School Committee to modernize Westfield's educational system. The first of Westfield's consolidated schools, Prospect Hill was a neighborhood institution fondly remembered by its alumni and neighbors. The rehabilitation of the Prospect Hill School will not only preserve a community institution, but also fill a critical need for affordable housing in the city.
Archaeological Significance Historic archaeological resources described above may help document the history of education in Westfield and the focal point of the Prospect Hill neighborhood, one of the first settled areas of Westfield. Additional historical research may contribute important information that identifies the complete sequence of school structures that occupied the Prospect Hill School property variously known as the District #8 School, the Great River District School, the Great River West School, and finally, the Prospect Hill School. Information obtained through archaeological survey and testing may supplement and corroborate historical sources by verifying school buildings identified through written sources, and by contributing evidence of school buildings and related outbuildings associated with each school.
Historical and archaeological resources may help establish architectural characteristics for each school building, when the buildings were built, renovated, and demolished or incorporated into later school buildings. Historical and archaeological research may also help identify the location and function of barns, stables, and outbuildings associated with each school building and the facilities associated with that structure. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 8 Page 34 Detailed analysis of the contents of occupational-related features and artifact distributions around school buildings might contribute important information related to the topics identified above, the students, their families, and ultimately the residents of the Prospect Hill Neighborhood. Artifacts and macrofossil evidence may survive that contributes social, cultural, and economic information related to the students techniques used in the school and how they changed from the 18h through 20" centuries. Filling and grading have each occurred on the Prospect Hill School property on at least two occasions since the mid 19th century. The school's lot is almost entirely paved with asphalt.
Given the above and the history of intensive landuse of the school property during the historic period, integrity remains a potential issue for historic archaeological resources that predate the present school. Any historic resources that predate 1925 may have been destroyed by construction of the present school and earlier grading activities. Filling might have also acted to protect historic resources in some areas. (end) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 9 Page 1 BIBLIOGRAPHY An Act Concerning the Attendance of Children at School. Massachusetts General Laws of 1852, Chapter Agricola Corporation. Historic Preservation Certification Application for Prospect Hill School, Sep 2005.
Alma Mater: Iwenty-first Triennial, June 1, 1907, State Normal School, Westfield, Mass., 1839-1907. Boston: Wright & Potter Printing Co., State Printers, 1907. Atlas of Hampden County, Massachusetts. Springfield: Richards Map Co., 1912. Atlas of Surveys - Hampden County, Massachusetts. Springfield: L.J. Richards & Co., 1894. Atlas of Westfield Town, Massachusetts, 1884 (photostatic copy at Westfield Athenaeum, no place of publication listed.) "Augustus W. Holton" (biographical essay). Biographical Review: The Leading Citizens of Hampden County Massachusetts. Boston: Biographical Review Publishing Company, 1895. Ballantine, John. "Westfieldiana." Typescript transcribed from Westfield Journal and Democratic Herald, 10 Sep 1833-8 Sep 1835. Bates, William G. "Pictures of Westfield as It Was." Typescript transcribed from Western Hampden Times 17 Mar 1869-3 Aug 1870.
Transcription project of National Youth Administration, Apr Beers, F.W. Beers' Atlas of Hampden County. New York: Beers, Ellis & Soule, 1870. Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. Vertical File SPFD F.1--Westfield. Copeland, Alfred Minot, ed. A History of Hampden County, Massachusetts. Century Memorial Publishing Co., 1902. "Death of Augustus W. Holton." Springfield Daily Republican, 15 Feb 1911, p. 12. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 9 Page 2 Dewey, Louis Marinus. "An Authentic History of Westfield, Massachusetts," 1919. In Connecticut Valley Historical Museum Manuscript Vertical File F.1 - Westfield. Dewey, Louis Marinus. "Historical Map of the Original Settlement." 1905.
Dewey, Louis Marinus. History of Ancient Westfield, 1892-93. (Typescript) Westfield, ca. 1905. Transcription project of National Youth Administration, May 1936. Dewey, Louis Marinus. "Old Landmarks." Typescript transcribed from Westfield Times and News Letter, 2 Jan 1895-6 Oct 1897. Everts, Louis H. History of the Connecticut Valley in Massachusetts, with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of Some of its Prominent Men and Pioneers. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1879. "Funeral of C. K. Lambson." The Springfield Union, 8 Jan 1907, p. 10. Solathwailstfield Athenaeum, 1 Plan of Westfield from ine Survey of 1831. 1834. 1. (Photocopy held by Griffenhagen & Associates. City of Westfield: Report on the City Government. Vol. VI: The School System and Library, 31 Jan 1940. "Herder C.
Wood, 73, Retired Contractor and Assessor, Dies." Springfield Daily News, 12 Feb 1941 (out- of-town edition), p. 22. Heyl, Scott P.., and Hamberg, Lee David. Historic Building Survey of Westfield, Massachusetts, July 1984. Holland, Josiah Gilbert. History of Western Massachusetts: The Counties of Hampden, Hampshire, Franklin, and Berkshire, Volume II, part III. Springfield: Samuel Bowles & Co., 1855. Janes, Edward C.., and Scott, Roscoe S., editors. Westfield Massachusetts, 1669-1969: The First Three Hundred Years. Westfield: Westfield Tri-Centennial Association, Inc., 1968. Kiwanis Club of Westfield. "This is Our City: Westfield, Massachusetts." Westfield: Kiwanis Club of Westfield, 1957 (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 9 Page 3 Lockwood, Reverend John H., D.D. Westfield and Its Historic Influences: 1669-1919. Springfield: Springfield Printing and Binding Company, 1922. Lockwood, Rev. John H., D.D., et al. Western Massachusetts: A History 1636 - 1925. New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, Inc., 1926. Obituary for Malcolm Bennett Harding (1885-1950), Westfield News Advertiser, 3 Feb 1950, p. 3. Picturesque Hampden. Northampton: Picturesque Publishing Company, 1892. Pitoniak, Stephen J., Sr. Western Massachusetts History: The Westfield Area. Westfield: Stephen J. Pitoniak, Sr., 1970. Plan of Westfield. Westfield: H. B. Smith Co., Inc., 1870. Plummer, Edgar, ed. Westfield Welcome Home Celebration: Official Souvenir: August 31-September 1,2, 1946. Westfield: E.H.
Plummer, 1946. Roberts, George S. Historic Towns of the Connecticut River Valley. Schenectady, New York: Robson & Adee, 1906. Rothery, Paul. "A Visitor from England," Pioneer Spirits. Springfield: Forest Park Junior High School, 1941-42, p. 47. Springfield Republican and Union-News. Various articles about Prospect Hill School and neighborhood and about community development in Westfield, 1980-2006. Stiles, Chester D. A History of the Town of Westfield. Westfield: J. D. Cadle & Co., 1919. "Thomas Little: Retired Contractor Succumbs to Long Illness." The Springfield Union, 24 Jul 1919, p. 4. Vogt, C. H., lithographer. "Westfield 1875." (Bird's-eye drawing) Milwaukee, 1875. Walling, Henry F. Map of Hampden County, Massachusetts. Boston: H.A. Haley, 1855. "Was Prominent Businessman: Clinton K. Lambson Dead." The Springfield Union, 7 Jan 1907, p. 10. Westfield-Barnes Airport.
Master Plan, 2004. (continued) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 9 Page 4 Westfield (Mass.). Community Development Department. Westfield 5 Year Consolidated Action Plan, 2004-2009 (including annual performance and evaluation reports and annual action plan updates). Westfield (Mass.). Engineering Department. Pavement and Traffic Congestion Management projects list. From City of Westfield Web Page, http://www.cityofwetfield.org/dtepages/departments247.html. Westfield town and city directories, 1871-1999. Westfield, Hampden County, Massachusetts. New York: Sanborn Map Company, 1910, 1917, 1924, 1947.
Westfield Jubilee: A Report of the Celebration at Westfield, Massachusetts on the 200th Anniversary of the Incorporation of the Town, October 6, 1869. Westfield: Clark & Story, Publishers, 1870. Westfield (Mass.). Town and City Annual Reports, 1904-1964. Westfield (Mass.). School Committee. Report of the School Committee of Westfield for the year 1836-37, 1854-56, 1861-62, 1865-72, 1873-90, 1894-1903. Westfield Newsphoto: Westfield's Own Modern Newsmagazine. 28 Sep-11 Nov 1936. (end) PROSPECT HILL SCHOOL Name of Property HAMPDEN COUNTY, MA County and State 10. Geographical Data Acreage of Property 1.38 acres UTM References See continuation sheet. (Place additional UTM references on a continuation sheet) 1.
Zone 18 Easting 686250 Northing 4666180 _ See continuation sheet Verbal Boundary Description (Describe the boundaries of the property on a continuation sheet.) Boundary Justification (Explain why the boundaries were selected on a continuation sheet.) see attached paypelea 11. Form Prepared By name/title Michele Plourde-Barker & Gregory Farmer (consultants) with Betsy Friedberg, NR Director, MHC organization_Massachusetts Historical Commission date_October 2008 (rev.) street & number 220 Morrissey Boulevard _ telephone 617-727-8470 city or town Boston state Massachusetts zip code_02125-3314 Additional Documentation Submit the following items with the completed form: Continuation Sheets A USGS map (7.5 or 15 minute series) indicating the property's location. A sketch map for historic districts and properties having large acreage or numerous resources.
Photographs - Representative black and white photographs of the property. Additional items (Check with the SHPO or FPO for any additional items) Property Owner (Complete this item at the request of the SHPO or FPO.) name Domus, Inc. street & number _ 4 School St. _telephone 413-568-4494 city or townWestfield _ state_ MA _ Zip code 01085 Paperwork Reduction Act Statement: This information is being collected for applications to the National Register of Historic Places to nominate properties for listing or determine eligibility for listing, to list properties, and to amend existing listings. Response to this request is required to obtain a benefit in accordance with the National Historic Preservation Act, as amended (16 U.S.C. 470 et seq.).
Estimated Burden Statement: Public reporting burden for this form is estimated to average 18.1 hours per response including the time for reviewing instructions, gathering and maintaining data, and completing and reviewing the form. Direct comments regarding this burden estimate or any aspect of this form to the Chief, Administrative Services Division, National Park Service, P.0. Box 37127, Washington, DC 20013-7127; and the Office of Management and Budget, Paperwork Reductions Project (1024-0018), Washington, DC 20503. NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No.
1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Section number 10 Page 1 Boundary Description The boundary begins at the southeast corner of Crown Street and Montgomery Street and proceeds in a southwesterly direction along Montgomery Street for 165.56 feet, then turns at a slight angle and continues southwesterly along Montgomery Street for 88.6 feet. The boundary then turns at a right angle and runs east 307.17 feet along the southern property line of 33 Montgomery Street to the southwest corner of 33 Montgomery Street. The boundary turns north and runs along the rear lot line of 33 Montgomery Street for 72 feet. The boundary then turns east and runs in a northeasterly direction along the northern lot line of 33 Montgomery Street for 318 feet to the point of beginning.
Boundary Justification The boundary for the nominated property is the same as the boundary for the building lot on which the structure stands. (end) NPS Form 10-900-a (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Prospect Hill School Westfield, Hampden County, MA Photographs Page 1 Prospect Hill School Photographer: Gregory Farmer 33 Montgomery St. Date: October 2006 Westfield, Hampden County, Massachusetts Location of Negatives: Domus, Inc. Photo # 1. Exterior view of Prospect Hill School, showing west and south elevations. 2. Exterior view of Prospect Hill School, showing primary (west) elevation. 3. Exterior view of Prospect Hill School, showing north and west elevations. 4. Exterior view of Prospect Hill School, showing east and south elevations. 5.
Interior view of Prospect Hill School, showing typical basement conditions, looking southwest. 6. Interior view of Prospect Hill School, showing 1" floor main corridor, looking east 7. Interior view of Prospect Hill School, showing typical 1" floor classroom, looking southeast. 8. Interior view of Prospect Hill School, showing typical 2"° floor classroom, looking northeast. 9. Interior view of Prospect Hill School, showing former 2nd floor auditorium, looking north. Attachments a) Neighborhood Map, City of Westfield GIS (2006). b) Map of Westfield from Richards, Atlas of Hampden County (1912). c) Prospect Hill School from Sanborn Insurance Maps (1917). d) Prospect Hill School from Sanborn Insurance Maps (1924). e) Photograph of Prospect Hill School and original (1897) facade from City of Westfield Annual Report (1914-15).
Photograph of Prospect Hill School after 1919 remodeling (original source unknown, courtesy Westfield Atheneum). g) Photograph of Prospect Hill School (west and south elevations), 1920 from the Ross Conner Collection, Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. h) Field day at Prospect Hill School, 1923 (Ross Conner Collection, CVHM). i) Auditorium at Prospect Hill School (event not identified), April 1926 (Ross Conner Collection, CVHM). j) Graduating class of Prospect Hill School, 1929 (Ross Conner Collection, CVHM). k) Chamber of Commerce clean-up day at Prospect Hill School, ca. 1930 (Ross Conner Collection, CVHM).
(End of photographs and attachments) 202-39 Ó TE AC 202-17 D4: 4: 202-15 0.20 M; 202-20 202-7 202-21 ESTKC MONTGOMERY CROWN ST 202-101 202-19 202 202-3 0 22 AC MURRAY AV 202-1 :27AC 200-20 So tTAC 200-21 200-24 416AC 230-31 :54.4C 200.22 D2745 200-29 D.2242 200-2 1024: DEMOND AV 299: Dn dl aad MA mabes no vamrasty mpresea-tator un to tre ioculacy terelress of compeleneo oany o°te dra Tre Cra d yasded me sholfüve o babedo tr tore data df cc. treenest tea deciso trae de d0 den de pot toten ipnepon an ofthe cat 33 202-22 Prospect Hill School 200-109 047Ag 200-104 DATAC - 200-106 0 30AC 200-108 200-103 DXAC 200.102 :40AC City of Westfield - GIS :4: AC 202-69 DRT mi 221-1 292AC 50 100 200 300 ]Feet Xitet CURT1S PLATE 8 ]DRAKE 10 ATWATER RIVER 3* MOSELEY - FARM, SEE PLATEG Westfield, Massachusetts, 1912. From Richards Atlas of Hampden County, 1912, Plate 7.
Copyright: Richards Map Co., 1912 From the Atlas and Map Collection of the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. frospet Hill School, 33 Montyomeny st. /72 /ke=. FURROW 69 DAME NOTRE ETHAN 80 TETHAN MONTGOMERY PO. T8 PROSPECT 85 -10Pe. DEC.1917 EWESTFIELD MASS SCALE100FT TO AN INCH 22 - 420 CRON 8 76 ..1:2. .Ea5...g.- AV. p-. OAKDALE C AT OAKDALE W. PARKER AV. CURTIS 95 Scale 100 Ftto One Incho 89 8 MURRAY AV. 90 AUBURN DEMOND PARKER MONTGOMERY 3 50° AV. MONTGOMERY STATE 94 Westfield, Hampden County, Massachusetts. New York: Sanborn Map Company, 1917 (Prospect Hill School outlined above.) 91 20 Prospect Htill School. 33 Montgumers St. westfield mn 79 FURROW 69 Poveae 00 30 DAME- ETHAN BI (1673) 25 JUNE1924 WESTFIELD MASS. SCALE 100FT. TO AN INGH 77 78 -#Kyc...... PROSPECT 85 MILTON 76 2 OAKDALE 50 AV. Fed 87 OAKDALE 88 89 E W. PARKER AV.
92 !O*EneE 18% CURTIS -Sseai 00 rg go one nceia Sover.ip.. -F:0PIeG..f 86 MURRAY (AV.) 90 TGOMERY AON' AUBURN DEMOND AV. 94 PARKER 93 Westfield, Hampden County, Massachusetts. New York: Sanborn Map Company, 1924 (Prospect Hill School outlined above) Bgo MONTGOMERY 23 %.Y.PuPf.2: Prospeut Mill School 33 Mont gomery st. luestficld, ma PROSPECT HILM Prospect Hill School, original facade From Westfield Town Annual Report, 1914-15 Prospect Hill School after 1919 remodeling. Date and source of original image unknown. From a photocopy in the collection of the Westfield Athenaeum. Prospect Hill School, 33 Montgomery Street, Westfield, Mass., 1920 Constructed 1897 - Architect Augustus Holton. Addition and facade remodeling, 1919 - Architect Malcolm Harding Scanned from an uncatalogued negative from the Ross Conner Collection at the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum.
This image may not be exhibited, copied, or published in any way (including electronically) without permission from CVHM. Field day at Prospect Hill School, 33 Montgomery Street, Westfield, Mass., 1923 Scanned from an uncatalogued negative in the Ross Conner Collection at the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. This image may not be exhibited, copied, or published in any way without permission from CVHM. Unidentified group, Auditorium, Prospect Hill School, 33 Montgomery Street, Westfield, Mass., April 1926 Scanned from an uncatalogued negative in the Ross Conner Collection at the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. This image may not be exhibited, copied, or published in any way without permission from CVHM.
1929 Graduation group, Prospect Hill School, 33 Montgomery Street, Westfield, Mass., 1929 Scanned from an uncatalogued negative in the Ross Conner Collection at the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. This image may not be exhibited, copied, or published in any way without permission from CVHM. Photographer: Frederick J. Tooke Copyright: Frederick J. Tooke, 1929 Chamber of Commerce clean-up day at Prospect Hill School, 33 Montgomery Street, Westfield, Mass., circa 1920-1930 Scanned from an uncatalogued negative in the Ross Conner Collection at the Connecticut Valley Historical Museum. This image may not be exhibited, copied, or published in any way without permission from CVHM.
JNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOI JATIONAL PARK SERVICI NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES EVALUATION/RETURN SHEET REQUESTED ACTION: NOMINATION PROPERTY Prospect Hill School NAME: MULTIPLE NAME: STATE & COUNTY: MASSACHUSETTS, Hampden DATE RECEIVED: 10/09/08 DATE OF 16TH DAY: 11/11/08 DATE OF WEEKLY LIST: REFERENCE NUMBER: 08001069 DATE OF PENDING LIST: 10/27/08 DATE OF 45TH DAY: 11/22/08 REASONS FOR REVIEW: APPEAL: N DATA PROBLEM: N LANDSCAPE: N LESS THAN 50 YEARS: | OTHER: PERIOD: PROGRAM UNAPPROVED: REQUEST: N SAMPLE : N SLR DRAFT: N NATIONAL: COMMENT WAIVER: N VACCEPT _RETURN ABSTRACT/SUMMARY COMMENTS: REJECT 11-19-050ATE Entered in The National Reglster Historic Places RECOM./CRITERIA REVIEWER DISCIPLINE TELEPHONE DATE DOCUMENTATION see attached comments I/N see attached SLR Y/N If a nomination is returned to the nominating authority, the nomination is no longer under consideration by the NPS.
PROSPeCT HILL SCtoOL WESTFIELD (HAMPDEN), ML FARMeR photographe 2006 EXrERIOR: W,S ELEVATONS PItOrO # ! vk phok eyt 9 Prospect Hill Schoo! 33 Mentgomery 19, Westfich, me PROSPECT HILL SCHOOL WESTFIELD(HAMPDEN) MA FARMER photo, 2006 PReMARy (W0) ELEVATON #2 ur Phos #2 o 9 Prospect Hill School, 33 Montgemery 87, Westfield, mt PRROSPECT HILL SCHOOL WESTFIELD (IAMPDEN) MA FArMeR PrOTo, 2006 N, W ELEVARONS PAOTO $$3 un phot #3o19 Prospicct Mill Schoo, 33 Montgomeny 18, Westfred, MA PROSPECE HeLE SCHOOL WESTFIELD (HAMPDEN) MA FARMER photo 2006 Rem (e) aud S eveus. PIS0TO # 4 vn Phot < 40+9 Prospect Hill Sches? 33 Mentgomeny st. Wertfiel MA PROSPECT HILL SCHOOL WESTFIELD (HAMPDEN) MA FARMER photo 2006 INTERIOR: BASEMENT CONDIMONS, looking SW PItOrO #5 Vn Photo 45ot) Prospeet Hill Schosl, 33 Montgama, 54.
Watfied, MA PROSPECT HILe SCHOoL WESTFIELD(HAMPDEN) MA FARMeR photo 2006 INTEMIOR: IST FIDOR, MAIN COMRIDOR, looking E PIORO #6 vn PhAs «6otS Prospect Hill Schoo? 33 Mentsomeny S9, Wertfiel, Mn. PROSPECT HILE SCHOOL WESTFIELD (HAMPDEN) MA FARMer photo 2006 INTERIOR: 1S5 FLDOR CLASSROOM, looking se PAOrO #7 vn Photo 47o9 Prospect Hill Schos 33 Mentgame, Sa, Westfied, MA PROSPECT HILL SCHOOL WESTFIELD(HAMPDEN) MA FARMER photo 2006 INTERIOR: 2ul FLOOR CUASSnOOM, looking NE PHOTO #8 Nr Phato 48of9 Peospent Hill Schoo?, 33 Martpomery P, Wertfiel! PROSPECT HILL SCHOOL WESTFIELD (HAMP DEN) MA FARMER photo 2006 INTEMIOR: 2ND FLOOR AUDITORIUM, looking N PIOTO #9 Nn Phts eS o9 Prospect Hill (cloo?, 33 Montgomer, St, wistfield RECEIVED 2280 OCT 09 2008 The Commonwealth of MassachusettSAT.
REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACE VATIONAL PARK SERVICI William Francis Galvin, Secretary of the Commonwealth Massachusetts Historical Commission October 6, 2008 Mr. J. Paul Loether National Register of Historic Places National Park Service 1201 Eye Street, NW 8th floor Washington, DC 20005 Dear Mr. Loether: Enclosed please find the following nomination form: Prospect Hill School, 33 Montgomery Street, Westfield (Hampden Co.), MA The nomination has been voted eligible by the State Review Board and has been signed by the State Historic Preservation Officer. The owners of the property were notified of pending State Review Board consideration 30 to 45 days before the meeting and were afforded the opportunity to comment. Sincerely, Betsy Fudting Betsy Friedberg National Register Director Massachusetts Historical Commission enclosure CC: Denise Quinn, Westfield Historical Commission Domus, Inc.
/ Prospect Hill Apartments LP Michael Boulanger, Mayor, City of Westfield Gregory Farmer, Michelle Plourde-Barker, consultants Anthony Petrucelli, Westfield Planning Board 220 Morrissey Boulevard, Boston, Massachusetts 02125 (617) 727-8470 - Fax: (617) 727-5128 www.state.ma.us/sec/mhc
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