The Worcester City Hall and Common, the civic heart of the city, are a historic city hall and

town common Common land is land owned by a person or collectively by a number of persons, over which other persons have certain common rights, such as to allow their livestock to graze upon it, to collect wood, or to cut turf for fuel. A person who has a ...

at 455 Main Street in

Worcester, Massachusetts Worcester ( , ) is a city and county seat of Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. Named after Worcester, England, the city's population was 206,518 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the second-List of cities i ...

. The city hall and common were added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

in 1978.

Early history

The Common, established in 1669, originally encompassed about , compared to its present size of .City of Worcester, Parks Dept.
/ref> A meeting house used for both town meetings and religious functions was constructed on the Common in 1719, on the same site as the current City Hall. In 1763, the first meeting house was demolished and what became known as The Old South Meeting House was constructed on the site. It was here, on July 14, 1776, that Isaiah Thomas publicly read the

Declaration of Independence A declaration of independence or declaration of statehood or proclamation of independence is an assertion by a polity in a defined territory that it is independent and constitutes a state. Such places are usually declared from part or all of th ...

for the first time in

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the Can ...

Salem Square

Salem Square was a triangular-shaped plaza on the east side of Worcester Common. Facing the square were two churches, the First Baptist Church (c. 1830s), and the Congregational Church (c. 1848). Most of Salem Square was eliminated in the early 1970s as part of the Worcester Center urban renewal project, which replaced the plaza with an office building, shopping mall, and parking garage.

Notre Dame des Canadiens

The Notre Dame des Canadiens was a landmark church which faced Salem Square and Worcester Common from 1929 to 2018. In the 1920s, the Catholic Church purchased the Baptist Church on Salem Square and razed it in 1927 to build a new church to serve the city's French Catholic population, the cathedral-like Notre Dame des Canadiens. The

neo-Romanesque Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

church measured 198 feet long, 91 feet wide, and 64 feet high, and ran from Trumbull Street to Salem Square. The building featured two towers with gold crosses and a 194-foot high bell tower. The Roman Catholic diocese closed the church in 2008, due to falling attendance. The building was sold in 2010 and demolished in October 2018.

City Hall

Worcester City Hall was designed by

Peabody & Stearns Peabody & Stearns was a premier architectural firm in the Eastern United States in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Based in Boston, Massachusetts, the firm consisted of Robert Swain Peabody (1845–1917) and John Goddard Stearns ...

and built by the

Norcross Brothers Norcross Brothers Contractors and Builders was a nineteenth-century American construction company, especially noted for their work, mostly in stone, for the architectural firms of H.H. Richardson and McKim, Mead & White. The company was founded by J ...

in 1898. The Italianate structure was built with a granite exterior, and was partly modeled after Italian Renaissance palazzos. Its tower shares some similarity to that of the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, Italy, and the interior of the building extensively uses marble, commonly seen in Italian Renaissance buildings, and features an interior courtyard where the upper floors have balconies supported by decorated round arches.Worcester's City Hall
''Worcester and its People'', College of the Holy Cross City Hall is currently the 4th tallest building in Worcester.

Burial ground, Civil War Memorial, and fountain

Near the center of the Common is the meeting house's burial ground, marked by gravestones and the Bigelow Monument. The Soldiers' Monument, located near the northeast corner of the Common, honors the 398 Worcester soldiers killed in the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states ...

. The Burnside Fountain, located near the southeast corner of the Common, provided water for horses, and features the sculpture ''Boy with a Turtle'', commonly known as "Turtle Boy."

Photo Gallery

File:Worcester City Hall 2018.jpg, City Hall, front view File:City Hall, from Robert N. Dennis collection of stereoscopic views 19.png, Old South Meeting House (circa 1885), demolished 1890s File:Col. Timothy Bigelow Monument - Worcester, MA - DSC05751.jpg, Bigelow Monument File:CivilWarMemorialWorcester.JPG, Soldiers' Monument File:Burnside Fountain - Worcester, MA - DSC05763.jpg, Burnside Fountain File:George Frisbie Hoar Monument - Worcester, MA - DSC03937.jpg, Statue of George Frisbie Hoar

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Worcester City Hall And Common City and town halls on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts Government buildings completed in 1898 Skyscrapers in Worcester, Massachusetts City halls in Massachusetts Tourist attractions in Worcester, Massachusetts National Register of Historic Places in Worcester, Massachusetts Government of Worcester, Massachusetts Skyscraper office buildings in Massachusetts