East Worcester School-Norcross Factory
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The Norcross Factory is a historic building at 10 E. Worcester Street in
Worcester, Massachusetts Worcester ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Massachusetts, second-most populous city in the U.S. state of Massachusetts and the list of United States cities by population, 113th most populous city in the United States. Named after Worcester ...
. Built in stages beginning 1863, this structure includes one of the city's oldest school buildings, the East Worcester Grammar School, and represents an
adaptive reuse Adaptive reuse is the reuse of an existing building for a purpose other than that for which it was originally built or designed. It is also known as recycling and conversion. The adaptive reuse of buildings can be a viable alternative to new con ...
of the building, serving from 1893 to 1918 as the main facility of the
Norcross Brothers Norcross Brothers, Contractors and Builders was a nineteenth-century American construction company, especially noted for its work, mostly in stone, for the architectural firms of H.H. Richardson and McKim, Mead & White. The company was founded in 1 ...
, a firm best known for its construction of H. H. Richardson designs. The building was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...
in 1980.


Description and history

The former East Worcester School and Norcross Factory is set on Worcester's east side, at the junction of Shrewsbury Street and East Worcester Street, just north of Worcester's main railroad yard and east of Interstate 290. This three story brick building was built in three stages, between 1863 and 1893. The oldest portion, the westernmost part of the structure, was originally built as a schoolhouse, and is one of the oldest surviving school buildings in the city. It was designed by E. Boyden & Son, based on an earlier school (no longer extant) on Salem Street. This section has a hip roof, paired entrances on the north and south facades, and granite window surrounds. It served as the East Worcester Grammar School until 1893. The school was purchased by the
Norcross Brothers Norcross Brothers, Contractors and Builders was a nineteenth-century American construction company, especially noted for its work, mostly in stone, for the architectural firms of H.H. Richardson and McKim, Mead & White. The company was founded in 1 ...
in 1893, and connected via additions to a planing mill they had built on an adjacent parcel in 1880-81. Both the additions and the planing mill are modest three-story brick structures, with flat roofs, corbelled cornices, and sandstone trim. This space was then used by the Norcrosses to as office space, and factory space in which they manufactured architectural building parts, including doors and window sashes, until 1918.


See also

*
National Register of Historic Places listings in eastern Worcester, Massachusetts There are 98 properties and historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Worcester, Massachusetts, east of I-190 and the north-south section of I-290, which are listed below. Two listings overlap into other parts of Worcest ...


References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts School buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts Industrial buildings completed in 1863 Schools in Worcester, Massachusetts National Register of Historic Places in Worcester, Massachusetts