Town Center
The original Town Center was located adjacent the Old Cemetery on College Highway at Klaus Anderson Road. With the town border being re-defined, the townspeople also once considered the current Gillette's Corner (where the McDonalds and Big Y Market currently sits) as the center. Commerce and practicality led to the development of the current Town Center, as seen today, in a group of Colonial and Greek Revival buildings, including the landmark Congregational Church and Town Square (at the intersection of Granville Road, Depot Street, and College Highway).
Remains of the original Town Green
At the busy intersection of College Highway (U.S. Route 202) at Granville Road (Massachusetts Route 57) and Depot Street there was a "Town Green " Basic markets of trade, communication, medical and grooming services, barns and utilitarian outbuildings served the traveling public and their horses as well as Southwick's own. A growing collection of homes and civic buildings reflected the period in which they were built. A space for civic gatherings formed. Notably, a Village Meeting Hall was built on the west side of College Highway across from where the Congregational church still stands. The library found its place on the corner of College Highway and Granville Road and so did the "Southwick Inn". It was a modest and hopeful beginning for a village.
As horse travel lost out to the automobile, blacksmith stalls were replaced with gas stations. Further business expanded away from the original Town Square. Family stores competed with an Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company located in the heart of the village. A telegram and postal office separated into a Bell Telephone Company office, complete with its own staff of operators and relocated to newer facilities just north of the center. Southwick's many one-room-school-houses were replaced, in use, by the Consolidated School built in 1928 directly south of the center. A police and firestation was built just east of the center. Until the mid 1970s, anyone could walk from the Town Center to clothing stores such as Smith's Department Store & Adams Shoes, food stores such as Jones Market & Cantell's, doctor's offices, barber shops, banks such as Woronoco Savings and Third National, and two family owned drugstores; Southwick Pharmacy & Community Drugs complete with their own lunch counters. It truly was a "close knit" community.
Modernization spurred further change and growth outward from Southwick Center. Business and civic endeavors sought more space for inventory and parking. A few of the historically significant buildings, such as the aforementioned Meeting Hall, have been torn down or relocated to such tourist attractions as Old Sturbridge Village and the Eastern States Exposition to serve as museums of our region's rich history.
Today, the original Town Square still has the Congregational Church, a gift shop and the Inn. All are still in use and have retained their original appearance. Concerned citizens strive to preserve Southwick's heritage. Hopefully other historic buildings, such as the original Town Library will also be preserved and honored in the place they stand, or relocated to an area where the building can be put to a constructive use.
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Famous quotes containing the words town and/or center:
“If I am to be a thoroughfare, I prefer that it be of the mountain brooks, the Parnassian streams, and not the town sewers. There is inspiration, that gossip which comes to the ear of the attentive mind from the courts of heaven. There is the profane and stale revelation of the barroom and the police court. The same ear is fitted to receive both communications. Only the character of the hearer determines to which it shall be open, and to which closed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Columbus stood in his age as the pioneer of progress and enlightenment. The system of universal education is in our age the most prominent and salutary feature of the spirit of enlightenment, and it is peculiarly appropriate that the schools be made by the people the center of the day’s demonstration. Let the national flag float over every schoolhouse in the country and the exercises be such as shall impress upon our youth the patriotic duties of American citizenship.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)