Read on Twitter
After Sharps Rifle, the Pope Manufacturing Company was one of the first firms to set up shop in Parkville. What did Pope produce? Bicycles! This was the Pope Tube Works, which produced parts and tires for the bicycles.
The complex persuaded the Hartford Rubber Works, one of Pope's most important suppliers, to make the neighborhood the site of its industrial chain.
This is the 1903 plant of the Hartford Rubber Works.
The view on Bartholomew Ave. You can just make out "Hartford Rubber Company 1903" at the top of the castellated tower.
In the 1910s, financiers arranged for the merger of Hartford Rubber Works and several Connecticut competitors to create the U.S. Rubber Co. The firm would become a major supplier of car tires. It rebranded itself as Uniroyal in the 60s. Here is the 1912 boiler house.
Exploring Parkville is like walking through the evolution of American industry. This is the Hart Manufacturing Company, built in 1910. It's more expansive than the plants I just posted and taller, with 4 floors. Hart produced electrical hardware, especially switches for doors.
The Whitney Manufacturing Co, built between 1906 and 1916. The form reminds me of an aircraft carrier. Whitney made machine tools - milling machines, water tool grinders, and drill chucks. Driving chains, used on Pope bicycles and later automobiles, were its most notable product.
Whitney's 1919 plant is a block south on Bartholomew Avenue.
You can also see the evolution of industrial architecture north of Park Street. This was the Hartford Industrial Company, later the Underwood Computing Company. Underwood manufactured typewriters and Connecticut was a hub of the typewriter industry.
This picture is better.
This is the Gray Telephone Station factory. It was originally built in 1913 with alterations made in the 1920s. That's poured concrete you see.
Better view.
The US Rubber Company's 1920 building was the acme of Parkville industrial architecture with Art Deco detailing. Today it's center of the neighborhood. It also has a brewery, shops, and an ax throwing business. Most importantly, it has four floors of loft apartments.
In Memoriam. The Royal Typewriter Company factory on New Park Avenue. 1100 workers once toiled here. The plant suffered a horrible fire in 1992 and was demolished shortly afterward.
Excuse me. I have to cry.
In Hartford, dense three-story multifamily structures were built close to the factories. These are the half perfect sixes, or triple-deckers, per the parlance of the rest of New England.
These are on Capitol Avenue, Parkville's northern boundary.
Three more half perfect sixes on Capitol Avenue.
Here are three half perfect sixes on Sisson Avenue.
Of course, there are Perfect Sixes as well. If you look closely, you could see on the brickwork where the porches were originally attached to the building face.
Porches go well with clapboarded structures as well. Some of these are now clad with vinyl.
The Perfect Six left an immense legacy. The form was inherited by the 3-story apartment buildings built in the 10s and 20s, a great many of which remain to this day. These are on Hamilton St. I think these were designed by George Zunner, one of several prodigous 1920s architects.
Parkville has a number of larger apartment structures.
(Yes the parking in the front yard made me want to puke. Paved front yards are a huge issue in Hartford.)
(Yes the parking in the front yard made me want to puke. Paved front yards are a huge issue in Hartford.)
Parkville had its share of institutional uses as well. This was the La Sallette Missionary College, constructed in 1894.
Park Street and New Park Avenue were the neighborhood's commercial corridors. This Park Street looking west. You can get a lot of good Portuguese food here today. It's not like the food in Newark's Ironbound neighborhood, but it's decent.
That legacy is carried on to this day. This is Parkville Market, the food hall which just opened here.
Here's the side of Parkville Market and the Grey Telephone complex in the background.
And that's a wrap.
