At the center of Lowell, Massachusetts lie the rivers, dams,
canals, and factories which contributed to the growth of one
of America's greatest manufacturing centers. Although
considerable attention has been focused on the study of
Lowell's central core, the majority of Lowell's residents in
the mid-to late nineteenth century resided outside the city
center. The colorful names of Lowell’s neighborhoods -
such as Chapel Hill, Belvidere Village, Pawtucketville,
Centralville, and the Highlands - provide only a hint of the
important role these areas had in shaping the city's history.
Among the earliest of these neighborhoods
is Chapel Hill,
with representative residential architectural styles from nearly
every period of the city's industrial development. Enveloping
a hilly site, Chapel Hill is bounded at the east by the Concord
River, at the west by Gorham Street, and at the north and
south by Charles Street and Hale’s Brook.
Chapel Hill's settlement began in the 1820s,
when Lowell
was emerging as a major textile center. Although many of the
town's residents were employed in the cotton mills and
lived in company-owned houses, the growing community
attracted others -shopkeeper, carpenters, masons,
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policemen - who supplied the goods and services
required by a rapidly expanding town.
For individuals wishing to build their own
houses,
Chapel Hill proved to be the only available land
convenient to the center of Lowell that was neither in
corporation ownership nor separated from the mills by
a river. Unlike Centralville and Washington Square in
Belvidere, which date from the 1830s, there was no
predetermined plan for the growth of Chapel Hill.
Instead of following a previously laid-out
grid of
streets and houselots, the area grew organically,
conforming to the topography and to the random sale
and development of house lots. Paralleling the north-
south axis of Gorham Street (the original colonial
route between East Chelmsford and Billerica), Central
Street wrapped around the hill, Chapel Street ran over
its ridgeline, and Lawrence Street followed the
Concord River. A network of short cross streets
(Charles, North, Ames, Mill and Elm) soon
connected them.
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