{"nrhp_refnum":"09000235","name":"H.W. Clark Biscuit Company","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"179-191 Ashland St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"North Adams","county":"Berkshire County","state":"MA","lat":42.69408000000004,"lon":-73.10886999999997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2009-04-22","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Community Planning and Development","Industry"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A complex of five attached brick and reinforced-concrete industrial buildings, two structures and one object at 179-191 Ashland Street, North Adams, Massachusetts, built between 1895 and ca. 1955 for the H.W. Clark Biscuit Company.","why_significant":"The nomination argues that the complex shows the growth of North Adams's early 20th century manufacturing economy and the career of grocer-industrialist H.W. Clark, who converted a former shoe factory into a large bakery beside the railroad. It also holds that the buildings, from slow-burning mill construction to a Moderne-detailed reinforced-concrete bakery, embody distinctive types of industrial construction.","narrative":"Along Ashland Street in North Adams stands a former biscuit factory made up of five attached buildings, a railroad spur, a brick smokestack and an iron fence. The oldest part is a brick storehouse of 1895-1897 left from the Canedy-Clark Shoe Factory. Grocer and businessman H.W. Clark turned the site into a bakery after 1901, adding a boiler house and a three-story mill-construction Icing Building in 1913. In 1922 came a four-story reinforced-concrete Baking Building with mushroom-shaped interior columns, Moderne piers and a Classical Revival entry pediment. Its upper floors still hold fireboxes and brick ovens. The complex is significant for its part in the city's early twentieth century manufacturing economy and for its industrial architecture. Clark's bakery lines were said to be the longest in Massachusetts. The period of significance runs from 1895 to 1954, when the company closed. The property is now vacant, and parts of it are badly deteriorated.","period_of_significance":"1895-1954","architect_builder":"William J. Higginson, Architect; D.L. Dillon, Builder","architectural_style":"Late 19th & Early 20th American Movements/Commercial Style; Modern Movement/Moderne","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Listed as vacant/not in use; the West Storehouse and Boiler House are deteriorated, with roof and masonry wall failure, and the smokestack has partly collapsed.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:13:04.473516-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/41/7892/63789241/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/09000235.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/09000235/836f036bf0-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/09000235/836f036bf0-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"Beyond My Ken","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:H._W._Clark_Biscuit_Company.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Beyond My Ken</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:H._W._Clark_Biscuit_Company.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63789241","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._W._Clark_Biscuit_Company","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5628636"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/berkshire-county/h-w-clark-biscuit-company-09000235/"}