{"nrhp_refnum":"79000347","name":"Kennedy-Worthington Blocks","other_names":["Wilkinson and Wright Blocks"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"1585-1623 Main St. and 166-190 Worthington St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Springfield","county":"Hampden County","state":"MA","lat":42.10416240500007,"lon":-72.59299764799994,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1979-06-14","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Commerce","Architecture","Communications"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A group of three five-story brick commercial buildings on the east side of Main Street at Worthington and Taylor Streets (1585-1623 Main Street; 166-190 Worthington Street) in Springfield's North Blocks area. The buildings date from 1872 to 1888, with a 1914 facade on the Worthington Building.","why_significant":"The blocks played a major role in developing the North Blocks as a commercial and manufacturing section of downtown Springfield. They were built by Emerson Wight, a local businessman and mayor, and housed newspapers and manufacturers. Architecturally they are among the finest and least altered large manufacturing buildings in the area, with changes limited mostly to twentieth-century storefronts.","narrative":"Three five-story brick commercial buildings line the east side of Main Street in Springfield, between Taylor and Worthington Streets: the Kennedy Block, the Worthington Building and the Worthington Street Block. Emerson Wight, a local businessman who served as mayor from 1875 to 1878, developed them in the 1860s and 1870s. The Kennedy Block was rebuilt in 1874 after a fire, the Worthington Street Block was redesigned in 1888 by Frederick Newman, and the Worthington Building received a classical stucco and cast stone facade in 1914. Tenants included the Daily Union and Daily News newspapers, the Morgan Envelope Company, the R. H. Smith Manufacturing Company, and later Kennedy's clothing store. A deadly 1888 newspaper-office fire here helped prompt the city to add aerial ladders to its fire-fighting equipment. The buildings represent the North Blocks' role as space for small manufacturers near the railroads, and their facades are largely intact above twentieth-century storefronts.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":"Kennedy Block: 1874 rebuilding (architect not named). Worthington Building: George Potter (1872), E.C. and G.C. Gardner (1914 facade). Worthington Street Block: Frederick Newman (1888). Built for Emerson Wight.","architectural_style":null,"criteria":[],"status_note":"All three buildings were in the process of being adaptively recycled for mixed residential/commercial use at the time of the form; the ground floors had been altered with twentieth-century storefronts.","vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:53.359411-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/1/7952/63795201/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/79000347.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79000347/10ed427aa6-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79000347/10ed427aa6-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"John Phelan","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kennedy-Worthington_Blocks,_Springfield_MA.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">John Phelan</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kennedy-Worthington_Blocks,_Springfield_MA.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63795201","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy-Worthington_Blocks","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6389580"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/hampden-county/kennedy-worthington-blocks-79000347/"}