What's Up in Nashua?

There's been quite a lot happening here in recent months both at the mill apartment building as well as a major undertaking in the downtown area on Main St. with high-reaching projects. 

Renovations were completed to the cupola (also called the bell tower) atop the mill building at Clocktower Place Apartments, the mill building where we reside (only apartments, no condos). The above photos show the completed work which involved replacing wood and repainting. Originally, a building's cupola was functional and could be used to ventilate and provide natural light for the structure below. It also served could enclose a bell; this one formerly housed a bell (shown below).

This scaffolding was erected around the mill tower for many months during 2021. Workers didn't climb it to reach the top, but entered the rooftop work area from inside the building.

Many years ago, this bell was housed in the cupola and would be rung to summon millworkers. It was removed years ago and now resides in a separate area on the grounds and there are no plans to re-insert it in the repaired cupola. I don't know the exact reason for its removal which was done long ago, possibly when the mill buildings were renovated for other uses before their conversion to residential housing. 

Work has been moving along on a performing arts center in downtown Nashua. It's located on the site of a former shoe store, which relocated to a new and larger location outside the city. 

This popular 1960s shoe store was demolished to its foundations which were reconstructed to house the audience chamber, stage, and front of house functions. The exterior of an adjacent 1924 brick apartment building was retained and the redesigned interior will house additional lobby space and other functions. 

Completion of the 750-seat performing arts center is expected by late fall of this year. It is expected to host nationally touring musical performances and theatre acts. It will also serve as a local venue for concerts, plays, children's performances and other events. 

This is an earlier architectural rendering of how the project is expected to look on completion. Here, the name is shown as Nashua Performing Arts Center, but the official name will be the Nashua Center for the Arts.

That's because in late 2021, the Nashua Community Arts board announced that a local family had contributed an anonymous $1 million gift towards the $25 million project. It was given final naming rights as a result of that donation. 

The use of the word anonymous seemed puzzling at first since if you remain anonymous when you do something, you don't let others know. Don't misunderstand, this was a generous and wonderful donation plus the selected name seems more appropriate. In this case, as in others, the use of the word meant that those responsible didn't want their name shared publicly.

To follow up on a fellow blogger's comment that this looks to be an impressive center for a fairly small city. That's true considering that Nashua's population is under 100,000. But it's also the second largest city in the state of NH at just under 90,000. Manchester is the largest with a population of 112,600 and Concord is third with 43,500.

There's been a lot more going on around Nashua including some new wall murals. A future post will include photos of both older and newer ones.