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Varnum School

1857 establishments in MassachusettsNational Register of Historic Places in Lowell, MassachusettsSchool buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in MassachusettsSchools in Lowell, Massachusetts
VarnumOld
VarnumOld

The Varnum School is a historic former school building in Lowell, Massachusetts. The Greek Revival building was built in 1857, and was the first school built in the city's Centralville section after it was annexed to the city in 1851. The building was altered with a minor addition added in 1886, and a substantial Classical Revival addition was made in 1896. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995. Vacant since the 2000s, it is now owned by a developer, and is slated for conversion to housing units.

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Varnum School
Myrtle Street, Lowell Centralville

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N 42.651111111111 ° E -71.299444444444 °
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Myrtle Street 37
01850 Lowell, Centralville
Massachusetts, United States
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Pawtucket Canal
Pawtucket Canal

Completed in 1796, the Pawtucket Canal was originally built as a transportation canal to circumvent the Pawtucket Falls of the Merrimack River in East Chelmsford, Massachusetts. In the early 1820s it became a major component of the Lowell power canal system. with the founding of the textile industry at what became Lowell.The Pawtucket Falls are a mile long series of falls and rapids over which the Merrimack River drops 32 feet. The falls hampered the shipment of inland goods, mostly lumber, to the mouth of the Merrimack and Newburyport, Massachusetts. Newburyport was then one of the largest shipbuilding centers in New England, and a steady supply of wood from New Hampshire was critical to its industry. The original canal was built by wealthy Boston merchants who formed a limited liability corporation called the Proprietors of Locks and Canals, one of the first of its kind in the United States. However, within a decade of its construction the Middlesex Canal was completed, connecting the Merrimack directly with Boston, Massachusetts. Bringing goods directly to Boston was more advantageous for merchants, and the Pawtucket Canal fell out of favor for inland transport. The investors in the Boston Manufacturing Company having successfully built upon Francis Cabot Lowell and Paul Moody's work in building a successfully integrated cotton mill at Waltham, Massachusetts on the Charles River were looking for a site that offered more waterpower and the Pawtucket Falls offered what they needed. In 1821 they bought the Proprietors of Locks and Canals and with it the water rights of the Merrimack River upstream from the Pawtucket Falls. The Pawtucket Canal was deepened to become a power canal, and the first of 5.6 miles of canals in the soon to be named City of Lowell, Massachusetts. The first canal built off the Pawtucket Canal was the Merrimack Canal, which powered the Merrimack Manufacturing Company, thus starting the Lowell experiment, and the first planned industrial city in the United States. The canal is operated today by Boott Hydro, LLC.

Rex Center

The Rex Center was an arena and entertainment center in downtown Lowell, Massachusetts, existing from 1933 to 1960. Entrepreneur and car dealer Charles Dancause created the Rex, which opened in 1933 in a renovated mill building, the old Prescott Division Plant of Mass Cotton Mills. The architect of the conversion was Harry Prescott Graves.Among the entertainments offered at the Rex was dining (the Rex Grille, which also offered floorshows), bars, a dancing ballroom, duckpin bowling (65 lanes), roller skating, pool (30 tables), and Turkish baths. There were five banquet halls; banquets, wedding receptions, and other events were held there. The Rex Center constituted an important part of Lowell social life in the mid 20th century; the Lowell Sun described it as "one of Lowell's landmark spots" and "the sports and dining showplace of Lowell".The Rex Arena in the center seated 1,000 or 2,000 and hosted boxing matches, and also wrestling matches (featuring appearances by Jim Londos, Ed "Strangler" Lewis, The French Angel, Man Mountain Dean, Dropkick Murphy, Bull Curry and many others), particularly after the older Crescent Rink on Hurd Street burned down. Semi-pro basketball games were played there, and the Harlem Globetrotters appeared there.The Rex Center burned down on June 25, 1960. The huge fire raged out of control for several hours, and of the more than 300 firefighters from Lowell and 14 other towns, sixteen were injured. The derelict building was torn down in 1971 and replaced with a parking lot. Wang Laboratories built a training center at the site in 1984, which in 1990 was purchased by Middlesex Community College and is now used as its Lowell campus.