The one-story commercial building that once stood at 188 Prospect Street was designed in 1912 by the architect Nathan Douglas and constructed by its owner Thomas A. Gannon. Douglas was a prolific local architect with an office on Harvard Street, who designed dozens of three-deckers, apartment houses, and stores between 1901 and 1927. His larger commissions included the Beth Israel Synagogue at 238 Columbia Street (1901) and the Swedish Evangelical Church at 146 Hampshire Street (1902). The façade of 188 was arranged as a single storefront, with a recessed center entrance and two large plate glass windows that angled in to meet the entry door. The façade was detailed with ornamental rafter tails and dentils across the front that wrapped around the corners. A large quarter-round molding decorated the cornice. In 1946 red asphalt shingle siding was added , covering the original clapboards.
The first business to occupy the building was Thomas A. Gannon’s ice cream shop. Gannon manufactured his ice cream in the basement of the house at #190 and sold it at the store next door. Gannon died in 1914 and was succeeded by H.L. Fowler. His advertisement in the 1914 city directory includes offerings of ice cream, baked goods, and homemade candies. Fowler kept the store until 1918 and was followed by the Cambridge Funeral Company operated by Daniel L. Shea, a Somerville resident. (There must have been a good freezer in the building.) Later shops included another confectionery, furniture sales and refinishing, tire sales and service, bicycle seat covers and upholstery, and a photographic gallery.
Infill development on Prospect Street related to garaging and repair of automobiles began in the 1920s and 1930s. Even 188 Prospect Street had an automobile related use for a time: a Sanborn atlas lists a tire sales and service business there in the late 1940s or early 1950s. Occupants in the 1960s included Hamilton Television Service and New England Bicycle Cover Co.
In 1969, the storefront became the first home of a school called Trout Fishing in America, which took its name from Richard Brautigan’s 1967 best-selling countercultural novel. William Hjortsberg wrote in his 2012 biography of Brautigan, Jubilee Hitchhiker: The Life and Times of Richard Brautigan, that the school comprised eight different storefronts. For a fee of $10, students could enroll in courses such as English, theories of revolution, math, science, and motorcycle repair. Trout Fishing in America served as both an educational space and a gathering spot for those who wished to listen, socialize, and plan their peaceful revolutionary future.
In 1969, Brautigan came to the Boston area to promote the release of a collection of three works, Trout Fishing in America, The Pill versus The Springhill Mine Disaster, and In Watermelon Sugar, and visited the Prospect Street school. With him was the reporter John Stickney, who was on assignment for LIFE magazine; his piece, “A Gentle Poet of the Young”, appeared in the August 14, 1970, issue. (Stickney later volunteered as the school’s journalism teacher.) The LIFE photographer Steve Hansen captured this image of Brautigan seated on the curb in front of the school surrounded by teachers and students. During his visit to Cambridge, Brautigan also participated in a Trout Fishing for America parade that began at 188 Prospect and wound through Central and Harvard squares to the northern end of Cambridge Common.
The Trout Fishing in America was based at 188 Prospect only for a short time before moving to 353 Broadway where it shared space with the Cambridge chapter of Vocations for Social Change.
By 1971 The People’s Gallery, a photographers collective, occupied the space at 188 with a storefront gallery and dark room below. They soon shared space with Boston Area Ecology Action, an organic bulk foods store, and another photography studio came in the 1980s. Eventually the building fell into disuse. An application to demolish the commercial building and garage at 188 Prospect Street was filed in early July 2006, and the building was razed later that month. Today, the site is occupied by condominiums.
Sources
Cambridge Public Library historic newspaper database
CHC architectural survey files
Jubilee Hitchhiker: The Life and Times of Richard Brautigan by William Hjortsberg (2012)
“Mapping Out Utopia, Vol. 1: Cambridge” by Tim Devin (2017)