immigrants - The Cambridge Historical Commission Blog

The Story of an Ordinary House: 91-93 Windsor Street

Posted on May 19, 2026May 18, 2026 by cambridgehistoricalcommission

91-93 Windsor St in December 1937. Cambridge Historical Commission photo. Cambridge Photo Morgue Collection.

*Detail of Atlas of the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts* (Philadelphia : G.W. Bromley & Co., 1894) showing the location of 91-93 Windsor St.

This is the story of an ordinary house that was demolished. For 59 of the 105 years that this house stood at 91-93 Windsor Street on the corner of School Street, it was owned and lived in by Richard Beckett and/or his descendants. His is an interesting immigrant story…but let’s start at the beginning:

The land on which 91-93 Windsor Street was built in 1836 was originally part of the estate of Spencer Phipps (1635-1757), who was Lieutenant Governor and Commander in Chief “in and over his Majesty’s Province of the Massachusetts Bay in New-England” from 1732 to his death in 1757.

In 1793, Andrew Boardman IV (1745-1817) (later known as Bordman) inherited a portion of the Phipps estate upon the death of his mother, Sarah Phipps. In 1801, he and others laid out Windsor Street through his estate. This was followed in 1803 by surveying building lots in the area west of Windsor St and south Harvard St. (Andrew Bordman also donated the land for the school named after him, located on the opposite corner of School and Windsor Streets. The name of the street was originally spelled “Winsor;” it was not until around 1841 that the spelling changed to Windsor.)

View of the Boardman School building (built 1868) at 105 Windsor Street as photographed by Richard CHeek in July 1968. Cambridge Historical Commission photo.

Subsequently, Josiah Wellington Cook (1805-1891) acquired the land, and in 1836 built this house. Meant as an investment rental property, it was a simple vernacular wood frame double house, with two front doors centered, and a side gable roof with slight returning eves. At the time of its construction, the house was in a working-class neighborhood.

Josiah Cook was in the grocery business until he was elected a director and secretary of the Cambridge Mutual Fire Insurance Company, later becoming president. (The Cambridge Mutual Fire Insurance Company building, built in 1888, still stands in Central Square on the corner of Mass Ave and Inman St.) Cook was a member of the Cambridge Anti-Slavery Society, served as Deputy Sheriff, City Marshall, Assessor of Cambridge, and was a Justice of the Peace for Middlesex County. He is buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery, in Lot #2050 Honeysuckle Path.

Cook owned the building at 91-93 Windsor St until at least 1847. By 1852, it was owned by Charles Hancock, a carpenter who was later partner in the Hancock & Greeley Company, lumber dealers and carpenters. Hancock later dissolved his relationship with Greeley and by 1879 was in the real estate and insurance business, providing “special attention…to collecting rents and the care of Real Estate.” (The Cambridge Chronicle September 10, 1881)

In 1873, the double house was owned by Daniel Gregory Stone, a box-maker who died in 1876 at the age of 55. His wife, Lucy A. (Parker) Stone, was the administrator for her husband’s estate. Following Lucy’s death in 1882, Richard Beckett purchased the property from George A. Parker for $1400 (George’s relation to Lucy A. Parker is unclear). Beckett’s life is interesting as it exemplifies the classic entrepreneurial immigrant success story.

Richard Beckett was born in Tyrone County Ireland in 1833. He was just 18 when he emigrated to the U. S. in 1851. In 1853, he married Ann McClean (1830 Ire. – 1891 Cambridge). Just six years later in 1857 at the age of 24, he became a naturalized citizen and bought his first property at the corner of Eliot Street and Brighton Ave (now called JFK Street) near Harvard Square. Beckett is listed on the deed as a “laborer.” He and his family lived there from 1875-1877. The building was originally a schoolhouse on Garden Street, subsequently moved to Eliot St. Beckett built a brick foundation and added a second story with a French roof.

Detail: *Atlas of the City of Cambridge, Middlesex Co., Massachusetts* (G.M. Hopkins & Co., 1873) showing the location of Richard Beckett’s property near Harvard Square

Beckett worked at the Cambridge Gas Co. for 40 years – rising to the rank of “supervisory foreman” by 1880. Just nine years after arriving in the U. S., the census of 1860 lists Beckett’s worth as $1000, and by 1870 it was $2800. By 1886, he owned a total of four adjoining buildings along Brighton Ave.

Detail: *Atlas of the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts* (G.M. Hopkins & Co., 1886) showing the location of Richard Beckett’s property near Harvard Square

Beckett’s next purchase, in 1875, was a brick townhouse at 11 Broadway. Moving in with his family in 1878, he lived there until his wife’s death and his own, both occurring in 1891. In addition to working for the gas company, the City Directory of 1885 listed Beckett as a purveyor of “liquors, Wines, Etc.”

11 Broadway storefront at center as photographed on December 10, 1899. These buildings were razed in 1935. Cambridge Historical Commission photo.

Detail of *Atlas of the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts* (Philadelphia : G.W. Bromley & Co., 1894) showing Richard Beckett’s property at 11 Broadway

At his death, Beckett’s three properties (28 Boylston, 11 Broadway, and 91-93 Windsor St) were bequeathed to his heirs. His daughter Annie Maria (1859-1936) lived at 91-93 for 30 years, from 1916 until her death in 1936. In 1879, she married cabinet maker James Edwin Stewart Sr. (1862 Canada -1910 Worcester, MA). Edwin emigrated from New Brunswick, Canada in 1872 and petitioned for citizenship in 1888. The couple lived at Annie’s father’s property at 11 Broadway, where the Stewarts raised their four daughters and two boys until James’s Stewart’s Sr. death in 1910. Both are buried in the Cambridge Cemetery.

Portrait of Anne Maria “Annie” (Beckett) Stewart via FindAGrave. Photo added by David M. Carrig.

Portrait of James Edwin Stewart via Ancestry. Photo uploaded by user cw_cook.

James Stewart appears in an amusing anecdote in The Cambridge Chronicle (January 14, 1905) about the thousands of households permitted to raise chickens in Cambridge. He was listed as having 12 chickens on his property at 11 Broadway.

James Stewart died in 1910 and was only 48 years old at the time. His death may have occurred under tragic circumstances, as it was recorded at the state hospital in Worcester, known as the Worcester Asylum for the mentally ill. Their eldest son was by that time out of the house, but Annie was left to raise the remaining children on her own.

Two years after her husband’s death in 1912, a notice ran in The Cambridge Tribune advertising a public auction of the “Stewart Estate,” comprised of the three properties owned by Richard Beckett. The lots were referred to as the Stewart Estate because they had been passed down to Anna Marie Stewart, daughter of Richard Beckett. In the notice, 91-93 Windsor St is described as a “Double frame dwelling with small barn in rear, about 3,274 feet of land; Assessed Valuation, $3,000.”

*The Cambridge Chronicle* April 27, 1912

The 1920 Census shows Annie carried a mortgage on 91-93 Windsor; by 1930 she owned it free and clear. Annie’s daughter Ruth lived in the building from 1914-1915, and again after her marriage to Herbert E. Adams, a Chauffer, from 1928-1941.

Others who had lived at #91 included:
1904-1912: Joseph and Helen Marsh. Joseph was foundryman/mechanic
1910: Charles E. Kelley, building mover
1913: Edward A. Gorvina, Driver
1918-21: Mrs. Helen Blanche

Occupants at #93 next door included:
1905 -1906: John W. Green, Tailor
1907 -1911: Mrs. Margaret Gunning, groceries
1911 – 1917: Bernard T. Phelan, Teamster and Mrs. Isabella Phelan, Grocer
1913: Charles H. Burns, Clerk and William J. Burns, laborer
1913: Mr. John C. Phelan, clerk, and Mrs. C. Shaughnessy, Baker
1915-1916: Edward L. Powers, Clerk
1918 -1920: Frank (a driver) and Hattie Fleet
1921: Thomas S. Graney, Laborer, and his wife Sarah.
1925-: Paterson, John (a painter) and Agnes Paterson, along with George K. Paterson, a coremaker
1930: Arthur Villemaire, Chauffer

The Final Act

In 1941, Annie Stewart’s heirs sold the property to Paul Rudak, who razed it, and built a new store on the property. In 1950, Paul Gauthier opened “Paul’s Grocery” on the corner. In 1979, the Gauthier family bought the property, and it became the famed Newtowne Variety until it closed in 2016.

*The Cambridge Chronicle* March 16, 1950

David Gauthier, Burt Gauthier, and John Gauthier, pictured left to right, are the three brothers who ran Newtowne Variety in The Port. Photo courtesy of Wicked Local

In 2004, the Cambridge Historical Commission awarded the Newtowne Variety store a Certificate of Merit “for their contribution to the streetscape and respectful treatment of historic aspects of the building.” After the Newtowne Variety store closed, the property was purchased by “Windsor Ninety Three LLC” and later occupied for a short time by cafe Brew on the Grid. By 2025, the property sold again to Windsor Units LLC for $1,270,000. As of December 2025, 93 Windsor Street is an empty storefront.

Then…and now…

Exterior of a closed coffee shop 'brew on the grid' with brown awning, windows covered in paper, and a parking meter out front.

Today’s post was written by Kathleen M. Fox

Sources
Ancestry.com
Bunting, Bainbridge and Robert Nylander Survey of Architectural History in Cambridge: Old Cambridge (1973).
Cambridge City Directories
Cambridge Historical Commission
Cambridge Public Library’s Historic Cambridge Newspaper Collection
Hail, Christopher. Buildings and Architects of Cambridge
Library of Congress
Paige Lucius R. History of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1630-1877, with a Genealogical Register
Boston 1877, H. O. Houghton and company; New York, Hurd and Houghton
Middlesex South Registry of Deeds
Wikitree

A Cambridge Entry in the Green Book

Posted on February 24, 2019May 14, 2020 by cambridgehistoricalcommission

Today’s post was written by CHC Preservation Planner, Sarah Burks.

You likely have heard a lot of talk recently about Green Book, the award-nominated movie starring Mahershala Ali as Dr. Don Shirley, a world class pianist on a performance tour in the southern states during the Jim Crow era. The name of the movie derives from a U.S. travel guide for Black tourists. The Negro Motorist Green Book offered lists of restaurants, automobile service stations, hotels, parks, and other sites that would be safe and welcoming to African Americans traveling for work or leisure. The books were published by Victor H. Green between 1936 and 1967. A new documentary, The Green Book: Guide to Freedom, will air on the Smithsonian Channel on Monday, February 25 at 8:00 P.M. The original books have been digitized by the New York Public Library and can be viewed online here.

Green Book, 1947 cover — Cover of the 1947 edition of *The Negro Motorist Green Book*. Digital Collections of the New York Public Library.

Although Boston had a couple dozen sites listed in the Green Books, Cambridge only had one, a “tourist home” at 26 Mead Street with the contact name of S. P. Bennett.

Green Book, 1947, detail of Cambridge entry p 43 — Detail of the Cambridge entry in the 1947 edition of *The Negro Motorist Green Book*. Digital Collections of the New York Public Library.

Satyra Pearson Bennett was a Cambridge resident who rented out rooms to travelers in her family home. She worked as a linotype operator for several newspapers and was on the board of multiple charitable organizations and city committees. Satyra Pearson was born in 1892 in Rock Hill, Jamaica to Frances and William Pearson. In 1894, Satyra and her parents departed from Kingston and arrived in New York City. The family moved to Massachusetts in 1903, first residing in Worcester and then settling in Cambridge on Mead Street.

1916_Bromley — 1916 Bromley map showing the Pearson residence at 26 Mead Street in Northwest Cambridge

According to Satyra’s 1926 Petition for Citizenship, the family arrived in Boston from St. John, New Brunswick aboard the U.S.S. Calvin Austin in 1913.

Satyra’s father was an ordained minister and was the pastor for many years at St. Paul A.M.E. Church at 37 Bishop Allen Drive in Cambridgeport.

20St Paul AME late 1800s — St. Paul AME Church in the late 1800s

In 1919, Satyra married Cyril Bennett. Cyril was also a Jamaican-born minister, and following their marriage, Satyra moved with him to Detroit. Together they had one son, George B. Bennett in 1920, but the couple soon divorced. By July 1921, Satyra had moved back to Cambridge and lived with her parents at 26 Mead Street. Satyra advertised her dress-making services in local newspapers, and in 1926 began the process to attain her U.S. citizenship.

CambChron_23July1921 — Clipping from the *Cambridge Chronicle*, 23 July 1921

citizen1933 — Frances Satyra Bennett’s citizenship card, 1933

Mrs. Bennett was a founding board member of the Cambridge Community Center, the Citizens Charitable Health Association, and an officer of the Boston chapter of the NAACP. She died in 1977. Her sister, Mrs. Ozeline Pearson Wise, was the first African American woman to work for the banking department of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. She was interviewed in 1978 as part of the Black Women’s Oral History Project. You can listen to their story here and view their entries on the Cambridge Women’s Heritage Project.

26 Mead St Cambridge Assessor's photo 2017 — Bennett House at 26 Mead Street, Cambridge, MA. Cambridge Assessing Department photo, 2017.

Igor Fokin Memorial Sculpture, One Brattle Square

Posted on February 7, 2019May 14, 2020 by cambridgehistoricalcommission

Since the 1970s, summer evenings in Harvard Square have featured a vibrant street theater scene. In 1985, a major subway construction project that extended the Red Line subway to Alewife was completed, resulting in major changes above ground, including wider sidewalks and small plazas, that created even more opportunities for busking (Lotman, Harvard Square, An Illustrated History Since 1950, 2009). Performers ranged from jugglers, mimes, tightrope walkers, and fire eaters, to musicians and singers. This dynamic street performance culture continues today.

igorshow courtesy of http://www.igorfokin.com

In the early 1990s, one performer stood out as a unique and remarkably gifted entertainer. From 1993 to 1996, Igor Fokin enchanted people with his life-like marionettes that mesmerized young and old alike as they danced, played, and interacted with the audience. Igor hand-carved his wooden puppets who ranged from dancing skeletons, a witch sweeping up the sidewalk, to a puppet named Doo-Doo with a fluted nose, and Satchmo playing his trumpet to the song Mack the Knife. Each puppet, measuring less than 12 inches, was elaborately detailed and truly came to life under Igor’s nimble handling, when climbing up someone’s leg, petting someone’s nose, or sitting on a child’s lap.

castcolor courtesy of http://www.igorfokin.com

Born in Russia and a graduate of St. Petersburg Theatrical Institute, Igor moved to Cambridge in the summer of 1993 with his collection of puppets, and by the end of the summer he was one of the most popular performers. Igor put on several shows a day, including passers-by in the late afternoon and culminating in the evening with a large audience who purposely came out to see his show. He was always refining his craft and developing new characters for his street performances which he referred to as the “most democratic art form” (Schmidt, The Puppeteer, 2003).

igorandcast courtesy of http://www.igorfokin.com

Igor performed in Harvard Square until his untimely death in 1996 at the age of 36. Today, at the corner of One Brattle Square, where Igor enjoyed performing the most, a bronze replica of Doo-Doo by sculptor Konstantin Simun is perched on a bollard, a permanent reminder of Igor’s joyful imagination and the delight he brought to everyone lucky enough to experience his magical world.

Sources
Lotman, Mo. Harvard Square, An Illustrated History Since 1950. Abrahms, 2009.

Schmidt, Chris, and Gary Henoch, The Puppeteer, 2003, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJ2gizaqVw8

http://www.igorfokin.com

New Small Collection: The Coleman-Cutting Family Photographs

Posted on January 3, 2019May 14, 2020 by cambridgehistoricalcommission

The Historical Commission recently accepted a donation of eight photographs depicting members of three Cambridge families in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries. The photographs were donated by a descendant of these families. Scroll down to read snapshots of these people and their connections to 19th century Cambridge industries.

Coleman Family: Police and Coal

This family collection’s story begins with a tintype of John Coleman, likely from the 1850s.

John Coleman002 — John Coleman, ca. 1850s.

Coleman was born in Birmingham, England, in 1827. Around 1847, he and his wife Elizabeth Harper Whitehouse immigrated to the U.S. and settled in Cambridge, where John became a well-known policeman. In 1878, John and his son Walter started a coal and wood business at the corner of Broadway and Sixth Street in Cambridge; in 1881 son James also became part of the firm. After John’s death in 1883, Walter and James took over the firm, naming it Coleman Brothers. Their company did business at 428 Massachusetts Avenue until a merger with the Massachusetts Wharf Coal Company in 1923.

chronicle18930722-01.2.9-a5-700w — A (barely visible) newspaper image of the Coleman Brothers coal factory, Cambridge, Mass. Cambridge Chronicle, July 22, 1893. https://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/

Cutting Family: Firemen and Markets

John Coleman’s daughter, Fannie Coleman, married Charles H. Cutting. Charles was born in Boston but, like Fannie, grew up in Cambridge.

Fanny Cutting005 — Fanny Coleman Cutting, n.d.

Charles H Cutting003 — Charles H. Cutting, n.d.

The Cuttings had four children: Elizabeth Swanton, Henry Arthur, Herbert Harper, and Ida May. Sadly, Fannie died from complications of childbirth in 1889.

Cutting Children004 — The Cutting children, 1889

Charles Cutting’s occupation was originally listed as an iron molder, but he was later listed as a fish dealer and eventually owned his own provisions store at 885 Main Street (now on Mass Ave near Harvard Square). Charles may have taken over ownership of this store from E.A. Burroughs, proprietor of The Old Rockport Market, selling fish, oysters, and canned goods.

Cutting Market004 — The Cutting family outside of their store at 885 Main Street, n.d.

Charles would also serve as a volunteer fireman with the Cambridge Fire Department for 37 years, retiring in 1915.

Cutting Market 2005 — The Cutting family inside their store, n.d.

The three eldest Cutting children seem to have helped with the family store, especially son Henry, who later took over running the store after Charles died in 1920. Henry also worked for the Cambridge Fire Department at River Street from 1920-1942.

Kemp and Nowell Family: Soap

Charles Cutting’s daughter Elizabeth Cutting married Bowman Nowell, the son of Lucy Ann Kemp and Charles Nowell. Lucy Ann was the daughter of Lysander Kemp, owner of a Cambridge soap manufacturing company and brother-in-law to Curtis Davis of the Curtis Davis Company (a large soap manufacturer that was later bought by Lever Brothers).

Nowell002

Lysander’s original company, which manufactured laundry soap, was Kemp & Sargent, later Lysander Kemp & Sons.

lysander kemp postcard

To see these photographs or to learn more about any of the industries mentioned here, make a research appointment with us at histcomm@cambridgema.gov. If you are interested in donating photographs or materials on your Cambridge ancestors, please feel free to contact Emily, egonzalez@cambridgema.gov.

The Cambridge Historical Commission has a rich collection of both family photographs and historical materials on Cambridge business and industry, and we are always excited to add more to the collection.

New Images and Finding Aids

Posted on October 13, 2017November 15, 2018 by Meta Partenheimer

The Commission is happy to announce the availability of newly digitized images and updates to finding aids for four of our collections! Scroll down for descriptions and samples of images from the following collections: Inner Belt Scrapbook, Godinho Family Photograph Collection, Cambridge Manual Training School/ Rindge Manual Training School/
Rindge Technical School Collection, and the Curtis Mellen Photograph Collection.

Inner Belt Scrapbook
Proposed in the mid-1950s, the Inner Belt was once a planned highway that would have been Interstate 695. If built, this highway would have run a route through parts of Cambridge, Boston, Somerville, and Brookline. Many citizens protested the plan as it would have divided neighborhoods and displaced thousands of residents. This collection contains scrapbook pages detailing the saga of the Inner Belt campaign from 1960-1969.

Flyer: State House Rally, Jamaica-Plain-Roxbury Expressway Committee, 1969

1966_00J — Clippings: Inner Belt Activities; Morning Union Leader, Christian Science Monitor, The Cambridge Chronicle; March 1966

View the finding aid for this collection here.

Additional pages from the Inner Belt Scrapbook can be viewed here.

Godinho Family Photograph Collection

Scrapbook page: Members of the Godinho Family, c. 1920

This collection contains photographic materials and personal items of the Godinhos, a Portuguese family who lived in Cambridge from the late nineteenth to mid twentieth century. Although little is known about the individuals depicted, including many of their identities, the collection contains photos of the Azores, a region in Portugal, indicating that this may be where the family originated. When whaling and fishing declined towards the end of the nineteenth century, many Portuguese immigrants, who had been whalers and fishermen in New Bedford, Massachusetts, moved to industrial towns near Boston, including Cambridge. The Portuguese Catholic population became large enough that in 1902 St. Anthony’s Church was opened in East Cambridge.

Unknown Boy: Gribal Godinho Family - First Holy Communion Portra — Unknown Boy: Gribal Godinho Family – First Holy Communion Portrait, c. 1915-1920

Joseph Godinho (left) and Unknown Man, c. 1920

Additional images from the Godinho Family Photograph Collection can be viewed here.

View the finding aid for this collection here.

Cambridge Manual Training School/ Rindge Manual Training School/
Rindge Technical School Collection

The Cambridge Manual Training School for Boys was founded by Frederick Hastings Rindge in September 1888. The Cambridge School Committee renamed the school Rindge Manual Training School in 1899 in honor of Mr. Rindge after he retired. Considering its broadened offerings in technical education, the school was later renamed Rindge Technical School. In 1977, the Rindge Technical School merged with the Cambridge High and Latin School to form the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School (CRLS).

Having been assembled from multiple sources, items in this collection are related to the school and range from the 1880s to 1940s. Formats include photographs, documents, correspondence, and objects. Photographic subjects include events and classes at the Rindge School and Camp Rindge, as well as fire brigade practice operations.

classroom001 — Chemistry classroom, c. 1920s

fire_brigade001 — Fire brigade operations, c. 1910

The bulk of this collection includes photographs of sports teams and individual players at Rindge Technical School. Many images depict the football team, but also include crew, hockey, track, swimming, and baseball.

baseball001 — D. Allen, Baseball Captain, 1922

View the finding aid for this collection here.

Curtis Mellen Photograph Collection
The Mellens were a very prominent family in Cambridge, and their soap business, Curtis Davis & Co., became the American branch of Lever Brothers, the largest soap manufacturer in the world at the time.

Interior View: Curtis Davis and Co., 180 Broadway

This collection includes family photographs as well as photographs of both the interior and exterior of Mellen family homes in Cambridge. Depicted are homes on Broadway, Chauncy, Forest, Linnean, and Hampshire streets. Many of the photographs have been attributed to Edwin D. Mellen and depict lavish interiors with intricate fixtures and furnishings.

Interior View: 33 Washington Avenue, c. 1880s

Interior View: Unknown address, c. 1880s-1890s

Additional images from the Curtis Mellen Photograph Collection can be viewed here.

View the finding aid for this collection here.

To schedule an appointment for in-person research, please contact the Cambridge Historical Commission today at 617.349.4683 or e-mail our Archivist, Emily at egonzalez@cambridgema.gov.

Ella Jepson Nylander Photograph Collection

Posted on April 24, 2017November 14, 2018 by Meta Partenheimer

In this post, our archives assistant Meta shares highlights and images from the recently processed and digitized Ella Jepson Nylander Photograph Collection. This collection is open for research at the CHC.

This collection consists of photographs found in a trunk that belonged to Ella Jepson Nylander. Mrs. Nylander was born Rozella Josephine Jepson in New Sweden, Maine in 1883 to Swedish immigrants Mons and Elna Jepson. Ella and her husband Olof Conrad Nylander lived within the closely-knit Swedish-American community in Cambridge for many years, and a number of the photographs in this collection were taken by photographers in Cambridge and across the water in Boston. Members of the Nylander and related families are represented in the images, in addition to friends and fellow church-goers of the Swedish Baptist Church located at the corner of Washington and Columbia streets.

nylander_1 — *Portrait of Anna Nyman (left) and Ella Jepson Nylander (right)*, c. 1890-1905.

Cambridge began seeing a rise in Swedish immigrants during the late-nineteenth century, and by 1905 the population had reached 1,645. Many Swedes were employed in trades and as craftsmen, but quite a few members of the younger generation began working in a more professional capacity. The Swedish and Swedish-American community in Cambridge was a close-knit and religious group during this time, and many of their activities centered on their religion.

nylander_2 — *Portrait of Olof Conrad Nylander (left) and Otto H. Anderson (right)*, c. 1900-1910.

Ella Jepson married Olof Conrad Nylander in Cambridge, Massachusetts on May 30, 1908, and the ceremony was performed by Reverend C. (Carl) E. Johnson, the couple’s first pastor in Cambridge. Reverend Johnson became the pastor for this congregation in 1899. During his time in Cambridge, Reverend Johnson performed wedding ceremonies for various friends of the Nylanders and was very active in organizing church social events.

nylander_3 — *Portrait of Reverend Carl E. Johnson*, c. 1900.

By 1902, the Swedish Baptist congregation in Cambridge had expanded to over 100 members and began taking bids to create a new church. Many members of the congregation were said to be poor or working class immigrants, and the surrounding community of Cambridge was encouraged to aid in fund contributions to the new church. Construction began in late 1902, and during this time the congregation worshiped in the YMCA building. The cornerstone for the new church was laid on March 8, 1903 and dedicated the following May in 1904. As it stands today, the building at 77 Columbia Street is a substantial improvement to its predecessor and embodies the spirit of community and fellowship of the Swedish community in Cambridge.

nylander_4 — *Swedish Baptist Church at 77 Columbia Street, Cambridge*, c. 1903-1915.

For a more in-depth history of this collection and the individuals photographed, click the following text to open the Ella Jepson Nylander Photograph Collection finding aid.

To view the full collection of digitized images, visit the Cambridge Historical Commission Flickr page.

References:

“Ancestry,” Retrieved from http://www.ancestry.com/.

“Death of Iowa Rev. Olof Lindh.” Cambridge Chronicle, October 12, 1912. Accessed October 7, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Chronicle19121012-01.2.117&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

“Harvard Square.” Cambridge Tribune, June 15, 1907. Accessed October 11, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Tribune19070615-01.2.44&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

“Midsummer Festival.” Cambridge Chronicle, June 29, 1918, Accessed October 11, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Chronicle19180629-01.2.59&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

“Midsummer Festival by Swedish Church.” Cambridge Chronicle, June 28, 1919. Accessed October 11, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Chronicle19190628-01.2.54&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

“New Swedish Baptist Church.” Cambridge Chronicle, July 19, 1902. Accessed October 7, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Chronicle19020719-01.2.157&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

“Over 600 Present at Annual Swedish Night.” Cambridge Chronicle, March 10, 1923. Accessed October 11, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Chronicle19230310-01.2.75&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

“Proposed Swedish Baptist Church.” Cambridge Tribune, March 7, 1903. Accessed October 7, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Tribune19030307-01.2.109.3&srpos=9&e=–1846—1935–en-20–1-byDA-txt-txIN-%22swedish+baptist+church%22+columbia—–#.

“Prospect Union.” Cambridge Sentinel, January 7, 1911. Accessed October 11, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Sentinel19110107-01.2.58&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

“Swedish Baptist Church.” Cambridge Tribune, June 13, 1896. Accessed October 7, 2016. http://cambridge.dlconsulting.com/cgi-bin/cambridge?a=d&d=Tribune18960613-01.2.51&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——.

Woods, Robert A. and Albert J. Kennedy, The Zone of Emergence: Observations of the Lower Middle and Upper Working Class Communities of Boston, 1905-1914. Abridged and Edited with a Preface by Sam Bass Warner, Jr., 70-74, Cambridge: The M.I.T. Press, 1962.