Rockdale Common Housing District - Northbridge MA - U.S. National Register of Historic Places on Waymarking.com

The village of Rockdale was a company town built between 1857 and 1920. The tenements are part of a residential section of the town. The tenements were built to attract workers and their families to the Rockdale mill. The buildings are in great condition and still in use today as low income housing.

Rockdale's first mill was built by Sylvanus Holbrook in 1814 for making satinet. It was one of the earliest mills in the Blackstone Valley. Fires in 1841 and 1851 devastated the entire village The mill and water rights were purchased by the P. Whitin and Sons. Another mill was built following the Whitin family acquisition. Because of the difficulty of attracting labor to the area because it was so rural, the Whitin family, built its own town including housing, stores, schools and other municipal buildings. The housing was comfortable and inexpensive, discouraging turnover which was one of the foundations of successes for the Whitin companies

Street address: 4-20 McBride, 46-58 Plantation, and 37-42 Taft Sts Northbridge, MA County / Borough / Parish: Worcester Year listed: 1983 Historic (Areas of) Significance: Architecture/Engineering, Event Periods of significance: 1900-1924, 1875-1899, 1850-1874, 1825-1849, 1800-1824 Historic function: Domestic Current function: Domestic Privately owned?: yes Primary Web Site: [Web Link] Season start / Season finish: Not listed Hours of operation: Not listed Secondary Website 1: Not listed Secondary Website 2: Not listed National Historic Landmark Link: Not listed

Visit Instructions:
Please give the date and brief account of your visit. Include any additional observations or information that you may have, particularly about the current condition of the site. Additional photos are highly encouraged, but not mandatory.

Recent Visits/Logs:

There are no logs for this waymark yet.