CUMBERLAND – A Massachusetts developer is proposing a major overhaul of one of the region’s giant textile mills with the goal of installing apartments, a restaurant where diners can overlook the Blackstone River, and space for small businesses.
Bill Gately of Winchester, Mass., has purchased the century-old, vacant Naushon Mill at 32 Meeting St. where generations of northern Rhode Islanders, working for a succession of owners, turned out cottons, silks and woolens from 1903 until the final rug maker closed two years ago.
Thrilled with the riverfront setting, Gately says candidly that he likely wouldn’t be interested if not for the river flowing through the mill’s back yard. “This is truly a special place,” he says. “Just look at what it will be,” he said. “I couldn’t image a better setting.”
His vision, he says, is 45 to 50 apartments of 1,200-1,500 square feet, outfitted with stainless appliances, granite countertops, high-end finishes and river overlooks. He imagines he’ll appeal to recent college graduates providing a ready clientèle for a gym that’s also part of the plan, and the restaurant.
The building sits on Cumberland’s most southern point, off Broad Street near the Club Juventude Lusitana. It was brought to Gately’s attention by a printer looking for new space who will be accommodated along with the possibility of other businesses.
He’s well aware, Gately said, that the area needs a facelift, using the word “downtrodden” to describe much of the neighborhood.
“But,” he says, “we’re into something people can really use - a place to live, work out, eat and drink,” all priced “a little bit below average. We don’t need to hit it out of the ballpark, but turn in strong singles and doubles,” he said.
Gately, who has been in the real estate redevelopment business for years, currently owns business property in South Boston, Dorchester and Nashua, N.H.
He suggests this new venture will require a $12- to $20-million investment, with an initial $3- to $5-million to get the restaurant open and some apartment spaces.
Town Council approval to rezone the property from Industrial 1 to Commercial 2 may be as soon as the Aug. 17 meeting.
Meanwhile, members of the Technical Review Committee team of town department directors gave the project an enthusiastic recommendation at last week’s meeting, with Town Solicitor Tom Hefner commenting “I think this is fantastic.”
Gately couldn’t be more complimentary about Mayor Bill Murray, describing him as “set(ting) the stage with open arms” during an initial meeting in Murray’s office.
Gately says of all his development projects he’s never received the kind of support he’s found from Murray and the town’s Planning Department.
Murray also met with Gately’s financiers from Centreville Bank telling them, in Gately’s words, “Fund this guy because we want this mill to happen.”
Said Gately, “Rhode Island may be the worst state to do business, but Cumberland certainly isn’t.”
Murray confirmed later that he did urge the bankers to get behind the project. “When I talked to the bank I impressed upon them the great opportunity here,” he said.
“Gately is a go-getter,” Murray told The Breeze. “He bought it as shot in the dark, the only one with the guts to do it.”
The project comes as a long hoped for Broad Street improvement plan seems to be gaining traction. Central Falls, Pawtucket and Cumberland are currently working together with an $11.5 million beautification grant and as the Blackstone Valley Prep Mayoral Academy charter school system gets ready to build its new high school on nearby Jones Street.
About the restaurant, Meredith “Mimi” Savignano, currently of Hull, Mass., is the previous owner of Companitico, a catering and restaurant enterprise in Providence.
Her vision for Cumberland is a takeout service offering clamcakes, lobster rolls and other seafood. Picnic tables along the river will be provided.
An interior dining room, in the old boiler room, that shows off the building’s open beams, wood floors and giant windows, might feature an Italian menu, she suggests.
The kitchen would be in the adjacent engineering room where a colony of feral cats - obviously fed by neighbors - have taken up residence. She’s working with lots of imagination here since the roof has caved in making it virtually impossible to explore the entire interior space.
“This is my passion,” she told The Breeze.
As Gately noted of his apartments, she’s stressing, an eatery that’s “not overpriced.” Live entertainment and a bustling bar are part of the plan.
Naushon Mill is named for the summer island residence of its founder, Malcolm Greene Chace, grandson of the Valley Falls Company co-founder Samuel Chace, according to Ned Connors of Edward Connors & Associates in Riverside.
Connors, hired to produce a historical record that might see the mill placed on the National Register of Historic Places, says Naushon was operating in Woonsocket in 1901 when the firm purchased a two-acre waterfront property from the Albion Company, a significant landowner in the Blackstone River area. As residents here know, 50 years earlier the Albion Company had sponsored a mining venture, the Blackstone Mining Company, on the land and Connors describes the area as still containing underground shafts.
Connors’ 27-page report describes a two-story pier and spandrel building of red brick that’s 276 feet long by 170 feet wide.
Most of the windows are original, set in segmental arch openings but not operable. Instead, the plant relied on an unusual forced-draft ventilation system.
A series of sawtooth skylights brought in diffused northern light.
The plant was initially built for the manufacture of gingham washed goods created on 1,000 broad and narrow looms on the second floor.
The plant opened in 1903 with 250 looms and a staff of 275 operatives, says Connors, and almost immediately faced labor issues. Fifty-three four-loom operators walked out over a dispute in wages and although quickly settled it was just the first of many walkouts.
Naushon Mill reached its peak of nearly 500 employees operating 700 looms in 1908, reports Connors, but by 1909 the plant was sold for $1 to Tilton Mills of Albany, N.Y.
Labor strife continued with Polish weavers, sympathetic to several who had been terminated for what was described as inefficiency, closed the entire operation, a move that led to riots involving rock throwing at police who responded with gunfire and a walkout by all weavers of the Blackstone Valley.
Subsequent owners were the Hansahoe Manufacturing, Worcester Textile Company, Sidney Blumental Inc., which was acquired as a division of Burlington Industries in 1961, then sold to G&S Realty in 1962.
G&S leased space to a variety of light industrial tenants, including Standard Romper Company which became Health-tex.
International Textile Manufacturing Company was running a braided rug business in 2014 when it vacated and later condemned by the town.
The mill today sits in a mostly residential area, although the Cadillac Mills, 90 percent occupied, is nearby. Murray reports a series of small businesses including Green Tech Assets, the webbing company Textel Industries, ornamental architectural crafter Preferred Precast, a laminating company, Biecura Medical, and even the Light House Family Center food bank.
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Today’s Naushon Mill has changed little since it was built in 1903, except for the 1945 addition on the left end that was added while Sidney Blumenthal owned it under the Worcester Textile name. (Valley Breeze photo by Tom Ward)
Looking southwest from Meeting Street, here’s how it looked in 1928 when it was owned by the Hansahoe Manufacturing Co. The photo was found in a 1928 bankruptcy auction catalog.
Meredith “Mimi” Savignano of Hull, Mass., stands in front of the old engineering room where she hopes to create the kitchen that will serve both indoor and outdoor diners overlooking the river.
The interior, although damaged by water leaking through the roof and by vandals, suggests the expanse of opportunity for this project that could include apartments and small businesses that include a printer, a restaurant and a gymnasium, says developer Bill Gately of Winchester, Mass.
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MARCIA GREEN, Valley Breeze Editor
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Many of the architectural details of 1903 still remain, including the arched windows and doorways.
A Google Earth view of the Naushon Mill suggests the appeal of the century-old building right along the Blackstone River. Trees will be trimmed to open the view from picnic tables that will be placed outdoors. Apartment dwellers will enjoy decks that overlook the view, says the developer.
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