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Manoian to give historic presentation to benefit Nashua’s West Pearl Street Mural project

By Staff | May 16, 2013

NASHUA – Alan Manoian is coming back to town, and you won’t have to walk to hear him talk.

City Arts Nashua is sponsoring a fundraising presentation by Manoian titled “To Wander and Wonder along Historic West Pearl Street.” Proceeds will help fund the West Pearl Street Mural project.

The Nashua Historical Society will host Manoian’s presentation at 1:30 p.m. Sunday, May 19, in the library of the Florence H. Speare Memorial Museum, 5 Abbott St.

Manoian, a native of Lowell, Mass., is a popular speaker about Nashua history. He has conducted countless walking tours attracting and entertaining thousands of Nashua residents and tourists alike for more than 20 years.

His walks and talks explain the architectural and social history and heritage of downtown, the mill yards, the riverfront district and the historic inner-city neighborhoods of Nashua.

Manoian, an economic development and urban planning professional for more than 20 years, served as downtown development specialist and assistant economic development director for the city of Nashua from 1994-2003. He currently is the economic development specialist for Auburn, Maine, and is the principal of his form-based code consulting firm, About Place Partners.

“We are grateful that Alan is helping us raise funds for the West Pearl Street mural by sharing his knowledge of Nashua history in a way that will bring to life the image the mural portrays,” said Marjorie Bollinger Hogan, president of City Arts Nashua.

The mural will depict a 1909 view of West Pearl Street, looking from the corner of Pearl and Main, with the Tremont House hotel predominantly at the front of the scene.

The Tremont House stood where the TD Bank is located.

The 35- by 45-foot full-color mural, painted by local mural artist Barbara Andrews, will be on the wall of 83 West Pearl, adjacent to the TD Bank parking lot.

“Alan always draws a crowd, and we all go away from his talks both entertained and knowing more about Nashua history,” Hogan said.

Manoian said West Pearl Street is one of the original thoroughfares designed in 1824-25 by Boston architect Asher Benjamin for the Nashua Manufacturing Co.’s new and experimental planned manufacturing township of Nashua Village.

“West Pearl served not only as the internal ‘living’ spine connecting the entire urban street grid of the mill workers’ West End neighborhood from Main Street on the east to Pine Street on the west,” Manoian said, “but also as the great public stage of Nashua’s social, mercantile, educational, ethnic, religious and labor history spanning more than 180 years.”

On Sunday, learn about the 1826 “Old Brick,” Nashua’s first urban schoolhouse and first high school; the fascinating notables who graced the grand Tremont House hotel at Tremont Square; the heartwarming stories of the legendary Greek coffeehouses that once lined West Pearl into the old Greek neighborhood on Ash Street; and the old Irish and Lithuanian neighborhoods of High Rock.

The presentation also will cover great old family businesses such as Bergeron’s, Gaby’s, Vivian’s and The Modern; the challenging days of 1960s and ’70s urban renewal and destruction of the grand old street; and the encouraging current-day renaissance and redevelopment of West Pearl Street and downtown Nashua.

“To wander and wonder along West Pearl Street is to experience a journey through the full and rich story of a place called Nashua,” Manoian said. “I am delighted that my talk will contribute to this great downtown project that combines public art and history.”

The Nashua Historical Society will have the register of the Tremont House hotel on display at the presentation. The register is part of the society’s Adopt an Artifact program.

Mary Coe Foran, society board member and chairwoman of the Adopt an Artifact committee, said the register was given to the society as a scrapbook, with interesting vintage articles covering many of the pages.

The leather-bound book was discovered to be the register of the hotel, with parts of signatures visible at the sides and bottoms of the pages. The Nashua Historical Society decided it was worth restoring, and made it available for “adoption” to donors willing to help fund the cost.

The Tremont House was “the place to stay” in Nashua for years. Many dignitaries and presidents were guests at the hotel.

“We are awaiting the ‘big reveal’ of the signatures once the register is restored,” Foran said.

General admission to the presentation is $15; admission for members of City Arts Nashua, the Nashua Historical Society, seniors and students is $10. Doors open at 1 p.m.

For more information about the West Pearl Street Mural project, visit www.cityartsnashua.org and click on Mural Project. Tax-deductible donations of any size are accepted online or by printing and mailing the donation form.

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