Photo of the Week: 5/20/2011

Well, it's Friday, which means it's time for another Photo of the Week! Last week I talked about a trolley, Manchester & Nashua car 38, which was built at the Laconia Car Company in Laconia, NH. I have also talked about another vehicle built there, Atlantic Shore Line locomotive 100, so today I am going to talk about the facility itself. First is a sketch that I will not post directly here, although I do believe it is in the public domain. This was the factory as it appeared about when the 38 and the 100 were built. It was located just west (railroad south) of the depot. The train in the foreground of the sketch, heading to the right, would be going south, having just left the depot. Also a point of interest, the house in the upper right corner of the sketch belonged to the owner of the car company. The house still stands on Church Street in Laconia. Anyway, without any further ado, here is my photo:

It's not much to look at, but it's part of what's left of the Laconia Car Company. This building houses a workshop for a construction company. A group of larger buildings are now called "Streetcar Place" and have offices and condos and storefronts built into them. They also look better.

The Laconia Car Company's history is very similar to the history of the streetcar itself. They built trolleys for most of the trolley lines in New England, as well as railroad cars for local railroad lines. The company prided itself with its woodwork, which is very apparent in the Laconia products I have seen. However, they did not get involved with much metalwork beyond what was necessary to build a streetcar, and when trolleys began to evolve into metal cars, Laconia started seeing fewer and fewer orders. In the late 1920s, with streetcar traffic tapering off, the Laconia Car Company finally closed its doors. The ironic part is that it lasted a few years longer than the Laconia Street Railway!

In its day, the Laconia Car Company was by far the biggest employer in the city. I don't know what the population was at the turn of the century, but today it is only about 16,000 people, so it must have been less 100 years ago. However, at the time, the company employed over 500 people in its expansive shop facilities. Today, the city's economy depends on tourism and the boating industry. The only railroad left in town is a tourist railroad.

I don't have time now, but I think I will create a Facebook photo album about Laconia, focusing on the railroad history, the car company, the streetcar line, and the railroads today. I will do a write-up here as well. Look for that in the future!