Parson's Paper

Parson's Paper

http://s64.photobucket.com/albums/h169/everyhumandies/Parsons%20Paper/

I found a blog here by Van Dog, who took a few exterior shots of Parson's Paper Mill in Holyoke Ma a few months before it was set on fire. I would like to add my own blog of my own experience with Parsons Paper, because I feel it was an important one...

I am an "urban explorer" of sorts - I like to explore and photograph abandoned places, and have done so in a few places around Western Mass and beyond. As a disclaimer, I will say that I do in fact trespass on these properties, and this is not something I would condone for others. Most of the time, there are many health hazards associated with them that require the use of a good respirator - aside from the presence of asbestos, mold, and left-over chemicals, plus lots of bird and animal feces...Not the kind of stuff you want to breathe in...there can also be wild animals, squatters, vandals, and "urban miners", who strip old buildings of valuable metals to sell to scrap yards. These people are typically hostile because they will usually destroy an interior looking for copper pipes/etc, and do NOT want to be discovered...Also, many old abandoned buildings are in an advanced state of decay - rotting floors and stairs can be deadly, and not easy to see if the buildings are boarded up and dark inside. Some have basements and tunnels that are vast and complex - without plenty of lights and backup lights, getting lost can mean disaster. I certainly do not want to get caught trespassing, but that is another risk of this hobby that I am willing to deal with if it ever happens. First and foremost, I will not enter a building unless there is easy access - breaking into abandoned places is not for me...

Why do I do this? my interests lie not only in the thrill of being somewhere people have forgotten, but in the history and architecture of these types of places. I am a strong advocate for their preservation and re-use, and when I visit them, I adhere to a strict code: take only photographs, leave only footprints...I also do not typically give out real names or locations because I do not want to invite anyone who would want to vandalize, steal from or worse, burn them. I will report anyone I find engaging in these kinds of activities, and if there is a chance, I'll snap a pic or two just to provide evidence.

That all being said, I wanted to set this post up here to showcase many of the photos I took of Parson's from the inside, just three days before the fire...I think it's possible that we might have been the only ones to take photos of it after it had been abandoned. I knew when we entered the building through an open door that Parson's was a sitting duck in terms of being endangered.

As we walked from room to room, floor to floor, I was alarmed by the amount of extremely flammable materials that were everywhere - pallets of waste paper sat beside old machines, piles of wood scraps were stacked to the ceilings, and there were barrels of chemicals everywhere. One room had at least 50 large hoppers filled with what looked like purple lint that we could only assume was a by-product of the manufacturing process...We even saw one large warehouse room that was lined wall to wall with 50 lb bags of powdered bleach! Having read about the many devastating fires that claim such places year after year, whether from arson, accidentally ( homeless people often light fires in abandoned buildings to stay warm in the winters - one such fire was what killed those firefighters in Worcester years ago) , or naturally from lightning, it is just something I hate to see.

Desks were cluttered with paperwork, phones were on their bases, with personal affects all around them...The variety of machinery still in place was staggering - some were colossal, reaching over 15 feet high or more, and 40 or more feet long. In the basement, we could see and hear the rushing flow of the canal as it came through, once providing the power for the mechanisms of the mills 19th century heydays...The old administrative offices were located in the wing that was closest to Sargent Street that collapsed soon after the blaze began. The old safe was open and empty, and is now a rusted hulk of metal that is visible as you drive by...Throughout the entire complex, it seemed that the workers had simply been told not to come in, and everything was just left behind in a hurry. Besides the dust and the decay of the building itself there were a lot of areas that had been trashed by vandals - it almost looked like someone had gone through a lot of it with a giant leaf blower, scattering old paperwork and knocking things over as they went. There were also obvious signs that many people had used the place as a hangout - tags and graffiti were everywhere, along with beer cans and bottles and occasionally needles or small glass pipes. As I said, getting in was easy - aside from the open door on the ground floor along the canal that we walked through, there were windows and doors everywhere that were either missing or wide open. We even watched from one wing as another photographer climbed up through a low window across the complex. We wondered if we would cross paths, but we never saw him inside...

That fateful Monday night, just after the fire started, I was with my band mates across town at our practice space. (I had just showed off my photo set!) When we left, we could see that the sky was lit up, and we could smell the fire. Just as I realized that it must be Parsons, I got a call from my guitarist who had left a little earlier - "you won't believe what I'm watching" he said "Parsons Paper just exploded and the entire right side of the building collapsed!" In shock, I drove over, calling one of my fellow explorers to come see it for himself. We stood across the canal for hours, as flames continuously erupted from the old place, in utter disbelief that this historical treasure was disappearing right before our eyes. We could hear many sounds from inside as the flames consumed it - glass shattering, the creaks and groans of those old hand-hewn beams collapsing, and every once in a while, the dull thud of something exploding would send tornadoes of flame over a hundred feet high into the night sky...It was an unforgettable scene of disaster.

The morning we went in, there were four of us - we got there early, just around sunrise, and there was a thick fog all around that shrouded the building and enhanced it's already imposing appearance...We took our time, and finally walked back out after almost five hours inside. We took with us hundreds of pictures, and at the time, had no idea that they would be the only ones taken of Parson's in that state...

Since it is taking me forever to upload pictures, I've only put up a small handful - I will add more to this blog in time, and I welcome any and all input.