Photographing America: Holyoke

Some images from one of America's most unique places

Holyoke Massachusetts is one of my favorite towns in the US, because it is beautiful, unpretentious, and unique.

Most of its residents are Puerto Rican, so at the street level it is a Puerto Rican town. There are Pentecostal churches pumping out song after song, there are food vendors clustered around parks filled with semi-pro baseball games, there are groups of men in folding chairs drinking Coors, there are flocks of pigeons being flown from rooftops, there are beauty salons, nightclubs, decked out Accords throbbing with Reggatone, families dressed to the nines headed from church to the McDonald’s.

The residents who are not Puerto Rican are from prior waves of immigration: Irish, Polish, Ukrainian, Italian, or some nebulous mix of all of the above.

At the architectural and built level it is a New England Mill town. Walled in on one side by the Connecticut River, and then sliced and intersected three more times by broad canals lined by huge warehouses.

The result is an odd town with a real sense of place. It is like the South Bronx and Worcester had a child.

Below is 25 photos that I hope capture some of what I love about Holyoke.

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The Connecticut river wraps around Holyoke, providing a boundary, power, and scenery

The river feeds canals cutting through the “Flats” in the east creating a little Venice. Without anything else Venice has.

The rest of the Flats is light industry, tenament style housing, and old school gas stations

Many of the old warehouses in the Flats are condemend.

Others are refurbished and rebranded as office space

The canals, especially in the winter, are soothing, though no longer lined and filled with life, just garbage

Holyoke was once filled with mills, mostly making paper. It is still known as The Paper CIty. Now it just has the Riverside Paper Company

People do live in the Flats. Which is almost entirely Puerto Rican

There are tbe usual traditional urban amenities. Including bike shares, although done in a very Holyoke way

The bus station benches are lacking

Sports allegiances are equally split here

There are lots and lots of churches in Holyoke. Especially in the Flats

Across the two canals, West of the Flats, is the historic downtown.

It has two main streets of shops. There are barbers, next to empty stores, next to churches

Next to Liquor stores

Red, White, and Blue

Happy New Year

We Love Trump

Urban Tranquility

Hair Hunter

Key Of The Sea / Justice 2020

There are still blocks of the old rowhouses downtown, although most are gone

More churches. There are lots of them

Thats it. That is Holyoke. (It is hoping the Cannabis Industry is the future. Perhaps.)