CELEBRATE Laconia Passenger Station remains a hub of city life

When it was in operation, the Laconia Passenger Station was the principal means for the city to interact with the larger world. In this photo, part of the collection of the Laconia Historical and Museum Society, city residents gather to send young men off to World War I. (Courtesy photo)

By JOHANNA HALPERIN

To our modern sensibilities, railroad travel seems historic and romantic. But for Laconia in the late 19th Century, the coming of the railroad was an important event for the town and the area.

The railway, also known as "The Iron Horse," came to Laconia (then Meredith Bridge) on Aug. 8, 1848, connecting the city with Concord and greatly expanding business and travel opportunities for the area.

In the same year, Charles Ranlet started the C. Ranlet Car Manufacturing Company on Water Street. The company went through multiple reorganizations and was known over the years as the Moulton & Ranlet Car Company, Ranlet Manufacturing Company, the Laconia Car Company and finally the Laconia Car Company Works. In some form the company survived until 1930 and produced hundreds of streetcars and thousands of passenger and freight cars for steam railroads.

Rail service and railcar manufacturing quickly became vital to Laconia. Charles A. Busiel, a Laconian who served as a managing director of the railroad, saw the importance of rail service to the area and wished to improve and expand local rail systems in order to serve travelers and shippers throughout the Lakes Region. As such, Busiel, who also served during his career as mayor of Laconia and Governor of New Hampshire, advocated for a large rail depot in the city.

Built for $30,000 in 1892 to serve users of the old Boston, Concord and Montreal Railroad, which was acquired by the Boston and Maine Railroad three years later, the Laconia Passenger Station opened in August and was designed by architect, Bradford Gilbert. At the time, the Laconia Democrat announced the opening and described the building as follows.

"The main features of the building are the port-cochere at the entrance and the large general waiting room or rotunda, open to the roof, with clerestory windows on all sides. The floor of this room is of tile, and the wall to a height of ten feet are finished in quartered oak, and above that plastered and tinted in two shades of chrome."

Bradford Lee Gilbert was a nationally-active and critically acclaimed architect based in New York City. He is best known for designing the first steel-framed curtain wall building in New York, the Tower Building, which opened on Broadway in 1889 and is considered New York’s first sky scraper.

Born in Watertown, New York, Gilbert was appointed architect of the New York, Lake Erie & Western Railroad at the young age of 23. Among his extensive work for multiple railroads across the country, he also designed a previous version of New York City's Grand Central Terminal in 1898. Most of his New York buildings have been demolished, but his landmark eleven story Flatiron Building (1898) still stands in Atlanta, Georgia, and predates the similar and more famous New York City Flatiron Building.

Gilbert’s Laconia Passenger Station building, of course, remains. It was sold by the Boston and Maine railroad to the city of Laconia with the provision that the station could continue to be used by the rail company for passenger service. By 1963, use of the railroad station was decreasing and the city made several modifications to the building to accommodate the Laconia police and court facilities. Passenger service on the Boston and Maine line ended in 1965. The police and court facilities left the station as well, but the building has served the community in many ways since housing retail shops, restaurants and other businesses. The Laconia Passenger station was added to the National Register of Historic places in 1982. The elegant granite and red sandstone building, now in its 125th year, remains a central feature of downtown Laconia.