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After working together in the
architectural department of H. P. Hood and Sons Dairy in Charlestown,
Herbert Glassman and Edmund E. McMahon left for Lowell, Massachusetts to
found the firm of Glassman & McMahon. In 1947, “old-time architect” Perley
F. Gilbert invited them to join forces with him to design a “modern”
school building. Mr. Gilbert’s firm had been founded by Otis A. Merrill in
1872 and later became Merrill & Cutler and then Merrill, Cutler & Gilbert.
The firm was best known for its design of the Richardsonian Romanesque
Lowell City Hall. Designer of high schools in Andover, Billerica and
Tewksbury, numerous buildings for the American Woolen Company, and
Shawsheen Village, Perley F. Gilbert was the only architect in the City of
Lowell whose business survived the Depression.
Mr. Glassman rose to the position of President in 1959. Under his
leadership, Perley F. Gilbert Associates won national recognition for its
design of numerous educational facilities throughout New England,
including several awards from the American Association of School
Administrators. Works that received particular attention included the
nine-building Brockton High School – the largest school east of the
Mississippi River when it was completed -- and Educational Parks in
Acton-Boxboro, Ayer and Maynard. The firm was responsible for the design
of approximately 112 school buildings, as well as the Student
Union-Dormitory high rise at Lowell Technical Institute (now Fox Hall at
University of Massachusetts, Lowell). Gilbert Associates also designed
hospital facilities for Northampton, Gardner and Medfield, and senior
housing in Tewksbury.
Although his firm concentrated on the planning and design of public school
buildings, Mr. Glassman also designed synagogues for congregations in
Lexington, Lowell, Medford, Peabody, Winthrop, Stoughton, Canton and
Lawrence, New Britain (Connecticut) and Portland (Maine). He typically
donated his own time to the temple projects, considering them a labor of
love (and faith).
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