How Historic Former Firehouse has become the Heartbeat of a Massachusetts Town
WCVB Channel 5 did a feature story on The Center for Arts in Natick, or TCAN, on February 1, 2019. TCAN occupies the space that once housed the Central Fire Station, which was built nearly 150 years ago.
"In the early hours of January 13, 1874, a bitterly cold winter morning, the fire broke out in a shoe factory just across the street," said Niki Lefebvre, executive director of the Natick Historical Society. Water in the fire hoses froze, and despite valiant efforts by firefighters, most of downtown Natick was destroyed six hours later—18 blocks were gone.
"Thirty-seven buildings in all were burned to the ground, and these were critical structures: Town Hall, a police station, a fire station," Lefebvre said.
The first thing the residents of Natick rebuilt was a new firehouse. The Central Fire Station on Summer Street kept the town safe for decades. However, in 2001, it underwent restoration after the town sold the fire station property to TCAN to create a facility dedicated to the arts.