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Market Gallery
Market Gallery
J.C. Ayer Company Laboratory, Built 1858/1867
Building History
The J.C. Ayer Company Laboratory, along with 172 Middle Street (1890-95) to the rear, housed one of Lowell’s largest patent medicine companies. The building housed the company’s headquarters from 1858 until 1917 with the two Ayer buildings being joined by bridges at various levels in the alley as well as through a tunnel. The building’s western ten bays date from 1858 while its eastern four bays were added with nearly identical details around 1867. Italianate in style, it is an especially noteworthy mid-19th century commercial building with its brick façade, granite and iron storefronts, Italianate window hoods, and projecting wooden cornice.
Ayer was instrumental in the development of Lowell’s patent medicine industry in the 19th century when he marketed his “Cherry Pectoral” and Ayer Cathartic Pills” beginning in the 1840s. By the time of his death in 1878, his company was one of the largest non-textile businesses in the city. The company continued to expand and operate until it went out of business in the 1930s but in its nine decades of operation, it spread Ayer’s, and Lowell’s, name worldwide. “Ayer’s Cherry Pectoral,” “Ayer’s Hair Vigor,” and other products were sold around the world, and millions of copies of Ayer’s Almanac were distributed each year, free of charge, in eight languages including Chinese.
The company shifted operations from the building and consolidated into the Middle Street building in 1917. It appears that the building was then converted into a lodging house and by 1922, was occupied by a Studebaker Motor Car dealership. The F.P. McCartin Company then occupied the building from 1929 until the late 1990s.
Preservation and Reuse
Acquired by a private developer in 2002, the building was converted into 23 residential lofts as well as ground floor and basement commercial and gallery space that is known as Market Gallery. The extensive project included the restoration of existing cast iron, granite, and wood storefronts, along with in-kind replication of missing storefronts.