What lies beneath?: Need for restrooms once served by ‘public comfort station’ below Greenfield Common

GREENFIELD — Long before conversations about Porta Potties and Portland Loos entered the public realm, a more discreet restroom — known then as a “public comfort station” — existed beneath the surface of the Greenfield Common.

“We would walk back from the fairgrounds, back to the Town Hall area, where my father would eventually pick us up,” Montague resident and historian Ed Gregory, 76, recalled of his childhood. “Always, before we went back to Turners, we’d use the toilet facilities there.”

Now long gone — likely closed sometime between 1966 and 1967, according to a column in the Greenfield Recorder by Thomas W. Merrigan, dated Jan. 5, 1967 — the underground facilities were “very small, but very neat and tidy,” Gregory said.

“There was no charge, no attendant,” he recounted. “It was there for the convenience of those who needed to use the space.”

Although it is unclear when the restrooms were actually constructed, the city’s annual report from 1923 outlines the $7,025 contract price to construct, heat, light and ventilate a public comfort station beneath the Greenfield Common. In total, $8,000 was appropriated for the project, which had been proposed at least as far back as 1920.

A blueprint dated March 3, 1950 titled “Alterations to the Common” shows changes to the street line on the south end of the common, where the entrances to the men’s and women’s restrooms were located at the time.

“There was a stairway down with a door, and that was the underground toilet area,” Gregory recalled.

In an undated photo of the common, a ventilation grate is located on the ground behind the entrances, next to the monument.

Whether the comfort station was also connected by tunnel to Town Hall, however, remains unclear.

“I don’t know about a connection between (the comfort station) and the Town Hall,” Gregory said, nor could he recall why the comfort station had been closed.

In its stead, Porta Potties have cropped up over the years for public use — a subject that stirred concern among city officials for the reported use of the portable toilets as trash receptacles for hypodermic needles.

Late last year, in response to growing concern, Mayor Roxann Wedegartner set aside $200,000 in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to buy a Portland Loo — a standalone restroom “specifically designed to prevent problems that are commonly experienced in public toilets,” the company’s website states.

“We have to make sure there is public water and sewer available, and we can access it easily,” Wedegartner previously explained.

After an unsuccessful search for an old passageway entrance in the basement of City Hall recently, Christopher Phillips of the Central Maintenance Department walked over to the Greenfield Common and stood where the entrances used to be located. He surmised the higher elevation of that end of the common was a result of filling in the now-abandoned restrooms.

“If we were to dig a hole right here,” he said, pointing to the ground beneath him, “we’d probably be able to go right in.”

Reporter Mary Byrne can be reached at mbyrne@recorder.com or 413-930-4429. Twitter: @MaryEByrne