Then & Now: 39 Elm St., Worcester

Last week we featured the house in Hubbardston that Jonas G. Clark helped build for his brother, Leonard.

The two-story Greek Revival house at 15 Main St. remains.

Many readers were familiar with the Jonas Clark House, as a sign declares, but not everyone was aware that Jonas never lived there.

Jonas, a successful businessman, while generous to his sibling, lived in much more stately quarters. His massive stone mansion at 39 Elm St. in Worcester is the subject of this week's Then photo.

Clark was long retired when he commissioned the new house near downtown Worcester. It was 1881, and Elm Street at the time was filled with the large homes of business and community leaders.

Some readers might recognize the mansion as the home of the Worcester Lodge of Elks. The organization took over the house in the years after Jonas Clark's death.

Clark, like his house, carried great stature in the city. It was Clark who lent his vision, his wealth and his name to what is now Clark University.

He made his fortune after leaving the family farm in Hubbardston to work in the carriage trade. He eventually expanded his business interest and made his way to California, where he sold supplies for the mining industry.

He returned to Massachusetts in the 1860s. Among his many real estate purchases was land in what is now Main South, the future home of Clark University.

With his wife, Susan (Wright) Clark, also a Hubbardston native, Jonas eyed a wooded parcel a block west of Main Street.

The stone mansion was completed in 1881, 19 years before Jonas Clark's death. During that time he teamed with G. Stanley Hall on a vision for a new college.

In 1887, Clark University was incorporated.

Jonas Clark died May 23, 1900, in his mansion. It was there that a funeral service was held, with Clark's casket in a large reception room.

Professors and students from Clark University were there, with honorary pallbearers that included Hall, U.S. Sen. George F. Hoar and Mayor Rufus B. Dodge Jr.

After Clark's death, the mansion on Elm Street proved too big for his survivors. In 1921, the Worcester Elks took over the property.

The organization remained in the house for four decades, although it almost got the boot over unpaid taxes in the mid-1930s. There was talk of the mansion being turned over to a veterans group.

In early December 1935, City Treasurer Harold Tunison declared that someone had come forward to pay off the Elks' tax debt of $3,606.88.

"The parties paying the taxes specifically requested that their identity be shielded,"  Tunison told a Worcester Telegram reporter.

In 1963, the Elks sold their building to a business neighbor, New England Telephone and Telegraph Co., now under Verizon. The company was looking to expand its massive operations center.

In early 1965, after the Elks had moved to new quarters on Mill Street, the mansion was demolished.

Stones from the leveled structure were a sought-after item. Many were used in the 1966 expansion of the Castle Restaurant in Leicester.

Last week: Then & Now: Jonas Clark House, 15 Main St., Hubbardston

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Then & Now: 39 Elm St., Worcester