Paul Carnahan
Abbott & Bailey, a hardware store, was located at 81 Main Street at the foot of State Street from 1899 through 1905. Owned by Henry L. Abbott (at center of the storefront photo) and Marshall Bailey (right), both from Worcester before they bought the store, it was one of a series of hardware stores to occupy the storefront on the right side of the 1840 Willard Block (see below, now called the Heney Building). The projecting storefronts on the building were created during reconstruction after the 1927 flood.
In this 1930 photograph, F.I. Somers & Sons, another hardware store, is in the Abbott & Bailey location. Somers was later in the French Block opposite city hall until 2018.
