Look for a large, three-and-a-half story red brick building with a striking mansard roof, white-trimmed windows, and a central wooden portico-right ahead on Ash Street, stretching across nearly half a city block.
Take a look at this grand, H-shaped building-picture it back in 1893, when dozens of boys’ footsteps echoed on these stone steps, and the air was filled with the scents of brick dust and homemade bread. The Healy Asylum was brought to life thanks to Msgr. James Augustine Healy, whose name it proudly carries. It was the era of bustling textile mills in Lewiston, and the town was overflowing with French Canadian families who had crossed the border for work, dreams, and sometimes, a bit of trouble. When the Grey Nuns from Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec arrived, their original job was to teach the children of those mill workers. But as the story goes, in 1892, the nuns swapped their chalk for a new mission-caring for orphaned and troubled boys, after some “gentle” persuasion.
Imagine the nuns, gliding down these halls, their feet barely making a sound, except for the occasional clatter of a broom falling over. The boys here came from all across Maine, sent by a diocese that sometimes forgot to send the check. Funding was always a headache-one might say you could hear the arguments echo down Ash Street on budget day! Designed by local architects Jefferson L. Coburn & Sons, the Healy Asylum’s red brick walls soon saw decades of laughter, tears, and a bit of mischief, until 1973, when the last boy left and time slowly transformed the orphanage into a peaceful home for seniors. Now, as Healy Terrace, it’s a place for stories rather than shenanigans, and one can almost hear the soft voices of history if you listen carefully.
