Gift & Specialty Shops – Stores
Headlines – Located at Market Sq Headlines was the store cops love to see you exit then follow you home. You could pick up a bong, pipes, velvet posters, black lights, rolling papers and bikini posters of Farrah and Cheryl Ladd. The smell of burning inscents permeated every customer and air particle in the store. However, to make the shopping experience more mainstream, you were able to pick up a birthday card for your mother. That’s even debatable though. This was their first Newburyport location. I liked the velvet posters… Locate It
Joke Shop – Located on State St next to the Mobile Station. It had many gift and gag items, from Sea Monkeys, hot gum, masks, fake cut off fingers to magic. It was located in a house. Locate It
About Shawn Gearin - ModeratorShawn is a former NBPTMA resident from 1967-1996. He lived at 5 Walnut St in a gray Greek revival home. He was a Whittier Tech 1986 graduate and a Northern Essex Community college graduate where he wrote and photographed for both school's newspapers. Finishing his education at Hesser College and North Shore Community College, he received a BA in Business Management and a FAA Private Pilot Certification. An aviation, photography enthusiast and telecommunications project manager, he enjoys writing history, personal memoirs, and asking lots of questions on his hosted websites. Now a resident of North Carolina, he lives with his family in a 1930 farmhouse on a gentleman's farm surrounded by cattle from other nearby farms. YEAT!
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Duncan Chase Old Hill Burying Ground 
Father Gerard Darcia French Church. Federal St.
Hand Tubs / Firemen Musters/
Built: 1878 Manufacture: Button Cylinders: 10 Reg #: 650 Fire Department: Newburyport, Ma Class: A Neptune 8 – is owned by the Neptune Veteran Firemen’s Association of Newburyport Ma. ————————————————————————————————————- Ould Newbury Protection #1 -This pump’s hometown is Newbury, Ma. Built: 1865 Manufacture: J Cylinders: 10 Reg #: ?? Fire Department: Newbury, Ma Class: A […]
Earlier on, there was a “Headshop” located on Water Street next to the entrance to the sewage treatment plant. The place was called “the Hogpenny”… Lots of the usual “Paraphernalia”…Only there for a year or so, ( circa 1970?).
I DO BELIVE THERE WAS A HEAD SHOP AT THE CORNER OF KENT AND MERRIMAC ST CALLED THE DEVILS DOIN , MAYBE SHORT LIVED .
Specialty shops were a novelty back in the Yankee days of Newburyport business. Little did most of us know what the future held for the downtown. Present day has the once very native oriented shopping district operating as a “Tourist” dependant economy. What happened? Remember a time when we could satisfy our consumer needs in one trip to Merrimac, State, Pleasant, Inn, or Green Streets? There was Sampson’s Grocery, Premier Market, and Liberty Market for downtown food shopping. First National was a very close “Supermarket” right at the Mall. Inn St. was busy with the old Daily News office. Hayden’s Rexal had an Inn St. entrance. Stoney’s donuts, the old furrier, Hazel’s Yarn, etc. were also located on this narrow street. State st. was not as it is now, a selection of “trendy” gift and “specialty” stores. If your dog needed a gift back in the sixties, you got him a “bone”. we could buy a pair of shoes from Quality Shoe, Hymam’s Shoes, and Pray’s. Pat and Pam had a really cool round couch shaped and stacked like a wedding cake. They had great children’s clothes too. Nothing pretentious, or “gifty”… Pray’s, Kray’s, Nates, Puritan’s, Steven’s, all had nice clothing too. Shoes could be repaired as well as “shined” instead of replaced, at two establishments,( not to mention on Federal St. as well). Nobody sold “Newburyport” tee shirts. Where the hell were we going to wear them? The old “Fire House” served us quite well as the old “Fire House”. There was a “work clothes” store for people that actually worked. Used to be right on the corner of Merrimack and Inn Streets. Newburyporters weren’t embarrassed to buy lumber right in the old downtown. We shopped at Atkinson’s and Diamond Lumber. We also bought plumbing and heating stuff at Dugin’s in the square. Kunkle’s was a no nonsense book and stationary store. Mr. Kunkle added to the shopping experience by constantly talking to himself. I still own several books bought there. His was a store with no “gimmicks”, unlike the ones that have taken his place as sellers of “reading material”… Not so long ago, we walked home from “our” downtown without a piece of fudge and a hammered copper fish or a candle. We didn’t have to fight our way through a crowd of rude or drunk tourists. My, my,my, how things have changed…