Live Poultry Fresh Killed

Somerville Live Poultry, Inc., which adopted the trade name Mayflower Poultry about 1965, has been in operation since 1932. The company moved to East Cambridge on Cambridge St in 1935.

By 2011 the retail demand for live poultry had dwindled. James Gould, the current owner, stopped slaughtering poultry at the store but retained the sign, which began to be noticed in the media in the mid-1990s.

Mayflower Poultry eventually moved to 139 Newmarket Square in Boston. Gould auctioned off the sign to the highest bidder on August 26, 2021. The winning bid came from the East Cambridge Business Association (ECBA), who now own the sign and iconic image. It is the intention of the ECBA to keep this historical East Cambridge landmark where it belongs, in the neighborhood that it called home for so many years