Impressively sited on the west side of Salem Common (though often obscured by tour buses!) is the Andrew-Safford House, built in 1818-1819. Regarded as one of New England’s great Federal-era houses, it was built for John Andrew, a wealthy merchant of Russian furs. In the 1860s, the house was owned by the Smith and Creamer families and in 1871 was purchased by John Osborne Safford, a leather merchant. His family gave the home to Essex Institute, now the Peabody Essex Museum, in 1947. Since the picture above obscures the house’s striking Federal entryway, click below to see an image of it…

Also, check out the dramatic picture in this pdf document: http://www.hawthornehotel.com/documents/SkyviewTourofSalem_002.pdf