Lysander H. Allen, a wire goods manufacturer, built his house, at 599 Main Street in Amherst, in 1886. In later years it was the home of his son, Harry Allen, who taught at Amherst College. The house, which is a notable example of the stick style of architecture, was the winner of the 1991 Amherst Historical Commission‘s Preservation Award. It is now a bed & breakfast known as the Allen House Inn.
Helen Hunt Jackson, the author of many books and poems, was born Helen Maria Fiske in Amherst in 1830 in a Greek Revival house, built the same year at 249 South Pleasant Street. Her father, Nathan Fiske, was a minister and a professor of Language and Philosophy at Amherst College. A contemporary and classmate of Emily Dickinson, Helen Hunt Jackson was educated at the Ipswich Female Seminary and at the Abbott Brothers’ School in New York City. She was married twice, lost two sons and lived later in life in Colorado. An activist who denounced the treatment of Native Americans by the U.S. government, she detailed the history of broken treaties and called for reform in her book, A Century of Dishonor (1881). Inspired by Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, she also addressed the issue of the federal government’s mistreatment of Native Americans in her novel, Ramona (1884). Her birthplace was later acquired by Amherst College and is now a private residence.
The building at 85 Amity Street in Amherst was built in 1855 as a two-story residence. In 1898, Egbert Perry began taking in boarders and in 1912 the building, by then known as the Hotel Perry, was expanded two more stories. In 1938, it was acquired by William Richters, who had owned Drake’s Restaurant in Times Square. He renamed the hotel the Drake, after the famous New York hotel of the same name. It continued to be known locally as the Drake, even after later owners changed its name to the Village Inn in 1959. The Drake was home to a legendary basement bar called the Rathskeller, a popular student hangout whose infamous reputation eventually led to the sale of the building in 1985 and its conversion into apartments under the name the Perry. Student reaction at the time can be judged by the still visible graffiti on the nearby Amherst Cinema Building, which declares “Save the Drake” and “For Willy [the Drake’s bartender] For Humanity!”
The East Experiment Station was constructed in Amherst on the campus of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, now the University of Massachusetts, in 1889-1890. It was built with funds made available due to the Hatch Act of 1887, which provided federal funding for the benefit of State agricultural experiment stations. The Richardsonian Romanesque structure was designed by architect Emory Ellsworth and was a companion to his 1889 West Experiment Station. At one time the East Experiment Station, also known as the Hatch Experiment Station, had an attached shed and an ornate Victorian greenhouse, which was later removed. The building, which was built to house the Department of Vegetable Pathology, has been altered for other uses and currently is home to the offices of the University of Massachusetts Press.
The Henry F. Hills House (pdf) is a striking mansion at 360 Main Street, recently renumbered as 38 Gray Street, in Amherst. It was designed by William Fenno Pratt of Northampton and was built in 1862-1863 for Henry Francis Hills, next to the lot where his father, Leonard M. Hills would soon also build a house by the same architect. Father and son owned a factory complex near the railroad depot that made palm leaf hats. Henry Hills succeeded his father as president of the company in 1877. After Hills’ death in 1924, the house, which had been built as a wedding gift for his bride Adelaide Spenser of South Manchester, Connecticut, was next occupied by his daughter, Susan C. Hills Skillings, who lived there until her death 1968. From 1976 to 2007, the property was owned by the Amherst Boys and Girls Club. It was then sold to a developer, who has restored (pdf) the house and three other historic houses that had been moved to new lots on the former Hills property: the Chapin-Ward House, the Potwine House and the Tuttle Farmhouse.
Baxter Marsh was a carpenter in Greenfield, who settled with his wife, Jane H. Ware Marsh, in Amherst in 1873. He built several houses in town and in 1896 he probably was the builder of his own large Georgian Revival home on Main Street. Rooms were rented out to instructors working at nearby Amherst College including, from 1918 to 1920, Robert Frost. Another tenant was literature professor John Erskine, who included reminiscences of his residence in the Marsh House in his book, The Memory of Certain Persons (1947). The Baxters’ son, Edward Baxter Marsh, attended Amherst and later continued to reside in his own house in town. The house was later used by the Amherst Record and in 1989 it was moved from 109 to 401 Main Street to make way for the new Police Department building.
Williston Hall was built in 1858 on the campus of Amherst College, where it stands at the north end of College Row. Named for philanthropist Samuel Williston, it was designed by George P. Shoals of Easthampton. The building once had a prominent tower, which was later removed. Williston Hall was initially an academic building and contained the College’s art collection. Remodeled with a Greek Revival roof, it held various academic departments over the years, but was later in danger of demolition. In 2003, an adaptive reuse project was completed, which transformed the restored building into a student residence.
