Category: Federal

Susan B. Anthony Birthplace (1817)

by Dan//Adams, Federal, Houses

Susan B. Anthony Birthplace

[Note–This is a non-partisan post, but some of the links lead to pages reflecting representing strong opinions on both sides of the abortion issue.] The famous women’s suffrage leader Susan B. Anthony was born in 1820 in a house in Adams. The house had been built by her father, Daniel Anthony, in 1817. He was a cotton manufacturer and abolitionist who raised Susan in the family’s Quaker religion. The family left the house in 1827 and moved to New York State. Their former home, located at 67 East Road in Adams, passed through several owners. From 1926 to 1949, The Society of Friends Descendents owned the house and operated a museum about Susan B. Anthony. After a few unsuccessful attempts by later owners to again make the house a museum, it was purchased at auction in 2006 by Carol Crossed, of the pro-life group Feminists for Life. The restored house opened to the public in 2010 as the Susan B. Anthony Birthplace Museum. It did not open without controversy, however, as there were objections to the museum’s presentation of Anthony’s position on abortion.

79 Broad Street, Westfield (1820)

by Dan//Commercial, Federal, Houses, Westfield

The origins of the building at 79 Broad Street in Westfield are uncertain and complicated by the fact that the house has been completely altered inside. It was built between 1810 and 1830 and is said to have been a blacksmith shop. It was later converted into a residence and is now used as offices. The building is transitional in style from the Federal to the Greek Revival and has an addition and a projecting pediment and brackets that were added in the later nineteenth century. The front doorway was added in the late 1970s.

Loring-Emmerton House (1818)

by Dan//Colonial Revival, Federal, Houses, Salem

The Pickman-Loring-Emmerton House, at 328 Essex Street in Salem, was built in 1818 as a Federal style house. In the mid-nineteenth century, it was the residence of George B. Loring (1817-1891), who served in the U.S. House of Representatives (1877-1881), as United States Commissioner of Agriculture (1881-1885) and as Minister to Portugal (1889-1890). The house was later owned by George R. Emmerton, a merchant and president of the Merchant’s National Bank. In 1885, he hired architect Arthur Little to expand and remodel the house in the Colonial Revival style. Emmerton was the father of Caroline O. Emmerton, the philanthropist and preservationist who established the House of the Seven Gables Settlement Association.

Dr. Thomas Williams House (1748)

by Dan//Colonial, Deerfield, Federal, Houses

Happy Thanksgiving! Located along the main street of the village of Deerfield is a house, now painted a shade of yellow, which was built in 1748. It was originally the home of Dr. Thomas Williams. He was appointed surgeon to the to the regular and provincial troops by Royal Governor William Shirley and served in King George’s War and the French and Indian War. George Sheldon, in his book, A History of Deerfield Massachusetts (1895), writes that Dr. Williams (b. 1718)

came to Dfd. 1789; lived on No. 9; became a prominent figure as a man of affairs, as well as in his profession; was surgeon in the abortive Can[adian] expedition 1746 and for the line of forts; he left Fort Mass. only two days before its capture in 1746; was surgeon in the regt. of his brother Ephraim, at the battle of Lake George, Sept. 8, 1755, and dressed the wounds of Baron Dieskau, the captured commander of the Fr. army; in the campaign of 1756 he was lieut.-col.; rep 2 yrs; selectman 2; town clerk 17; judge of probate and justice of the court of common pleas; and had an extensive professional practice; d. Sept. 28, 1775.

A slave owner himself, Dr. Williams kept records of the treatment he gave to enslaved Africans and free blacks in Deerfield. Slave owners sometimes paid their debts to the doctor with their slaves’ labor. Upon the death of Dr. Williams, his practice was continued by his apprentice, Dr. Elihu Ashley (1750-1817), a son of Rev. Jonathan Ashley, who lived a few houses down the street from the doctor’s house.

Early in the nineteenth century, the exterior of the house was updated in the Federal style, when the original gambrel roof was removed, the front portico was added, and fanlights (not pictured above) were placed in the gable ends.

South Deerfield Congregational Church (1821)

by Dan//Churches, Deerfield, Federal

The Congregational Church in South Deerfield was organized in 1818 and services were held in a schoolhouse on North Main Street. The current church building was constructed in 1821 to the north of the schoolhouse. The church was moved to its present location, at 71 North Main Street, in 1848. That year, there was a split in the church and the Second, or “Monument,” Church was founded, but the two congregations reunited in 1865.

Dr. Ebenzer Ames House (1816)

by Dan//Federal, Houses, Wayland

The house at 24 Cochituate Road in Wayland was built in 1816 by Dr. Ebenezer Ames. Born in Marlborough, Dr. Ames came to town (then called East Sudbury) in 1814, the same year he married Lucy Weeks. He had an extensive practice as a physician until his death in 1861. From 1831 to 1875, the house was the residence of Judge Edward Mellen, who was made Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Court of Common Pleas in 1855. Judge Mellen’s old law office still stands across the street.