Houses – Page 34 – Historic Buildings of Massachusetts

Enos Cook House (1855)

by Dan/November 14, 2011/Amherst, Houses, Stick Style

Built about 1855, the Enos Cook House stands at 30 Boltwood Walk (formerly 10 Lessey Street) in Amherst. Enos Foster Cook, a prominent Amherst businessman and entrepreneur, was president of the Amherst Savings Bank from 1870 until his death in 1909, at the age of 93. His house, an early example of the Stick style combined with Gothic and Georgian elements, became a nursing home in 1955. A north wing was added in 1960. More recently, the former house has been used as a restaurant with additional space for other businesses.

Stebbins-Lathrop House (1790)

by Dan/November 12, 2011November 11, 2011/Houses, Italianate, Northampton

The house at 81 Bridge Street in Northampton was built in 1790 by Asahel Wright and was sold to James Bull in 1809. It was later owned by a physician, Dr. Daniel Stebbins. Through his correspondence with missionaries in China, Dr. Stebbins was one of the earliest people in the area to import silkworm eggs in 1842. Stebbins had 12 acres of mulberry trees behind his home and he and his daughters fed the leaves to the worms. Dr. Stebbins brought a silk weaver from Lyons, France to weave his family’s silk. After Dr. Stebbins’ death in 1859, his daughter Clarissa resided in the house with her husband, Henry Lathrop. They hired the architect William F. Pratt to redesign the originally Federal-style house in the fashionable Italianate style, an altered appearance it maintains today.

John L. Draper House (1895)

by Dan/November 11, 2011November 9, 2011/Houses, Northampton, Queen Anne

At 2 Pomeroy Terrace in Northampton is an impressive (and impressively situated) Queen Anne mansion, built for John L. Draper in 1895. Draper, a wealthy retired merchant, held a competition for the design of his house. The winner from among the three competing local architects who submitted plans was Curtis Page, whose design included an impressive three-story tower, behind which is a decorative chimney built of Longmeadow stone and red brick. A developer restored the house and converted it into condominiums in the mid-1980s.

Duckett House (1810)

by Dan/November 9, 2011November 8, 2011/Federal, Houses, Northampton

Duckett House is a dorm on the campus of Smith College in Northampton. The house, located at the corner of Elm Street and Bedford Terrance, was built as a private residence for the Clark family about 1810. It was sold to Mary L. Southwick in 1886, who ran a boarding house for Smith students in the building until 1918. It was next owned by the Alumnae Association and in 1921 became part of the Burnham School for girls. The building was acquired by the college in 1968. As a dormitory, it was named for Eleanor Shipley Duckett, philologist and medieval historian, who was a Smith College professor and author of such books as Alfred the Great and his England (1957) and The Wandering Saints of the Early Middle Ages (1959). Additions to Duckett House were constructed in 1973 and the mid-1990s. Both of these modifications included connecting Duckett to neighboring Chase House, another c. 1810 residence (with later mansard roof) that is now a Smith College dorm. Chase House was named for Duckett’s lifelong companion, Smith College professor and novelist Mary Ellen Chase. Chase House had also served as the main building of the Burnham School and was known as Burnham House.

36 Pomeroy Terrace, Northampton (1885)

by Dan/November 8, 2011/Houses, Northampton, Stick Style

The house at 36 Pomeroy Terrace in Northampton was built in 1885 by David Crafts and Edwin Clapp on a lot they had purchased from the 1884 subdivision of the Samuel Wright estate. The house initially served as a rectory for St. John’s Episcopal Church on Bridge Street, but ownership was retained by Crafts and Clapp until 1889, by which time their net costs had been paid. In 1893, when a new church was built on Elm Street, the house was sold to Dr. William Spencer, a dentist.

59 Phillips Place, Northampton (1848)

by Dan/November 7, 2011November 7, 2011/Greek Revival, Houses, Northampton

Phillips Place in Northampton was laid out in 1847 and quickly became a very fashionable residential street. The house at No. 59 was built not long after the street was opened, circa 1848-1850. It is the only Greek Revival-style house on the street, which is dominated by later Gothic cottages. The house’s first floor porch is a later addition.

General Israel Putnam House (1648)

by Dan/October 29, 2011/Colonial, Danvers, Houses

The earliest (rear) section of the Putnam House in Danvers was built in 1648 by Lt. Thomas Putnam. The house would go on to be the home of twelve generations of the Putnam family. During the Salem witchcraft trials, Joseph Putnam, who spoke out against the ongoing hysteria, lived on the property. Joseph’s son, Israel Putnam, for whom it’s now known, was born in the house in 1718. General Israel Putnam was a famous colonial officer and one of the primary figures at the Battle of Bunker Hill in 1775. In the 1850s, Daniel Putnam operated a shoe-making business in the house and in the twentieth century, the family ran a candy and ice cream shop next door called the Putnam Pantry. A number of additions were made to the house over the years, including the eighteenth-century gambrel-roofed section that is now the front facade. The Putnam family gave the house to the Danvers Historical Society in 1991.