Not far from and predating the North Easton Grammar School, the Oliver Ames High School in Easton, Massachusetts, is one of many civic buildings gifted to the community by members of the Ames Family. In 1893, Oliver Ames (1831-1895), a grandson of the Ames Shovel Works founder Oliver Ames, and son of Oakes Ames, offered to fund the construction of a new high school building if the town would pay the cost of digging its foundation and grading the site. They accepted. Oliver Ames hired Boston architect, Carl Fehmer, to design the school in Easton, after he had a positive experience with him as consulting architect to the Commonwealth for the extension to the Massachusetts State House years prior while serving as Governor. The refined Colonial Revival school building features a central pavilion with an entrance set within an ornate stone architrave with a Classical entablature with central pediment. The high school was outgrown and for years, became the town’s middle school until a consolidated school was built elsewhere. In the 1990s, the town sold the Oliver Ames High School to a developer, along with preservation restrictions, with the structure converted to apartments. A great example of adaptive reuse!
