Victorian

Urncrest // c.1875

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Located on Adin Street, a street of homes formerly owned by factory owners and managers in Hopedale, Massachusetts, you will find “Urncrest”, a stunning Queen Anne Victorian mansion. This home was originally built around 1875 for William Lapworth (1844-1937) an English-born weaving expert, who worked at Hopedale Elastics Co. and patented certain weaving processes for suspenders, boot webbing, and garters. Hopedale Elastics was absorbed by the Draper Corporation in 1890, and Lapworth “modernized” his home with profits from this sale. His formerly modest home was updated with a corner tower, large additions, wrap-around porch with porte cochere, and applied ornament. The detached carriage house was also expanded, where he added a coachman’s apartment.

Buckingham House // 1903

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This unique Queen Anne style house at the corner of Washington and Eddy streets in Warren, Rhode Island, stands out for its use of materials and late Victorian design, a departure from the Federal and mid-19th century architecture the waterfront community is best-known for. The residence was built for Hannah and Erastus Buckingham and today remains essentially as originally built. Its slightly asymmetric massing combining multiple materials of brick and weathered shingles with diamond pane sash windows, illustrate early 20″ century design simplification while retaining the use of materials typical of late 19″ century Queen Anne style. Erastus Buckingham inherited his father’s oyster farming business, which harvested over 200 acres of beds in the bays off Nayatt, Conanicut, Quonset, Rocky Point and Patience Island before packaging and shipping to markets.

William H. Hall House // 1896

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Located between his family factory and the memorial church built for his late sister, the William H. Hall House in South Willington, Connecticut, is among the community’s finest Victorian residences built for a wealthy industrialist. William Henry Hall (1867-1922) was the son of industrialist Gardiner Hall Jr., who established the business under his name, which manufactured thread and spools, hiring hundreds of employees. After the death of his father, William Hall became the head of the company, but clearly was successful long before this as he had this stately Queen Anne style mansion built in 1896. Beyond his work at his family’s business, William H. Hall served in the Connecticut House of Representatives in 1893–1897 and again in 1905, 1909, and 1911, and he was generous with his money throughout his life and in his will. Hall served on the board of trustees of his alma mater, Wesleyan University, from 1912 until his death, with his estate donating $175,000 to Wesleyan to construct a chemical laboratory named in his honor. Closer to his home, his heirs partially funded the the Hall Memorial School in South Willington in his honor. The property remained in the family after his death, and in the 1980s, it became an assisted living facility, with large additions constructed, but the Hall House remains a great architectural landmark for the mill village.

Charles and Elizabeth Ware Mansion // 1870

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Located at the corner of Brimmer and Mount Vernon streets in Beacon Hill, this stately mansion showcases the various architectural styles and methods utilized by architects in the waning decades Victorian-era Boston. Set atop a brownstone base, the floors above are in the “Panel Brick” style, which utilizes brick masonry in a variety of decorative patterns of slight projecting or receding panels. The style was popularized by the Boston architectural firm of Ware & Van Brunt, as noted by architectural historian, Bainbridge Bunting. As expected, this house (and the attached townhouse next door) was designed by William Robert Ware for his uncle, Dr. Charles Eliot Ware (1814-1887) and his wife, Elizabeth Cabot Lee Ware. Dr. Ware was a physician at Massachusetts General Hospital and secretary of the Massachusetts Medical Society. After the death of Dr. Ware and Elizabeth, the property was inherited by their daughter, Mary L. Ware (1858-1937), a naturalist and botanist who was the principal sponsor of the Harvard Museum of Natural History‘s famous Glass Flowers. After the death of Mary, the property sold out of the family to Robert Wales Emmons III, a financier from a yachting family. The mansion remains in a great state of preservation, and is among the great Victorian-era residences in Beacon Hill.

Tebbetts-Bowditch House // 1856

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The townhouse at 4 Walnut Street in Beacon Hill is among the most architecturally unique buildings in the neighborhood. The main facade consists solely of a bowed front, which contains a deeply recessed entry to the side. To the right of the entrance, a later tripartite window exhibiting Queen Anne/Colonial Revival multi-pane sash pierces the southern half of the bow front.  At the third story, a massive wooden oriel window projects over the street below and contains a window set within a recessed panel. Above, the mansard roof ties in with its neighbor. The residence was built in 1856 and purchased by William C. Tebbetts, a dry goods merchant who was partner in a Downtown firm. By 1890, the residence was owned for a short period by Ernest W. Bowditch (1850-1918), a celebrated landscape architect and engineer. By the 1930s, the property became a boarding house, primarily for single women and widows. Today, the former single-family home contains eight apartments and from the exterior, presents some Victorian flair and quirkiness not commonly seen on the South Slope of Beacon Hill. 

Richard P. Spencer House – Deep River Public Library // 1881

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The finest extant Queen Anne Victorian-era house in the town of Deep River, Connecticut, is located on Main Street and since the 1930s, has been home to the town’s public library! How’s that for adaptive reuse?! This residence was built in 1881 for Richard Pratt Spencer (1820-1910), a local prominent businessman who lived to be 90 years old. Spencer lived here with his second wife, Juliana Selden, who was 32 years his junior, and three children until his death in 1910. When Spencer’s widow died in 1932, the heirs sold the property to the Saybrook Library Association (before the town renamed Deep River in 1947), which then, in turn, sold the building to the town for a small price in order to convert it into a library. Opened to the public in 1931, the Deep River Public Library has been preserved inside and out with historic fireplaces, woodwork, and features. The only notable change occured in 1995 when a children’s room addition was built to resemble an old porch. The library even retains the original pebbledash finish in the gables, a rare detail not commonly found in typical old houses of the period.



Emerson-Arnold Double-House // c.1875

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Elijah Carleton Emerson (1807-1888) was a wealthy Boston merchant, making his fortune as Director of the Second National Bank and President of the Middlesex Horse Railroad. In his late 30s, he purchased land in Brookline Village and established his estate on the land that is now Emerson Park in 1846. The bucolic setting of his estate included a pond, boathouse and adjacent cottage, but as the surrounding area continued to develop with easy access to Downtown Boston, Elijah Emerson began to develop his estate. Emerson began to build residences on his land for supplemental income. This handsome Stick style double-house was built around 1880 and rented by Mr. Emerson and was eventually occupied by his granddaughter, Tirzah and her husband, George Francis Arnold. The residence features a mansard roof, decorative brackets and applied stickwork, and a handsome porch with turned posts.

Isaac Rich House // 1846

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The Lindens neighborhood, located just east of the civic and commercial core of Brookline Village, was long an apple and cherry orchard known as Holden Farm. Beginning in 1843, the area became the earliest planned development in the town and was laid out as a “garden suburb” for those wishing to escape the growing congestion of Boston. As originally conceived in 1843, it reflected the latest ideals of planned residential development for a semi-rural setting on land owned by Thomas Aspinwall Davis. The streets, parks, and house lots here were laid out by civil engineer, Alexander Wadsworth, who two years earlier, laid out plans for Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, the first “Rural Cemetery” in America. Early homes were built on speculation by John F. Edwards, an architect-builder, for Davis, who was strict about high-quality designs in the Greek and Gothic revival styles in his newly laid out neighborhood. This house on Linden Street was built in 1846 in the Greek Revival style and was purchased upon completion by Isaac Rich. Isaac Rich (1801-1872) was a prominent merchant and philanthropist and founder of Boston University. The house was modernized in the 1860s with the addition of a mansard roof and paired windows.

Dr. Tappan Eustis Francis House // 1879

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Located on Davis Avenue, a narrow residential street in Brookline Village, the Dr. Tappan Eustis Francis House is an unusual work by an architect that differs from the style they became best-known and sought after. Dr. Tappan Eustis Francis (1823-1909) graduated from Harvard College in 1844 and Harvard Medical School in 1847 and moved to Brookline where he practiced medicine for over 50 years. For his Brookline residence, Dr. Francis hired William Ralph Emerson, who has become best-known for his Shingle style designs and summer cottages that lined the New England coastline and in Boston suburbs, to furnish plans for his suburban residence. For Dr. Francis’ home, Emerson envisioned a brick house in the English Queen Anne style. The tall chimneys with panel brick designs, corbeled brick brackets and terra-cotta decorations in the gable peaks, and the massive slate-roofed entry porch are all stunning features on the house; but the most intriguing has to be the bracketed hood on the corner of the house which originally sheltered a wooden bench, as depicted in an 1879 drawing.

Damon-Griffin House // 1869

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The Damon-Griffin House at 92 Commonwealth Road in Wayland, Massachusetts, is one of the exemplary buildings constructed in the Cochituate village in town, which prospered in the 19th century and centered around industry. This stately Second Empire style mansion is sited on a rise in the land overlooking Lake Cochituate and was completed in 1869 for George A. Damon (1826-1885), a wealthy businessman. George Damon died in 1885, and the house was sold to Wallace Griffin, one of the Griffin brothers who worked for the Bent Company, a prominent local shoe manufacturer. In 1890, Noble Griffin bought the house from his brother and, as his business prospered, proceeded to fix up the house as the showplace of a successful shoe manufacturer. In the mid-20th century, the Damon-Griffin House became a funeral home, and later was purchased by a developer who subdivided the land to build a suburban-style development of detached homes behind the house, and constructed an addition to the rear with more condominium units.

James H. Small House // c.1898

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After the completion of the Wayland Railroad Depot in 1881, suburban development in Wayland Center increased, where the village saw dozens of large homes built in the late 19th and early 20th century. On Bow Road, the James H. Small House was built around 1898 by and for its namesake, who worked as a carpenter and builder in town. James Henry Small (1847-1913), while not a trained architect, built this home as a late example of the Queen Anne style, as the Colonial Revival style began to proliferate in the village, showing a changing of architectural taste. The James Small House consists of a main gable-front block with a side wing that includes a square tower. The use of clapboards, differing shingles, and diagonal sticks provide variety and texture to the house and serves as a unique contribution to the village which is largely dominated by rigid symmetry and vernacular of Colonial-era homes.

Dr. Albert Phillips House // c.1875

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Dr. Albert W. Phillips (1838-1929) was born in Marcellus, New York, the son of immigrant parents from England. He studied medicine in the Midwest and later opened a medical practice in Rockport, Illinois, but in response to President Lincoln’s first call for volunteers, he returned to New York and enlisted as a private in the Union cause. He served as assistant surgeon with the 149th N. Y. Volunteers, where he saw action in many battles, including at Gettysburg. After the war, Dr. Phillips moved to the rapidly developing industrial city of Derby, Connecticut, where he opened a family practice. By the 1870s, he built this Stick style residence on Caroline Street. While working as a doctor of great esteem, Dr. Phillips was elected as the fifth mayor of Derby in 1901 and in 1903, was elected as a state senator.His home on Caroline Street in Derby maintains its unique entry porch and trusswork in the gables.

Whiting Library // 1891

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The Whiting Library in Chester, Vermont, was designed by architect George H. Guernsey, and is said to be the only building in the village designed by a regionally significant architect. For the design, Guernsey created an eclectic library blending Romanesque and Queen Anne influences that strikingly enhance the library’s relatively modest physical stature. The building was named to honor Chester physician, Laurin G. Whiting and his wife, Abigail, who donated funds for the land and building. The polychromatic brick and granite building features unique gables, corner tower, and arched openings, which were carried over to a lesser scale into an addition a few decades ago.

William Pollard House // 1899

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This high-style and ornamental house in Chester, Vermont, ranks among the state’s best examples of the Queen Anne style. The residence was constructed in 1899 for William Pollard (1854-1941), a local businessman who owned a shirtwaist manufactory in town with his brother, who lived next door. The painted-lady Victorian house features an asymmetrical plan highlighted by a three-story octagonal corner tower that is surrounded by a wrap-around porch with a delicate spindled frieze. The use of accent colors in the paint scheme further highlight the millwork details on the residence, which have all been preserved for well over a century. 

Charles Storrow House // 1884

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Facade

This shingle and brick Queen Anne style house at 112 High Street in Brookline, Massachusetts, was built in 1884 for Charles Storrow and his wife, Martha Cabot Storrow from plans by architect, Edward C. Cabot, Martha’s father. The lot here is said to have been gifted to Charles from his father, Charles Storer Storrow, a prominent civil engineer and industrialist, who is known for designing and building the dam and textile mill complex in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Besides the Victorian main house, the property included a historic stable and a detached house on an adjacent lot, which appears to have been rented by Mr. and Mrs. Storrow. The property was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted’s firm, with rustic rock walls, natural topography, and large, mature plantings. The Storrow House originally had stained glass windows designed by John LaFarge, which were sold in the 1970s. 

Side elevation.