43 Beacon Street
Follow Massachusetts Historical Commission Survey Manual instructions for completing this form.
FORM B − BUILDING
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION
MASSACHUSETTS ARCHIVES BUILDING
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Photograph
Topographic or Assessor's Map
Recorded by: Bonnie Parsons
Organization: PVPC
Date (month / year): April, 2010
Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
23A-196 Easthampton NTH.220
Town: Northampton
Place: (neighborhood or village) Florence
Address: 43 Beacon Street
Historic Name: Kate Coughlin House
Uses: Present: single-family residence
Original: single-family residence
Date of Construction: 1882-1884
Source: Registry of Deed and atlas
Style/Form: Italianate
Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: brick
Wall/Trim: clapboards
Roof: slate and asphalt shingles
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
Carriage barn
Major Alterations (with dates):
Wing added ca. 2000.
Condition: good
Moved: no | x | yes | | Date
Acreage: 0.635 Acres
Setting: House is on a wooded lot, facing south. It is set
back from the street.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [43 BEACON STREET]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 1
NHT.220
_x__ Recommended for listing in the National Register of Historic Places.
If checked, you must attach a completed National Register Criteria Statement form.
Use as much space as necessary to complete the following entries, allowing text to flow onto additional continuation sheets.
ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION:
Describe architectural features. Evaluate the characteristics of this building in terms of other buildings within the community.
The Kate Coughlin House takes a form that was popular during the Italianate style period. It is two-and-a-half stories high under
a side-gable roof on which is centered a transverse gable. A pair of chimneys rise from the center section of the roof. Wide
boxed eaves have paired Italianate brackets on all elevations. The house is only three bays wide but proportions are large. The
center entry is sheltered by an Italianate style porch supported on chamfered posts that have arched braces at the eaves. A
railing tops the porch providing a second story porch entered by a second story door. Windows are paired on the first story and
have 2/1 sash and shallow hooded lintels. The clapboard-sided house has a visually active surface divided by double
stringcourses between stories. There is a one-and-a-half story wing on the east that has an exterior wall chimney. A vertically-
sided carriage house follows the elevation of the main house by being side-gabled with a centered transverse gable. It has an
arched window in the transverse gable and a cupola centered on its roof.
HISTORICAL NARRATIVE
Discuss the history of the building. Explain its associations with local (or state) history. Include uses of the building, and the role(s) the
owners/occupants played within the community.
From the Form B of 1976, “This was one of the earliest houses built on Beacon Street. The street had been laid out during the
1860s, but was primarily the private domain of George Burr, one of Florence’s leading industrialists who had bought 8 ½ acres
on both sides of the street in 1868. In 1882 Kate Coughlin bought a lot east of Burr’s homestead and had this house built. At
the end of the year she sold the lot and house to John B. O’Donnell, one of Northampton’s first mayors and a real estate
developer. Miss Coughlin continued to live in the house, however. “
BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES
Beers, F. W. County Atlas of Hampshire Massachusetts, New York, 1873.
Hales, John G. Plan of the Town or Northampton in the County of Hampshire, 1831.
Miller, D. L. Atlas of the City of Northampton and Town of Easthampton, Hampshire County, Massachusetts, Philadelphia, 1895.
Walker, George H. and Company. Atlas of Northampton City, Massachusetts, Boston, 1884.
Walling, Henry F. Map of Hampshire County, Massachusetts, New York, 1860.
Registry of Deeds: Book 253. Page 217.
Sheffeld, Charles (ed.) History of Florence, Florence, 1895.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [43 BEACON STREET]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 2
NHT.220
National Register of Historic Places Criteria Statement Form
Check all that apply:
Individually eligible Eligible only in an historic district
Contributing to a potential historic district Potential historic district
Criteria: A B C D
Criteria Considerations: A B C D E F G
Statement of Significance by _____Bonnie Parsons___________________
The criteria that are checked in the above sections must be justified here.
The Coughlin House would contribute to a Beacon Street Historic District developed and resided in by some of
Florence’s leading industrialists in the 1860s-1910s. It represents the shift in Florence from neighborhoods that
mixed mill workers’ housing with mill owners’ housing of the first half of the century to that of neighborhoods of
economically-similar residents with, in this case, large lots, grand homes set back from a broad street.
Architecturally, the district is significant for its range of high style homes and a church in the Stick Style, Italianate,
Queen Anne and Tudor Revival styles. Further research would indicate which among them were architect-designed,
as many certainly were. The Coughlin House is a particularly fine Italianate style house that has been well-preserved.