115 Bridge 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: Pioneer Valley Planning Commission
Date (month / year): March, 2010
Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
32A-241 Easthampton NTH.2119
Town: Northampton
Place: (neighborhood or village)
Address: 115 Bridge Street
Historic Name: Seth Hunt House
Uses: Present: single-family residence
Original: single-family residence
Date of Construction: 1859
Source: Daily Hampshire Gazette, March 8, 1859.
Style/Form: Gothic Revival/Italianate
Architect/Builder: William Fenno Pratt, architect
Exterior Material:
Foundation: brick
Wall/Trim: clapboards, shingles
Roof: slate
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
Major Alterations (with dates): 2005-2006 ell additions on
east elevation.
Condition: good
Moved: no | x | yes | | Date
Acreage: 2.99 acres
Setting: House faces southwest behind a wrought iron
fence. Landscape is designed with perennial flower beds
and shrubbery.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [115 BRIDGE STREET]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 1
NTH.2119
_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.
Previously considered a Gothic Revival style house for its steeply pitched roofs, the Hunt House may be seen as Gothic Revival
transitional to the Italianate style. It is a two-and-a-half story house that is L-shaped in plan, and like its neighbor at 109 Bridge
Street that dates about 15 years later and is fully Italianate, it places an entry in the angle of the two wings. Rather than a
square tower as at 109, however, William Fenno Pratt, the architect, placed a front-gabled pavilion of two stories into the angle
and skirted it with a three-sided open porch on Italianate chamfered posts with a pediment over the entry stairs. The main entry
door is round arched. The house has much of the visual interest of the two styles with a patterned slate roof that has a tall
chimney in the wing and a shingled cupola at the crossing of the two ridge poles. There is a three sided bay window on the
south elevation of the wing and pairs of Italianate arched windows in both ends of the two building sections at the second floor
level. There is a wing on the north elevation of one-and-a-half stories. Three bays long, it has through-cornice dormers with
Gothic Revival style lancet windows and a secondary entrance with a pointed arch portico. There are three chimneys and two of
them are double stacks. There is a two-story, recently added ell on the west that includes a three-story shingled tower. .
Clearly Pratt was working out the elements of design between two current styles of architecture, and the result is a unique
building.
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.
According to the Form B of 1975, “This Gothic Revival style house was built in 1859 for Seth Hunt, Treasurer and Clerk of the
Connecticut River Railroad. It was designed by Northampton architect William Fenno Pratt. Hunt had purchased a three acre
tract of land ‘with buildings thereon’ from J. Stebbins Lathrop in 1858 for $2,900. In 1875 Hunt took out a mortgage on the three
acre tract.” He later repurchased a ¼ acre section and built a house upon it that he then sold to Mary Ann Cochran in 1878. The
¼ acre and the house that he sold were at 109 Bridge Street.
BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES
Registry of Deeds, book 180, page 334; book 180 page 293; Book 321 Page 441; Book 336 page 366; Book 339 page 372;
Book 472 Page 349; Book 488 page 153; Book 491 page 325; Book 600 page 53; Book 777 page 513; Book 777 page 105.
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.
Annual Reports Connecticut Valley Railroad Company 1870 to 1883.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [115 BRIDGE STREET]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 2
NTH.2119
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.
This house would contribute to a potential Pomeroy Terrace historic district that developed south and east of the
Bridge Street Cemetery from the second third of the 19th century as Northampton’s finest residential district. Original
residents here were merchants, retired farmers, lawyers, railroad owners and other professions. As the century
progressed the adjacent streets were laid out for the growing middle class with railroad personnel joining clerks,
teachers, and others.
Architecturally the potential historic district is significant for the fine examples of the 19th century architectural styles
from the Greek and Gothic Revivals, Italianate, Queen Anne and Colonial Revival styles. The district includes
significant examples of the work of Northampton architect William Fenno Pratt. This is a fine example of Pratt’s
work in the Gothic Revival style. This potential historic district has integrity of workmanship, feeling, setting, design
and materials.