22 Butler Place
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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): June, 2010
Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
32A-208 Easthampton NTH.2095
Town: Northampton
Place: (neighborhood or village)
Address: 22 Butler Place
Historic Name: Harlan H. and Caroline Derrick House
Uses: Present: three-family house
Original: single-family house
Date of Construction: 1894
Source: Registry of Deeds, atlas and Daily Hampshire
Gazette Style/Form: Colonial Revival
Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: brick
Wall/Trim: shingles, clapboards and panels
Roof: asphalt shingles
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures: secondary
residence
Major Alterations (with dates): conversion of a garage to
a secondary residence, ca. 2000.
Condition: good
Moved: no | x | yes | | Date
Acreage: 0.18 acres
Setting: Shaded by one of this street’s older maple trees,
this house is south-facing.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [22 BUTLER PLACE]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 1
NTH.2095
__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.
This house is one of the most recently rehabilitated buildings on Butler Place and its unique design gives it the appearance of
having been architect designed. It is two-and-a-half stories high with a front-gable roof. There are transverse gable bays on
east and west to add variety to the rectangular plan. The south façade is three bays wide composed of an entry flanked on one
side by an oval stair window and on the other side by a three-sided bay. There is a wraparound porch that covers the entry and
wraps with a rounded corner to the west elevation where it extends to the transverse gable bay. The porch is supported on
fluted gunstock posts, an unconventional choice that moves away from the fussiness of Queen Anne/Colonial Revival to the
simplified forms of early 20th century styles such as Tudor Revival and Prairie style. The porch entry at first floor level has a
pediment over the stairs in whose tympanum is festooning. It is a stacked porch with a second story section, one bay wide, on
the south façade. The second story of the porch is supported by slender Doric columns above a solid, shingle-sided railing. The
frieze beneath the roof of this section of the porch is ornamented with additional festooning. The three-sided bay of the façade
has triple panels between stories and below the windows, a motif that is repeated on the east and west transverse gable bays
for a unified effect. The main front-gable of the house is ornamented with a recessed Palladian window composition with an
arched center opening resting on columns. Attached to the house at its northwest corner is a contemporary wing, designed to
resemble a hipped roof carriage barn.
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 1980 Form B, “In 1892 Butler Place was opened through the Butler estate on Hawley Street. Lots were sold for
residential development and by 1895 seven of the present ten houses were built. An 1895 article in the Gazette on the recent
development in the city mentioned, “several examples of art in architecture” on the street. This house was built for H. H. D errick
in 1894 at an approximate cost of $4000. “ Harlan and Caroline Derrick were Canadian immigrants who arrive in the U.S. in
1895. Harlan was a steam laundryman according to the 1900 census and two roomers lived with them on Butler Place, a lawyer
and a mill overseer, both of whom also had come from Canada to Northampton. The Derricks were among the many
Northampton residents with large houses who took in roomers or boarders. While many of the renters were associated with
Smith College, there were also many for whom renting a room while working in downtown Northampton or its factories was a
choice. The Derricks may have returned to Canada by 1910 as they do not appear in the censuses, and by 1917 the house
was occupied by Clarence K. and Mary Graves. Like many of his neighbors on Butler Place, Clarence worked in a nearby
Northampton business, Coburn and Graves, druggists. Mary Graves was still in the house in 1937, but Clarence had died.
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.
U. S. Federal censuses 1900-1910.
Walker, George H. and Company. Atlas of Northampton City, Massachusetts, Boston, 1884.
Walling, Henry F. Map of Hampshire County, Massachusetts, New York, 1860.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [22 BUTLER PLACE]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 2
NTH.2095
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 Derrick 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, 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 potential historic district has
integrity of workmanship, feeling, setting, design and materials.