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43 Dryads Green 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): January, 2010 Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number 31A-269-001 Easthampton NTH.574 Town: Northampton Place: (neighborhood or village) Address: 43 Dryads Green Historic Name: Victor and Virginia Lucia House Uses: Present: single-family residence Original: single-family residence Date of Construction: 1909-1910 Source: Northampton Street Directories Style/Form: Tudor Revival Architect/Builder: Exterior Material: Foundation: brick Wall/Trim: brick, shingles, stucco Roof: asphalt shingles Outbuildings/Secondary Structures: Major Alterations (with dates): Condition: good Moved: no | x | yes | | Date Acreage: 0.279 acres Setting: This is a north-facing house located on a short street with a wooded area to the south through which the Mill River passes. INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [43 Dryads Green] MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation sheet 1 NTH.574 _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 early Tudor Revival style house is representative of the high architectural standards that Northampton’s architects and builders maintained at the turn of the century. It is a two-and-a-half story house with a front-gabled roof; it is brick on the first story and shingle on the second story and gable ends have stucco and wood half-timbering. Although it is only two bays wide and three bays deep, the house has variety in its plan and elevation by the use of an unusual two-story, shed-roofed oriel on its west elevation and a single bay, pedimented portico on the north façade. In addition there is an overhang between first and second stories and a north gable end jetty that is supported on molded Tudor brackets. Tudor Revival barge boards ornament the gables. The roof flares slightly at the eaves of the main roof and on the porch. The north façade has a broad entry door with three-quarter length, leaded glass sidelights. The adjacent window is single pane with a leaded transom above. Both the main roof gable and the porch pediment are ornamented with faux half-timbering in stucco. The porch is supported by paired posts. 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 about 1850 Northampton’s most expensive neighborhood was at the east end of the Center comprised of Pomeroy Terrace, King Street, and Philips Place. This is a neighborhood of Gothic Revival and Italianate style homes of considerable elegance. Elm Street became more rural the further west and north one traveled on it until the end of the 19th century. In 1889 two brothers-in-law, John Sullivan and J. C. Hammond, bought farmland on the south side of Elm Street owned by Daniel Clark and laid out Forbes Avenue. In 1890 the land that had been Clark’s cow pasture was laid out by Sullivan and Hammond as Dryads Green, while a third developer, Charles Crouch laid out Kensington Avenue. Sullivan and Hammond put in sewers, built the streets with curbing and concrete sidewalks, lined the streets with trees and divided up the land into house lots. With this development, followed by Harrison Avenue and streets on the north and east side of Elm Street, the west end became the most expensive area in Northampton. Homes on Kensington Avenue and Dryads Green in 1895 ranged between $5,000 and $20,000. Dryads Green, which in large part, ran parallel to the Mill River became a sought-after street for the green that was located there, planted and maintained by one of the street’s first residents, George Cable, a writer, Abolitionist, and philanthropist. Dryads Green became known for the important writers, politicians and intellectuals that Cable entertained at his home “Tarryawhile”. Between 1900 and 1910 Dryads Green was built up with houses owned by doctors, teachers, businessmen and scholars. A couple that lived in this neighborhood almost as long as their neighbors the Dunphys at 31 Dryads Green were Victor and Virginia Lucia. The Lucias first appear in 1900 in Northampton on Prospect Street. Virginia was then a history teacher at the Capen School, and Victor was a Northampton grocer. The Capen School was a private boarding school for girls that prepared many of its students to go on to Smith College, and the grocery store was in the Lucia family. By 1905 Victor had left the grocery business to begin a long career as a school building superintendent starting at the Burnham School, followed in 1908 by the Northampton School for Girls where he was also superintendent. The Lucias moved to Dryads Green from Prospect Street between 1909 and 1910 and, but by 1910 Victor had joined Virginia working at the Capen School as Superintendent of Buildings. The Capen School closed, however, in 1920 after Bessie Capen’s death, so the couple changed careers. By 1920 Victor’s mother Elizabeth Forrest had moved in with them and Victor’s new career was as a school purchasing agent and Virginia left teaching to become a secretary. Victor made a final career change in 1934 when he began working as a clerk at the Northampton Institute for Savings where he became an important figure in the community. By 1950 the house was vacant to be occupied again in 1960 by Joan and Luke Ryan. Luke Ryan was a Special Justice of the Northampton District Court. INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [43 Dryads Green] MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation sheet 2 NTH.574 The period of the Lucias’ residence in Northampton on Dryads Green coincided with the flourishing of educational institutions in Northampton and the expansion of Smith College with new buildings and purchase of existing buildings through the 1920s. Among the schools operating in Northampton were the Capen School, Burnham School, the Clarke School and Smith College. Smith built the Quadrangle of ten dormitories beginning in 1922 and to house its ever-expanding faculty the college also bought homes in the Dryads Green neighborhood including 47 and 49, 70 and 72 Dryads Green. This expansion made a particular impact on the neighborhood as it drew accomplished faculty to the neighborhoods, but also contributed to the mobility of residents. BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES Beers, F. W. County Atlas of Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, 1873. Massachusetts Historical Commission. Reconnaissance Reports, “Northampton”, 1982. Miller, D. L. Atlas of the City of Northampton and Town of Easthampton, Hampshire County, Massachusetts, Philadelphia, 1895. Northampton Directories 1910-1960. Sanborn Insurance Maps, Northampton, 1915. U. S. Federal censuses 1890-1930. Walker, George H. Atlas of Northampton City, Massachusetts, Boston, 1884. Massachusetts Historical Commission Community Property Address State Archives Facility 220 Morrissey Boulevard Northampton 43 Dryads Green Boston, Massachusetts 02125 Area(s) Form No. NTH.574 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 property would contribute to a potential historic district that would encompass the residential/institutional side streets laid out from Elm Street in Northampton Center between Main Street on the east and the west boundary of Childs Park on the west. This potential historic district is significant according to criteria A and C and would have local significance. These residential streets are significant according to criterion A for their reflection of the development of Northampton from the mid-19th century as a relatively affluent community that supported several private schools for young women, which prepared them after 1875 for attendance at Smith College, and the Clarke School where deaf students were given an education that thoroughly prepared them for the hearing world. The residences in this area made a shift from gentlemen’s estates to accommodation of the growing middle class in Northampton during the 19th century with businessmen, scholars, teachers, doctors, and retired farmers. According to criterion C this district would be significant for the range of historical styles that it includes. Gothic Revival, Italianate, French Second Empire, Queen Anne and Colonial Revival styles are all well-represented within a landscape of individual large lots, and streetscapes that were laid out and developed at one time.