183-185 Main 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): February, 2011
Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
10 D-016-001 Easthampton NTH.25
Town: Northampton
Place: (neighborhood or village) Leeds
Address: 183-185 Main Street
Historic Name: Nonotuck Silk Company Workers’s House
Uses: Present: Three-family residence
Original: Two-family residence
Date of Construction: 1895-1915
Source: atlases
Style/Form: Queen Anne
Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: brick
Wall/Trim: clapboard
Roof: asphalt
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
Major Alterations (with dates): windows replaced, ca.
2000
Condition: good
Moved: no | x | yes | | Date
Acreage: 0.252 acres
Setting: This building faces west towards the Mill River.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON ] [183-185 Main Street]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 1
NTH.25
__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.
Workers’s housing in Leeds was most frequently built in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in frame construction rather than
the more expensive masonry and buildings were both single and two-family. This two-family is two-and-a-half stories in height
under a side-gable roof on which are two chimneys on the ridge. The house has two entries centered on the six bay façade
behind a full-width porch that is supported on partially turned, Queen Anne style posts. Railings have square balusters. There is
a side corner porch for each unit on the east elevation and they too rest on turned posts. The windows of the building have been
replaced with 1/1 sash with the exception of one attic window in the north gable end that has retained its 2/2 sash.
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 1980, “This large double house was built early in the t20th century. It was used as a tenement house by the
Nonotuck Silk Company. The southernmost of the three factories owned by the Company in Leeds was located just south of this
house, on the bank of the Mill River. The site had originally been used for a small woolen mill which became consolidated with
the Shepherd woolen mills in the 1930s as the Northampton Woolen Manufacturing Company. After the failure of the Company
in the late 1850s, A. P. Critchlow bought this part of the Company’s property. In 1860 he began the manufacture of buttons from
vegetable ivory, the firs to do so in this country. Mr. Critchlow maintained his connection with the business until the early 1870s,
but returned after the flood of 1874 had destroyed the mills to rebuild. Business resumed in 1875 under the name of the Mill
River Button Company. The Nonotuck Silk Company took over the property in the early 1890s.
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.
1875-1876 Northampton Directory and Historical Register, pp. 45-50.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON ] [183-185 Main Street]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 2
NTH.25
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 Nonotuck Silk Company workers’ house in Leeds would contribute to a Leeds Center Historic District. This
small industrial village center was rebuilt after the flood of 1874 had washed away its preceding textile mill buildings,
housing and residents. It continued to function as a mill village into the 20th century and the bridge connected
industries on both sides of the Mill River. Architecturally the district is significant as a representative village with
boarding house, general store, mill building, bridge, and workers’ housing. It has integrity of design, setting,
association, feeling, workmanship and materials.