59 Maple Street
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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): March, 2010
Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
23A-60 Easthampton NTH.179
Town: Northampton
Place: (neighborhood or village) Florence
Address: 59 Maple Street
Historic Name: William Latham House
Uses: Present: 10-family residence
Original: single-family residence
Date of Construction: ca. 1890
Source: atlas of 1895
Style/Form: Queen Anne
Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: granite
Wall/Trim: granite, brownstone, wood, terra cotta
Roof: asphalt
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
Carriage Barn
Major Alterations (with dates):
Condition: good/fair
Moved: no | x | yes | | Date
Acreage: 0.411 acres
Setting: This is a west-facing house with two large blue
spruce trees in its front yard, one at each side of a central
walk.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [59 MAPLE STREET]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 1
NTH.179
___ 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, the only granite house in Florence, is a two-and-a-half story, Queen Anne style house under a hipped roof. It has on its
west façade a two-and-a-half story polygonal bay. There is a front-gabled dormer on the roof of the main block of the house. It
has a sunburst pattern in its gable field. On the roof as well are two tall granite chimneys and at terra cotta cresting at its ridges.
The bay window has a small hipped roof dormer on its roof. From the angle between the bay window and the main block of the
house, across the west façade and around to the south elevation is a porch with a rounded corner. It has turned Queen Anne
style posts and a turned baluster railing. Above the stairs to the porch is a pediment. The main block is three bays wide. An
entry with a leaded glass transom is adjacent to a pair of windows with 1/1 sash. Sash in the bay window is multiple-pane
Queen Anne sash. The rough-faced granite blocks of the building are regularly coursed but randomly sized. Contrasting with
the granite is brownstone trim. The building has a brownstone watertable, continuous brownstone lintels and sills at the first and
second story windows, keyed window and door surrounds and brownstone sills. This is an unusual and unique house in
Northampton and may well have served as a demonstration of mason Latham’s work.
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 1976, “Built in the early 1890s by William Latham, (this house) is located on one of the two major
side streets in Florence center. Maple Street had been laid out in the late 1840s after the dissolution of the Florence
Community. Lots were sold for homesteads and the area was quickly built up. William Latham bought a lot with a frame
dwelling house thereon in 1891, and built his new residence soon thereafter. Latham is listed as mason and builder, stone
quarrier and wood dealer in the local directory.”
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 443- pate 494.
Northampton Directory: 1892-93.