197 Prospect Street
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xFORM 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): April, 2011
Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
24D-039-001 Easthampton NTH.
Town: Northampton
Place: (neighborhood or village)
Address: 197 Prospect Street
Historic Name: William and Catherine Godfrey House
Uses: Present: Single-family house
Original: Single-family house
Date of Construction: ca. 1870
Source: Map of 1873
Style/Form: gable-and-wing form
Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: parged brick
Wall/Trim: shingles
Roof: slate
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
Major Alterations (with dates):
Garage attached ca. 1930; windows replaced ca. 2008
Condition: good
Moved: no | x | yes | | Date
Acreage: 0.129 acres
Setting: This house occupies a corner lot.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON ] [STREET ADDRESS]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 1
___ Recommended for listing in the National Register of Historic Places.
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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 is a gable-and-wing form house whose front-gabled section is two stories in height and three bays wide. The wing is one-
and-a-half stories in height and three bays wide. The shingle sided house has a slate roof and its brick foundations are parged.
Windows have been replaced by vinyl 1/1 sash, which alters the historic character of the house. Eaves are thinly boxed and
wide, suggesting the house was originally Italianate in style, though it has lost most of its stylistic features. The house has an
attached garage and a porch on its east elevation. The entry portico was a later alteration.
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.
This house was present when the map of 1873 was drawn but no name was attached to it. By 1884 it was owned and occupied
by William and Catherine Godrey and their seven children plus William’s mother Margaret. William and Catherine and Margaret
were Irish immigrants, but all their children had been born in Massachusetts. William supported them as a marble worker in t his
neighborhood of Irish working class families. The Godfreys were still in the house in 1895 but by 1910 it was occupied by Anton
Bilz. Bilz worked in the Belding Brothers Silk Manufactory and remained in the house through 1919. By 1930 the house was
vacant and in 1940 W. J. Pranell was its owner.
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.