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51 Prospect 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): March, 2010 Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number 31B-132 Easthampton NTH.628 Town: Northampton Place: (neighborhood or village) Address: 51 Prospect Street Historic Name: Wright House Uses: Present: Single-family residence Original: Single-family residence Date of Construction: ca. 1850 Source: Maps and visual evidence Style/Form: Italianate Architect/Builder: Exterior Material: Foundation: brick Wall/Trim: clapboards Roof: asphalt shingles Outbuildings/Secondary Structures: Major Alterations (with dates): Colonial Revival porticos, verandah and windows added ca. 1900; wing added on east, ca. 1980 Condition: good Moved: no | x | yes | | Date Acreage: 0.22 acres Setting: This house occupies a lot that slopes down to the east and south. INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [51 PROSPECT STREET] MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation sheet 1 NTH.628 _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. The Wright House is a south-facing house that is Italianate in style. It is two-and-a-half stories in height under a side-gable roof and is three bays wide and two bays deep. It has a one-and-a-half story wing on its east elevation. The main block of the house has full-length Italianate style windows on its south façade and 6/6 sash elsewhere. It was altered during the Colonial Revival era by the addition of an open verandah on the east bordered by a turned baluster railing and by the addition of a two-story pedimented portico on colossal Doric columns that rise outside a one-story portico supported on Doric columns. The one-story portico has a wrought iron balustrade and its roof curves on its south side. Colonial Revival as well is the Palladian window composition in the gable field at attic level on the west elevation. Two hipped roof dormers on the south façade may date from the Colonial Revival alterations. Eaves make full returns in the gable ends and have over-scaled modillion blocks at their cornices. 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 Form B of 1980: “Prospect Street appears on the first map of Northampton, dated 1794, as a loop around the eastern side of Round Hill. It connected on the north and south with the Stage Road from Northampton westwards (now known as Elm Street). The second map of the town dated 1831 shows a house on this site, identified on subsequent m aps of the 19th century as the Wright homestead. Directories from 1860 to 1885 list William K. Wright, a piano tuner, at this address.” 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. INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [51 PROSPECT STREET] MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation sheet 2 NTH.628 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 Round Hill Historic District. This potential historic district is significant according to criteria A and C and would have local significance. The residential streets that cross Round Hill are significant according to criterion A for their reflection of development in Northampton from the early 19th century (1807) through the 1950s. Residential development began on Round Hill with the establishment of gentleman’s estates but grew with schools and a resort hotel until the 1890s when residential development increased significantly. From the 1890s through the 1950s (1959 McAlister Infirmary) Round Hill became home to Northampton’s wealthy and to the Clarke School for the Deaf. Architecturally this area of Northampton is significant for the range of residential architectural styles including the Queen Anne and Colonial Revival, and for its institutional buildings in the French Second Empire, through High Victorian Gothic and Colonial Revival styles ending with the American International style. The potential district has integrity of workmanship, design, feeling, association, and materials.