254 Spring 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
16C-015-001 Easthampton NTH.2550
Town: Northampton
Place: (neighborhood or village) Florence
Address: 254 Spring Street
Historic Name: William H. Adams House
Uses: Present: single-family house
Original: single-family house
Date of Construction: ca. 1910
Source: Street directories and census
Style/Form: gable-and-wing form
Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: brick
Wall/Trim: clapboards
Roof: asphalt shingles
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
Major Alterations (with dates):
Condition: good
Moved: no | x | yes | | Date
Acreage: 2.85 acres
Setting: This is an east-facing house set an a slight rise
on a busy street.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON] [254 SPRING STREET]
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Continuation sheet 1
NTH.2550
___ 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 a gable-and-wing form house much like its neighbor at 240 Spring Street. It is one-and-a-half stories in height under a
front-gable roof. The gable section of the house is three bays wide and two deep and the wing is one story in height and the
equivalent of three bays wide behind an enclosed porch. The house is very modest in trim with narrow cornerboards and flat
stock window and door surrounds with drip edges, but it is a well-maintained version of the vernacular housing the appeared on
Spring Street in the second half of the 19th century. It has brick foundations and a single interior chimney. Sash is /21 and there
is a bay window that has been added on the north elevation.
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.
Although Spring Street appears on Northampton maps as early as 1831, it was so sparsely populated that subsequent atlases
did not include the area through 1895, and the Sanborn Insurance Maps do not include the street, due to its rural nature, through
1930. Tracking the property is possible through the directories of Northampton in a limited fashion, but it is possible to identify
the property’s owner in 1922 as William H. Adams, a farmer, and his wife Agnes and to say that Adams was not at the property
in 1910. The Federal census for 1900 indicates the family was in Northampton and that William was working as a stage driver
as was their eldest son Henry. Their other children were Herbert, Theodore, Martha, Clara, James, Sarah, and William who
were in school or too young for school. The census of 1910 tells us that the family was on Market Street and that William was
working in a stable as a hosteler while Agnes was at home with their children Martha, James, Sarah, William , Agnes and Gladys
who were either working or at home. Martha worked as a cook in a restaurant and James as a clerk in a market. In 1920 the
census places William and Agnes here on Spring Street and they were farming with their son William L. who was 19 at the time,
while their two younger daughters Agnes and Gladys 16 and 18 were working in the silk mills as “boxers”. By 1930 William had
died and daughter Agnes had married Philip Spencer and the younger generation had taken over the farm but Agnes, mother,
and Gladys were living with them. Gladys was working as a spooler in the silk mill while Philip was a fireman in the Northampton
Fire Department. The Spencer/Adams family had left the farm by 1940 when it was owned by Ray Upham. Ray and Grace
Upham were here through 1960 and Ray worked as a gardener for Smith College. At some point after 1983 this property’s
address changed from 208 to 254 Spring Street.
The history of this property’s owners reflects that of many of the people who lived in Florence and balanced their work lives
through farming and working in the mills. Children were educated during the primary years and then moved into trades or mill
work, meanwhile farming the land they had acquired.
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.