New Hampshire Division of Historical Resources Architectural History Consultant Workshop December 5, 2018 New Hampshire National Guard Training Center 722 Riverwood Drive, Pembroke, NH A History of Preservation and Progress Since 1982 CULTURAL LANDSCAPES OF NEW HAMPSHIRE Virginia H. Adams Senior Architectural Historian and Laura J. Kline Senior Architectural Historian NORTHERN PASS PROJECT CASE STUDY • PAL engaged by Northern Pass Transmission LLC in 2016-2018 • Linear project corridor 192 miles long, much in existing ROW, taller towers, some new alignment • NHDHR determined cultural landscape approach best to identify and evaluate properties eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places; based in part on Caltrans precedent guidance for identifying and evaluating cultural landscapes in linear corridors – Identify any cultural landscapes in the study areas – Determine the size, scale, boundaries, features, historic contexts – Evaluate significance, assess integrity for National Register eligibility CULTURAL LANDSCAPES DEFINITION adapted from National Park Service • Reflect human adaptation and use of natural resources within a specific geographic area and are a distinctive entity. • Express characteristics physically in settlement and land use patterns, circulation systems (roadways, waterways, and trails), vegetation, buildings and structures, and natural features, and by uses that reflect cultural values, social perspectives, and traditions. • Are cultural resources embedded with characteristics and features associated with significant historic contexts, events, trends, and people, and comprise assemblages at overlapping scales that are dynamic and change over time. CULTURAL LANDSCAPES DEFINITION Cultural Geography “The cultural landscape is fashioned from a natural landscape by a culture group. Culture is the agent, the natural area is the medium, the cultural landscape the result.” (Carl O. Sauer 1963 [1925]:343) CULTURAL LANDSCAPES EXAMPLES CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY • Relationships between • Why do certain places Places ↔ People have a distinct, coherent Environment ↔ Society identity? • Maps are crucial tool – Morphology • “Places” can be very – History different sizes – Community FOUR STUDY AREAS • Suncook River Valley • Pemigewasset River Valley • Ammonoosuc River Valley • Great North Woods RESEARCH & DATA COLLECTION Sources and Research Questions • Multi-disciplinary team – Architectural and industrial history – Archaeology – Ethnohistory – Cultural geography – GIS mapping • Formal and informal input from knowledgeable local representatives (Consulting Parties) • Research Questions defined early in process RESEARCH & DATA COLLECTION Geographic and Environmental Information – Watersheds, bodies of water – Soils – Ecoregions – Cultural and natural assets – Topography, bedrock geology – Vegetation RESEARCH & DATA COLLECTION Archival Sources – Project CRM reports – DHR inventory and archaeological site forms – National Register Nominations and HABS/HAER – Published histories, town plans, essays, and articles – Historical maps and images – Consulting Parties information RESEARCH & DATA COLLECTION Ethnographic Information Cultural values and traditions Questionnaires and follow up What are some of the most important natural features or resources of this What thing(s) make the Study Area special region in terms of shaping where and to you or make it unique from other parts of how people live and work? the state? Can you give any examples of places or sites that you feel would not be found any other place but here? Does your family have any traditions tied to a particular place in the Study Area, or If you were to pick one place or do you feel that there are particular landscape that best represents the traditions, or social customs or cultural Study Area, what would it be? Why? perspectives that define the region? RESEARCH & DATA COLLECTION Driveover of Study Areas • Range and distribution of historic resources • Character of intertwined natural and historic landscape • Areas of visual cohesion RESEARCH & DATA COLLECTION Demographic Data: Census and Ancestry • English • Irish • French • German RESEARCH & DATA COLLECTION Aerial Photography: 1951 and 2014 Academy Rd DATA ANALYSIS Historic Context Development – Historical and cultural patterns linked thematically, geographically, and chronologically – Identified approximately 40 NHDHR historic contexts for each Study Area – Identified historic resources and natural features that support and embody these historic contexts GIS-Based Mapping – Organize, visualize, compare, and interpret data DATA ANALYSIS National Register Evaluation – Define areas of significance using historic contexts Agriculture Recreation/Tourism Social/Ethnic History Architecture Transportation Archaeology Conservation Exploration/Settlement Industry – Verify continuity of historic resources and land use, integrity – Apply National Register criteria of eligibility – Establish boundaries DATA ANALYSIS • Reconnaissance-level identification of potential cultural landscapes within entire Study Area • Intensive-level evaluation of cultural landscapes within or adjacent to Area of Potential Effects (APE) defined for Northern Pass Project SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY STUDY AREA SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY ENVIRONMENTAL CHARACTERISTICS Residential/Commercial/Industrial Crops/Pasture/Orchards Forest Wetlands Conservation Land Water SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS Carrigain, 1816 Hurd, 1892 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY LANDSCAPE CHARACTER Suncook River from Mill House Road, Epsom PAL 2016 Stone Walls and Farm Fields on West Bank of Suncook River, Pembroke PAL 2016 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS AGRICULTURE Historic Farm, Epsom Epsom Historical Association n.d. Bachelder Farm, Pembroke PAL 2016 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS HISTORICAL MARKERS Robert Frost Summer Cottage, Allenstown Buck Street Mills, East Pembroke PAL 2016 PAL 2016 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS CONSERVATION AND RECREATION Civilian Conservation Corps Dining Hall, Bear Brook State Park, Allenstown Bear Brook State Park, Allenstown PAL 2016 Laprey, Monroe and Hooper 2012 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS TRANSPORTATION Ca. 1869 Cattle Pass below Suncook Valley Former Railroad Station and Railroad Grade, Railroad, Allenstown Short Falls Village, Epsom PAL 2016 PAL 2016 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS SOCIAL / ETHNIC Odd Fellows Hall, Short Falls Village, Epsom Short Falls Village PAL 2016 Hurd 1892 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY SENSE OF PLACE “….Past din of loom, and rushing wheel, And ringing bell its waters steal; O’er falls, where dash and roar Its waves on rocky shore; Past glades that bask in noonday beams, Where ploughmen urge their drowsy teams; Suncook River, New Hampshire Past homesteads in the shade Leon Foster Jones, 1909 Of maple colonnade….” –Solomon Walker Young, The Suncook, 1891 SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY NATIONAL REGISTER ELIGIBLE CULTURAL LANDSCAPES • Two cultural landscapes identified and evaluated eligible for National Register: – Short Falls Cultural Landscape, Epsom, 648 acres – Buck Street-Bachelder Road Cultural Landscape, Pembroke, 1,852 acres • Rural vernacular landscapes • Assemblages of natural and manmade features • Typify 19th-century settlement patterns and agrarian land use within Suncook River Valley SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY NATIONAL REGISTER ELIGIBLE CULTURAL LANDSCAPES • Significant under Criteria A and C • Boundaries selected to encompass greatest extent of continuous natural and historic features, based on comparison to historic maps and aerial photographs • Boundaries defined using natural features, legal property boundaries, roads, changes in development, and visual barriers SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY NATIONAL REGISTER ELIGIBLE CULTURAL LANDSCAPES • Short Falls Cultural Landscape – Compact farming village along river valley in Epsom – Farmsteads, Short Falls Village, community buildings, road system, Suncook River and floodplain, bridge and mill site on river SUNCOOK RIVER VALLEY NATIONAL REGISTER ELIGIBLE CULTURAL LANDSCAPES • Buck Street-Bachelder Road Cultural Landscape – Follows historical linear transportation corridor between west bank of Suncook River and range road lands west of Buck Street – Agricultural resources, rural residences, road system, cemeteries, industrial sites, commercial buildings PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY STUDY AREA PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY ENVIRONMENTAL CHARACTERISTICS Residential/Commercial/Industrial Crops/Pasture/Orchards Forest Wetlands Conservation Land Water PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS Carrigain, 1816 Hurd, 1892 PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY LANDSCAPE CHARACTER Pemigewasset Wilderness from Mt. White Mountains in Franconia from I-93 Lafayette Summit PAL 2016 PAL 2016 Baker River, Warren PAL 2016 Squam Lake, Holderness East Branch Pemigewasset River, Lincoln PAL 2016 PAL 2016 PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS EARLY SETTLEMENT Farm Fields and the Village of Alexandria, Hebron Village, Settled ca. 1800 (NR listed) Settled 1769 PAL 2016 PAL 2016 PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS AGRICULTURE Hill Farms, Andover Connected Farmstead, Meredith PAL 2016 PAL 2016 PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS TRANSPORTATION Steamboats on Squam Lake, Early 20th Route 3 and the Pemigewasset Valley Century Branch Railroad, Woodstock Tatham and Smith 1968 PAL 2016 PEMIGEWASSET RIVER VALLEY HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS