HISTORIC HOUSES STILL IN CONCORD October 21, Sunday: Henry Thoreau and his father John Thoreau had just had a conversation about the old houses in Concord: October 21: ... I have been thinking over with father the old houses in this street— There was the Hubbard (?) house at the fork of the roads—The Thayer (Bo house— (now Garrisons) The Sam Jones’s now Channings— Willoughby Prescots (a bevel roof— which I do not remember) where Lorings is— (Hoars was built by a Prescott)— Ma’m Bond’s. The Jones Tavern (Bigelow’s) The old Hurd (or Cumming’s?) house— The Dr Hurd House— The Old Mill—& The Richardson Tavern (which I do not remember— On this side— The Monroe house in which we lived —The Parkman House in which Wm Heywood 20 years ago told me^that he helped raise the rear of 60 years before—(it then sloping to one story behind) & that then it was called an old house Dr Ripley said that a Bond built it. The Merrick house— A rough-cast house where Bates’ is Betty—& all the S side of the mill dam— Still further from the center—the old houses & sites are about as numerous as above— Most of these houses— slanted to one story behind. OLD HOUSES “NARRATIVE HISTORY” AMOUNTS TO FABULATION, THE REAL STUFF BEING MERE CHRONOLOGY Traveling Much in Concord “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD OLD HOMES 1644 The “Elisha Jones” house (also known as the home of Judge John Shepard Keyes) was being constructed as a two-story frame house with a side gable with triangular pediment entry portico. This phase of the work would complete in 1650. A shed known as the “Bullet Hole House” would be attached at the mid-18th Century during this home’s occupation by Minute Man Elisha Jones. The house would be extensively altered beginning in 1695; the present fenestration is indicative of these alterations. It would appear that this is the oldest structure presently in existence in Concord. OLD HOUSES NOBODY COULD GUESS WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT Traveling Much in Concord “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX OLD HOMES TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD 1657 The Jonathan Ball House now housing the Concord Art Center as established by Abba May Alcott Nieriker eventually would be built on a rectangular house lot between Mill Brook and the ridge to its north that “Thomas Dane, Carpenter of Concord,” 54 years of age, that was in this year purchased from the Reverend Peter Bulkeley. This lot was intersected by the town’s Straite Street, with an orchard and at least one barn already in existence on the brook side of “the highway under the hill through the Towne” (now Lexington Road), and a house already in existence on the raised side of the highway. The Reverend Bulkeley had earlier purchased this property from George Haywood.1 Dane had come with the Reverend Bulkeley and his wife when they had set sail from England in May 1635. His will, which indicates religious conviction, I commit my Soul to God yt gave it to mee, hoping and believeing in Jesus Cht my only Savior, that he will receive my Soul into the Armes of his mercy, and raise my body to Eternall glory at the resurrection. left his “dwelling house, barns, and orchard” to his son Joseph Dane, who presumably sold it (since by 1692 this plot would no longer pertain to the Dane family). OLD HOUSES NO-ONE’S LIFE IS EVER NOT DRIVEN PRIMARILY BY HAPPENSTANCE 1. George Haywood’s grant had been one of the 1st recorded in Concord. HDT WHAT? INDEX TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD OLD HOMES 1660 During this decade and the following two decades, the “John Meriam” house was being constructed in Concord, on a brick foundation around a central chimney stack, as a two-story saltbox with five bays and a modified roof pitch. This structure would be altered in 1730 but then would stand largely without alteration. It would be at this house site that the running battle between the militia and the army would begin on April 19, 1775. This is a structure still in existence. OLD HOUSES LIFE IS LIVED FORWARD BUT UNDERSTOOD BACKWARD? — NO, THAT’S GIVING TOO MUCH TO THE HISTORIAN’S STORIES. LIFE ISN’T TO BE UNDERSTOOD EITHER FORWARD OR BACKWARD. Traveling Much in Concord “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX OLD HOMES TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD 1666 In Concord, Timothy Wheeler was again deputy and representative to the General Court. The bridge across the Concord River at Concord that had washed away in the previous year, the one below Joseph Barrett’s, Esq. that went to Lee’s hill, was replaced by another where the South Bridge would later stand. In Concord, Nathaniel Ball, Sr. recorded ownership of a “house lott” of 13 acres. (This property eventually would become the Alcott family’s “Hillside” and the Hawthorne family’s “The Wayside.”) OLD HOUSES THE FUTURE IS MOST READILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT Traveling Much in Concord “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD OLD HOMES 1686 From this year until 1775 the “Farwell Jones” house, homestead of the Jones family of Concord, Massachusetts, would be being constructed in phases on a site probably already occupied, as a two-story, side- gabled, three-bay house. Initially this house would have but a single chimney. (In an even later timeframe the present Greek Revival front porch with arches would be added.) OLD HOUSES THE FUTURE CAN BE EASILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT Traveling Much in Concord “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX OLD HOMES TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD 1693 In Concord, Thomas Brown continued as Town Clerk. In Concord, Jonathan Prescott was deputy and representative to the General Court. In the Concord vicinity, the “William Smith” house was constructed on a stone foundation as a two-story Early Georgian with a plaster cove cornice, a triangular pediment door surround with a 6-light transom, and a covenant chimney. A lean-to addition would be erected at the building’s rear. Captain William Smith of the Lincoln Minuteman Company was the brother of Abigail Adams. This is a structure still in existence. OLD HOUSES DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION? GOOD. Traveling Much in Concord “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD OLD HOMES 1700 From this year into 1745, in the vicinity of Concord, the “Jacob Whittemore” house was being constructed as a two-story side gable Georgian 5-bay edifice around a central chimney. Its front door had heavy entablature. Associated with this house would be a barn, a cornhouse, a cider mill, and a blacksmith shop. Jacob Whittemore was a son of Dr. Nathaniel Whittemore, publisher of a widely circulated almanac as well as physician. This house would later pertain to the family of Lexington minute man John Muzzy. This structure is still in existence. OLD HOUSES Early in the 1700s, Samuel Miles constructed his house on “faier haven way” (the present Williams Road) on the over-400 acres of the South Quarter of Concord (Nine Acre Corner area) belonging to the Miles family. In this house his son Captain Charles Miles of Revolutionary fame would be born in 1727 and would live most of his life. OLD HOUSES CHANGE IS ETERNITY, STASIS A FIGMENT Traveling Much in Concord “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX OLD HOMES TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD 1703 In Concord, Abraham Wood, Joseph French, Stephen Hosmer, John Wheeler, Jonathan Hubbard, and William Wilson were Selectmen. In Concord, Abraham Wood continued as Town Clerk. In Concord, Jonathan Hubbard continued as Town Treasurer. John Wheeler was Concord’s deputy and representative to the General Court. The older of the two Hunt houses on Monument Street in Concord, pictured below, the unpainted one in the back, was erected in this year by William Hunt and his sons Nehemiah Hunt and Isaac Hunt. The newer part, in front, the part that is painted, would be built around 1800 by a later Nehemiah Hunt. William Henry Hunt (1839-1926), through whose bequest the Hunt Gymnasium would be built, would be the last of the Hunts to live on this site, as he would erect a new house for himself across the road and sell the property on which the old house stood to Russell Robb — who would take it down. The small-pox prevailed in the town in 1703; but it does not appear that any died of the disease. In 1792 it was introduced by inoculation. A hospital was fitted up where Mr. Augustus Tuttle now [1835] lives; and 130 persons went there at several times to be inoculated under the care of the three physicians of the town. From some cause the disease spread. It appeared at Amos Wright’s (Deacon Jarvis’s [Francis Jarvis]), at Cyrus Hosmer’s, at Deacon Chandler’s, and at Ephraim Potter’s. At the last place a new hospital was fitted up where the sick were taken, and near which a small burying-ground and grave-stone now [1835] mark the melancholy ravages of this disease. Ten persons were its victims, — 2 by inoculation and 8 by contagion, — and were buried by themselves; it being considered improper to inter them in the usual ground. Happily for mankind, the terrors which HDT WHAT? INDEX TRAVELING MUCH IN CONCORD OLD HOMES the appearance of this disease once inspired, are much mitigated by kine-pock inoculation.2 2.