'''FORM B − BUILDING'''
Massachusetts Historical Commission
Massachusetts Archives Building
220 Morrissey Boulevard
Boston, Massachusetts 02125
'''Photograph'''
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'''Locus Map'''
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(image oriented to the compass)
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| '''Recorded by: John D. Clemson''' |
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| '''Organization: Medford Historical Commission''' |
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| '''Date''' (''month / year): December, 2014'' |
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Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
{| | L-08-31 | | Boston North | | M | | MDF.381 |}
NRDIS (4/21/1975); LHD (2/15/1985)
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| '''Town/City:''' Medford |
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| '''Place:''' ''(neighborhood or village)'': Medford Square [[Category:Medford Square]] |
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| '''Address:''' 26 Hillside Avenue |
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| '''Historic Name:''' Frank Hervey House |
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| '''Uses:''' '''Present: residential single-family''' |
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'''Original: residential single-family'''|- | '''Date of''' '''Construction:''' 1889-1890 |- | '''Source:''' 1889 Atlas of Medford by George A. Stadley Co., Boston; 1890 City Directory |- | '''Style/Form:''' Shingle/gambrel front |- | '''Architect/Builder:''' possibly John W. Russell |- | '''Exterior Material:''' |- |
'''Foundation: brick'''|- |
'''Wall/Trim: vinyl clapboard'''|- |
'''Roof: asphalt'''|- | '''Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:''' A landlocked side-gable building located directly behind at #24 may originally have been a carriage house but had been converted to a dwelling by 1897; two-bay detached garage, early 20th century. |- | '''Major Alterations''' ''(with dates):'' Application of vinyl siding, recent. |- | '''Condition:''' Fair |- | '''Moved: no''' '''yes''' '''Date:''' |- | '''Acreage:''' 7,609 square feet |- | '''Setting: densely settled residential district of large-scale, elaborate, professionally designed single family houses of the same period; the area abuts the institutional and commercial core of Medford at the base of Pasture Hill lining High Street''' |}
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.''
''Constructed between 1889 and 1890, the Hervey-Volpe House is a commodiously scaled gambrel-front single family house two bays wide and four bays deep. With its tall corner tower and cross-gambrel roof, the house has a dramatic and picturesque asymmetrical silhouette. The massive gambrel roof rises two stories above the single ground-level story and serves as the building’s principal decorative feature. This kind of massing, a reference to 18th century Colonial architecture, is a character-defining feature of the Shingle style fashionable during the period of the house’s construction. The roof structure is arranged in a T-shape with the top of the T across the rear pile. Within the symmetrical façade, the main entrance is located within a recessed front porch; the overhanging gambrel is supported by full-height Tuscan-order columns that rest upon a brick platform. A small porch-entrance pavilion, sheltered by a pedimented roof, projects from the center of the façade. Additional massing is provided by a three-story octagonal tower located at the left-front corner of the house that rises above the main roof ridge, terminating in a steeply pitched faceted conical roof, another characteristic of the Shingle style. Although the house is massed in a simple rectangle, the rear half of each side elevation is capped by a large-scale cross gambrel. On the right side a broad diversity of window openings, randomly arranged in an unembellished, planar elevation, indicate the location of interior vertical and horizontal circulation as well as what appear to be service spaces. The more formal left elevation has a rationally arranged fenestration pattern as well as a broad recessed balcony located in the center of the cross gambrel at the second-floor level. Although primarily a wood-frame structure, the first-story left elevation is brick.''
''Although what was originally most likely shingle sheathing is currently obscured behind a recent vinyl siding application, the house retains its original sash in a wide array of forms and configurations. Standard eight-over-two and six-over-two double-hung sash is interspersed by a wide variety of sizes and light patterns. The most elaborate windows, consisting of four-part Palladian, or Venetian arrangements, are located at the attic level of the gambrels in the front and left elevations. Equally elaborate one-part sash made up of lights arranged in elaborate round, half-round, diamond and rectangular patterns light what appears to be the hall, where they flank a fireplace, and the stair landing in the right elevation. Exaggeratedly tall chimneys protrude from the forward pile of the left elevation and the intersection of the roof ridge.''
''The house is sited on a minimal suburban lot within a planned subdivision dating largely to the 1890s. The function and history of the gabled building located directly behind the main house remains ambiguous. Although displaying the appearance of an elaborate carriage house, it had been converted to exclusively residential use by 1897, according its depiction on period Sanborn atlases. This structure will therefore be documented in a separate MHC Inventory Form. A detached, two-bay, hip-roofed, clapboarded garage is located directly behind the main house toward the right rear corner of the lot. The area, which currently forms a Local Historic District, was documented in an MHC Area Inventory Form during the mid-1970s (MDF.M). The area abuts the Institutional and commercial core of the city known as Medford Square [[Category:Medford Square]], which is located along High Street at the base of the hill to the south.''
'''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.''
''The subject property is located within the original boundaries of the estate of Thatcher Magoun (1775-1856), the well-documented ship builder and Boston shipping merchant, as it appeared in 1855.''See: Glenn A. Knoblock, ''The American Clipper Ship, 1845-1920'' (McFarland & Company, 2014) pp. 299-300; Fred H.C. Wooley, “Old Ship Street: Some of its Houses, Ships and Characters,” ''Medford Historical Register, Vol. 4'' (Medford Historical Society, 1901); Samuel Elliot Morrison, ''The Maritime History of Massachusetts, 1783-1860'' (Houghton Mifflin Co., 1921) pp. 102-103. ''Magoun’s house, an elaborate Greek Revival mansion that served as the public library until it was demolished in 1958, was located on the site of the present library building at 111 High Street. By 1875 Hillside Avenue had been constructed to serve a subdivision located on the south slope of Pasture Hill that remained in the ownership of Thatcher Magoun, Jr. (1808-1883), a business partner of his father, who resided on the south side of High Street (see MDF.AQ) and his sister, Mrs. Martha Bradshaw Magoun Adams (1812-1885). The subdivision was slow to develop, however. No buildings had been constructed on Hillside Avenue as late as 1889, by which time the former Magoun land west of the avenue had been sold to Frank Hervey (1838 – Feb. 10, 1918).''
''Frank Hervey was a prominent local merchant and proprietor of the Boston Branch Grocery at 11 Main Street between 1890 until at least 1916. He was also a veteran of the Civil War.''Enlisted in Company F, Mass. 5th Infantry Regiment on 23 Sep., 1862, mustered out Jul. 2, 1863: Massachusetts Soldiers, Sailors and Marines in the Civil War, Mass. GAR Journal of the Annual Encampment. ''The store was located directly behind Old City Hall at the south west corner of Main and High streets. He later brought in his nephew Edgar J., who took over management and changed the name to Edgar J. Hervey Co.; Edgar resided nearby at 27 Grand View Avenue with his son, Chester A. Hervey, an employee of the market. As early as 1890 Frank Hervey resided at 4 Hillside Avenue, which was almost certainly the subject house; although only some of the lots were numbered and none had been assigned street numbers as late as 1898, the subject house is positioned on what would be lot number 4 based upon the order in which they were assigned numbers. By 1898 Hervey had constructed three other houses on his property: numbers 16, 20 and 24. The attribution of numbers 16 and 20, both built for Frank Hervey on speculation, to architect John W. Russell, suggests his own house at number 26 was designed by Russell as well.''Hillside Avenue NRDIS nomination; no source cited, likely Building Department records. ''Although 24 Hillside Avenue, sited, designed and massed in a manner that would identify it as an outbuilding, probably a carriage house and stable, it was depicted as early as 1897 (Sanborn) as a dwelling. Although Hervey lived in the subject house until his death, he also occupied number 16 for a short period of time during 1909; later this house was occupied by relatives, including Julia A. Hervey, the widow of James A. Hervey, a third brother of Frank and Edgar. And after 1920 Edgar moved there as well. Although Frank Hervey married in 1885 Olive P. Buckley (Sawyer) (b. June, 1845) a widow from New Bedford and former housekeeper, there were no children.''
''In 1920 the house was occupied by Waldo S. Plastridge, a store manager, director of the Second National Bank of Malden and a former builder turned real estate developer (he developed the large apartment house at 22-26 Bradlee Road, see MDF.1095), but by 1924 it had been purchased by Angelo C. Volpe (1881 – Apr. 27, 1971). Angelo Volpe, in partnership with his father, Pasquale (b. 1849), a native of Naples, Italy who immigrated in 1874, operated a fruit, vegetable and grocery store in the Bigelow Block (MDF.83, NR 2/24/1975) that was established in 1887. According to previous research, the Volpe family purchased the Bigelow Block in 1925 and operated the grocery store until the early 1940s. Angelo Volpe with his wife, Angelina (b. 1894), also a native of Italy, occupied the house, which was valued at $11,000 in 1930, with their four children until as late as 1940. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in the Hillside Avenue NR District'' (4/21/1975); The NR district became a Local Historic District (2/15/1985) and its boundaries were expanded in 2002 (see area form MDF.M).
''John W. Russell, probable architect''
''A 1970s area form of the Hillside Avenue Historic District [[Category:Hillside Avenue Historic District]] identifies John W. Russell as the architect of both 16 and 20 Hillside Avenue, both similar architecturally and both constructed for Frank Hervey, suggesting Russell designed all three. Directories from the time show that Russell lived in Medford and had an office on Tremont Street in Boston. John W. Russell (b. c. 1852) resided in a boarding house at 68 Ashland Street between 1890 and 1930. He maintained offices in Boston at 5 Pemberton Square during the 1890s and 110 Tremont Street between 1920 and 1930. Although little is known regarding Russell’s training, his partner between 1905 and 1927, Henry Preston Clark (1853-1927) was educated at M.I.T. and the Academy des Beaux Arts in Paris, the pinnacle of architectural training worldwide during the late-19th century, suggesting Russell’s qualifications were of a similar caliber. The firm received commissions for a number of high-profile buildings and residences in the region, including the Public Library of Hyde Park at 35 Harvard Avenue, Boston (BOS.10957), 15 Channing Place, Cambridge (1899), the W.C. English House (1912), the Teresa A. Crowley House (1909, 86 Dean Road, BKL.1533) and the Hermann F. Clarke House (1916, 420 Warren Street, BKL.1276), the last three in Brookline.''BOS.10957.
'''BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES'''
Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 [database on-line] Ancestry.com.
Federal Census, 1880, 1900, 1920, 1930, 1940
Medford City Directories, 1890, 1900, 1909, 1916, 1918, 1920, 1924, 1938
1855 H.F. Walling Map of Medford
1875 F. W. Beers Atlas, P. 108, Medford Square [[Category:Medford Square]]
1889 Atlas of Medford by George H. Walker Co., Boston
1898 Atlas of Medford by George A. Stadley Co., Boston
1900 Atlas of Medford by George A. Stadley Co., Boston
Medford Sanborn Maps: 1897, 1903, 1910
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''North-facing (right) side elevation''
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''1898 Atlas of Medford by George A. Stadley Co., Boston, showing the early numbering of Hillside Avenue.''