INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET LEXINGTON 35 WACHUSETT DRIVE
<br /> MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
<br /> 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125
<br /> 2280
<br /> daughters, and a servant. The federal agricultural schedule of that year shows him owning 37 acres of land valued at$7,000.
<br /> Richardson and his wife Amelia O. Currier, both born in Boston, had five children, all born in Lexington between 1871 and 1881.
<br /> Robert Means Lawrence, a Boston physician (b. 1847), moved to Lexington in 1882, soon after he bought the property that is
<br /> now 35 Wachusett Drive. Grandson of the industrialist and businessman Amos Lawrence, Robert Lawrence was a member of a
<br /> prestigious and wealthy Massachusetts family. Lawrence graduated from Harvard College in 1869 and Harvard Medical School
<br /> in 1873, continued his medical studies in Vienna and Paris, and had a medical practice in Boston. During preparatory school,
<br /> he was a member of the Oneida Football Club of Boston, which is thought to be the first organized football club in the country,
<br /> active from 1862 through 1865. A monument to the group was erected in Boston Common in 1925, and Lawrence was one of
<br /> six of the seven surviving team members who attended the dedication ceremony. (See attached photograph.)
<br /> Robert Lawrence was married in 1870 to Katherine Cleaveland, with whom he had five children. The Lawrence family occupied
<br /> this house until at least 1902. By 1905, they seem to have left Lexington for the fashionable Back Bay neighborhood of Boston,
<br /> where they had lived before coming to Lexington and where they appear to have maintained a winter residence during their time
<br /> in Lexington. Robert Lawrence was active in the Lexington community, serving as a selectman from 1884-86, as a member of
<br /> the school committee from 1888-90, and a founder of the Episcopalian Church of Our Redeemer. In addition to his general
<br /> medical practice, Lawrence pursued genealogy, medical folklore, and psychotherapy, publishing several books on these
<br /> subjects. In his application for a passport in 1896, Lawrence gave his occupation simply as "literature".
<br /> In 1909, the property was acquired by Francesca Scamman of Saco, Maine, and occupied by her nephew, Arthur E. Horton; the
<br /> property was then known as Fair Oaks. Horton took title to the property in 1916 under the name of the Fair Oaks Realty
<br /> Corporation. A progressive residential development was planned, and Horton, a landscape architect, laid out curvilinear roads
<br /> to follow the topography of the site and preserve the natural landscape. The subdivision plan that Horton originally promoted
<br /> contained 52 house lots, including one at the bend between Wachusett Drive and Fair Oaks Drive that contained the "Old
<br /> Mansion" and a development office. A denser subdivision plan, incorporating 150 lots, was accepted by the town in 1924 and
<br /> built out as the "Fair Oaks" neighborhood by the prolific local developer, Neil McIntosh (see Area Form LEX.Y).
<br /> Ralph B. Maloney, a manager, his wife Margaret V., and William H. Smith, retired, and his wife Mary were living at this address
<br /> by 1955. Residents in 1965 included Otis H. Bramhall, an engineer, his wife Eleanor C., and Harry L. Hoisington, retired.
<br /> The origins and evolution of the present house on the property are merely suggested in available documentation. Worthen
<br /> notes that in 1876, a house that stood on the property"was almost entirely destroyed by fire, and it was probably not restored
<br /> until after it passed to Dr. Lawrence" in 1881 (Worthen: 112). Worthen further reports that
<br /> "The Lawrences did much to improve the old house, adding a cottage during their early years there, which was occupied for
<br /> many years by Mr. and Mrs. Murray Smith. Dr. Lawrence purchased additional land so that in 1902 he was assessed for a
<br /> house $3,900, cottage$800, barn $600, and eighty-eight acres $14,200" (Worthen: 112).
<br /> Further research is recommended on the lives of both Joseph Richardson and Robert Means Lawrence, and to determine the
<br /> date, builder, and original/early appearance of the present house.
<br /> BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES
<br /> Back Bay Houses; Genealogies of Back Bay Houses. "321 Dartmouth" http://backbayhouses.org/321-dartmouth/ Accessed
<br /> Aug 12, 2015.
<br /> Boston Directories: 1880, 1882, 1899, 1905, 1909, 1912, 1914.
<br /> The Boston Globe. "Remembering the first high school football games," Bob Holmes. Nov. 21, 2012.
<br /> Historic maps and atlases: Walling 1853; Beers 1875; Walker 1889; Stadly 1898; Walker 1906; Sanborn 1908, 1918, 1927,
<br /> 1935, 1935/1950.
<br /> Hudson, Charles. History of the Town of Lexington, Vol. II. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1913.
<br /> Lawrence Genealogy. Ancestry.com. The New England Historical & Genealogical Register, 1847-2011 [database on-line].
<br /> Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. Original data: New England Historic Genealogical Society. The New
<br /> England Historical and Genealogical Register. Boston: The New England Historic Genealogical Society.
<br /> Continuation sheet 2
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