HomeMy WebLinkAboutblossom-street_0026 i AREA FORM NO.
FORM B - BUILDING
555
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION
294 WASHINGTON STREET, BOSTON, MA 02108
_ - -
s - _ wn Lexington
26 Blossom Street
_- - - storic Name Underwood-Smith-Hutchinson
use
r
Present residential
r n,®, d � �/fit( n_: - Original residential
)ESCRIPTION:
;e first half of eighteenth century
Source stylistic analysis
SKETCH MAP
Show property's location in relation Style Early Seeo --Period
to nearest cross streets and/or
geographical features. Indicate Architect
all buildings between inventoried
property and nearest intersection. Exterior wall fabric artificial siding
Indicate north. o k
1 Outbuildings
13 I
0
C2 Major alterations (with dates) see
0
0 0 , Architectural Significance
4 D
p� 0 Moved Date
nApprox. acreage 66256 ft.
2
9 v�
Recorded by Anne Grad1� anG 'Ianc S. Seasholes Setting At end of dead end street next
Organization Lexington Historical Commission to a major six-land highway; near recent
Date !larch, 1984 houses; backs onto prominent hill.
(Staple additional sheets here)
ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE (Describe important architectural features and
evaluate in terms of other buildings within the community.)
Although altered and enlarged many times, the earliest portions of this
house appear to date from the first half of the eighteenth century. very
likely, the house was originally two rooms over two rooms with central chimney
and comprised the southernmost rooms of the current house, except for the
sunporch.
Evidences of an early Second Period construction date include an inch-
wide quarter-round chamfer on beam cases in the right hand chamber, and a
(see Continuation Sheet)
HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE (Explain the role owners played in local or state
history and how the building relates to the development of the community.)
According to an antiquarian account, this house was originally owned
by Joshua Underwood. This does not readily accord with a construction date
in the first half of the eighteenth century, however, for Joshua Underwood
was born in 1725, married in 1766, and died in 1775. Perhaps the house was
originally built by his father Joseph (1681-at least 1749) , but more research
is necessary to establish the original ownership of this important house. In
any case, it does seem reasonably clear that c. 1760 Joshua Underwood sold
the house to Josiah Smith (1724-1764) , the ancestor of many of the Smiths in
what came to be known as the "Smith's end" part of Lexington, and the brother
of Hezekiah Smith on Allen Street, then just a continuation of Blossom Street
and part of a major road in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries between
Lexington and Boston (see Allen Street area and 56 Allen Street forms) .
T is �jith w s a} selpgtman f9r f've. eaxs b tween 1l771 and 1777-and an
.issse lrfrom �7Q on �� s e se°rv�e�1�inrt�ies�eogo�ution apnePaasyaJshoemaker.�
Many of these characteristics were also true of his son Josiah (1753-1826) ,
who bought the farm after his father's death: the second Josiah also fought
in the Revolution; was a selectman for four years between 1601 and 1806 and
an assessor twice; and was a shoemaker with four to six employees. (His shop,
an old schoolhouse, was apparently taken down c. 1886.) In 1817 his son Elias
(1792-1878) bought the farm, suggesting a possible date for the Federal
"modernization" of the interior. Elias Smith, the brother of "Fifer Si" at
(see Continuation Sheet)
BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES (name of publication, author, date and publisher)
Hudson, Charles. History of the Town of Lexington, II, np. 635, 639, 643-644,
646. Boston: Houghton rlifflin Company, 1913.
Smith, A. Bradford. "Kite End" (1891) . Proceedings of the Lexington Historical
Society II(1900) :112-114.
1689 map
1906 map
1887 Directory
1906 Directory
10M - 7/82
INVENTORY FORM CONTINUATION SHEET Comrm_mity: Form No:
I1SSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COWU SSION Lexington 555
Office of the Secretary, Boston
Property Name: 26 Blossom Street
Indicate each item on inventory form which is being continued below.
ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE
board and batten door with vertical feather-edged panel and strap hinges also
in that chamber. These features place the house among the half a dozen first-
half-of-the-eighteenth-century houses extant in Lexington.
An interesting feature of the house is the relatively steep pitch of the
front slope of the roof, almost First Period in configuration (the rear slope
of the roof has been raised several times) . Even though this house sits on
one of the earliest roads in Lexington, there is no other evidence that the
house was built in the First Period. The roof slope must represent a stylistic
holdover. The beams, for example, are.rough hewn and were not intended to be
exposed as they would have been in the seventeenth century.
Other features consistent with an eighteenth century construction date
are brick nogging (seen in the first floor rear wall) ; roof framing of princi-
pal rafters bridle jointed at the apex with a slim purlin at the ridge and two
purlins along the slope; obvious early plaster laid on split lath; and splayed
corner posts in the chambers.
There have been many changes to the structure. Fenestration and door
openings on the south facade have been altered and perhaps moved. Finishes in
the rooms on the first floor of the original portion of the house date from the
early nineteenth century. The staircase is now in the rear of the house,
outside the original structure. There is one chimney at the rear of the right
hand room. Its foundation is of a type found elsewhere in late eighteenth and
early nineteenth century houses in Lexington: two brick piers with timbers lain
horizontally across them to support the superstructure. (Note: no evidence of
the earlier central chimney was found; its presence is just conjectured.)
There have been numerous lateral and rear additions to the house. The
rear slope of the roof has been raised twice. Evidence in the attic shows that
first a one room deep addition was placed along the rear of the house with
lean-to roof extending down to the first floor ceiling height on the north wall.
Rafters to support this lean-to are still seen in the east and west walls of
the attic laid on top of original rafters to form a lean-to roof with shallower
slope. The roof of the lean-to was later raised to accommodate a full two
stories in the rear of the house.
HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE
the end of Blossom Street and Ebenezer at 389 Concord Avenue, both also
shoemakers (see 272 Concord Avenue and 389 Concord Avenue forms) , was first a
shoemaker and later a farmer. . After his death the farm was purchased by his
son A. Bradford (1829-1910) , who owned it until 1884 when it was finally sold
out of the Smith family for the first time in 124 years. In 1889 the house
was owned by Solomon Estabrook, a farmer, and in 1906 by Edwin W. Hutchinson,
a market gardener.
4
Staple to Inventory form at bottom