HomeMy WebLinkAboutcharles-street_0023 FORM B BUILDING Assessor's Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
0 0 2206
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION 13/270
MASSACHUSETTS ARCHIVES BUILDING
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD Town/City: Lexington
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Place: (neighborhood or village):
Photograph
Address: 23 Charles Street
Historic Name:
Uses: Present: residential
Original: residential
Date of Construction: ca. 1906-20
Source: style, historic maps
Style/Form: Queen Anne/Colonial Revival
Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: fieldstone
East(fagade)and north (right side)elevations
Wall/Trim: vinyl siding and trim
Locus Map Roof- asphalt shingles
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
Major Alterations(with dates):
Artificial siding (L 20th c); side entry vestibule? (L 20th c?)
} Condition: good
Moved: no ❑ yes ❑ Date:
o .
Acreage: 0.12
' Setting: Located on a short residential side street near the
main thoroughfare of Massachusetts Avenue, close to the
mop Arlington line. Dense hillside neighborhood with buildings of
varying size and scale and predominantly early to mid-20th c
construction.
Recorded by: Wendy Frontiero
Organization: Lexington Historical Commission
Date (month/year): September 2015
12/12 Follow Massachusetts Historical Commission Survey Manual instructions for completing this form.
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET LEXINGTON 23 CHARLES STREET
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125
2206
❑ 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.
23 Charles Street occupies a small lot that slopes down from left to right through the site. A concrete block retaining wall lines
the sidewalk edge of the property. The building has modest front and side setbacks, which include a paved driveway on the left
side of the house. A brick walkway leads from the sidewalk to the front entrance. The yard is maintained chiefly in lawn, with
foundation plantings and scattered mature trees.
The rectangular building rises 2 '/z stories from a fieldstone foundation to a front gable roof with no returns and a center chimney.
Walls are sheathed in vinyl with vinyl trim. Windows typically have 6/1 or 1/1 double hung replacement sash with vinyl trim. The
front fagade (east elevation) is spanned by a one-story porch with concrete steps framed by fieldstone cheek walls, half-height
fieldstone walls surmounted by Tuscan columns, and a low hip roof. An offset entry door is located in a shallow projecting bay
on the left, with paired 6/1 windows to the right. A large cross-gabled pavilion is centered over the entrance bay. It contains an
angled bay window on its front face and single windows on its sides. A single 1/1 window is set in the right-hand bay of the
second floor, and a 1/1 window is centered in the half story of the facade.
The asymmetrical north (right side) elevation has two large windows and an offset doorway in its partially exposed basement,
three windows on the first floor, and two on the second. The more irregular south (left side) elevation has one window visible on
the first floor, three of varied size on the second floor, and one intermediate level window near the center, suggesting an interior
stairway. A small shed-roofed entry vestibule projects from the center of this elevation, with a single-leaf doorway facing the
driveway and a 1/1 window facing the street.
Well maintained, 23 Charles Street has lost architectural integrity through the application of artificial siding and trim.
Representative of early 20th century, middle-class suburban development in Lexington, the ambitious house is notable for its
comparatively large size and scale in a neighborhood of mostly modest housing. It is also distinguished by its striking fagade
composition, including the bold, rustic masonry base of the front porch and the articulated fagade pavilion.
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 small grid of streets bordered by Massachusetts Avenue, Hibbert Street, Taft Avenue, and Bowker Street represents an
early area of suburban infill in East Lexington, near the Arlington town line. Immediately south of Taft Avenue is Liberty Heights
(LEX.Q), a hilltop subdivision laid out by Brookline developer Jacob W. Wilbur in 1909 and developed in the teens and twenties.
The growth of both these neighborhoods followed the arrival of the electric street railway on Massachusetts Avenue in 1899 and
was directed at working class residents.
In the area adjacent to Massachusetts Avenue known as Dexter Hillside, Hibbert and Sylvia streets, which straddle the
Lexington/Arlington line, were laid out, platted, and partially developed by 1898. The only other evidence of development here at
that time is the L-shaped beginning of Charles and Cherry streets, where ten house lots were laid out but vacant. By 1927, both
Charles and Bowker streets extended from Massachusetts Avenue to Taft Avenue, and the western ends of Cherry Street,
Stevens (then Cary) Road, and Camden (then Smythe) Street pushed a few lots eastward from Charles. Development was
gradual through the 1920s and 30s and was virtually complete, with the present network of streets, by 1950.
Continuation sheet 2
INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET LEXINGTON 23 CHARLES STREET
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125
2206
The house at 23 Charles Street appears on the 1927 Sanborn map, where it shared a lot with the house immediately uphill
(#25); a narrow garage is set between and behind them. By 1935, the parcel was subdivided and the garage (not extant) stood
on the property with #23. The first known residents at this address were Walter B. Flewelling, who worked as a stereotyper in
Boston, and his wife Blanche E. in 1922. By 1935, the house was occupied by John J. Gandy, a prison guard, and his wife Irene
C. Subsequent residents included Roy A. Cook, a fireman and later fire chief, in 1945 and 1955, with his wife Marion G. and two
sons in the Army in 1945. They were accompanied in that year by Paul Sullivan, a chiropodist, and his wife Phyllis, a nurse. By
1965 Adam A. Adams, proprietor of an unnamed business, was living here with his wife Alice.
BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES
Historic maps and atlases: Walling 1853; Beers 1875; Walker 1889; Stadly 1898; Walker 1906; Sanborn 1908, 1918, 1927,
1935, 1935/1950.
Lexington Comprehensive Cultural Resources Survey, Period and Area Summaries.
http://historicsurvey.lexingtonma.gov/index.htm Accessed Jul 23, 2015.
Lexington Directories: 1899, 1908-09, 1922, 1928, 1934, 1936, 1938, 1942.
Lexington List of Persons: 1935, 1945, 1955, 1965.
Massachusetts Historical Commission. "MHC Reconnaissance Survey Town Report: Lexington." 1980.
. Form A— Liberty Heights, LEX.Q. Prepared by Anne Grady and Nancy Seasholes, 1984 and 2001.
U.S. Census: 1930.
SUPPLEMENTARY IMAGES
1-7
1
J
s /
South (right side)and east (facade)elevations
Continuation sheet 3