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Home My WebLink Abouthibbert-street_0005 FORM B BUILDING Assessor's Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number 0 0 2230 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION 13/9 MASSACHUSETTS ARCHIVES BUILDING 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD Town/City: Lexington BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Place: (neighborhood or village): Photograph Address: 5 Hibbert Street Historic Name: Uses: Present: residential ■ Original: residential Date of Construction: ca. 1898 r Source: historic maps, style • Style/Form: Queen Anne/Colonial Revival Architect/Builder: _. Exterior Material: Foundation: granite Left side (south) and fagade (east) elevations Wall/Trim: vinyl siding and trim Locus Map Roof- asphalt shingles Outbuildings/Secondary Structures: none W� Major Alterations (with dates): d. Side addition (L 201h c) r-2 2L Condition: good j 5.917Moved: no yes ❑ Date: . u` . E] Acreage: 0.17 fM1V Setting: Located on a residential side street, close to the main thoroughfare of Massachusetts Avenue and the � 9 .� 9 . •-.. 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 s HIBBERT STREET MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 2230 ❑ 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. 5 Hibbert Street occupies a modest hillside lot that slopes up steeply from right to left across the property. The house is offset to the right side of the parcel, with modest side and front setbacks and a broad, paved parking area on the left side. A timber retaining wall borders the sidewalk edge, topped by a vinyl fence around the small front lawn. A high, solid vinyl fence lines the end of the parking area. A brick walkway leads from the driveway to the front door adjacent to the base of the house. Mature trees and lawn occupy the right side yard. The building consists of a 1 '/2 to 2 '/2 story main block with a large side addition. The rectangular main block has a complex roof line, featuring a 1 '/2 story section with a very high hip roof and 2 '/2 story gabled ells on its southern section. Walls are sheathed in vinyl siding and trim. The base of the second story walls flare very slightly above the first story, separated by a flat band course. Windows typically have 6/6 double hung replacement sash. The front facade (east elevation) has a full-length front porch with Tuscan columns supporting a low hip roof. A single-leaf, off-center door is flanked by an 8-light window with semi-circular fanlight on the right and two 6/6 windows on the left. A hip roof dormer is centered over the doorway and displays a large Queen Anne window (a large center pane ringed by a band of small panes on the perimeter). The left half of the elevation contains a prominent, front gabled ell with a large tripartite window on the second floor, a flared roof skirt forming a pediment effect at the gable peak, and a small, pentagonal lunette in the half story. The north (right side) elevation has a fully exposed basement and four 6/6 windows above. The south (left side) elevation has one window bay towards the front, with one window on each floor, and a 2 '/2 story, cross-gabled ell towards the back, with a short angled wall facing the street that contains one window on each floor. Most of the south elevation of the side ell is obscured by an abutting, two-story addition with a high hip roof. The front fagade (east elevation)of the addition has two windows on each floor. Although well maintained, 5 Hibbert Street has lost significant architectural integrity through the application of artificial siding and the loss of original trim and textures. Nonetheless, it still presents a significant representation of turn of the century, middle class suburban housing in Lexington. The house is notable for its bold massing, picturesque roof edge, unusual variety of fenestration, and prominent front porch. 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 I INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET LEXINGTON s HIBBERT STREET MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 2230 The Dexter Hillside development was conceived by Nathan Dexter Canterbury(1837-1912), who in 1895 began development of a large farm previously owned by Micajah Locke. A resident of Weymouth, Canterbury was a shoe and boot manufacturer, founded the East Weymouth Savings Bank and two Weymouth newspapers, and served as a state representative. Streets were given the middle names of Canterbury and his family. As reported by a local newspaper, "'Dexter Hillside' attracted many Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe who moved from densely populated areas of Boston to what was then a suburban outpost. In 1916, an Orthodox synagogue, Temple B'nai Jacob, was built on the Lexington section of Sylvia Street. It served members for three decades and closed after younger generations of early residents moved from the neighborhood, ending its unique Jewish identity." (Arlington Advocate, May 2, 2011) The house at 5 Hibbert Street is one of the earliest in the neighborhood, appearing on the 1898 map. By 1906, it was owned by G. H. S. Driver, about whom no information is presently known. The first known occupants were Harry Bornstein, identified as a junk dealer, and his wife Annie, who were living here with their five children and a servant by 1910. (In 1900, they lived in Boston's North End with two children and an Irish servant.) Widowed by 1920, Annie Bornstein continued to reside at this house at least through 1945. She was accompanied here in 1920, 1935, and 1940 by boarder John E. O'Connell, and in 1935 also by Edward P. and Mildred M. Hoffman. In 1945, Charles J. Foye, serving in the Army, and Mary E. Pero, employed in defense work, were living with Mrs. Bornstein. Subsequent residents included Lawrence H. Fitzpatrick, a laborer, and his wife Priscilla, in 1955 and 1965. They were joined in 1965 by Robert G. Fitzpatrick, who was serving in the Navy. BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES Duffy, Richard. "Sylvia and Rublee echo with family connection". Arlington Advocate, May 2, 2011. 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, 1934, 1936. 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: 1910, 1920, 1940. SUPPLEMENTARY IMAGES tl 111 �� amucnrrrrr uirt`rriiriiminr Front fagade (east) elevation Continuation sheet 2