HomeMy WebLinkAboutmaple-street_0015 FORM B - BUILDING
Assessor's Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION 10030000102 Boston N. 647
MASSACHUSETTS ARCHIVES BUILDING
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD Town Lexington
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Place (neighborhood or village)
Address 15 Maple St.
�� ,, :' • ' Historic Name Nancy Brown/Gustave Kauffmann House
VIM is Uses: Present Residential
Original Residential
A
Date of Construction 1838
t Source Lexington Valuation lists
k'G
J Style/Form Italianate
Architect/Builder
Exterior Material:
Foundation Fieldstone
to Wall/Trim Wood Shingle
C , Roof Asphalt Shingle
'_ � • r Outbuildings/Secondary Structures Barn with attached
garage
/ Major Alterations(with dates)
04 Rear addition, barn converted to residence (dates unknown)
Condition Good
Moved ® no ❑ yes Date
—� Acreage 0.4 A.
Setting Close to a heavily-trafficked street and next to the
Recorded by Nancy S. Seasholes bikepath(formerly railroad tracks); in a row of 19th-century
houses
Organization Lexington Historical Commission
Date(month/year) February 1998
Follow Massachusetts Historical Commission Survey Manual instructions for completing this form.
BUILDING FORM
ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION ❑see continuation sheet
Describe architectural features. Evaluate the characteristics of this building in terms of other buildings within the community.
15 Maple St. is one of several simple front-facing L-shaped Italianate cottages in Lexington(a comparable example is at 16
Adams St. [MHC #698]). The house is cross-gabled with a rear ell,two stories, and has a side chimney in the ell. It is set on a
fieldstone foundation,clad with wood shingles, and roofed with asphalt shingles. The long front-gabled rear ell has a flat-roofed
addition on its west elevation and a screen porch at the rear. The main entry of the house is in the reentrant angle and windows are
2/2 double hung sash. The house has very few period finishes other than eave returns and a small drop at the corner of the entry
porch roof. The front-gabled 1'/2-story barn is clad with wood clapboards and has been converted to a residence; on its west
elevation is an attached shed-roofed one-car garage clad with wood drop board siding.
HISTORICAL NARRATIVE ❑see continuation sheet
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.
It is interesting that this house and the one next to it at 19 Maple St. (MHC#648)which were both built at the same time—this
one in 1838 and the one next door between 1837 and 1846—,are both unusual styles for the period—this one an Italianate and 19
Maple a Federal—and both built by single women. Lexington assessors' records indicate that this house was built in 1838 by
Nancy Brown (1780-1862),who had been the wife of John Brom(1779-1846) of Lexington but by 1834 had apparently left her
husband and was living in Bedford. That year she bought a house for herself on what is now Massachusetts Ave. in East
Lexington and the following year bought the one-third acre on which this house stands. In 1838 she built this house on the lot, for
in 1839 she was assessed for two houses, and until 1843 her son Horatio(b. 1809) lived here.
In 1876 this house was purchased by the wife of Gustave Kauffmann(b. 1843), a cigar manufacturer who had emigrated from
Germany in 1857, fought in the Civil War, and moved to Lexington in 1868, living first on Concord Ave. before moving to Maple
St. Kauffmann originally worked in Boston but later had his cigar manufacturing shop on this property. He was reportedly very
patriotic, in 1893 organizing the first Color Guard in the United States, and was a Lexington assessor from 1901-1910.
BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES ❑ see continuation sheet
Hudson, Charles. History of the Town of Lexington. Revised and continued to 1912 by the Lexington Historical Society.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1913. 2: 68-69, 331-32.
Lexington Valuation Lists. 1834-1846.
Middlesex Registry of Deeds. Deeds. Cambridge, MA. 336: 71; 358: 382; 893: 478; 1412: 1.
Worthen, Edwin B. Tracing the Past in Lexington, Massachusetts. New York: Vantage Press, 1998. 37-38.
A Calendar History of Lexington,Massachusetts, 1620-1946. Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Savings Bank, 1946. 92.
❑ Recommended for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. If checked,you must attach a completed National
Register Criteria Statement form.