HomeMy WebLinkAboutmiddleby-road_0170-0172 FORMB - BUILDING AREA FORM N0600
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MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION
294 WASHINGTON STREET, BOSTON, MA 02108
, own Lexington
tR ,.
'ddress 170-172 Middleby Road
r�i T istoric Name John Bridge House
$E WE
se: Present residential
Original residential
ate c. 1730 or c. 1835
a Source local history, stylistic analysis
SKETCH MAP
Show property's location in relation Style Greek Revival
to nearest cross streets and/or
geographical features. Indicate Architect
all buildings between inventoried
property and nearest intersection. Exterior wall fabric clapboards
Indicate north.
Outbuildings
4
Major alterations (with dates) either
rebuilt or remodeled (c. 1835) ; six-room
Y qa ell removed (recently)
o Moved Date
Ooy Approx. acreage 2.0258 A.
Recorded b Anne Grad �- Setting Across from school amid mid-
y y g ,
Organization Lexington Historical Commission twentieth century residential development.
Date April, 1984
(Staple additional sheets here)
ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE (Describe important architectural features and
evaluate in terms of other buildings within the community.)
This house is now a substantial structure with heavily proportioned Greek
Revival decorative features: frontispieces on the south and west sides with
panelled pilasters and entablatures with broad frieze and large dentils, panelled
corner pilasters, slim frieze boards and a course of large dentils at the eaves.
whether or not the house incorporates the 1730 structure known to have
been on this site is uncertain. The five-bay-wide south elevation could have
been the facade of a Second Period house that received a new roof with ridge
(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.)
This property was part of the acreage amassed by the Bridge family,
original seventeenth-century proprietors of Lexington, then "Cambridge Farms."
Before his death in 1738 Matthew Bridge, Jr. had given a house and 100 acres of
farmland to each of his four sons (see 271 Marrett Road form for a fuller account
of the Bridge family) . Third son, John Bridge (b. 1700, d. 1776) received the
house on this site, built very likely at the time of his first marriage in 1730.
John Bridge served as selectman and town treasurer. His son, John, who
presumably resided on this site, was one of the foremost citizens of his time in
Lexington. He served in the army in the 1750s, was a member of Captain Parker's
company of Minute Men on the Common on April 19, 1775, served with the Lexington
Minute Men in Cambridge and at Bunker Hill, and when Captain Parker died, Bridge
became captain. Bridge led the Lexington Minute Men to duty in Roxbury and later
became a major in the militia. He served as a member of the Committee of
Correspondence and Safety in 1776 and was after the war a magistrate and justice
of the peace and assessor.
A large dairy farm was operated here in the second half of the nineteenth
century. By 1899 Joseph M. Middleby ran the Reservoir Stock Farm here.
BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES (name of publication, author, date and publisher)
Hudson, Charles. History of the Town of Lexington, revised and continued to
1912 by the Lexington Historical Society, Volume II, p. 56. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1913.
Worthen, Edwin B. , Jr. "The Bridge Family and Lexington. " Written for the use
of the Lexington School Committee, 1964.
1853 map
1875 atlas
1889 atlas
1898 atlas
1906 atlas
1899 Directory
1906 Directory
10M - 7/82
INVENTORY FORM CONTINUATION SHEET Community: Form No:
`h
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL Ci�fISSION Lexington 600
Office of the Secretary, Boston
Property Name: 170-172 Middleby Road
Indicate each item on inventory form which is being continued below.
ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE
line turned 90 degrees in the Greek Revival period. The presence of mitered
window frames would also support a pre-Greek Revival construction date. Further
research is needed.
The current owner removed a six room ell to the north and restored the house.
Staple to Inventory form at bottom