HomeMy WebLinkAboutstevens-road_0011 FORM B BUILDING Assessor's Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION 13/119 0 0 2266
MASSACHUSETTS ARCHIVES BUILDING
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD Town/City: Lexington
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02125
Place: (neighborhood or village):
Photograph
Address: 11 Stevens Road
Historic Name:
Uses: Present: residential
Original: residential
p Date of Construction: ca. 1910-22
Source: historic maps, town directories, style
Style/Form: Dutch Colonial Revival
4 Architect/Builder:
Exterior Material:
Foundation: stone
West left side and south facade elevations Wall/Trim: vinyl siding, wood trim
Locus Map Roof- asphalt shingles
Outbuildings/Secondary Structures:
F Attached garage
Major Alterations (with dates): ��
h: , Enclosed sun porch and rear ell (L 20 c)
Condition: good
,,
Moved: no ❑ yes ❑ Date:
� • � + /� Acreage: 0.20
Setting: Residential side street between Taft Avenue and
Charles St., two blocks from main thoroughfare of
Massachusetts Avenue. Densely developed streetscape
with buildings of similar size, scale, and period;
predominantly early to mid-201h c construction with
consistent front setbacks and spacing.
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 11 STEVENS ROAD
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125
2266
❑ 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.
11 Stevens Road occupies a modest, level lot on the north side of Stevens Road, between Charles Street and Sutherland Road.
The building is set near the center of the parcel, with a narrow front setback and a paved driveway on the left side of the
property. The flat yard is maintained chiefly in lawn on the east(right) side, with foundation plantings on all three visible
elevations. The building consists of a 1 'h story main block with a couple of rear additions and an attached garage on the side.
The small and narrow main block rises from a stone foundation to a front-gambrel roof that flares slightly at the base. Walls are
clad with vinyl siding and trim. Windows typically have 1/1 double hung sash and narrow band molding, arrayed singly and
paired. The front fagade consists of a one-story enclosed sun porch with a hip roof spanning the full width of he building,
surmounted by paired windows that are centered in the half story. The sun porch is composed of square corner posts, banded
windows on the front fagade and east (right) side, and a single leaf door flanked by narrow 1/1 windows on the west (left) side,
accessed by wood steps with vinyl railings on each side.
The east (right side) elevation has one single window and one set of paired windows in the southern half. A cross-gambrel
addition at the rear is slightly higher than the main block, with a side gambrel roof, large polygonal bay on the first floor, and
paired windows in the half story. The corner of a 1 story addition with a pitched roof is visible at the back of the 1 '/2 story
addition, reached by a wooden stairway and wood deck. The west (left side) elevation contains three regularly spaced windows
on the first floor and two symmetrical shed-roofed dormers with set of paired windows in each.
The gambrel-roofed ell extends west of the main block as a one-car garage, with a non-contiguous multi-light transom above the
modern garage door and a shed-roofed dormer with paired windows in the half story. Between the garage door and main block
is a side entrance with a single leaf door, sheltered by a low hip roof supported by a slender corner post.
Well preserved and well maintained, 11 Stevens Road is a good example of modest, early 20th century suburban infill housing in
Lexington. The house is notable for its petite volume and balanced proportions, flared front-gambrel roof, front sun porch, and
intact fenestration.
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 Lexington center, 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 11 STEVENS ROAD
MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No.
220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125
2266
The western stub of Stevens Road, then named Cary Street, was in place by 1927, with buildings on all three of the lots platted
there. The eastern end, off Taft Avenue, was laid out and three lots platted out by 1935, but no houses were yet constructed
there. (The eastern end was also named Cary Street.) As late as 1935, a very long and narrow, undeveloped and unplatted
parcel-200 to 300 feet wide and more than one-third of a mile long—extended south of Massachusetts Avenue between
Charles Street and Taft Avenue. The ends of Stevens Road were finally connected by 1950, when all the land was platted and
all but one of the lots was developed. The name Cary Street was replaced by Stevens Road between 1955 and 1965.
The house at 11 Stevens Road appears on the 1927 Sanborn map. A one-story, square accessory building, likely a garage,
appeared on the property by 1935. No longer extant, it was set to the left and in back of he house. The building's first known
occupants, in 1922, were Charles L. Parker, a superintendent, and his wife Jennie C. Parker. Charles Parker was, from 1934 to
1937, Captain Commanding of the Lexington Minute Men, an independent, ceremonial militia unit that was formed in 1689 and
chartered in 1910.
Charles and Jennie Parker lived here with their two children; Charles Jr., a salesman, remained here as late as 1935. By 1940,
residents included Clyde T. Butcher, who worked as an auto mechanic and chauffeur, his wife Kathleen J. Butcher, a store clerk
and "corsetiere", their young son, and Clyde's sister-in-law Dorcas E. Clark, an office clerk. The Butcher family lived here
through at least 1945. Subsequent residents included George H. Phelan, a salesman, and his wife Rose (1955 and 1965).
Their daughter Rosemary, a secretary, lived with them in 1965.
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.Iexingtonma.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.
Personal communication with Sam Doran, Lexington Historical Commission. September 2015.
U.S. Census: 1920, 1930, 1940.
SUPPLEMENTARY IMAGES
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South (fagade)and east(right side)elevations
Continuation sheet 2