The Acton Center Historic District encompasses the historic heart of the once-rural, now suburban, town of
Acton, Massachusetts
Acton is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, approximately west-northwest of Boston along Massachusetts Route 2 west of Concord and about southwest of Lowell. The population was 24,021 in April 2020, according to the Unite ...
. The district includes properties on Main Street, Wood and Woodbury Lanes, Newtown, Concord, and Nagog Hill Roads, and has been the town's civic heart since its establishment in the 1730s. It was added to the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
in 1983.
Description and history
The area that is now Acton was granted to English colonial settlers in 1643, but was not settled until 1680 as part of
Concord
Concord may refer to:
Meaning "agreement"
* Pact or treaty, frequently between nations (indicating a condition of harmony)
* Harmony, in music
* Agreement (linguistics), a change in the form of a word depending on grammatical features of other ...
. It was separately incorporated in 1735. The town's early civic buildings and common area were located near its geographic center, which for much of the colonial period remained a small agricultural settlement. It remained so due to the absence of water power for industrial growth, which led to the growth of West Acton and South Acton. It was also bypassed by the railroad, but remained of civic importance due to the presence of churches and civic buildings. Most of the housing stock in Acton Center is Federal or Greek Revival in style, although there are some houses that have later Italianate and Queen Anne styling, and there are several Colonial Revival houses.
The historic district extends along Main Street (
Massachusetts Route 27
Route 27 is a south–north state highway in eastern Massachusetts. Its southern terminus is at Route 106 in Kingston and its northern terminus is at Route 4 in Chelmsford. Along the way it intersects several major highways including Rou ...
) from the triangular common in the west to Nagog Hill in the east, and includes a few buildings on adjacent roadways. The common is the remnant of the town's original common, established in 1731, and houses the town's monument to the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
. It was here that the town's militia company mustered for the
Battles of Lexington and Concord
The Battles of Lexington and Concord were the first military engagements of the American Revolutionary War. The battles were fought on April 19, 1775, in Middlesex County, Province of Massachusetts Bay, within the towns of Lexington, Concord ...
that sparked the conflict. The town's main civic buildings are in the district: the Congregational Church (1846, later restyled with Queen Anne details), the Town Hall (1863, Italianate), and
Acton Memorial Library
Acton Memorial Library is a public library at 486 Main Street in Acton, Massachusetts. In 1889 William Allan Wilde (1827-1902), a Sunday school publisher and philanthropist who was a native of Acton, donated funds to construct the library to memori ...
(1889, Romanesque Revival).
See also
*
References
{{National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts
Historic districts in Middlesex County, Massachusetts
Buildings and structures in Acton, Massachusetts
National Register of Historic Places in Middlesex County, Massachusetts
Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts