The Oil City North Side Historic District, also known as Cottage Hill, Palace Hill, and Polish Hill, is a national

historic district A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries or jurisdictions, historic districts receive legal protection from c ...

that is located in Oil City,

Venango County, Pennsylvania Venango County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 50,454. Its county seat is Franklin. The county was created in 1800 and later organized in 1805. Venango County comprises the Oil City, ...

. Situated directly north of the Oil City Downtown Commercial Historic District, 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 1999.

History and architectural features

This district includes 1,140 contributing buildings that are located in a predominantly residential section of Oil City. It includes a few neighborhood commercial buildings, churches, and two schools. The houses were built between about 1870 and 1945 and were designed in a variety of popular architectural styles, including

Romanesque Revival Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

, Queen Anne,

Second Empire Second Empire may refer to: * Second British Empire, used by some historians to describe the British Empire after 1783 * Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1396) * Second French Empire (1852–1870) ** Second Empire architecture, an architectural styl ...

Colonial Revival The Colonial Revival architectural style seeks to revive elements of American colonial architecture. The beginnings of the Colonial Revival style are often attributed to the Centennial Exhibition of 1876, which reawakened Americans to the archi ...

Classical Revival Neoclassical architecture is an architectural style produced by the Neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century in Italy and France. It became one of the most prominent architectural styles in the Western world. The prevailing style ...

, and

Italianate The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style drew its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century Italian R ...

. This district also includes a number of working class, vernacular dwellings, especially in the Polish Hill section. ''Note:'' This includes It was added to the

in 1999.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania Italianate architecture in Pennsylvania Romanesque Revival architecture in Pennsylvania Colonial Revival architecture in Pennsylvania Queen Anne architecture in Pennsylvania Buildings and structures in Oil City, Pennsylvania National Register of Historic Places in Venango County, Pennsylvania