The John Smith House is located on Albany Avenue (
NY 32
New York State Route 32 (NY 32) is a north–south state highway that extends for through the Hudson Valley and Capital District, New York, Capital District regions of the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It is a two-lane s ...
) in
Kingston, New York
Kingston is the only Administrative divisions of New York#City, city in, and the county seat of, Ulster County, New York, United States. It is north of New York City and south of Albany, New York, Albany. The city's metropolitan area is grou ...
, United States. It is a wood-frame house in the
Italianate
The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style combined its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century It ...
architectural style
An architectural style is a classification of buildings (and nonbuilding structures) based on a set of characteristics and features, including overall appearance, arrangement of the components, method of construction, building materials used, for ...
built in the mid-19th century.
It has remained relatively intact since then. In 2002 it was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...
.
Building
The house is on a deep, narrow, level
lot at the corner of the busy intersection of Albany Avenue and Chandler Drive (
Interstate 587/
NY 28). This junction marks a boundary between the
mixed-use
Mixed use is a type of urban development, urban design, urban planning and/or a zoning classification that blends multiple uses, such as residential, commercial, cultural, institutional, or entertainment, into one space, where those functions ...
uptown area around the
Stockade District and the residential neighborhoods of Albany and neighboring streets. The
George J. Smith House is to the east, with the
Sharp Burial Ground about further away on the other side of the street. Both properties are also listed on the Register.
The Smith house is a two-story, three-by-three-
bay
A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a ''gulf'', ''sea'', ''sound'', or ''bight''. A ''cove'' is a small, ci ...
clapboard
Clapboard (), also called bevel siding, lap siding, and weatherboard, with regional variation in the definition of those terms, is wooden siding of a building in the form of horizontal boards, often overlapping.
''Clapboard'', in modern Am ...
-
sided frame structure on a raised brick
foundation
Foundation(s) or The Foundation(s) may refer to: Common uses
* Foundation (cosmetics), a skin-coloured makeup cream applied to the face
* Foundation (engineering), the element of a structure which connects it to the ground, and transfers loads f ...
with a moderately
pitched hipped roof
A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downward to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope, with variants including tented roofs and others. Thus, a hipped roof has no gables or other vertical sides ...
. The roofline has broad overhanging
eave
The eaves are the edges of the roof which overhang the face of a wall and, normally, project beyond the side of a building. The eaves form an overhang to throw water clear of the walls and may be highly decorated as part of an architectural sty ...
s, a
molded
Molding (American English) or moulding (British and Commonwealth English; see spelling differences) is the process of manufacturing by shaping liquid or pliable raw material using a rigid frame called a mold or matrix. This itself may have ...
cornice
In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative Moulding (decorative), moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, ar ...
and paired
brackets
A bracket is either of two tall fore- or back-facing punctuation marks commonly used to isolate a segment of text or data from its surroundings. They come in four main pairs of shapes, as given in the box to the right, which also gives their n ...
.
A full-length porch runs along the first story of the south (front)
facade. It has a similarly pitched hip roof with a molded, dentilled cornice. The roof is supported by four wooden posts on octagonal
plinth
A pedestal or plinth is a support at the bottom of a statue, vase, column, or certain altars. Smaller pedestals, especially if round in shape, may be called socles. In civil engineering, it is also called ''basement''. The minimum height o ...
s. Behind all three bays have
French door
A door is a hinged or otherwise movable barrier that allows ingress (entry) into and egress (exit) from an enclosure. The created opening in the wall is a ''doorway'' or ''portal''. A door's essential and primary purpose is to provide securit ...
s, molded cornices and
louver
A louver (American English) or louvre (Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-re, -er, see spelling differences) is a window blind or window shutter, shutter with horizontal wikt:slat, slats that are angle ...
ed
shutters
A window shutter is a solid and stable window covering usually consisting of a frame of vertical stiles and horizontal rails (top, centre and bottom). Set within this frame can be louvers (both operable or fixed, horizontal or vertical), solid ...
. The second-story windows have similar trim.
On the northernmost two bays of the first story on the east is a projecting bay window. The north (rear) elevation has similar windows and an enclosed porch. The west, facing what is now the end of the interstate, is the least decorated of the facades, with asymmetrical windows and an enclosed cellar stair.
The main entrance, two paneled glass and wood doors with a large
transom, leads to a broad central hall with large
parlor
A parlour (or parlor) is a reception room or public space. In medieval Christian Europe, the "outer parlour" was the room where the monks or nuns conducted business with those outside the monastery and the "inner parlour" was used for necessary ...
s on either side. Here and on the second floor, many of the original finishings, including plaster and wood, remain.
At the end of the driveway to the east is a modern garage in
concrete block
A concrete block, also known as a cinder block in North American English, breeze block in British English, or concrete masonry unit (CMU), or by various other terms, is a standard-size rectangular block used in building construction. The u ...
. It is not considered a
contributing resource
In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distr ...
to the historic character of the property.
History
The house is first recorded in an 1870 map as the home of a Mrs. C.S. Smith. A city directory from ten years later clarifies that this is Catherine S. Smith, described as the widow of John Smith. By the early 20th century it had passed to other owners, and has remained a private residence ever since.
Originally the house had a
cupola
In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout.
The word derives, via Ital ...
in the center of the roof. It was removed in the early 20th century after it was damaged. There have been no significant changes since.
See also
*
References
{{National Register of Historic Places in New York
Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in New York (state)
Houses in Ulster County, New York
National Register of Historic Places in Ulster County, New York
Italianate architecture in New York (state)
Houses completed in 1860
Kingston, New York