The Spring Hill Historic District is a

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

roughly bounded by Summer, Central, Atherton, and Spring Streets in the Spring Hill area of

Somerville, Massachusetts Somerville ( ) is a city located directly to the northwest of Boston, and north of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Cambridge, in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, the city had a total population of 81, ...

. The district encompasses the city's best-preserved residential subdivision from the mid-19th century, with later infill construction in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The district 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 ...

in 1989. Most development took place in the neighborhood between the 1840s and early 1900s. Spring Hill has a fine selection of

Greek Revival Greek Revival architecture is a architectural style, style that began in the middle of the 18th century but which particularly flourished in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in northern Europe, the United States, and Canada, ...

houses and

Victorians Victorian or Victorians may refer to: 19th century * Victorian era, British history during Queen Victoria's 19th-century reign ** Victorian architecture ** Victorian house ** Victorian decorative arts ** Victorian fashion ** Victorian litera ...

including Italianates, Gothic Revivals and Queen Annes. Large houses were built in the neighborhood as well as smaller workers' houses and attached houses. In the early 1900s triple-deckers filled in the remaining land.

Description and history

Spring Hill is a glacial

drumlin A drumlin, from the Irish word ("little ridge"), first recorded in 1833, in the classical sense is an elongated hill in the shape of an inverted spoon or half-buried egg formed by glacial ice acting on underlying unconsolidated till or groun ...

with an elongated summit roughly north of Summer Street, between Lowell and Cedar Streets in central Somerville. Its name derives from a spring that was useful for farmers who originally settled the area in the 17th century. The construction of the

Boston and Lowell Railroad The Boston and Lowell Railroad was a railroad that operated in Massachusetts in the United States. It was one of the first railroads in North America and the first major one in the state. The line later operated as part of the Boston and Maine R ...

in the 1840s, with a station at the base of the hill, spurred residential construction in the area for businessmen working in Charlestown and

Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

. The tract of land making up this district was purchased by George Brastow, a native of Wrentham who later became Somerville's first mayor. Recognizing the potential for development, Brastow hired Alexander Wadsworth to lay out housing lots. The historic district is roughly L-shaped, and is bounded on the north by Summer Street, on the west by Spring Street, on the south by Atherton Street as far as Beech Street, on the east by Central Street (between Summer and Monmouth Streets) and Harvard Street (further south to Atherton). It includes 69 historically significant buildings, most of which were built during the area's first major period of development, 1845-1870. A second period of construction 1885-1910 resulted in the infill construction of additional buildings, including the 1898 Martin W. Carr School, the only non-residential building in the district. The oldest buildings in the district include seven of the first eight houses built after Brastow's subdivision; these are all Greek Revival two-family residences, of which 46-48 Atherton Street is the least altered. The Italianate Round House was built at Atherton and Beech Streets in 1856, and remains a local curiosity. Its builder, Enoch Robinson, also built the fine Italianate house at 47 Spring Street, which is one of the finest examples of that style in the city. Most of the buildings in the district are wood frame structures, with one to three housing units. Most were not architect designed; there is only one house, 152 Summer Street, that has been definitely attributed to an architect. In this case it was local architect George Loring, who is known to have designed more than 100 residences in the city, although only a few survive. The c. 1890 Rymes House at 49 Spring Street may also be a Loring design.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts Historic districts in Middlesex County, Massachusetts Queen Anne architecture in Massachusetts Shingle Style architecture in Massachusetts Neighborhoods in Somerville, Massachusetts Hills of Massachusetts National Register of Historic Places in Somerville, Massachusetts Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts

Description and history

See also

References