[MassHistPres] Fwd: Re: Brick nogging

Mon Feb 1 10:26:11 EST 2010

In Somerville, there was a circa 1860 house (the William Jaques house) that had brick nogging similar to that in the Brookline example.  The nogging went from the first floor up through the second story to the roof level 
on all sides.  A picture of the house is attached.  

William Jaques was the son of Col. Samuel Jaques, a colorful character who was a construction supervisor on the Middlesex Canal project, a founder of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society and friend of Daniel Webster.  He came from an old  Yankee stock of which he was very proud.   Colonel Jacques bought the Temple House and 160 acres of Ten Hills Farm in 1832  and although he farmed this with his sons and daughters, he also produce brick.  The William Jaques house, which was located on the acreage of Ten Hills Farm came to the Somerville Historic Preservation Commission's  interest in 2004 as it was slated to be demolished.  Attempts were made to have the house moved, but eventually it was subject to arson and destroyed.  I might add that the first attempt at arson did not cause enough damage to completely destroy the house and it was arsoned again the following week.  Perhaps this is a case for the nogging being a useful fire preventative measure.

Barbara Mangum

Begin forwarded message:

From:   "Dennis De Witt" <djd184 at verizon.net>
Subject:    Re: [MassHistPres] Brick nogging
Date:   January 29, 2010 2:05:49 PM EST
To: "MHC MHC listserve" <masshistpres at cs.umb.edu>
Attachments:    1 Attachment, 450.0 KB
Attached is a ca. late-18th -- early 19th. C example from Brookline -- visiting experts found it hard to date.  The frame was never exposed, but note the gunstock post.  Timbers seemed to be Chestnut.  The house looked from the outside like a modest 1860s mansard further modified ca. 1900 and was believed to have been moved.  By the time the formal demo app was made & anyone bothered to look inside -- and discovered the boxed corner posts -- the development process for the property was too far down the line to save the house in the face of an unsympathetic pro-development establishment.

Had it been identified earlier, so that preservation had a seat at the planning board process, its site might not now be three parking spaces in the corner of a condo project parking lot.

Instead, all that we got out of it was documentation.

Dennis De Witt

=

On Jan 29, 2010, at 1:13 PM, Zimmerman Sally wrote:

Re: English building practices and brick infill, Abbott Cummings, Framed Houses of Mass. Bay, p. 11 states: "The use of brick for the infilling of walls, often in herringbone patterns, did not become in any sense widespread in England until the seventeenth century."

Whether nogging reflects this decorative use, I would defer to Cummings' reticence to ascribe the practice here to an English practice, but that nogging here is deliberate and not a way to dispose of construction refuse is a certainty.

Sally Zimmerman
Preservation Specialist
Historic Homeowner Program
185 Lyman Street
Waltham, MA 02452-5645
New Phone Contact:
(617) 994-6644 Direct

>>> rebecca mitchell <rufusrulesok at hotmail.com> 1/29/2010 1:01 PM >>>
James Garvin's Building History of Northern New England has a good photograph and brief discussion of brick nogging on p. 53.  When a north wall of my house (c 1725) was opened for a sill repair we discovered nogging of bricks (whole and broken) and clay.  In addition to the reasons already raised (insulation, fire retarding) I have wondered if the practice might have been simply a vestige of English building practice.  It seems more deliberate than simply a means to dispose of construction refuse.

Rebecca Mitchell
200 Portsmouth Ave.
Stratham, NH 03885
(603) PRimrose 8-7979

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> Date: Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:00:02 -0500
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> 1. Reason fro brick nogging (Anne Grady)
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> Subject: [MassHistPres] Reason fro brick nogging
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> I concur with the previous writers that the reasons for filling walls with brick were probably for insulation and protection from vermin, but I have never read anything written in the 17th or 18th centuries about the reasons. I remember Abbott Cummings being asked once about brick nogging. He said wasn't certain, but pointed out the great need for insulation. He cited a quote from Judge Samuel Sewall, who said, "The ink froze in my inkwell, though I write by a good fire in my wife's chamber."
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> Anne
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