[MassHistPres] Examples of clusters of workmans cottages in Massachusetts

[Joyce Anderson]

PRINCETON has three Greek Revival workers cottages on Main Street! A lovely NHR District.

Sent from my iPhone

> On May 26, 2021, at 2:52 PM, Lee Caras <lee.caras at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I am also having a hard time describing the large numbers of homes built here in Maynard for woolen millworkers by the mill owners as “cottages”.  There are only two, small salt box-type homes built for workers at the local powdermill that could be called “cottages”.  All the others are either modest homes (built in the area called “the Presidentals” with its streets named for presidents), tenement row houses, or modest bungalows.  These are millworker housing, but definitely not cottages.  -Lee Caras, Maynard Historical Commission
> 
> Sent from my iPad
> 
>>> On May 26, 2021, at 8:59 AM, Richard Casella <rcasella at historicdoc.com> wrote:
>>> 
>> 
>> Agreed that when using the term "Cottage" one needs to define its characteristics in each case. Worker housing is just that: housing built for workers, typically by the employer of the workers such as 19th c. mill housing or 20th c. military housing, usually of one or just a few differing designs. I have not seen Cottage used in conjunction with worker housing, or worker housing that I would call cottage style, but that's not to say the property type is not out there and that one could not make such an argument. Levittown for example, one might say are cottages built for the working class, but most architectural historians would not use the terms cottage or worker housing to describe them - the mass-produced or factory-built property type is more accurate.
>>  
>> Below is 1902 definition of cottage from Stugis' Dictionary of Architecture...
>>  
>> <image002.jpg>
>>  
>> Sturgis of course does not take into account all the mid-20th c. waterfront, forest and mountain cottages we are all familiar with.
>> For the characteristics of that property type see Camps and Cottages... by Charles D. White, 1937/1946, available here:
>> https://archive.org/details/CharlesDWhiteCampsandCottagesHowtoBuildThem0001
>>  
>> Richard Casella
>> Portsmouth RI
>>  
>> From: MassHistPres [mailto:masshistpres-bounces at cs.umb.edu] On Behalf Of Henry Cooke
>> Sent: Tuesday, May 25, 2021 8:16 AM
>> To: annelusk at gmail.com; masshistpres at cs.umb.edu
>> Subject: Re: [MassHistPres] Examples of clusters of workmans cottages in Massachusetts
>>  
>> Anne, it sounds like and interesting study
>>  
>> Please define the term "cottages".  To me, it creates the image of small one room summer homes, intended for temporary or seasonal use, especially those built in the bungalow style at the turn of the 20th century.
>> 
>> Randolph has a number of homes of workers in the boot and shoe industry, built in the 1850s and 1860s. Most were built to accommodate the influx of Irish immigrants who came to Randolph during that time. Some are scattered singly, but most were built "cookie cutter" style, in clusters, especially in the more densely populated West Village (downtown Randolph), which is where many of our surviving examples still stand, and can often be found in proximity to the locations of central shops where leather was cut and bundled for distributions to boot makers and finished products were received and packed for shipping.
>>  
>> These houses are built in a vernacular style, 1 1/2 stories high, 2-3 bays wide, by 3-4 window bays deep, gable end to the street, with asymmetric floorplans usually consisting of an offset entry hall with stairway to the second story, a formal front room and fireplace, a back room at the rear of the main building, and a kitchen addition at the rear. Most of ours have a "ten footer" ell projecting at right angles to the axis of the principal block of the house, that was in most instances used in the production of shoes for the local central shop. These houses are nearly identical to larger houses of the same style, only with the rooms scaled down in size. These workers homes are small, often on narrow lots, with the houses about 30-40 feet apart, compared to much wider spacing outside the downtown area.
>>  
>> MHC has area surveys of some of these properties, compiled by Katleen Kelly Broomer that discuss this housing in greater detail.
>>  
>> Henry Cooke, Chair
>> Randolph Historical Commission
>>  
>>  
>>  
>>  
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Anne Lusk <annelusk at gmail.com>
>> To: Masshistpres <masshistpres at cs.umb.edu>
>> Sent: Mon, May 24, 2021 1:04 pm
>> Subject: [MassHistPres] Examples of clusters of workmans cottages in Massachusetts
>> 
>> Dear All,
>>    I'm working on a Study Report for a Local Historic District submission in Brookline that concerns a cluster of workman's cottages that were built, starting around 1820.  There are 11 cottages really close together on Hart Street and 5 cottages really close together on Franklin Court. 
>>      Are there any other clusters of workman's cottages in Massachusetts?  I gather there are some cottages near the old glass factory in Sandwich. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarvesville_Historic_District   Could someone give me a street name for these cottages?  Those cottages would have been built by the glass company to house their workers. 
>>       The houses on Hart and Franklin were moved in 1870 to these streets to be owned by Irish Catholic workers or rented to them. Eventually, all the houses were owned.  Many single women owned the houses, widows remained in the cottages for a long time, and houses were passed down from family to family.  
>>      With so many wealthy mansions already being listed and the threat of smaller homes being demolished to build McMansions, saving the humble cottages and telling the stories about the owners is worth the effort. 
>> Thanks so much for your help,
>> Anne Lusk, Ph.D. 617-879-4887    
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