Houses

Northfield Chateau, Northfield, Mass

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The Northfield Chateau at the end of Highland Avenue in Northfield, in 1963. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Historic American Buildings Survey Collection.

The scene in 2017:

Unlike many other parts of New England, the Connecticut River Valley in Massachusetts was never a major summer resort destination during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As a result, the area saw few of the grand hotels and Gilded Age “cottages” that were built in places like Bar Harbor, the Berkshires, Newport, the North Shore, and the White Mountains. However, one of the exceptions was this 99-room Châteauesque mansion in Northfield, which was completed in 1903 as the summer residence of Francis Robert Schell, a wealthy New York businessman.

Francis Schell and his wife Mary first came to Northfield in the summer of 1890, and stayed at the nearby Northfield Hotel. They originally came because of prominent evangelist D. L. Moody, who lived in the town and ran the Northfield Seminary for Young Ladies, but the Schells soon fell in love with the town itself. They continued to return each summer, eventually purchasing a summer house. However, Francis’s father, Robert Schell, died in 1900, leaving him with a substantial fortune, and that same year the Schells began planning a massive house here in Northfield.

The house was designed by noted architect Bruce Price, and featured a style similar to his most famous work, the iconic Château Frontenac in Quebec. It would have blended in well in places like Lenox or Newport, but here in Northfield it stood out as garish and ostentatious, in the midst of a small farming community with otherwise modest houses. The house’s size and style did little to endear Schell to the town, nor did the fact that he enclosed his 125-acre estate with a fence to prevent locals from trespassing on the property. Schell did make at least one major contribution to the town, donating the nearby Schell Bridge over the Connecticut River, although even this was rather self-serving, since it gave him direct access from his house to the railroad station across the river.

The Schells spent many summers here in the house, from its completion in 1903 until Francis’s death in 1928. Mary would continue to visit Northfield after his death, although she reportedly stayed at the Northfield Hotel, being unwilling to return to the mansion without Francis. By this point, though, the house had little resale value, despite the extravagance that went in to its design and construction. The grand summer houses of the Gilded Age were falling out of fashion, a trend that was accelerated by the onset of the Great Depression in 1929.

The house was eventually purchased by the Northfield School, and for many years it was used as the venue for the school’s prom, which became known as “The Chat,” after the chateau. It was also used as an annex for the Northfield Hotel, and at one point the basement was converted into a youth hostel. However, it steadily fell into disrepair, and by the 1960s it was becoming too expensive for the school to maintain. The first photo was taken in 1963, as part of a Historic American Buildings Survey study of the building, and it was demolished later in the year, just 60 years after its completion. Today, the site of the house is an open field adjacent to the Northfield Golf Club, which is located on the former site of the Northfield Hotel.

Chapin Street, Brattleboro, Vermont

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Looking east on Chapin Street, from the corner of Oak Street in Brattleboro, around 1894. Image from Picturesque Brattleboro (1894).

The scene in 2017:

Chapin Street was developed in the mid-1880s, less than a decade before the first photo was taken. The street, which runs one block from Oak Street to Linden Street, was built through land that had once belonged to Dr. Charles Chapin, who lived in a house at the end of the road on Linden Street. Chapin was a Harvard-educated physician, but he was also a businessman who served as a state legislator, a U.S. Marshal, and a director of the Vermont Mutual Insurance Company and the Vermont Valley Railroad. He lived here until his death in 1875, and his wife Sophia died five years later.

Soon after Sophia’s death, the property was sold and subdivided. The old house survived, and still stands today, but the rest of the land became building lots for new houses. The new street was named in honor of Chapin, and was developed around the same time as Williston Street, which runs parallel to Chapin Street on land once owned by merchant Nathan B. Williston. Both streets featured ornate, Queen Anne-style homes, most of which were completed by the time the first photo was taken in the early 1890s. A streetcar line was also built on the street in the 1890s, although this apparently happened after the first photo was taken.

The first photo shows a few people walking along an otherwise quiet residential street. In the foreground, three women walk arm-in-arm along the sidewalk, while a man walks further in the distance. On the left side of the street, a boy appears to be sitting on some sort of a bicycle, and far in the distance a pair of horses are harnessed to a wagon. In the distance, beyond the newly-built homes, is the northern slope of Mount Wantastiquet, which forms a scenic backdrop for much of downtown Brattleboro.

Today, most of the houses are hidden by trees from this view, but all of the ones from the first photo appear to still be standing. Chapin Street remains a well-preserved example of a late 19th century middle class neighborhood, and the houses still retain their decorative exterior designs with multi-colored paint schemes. The street itself has changed somewhat over the years, though. The trolley tracks have come and gone, the street has been widened and paved, and the sidewalk on the left is gone, but overall the scene is still easily recognizable from the first photo.

Lindenhurst, Brattleboro, Vermont

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The mansion at the corner of Green and High Streets in Brattleboro, around 1894. Image from Picturesque Brattleboro (1894).

The scene in 2017:

In the years leading up to the Civil War, Brattleboro was a popular summer destination for wealthy southerners, many of whom came to the town for the reputed health benefits of the nearby Wesselhoeft Water Cure. Some ended up building summer homes here, including Simon Bolivar Buckner, an army officer from Kentucky. He purchased this property around 1859 and built a large Italianate-style house, which he subsequently gave to his friend James B. Eustis, a lawyer from New Orleans. Some sources identify Buckner as Eustis’s father-in-law, but this seems unlikely since, at the time, Buckner was about 36 years old and had only been married for nine years.

Neither Buckner nor Eustis would spend much time here at this house, since the Civil War broke out only a few years later. Both men supported the Confederate cause, with Buckner becoming a lieutenant general and Eustis serving as a judge advocate in the Confederate Army. Despite losing the war, though, they would both go on to have successful political careers in the postwar era. Buckner served as governor of Kentucky from 1887 to 1891, and was the father of Simon Bolivar Buckner, Jr., a U.S. Army general who was killed in action in World War II during the Battle of Okinawa. Eustis became a U.S. Senator from Louisiana, serving from 1876 to 1879 and 1885 to 1891, and he was also the U.S. Ambassador to France from 1893 to 1897, during the second Cleveland administration.

However, after the war, Brattleboro did not regain its popularity as a resort for southerners. In 1871, the house was sold to Elie Charlier, a native of France who lived in New York City. He ran the Charlier Institute, a school in New York that was described in advertisements as “A Protestant French Boarding and Day School. Boys and young men from 7 to 20 prepared for College and Business. School designed to be as perfect as money, science, and experience can make it.” Some of Charlier’s students went on to have successful careers in politics, business, and the arts, including prominent photographer Alfred Stieglitz. Aside from his students, though, Charlier was also the great grandfather of folk singer Pete Seeger. As a boy in the 1920s, Seeger even visited this house in Brattleboro, although it was long after his family had sold the property.

Charlier ultimately sold this house in the late 1880s, to Brattleboro businessman George E. Crowell. Born in Massachusetts in 1834, Crowell grew up in New Hampshire, and served in one of the state’s regiments during the Civil War. However, after the war he came to Brattleboro, where he found a job with the Vermont Record and Farmer newspaper. He was only with the paper for a short time, though, before he went into business for himself. In 1868, he began publishing The Household, which was among the first magazines to focus on domestic living. It quickly gained a widespread readership, with 50,000 subscribers after only three years, and by the mid-1870s it could be found in every state and in a few foreign countries.

Aside from the publishing business, Crowell also invested in real estate, owning significant tracts of land in the western part of town. He also owned industrial properties along Flat Street, and had an ownership stake in several of these companies, including the Carpenter Organ Company and the Brattleboro Jelly Company. Crowell was also responsible for building the Chestnut Hill Reservoir, which served as the town’s public water supply starting in the late 19th century.

Upon purchasing this house, Crowell began a major renovation project that significantly increased its size and altered its exterior and interior appearance. The remodeling took nearly two years, and was finished in 1890, a few years before the first photo was taken. By this point, there was little trace of the original Italianate-style design, and the house instead featured new Queen Anne-style details, such as the turrets and cupola on the roof. The renovated house, which was renamed Lindenhurst, had a total of 37 rooms, and was valued at around $150,000 in 1890, equivalent to over $4 million today.

George Crowell and his wife Mary had five children, although three of them died as children or young adults. George died in 1916, but the rest of the family continued to live here for another decade or so. It was ultimately converted into a boarding house, but was owned by Mary Crowell until 1934, when her mortgage lender, the Vermont National Bank, foreclosed on the property. The Great Depression likely contributed to Mary’s financial downturn, but it also hurt the bank’s ability to resell the property. With no demand for such a large house at the time, the bank ultimately demolished it in 1936, in order to avoid having to pay property taxes on the massive mansion.

The town ultimately purchased the property, and the Green Street School was built on the eastern section. The rest of the lot, including the site of the house, became a public park, named Crowell Park. As the first photo shows, the site of the house is now an open field, with no visible remnants of the Gilded Age mansion that once stood here. However, there are apparently still some old maple trees in the park, which date back to the time when the house was here. Pete Seeger recalled the trees during his childhood visit in the 1920s, and he was reportedly able to recognize these same trees during a 2008 visit to Brattleboro. These trees are probably not visible in the present-day scene, although the tree on the far right looks like it might be old enough to date back to the early 1920s.

Green Street, Brattleboro, Vermont

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Looking north on Green Street toward High Street in Brattleboro, around 1894. Image from Picturesque Brattleboro (1894).

The scene in 2017:

Downtown Brattleboro is located right along the Connecticut River, with Main Street running parallel to the the river. However, the topography quickly rises to the west of the river, and much of the downtown area is built into the side of a hill, as shown in this scene. When the first photo was taken, this area consisted primarily of modest, wood-frame houses, in contrast with the large brick commercial blocks that were located just a block to the east on Main Street. At the bottom of the hill is High Street, one of the main east-west roads in the town, and further in the distance the two steeples mark the location of Main Street. The one closer to the foreground is the First Baptist Church, which was completed in 1870, and the one further in the distance on the right is the Centre Congregational Church, which was built in 1842 and had its current steeple added in 1864.

The buildings on the right were demolished within about 15 years after the first photo was taken. They were replaced by the present-day building, which was completed around 1910. It was owned by the neighboring Hotel Brooks, and was used as an automobile repair and rental business, which was run by John and Robert Manley. The main entrance to the building was at the bottom of the hill on High Street, but there was a second entrance here on Green Street, on the far right side of the 2017 photo, which allowed direct access to the third floor. Known as the Brooks House Garage, this building was advertised as “the largest and most complete garage in Vermont,” and offered day and night repair work, tires, and “Cars to rent by the hour, day and week.” They were also agents for Stoddard-Dayton, Mitchell, Maxwell, and Ford car companies,  and the advertisement in the Automobile Blue Book promised that “Tourists Will Receive Special Attention.”

Today, the only identifiable feature from the first photo, aside from Green Street itself, is the First Baptist Church steeple, with its spire still rising above the roofline of the old Brooks House Garage. The Centre Congregational Church is also still there, although its steeple is no longer visible from this angle. Otherwise, this scene is completely changed from the first photo, and the two most visible buildings are the garage on the right and the Shriners Hall on the left, which was evidently built here sometime in the early 20th century, on the site of a house that had stood here when the first photo was taken.

Richards Bradley House, Brattleboro, Vermont

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The house at 53 Harris Avenue in Brattleboro, around 1894. Image from Picturesque Brattleboro (1894).

The house in 2017:

This house was built in 1858 as the home of Richards Bradley, a member of a prominent political family in Vermont. His grandfather, William C. Bradley, had served two terms in Congress in the 1820s, and his great grandfather, Stephen R. Bradley, had been one of Vermont’s first two U. S. Senators, and served as President pro tempore of the Senate from 1802 to 1803 and 1808 to 1809. Richards Bradley briefly worked as a merchant in New York City, but in 1856 he married Sarah Ann Williams Merry, a wealthy heiress from Boston. With this fortune, he was able to live as a country gentleman, and in 1858 he built this elegant house on a large plot of land, just to the north of downtown Brattleboro on the banks of the Connecticut River.

Richards and Sarah’s first child, Robert, was born in 1857 but died just a week later. They had six more children, all of whom grew up in this house: Susan, Richards, Jonathan, Emily, Sarah, and Walter. During the 1870 census, the family also lived here with three servants and a coachman. Richards was listed as a farmer in that census, with real estate valued at $50,000 and a personal estate of $20,000, for a net worth equivalent to over $1.3 million today. Then, in 1877, they purchased a second house at 122 Commonwealth Avenue in Boston, in the city’s exclusive Back Bay neighborhood. This became their winter residence, with the family spending summers here at their Brattleboro home, and they continued this arrangement until 1891, when they permanently returned to Brattleboro.

Richards Bradley died in 1904, and Sarah in 1914, but the house remained in the family for several more decades, until it was finally sold in 1940. Six years later, the house was converted into apartments, and at some point it was expanded, with a large addition on the right side of the photo. The large estate has also since been subdivided, and the house is now surrounded by mid-20th century homes. The exterior of the original part of the house has seen some changes, particularly the loss of the porch, but it retains much of its original appearance. It is now used as a senior living facility, and it is currently undergoing a major renovation and expansion to increase the number of residents.

Deacon John Holbrook House, Brattleboro, Vermont

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The house at 80 Linden Street, at the corner of Chapin Street in Brattleboro, around 1894. Image from Picturesque Brattleboro (1894).

The house in 2017:

John Holbrook was born in 1761 in Weymouth, Massachusetts, but as a young man he moved to Vermont, where he found work as a surveyor in what was, at the time, largely uncharted territory. He originally settled in Newfane, where he later ran a general store, but he subsequently moved to Brattleboro, where he continued his business career. Holbrook was affiliated with merchants in Hartford, Connecticut, and in 1811 he relocated to East Windsor. However, he only remained in Connecticut for a few years, returning to Brattleboro soon after the death of his son-in-law, William Fessenden, in 1815. Upon returning, Holbrook took over Fessenden’s publishing company, and he was also selected as a church deacon.

Holbrook had no prior experience in the publishing industry, but he grew the company into a prosperous business, which specialized in producing Bibles. Although located far from the major commercial centers of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, Holbrook’s Brattleboro-based business fared well in competition with the more established publishing houses in the major cities. His Bible proved popular, thanks in part to its quality paper and abundant illustrations, and over the next few decades he and his firms would produce 42 different editions.

Holbrook retired in 1825, and moved into this newly-built home in the northern part of the downtown area. It was designed and built by local builder Nathaniel Bliss, with a Federal-style design that was likely inspired by the works of Asher Benjamin, a prominent New England architect who published a number of architectural handbooks in the early 19th century. As was usually the case in Federal architecture, the front facade is nearly symmetrical, with the only exception being the off-centered front door. The house also includes a distinctive, and somewhat unusual front porch, although it does not seem clear as to whether this was part of its original design.

By the time John Holbrook and his wife Sarah moved into this house, most of their ten children were already grown. The youngest, Frederick, was born in 1813 during the family’s brief residence in Connecticut, but spent most of his childhood in Brattleboro. He was about 12 when this house was built, and presumably lived here for at least a few years before leaving to attend school. Returning to Brattleboro after a tour of Europe in 1833, Frederick became a farmer, eventually serving as the president of the Vermont State Agricultural Association for eight years. Along with this, he also had a career in politics, serving in the state legislature from 1849 to 1850, and as governor from 1861 to 1863.

In the meantime, John Holbrook lived here in this house until his death in 1838, and his widow Sarah sold the property three years later, to Dr. Charles Chapin. Originally from Orange, Massachusetts, Dr. Chapin attended Harvard, and he subsequently began practicing medicine in Springfield, Massachusetts. His first wife, Elizabeth, died only a few years after their marriage, and in 1830 he remarried to Sophia Dwight Orne, the granddaughter of prominent Springfield merchant Jonathan Dwight. A year later, the couple relocated to Brattleboro, where Dr. Chapin became a businessman and a government official. His long career included serving in the state legislature and as a U.S. Marshal, and he was also a director of the Vermont Mutual Insurance Company and the Vermont Valley Railroad.

Dr. Chapin had one child, Elizabeth, from his first marriage, and he had five more children with Sophia: Lucinda, Oliver, Mary, William, and Charles. All but the youngest were born before the family moved into this house, but they all would have spent at least part of their childhood here. The two older sons, Oliver and William, would later go on to serve in the Civil War, and William spent time in the notorious Libby Prison in Richmond, after being captured by Confederates. By the 1870, their widowed daughter Mary was their only child still living here with them. The census of that year shows Charles with a net worth of 40,000 – a considerable sum equal to nearly $800,000 today – while Sophia had $25,000 of her own, possibly an inheritance from her wealthy Dwight relatives.

Dr. Chapin died in 1875, and Sophia died five years later. Shortly after, the property behind the house was sold and subdivided. Chapin Street was opened through the property, just to the left of the house, and was developed with new houses by the late 1880s. The first photo was taken only a few years later, and one of the new houses can be seen in the distance on the far left. However, the old Holbrook and Chapin house remained standing, even as the surrounding land was divided into house lots for the growing town population.

Today, the house’s exterior is not significantly different from when the first photo was taken over 120 years ago. Although now used as a commercial property, the house has remained well-preserved as a good example of late Federal-style architecture, and as one of Brattleboro’s finest early 19th century homes. Because of this, in 1982 the house was added to the National Register of Historic Places.