Buildings

Old Manse South Parlor, Concord, Massachusetts

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The south parlor at the Old Manse in Concord, probably around 1890-1910. Image courtesy of the Phillips Library at the Peabody Essex Museum, Frank Cousins Glass Plate Negatives Collection.

The room in 2023:

These two photos show the south parlor at the Old Manse, a historic home that was built in 1770 as the home of the Reverend William Emerson and his wife Phebe Bliss Emerson. The house served as the parsonage, or “manse” for Emerson until his death in 1776, and it was subsequently the home of his successor, the Reverend Ezra Ripley, who married his widow Phebe in 1780.

However, the house is best remembered for its association with two prominent 19th century writers. Ralph Waldo Emerson, a grandson of William and Phebe, lived here from 1834 to 1835 and wrote one of his earliest works, the essay “Nature,” in his upstairs study here in the house. Then, from 1842 to 1845 the house was rented to Nathaniel Hawthorne, who lived here with his wife Sophia and their infant daughter Una.

The floor plan of the house is typical for late 18th century homes. It features a hallway and staircase in the center of the house, with parlors on either side of it on the ground floor. As was often the case, the north parlor was the more formal one, where its expensive furnishings would be better protected from sunlight, while the south parlor—shown here in these two photos—was a less formal space that would have been used by family members and close friends. This room has a door connecting it to the main hall, and it also has a door to the kitchen, as shown on the left side of these photos.

By the time the top photo was taken, the house was over a hundred years old and had become a famous landmark, thanks in part to the title of one of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s early works, Mosses from an Old Manse, which he wrote while living in the house. It was still owned by descendants of the Ripley family, and many of its furnishings dated back to when Emerson and Hawthorne lived here.

Perhaps the most famous object in the top photo is the stuffed owl on the mantle. According to legend, the owl was brought to the house by Harvard students after they fled Cambridge at the start of the American Revolution. Regardless of how it ended up here, though, Hawthorne discovered it in the attic when he moved in. He brought it downstairs to the parlor and named it “Longfellow” after his Bowdoin College classmate Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Hawthorne’s wife Sophia was somewhat less enamored with the owl, and the family left it here when they moved out in 1845. The owl is still here in this room today, although it is now in the corner behind where these two photos were taken from.

The house was owned by Ripley descendants until 1939, when Ezra and Phebe’s great granddaughter Sarah Ames died. Her husband then donated the house and its contents to the Trustees of Reservations, which has owned and preserved the house ever since. The room was decorated for Christmas when the second photo was taken, but otherwise it does not look much different from when the top photo was taken. The house remains an important literary and historic landmark, and it is open to the public for guided tours.

Old Manse Main Staircase, Concord, Massachusetts

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The main staircase at the Old Manse in Concord, probably around 1890-1910. Image courtesy of the Phillips Library at the Peabody Essex Museum, Frank Cousins Glass Plate Negatives Collection.

The scene in 2023:

These two photos show the view looking up the main staircase from the front door at the Old Manse in Concord. This house, which was featured in more detail in an earlier post, was built in 1770 as the home of William and Phebe Emerson. William was the pastor of the church in Concord, but he died in 1776 while serving as a chaplain in the Continental Army. His widow Phebe subsequently remarried his successor, the Reverend Ezra Ripley, and the house would remain in their family well into the 20th century.

During this time, the house had several notable residents. William Emerson’s grandson was the prominent Transcendentalist writer Ralph Waldo Emerson, and he lived here for about a year from 1834 to 1835. He was not yet a famous author at this point, but he wrote one of his early works, the essay “Nature,” here in this house, in his study at the top of the stairs on the right side of the hall.

Ezra Ripley died in 1841, and his son Samuel inherited the house. However, he did not immediately move in, and instead rented the house to Nathaniel Hawthorne and his newlywed wife Sophia. They spent their wedding night here on July 9, 1842, and they lived here for the next three years. Like Emerson before him, Hawthorne was an aspiring yet largely unknown writer. He also used the same upstairs room for his study, and he wrote a number of short stories there, which would later be published in 1846 as the book Mosses from an Old Manse. However, Hawthorne struggled financially during this time and was unable to pay rent for the house, so he and his family ultimately moved out in 1845.

Another prominent resident here was Sarah Bradford Ripley, wife of Samuel Ripley. She and her husband moved into the house after the Hawthornes left in 1845, but Samuel died just two years later. Sarah was a self-taught scholar and educator, and after her husband’s death she earned an income by tutoring Harvard students here at the house.

Sarah Ripley died in 1867, but the house remained in her family for several more generations. The top photo was taken sometime around the turn of the 20th century, during the ownership of Sarah’s daughter Sophia Thayer. By this point the house was already a famous landmark, largely because of its association with Emerson and Hawthorne, and it had become known as the “Old Manse” because of the title of Hawthorne’s book that he wrote here.

In 1914, Sophia Thayer’s daughter Sarah Ames inherited the house. Sarah was the great granddaughter of Ezra and Phebe Ripley, making her the fourth consecutive generation to own the property. She died in 1939, and her husband subsequently donated the house, including all of its contents, to the Trustees of Reservations, a nonprofit conservation and historic preservation organization.

Today, the house still looks largely the same as it did when the Ripley family and their descendants lived here. The wallpaper here in the stairway hall has changed since the top photo was taken, in order to reflect the style of wallpaper that was here earlier in the 19th century. Otherwise, though, not much is different from the top photo, and even the sofa appears to be the same in both photos. The house is still owned by the Trustees, and it is open to the public for guided tours.

Town Square, Plymouth, Massachusetts

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The Town Square in Plymouth, around 1865-1885. Image courtesy of the New York Public Library.

The scene around 1921. Image from Illustrated Guide to Historic Plymouth Massachusetts (1921).

The scene in 2023:

These three photos show the Town Square in Plymouth, facing west from the corner of Main and Leyden Streets. Since the early years of the Plymouth Colony, this site has been a focal point for the community, and it is surrounded by a number of historic buildings. Most significantly, the Town Square has been the site of a series of meetinghouses for the First Parish Church since the mid-1600s. However, the development around the square has also included town offices, the county courthouse, and various commercial properties over the years.

In the distance on the right side of these photos is Burial Hill. It was used as the town’s primary graveyard for much of the colonial period, but prior to that it was the location of several defensive fortifications, the first of which was built in 1621. The fort on the hill also served as the town meeting house until a purpose-build meeting house was constructed here at the square, which apparently occurred in either 1637 or 1648. It was located on the north side of the square, so it would have stood somewhere on the right side of the scene in these photos.

The 1637-48 meeting house was replaced by a second one in 1683, which stood at the west end of the square, on the site now occupied by the stone church in the center of this scene. A third meeting house was built on the site in 1744, followed by a wooden Gothic Revival church in 1831. That building is shown in the center of the top photo, and it stood here until 1892, when it was destroyed by a fire. This fire prompted the construction of the current First Parish Church of Plymouth on the same site. This Romanesque Revival church was completed in 1899, and it bears resemblance to the style of church buildings that the Mayflower Pilgrims would have known in England prior to their departure for the New World.

Although the First Parish Church was the predominant church congregation throughout the colonial period in Plymouth, other churches would eventually emerge in the town, including the Third Church of Christ in Plymouth. Established in 1801 as a result of the Unitarian-Trinitarian divide that swept through New England churches in the early 19th century, this congregation continued to follow the more conservative Trinitarian theology and practices, while the First Parish Church became Unitarian. In 1840, the Third Church of Christ built the church that stands on the right side of this scene, and that same year it became known as the Church of the Pilgrimage.

Aside from religious organizations, the Town Square was also the seat of the colony’s government for many years. At some point in the 1600s, the colony constructed a “country house” on the south side of the square, in the distance on the left side of the scene. When this was built, Plymouth was still a separate colony, so the building served as the de facto colonial capitol. It was also used as a courthouse, and this continued even after Plymouth became a part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691. This building was eventually demolished and replaced by a new courthouse on the same site in 1749. The new building was also used for the town offices, and it still stands today. It is two stories tall and painted white, and it is visible in the distance on the left side of the bottom photo.

The area around the Town Square has also been the site of various commercial buildings over the years, particularly in the area closer to the foreground. All of the buildings in the foreground of the top photo appear to have been demolished by the time the middle photo was taken in the early 1920s, but their replacements are still standing here today. They include the Odd Fellows Block on the right, which was built in 1887, and another brick commercial building on the left, which was built around 1912.

Burial Hill, Plymouth, Massachusetts

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The view looking southeast from near the top of Burial Hill in Plymouth, on October 22, 1929. Image courtesy of the Boston Public Library; photographed by Leon Abdalian.

The scene in 2023:

These two photos show the view looking toward the center of Plymouth from Burial Hill, the main colonial-era graveyard in the town. This site offers expansive views of Plymouth and the harbor further in the distance, and it was here on this hill that the Pilgrims constructed a fort in 1622. This fort also served as the town’s meeting house, and it was protected by a palisade. The fort was enlarged several times over the years, and it was also joined by a brick watchtower here on the hill in 1643.

After the conclusion of King Philip’s War in 1676, this site was no longer needed for defensive fortifications. The structures here were dismantled, and by 1679 the hill was in use as a graveyard. This was not the first burial ground that was used by European settlers in Plymouth. During the first winter of 1620-1621, the dead were evidently buried closer to the harbor on Cole’s Hill, and that site remained in use until at least the 1640s. As  result, most of the Mayflower passengers were likely buried there in unmarked graves, rather than here on Burial Hill. The oldest surviving gravestone on Burial Hill is dated 1681, which is long after most of the Mayflower passengers had died.

Burial Hill continued to be used for new interments until around the mid-19th century. By that point, trends had shifted in favor of newer, park-like cemeteries, rather than the old colonial-era graveyards such as this one. Instead, Burial Hill came to be recognized for its historical significance, both in terms of its use as a fort in the 17th century and also for its variety of intricately-carved headstones, which often feature skulls and other grim reminders of death.

In the meantime, downtown Plymouth continued to grow and develop over the years. The first photo, taken in 1929, shows two churches in the background at the foot of Burial Hill. On the left is the Third Congregational Church, also known as the Church of the Pilgrimage. This building was constructed in 1840, but it was subsequently remodeled in 1898 to give it more of a Colonial Revival appearance. The church to the right is the First Parish Church in Plymouth. It was built in 1899 on the site of an earlier church building, and it has a Romanesque-style design that resembles the style of church buildings that existed in England prior to the Pilgrims’ departure.

The trees in the present-day scene make it difficult to see the churches and other buildings at the base of the hill, but not much has changed in nearly a century since the first photo was taken, and both church buildings are still standing. Here on Burial Hill, the scene has likewise remained essentially the same. Most of the gravestones from the first photo are still here, although some have since been encased in granite in an effort to better protect them. Because of its significance to the early history of Plymouth, Burial Hill was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2013.

Ichabod Tucker House, Salem, Massachusetts

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The house at 28 Chestnut Street in Salem, probably around 1890-1910. Image courtesy of the Phillips Library at the Peabody Essex Museum, Frank Cousins Glass Plate Negatives Collection.

The house in 2023:

This house was built in 1800 as the home of Ichabod Tucker, a lawyer who served as clerk of courts for Essex County. Its design was typical for houses of this period, featuring three stories that were topped by a hip roof. The front façade was subsequently reconstructed in 1846 with Greek Revival features, which often happened as owners tried to keep up with changing styles and tastes.

Tucker lived here until his death in 1846, and his adopted daughter Nancy inherited the house. She lived here with her husband Thomas Cole, a teacher and microscopist who is not to be confused with the prominent 19th century artist of the same name. Nancy died in 1890 at the age of 95, and the house was later owned by the Willson family before becoming the parsonage for the First Church in Salem.

The first photo was taken around the turn of the 20th century, and very little has changed in this scene since then, aside from paving the street and adding a driveway on the right side. As with the other homes on Chestnut Street, it has remained well-preserved in its 19th century appearance. It is a contributing property in the Chestnut Street District, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

Nathaniel West & James W. Thompson House, Salem, Massachusetts

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The house at 38-40 Chestnut Street in Salem, probably around 1890-1910. Image courtesy of the Phillips Library at the Peabody Essex Museum, Frank Cousins Glass Plate Negatives Collection.

The house in 2023:

This double house was built in 1845, and it stands on the north side of Chestnut Street. It consists of two separate homes standing side by side, with 38 Chestnut on the right and 40 Chestnut on the left. It is somewhat newer than most of the other houses on the street, which generally date to the first two decades of the 19th century. As a result, while the house has many of the same Federal-style features of the earlier homes on the street, it also includes a mix of Greek Revival elements.

The original owner of 38 Chestnut was merchant Nathaniel West, although he does not appear to have actually lived here. By the early 1850s, the house was owned by another merchant, Joseph S. Andrews, who also served as mayor of Salem from 1854 to 1856. In the meantime, the house on the left side at 40 Chestnut was originally owned by the Rev. James W. Thompson, who lived here until 1859. It was subsequently the home of merchant John B. Silsbee and his wife Martha.

Both houses would have a number of other owners throughout the 19th and into the 20th centuries. The first photo was taken sometime around the turn of the century by Frank Cousins, who used photography to document many historic properties throughout the city. Very little has changed with the appearance of the house in more than a century since the first photo was taken, and it is one of the many historic homes that still line Chestnut Street today.