Isaac Damon Architecture Dissertationi
fixing its boundaries by their distance from
which stood in his an elm tree,
from
door yard, irl31
Now the Rectory
of
a Catholic Church built on that adjoining land, it has
been extensively altered and rebuilt inside
only original elements and out, the
now visible on the exterior being
'the pediment, the window spacing, the front door, and.pos-
sibly the angle pilasters.
The latter are unlike an
others of Damon's and rather resemble the
front porch, which is . definitel carpenter -built
y new. However, their e£-
feet would doubtless have been different before the build-
in was refaced with brick. A sketch of the Original
Porch made before 1890 indicates that it had paired col -
umns and Pilasters and therefore
a breadth that must have
bees more in accord with t be. expansive proportions of
the buildings front,132
Even with the turn-of-the-cen-
t 'y sash, storm windows and grid stretches of brick,
the spacing-of the openings across
De that front still ap_
ars strong and forthright.
Considerably wider in pro -
Dortion to its depth than the Town Hall a o
Courthouse r the first Green-
field
the Hopkins House seems to anticipate
the somewhat
ponderous mass of the series of houses-with
i hexastyle_•porticoes
that Elias Carter put up in Worcester
during the 1830r 11 Within the framework of its central .
h &11, f our - square plait, it reflect'ed the preference
tor'
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� R
r
I
fir
el
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181
larger front rooms and smaller rear ones that had been
evident in Damon's own house on Bridge Street.
3; Unidentified Project (c. 1825 -26 ?)
Two architectural drawings preserved in the Damon
house in Northampton can best be discussed at this point,
though they are transitional in character and may have
been done somewhat later than Damon's strictly Federal
work. (Figs. 117, 118) Both are elevations of a house
with a central block two stories high and three bays wide,
and one -story wings of two bays each. Their essential
similarity suggests that they a:ay have been studies for
the same project. Neither drawing is signed, nor is eith-
er one identified by more than the phrase "Front view or
Elevation.." An extra wiggle in the "F" of "Front ".on one
of'them and the "N" of "Nr l" on the same drawing are
both typical of Damon's handwriting, however, and there
. seem to be little reason to doubt that they are in
fact by him, �3 The drawing labeled "Nr 1" differs: from
the other in that the central block casts a shadow on one .11
of the wings, there is a instead of a door in the
edge of.the roof . is solid
inner bays of the wings, and the railing on the /except
for panels of lattice work over the windows. Both are
:notabl'e for the strength of their proportions and for an
impression of inconsistency in scale, particularly in the
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f YR6
Y
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389
F�25, Cf. Place, Charles Bulfinch, pp, 210 -11.
126 Wylliam W. Wheildon, Letters from Na
hant Histor-
' 3ca1 Descriptive and Miscellaneous (Boston, Press of
e:1 Bunker -Hill Aurora, 18tL2), p, 24- Nahant Was di-
A
ire tly connected by steam boat with Hingham in 1820, so
� the Hotel Was doubtless Well-known-on the South
}x'� Shore and perhaps thus to Damon. (Ibid., p, 8
History of the Connecticut Valley in Massachusetts
128 Damon bought the land,.approximately half an acre
y '
on February 23, 1813, for $700. On March 5, he settled
claims to it of Isaac C. Batea'
a local attorney,
!or $300. Registry of Deeds, Northampton, Book 34, P•
} ook 35, P. 219.
129 Ibid., Book 0
1,
5 , p. 656.
130: Ibid., Book 53, P. 272.
1 3 1 Ibid. Book 62, P• 58.
1 32; This was one of a aeries of sketches of details of
old Northampton buildings by Thomas C. Shepherd in Pic -
tUre8que Hampshire (Northampton, Wade, Warner, 1890), P.
NNW-
390
133. Cf. Mrs. Harriette M. Fcrbes, "Elias Carter, Archi-
tect, of Worcester, Mass.," 0 -TNE 11 (1920), 62 - 69.
134. The "Nr 1" is Just discernible in the lower right
corner of this drawing, (Fig. 117) It may be compared
with the "N" of Northampton in Damon's bid to build the
first Northampton Courthouse. (Fig. 96)
.135. Temple -form houses with one -story wings appeared
in various builders' guides and were widely built, but
Damon's variant with a hip roof was most unusual. Jul-
iette Tomlinson of the Connecticut Valley Historical Mu-
seum mentioned to me that she was reminded of the pair
of Damon drawings by two houses of this type standing
aide by side in Haydenvile Massachusetts, Both, however,
have pedimented fronts. Quite possibly the origin of
this type of house goes back to Palladio by way of subh
4
intermediaries as the Redwood Library in Newport.
r
136. For an account of this building and of its place
k
in'bha architectural growth of Amherst College, of. Stan-
k
; King, The Consecrated Eminence The Story of the Cam -
4 c Pus and Buildin s of Amherst College g (Amherst, Amherst
} r�s 3',Colleg8, 1951), pp, 1 -23. Historical information below
not-Otherwise identified is from this so urce.
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