Elm Street 10.pdf
Follow Massachusetts Historical Commission Survey Manual instructions for completing this form. FORM B − BUILDING MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION MASSACHUSETTS ARCHIVES BUILDING
220MORRISSEY BOULEVARD BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Photograph Topographic or Assessor's Map Recorded by: Bonnie Parsons Organization: Pioneer Valley Planning Commission Date (month /year):
March, 2010 Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number 31D-11 Easthampton NTH.738 Town: Northampton Place: (neighborhood or village) Address: 10 Elm Street Historic Name: College
Hall, Smith College Uses: Present: Administration Building Original: College classroom building Date of Construction: 1874-1875 Source: Northampton Book Style/Form: High Victorian Gothic
Architect/Builder: Peabody & Stearns Exterior Material: Foundation: granite Wall/Trim: brick, brownstone, limestone, granite Roof: slate Outbuildings/Secondary Structures: Major Alterations
(with dates): Chapel expanded on west in 1890. Condition: good Moved: no | x | yes | | Date Date Acreage: 1.05 acres Setting: This building is set on a high promontory on a corner lot.
A formal brick gate marks its entrance and its grounds are shaded by maple trees.
INVENTORY FORMB CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON ] [10 ELM STREET] MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation
sheet 1 NTH.738 ___ Recommended for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. If checked, you must attach a completed National Register Criteria Statement form. Use as much
space as necessary to complete the following entries, allowing text to flow onto additional continuation sheets. ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION: Describe architectural features. Evaluate
the characteristics of this building in terms of other buildings within the community. Peabody and Stearns who designed this building in the High Victorian Gothic style adopted Italian
Gothic antecedents for the two-and-a-half story brick building. For its overall form, the asymmetrical building has a truncated hipped roof of slate at its center with three transverse
gable bays projecting from east and west elevations and shallow pavilions projecting from its north façade and south elevation. An off-center, five story clock tower with an attached
side pavilion contains the main entry to the building on the north façade through double-leaf doors. Medieval Italian architectural features are the arched entry whose jambs consist
of brownstone colonettes with limestone capitals flanked by engaged buttresses, and the permanent polychromy favored by the style in the form of alternating voussoirs of limestone and
brownstone. Triple, pointed-arch windows whose mullions are paired brownstone colonettes with granite capitals alternate with limestone lintels on the second floor with Gothic label
hoodmolds with label stops. On the roof, front-gabled dormers are ornamented with Gothic tracery in the form of barge boards on braces. Patterned brickwork adds visual interest to the
exterior surface of the building while tying all the features together by circling the building with a dentilled brick cornice, stringcourses of limestone, a watertable of brownstone.
Elsewhere brick corbels support a balcony on the tower, brick spires ornament the tower corners, limestone quoins contrast with brick on one bay; they are joined by trefoils on lintels,
and cresting rails that altogether make up the High Victorian Gothic style. HISTORICAL NARRATIVE Discuss the history of the building. Explain its associations with local (or state) history.
Include uses of the building, and the role(s) the owners/occupants played within the community. From Form B of 1976: “Smith College, a private women’s college, was founded in 1874 as
the result of the will of Miss Sophia Smith of Hatfield. The college was located in Northampton on the hill above Main Street. Later in the nineteenth century several “classical schools”—institutions
designed to prepare young women for the rigorous academics of Smith—located in Northampton, in the Elm Street area. College Hall was designed in 1874 by Peabody & Stearns of Boston.
The firm was the designer of many early College buildings and of the First Church in Northampton Center. The building is the earliest of a group of Smith buildings designed by Peabody
& Stearns. Costing $76,000 at the time of its construction, College Hall first contained classrooms, a laboratory, art museum, chapel, and social hall. Now an administration building,
the interiors have undergone alteration but the exterior has retained its nineteenth century character.” BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES Beers, F. W. County Atlas of Hampshire Massachusetts,
New York, 1873. Hales, John G. Plan of the Town or Northampton in the County of Hampshire, 1831. Miller, D. L. Atlas of the City of Northampton and Town of Easthampton, Hampshire County,
Massachusetts, Philadelphia, 1895. Walker, George H. and Company. Atlas of Northampton City, Massachusetts, Boston, 1884. Walling, Henry F. Map of Hampshire County, Massachusetts, New
York, 1860.
INVENTORY FORMB CONTINUATION SHEET [NORTHAMPTON ] [10 ELM STREET] MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220MORRISSEY BOULEVARD, BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation
sheet 2 NTH.738 South elevation of College Hall.