Amesbury Friends Meeting House facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
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Amesbury Friends Meeting House
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Postcard view, 1911
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 Location in Massachusetts
Location in the United States
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| Location | 120 Friend St., Amesbury, Massachusetts |
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| Built | 1850 |
| Architect | Thomas W. Thorndike |
| Architectural style | Greek Revival |
| NRHP reference No. | 02000376 |
| Added to NRHP | April 18, 2002 |
The Amesbury Friends Meetinghouse is a special building in Amesbury, Massachusetts. It's located at 120 Friend Street. This meetinghouse was built in 1850. A famous poet named John Greenleaf Whittier helped guide its construction.
This building is home to a very important group of Quakers in the area. Quakers are members of the Religious Society of Friends. Historically, this meetinghouse hosted large gatherings for Quakers from all over eastern Massachusetts and southeastern New Hampshire. The Amesbury Friends Meetinghouse was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2002. This means it's recognized as an important historical site.
What Does the Meetinghouse Look Like?
The Amesbury Friends Meetinghouse is west of downtown Amesbury. It's a simple, one-and-a-half-story building made of wood. It has a pointed roof and flat wooden boards on the outside. The front of the building has three sections. There are windows on either side of the main entrance. A smaller window is located in the triangle part of the roof above.
Inside, there's a hallway called a vestibule that goes across the whole building. This leads to the main room. Above the main room, there's a balcony area. The main room has special walls that can be moved up and down using ropes and pulleys. These movable walls allowed the Quakers to hold services together. They also used them to separate into groups for business meetings, which used to be divided by gender.
A Rich History of Friendship
The Quaker group in Amesbury is the oldest in northeastern Massachusetts. It started way back in 1657. At first, they met in what is now southern New Hampshire. This was to avoid being treated badly by the Puritan leaders in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. They built their first meetinghouse in 1705.
The building you see today is their fourth meetinghouse. It was finished in 1851. The famous poet John Greenleaf Whittier was a long-time member of this group. He was already well-known and played a big part in planning the new building. The meetinghouse is quite large. This shows how important the group was for hosting big regional Quaker gatherings.
From 1851 to 1962, the meetinghouse hosted the Salem Quarterly meeting. These were important meetings for Quakers from many different towns. Today, the Amesbury Monthly Meeting of Friends is still an active group. They hold their Meeting for Worship every Sunday at 10 AM. Inside, there's a special bench with a small sign that says "Whittier's Bench." This is where John Greenleaf Whittier used to sit.
See also
