Platts-Bradstreet House facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
|
|
Platts-Bradstreet House
|
|
Platts-Bradstreet House
|
|
 Location in Massachusetts
Location in the United States
|
|
| Location | 233 Main St., Rowley, Massachusetts |
|---|---|
| Area | about 0.5 acres (0.20 ha) |
| Built | c.1677 (MACRIS) |
| NRHP reference No. | 80000645 |
| Added to NRHP | September 27, 1980 |
The Platts-Bradstreet House is a really old house in Rowley, Massachusetts. It's like a museum now, showing how people lived long ago. The oldest part of the house was built around 1677! This makes it a great example of "First Period" architecture, which means it's from the earliest times of American settlement. Over the years, more parts were added, especially in the 1700s. Since the 1920s, the Rowley Historical Society has owned and taken care of it. The house was officially recognized as a special historic place in 1980.
What the House Looks Like
The Platts-Bradstreet House is located on Main Street in the center of Rowley. It's a two-and-a-half-story building made of wood. It has wooden siding and a big chimney in the middle. The front of the house has five sections, with the main door in the middle. The windows are called "sash windows."
Besides the main house, the property also has other old buildings. There's a barn, a small shop where shoes might have been made, and another long building with a sloped roof. These buildings help show what life was like on a property hundreds of years ago.
A Look Back in Time: The House's Story
The oldest part of the Platts-Bradstreet House was likely built in 1677. A man named Samuel Platts (who lived from 1617 to 1682) probably built it. He bought the land in 1660. This first part of the house was two stories tall and one room deep across the whole front.
In the early 1700s, a "lean-to" section was added to the back. This made the house look like a classic New England "saltbox" house. A saltbox house has a long, sloping roof in the back, like the lid of an old saltbox.
Later, in the late 1760s, Moses Bradstreet (who passed away in 1786) made more changes. He raised the lean-to section to be a full two stories tall. This gave the main part of the house the shape it has today. The way the inside of the house looks also seems to be from this time period.
Because people have lived in this house for so long, historians believe there might be old items buried on the property. These items could tell us even more about the families who lived there over the centuries. The Rowley Historical Society has been the owner of this historic property since the 1920s, preserving it for future generations.
See Also
- National Register of Historic Places listings in Essex County, Massachusetts
- List of the oldest buildings in Massachusetts
