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| Initially marketed as a “tear down,” the Houghton-Sprague house on West Bare Hill Road is currently undergoing substantial renovation. (Photo by Lisa Aciukewicz) |
Sitting on the corner of West Bare Hill and Still River roads is a rather forlorn looking, dilapidated farmhouse that was recently being marketed as a “tear down.” That is, until an unlikely savior decided to restore the building to its original condition.
Karla Pearlstein, who lives on the West Coast but recently established ties to the New England area, has bought the Houghton-Sprague farmhouse and teamed up with Robert Adam Preservation Services to bring the structure back to its original condition.
Pearlstein is a professional restoration consultant who has experience working on projects ranging from the Victorian era to 1950s mid-century modern. She believes that preservation and restoration can unlock the doors to timeless beauty. Adam, the founder of the North Bennet School of Preservation Carpentry, is no stranger to preservation projects in Harvard. He is responsible for the recent restoration of the Shaker herb drying shed in Shaker Village. He was also no stranger to the house even before meeting Pearlstein; the previous owner, Kevin Foster, was a childhood friend. He bought the house from Pat Sprague, who grew up in the house and owned it until 1995. Foster met with frustration. He found that living in the house during restoration was impossible, and that proper restoration required considerable expert help and money.
Enter Pearlstein, in December 2006. So how did Pearlstein, who is from Oregon and specializes in 18th century Victorians, end up with a 17th-century farmhouse in Harvard?
While researching Victorian lighting for one of her projects, Pearlstein found Chris and Cindy Allen, owners of Allen’s Antique Lighting, who recently moved to a Harvard property that has a huge barn in which the Allens could store their vast collection of Victorian lighting fixtures. Over time a friendship developed and Pearlstein started visiting the Allens, and subsequently explored New England and fell in love with the region. The realtor who sold the Allens their property showed Pearlstein the farmhouse.
Adam says they are at the very beginning of the restoration process, and the house won’t be even partially habitable for at least 18 months. His firm has been doing the structural work first. Site work has included repointing the stone foundation, which had been silted up because water flowed in. Rotted floor joists are being replaced, the site has been excavated to lower the grade and put in drainage, and a condemned well is being restored as a historic artifact. Adam and Pearlstein are researching various parts of the building to determine where the original openings were. Exterior changes won’t be evident for about a year, after the infrastructure is restored. Pearlstein is heading to upstate New York for a seminar (not her first) to learn how to create and grind pigments so she can develop the historic paint colors that will be used on the house.
The history of the farm begins with a land grant of 600 acres, originally part of Lancaster, to the Houghton family from the King of England. Adam believes that the first part of the farmhouse structure to appear on the property was a former garrison house that had been built by an early community that had settled by the Nashua River. Garrisons were used to protect settlers in the area from attacks during the Indian wars of the late 17th and early 18th centuries. After the wars, Adam believes, the Houghtons had the garrison moved to the farm, and over time expanded it into a multi-generational family house with sleeping quarters for farmhands.
The plaque in front of the house has a date of 1663, probably the date of the land grant. The sign, which reads “Houghton-Sprague Farm,” reflects the 1910 marriage of Franklin John Sprague and Anna Houghton. Results of dendrochronology testing (tree-ring dating) on the beams throughout the house revealed that the garrison section was probably built in 1717. Another part of the house, built on the land, tested out at 1745. The remaining extensions were likely finished somewhere around the last quarter of the 18th century, according to test results.
When asked about the range of styles the house represents, Adam said, “Stylistically, we are looking at the late Elizabethan period for the garrison, of which only fragments remain of the finish, but then there are some high-style Georgian features we’ve seen, where the windows were originally pedimented, [and] the early riven clapboards [were fastened] with rosehead nails; yet the front façade is really a federal, interpretational transition.”
Pat Sprague, who is the last Sprague heir and lives in Haverhill, told Pearlstein that her grandmother gave some of the old diamond pane coral glass windows that had been in the house to the Concord Museum. Pearlstein and Adam have found fragments of coral glass embedded in the walls, so they know where the windows were located. Pearlstein said that the different styles help them interpret how the house changed over time, and they want people to be able to “come in and get a sense of how the evolution took place.”
As an example, Adam pointed out that the lower room in the garrison section is likely to look as it originally did, with wide board sheathing on the walls, while the upper story is done in a Georgian period, and has paneled walls. One room may have a Federal 19th-century look to it, while the kitchen is likely to be early 20th century. Each side of the house had its own kitchen, so they know this was a duplex, housing an extended family over a couple of generations.
“The interesting thing about the house,” Adam said, “is that it is a very early house; it’s what’s considered a first period house. The section of the house that was the garrison was probably used as a community meeting house in addition to providing protection from Indians when this land was originally part of Lancaster.”
A tour of the house reveals some interesting features, such as a fireplace arch in the basement that supports the mass of the chimney, while providing within the arch (really a small brick tunnel) a space for cold storage. There are smoke chambers off the fireplace that, when opened, still smell of the smoking. “Set kettles”—large covered kettles—are suspended over a brick oven that would warm them for doing laundry and other chores. These and other elements of the house have been written about by William Nourse in his 1890 publication, A History of the Town of Harvard. That book also tells about the paneling in the house, which Adam found stored in the rafters. He has already figured out where the panels were originally placed.
Adding an element of suspense, petrified spiders are still hanging in their nests in the basement stairwell.
Pearlstein has been in touch with the Historical Commission, and wants to share the house with the community and use it for educational purposes. She plans to spend some time living in the house she is rescuing, and she already “feels really tied to it.”
Pearlstein is clearly committed to performing the renovation the “right” way, but can she do it the “green” way, too? She says that she is working with the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties to ensure that anything that isn’t historical (such as rigid insulation or storm windows on the inside) is done in a reversible manner. “One has to strike a balance,” she says.