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Metropolitan Boston » Route 128 Corridor Southwest » Needham » Needham Town Hall Historic District

Needham Town Hall Historic District

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Town Common.
  • Town Hall (Peter Vanderwarker or Antonina Smith)

Solidification of the Needham Common, designated in 1884 as the public center of the community, occurred in 1902 with the construction of a handsome Georgian Revival town hall (1471 Highland Avenue, NRD), designed by Winslow and Bigelow of Boston. The red brick building with white trim boasts a large meeting hall at the second level, lighted by tall arched windows on four sides, and a wooden cupola, which is a landmark for the village center. The nearby Kingsbury-Whittaker House (53 Glendoon Street, NR), now the Needham Historical Society, documents the development pattern of this section of Needham. An eighteenth-century five-bay clapboard farmhouse built by Timothy Kingsbury, the house was purchased in 1839 by Boston merchant Edgar Whittaker, who nearly doubled the size of the building. In 1924 the remaining 11 acres of the property were divided for a residential development, and in 1949 the Needham Historical Society purchased the house as its museum.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Keith N. Morgan
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Data

What's Nearby

Emery Grover Building (First High School)
Highlandville
Glavin Family Chapel, Babson College
Pettee Machine Works
Pettee Silk Mill

Citation

Keith N. Morgan, "Needham Town Hall Historic District", [Needham, Massachusetts], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/MA-01-ND3.

Print Source

Cover: Buildings of Massachusetts

Buildings of Massachusetts: Metropolitan Boston, Keith N. Morgan, with Richard M. Candee, Naomi Miller, Roger G. Reed, and contributors. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2009, 527-528.

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