
One of the prestigious (and still handsome) residential districts of the turn of the twentieth century extends south of the armory along South Main Street. At the corner of South Main and Mason is what remains of Stone House and of its property, on which some of the later houses were built. It deserves notice only because it was once among the grandest residences in the city and among the most impressive Greek Revival houses in the state. Although it has been cruelly altered for apartments and re-sided in vinyl, some sense of the portico and of its monitor remains. Built by a Massachusetts mill owner who was also proprietor of the Woonsocket Hotel, by 1850 it belonged to George C. Ballou, half owner of the Globe Mills in the valley below.