{"nrhp_refnum":"03000792","name":"Wilson Mill-Old Burlington Road District","other_names":[],"category":"district","location":{"address":"Old Burlington Rd. and Wilson Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Bedford","county":"Middlesex County","state":"MA","lat":42.50091150000006,"lon":-71.24435573627522,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2003-08-18","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Exploration/Settlement","Industry"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A roughly nine-acre historic district in Bedford, Massachusetts, centered on the Wilson Mill site and millpond on Vine Brook, at Old Burlington Road and Wilson Road. It includes three houses, two bridges, a mill site and a remnant millpond, dating from the late 17th century onward.","why_significant":"The district is significant for its link to early settlement and industry, beginning with John Wilson's grist mill of the late 1600s, and for its architecture, which includes a ca. 1740 Georgian brick-end house and two Colonial Revival dwellings. The mill site was used for grist, saw, paper and blind-and-sash production until about World War I or the 1920s.","narrative":"Along Vine Brook in Bedford, a small district of about nine acres preserves the site of a mill that began with John Wilson's corn mill in the late 1600s. Foundation remnants, a spillway, a stone-lined streambed, a stone arch bridge over the falls and part of the original millpond survive, though highway construction in the 1950s and 1960s removed much of the pond. The site later housed a paper mill, which burned in 1846, and then a sawmill producing blinds and sashes, and operations ended around World War I or the 1920s. Three houses complete the district: the Georgian Bacon-Gleason-Blodgett Homestead of about 1740, with brick ends and a Colonial Revival rear remodeling, and two Colonial Revival houses from about 1900 and 1924 tied to the Hunt family. The district is recognized for its settlement and industrial history and for its architecture, with a period of significance from about 1740 to 1953.","period_of_significance":"Ca. 1740-1953","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Georgian; Colonial Revival","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"The mill building is gone, leaving foundation remnants, a spillway and a stone-lined streambed. Old Burlington Road no longer carries traffic over the dam, and the town acquired land at the mill site in 1999-2000. The three houses remain in residential use.","vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:13:03.555722-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/33/7959/63795933/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/03000792.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/03000792/8a9053055b-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/03000792/8a9053055b-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"John Phelan","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Old_Burlington_Road_Bridge_over_Vine_Brook,_Bedford_MA.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">John Phelan</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Old_Burlington_Road_Bridge_over_Vine_Brook,_Bedford_MA.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63795933","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Mill-Old_Burlington_Road_District","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q8023145"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/middlesex-county/wilson-mill-old-burlington-road-district-03000792/"}