{"nrhp_refnum":"72000115","name":"Rocky Hill Meetinghouse and Parsonage","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"Portsmouth Rd. and Elm St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Amesbury","county":"Essex County","state":"MA","lat":42.85259815400008,"lon":-70.91009334299997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1972-04-11","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Religion"],"significance_levels":["state","local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A 1785 two-story white clapboard country meetinghouse and its neighboring five-bay, center-chimneyed parsonage at Portsmouth Road and Elm Street in Amesbury, Essex County, Massachusetts. The parsonage was moved from nearby to avoid demolition for Route 495.","why_significant":"The nomination calls the meetinghouse a fine example of a country meetinghouse and the least altered eighteenth-century meetinghouse in Massachusetts. A declining parish had no funds to modernize it, so the interior remained virtually unchanged. Both buildings were certified as a Massachusetts Historic Landmark.","narrative":"Rocky Hill Meetinghouse, built in 1785 on a rocky ledge in Amesbury, Massachusetts, is a two-story white clapboard country meetinghouse with a pitched roof and no chimneys. Its seven-bay front is divided by a two-story entrance porch, and dentilled cornices, Doric and Tuscan pilasters and pedimented doorways give the plain rectangle a restrained elegance. Beside it stands a five-bay, center-chimneyed parsonage of about the same date, moved from nearby to save it from demolition for Route 495. The parish, once the west parish of Salisbury, began to decline soon after the building was finished, and without money for updates the interior stayed essentially as built. It keeps a high carved pulpit with a pentagonal sounding board, boxed pews, a deacon's desk and a three-sided gallery on columns. The nomination describes it as the least altered eighteenth-century meetinghouse in Massachusetts, and both buildings were certified as a Massachusetts Historic Landmark.","period_of_significance":"18th Century (1785)","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Country meetinghouse, New England meetinghouse type with Doric and Tuscan pilasters and dentilled cornices","criteria":[],"status_note":"Condition listed as excellent and unaltered, on its original site; occupied and used for religious and museum purposes. The parsonage was moved from a nearby location.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:54.80912-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/80/7949/63794980/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/72000115.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/72000115/542d4a7137-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/72000115/542d4a7137-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Daderot at en.wikipedia","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rocky_Hill_Meeting_House_-_Amesbury,_Massachusetts.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Daderot at en.wikipedia</a>, <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rocky_Hill_Meeting_House_-_Amesbury,_Massachusetts.JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63794980","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocky_Hill_Meeting_House","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7355810"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/essex-county/rocky-hill-meetinghouse-and-parsonage-72000115/"}