{"nrhp_refnum":"74000360","name":"Dennis, Josiah, House","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"16 Whig St. (forermly Nobscusset Rd. at Whig St.)","address_restricted":false,"city":"Dennis","county":"Barnstable County","state":"MA","lat":41.74038526600003,"lon":-70.19891343299997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1974-02-15","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Religion"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two-and-a-half-story saltbox house, known as the Josiah Dennis Manse, at Nobscusset Road and Whig Street in Dennis, Massachusetts, erected in 1736 on about three acres of fields and trees.","why_significant":"It is tied to the Reverend Josiah Dennis, the town's first minister, after whom the town was named when the east precinct of Yarmouth became independent in 1793. It also stayed in the same family until the twentieth century and is a good example of New England saltbox vernacular. The town now maintains it as a museum and historical center.","narrative":"Built in 1736, the Josiah Dennis Manse is a shingled saltbox house at the corner of Nobscusset Road and Whig Street in Dennis, Massachusetts. It rises two and a half stories to a saltbox roofline, is five bays wide with a central chimney, and has two later single-story rear ells. The main facade ornament is the entrance, with a paneled door, five-light transom, pilasters and a plain entablature. Inside, the woodwork is simple but well made, with some paneling and wainscotting, and a raised \"stair bedroom\" created a storage cellar above a high water table. Reverend Josiah Dennis, a Harvard graduate ordained in 1727 in the east precinct of Yarmouth, lived here until his death in 1763. When the precinct became its own town in 1793, it took his name. The house passed through his widow, daughter and a Howes niece, and the Howes family lived there into the twentieth century. The town now owns the house and about three acres and operates it as a museum.","period_of_significance":"18th Century (1736)","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Saltbox vernacular","criteria":[],"status_note":"Good condition, altered, on its original site; owned by the town and maintained as a museum and historical center.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:54.76803-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/6/7941/63794106/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/74000360.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/74000360/648df029f4-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/74000360/648df029f4-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 2.0","author":"Thomas Kelley from Boston, MA","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Josiah_Dennis_House.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Thomas Kelley from Boston, MA</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 2.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Josiah_Dennis_House.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63794106","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josiah_Dennis_House","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6290465"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/barnstable-county/dennis-josiah-house-74000360/"}