{"nrhp_refnum":"75000298","name":"Bridgman, Percy, House","other_names":["Bridgman House--Buckingham School"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"10 Buckingham Pl.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Cambridge","county":"Middlesex County","state":"MA","lat":42.379207115500066,"lon":-71.12861992524944,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1975-05-15","is_nhl":true,"nhl_designated_date":"1975-05-15","areas_of_significance":["Science"],"significance_levels":["national"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two-and-one-half story frame house at 10 Buckingham Place in Cambridge, Massachusetts, built around 1920 by an unknown architect. It was the home of physicist Percy Bridgman from 1928 until his death in 1961 and is now part of the Buckingham School.","why_significant":"The nomination argues that the house is significant for its association with Percy Williams Bridgman, who won the 1946 Nobel Prize in physics for his work on high pressure physics. It also cites his concept of operational analysis, later adopted by social scientists. The house itself is not considered architecturally important.","narrative":"Ten Buckingham Place in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is a two-and-one-half story frame house built around 1920. Its architect is unknown, and the nomination notes that the house and three similar ones in the same subdivision are of little architectural importance. Its significance comes from its resident. Physicist Percy Williams Bridgman moved in during 1928 and lived there until his death in 1961. Bridgman spent his entire academic career at Harvard and pioneered the study of matter under high pressure, designing and building his own apparatus. He received the 1946 Nobel Prize in physics for that work. He also developed the idea of operational analysis, holding that a physical concept has meaning only through the operations used to measure it; social scientists later adopted the approach. After his death the Buckingham School acquired the property, and it still serves as a residence and faculty lounge. The nomination reports that the house remains largely unchanged since Bridgman's time.","period_of_significance":"1900-","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Vernacular (described in the description section as neo-rationalism)","criteria":[],"status_note":"Used by the Buckingham School as a residence and faculty lounge; condition excellent, with no significant changes since 1961.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:54.5029-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/75/7937/63793775/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/75000298_NHL.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/75000298/a3c4625a7c-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/75000298/a3c4625a7c-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Daderot.","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Percy_W._Bridgman_House_(Cambridge,_MA).JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Daderot.</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:Percy_W._Bridgman_House_(Cambridge,_MA).JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63793775","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_W._Bridgman_House","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7167631"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/middlesex-county/bridgman-percy-house-75000298/"}