{"nrhp_refnum":"77000202","name":"Barton, Clara, Homestead","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"3 mi. W of Oxford on Clara Barton Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Oxford","county":"Worcester County","state":"MA","lat":42.15336843500006,"lon":-71.89527129199996,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1977-09-22","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Social History"],"significance_levels":["national"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A 1½-story Cape-style house built in 1818 on Clara Barton Road, about three miles from Oxford, Massachusetts, with an adjacent barn, on a roughly 4/5-acre lot within a diabetic camp.","why_significant":"It is the birthplace of Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, who was born there on December 25, 1821 and lived there for thirty-two years. Her father, Captain Stephen Barton, built it in 1818. The house is maintained as a museum and holds many original Barton family furnishings.","narrative":"Clara Barton Homestead in Oxford, Massachusetts, is a simple Cape-style farmhouse built in 1818 by Captain Stephen Barton, a veteran of the Indian Campaigns. It has one and a half stories, a side-gabled ridge roof, a center chimney, a five-bay facade with a center entrance framed by an arched lattice trellis, and an internal well in the kitchen. The interior remains almost unchanged from Clara Barton's lifetime, apart from a small caretaker's apartment in a converted rear shed. A two-story shingled barn stands just east of the house. The property sits within a diabetic camp, surrounded by modern administration buildings and cabins. The house matters as the birthplace of Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, who was born there on December 25, 1821 and lived there for thirty-two years before leaving for Bordentown, New Jersey. She later returned often. A women's Unitarian-Universalist federation acquired it in 1921 and keeps it as a museum with many original family furnishings.","period_of_significance":"1800-1899","architect_builder":"Captain Stephen Barton","architectural_style":"Cape","criteria":[],"status_note":"Occupied and in excellent to good condition; maintained as a museum house, with a small caretaker's apartment in a converted rear shed. The barn is used by the adjoining diabetic camp in summer.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:53.879778-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/60/7975/63797560/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/77000202.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/77000202/42e04190de-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/77000202/42e04190de-1600.webp","licence":"Public domain","author":"Marcbela (Marc N. Belanger)","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Clara_Barton_birthplace.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Marcbela (Marc N. Belanger)</a>, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Clara_Barton_birthplace.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63797560","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clara_Barton_Homestead","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16890365"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/worcester-county/barton-clara-homestead-77000202/"}