{"nrhp_refnum":"79000357","name":"Peirce School","other_names":["Old Peirce School"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"88 Chestnut St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Newton","county":"Middlesex County","state":"MA","lat":42.34685655900006,"lon":-71.22383399999995,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1979-12-06","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Education","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Old Peirce School is a two-storey Georgian Revival brick school at 88 Chestnut Street, at the corner of Austin Street in West Newton, Newton, Massachusetts, designed by Stickney and Austin and built in 1894-95.","why_significant":"It was one of the first three brick, architect-designed schools in Newton and the first in West Newton, part of a late nineteenth-century program to replace wooden schools for fire safety. Its site was also chosen and landscaped to enhance the surrounding community. It is the major remaining building associated with educator Cyrus Peirce, for whom it was named.","narrative":"Old Peirce School occupies a sloping site on West Newton Hill at Chestnut and Austin Streets in Newton, Massachusetts. Built in 1894-95 to designs by Stickney and Austin, it is a two-storey Georgian Revival building of red brick with a low slate hipped roof, granite foundations and brownstone trim. The north front has a seven-bay central section, projecting end pavilions, an arched entrance and a balcony carved with the school's name. The school was among the first three brick, architect-designed schools in Newton, built after the city's building inspector urged replacing wooden schools with fire-resistant structures. It was the first of these in West Newton, and its site was landscaped to benefit the neighborhood. The name honors Cyrus Peirce, a prominent nineteenth-century educator who led Horace Mann's pioneering state normal school while it was in West Newton from 1844 to 1853. Of the three schools bearing his name, this is the major one that survives.","period_of_significance":"1894-1895","architect_builder":"Stickney and Austin","architectural_style":"Georgian Revival","criteria":[],"status_note":"The classification section marks the property as publicly owned (City of Newton) and occupied, with museum use checked among present uses. A 1980 letter refers to a planned rehabilitation.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:53.914495-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/48/7958/63795848/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/79000357.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79000357/2653454954-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79000357/2653454954-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"User:Magicpiano","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NewtonMA_PeirceSchool.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">User:Magicpiano</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:NewtonMA_PeirceSchool.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63795848","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peirce_School","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7160948"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/middlesex-county/peirce-school-79000357/"}