{"nrhp_refnum":"87001128","name":"Monument Square Historic District","other_names":["See Also: Bunker Hill Monument"],"category":"district","location":{"address":"Monument Sq.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Boston","county":"Suffolk County","state":"MA","lat":42.376393000000064,"lon":-71.06070616255957,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1987-06-02","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Community Planning and Development","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["national","state","local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A district of 47 buildings fronting Monument Square on Breed's Hill in Charlestown, Boston, laid out around the Bunker Hill Monument and its lodge. Buildings date from the mid-18th century to 1912, mostly 19th-century row houses.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the district is an early, successful planned residential development that brought an urban residential pattern into a formerly rural setting. It combines a monumental square with a unified residential background of masonry houses shaped by deed restrictions. It also has strong, intact architectural groupings in mid-19th to early 20th century styles.","narrative":"Monument Square in Charlestown is a ring of 47 buildings around the Bunker Hill Monument and its lodge, on the summit of Breed's Hill. Most are brick or stone row houses, no more than four stories, built from the 1840s through the early 1900s in Greek Revival, Italianate, Mansard, Queen Anne and Colonial Revival styles. Two older frame houses were moved to the square, and a granite high school (1907) and a public library (1912) complete the group. The square was planned in the 1830s when the Bunker Hill Monument Association sold part of the battlefield to raise money to finish the monument. Deed restrictions required masonry houses of three or four floors with a ten-foot setback, giving the area unusual uniformity of scale, materials and detail. Alterations have mostly been confined to the rear, so the streetscapes survive. The district is distinguished from the smaller, more modest buildings around it by its construction quality, arrangement and preservation.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":"Architects and builders named include N. J. Bradlee, William Wright, Cabot and Chandler, Stickney and Austin, Arthur Vinal, J. S. Small, John B. Wilson, and A. Brown","architectural_style":"Greek Revival, Italianate, Mansard, Queen Anne, High Victorian Gothic, Colonial Revival, Neo-Georgian and Neo-Classical, plus a Georgian and a Federal frame house","criteria":[],"status_note":"Described as well preserved and scrupulously maintained, with no intrusions; the district is occupied and used for residences, a library, a school, a museum and park space.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:13:01.360381-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/85/7968/63796885/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/87001128.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/87001128/86a272f845-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/87001128/86a272f845-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Ingfbruno","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:USA-Bunker_Hill_Monument_Park0.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Ingfbruno</a>, <a href=\"https://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:USA-Bunker_Hill_Monument_Park0.jpg"},"district":{"nrhp_refnum":"15000195","name":"Boston National Historical Park","url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/districts/massachusetts/boston-national-historical-park-15000195/"},"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63796885","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_Square_Historic_District_(Charlestown,_Boston,_Massachusetts)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6906850"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/suffolk-county/monument-square-historic-district-87001128/"}