{"nrhp_refnum":"90000053","name":"Swansea Village Historic District","other_names":[],"category":"district","location":{"address":"Roughly Main St. from Gardners Neck Rd. to Stephens Rd., and Ledge Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Swansea","county":"Bristol County","state":"MA","lat":41.74735300000006,"lon":-71.18953201958287,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1990-02-16","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Community Planning and Development","Exploration/Settlement","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A roughly 29-acre, largely linear village district of mostly residential and institutional buildings along Main Street in east-central Swansea, Bristol County, Massachusetts, dating from about 1750 to about 1939.","why_significant":"The district reflects Swansea's development from the late 18th century to about 1939 and became the town's residential and institutional focus in the late 19th century. It contains vernacular and high-style houses in a range of styles, plus stone institutional buildings designed by architects such as J. Merrill Brown and Henry Vaughan and funded by the Stevens family. It meets Criteria A and C at the local level.","narrative":"Swansea Village is a compact district of about 29 acres strung along Main Street in east-central Swansea. It holds 95 buildings, three sites, six structures and one object, most of them built between about 1790 and 1910. Early Georgian and Federal houses cluster near Elm Street and Stevens Road, while Italianate cottages were built around 1860 by the Stevens family for farm workers. The high-style Stevens Mansion of 1855 stands out among them. The village center is defined by three stone buildings paid for by the Stevens family: the Romanesque Revival Town Hall of 1891 by J. Merrill Brown, and Christ Church and the Frank Stevens Library, both completed in 1900 to designs by Boston architect Henry Vaughan. Two brick Georgian Revival schools, an 1889 finishing mill and three old cemeteries add to the mix. The district was listed because it records the town's growth from farmland and small trades into its civic and residential center, and because of its range of well-preserved architecture.","period_of_significance":"ca. 1750-ca. 1939","architect_builder":"J. Merrill Brown (Town Hall); Henry Vaughan (Christ Church, Frank Stevens Library, Frank Stevens School); James Ritchie (Joseph Case High School); J.J. Highlands (builder of Town Hall)","architectural_style":"Georgian, Federal, Italianate, Gothic Revival, Second Empire, Romanesque Revival, Shingle Style, Colonial Revival, Georgian Revival and Craftsman","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"General condition is described as good; present uses are residential and institutional. The industrial complex on Lewin Brook is now used for storage, and a former hotel is now a residence.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:13:03.849085-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/79/7896/63789679/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/90000053.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/90000053/fd94feddf2-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/90000053/fd94feddf2-1600.webp","licence":"Public domain","author":"Marcbela (Marc N. Belanger)","credit_html":"Marcbela (Marc N. Belanger), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Swansea_Village.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63789679","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swansea_Village_Historic_District","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7653722"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/bristol-county/swansea-village-historic-district-90000053/"}