{"nrhp_refnum":"91000506","name":"College Hill Residential Historic District","other_names":[],"category":"district","location":{"address":"Roughly bounded by McCartney St., Pierce St., Pardee St., the Forks Township line and the Delaware R.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Easton","county":"Northampton County","state":"PA","lat":40.70098491600004,"lon":-75.20280322999997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1991-05-01","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Industry","Community Planning and Development","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"College Hill is a residential historic district in the northeast part of Easton, Northampton County, Pennsylvania, occupying a sloping plateau at the base of Chestnut Ridge. It is a large area of houses erected between the 1830s and about 1940, with a mix of mid-to-late 19th and early 20th century styles.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the district is the most extensive single collection of mid-to-late Victorian and early 20th century residential architecture in Easton and the Lehigh Valley. It was the principal residential area for industrial and merchant families, and it also housed many middle working-class families. Its growth was tied to the 1888 electric trolley line and to the Speer Lumber Company's pattern-catalog houses.","narrative":"Built mainly between the 1830s and 1940 on a sloping plateau at the base of Chestnut Ridge, College Hill is a residential district of about several hundred houses spanning Italianate, Queen Anne, Colonial Revival, Tudor Revival and Foursquare forms. Its growth followed the 1888 electric trolley line, the first in the United States to climb steep 15 percent grades, which opened the hill to suburban development. Industrialists and merchants, including Arnold Gerstell of the Alpha Portland Cement Company, Howard Rinek of the Rinek Rope Company and William R. Haytock of the silk-mill firm Haytock-Gronemeyer, built large residences here. Architect William Michler designed thirty-nine houses on the hill between 1898 and 1934. The Speer Lumber Company built up to 200 pattern-catalog houses for working-class families. The district is regarded as the largest collection of its kind in the Lehigh Valley.","period_of_significance":"1830-1940","architect_builder":"Gerstell, Arnold., Haytock, William, R., Michler, William; Nevin, David W.; Speer Lumber Company","architectural_style":"Queen Anne; Colonial Revival; Classical Revival; Italianate; Federal; Gothic Revival; Second Empire; Stick Style; Romanesque; Shingle Style; Tudor Revival; Dutch Colonial Revival; Georgian Revival; French Eclectic; Bungalow/Craftsman; Prairie","criteria":["A","B","C"],"status_note":null,"vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.1-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 17:11:37.418888-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_PA/91000506.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/91000506/b7ba29b00f-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/91000506/b7ba29b00f-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Shuvaev","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cattell_St_200,_College_Hill_HD,_Easton_PA_03.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Shuvaev</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:Cattell_St_200,_College_Hill_HD,_Easton_PA_03.JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71995387","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/College_Hill_Residential_Historic_District","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5146433"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/pennsylvania/northampton-county/college-hill-residential-historic-district-91000506/"}