{"nrhp_refnum":"96000950","name":"Town Farm, The","other_names":["The Town Poor Farm","Easthampton Lodging House"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"75 Oliver St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Easthampton","county":"Hampshire County","state":"MA","lat":42.27944347650006,"lon":-72.69589514370502,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1996-09-12","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Agriculture","Community Planning and Development","Architecture","Health/Medicine"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A town-owned poor farm at 75 Oliver Street in Easthampton, Massachusetts, built in 1890 as a large Queen Anne, Stick Style and Colonial Revival house on a 56-acre farm, later known as the Easthampton Lodging House.","why_significant":"The property reflects the nineteenth and twentieth century tradition of community responsibility for the poor and sick, which Easthampton kept after other towns shifted it to the State. Its farmland recalls the working farm that gave residents employment and sustenance. The utilitarian house also shows late nineteenth century eclectic architecture. It was judged significant locally under Criteria A and C.","narrative":"Set on 56 acres of protected farmland along Oliver Street in Easthampton, this large wood-frame house was built in 1890 to shelter the town's poor and sick. Easthampton bought the former Horace Lyman farm after years of debate over the rising cost of boarding the needy with local families, then hired W.F. Pratt & Son of Northampton to design the building. It opened in December 1890 and was usually called the Town Farm because residents helped work the land. The cross-gabled house combines Queen Anne scalloped shingles and clipped gables, Stick Style corner posts and bandcourses, and Colonial Revival symmetry. A garage and workshop added through a Works Project Administration project in 1938-1939 also remain, along with foundations of the barn, icehouse and well. The property is significant for its social history, its architecture and its surviving farm setting between 1890 and 1946, and it still provides housing today.","period_of_significance":"1890-1946","architect_builder":"W.F. Pratt & Son","architectural_style":"Late Victorian - Queen Anne, Stick","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Still used as housing for Easthampton's indigent; the house, a WPA-era garage and workshop, and agricultural fields remain, while the barn, icehouse and well survive only as foundation remnants.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:13:04.829974-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/43/7954/63795443/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/96000950.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/96000950/4fde1f0bfa-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/96000950/4fde1f0bfa-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"John Phelan","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Town_Farm,_Easthampton_MA.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">John Phelan</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:The_Town_Farm,_Easthampton_MA.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63795443","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Town_Farm","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7769773"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/hampshire-county/town-farm-the-96000950/"}