Avon Hill Historic District

Avon Hill in Cambridge, Massachusetts, once known as Jones Hill, was open farmland until 1869, when five acres at the summit were sold to a shoe merchant and a newspaper founder. They built twin Mansard houses and sold nearby lots. The resulting district of roughly 20 acres includes houses on Washington Avenue, Walnut Avenue, Arlington Street, Lancaster Street and parts of Agassiz and Humboldt Streets. Two phases of building are visible: Mansard houses of the early 1870s on upper Washington Avenue and Arlington Street, and later Queen Anne, Shingle Style and Colonial Revival houses of the late 1880s on lower Washington Avenue and Lancaster Street. The later owners were self-made businessmen who chose to build away from Brattle Street. Four of seven large houses in that second group were designed by Hartwell & Richardson. Well-preserved houses on ample lots give the area a park-like setting and a cross-section of the city's late Victorian architecture.