East Gloucester Square Historic District

East Gloucester Square Historic District covers about 75 acres around Smith's Cove on Gloucester's Inner Harbor. Its roughly 186 contributing buildings, along with granite wharves, seawalls and retaining walls, date from about 1700 to 1945. East Main Street forms the spine, running past a small commercial node at East Gloucester Square and fish-industry complexes such as Reed & Gamage, the John F. Wonson Company Store and Gorton's. Uphill, Highland Street, Plum Street and Mount Pleasant Avenue hold modest wood-frame houses behind granite walls, with a few grander Italianate and Second Empire residences. The district matters as a compact record of the fishing economy that built Gloucester, showing homes of fishery owners and mariners beside the wharves that supported them. Its Greek Revival cottages, some with acorn-motif dentils found almost uniquely here, add architectural distinction. Good condition, strong integrity and few modern intrusions set it apart from surrounding areas.