Fernald, Walter E., State School

Spread across 180 acres of rolling land in Waltham, this former state school for people with intellectual disabilities grew from an institution founded in 1848 and moved to the Trapelo Road site in 1888. Its freestanding red brick buildings follow the contours of the land rather than a rigid grid, making it the second campus in the Massachusetts system laid out on the cottage plan. Boston architect William Gibbons Preston designed most of the earliest buildings, built between 1889 and 1910 with fieldstone foundations, sandstone trim and Queen Anne detailing. Later Colonial Revival dormitories and service buildings of the 1920s and 1930s filled in the central campus, and Craftsman staff cottages were added in 1925. The school is associated with Samuel Gridley Howe, Edward Jarvis and superintendent Walter E. Fernald, who shaped its mission. New construction and renovation have changed parts of the campus, but the early character remains clear, and most historic buildings survive.