Rocks Village Historic District

Rocks Village is a small riverside community in northeastern Haverhill, Massachusetts, where 25 buildings line Wharf Lane, River Road and East Main Street beside the Merrimack River. It began as a ferry crossing in 1640, and a covered bridge to West Newbury followed in 1795; the present steel bridge dates from 1905. Fifteen buildings are from the eighteenth century, eight from the nineteenth and two from the twentieth. Residents ran ferries and built an economy on farming, shipbuilding, fishing and making shoes and horncombs. Notable buildings include the Ingersoll House, showing the influence of Samuel McIntire, and the Ingalls or Countess House, which holds murals by Rufus Porter and inspired a Whittier poem. The John Swett House has an unusual angled chimney, and the 1840 Hand Tub House is now a museum. The district was listed as a nearly unchanged pre-industrial village with literary and artistic associations.