Sterling Center Historic District

Sterling Center is a village district of about 60 acres in Sterling, Massachusetts, set in a small vale ringed by hills, farmland and suburban development. It contains 111 contributing resources, mostly modest wood-frame houses with granite foundations, along with churches, shops and public buildings arranged around the Town Common. Federal and Greek Revival houses predominate, with a few Italianate, Gothic Revival, Second Empire, Queen Anne and Colonial Revival examples. Local architect John Springer and carpenter John Stevenson produced the 1835 Town Hall and other Greek Revival landmarks. The district matters because it still reads as a 19th-century rural village. The 1849 railroad spurred speculative building on streets such as Bird Street, and market farming and dairying supported local commerce. A store on Main Street is also tied to Ebenezer Butterick's first paper shirt pattern, which began the Butterick pattern business. Deep lots, trees and surviving barns add to the setting.