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Larch Farm

Essex County, Massachusetts Registered Historic Place stubsFarms on the National Register of Historic Places in MassachusettsHouses in Wenham, MassachusettsNational Register of Historic Places in Essex County, Massachusetts
Larch Farm, Wenham MA
Larch Farm, Wenham MA

The Larch Farm, also known as the Goldsmith-Pickering House, is a historic First Period farmhouse in Wenham, Massachusetts. The house is a large colonial 2+1⁄2-story wood-frame house, eight bays wide. The northern half of the house is three bays deep, and the southern half is two deep. Its complicated construction history begins in 1700, when Zaccheus Goldsmith was given permission to take timber for the purpose of building a house 40 feet (12 m) wide and 20 feet (6.1 m) deep. This structure was two stories high, with a leanto section in the rear and a chimney on its right. An addition during the Georgian period removed that chimney and doubled the size of the house, and moved the front door to the north side. A wing was added on the south during the 1780s, and the exterior was remodeled later to give the house a Federal style appearance. The interior of the house includes surviving decorative features from all three periods of construction.The house is also notable for its purchase in 1806 by Timothy Pickering, a former United States Secretary of State. Pickering transformed the Goldsmith property into a rural country estate, planting linden and larch trees on the grounds. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1990.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Larch Farm (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 42.602222222222 ° E -70.879166666667 °
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Address

Wenham Country Club

Main Street 94
01984
Massachusetts, United States
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Phone number

call+19784684714

Website
wenhamcountryclub.com

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Larch Farm, Wenham MA
Larch Farm, Wenham MA
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Nearby Places

Community House (Hamilton, Massachusetts)
Community House (Hamilton, Massachusetts)

The Community House at 284 Bay Road in Hamilton, Massachusetts is a historic social and civic community building serving the towns of Hamilton and Wenham. The Colonial Revival brick building was built in 1921 to a design by noted Boston architect Guy Lowell, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2011.Construction of the building was made possible through the efforts and generosity of George Snell Mandell and Emily Mandell, Hamilton residents and publishers of the Boston Transcript. The Mandells and a group of Hamilton residents worked with Community Service, Inc., a national non-profit that worked to improve recreational facilities. The Mandells purchased the land, in what was then a residential area outside the Hamilton-Wenham business district, and gave it to Hamilton House, Inc., founded to hold title to the property in perpetuity.The two story building houses an auditorium, sitting room, library, and kitchen on its first floor, and meeting rooms on the second. The basement originally held bowling lanes, a game room, and a men's lounge. Community Service of Wenham and Hamilton, Inc., which manages the building, has over the years offered a wide variety of social, recreational, and educational programs in the facility, and made it available to other community groups as meeting and function space.The most significant changes to the building have affected the lower level. As bowling rose in popularity, additional lanes were added in a 1934 addition, and also in an adjoining building; the original lanes were converted to a shooting range for law enforcement. With the waning of bowling's popularity, the adjoining building was leased out and eventually sold after being converted to medical offices, and the 1934 addition was converted to meeting space.