Normal School Historic District | |
 Murdock Hall and Smith (President's) House | |
   | |
| Location | North Adams, Massachusetts |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 42°41′27″N73°6′10″W / 42.69083°N 73.10278°W Coordinates: 42°41′27″N73°6′10″W / 42.69083°N 73.10278°W |
| Architect | various |
| Architectural style | Late 19th And 20th Century Revivals, Late Victorian |
| MPS | North Adams MRA |
| NRHP reference # | 85003391 [1] |
| Added to NRHP | October 25, 1985 |
The Normal School Historic District is a historic district in North Adams, Massachusetts. It consists of a group of ten buildings located along Church Street, roughly from Bradley Street in the south to Murdock Hall on the campus of the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA) in the north. The buildings represent a period of cohesive development of the area in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, shortly after the normal school (later North Adams State College, then MCLA) was established. It includes nine houses, eight of which are private residences, and one institutional building, Murdock Hall, dating to the inception of the normal school. The tenth building is Smith House, originally known as the Principal's House (later President's House), which is next door to Murdock Hall on the MCLA campus. [2]
North Adams is a city in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its population was 13,708 as of the 2010 census. Best known as the home of the largest contemporary art museum in the United States, the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, North Adams has in recent years become a center for tourism, culture and recreation.
The Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA) is a public, residential, liberal arts college in North Adams, Massachusetts. It is part of the state university system of Massachusetts. It is a member of the Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges. Originally established as part of the state's normal school system for training teachers, it now offers a wide variety of programs leading to Bachelor of Science and Arts degrees, as well as a Master of Education track.
A normal school is an institution created to train high school graduates to be teachers by educating them in the norms of pedagogy and curriculum. Most such schools, where they still exist, are now denominated "teacher-training colleges" or "teachers' colleges" and may be organized as part of a comprehensive university. Normal schools in the United States and Canada trained teachers for primary schools, while in continental Europe, the equivalent colleges educated teachers for primary, secondary and tertiary schools.
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All of the residential properties, including Smith House, are large Victorian houses. Six are in the Queen Anne style, with porches and turreted sections, while three are in the Colonial Revival style. Murdock Hall was built in 1896 (as was Smith House) and served as the normal school's main building. It is a rectangular Italianate structure built of yellow brick designed by architect H. Neill Wilson, and features a central pilaster-supported triangular pediment. Smith House is built of the same materials, but with Colonial Revival styling. A dormitory built at the same time has not survived. [2]
H. (Henry) Neill Wilson was an architect with his father James Keys Wilson in Cincinnati, Ohio; on his own in Minneapolis, Minnesota; and for most of his career in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. The buildings he designed include the Rookwood Pottery building in Ohio and several massive summer cottages in Berkshire County, Massachusetts.
South of Smith House on the west side of Church Street are three private residences, all built in either 1896 or 1897. The first of these, the Queen Anne style Hawkins House, was built according to a mail-order plan, and features some of the most elaborate woodwork in North Adams. The other five private residences are situated on the east side of Church Street; all but one was built in the early 1890s, before the normal school was established. [2]
The district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985. [1]
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance. A property listed in the National Register, or located within a National Register Historic District, may qualify for tax incentives derived from the total value of expenses incurred in preserving the property.
