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Home My Public Portal AboutHarwichRd_559Follow Massachusetts Historical Commission Survey Manual instructions for completing this form.4/11 FORM B  BUILDING MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION MASSACHUSETTS ARCHIVES BUILDING 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Photograph View from west. Locus Map (north at top) Source: Mass GIS Oliver Parcel Viewer. Recorded by: Kathryn Grover & Neil Larson Organization: Brewster Historical Commission Date (month / year): June 2018 Assessor’s Number USGS Quad Area(s) Form Number 64-25-0 Harwich BRE.481 Town/City: Brewster Place:(neighborhood or village): South Brewster Address:559 Harwich Road Historic Name: Curtis C. & Edna W. Eldridge House Uses:Present: single-family residence Original: single-family residence Date of Construction: 1927 Source:deeds, historic atlases, newspapers Style/Form: Craftsman / Bungalow Architect/Builder: unknown Exterior Material: Foundation: rock-faced cast concrete blocks Wall/Trim: wood shingles / wood Roof:asphalt shingles Outbuildings/Secondary Structures: none Major Alterations (with dates): none Condition:good Moved: no yes Date: Acreage:0.85 Setting: The house is situated in a dense residential area characterized by summer cottages and retirement homes built in the mid-20th century. INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET BREWSTER 559 HARWICH ROAD MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation sheet 1 BRE.481 Recommended for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. If checked, you must attach a completed National Register Criteria Statement form. ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION: The Curtis C. and Edna W. Eldridge House, built in 1927, is a one-story wood frame Bungalow-type single dwelling. The house is distinguished by low walls and a large gable roof that extends in the front over a deep porch surmounted by a central, gabled dormer. Tucked under the porch, a central entrance is flanked by window pairs. The front porch is enclosed by a shingled knee wall and in the open sections with mesh screening. A triple window unit is contained in the dormer. The gable ends contain three windows on the first story and paired windows in the gable. The house is situated at the front of a deep, narrow lot set back behind a large yard fronted by a rail fence. The driveway follows the southerly lot line to the rear of the house. The rear of the property is wooded. HISTORICAL NARRATIVE: The 3 March 1927 issue of the Hyannis Patriot reported in its regular column that “Curtis Eldredge and family moved into their new bungalow in South Brewster last Saturday,” that being the house now numbered 559 Harwich Road. The parcel was part of a 17-acre tract that Eldridge’s mother-in-law Carrie Louise Whitten had sold him in August 1926, a decade after he had married Whitten’s only child, Edna Cornelia.1 Carrie Whitten and her husband Alvah had acquired the former Josiah Baker farm on Harwich Road in 1911, which had a house dating to at least 1880 as well as outbuildings standing on it.2 Alvah Whitten was a native of Benton, Kennebec County, Maine, and by 1910 was the assistant treasurer, clerk, and one of the directors of Stoughton Rubber Company, whose offices were in Boston. In 1894 he married Carrie Louise Phillips of Boston, and by 1920 Carrie Whitten lived in Brewster with her father, Zebulon Phillips; her husband lodged in various places in Boston at least into the early 1920s. Enumerated next in the 1920 census are Curtis Eldridge, his wife Edna, and their infant son Curtis in the household of Henry T. Crocker, but by 1930 the Whittens and Eldridges are shown in consecutive households in the census. Born in Brewster in 1893, Curtis C. Eldridge was the son of farmer Jacob A. Eldridge and his wife Maria Bassett. His father was a fisherman, but Curtis was a retail grocer. In December 1914 Franklin B. Crocker, then the town treasurer, sold his North Brewster grocery business to Eldridge, who had been his clerk, and Eldridge remained a grocer for the rest of his career.3 By 1930 Alvah Whitten had moved to Brewster permanently and was the accountant of the “town books,” according to the census; he and his wife occupied the former Josiah Baker house, while Eldridge, his wife Edna, and their sons Robert C., Howard W., Gordon D., and Ralph E. occupied 559 Harwich Road. By 1940 the census listed Alvah Whitten as a farmer and Curtis Eldridge as the town constable; by then son Robert Eldridge was working as a newspaper mailroom foreman. Alvah Whitten died in Brewster in 1947, his wife died in 1966, and daughter Edna died in 1972. Curtis C. Eldridge died in October 1973. A year later Cape Cod Bank and Trust Company, executor of his will, sold 559 Harwich Road to Peter L. and Riona S. M. Brooks, who owned the property for a decade. They were living in Carrollton, Texas, in January 1984 when they sold the house to Joseph Curtis Robinson and Deborah A. Harmatz, then living on Paines Creek Road in Brewster. They owned 559 Harwich Road in 2018.4 1 “Brewster,” Hyannis Patriot, 3 March 1927, 10; Carrie L. Whitten to Curtis C. Eldredge, 24 August 1926, BCD 440:31; and “Brief Locals,” Barnstable Patriot, 19 June 1916, 2: “Invitations have been issued by Mr. and Mrs. Alvah Howard Whitten of Boston and South Brewster for the marriage of their daughter, Edna Cornelia, to Curtis Howard Eldridge at South Brewster on June 20.” Almost all records give Eldridge’s middle name was Clifton, though his birth record shows it as Clinton, and his last name is shown as both Eldridge and Eldredge. 2 Charles H. and Rachel Alden Wheelock to Carrie Louise Whitten, Boston, 17 February 1911, BCD 306:294. Josiah Baker’s heirs sold the 17- acre farm to Olenia Wadleigh of Brockton in 1903; see Eleazer Baker, Suncook NY; Josiah G. Baker, Northampton, to Olenia Wadleigh, 14 September 1903, BCD 268:269 3 “Brief Locals,” Barnstable Patriot, 14 December 1914, 2. 4 Cape Cod Bank and Trust Company, executor will Curtis C. Eldridge, to Peter L. and Riona S. M. Brooks (of Brewster), 7 October 1974, BCD 2113:113; Peter L. and Riona S. M. Brooks, Carrollton TX, to Joseph Curtis Robinson and Deborah A. Harmatz, Paines Creek Road, 3 January 1984, BCD 3980:55. INVENTORY FORM B CONTINUATION SHEET BREWSTER 559 HARWICH ROAD MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Area(s) Form No. 220 MORRISSEY BOULEVARD,BOSTON,MASSACHUSETTS 02125 Continuation sheet 2 BRE.481 BIBLIOGRAPHY and/or REFERENCES American Ancestors.org. Massachusetts vital, tax, and probate records. Ancestry.com. Federal and state censuses, vital records, historic maps, and “Valuation List of the Town of Brewster 1890.” Barnstable Patriot Digital Newspaper Archive. Sturgis Library website, http://digital.olivesoftware.com/Olive/APA/Sturgis/default.aspx#panel=home. Brewster Assessors’ Records, Brewster Town Clerk Archives and 1926 Town Report. Deyo, Simeon L. History of Barnstable County, Mass. New York: H. W. Blake Co., 1890. Freeman, Frederick. The History of Cape Cod: The Annals of Barnstable County. Boston: George C. Rand and Avery, 1858-62. Otis, Amos. Genealogical Notes on Barnstable Families. 2 vols. Barnstable, MA: Patriot Press, 1888. Sears, Henry J. Brewster Ship Masters. Yarmouthport, MA: C. W. Swift, 1906. Simpkins, John. “Topographical Description of Brewster.” Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society 10 (1809): 72-79. MAPS Walling. Henry Francis. Map of the Counties of Barnstable, Dukes & Nantucket, Massachusetts. Boston: 1858. Atlas of Barnstable County, Massachusetts. Boston: George H. Walker & Co., 1880. Atlas of Barnstable County Massachusetts. Boston: Walker Lithograph & Publishing Co., 1910. PHOTOGRAPHS (credit Neil Larson, 2018) View from NW.