BlockThe nomination, in full
Bibliography, boundary description, and the people who prepared and reviewed the nomination.
FORM H - PARKS AND LANDSCAPE FEATURES MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION 80. Boylston Street, Boston, MA 02116 Photo (3x3" or 3x5", black & white) Staple to left side of form Photo number SKETCH MAP Draw map showing property's location in relationship to nearest cross streets and other buildings or geographical features. Indicate north. See attached map. Area Form No. 331/4-5 1. Town Brookline MRA Address Sargent Road Name Sargent's Pond 2. Ownership: - Public x Private Present owner Trustees of Sargent Estate 3. Type: Park Green Training Field Boulevard or Parkway x Other (Pond) 4. Description: Date: late 1870s Size (approx. acreage) 3 acres Architect (if known)Charles Sprague Location of Plans (if Iargent NA Setting In a residential area, 1930s ani 1940s single family houses. Current Condition Good Recorded by Carla Benka OrganizationBrookline Historical Conn.
DateMay 1983 Newtón Quadrangle UTM Reference: 324640/4687380 Map #: 55 12/82 VISUAL ASSESSMENT Describe topography and layout. Note components such as structures (bandstands, gazebos, sheds) monuments & fountains; landscaping features (formal plantings, bodies of water). Compare current appearance with original, 1t possible. Sargent's Pond was designed to be a major focal point on the 150-acre Sargent estate, which was subdivided in the late 1920s. The houses in the immediate area are single- family homes set back from the street on predominantly one to two acre lots. The pond rests in a basin and is approached by a gentle downward slope; plantings aroud it, including irises, are informal and naturalistic. There is a small concrete main- tenance building/pump house off to one side.
According to sketches and photographs, there appears to have been more landscaping around the pond than exists now, and it seems that some of the original rhododendron have died or have been removed HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE Discuss types of use, major period of use, evaluate importance within town. Sargent's Pond was created in the late 1870s (according to an article by Marina Van Rensselaer) by Charles Sprague Sargent, who excavated a basin and supplied water to the pond by damming up a small, natural brook which seems to start around the Lower part ot Cottage Street. Sargent was the manager of Holm Lea, the country estate of his father, -gnatius, wno Detween 1045 and 1°/3 purchased a number of smaller estates, including those belonging to the Cook and Lee families.
The properties were united through the designs of both father and son, and the landscape was "altered, remodeled and virtually recreated." (Van Rensselaer) Ho1m Lea consisted of open spaces of rolling fields for a landscape effect, whioh were then surrounded by a great variety of rare trees, both American and exotic (see attached list for some of the trees planted there.) Above all, there were the vistas, believec by Sargent, an advocate of the naturalistic shcool of landscaping, to be an essential component of the concept of beauty. THis estate was famous for its size, variety of trees, shrubberies, and broad expanses of lawn and meadow, outlined by natural woods. So tamous was this estate that 30,000 people would visit it on Rnododendron Sunday, at which time the Sargent family would open their showplace to the public.
As one observer worote in 1903: Every department of country life is here represented in due proportion without extravagance or faddism; all were blended into a beautiful and useful picture which is nothing short of exquisite. BIBLIOGRAPHY Narin Van Rensseladac pe Cardenian in Btry iac,"" The Cenrork ing 1ibe, May. Marina Van Rensselaer, 1897, Vol LIV, #1. Cynthia Zaitzevsky, Frederick Law Olmsted and the Boston Park System, Harvard University Press, 1982. 12/82 INVENTORY FORM CONTINUATION SHEET Commnity : Brookline Forn,No: 14-5 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Oflice of the Secretary, Boston Property Name: Sargent's Pond Indicate each item on inventory form which is being continued below. Historical Significance Cattle grazed peacefully in the meadows which were one or two city blocks long and twice as wide and bounded by masses of woods.
Azaleas and rhododendron lined the pond's edge as did irises, while on the south side, the narcissus and Stars ofd Bethlehem grew in the grass. A rock garden hidden from view by tall shrubbery and partially concealed from the pond by willow trees, was full of Alpine flowers and ather little plants. There were also a few flower beds in inconspicuous and a "spring garden" olaces as well as green houses, reserve gardens'.lmost whollv artificial. of lilacs, irises, and peonies.
yet toacing Iike tredplolefature insheee ktndterfegeu It was a place yet looking like the work of Nature in one of her kindliest moods: restful, and serene;: nothing out of place, everything contributing to the general effect and each contributing to the effect of its neighbor; seclusive but not exçlusive; each landscape and separatea; harmonious in color, lightt, and shade, detail with detail." (Collins) There were four enrances to Holm Lea: at Cottage Street; Chestnut Place; Warren Street; and Perkins Street in Jamaica Plain. Ultimately the esfate was bordered by Walnut Street, along Warren; Cottage Street to the. Boston line; Perkins Street in Jamaica Plain; the back lot lines of houses on Chestnut Street and Chestnut Place; and Warren Street between Walnut and Cottage. Today the Sargent Estate subdivision is private and a series of roads, some one way, wind through the area.
Cearles Spargue Sargent Sargent was born in Boston in 1841, the son öf Ignatius and Henrietta Gray Sargent. He attended Harvard University and was graduated in 1862 at which time he entered the military and attained the rank of first lieutenant and aide-de-camp on the headquarters staff of the Department of the Gulf. remained in the service as a staff officer until August 1865 when he was mustered out, having attained the brevet rank of major. After travelling in Europe for three years,he returned to the United States and in 1868, was placed in the fill time position of manager of his father's estate in Brookline, Holm Lea. He lived in the old Thomas Lee house (see 209 Sargent Road information) which he remodeled in 1873 after it was purchased from Daniel Dwight in 1871. (Dwight bought it from the Lee family in 1868).
John Müir, in a letter to his wife in 1893 decribed it as follows''"This The house is about two hundred feet long with immense verandasstrimmed with huge flowers and vines, standing in the midst of fifty acres of lawns, grass, wild woods of pine, hemlock, maple, beech, hickory, etc. and all kinds of underbrush and wild flowers and cultivated flowers. There are acres of rhododendron twelve feet hight in full bloom, and a pond covered with lilies, etc.; all the ground, hill and dale, clad in the full sümmer dress of the region, trimmed with exquisite taste. Staple to Inventory form at botton INVENTORY FORM CONTINUATION SHEET Community: Brookline MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Office of the Secretary, Boston Form No: 80/B45 Property Name: Sargent's Pond Indicate each item on inventory form which is being continued below.
Pistorical Significance-2 Between 1872 and 1874 he was professor of horticulture at Harvard University, succeeding Francis Parkman, and during the same period he was one of four assistants to Asa Gray of the Harvard Botanic Garden. He became the director, although not a botanist and apparently "having 10 credentials ior the job beyond his social position and a modest reputation as a gentleman landscape gardener. " (Zaitzavsky, p.60) Althougr placing 88th out of a graduating class of 90 at Harvard, Sargent , under the tutaledge of Gray, learned quickly. His responsibility as director of the Botanic Garden was to reorganize the seven acre collection. job, however, "did not offer him enough scope for his energy and ambitions" (Zaitzevsky, P.60), and he took on the directorship of the Arnold Arboretum as well.
In 1872, the Arboretum was "an operation with great possibilities but little money to realize them". Originally located on just the Bussey farm in Jamaica Plain, it did not offer space to accomodate anything more than a simple arrangement of tree collections. "Sargent, the landscape gar dener only newly turned botanist, had ambitions that were as much aesthetic as scientific. He wanted the Arboretum to be as outstanding in landscape design as it would be in its colections." After eight years oI negotlations betw en the City of Bostonaand Harvard, Sargent s original concept 6o the city purchasing the Arboretum grounds from Harvard, buying several acres of adjoining land; and leasing all the property back to Harvard for 1000 years while retaining responsiblity for building and maintaining the roads and policing the grounds wase realized.
Sargent, Frederick Law Olmsted, and the Olmsted firm which included Charles Eliot as well as Sargent's nephew, Henry Codman Sargent, collaborated on the design. According to Cynthia Zaitzevsky, there are many visual parallels between Holm Lea and the Arnold Arboretum. "Contemporary accounts and views and what remains of the state today show many groupings shrubs, treatment of vistas, and other kandscape effects" w tre so and strek amateur mands. pe tzeveky g to statos that Sacapat,e om tr anslating his personal aesthetic vision into a broader medium than the gentleman's country estate.
" (p.63) Like his concept for HolMLea, the design of the Arboretum was to be naturalistic and one that fitted with the topography and existing trees, Its design went one step farther, however, and grouped trees by family and genus according to the natural order, while presenting them in logical sequence; "a blend of the scientific and the picttesque. " In the end, the Arboretum introduced more than one thousand trees and shrubs into this country, chiefly from Eastern Asia. Sargent remained director and henevolent dictator of this institution until his death in 1927.
In addition, he served as a special agent of the tenth census to investigate the forests of the United States; served as Chairman the Forests of of a commission in New York state to recommend a plan for the acre of the Adirondack forest; chaired a committeee formed to prepare a plan for the Staple to Inventory form at bottom INVENTORY FORM CONTINUATION SHEET MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL COMMISSION Office of the Secretary, Boston Community : Brookline Form No: 80(331+ 4,5 Property Name:Sargent's Pond Indicate each item on inventory form which is being continued below. Historical Significance -3 preservation and management of National Forests; and played an important role in the development of United States forest policy.
He was also a trustee of the Museum of Fine Arts; trustee and president of the Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture; trustee of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. director of the Boston and Albany Railroad from 1880 on, and a vice president of the Massachusetts Hospital Life Insurance Company. An editor of Garden and Forest from 1889-1897, Sargent was also the author of a number of books, including the fourteen volume, 740 plate Silva of North America. He married married Mary Allen Robeson in 1873 and had five children. One marriea Guy Lowell, the architect, while another, charles sprague argent, Jr., became the trustee ot Holm Lea and- supervised its eventual subdivision in the late 1920's and early 1930's.
Charles Sargent lived in Brookline for most oi his life and served as a Trustee of the Walnut Hills Cemetery and as a Park Commissioner. "By all accounts, Sargent was an unpredictable, difficult, and not FEL22 very lovable man, and no one ever claimed that he was a genius. Yet he founded a remarkable institution, and he won the friendship and respect of many giants of his day, including Frederick Law Olmsted and Henry neighbors (See 99 Warren Street and 25 Cottage Street, respectively.) Sargent's Pond meets NR criteria A,B,& C, being one of the few remaining elements of the Sargent Estate, probably the most famous19th century country estate for which Brookline gained so wide a reputation, and representing the spirit of the landscape philosophy of Charles Sprague Sargent, renowned horticulturalist and founder of the Arnold Arboretum.
Staple toInvéntory, form at bottom NPS Form 10-900-8 (3-82) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Inventory - Nomination Form Continuation sheet Item number OMB No. 1024-0018 Exp. 10-31-84 For NPS use only recelved 9-4-85 date entered Page Multiple Resource Area Thematie Group Name State Brookline MRA MASSACHUSETTS Nomination/Type of Review 71. Saint Paul's Church, Chapel, and Parish House 72. Saint Paul's Rectory 73. Sargent's Pond 74. Second Unitarian Church 75. Spurr, Eliphalet, House 76. Standish, James H., House 77. Strathmore Road Historic District 78. Toussaint, Winand, House 79. Town Stable 80.
Tuckerman, William F., House Enbered the Nebioael Regiater Entared 1n tatreeper lotional Register Attest f°Keeper Date/Signature AelonByan 1/2185 DelanAgu 10/12/85 Entered ia blie National Negiater Attest 6Reeper delnaByen 142185 Ertered ia the National Register Barbeel MeCional Register Attest fteeper Attest 6keeper AelonByan 10/alo5 AelomBya 10/2/0.
Eatered in the Mereherel Hegister Entered in tee Beldonal Begtater Attest Akeeper dulmnByua 1dalsi Attest tKeeper delonByer 10/2181 Entared 1x Mational Ieglaber Attest tKeeper Debußyen 121 Larlmced le the HasdinaeT seglarber Attest fKeeper KelaByun10/n/ei Attest Entered im the Xatlone1 Reslstor afiséeper Attest AilmueByen 10/2/85 85003314 ASO Form - 17 R" June 198 UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES EVALUATION/RETURN SHEET Sargent's Pond (Brookline MRA) Nortolk County MASSACHUSETTS -resubmission - nomination by person or local government - owner objection -appeal Substantive Review: -sample Reviewer's comments: Drequest SEP 4 1985 Working No. Fed. Reg.
Date: 24 3/07 Date Due: - 10/19185 Action: -ACCEPT _10-12-5) Entared in the -RETURN- _REJECT- National Regiateseral Agency: LJappeal -NR decision Recom./Criteria Reviewer Discipline Date - see continuation sheet Nomination returned for: _ technical corrections cited below _substantive reasons discussed below 1. Name 2. Location 3. Classification Category Ownership Public Acquisition 4. Owner of Property 5. Location of Legal Description 6. Representation in Existing Surveys Has this property been determined eligible? yes Lno 7. Description Condition Dexcellent -good -fairR - deteriorated Druins - unexposed Check one unaltered Daltered Describe the present and original (if known) physical appearance J summary paragraph J completeness -J clarity - alterations/integrity - dates - boundary selection Status Accessible Present Use Check one -original site - moved date 8.
Significance Period Areas of Significance-Check and justify below Specific dates Builder/Architect Statement of Significance (in one paragraph) summary paragraph completeness clarity applicable criteria justification of areas checked relating significance to the resource context relationship of integrity to significance justification of exception other 9. Major Bibliographical References 10. Geographical Data Acreage of nominated property Quadrangle name UTM References Verbal boundary description and justification 11. Form Prepared By 12. State Historic Preservation Officer Certification The evaluated significance of this property within the state is: national state local State Historic Preservation Officer signature date title 13.
Other Maps Photographs Other Questions concerning this nomination may be directed to _ Signed - Date - Phone: Comments for any item may be continued on an attached sheet Saugent's Pane Brookline (a) MRA PROCES Kodak JUNE Saugent's Pand RESERVOIR WAY PARK - GE SARGENT OGEORGE LANE SARGENT'S POND STRE SARGENTS POND (80/331-45) ownor bookune Mab Janiad xale'2= 200fT SHIL ATL MAIMONIDES SCHOOL $ FIRST UNITARIAN CHURCH R HOAD 6 TREE BROOKLI BROOKLINE CEMETERY ORIGINAL GROUNOSUTTNG 53 MA PpR - 8 SARGEN C BROOKIINE HOSPITAL BOSTON