Photographs from the nomination case file, National Park Service records.
Hancock School
Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1975. A historic map-sheet match is not published yet. The record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
From the record
“Such were tlie opinions expressed, the resokitions adopted, and the measures taken by the people of tliis Province, long before the 19th of April, 1775. It was not the battle of Lexington that gave rise to the llevolution.”
History of the Town of Lexington, Middlesex County, Massachusetts, from Its First Settlement to 1868, with a Genealogical Register of Lexington Families (1868). Machine-read text.
one of 1100 National Register listings in Middlesex County · listed in 1975 · category: Building · one of 3 National Historic Landmarks in Middlesex County.
National Register reference number.75000261- the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.
What happened here
An account from the chapter on Lexington town, The inset identifies its exact
source book and publication year.
He was first taxed in 1748< He was a member of Capt. Parker's company on the morning of 19 April 1775, and was severely wounded by a bullet which struck his right arm, and so fractured the bone that he was not only disabled for a long time, but pieces of bone were extracted from it for several months afterward.
Of the illustrations bound witli this work, the portraits of Rev. Mr. Hancock, Col. INIunroe, and the author were furnished by their respective descendants ; and those of Theodore Parker, Rev. Dr. and Mrs. Follen, and Rev. Mr. Stetson, by their numerous friends resident in the vicinity. The views of dwelling-houses, including the Lexington House, Avere, except as stated below, sup])lied by their present or late owners ; and those of public buildings by citizens' subscriptions.
In the exercise of the powers given to them, the Committee have inserted the following illustrations at the town's expense, viz. : a lithographic portrait of Jonathan Harrington ; wood enjrravinffs of the Clarke House, the old Munroe Tavern, the INIonument, the proposed Monument, and the Battle Scene on the 19th of April ; diagrams of Lexington Common, and the Old North Bridge at Concord, with their surroundings as they were in 1775 ; andy^c similes of the autogi'aphs of twenty-nine men whose names are affixed to public documents which are a part of the History. It was thought that nothing ought to be omitted from the book, which could serve to explain, or invest with additional interest, the events narrated.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 32 fires within 5 miles of Hancock School between
1992 and 2020, burning about 26 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 3 were recorded as arson.
Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted
here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
Reported cause
Fires
Debris and open burning
13
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
12
Arson/incendiarism
3
Other causes
1
Misuse of fire by a minor
1
Natural
1
Recreation and ceremony
1
The most recent of
them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service
that recorded it.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. Museums hold 1,826 specimens
collected within 10 miles of Hancock School between 1898 and
1975: 793 Animalia, 569 Plantae, 407 Fungi, 23 Protozoa, 17 Bacteria, 9 Unrecorded, 8 Chromista. 12 distinct Species records are shown.
Collected by ?, A B Seymour, A B. Proper and others. Each is a
physical object with a catalogue
number, and each entry opens the museum's record. This is what was
collected and kept, not a survey of what lives here - nothing can be
concluded from a species being absent.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists
11 workings within 5 miles of Hancock School: 7 past producers, 2 producers, 2 plants.
4 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Peat, Clay, Iron. Distance is straight-line from the
map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring
settlement's page as well.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Lexington, the town this property stands in, in 14 storm reports between 1997 and 2022: 6 hail, 6 thunderstorm wind, 1 flood, 1 lightning.
No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office
filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date
opens the federal record of that event.
Three lanes of Route 128 in Burlington were closed due to flooding. There was also 6 inches of flooding across the all lanes of Route 128 near North Street in Reading.
No historic map-sheet match is published
for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs
a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
Browse the county's mapped places while that work is
pending.
From the nomination file
3,239 words on record
When this property was proposed for the
National Register, someone wrote the case for it: what the building is,
and why it matters. That document is a federal record in the public domain.
It is quoted below word for word, never summarised. The text was read off the scanned case file by machine, so the
occasional stray character is the recogniser's and the 1970s
typewriter's.
Description of the property
Hancock School is a free standing three-story block located at the northeast corner of Forest and Clark Streets southwest of Lexington Center. It is set in a predominantly residential area at the base of Belfry Hill. The main ornamental facade of Hancock School faces north towards Massachusetts Avenue and was originally designed to be seen by approaah from Clark Street which is now one-way onto Massa- ean orig at ty bisatd pupi lo aeri ving ay caras ato ao a adjacent to a long black-topped parking lot. Hancock School is set on a granite foundation and rises from a basic rectangular plan. Exterior materials include common bond red brick for the walls and painted wood and sandstone for trim. All window sash is painted wood.
Ornamental brick bond patterns accent the wall fabric around the entrance porches and windows and in decorative panels on the long elevations. The steeply pitched roof and dormers are entirely covered in gray slate and trimmed with copper as are the shed roofed entrance porches and porte-cochere. Iwo interior brick chimneys project through the roof. The facade of Hancock School is dominated by two large staircase towers, one round, the other square, which rise the height of the building and are topped by pointed roofs. Each adjoin a one-story entrance porch with arched brick windows and entrance- ways which are trimmed with sandstone and iron grillwork. Both towers contain small windows at ground level which are topped by a sandstone belt course.
Four rectangular windows, one with 1/4/2 sash and three with 4/8/2 sash, are located on the first story between the towers. They are surmounted by another sandstone belt course and four arched sandstone trimmed windows, one with 1/4/1 sash, and three with 15/8/2 sash.
/ARCHITECT Hartwell and Richardson Hancock School has been serving children in Lexington's primary and secondary grades longer than any extant educational building in the town. Architecturally, it is among Lexington's best examples of Romanesque Revival public buildings. The school was designed in 1890 by Henry Walder Hartwell (1813-1919) and William Cummings Richardson (1854-1935), prolific suburban architects in the Boston area whose popularity peaked in the 1880's and 1890's. Examples of their numerous works include: Boston's First Spiritual Temple (Exeter Street Theater, extant) Belmont Town Hall (extant), Boston's Normal Art School (demolished), and Acton Memorial Library (extant).
All of these buildings, like Hancock School, were built during the period of Henry Hobson Richardson's greatest influence. Hancock School, however, is among the firm's more eclectic interpretations of Romanesque Revival architecture as evidenced by the unusual ornamental masonry and the imagina- tive design of the facade. In addition it is one of the best preserved examples of the firm's school architecture in any greater Boston community.
Hancock School's original building committee stated: "Our aim has been, first of all, for utility, healthfulness, and convenience; at the same time we have not been unmindful that correct proportions and architectural taste not only have an educating influence upon boys and girls, but tend to elevate the tone of the whole community." The enduringly fine quality of the school's design and construction has lived up to the building committee's initial expectations, and continues to foster great admiration and devotion to the school by alumni and families whose children find fascination in its special ambience which is in all probability unique and irreplaceable.
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 75000261, 19 pages, held by the National Archives in Record
Group 79. See the
catalogue record.
Listed places nearby
6 within 8 miles
Other National Register properties close
enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both
positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties
to their map sheets.
Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Specimens. Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), https://www.gbif.org/. Only records licensed CC0 or CC BY are used. Records licensed CC BY-NC are excluded because this site carries advertising. Images are checked individually and any whose licence is non-commercial, no-derivatives or unreadable is refused.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.
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