Photographs from the nomination case file, National Park Service records.
Colburn, Sarah Foster, House
Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1982. 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
“Richard Henry (1787-1879) was the author, poet and essayist. He was one of the founders of the North American Review.”
A History of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1630-1913 (1913). Machine-read text.
one of 1100 National Register listings in Middlesex County · listed in 1982 · category: Building · one of 3 National Historic Landmarks in Middlesex County.
National Register reference number.82004968- 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.
In October, 1660, the County Court ordered, that the House of Correction, or Bridewell, should be used as a prison for the County, until further provision be made. Such provision was made by the erection of a jail l before Aug. 26, 1692, when it was ordered by the Court, " that the County Treasurer take care that their majesties Goal at Cambridge be repaired, for the comfortable being of what persons may be committed forthwith." 2 It was also ordered, Dec. 14, 1703, " that an addition be made to the prison at the west end thereof, of eighteen foot square, with studs conformable to the old house." A dozen years later, the old part of the prison became so unsatisfactory, that the Court appointed " a committee to agree with carpenters and other workmen to erect and build a good well-timbered house in Cambridge for a Prison, for the accommodation of a keeper, to be thirty-six foot long, and for width agreeable to the foundation of the old Goal or Prison, two storeys high, fifteen foot stud, with a stack of chyrnneys in the middle, to be done and finished workmanlike, as soon as may be conveniently effected Further
Until 1720, the " Common " extended to Linnaean Street, and included also a few acres, lying in a nearly square form, at the northwesterly corner of Linnaean Street and North Avenue.1 This extreme point of the Common was set apart as a " Place of Execution," or " Gallows Lot," as it was more familiarly called. And after the Common was reduced to its present size, and the lots in this square fronting on the streets, had been granted to individuals, about one acre in its extreme northwesterly corner was reserved for its former use, until trials, and imprisonments, and executions were transferred to East Cambridge.2 It was entered from North Avenue through a bridleway or passage, between Lancaster Place and Arlington Street, now called Stone Court.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 61 fires within 5 miles of Colburn, Sarah Foster, House between
2015 and 2020, burning about 102 acres in total. None started naturally. 24 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
Arson/incendiarism
24
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
15
Debris and open burning
9
Recreation and ceremony
6
Smoking
5
Equipment and vehicle use
1
Misuse of fire by a minor
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 2,063 specimens
collected within 10 miles of Colburn, Sarah Foster, House between 1898 and
1975: 891 Animalia, 649 Plantae, 459 Fungi, 27 Protozoa, 17 Bacteria, 12 Chromista, 8 Unrecorded. 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
12 workings within 5 miles of Colburn, Sarah Foster, House: 10 plants, 2 past producers.
10 still produce. What was taken out: Iron, Lead, Tantalum, Niobium (Columbium). 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
Cambridge, the town this property stands in, in 16 storm reports between 2006 and 2023: 7 thunderstorm wind, 3 flood, 3 flash flood, 2 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.
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
2,172 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
Built in 1841, the Sarah Foster Colburn House is an unusual 2½ story frameresidence combining both Greek Revival and Gothic features. The steeply gabled facade most clearly demonstrates the skillful blending of the two styles. Here five unevenly spaced fluted columns with stylized Doric capitals support a narrow unadorned frieze and a deeply projecting gable pierced by wide pointed arch openings. A narrow lancet window filling the gable peak adds to the Gothic quality of the upper facade. This unusual configuration of deeply overhanging gable, Gothic lancets, and Greek Revival columns is related to a rare house type found in the Connecticut River Valley, but is unique in Cambridge.
Contrasting to the basic simplicity of the house are the dec- orative acorn pattern bargeboards along the widely projecting eaves of the front gable and the unusually elaborate cast iron railings which fill the space above the columns with a lacy floral pattern. The bargeboard trim is repeated on a narrow gable on the northern facade. The main entrance is recessed behind narrowly spaced columns and is balanced by a bay window on the southern facade. To the rear is a simple two- story clapboarded ell with a separate entrance which was rebuilt after a 1934 fire. Except for its conversion to four apartments in 1927, the house remains remarkable intact.
FHR-8-300A (11/78) UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR HERITAGE CONSERVATION AND RECREATION SERVICE NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES INVENTORY -- NOMINATION FORM FOR HCRS USE ONLY RECEIVED MAY 1 3 1980 DATE ENTERED CONTI NUATION SHEET ITEM NUMBER 6 PAGE Title: Historic American Buildings Survey Date: 1964 (Federal) Depository for survey records: Library of Congress City: Washington 8
Statement of significance
/ÄRETEEKX Nathaniel A. Virgin The Sarah Foster Colburn House possess integrity of location, design, setting, materials and workmanship and is significant both for its style and location. A unique Cambridge example of a rare Connecticut River Valley style combining Gothic and Greek Revival elements, 7 Dana Street is part of the mid-nineteenth century suburban development of Dana Hill. The neighborhood was planned by a local specula- tor, Isaac Livermore, after Judge Francis Dana's mansion on the hill was destroyed by fire in 1839 and the land sold. Built in 1841 by housewright Nathaniel A. Virgin, 7 Dana was purchased by Livermore's niece, Sarah Foster Colburn, in 1842.
was born in New Hampshire in 1814 and served an apprenticeship in the Connec- ticut River Valley in the 1830's before coming to Cambridge. His familiarity with Connecticut River Valley architecture no doubt explains the unusualsytle of 7 Dana Street. Virgin's only other known work in Cambridge was an 1838 house combining Italianate and Greek Revival details, which has been demolished.
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 82004968, 18 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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