Photographs from the nomination case file, National Park Service records.
Greek Orthodox Church
Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1983. 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
“Amos Bobbins was born in West Cambridge (now Arlington), Massachusetts, December 28,1817, and received a limited education in the public schools of the time and locality. At the age of fourteen he became a poultry buyer and dresser for his brother Nathan, who had been for some time established in Faneuil Hall Market in Boston.”
History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men (1890). Machine-read text.
one of 1100 National Register listings in Middlesex County · listed in 1983 · category: Building · one of 3 National Historic Landmarks in Middlesex County.
National Register reference number.83000805- 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 Arlington town, The inset identifies its exact
source book and publication year.
The command of the party of exempts is variously attributed to Pavid Lams on, a private soldier from Cambridge during the French War (see Paige, 405, note),* and to Phillips Payson, A.M., pastor of a church in Chelsea [H. U. 1754, D.D. &c.], both of whom were probably present. Bancroft says two wagons sent out to the troops with supplies were waylaid and captured by Payson, the minister of Chelsea.' Gordon, Hist.
Particulars relating to the later years of the towns of West Cambridge and Arlington may not be so full, in certain respects, as some readers might wish ; but the comparative unimportance of the events of recent times in the place, and the increased accessibility of modern local records, are ^considered a suflScient explanation for any such apparent neglect.
In 1655 John Fownell sold to Henry Dunster, thirteen acres of the above laud in Charlestovvn, which he recovered by law, as we have already stated; being a portion of that land, which certain inhabitants of Charlestown, in 164G, gi-anted to Mr. Henry Dunster, President of the College, in Winottamy or Menotomy Field - Cambridge bounds one side, and Mystic Pond and River and Menotomy Brook the other sides. - Midd. Registry, i. 104, 5. This property is now included in the town of Arlington. The present Mystic street' is very near the former Charlestown line, which formed the eastern (or northern) boundary of Cooke's twenty acres, 1G42-1652. See Wyman's Clis. 312.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 68 fires within 5 miles of Greek Orthodox Church between
2015 and 2020, burning about 97 acres in total. None started naturally. 28 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
28
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
14
Debris and open burning
12
Recreation and ceremony
10
Smoking
2
Misuse of fire by a minor
2
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 1,918 specimens
collected within 10 miles of Greek Orthodox Church between 1898 and
1975: 846 Animalia, 585 Plantae, 419 Fungi, 30 Protozoa, 17 Bacteria, 12 Chromista, 9 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
14 workings within 5 miles of Greek Orthodox Church: 6 plants, 6 past producers, 2 producers.
8 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Iron, Lead, Peat. 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
Arlington, the town this property stands in, in 11 storm reports between 1998 and 2022: 7 thunderstorm wind, 2 hail, 1 flash flood, 1 flood.
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.
A microburst occurred in Arlington, downing numerous trees. Most of these trees were downed in an approximately 1 square mile section of eastern Arlington, between the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Broadway and Route 16 around the Cambridge/Arlington line. Numerous houses and vehicles were damaged by downed trees. Traffic signals and street lights were also damaged or downed by falling trees/wind.
Several trees and branches were downed at the corner of Washington and Arnold by thunderstorm winds. A tree was downed onto a car on Howard Street. A large branch on Dudley Street was downed onto wires.
In Arlington, a tree fell into a house on Hamlet Street. A tree was down on Quincy Street. |A tree was down on Allen Street near Broadway. A tree and wires were down on Sunnyside Avenue. A tree limb fell into the side of a house on Davis Avenue.
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
2,734 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
The St. Athanasius The Great, Greek Orthodox Church is located on Massachusetts Avenue, a major thoroughfare, in the center of the town of Arlington, Massachusetts. When originally constructed in 1841 for the First Universalist Church of Arlington the wood-frame building was a modest box-like structure, 56' x 46', designed in the Greek Revival style and painted white. Unencumbered by neighboring structures, the church was visible from all sides. Early views show a row of mature elm and maple trees lining Massachusetts Ave. The trees are long since gone and later 19th century infill construction adjacent to the church now focus emphasis on the main facade.
The present elaborate Romanesque Revival appearance of the church is the result of alterations made in 1860 after the designs of Boston 'area arch- itect, Thomas W. Silloway. Revovations included replacement of the of original simple tower with an ornate three stage tower and 90' high spire: - relocation of the structure back from Massachusetts Avenue on its lot and addition of a six foot high raised basement and the present two stage projecting frontispiece. Due to structural damage incurred in the 1938 hurricane the spire portion of the tower was subsequently removed and the present seven foot high dome constructed. The remainder of the tower's ornamentation, however, remains intact.
The main body of the church is rectangular in plan, 4-bays wide on its side elevations, rises 2-stories from its raised basement with horizontal sheathing at the basement level and clapboards above. Architectural detailing includes a full entablature with dentils, channelled corner pilasters (original) and drip hood mouldings and bracketted sills at 11 andoarip hod the windows (1860 additions). A low gable roof covers the building.
/Architect Thomas W.Silloway(1860 alterations) 1860 altered construction Statement of Significance (in one paragraph) The SaintAthanasiusThe Great Greek Orthodox Church possesses integrity of location, materials, workmanship, association and desian since 1860. Although moved in 1860, it was simply relocated back several yards from Massachusetts Avenue on its original lot. It stands as an unusual and outstanding local example of Romanesque Revival architectural design and continues to reflect its long association with the historical development of Arlington. Thus the Greek Orthodox Church meets criteria A and C of the National Register of Historic Places. Conformity in religious matters was demanded of the earliest settlers in Menotomy (later West Cambridge and now current day Arlington).
Any "free man" must have been "an orthodox member of the church, at least 20 years old, worth L200, and taken an oath to be a true and faithful subject and yield assistance and support to the church and the Commonwealth". betncen 166 an9 1750, For a full 150 years, between 1630 and 1780, the"First Parish" was the only recognized, legally santioned congregation in Arlington. Until, 1732 the house of worship itself was in present day Harvard Square. That year, after over a decade of petitions, Menotomy was granted its own"2nd Precinct" parish, which in its turn usurped the fielty of all residents of the Village who were compelled to attend worship service except for "just cause".
The first church structure in Arlington was constructed by the residents of Menotomy and first opened for services in February of 1735. It measured 36' x 46' and contained 18 pews. and prestige within the Village, contributions to the minister's annual stipend, and "age and honor" in that order. The 2nd Precinct Parish was formally organized in 1739 and the Reverend Sanuel Cooke of Cambridge was installed as minister.
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 83000805, 15 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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