Historic District Forms

In New Hampshire, state historic district forms use the same form as project area forms, but have additional requirements. In general, historic district forms are used when it appears that there is a contiguous concentration of historic properties, which taken as a whole possesses integrity and historical significance and which can be distinguished from surrounding properties by differences in density, scale, type, age, or style or by differences in patterns of development or association. The following are illustrative examples of these forms.

Percy Summer Club Historic District, Stark

The Percy Summer Club, founded as a fishing club in the 1880s, consists of a distinctive grouping of seven Queen Anne/Shingle style lodges set on an otherwise undeveloped lake in Stark. The privately owned lodges are located on a single Club-owned lot that entirely surrounds 200-acre Christine Lake. Although the Club’s focus shifted towards a more family orientation, in its consistent design vocabulary and early organizing principles it retained ties to its fishing club origins. In addition to significance for summer/vacation home tourism, architecture and landscape architecture, the Club also has historical significance for its members’ efforts to control access to Christine Lake which set in motion court cases that ultimately established public ownership of large waterbodies in New Hampshire. The form recommended additional research relating to National Register eligibility under Criterion B for the Club’s illustrious early members from New York and Washington, including George P. Rowell (advertising), Samuel Hay Kauffmann I (journalism), Ossian Ray (law/government) and Francis H. Leggett (commerce).

Dana Hill Agricultural District, New Hampton

The Dana Hill Agricultural District is a grouping of historic hill farms set on roughly 1000 acres of farm and forest land in New Hampton. One of the earliest neighborhoods in the town, the Dana Hill community was influenced and bound together by its topography, early community institutions including its meeting house and school, the continuing presence of generations of longstanding New Hampton farm families, and a concentration of farms that operated continuously for over two hundred years. Characterized by a mixture of open fields and forested land (including some sugar bushes) the district retains traditional large parcel agricultural uses and demonstrates evolving farming practices over its history including a move from general mixed subsistence farming to more specialized uses including dairy farming and maple syrup production. Many of the families that settled farms in the district were also instrumental in founding and supporting the First Free Will Baptist Church and in the construction of the National Register-listed Dana Meeting House which continues to be used by the community today. The district has significance for its strong collection of early buildings, including homes, barns and various agricultural structures, a number of which date from the earliest history of New Hampton.

Peterborough Downtown Historic District

A detailed Historic District Area Form and Determination of Eligibility for the National Register was prepared for the large Peterborough Downtown Commercial, Civic and Residential Historic District.  Individual inventory forms were completed for the Brick Block an early 1800s brick duplex, and theMainStreetBridgeover theContoocookRiver.

Bath Upper Village Historic District

The project area involves historic Route 302 in theAmmonoosucRiverValleyincluding the sensitive village centers of Upper and Lower Bath, andLisbon. Town Area Forms were written forBath, Landaff andLisbon. Determinations of National Register Eligibility were produced for eight historic districts, and approximately 150 individual buildings in the three towns.

Gonic Village, Rochester

This New England mill village developed around a water-powered woolen mill and included the large Gonic Manufacting Company complex, two dams associated with the company and the surrounding  village. Particularly interesting were the company’s efforts, over nearly 140 years, to wrest power from the Cocheco River by improvements in equipment and in manipulating the river --through damming, channeling, and otherwise moving the water of the river–in the quest to derive greater power to operate the mill.

Mill Hollow Historic District, Alstead

Following the devastating flooding of October 2005, properties along NH Route 123 in Alstead were evaluated.  An extensive Area Form was prepared for the Mill Hollow Historic District, a nineteenth-century mill village and early-twentieth-century summer home district.