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Our largest project to date, the Lawrence-

Blake Homestead sits on the Nissitissit River

in Pepperell, Massachusetts. In the mid

1700s, the river was dammed and the town

grist mill was built over a granite sluice. A

stone and brick ice house was carved into a

small hill by the millpond, and a circular drive

allowed wagons to pull up to the mill, unload

grain or pick up flour and ice. Over the next

century, the mill complex was expanded, and

a two-over-two cape was built by David Wright

and expanded by the Lawrence family, incorporating the ice house. Around the 1830s, the Lawrences sold the property to Lemuel Ward Blake, whose sons became the town machinists. The Blake Brothers developed and patented an efficient mill wheel that they sold to other grist mills in Massachusetts, including the Faulkner Mill in Acton Center, which is still operated today by Erikson Grain Mills as a feed store.

Read more about Iron Work Farm and the Faulkner Mill here:

http://www.ironworkfarm.org/mill_corner1.htm

Quite prosperous, Lemuel Blake continued to expand the cape until his death in 1864, adding a keeping room, a birthing room, two second floor bedrooms, and raising the roof to create a third floor with three more bedrooms. A small barn was attached to the keeping room to serve as a kitchen, and the original cooking fireplace in the oldest parlor of the house was encased in brick and fronted by a smaller, more attractive heating fireplace. The extensive renovations included new plaster walls and the hiring of an itinerant painter, Moses Eaton, to decorate the walls with brightly colored stencil patterns on background washes of yellow and rose.

Moses Eaton was a student of mural painter Rufus Porter, and several of his stenciled works are still extant in historic homes throughout New England. Historic New England (formerly SPNEA) has Eaton’s stencil kit and brushes in their collection, and graciously allowed us to view them. What a thrill to see the tools of the artist, after so many years!

You can link to Historic New England here: http://www.historicnewengland.org/collections-archives-exhibitions/collections-access/collection-object/capobject?gusn=GUSN-26829&searchterm=moses%20eaton

Of course, we couldn’t bear to take down the house without trying to preserve the stenciled walls, so we identified the best ones--and after much struggle, we were able to remove wall sections, complete with studs and lath. The full story of the stencil removal, with photos and video of the arduous process, is coming soon.

By the late 1800s, the Blake Brothers Mill was thriving, and boasted the house and barn, grist mill, machine shop and granary. Pepperell depended on the churning waters of the Nissitissit River, not only for the grain mill but also for power to run the Pepperell Paper Company further downstream. In 1917-18, a hydroelectric plant was built in downtown Pepperell to supply electricity to the paper mill, which operated until 2002. After much town-wide discussion, the paper mill buildings were taken down in July and August 2011, and the town hopes to open the area to multi-use commercial development.

Back to nature

With the passing of the Lawrence-Blake Homestead’s last owner, Mildred Turner, the land was acquired by the Massachusetts Department of Fish and Game. Since Fish and Game’s charter does not include the maintenance of buildings, it partnered with the Nissitissit River Land Trust to have the house and barn taken down. Recognizing that the buildings had historic value and were still in excellent condition, NRLT called in The Restored Homestead to dismantle them and take them away. We are so grateful to be the alternative to the wrecking ball! We began dismantling the barn in February, followed by the house, and expect to finish toward the end of June. All the salvageable parts of the house and barn--brick, sheathing, floorboards, windows, hardware, doors, etc.--are being taken to Ashby, Massachusetts, where they will be rebuilt. Now that the buildings are gone and the foundations are filled in, the 17 acres of land along the Nissitissit River will be allowed to return to its natural state. Eventually, the Army Corps of Engineers will be called in to assess the removal of the dam, and the impact that would have downstream.

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