21 Carruth Street - Dorchester Atheneum

No. 20274 21 Carruth Street, photograph March 31, 2020.

No. 6005 21 Carruth Street, photograph April 16, 2005.

Date of construction: 1885 – building permit cited by Tucci in the appendix to The Second Settlement; the owner and builder is listed as C. Leake. The actual owner was Joseph W. Swan, and the Boston Directory shows Swan living at this property by 1886.

Architect: – C. S. Clark or E. S. Clark cited by Shand Tucci in Second Settlement as E. S. Clark

Style: Queen Anne

Although referred to as the oldest house on the street, that honor may actually go to 40 Carruth Street, built in 1884.

Tucci, Douglass Shand. Second Settlement: A Case Study in the Development of Victorian Boston. 1974. Although this book is about Jones Hill, the appendix has a list of properties built in the 1880s and 1890s.

Building Permit.821:1885 Clark, (E.S.) 21 Carruth, builder C. Leake Owner: C. Leake

The following is from Ashmont: An Historical Guide to Peabody Square, Caruth’s Hill, and Ashmont Hill and the Architecture of Edwin J. Lewis, Jr. and John A. Fox. By Paul Douglass Shand-Tucci. Dorchester, Dorchester Historical Society, 1991. p. 61

Whereas mid-Carruth is magnificently preserved in all its splendors, the next block of Carruth, after Rowena, is instead very much a cautionary tale; this part of the street has been wounded by inept alteration of several houses and the loss of a building, thus raising the whole vexing question of historical preservation–starkly so in the case of the Swan House, 21 Carruth, at Carruth and Rowena. The oldest house now standing on the street, built in 1885 to the design of C. S. Clark for Joseph Sawn, an official of the City of Boston Water Board, 21 Carruth has been disfigured by artificial siding that has completely overturned the original fenestration and made of it what Robert Severy calls a “beer can.”

The following is from the Area Form for Carruth Street/Peabody Square prepared as part of 1994 Survey of Dorchester, Boston Landmarks Commission.

Built in 1885, 21 Carruth Street is the oldest house now standing on the street. Designed by C.S. Clark, its original owner was Joseph Swan, an official of the City of Boston water board.

The following is from the Dorchester Historical Society’s Dorchester House Tour Ashmont/Carruth Street Neighborhood, June 11, 2017

Year built: 1885

Architect: C. S. Clark

Style: Queen Anne

21 Carruth was built for Joseph Swan, an official of the Boston Water Board. Its location near the top of the hill gives this house a presence enjoyed by few others on this street of remarkable homes. The recent removal of vinyl siding, as part of an extensive rehabilitation, revealed many elements that place it firmly in the Queen Anne style, including asymmetrical massing and picturesque elements.

On the south facade, the three-story gabled bay and second-floor oriel provide great visual interest. Other decorative features include brackets on the bay and dormers, and medallions on the barge boards of the gable and dormers. The only original windows, in both dormers and in the stair hall window, exhibit the divided lights characteristic of Queen Anne. The contrasting exterior cladding materials, also typically Queen Anne, include wood clapboards, a flared band of half-round shingles, and decorative cut shingles in various patterns.

Architectural elements lost in the earlier “remuddling” have been reinstated: new double-hung windows replace the casement windows that had severely marred the house’s architectural integrity, and the wraparound porch has been restored. A playfully bright paint scheme based on historic precedents celebrates the release of this wonderful house from its plastic prison.

Renovations to the interior were nearly as dramatic. Conversion to a two-family in the 1950s had radically altered the original floor plan: in turning it back to a single-family, the owners both restored and reconfigured spaces to suit their needs and taste. The living room greatly benefits from its four large new window, which replace their cut-down predecessors. The foyer’s double doors, salvaged from another building, complement the original balustrade and stained glass windows. The rear of the first floor has been opened up to create a sleek, modern kitchen, where a bank of window lights the main work area and island. (The house predated Carruth’s prohibition against horses, hence the carriage house in the back yard.) On the second floor, the owners converted the space back to bedrooms, but at the same time created a quirky stairwelll with surprisingly-placed interior window and playful light fixtures.

For years this house was a poster child of insensitive alterations. The owners have restored the exterior with integrity while freely modifying the interior to suit a busy 1st-century family wiath a modernist sensibility.

entry for Carruth Street in

A Record of the Streets, Alleys, Places, Etc., in the City of Boston. (Boston, 1910).

Carruth Street, Dor., 1869; from 239 Ashmont Street to 412 Codman Street [now Gallivan Boulevard]; laid out, Aug. 12, 1869. Plan in Boston Engineering Department L976.

Deeds

Nov. 1, 1884 from Mary A. McTigh to Joseph W. Swan Book 1657 p 227 Carruth & Fuller Sts. parcel of land

August 11, 1883 from Ezekiel S. Johnson to Mary A McTighe 1610.436

lot of land

Owners’ names from Bromley atlases

1884 plate K

owner of vacant land is E. S. Johnson

1889 plate 25

Jos. W. Swan, lot size is 7,357 sq ft, outbuilding in back of house

1894 plate 28