Houses of the period following the gambrel-roofed type were in shape commonly either square or rectangular. Almost always the third-story windows were nearly square, as compared with the taller ones of the first and second floors—an architectural device by means of which the building appeared lower than it actually was. This was called ‘foreshortening.’ The severity of outline presented by these simple structures was relieved by various devices—sometimes by quoined corner-boards, an ornamental cornice, a balustraded roof, or decorative lintels above the windows; very rarely by rusticated front-boards in imitation of stone blocks. The chief glory of the house as one viewed it from the outside was of necessity the entrance, with its porch, open or enclosed; and it was hither that the loving attention of architect and wood-carver was most assiduously directed.
The Stearns house, built in 1776, stands at 384 Essex Street, and presents a notable example of the Revolutionary style.
As was very often the case with Salem houses, the plain character of the original structure of the Stearns homestead was later relieved by the addition of a porch of most artistic design, again from the hand of Samuel McIntire, regarding whom one is continually led to wonder that in the short period of his activity he could achieve so much. This new porch was put in place in 1785, and is of especial dignity due to the use of flanking pilasters in addition to the engaged columns at the rear of the structure. The order is Doric and the effect is one of strength and permanence.
At the North Bridge affair in February, 1775, when Colonel Leslie’s troops met armed resistance from the Salem citizens, one of the leading spirits on the patriot side was ‘Major’ Joseph Sprague. It was for him that this house was erected, later passing into the hands of the Stearns family, connections of the Major by marriage. Colonel Sprague, as he later became, died in 1808, since which time this has been known as the Stearns house.
The Timothy Orne House
Belonging to the same period as the Stearns house, but a few years earlier in origin, having been built in 1761, the Timothy Orne house at 266 Essex Street makes a somewhat more painstaking attempt at decoration than most of those of the time.
It has balustraded roof, quoined corners, and ornamental cornice; its chimney-stacks taper at the top; while the handsome porch presents a center toward which the eye naturally reverts as the keynote of the whole.
The activities of the Committee of Safety just prior to the Revolution are well-known, as is the fate which commonly befell those persons who were suspected of Royalist leanings. Tarring and feathering was the usual method of exhibiting patriotic distaste for such proclivities; and Timothy Orne, owner of the house in question, seems to have fallen under the ban, inasmuch as some old-time correspondence relates that he narrowly escaped this humiliating ordeal, being released on condition of good behavior.
The Orne house possessed a ‘decked’ roof—the original purpose of which was to afford the Salem merchant an elevated platform from which through his glass he might scan the horizon for his incoming ships. This type of roof is found upon many of the houses of that period. The ‘belvedere,’ a small balustraded platform at the center of the roof at the summit, was a variation of the cupola idea, both of these as found upon Salem houses having their origin in utility—a lookout-place rather than an architectural feature. Nevertheless, as on the Baldwin-Lyman and Pickman-Shreve-Little houses and others, a gratifying decorative effect was secured.