Broadway Winter Hill Congregational Church

Broadway Winter Hill Congregational Church
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
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Location	404 Broadway, Somerville, Massachusetts
Coordinates	42°23′43″N 71°5′57″W / 42.39528°N 71.09917°W / 42.39528; -71.09917Coordinates: 42°23′43″N 71°5′57″W / 42.39528°N 71.09917°W / 42.39528; -71.09917
Area	less than one acre
Built	1890 (1890)
Architect	Hartwell and Richardson
Architectural style	Shingle Style
MPS	Somerville MPS
NRHP reference No.	89001238[1]
Added to NRHP	September 18, 1989

The Broadway Winter Hill Congregational Church is a historic church building at 404 Broadway in Somerville, Massachusetts. Built in 1890-91 to a design by Hartwell and Richardson for a Congregationalist congregation founded in 1865, it is one of the city's only examples of Shingle style architecture, and one of its finer architect-designed buildings from the 19th century. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1989.^[1] It is now home to the Vida Real Church.

Description and history[]

The Broadway Winter Hill Congregational Church stands near the summit of Winter Hill, at the southwest corner of Broadway and Central Street. It is a wood frame structure, with a gable roof set perpendicular to Broadway. Its exterior is finished in a combination of stone on the ground floor, and shingles on the upper sections. The main gable has a slightly projecting peak section, above a grouping of three stained glass windows topped by transom-like fixed panes. Projecting forward from the gables left end is a circular two-story turret with a conical roof. Projecting left toward Central Street is a tall square tower, whose front houses the main entrance under a shed-roof portico. The tower is somewhat medieval in appearance, with small windows in its stone lower section. The stone section is topped by a wood-frame louvered belfry, the openings adorned by Stick style woodwork. The tower is capped by a pyramidal roof with flared modillioned eave.

Congregational church activity began in the Winter Hill area as a Sunday School in 1863, and was formally organized as a congregation two year later. The congregation split over doctrinal issues in 1881, with the Winter Hill Congregational Society building this structure in 1890-91, having used an older Carpenter Gothic church before then. It was designed by Hartwell and Richardson, and is one of only a few institutional Shingle style buildings in the city.^[2]

See also[]

• Downer Rowhouses, next to the church on Central Street
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Somerville, Massachusetts

References[]

External links[]

• Vida Real Internacional