Historic Structure Report: Joshua Brooks Jr. House

Phillips, Maureen

Minute Man National Historical Park protects 970 acres in and around the Massachusetts towns of Lexington, Lincoln, and Concord, commemorating the opening battle in the American Revolutionary War. The Joshua Brooks Jr. house is located in Lincoln, Massachusetts, and is part of the Minute Man National Historical Park (MIMA NHP). Deacon Joshua Brooks built the house circa 1780 for his son Joshua Brooks Jr. who was a minute man at the battle of the North Bridge in Concord in 1775. Current treatment proposals are exploring the possibility of adapting the Joshua Brooks Jr. house, as well as the nearby Samuel Brooks house and buildings on the Noah Brooks tavern site, to lodging and/or dining facilities. These proposals would require significant alterations that may have an adverse effect on the integrity of the structures. Little developmental history of the structures exists that would inform the proposed management objectives, necessitating an evaluation of the historical and physical evolution and identifying character-defining features for each. Of the structures, the Samuel Brooks house has had the most scrutiny, although some research was conducted on the Joshua Brooks house in connection with a brief historic structure report that was written for the structure in the early 1960s. Thus, the most intensive investigative efforts for this project were directed towards the Noah Brooks tavern site; a somewhat less intensive level of documentation and investigation of the Joshua Brooks house was conducted for this report. This draft historic structure report for the Joshua Brooks Jr. house is an abbreviated Level II report. It was prepared for MIMA NHP by the Building Conservation Branch (BCB) of the National Park Service's Northeast Cultural Resources Center. Preparation for this report involved historical and archival research and physical and photographic documentation of the house. The research and documentation was conducted by BCB Architectural Conservator Maureen K. Phillips, who also wrote the report. Physical investigation of the structural evolution of the house was conducted by Maureen K. Phillips and BCB Preservation Specialist Jeff Finch. xii

Historic Structure Report: Joshua Brooks Jr. House

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