Hadley foundation wants $150K in CPA money for Phelps farmhouse fixes →

HADLEY — An initial phase of stabilizing the early 19th-century Phelps Farm, a farmhouse that became part of the Porter-Phelps-Huntington House Museum in 2022, could depend on support from the town’s Community Preservation Act account.

The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Foundation made a request last month for $150,000 in CPA money to supplement $106,000 it has already invested in repairs to the 1816 building, vacant since 1988.

“Despite the condition, the house is really this rare, intact example of this early New England domestic architecture,” Brian Whetstone, a public historian who serves on the foundation’s stabilization committee, told the CPA Committee in mid-February.

In the past 18 months, the farmhouse, built by Charles (Moses) Porter Phelps across River Drive from his childhood home, has been cleared of junk and debris, Whetstone said. The work has also included enhancing ventilation by clearing brush and trees, dismantling a chimney and addressing the dilapidated roof.

“The biggest and most exciting is completion of a temporary structure to cover the collapsing and really compromised portion of the working ell,” Whetstone said.

Using a report from MCWB Architects of Albany, New York, the CPA money would go toward about $250,000 in critical priorities, including roof stabilization, structural reinforcement in the basement and abatement of mold.

“Obviously additional sources of funding are needed to continue working toward completion of the first phase of stabilization,” Whetstone said.

Whetstone said the hope is to have most of the work completed over the summer and early fall. “Our intention is to have the property adequately secured for visitors in time for the museum’s 75th anniversary celebrations in the fall of 2024,” Whetstone said.

The request comes as the 114 acres and more than 20 historic buildings last year became the “Forty Acres and Its Skirts” National Historic District, under the purview of the National Park Service, allowing the foundation to develop new research on what makes the site so significant to Hadley and the region, such as its links to Asher Benjamin, an architect in Valley and Boston who published pattern books to popularize Federal style architecture.

Karen Sanchez-Eppler, the president of the board, said that Phelps Farm was donated as land and falling down buildings, in hopes that the foundation would preserve the farmhouse. The eventual plan is to unite the Route 47 sites and have a detailed history of farming in Hadley going from the 1750s to the 1970s.

A historic structures report is likely to be done in the spring as a step toward putting an historic preservation restriction on the property.

“We do feel confident if we can shore up the basement and cover the roof, that it will have enough stability that we can responsibly put on a historic preservation,” Sanchez-Eppler said.

Though no vote was taken, CPA members appeared favorable to the request. There is currently $3.03 million in the CPA account, of which $2.35 million is available for projects.

“I think that it’s a great use of CPA funds,” said Chairwoman Mary Thayer, adding that Porter-Phelps-Huntington is a respected organization in town. “I think it will be nice to have this additional space, this event space, for gathering.”

“I love the architectural history of it,” said committee member Mark Dunn said.

“Having driven by it for a couple of decades anyway, I’ve always been intrigued by that place and that property, and it’s good to see there’s an historic effort going into saving that building,” said committee member Andy Klepacki.

“This is what CPA was made for, because otherwise there’s no money to do projects like this, and the history is just lost,” said committee member Andy Morris-Friedman.

For Barbara Mathews, a public historian who lives in Hadley, there are few houses with the degree of historic integrity left inside, including the technology of kitchens and other spaces that make a house function, preserved since no one ever brought them up to date. “This is a very rare survival,” Mathews said.

Sanchez-Eppler said papers rescued from Phelps Farm have extremely detailed labor history of those who worked there, many related to families who still live in town.

Whetstone said the foundation hopes to have Hadley residents involved in the farmhouse’s future in much the same way Historic Northampton did last year when residents were invited to help move and rehabilitate an 1805 barn.

“In these ways the process of rehabilitating Phelps Farm can really help strengthen community commitment to and understanding of the value of preservation in a town like Hadley, so the farmhouse then will become a really important keystone in that process,” Whetstone said.

Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.