Longfellow National Historic Site

Longfellow National Historic Site 2010

http://www.nps.gov/long/

Located at 105 Brattle Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts, just outside of Harvard Square, this large yellow Georgian House is commemorated as a National Historic Site in honor of the poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The house is easily accessible on the Red Line, at the Harvard Square stop. Visitors should exit the MBTA from the Church Street exit, walk south to Brattle Street, take a right and walk four blacks (passing historic Radcliff yard and Harvard’s Education Schools along the way). Along the way are the Tory Row houses, which are marked with blue circular plaques telling about the Revolutionary significance of each site.

The Longfellow House is one of seven houses originally built on Kings Highways in the 1750s (today known as Brattle Street) and has been continuously occupied from 1759-1975 until it was donated to the National Park Service to become a historic site. Some of the prominent members to live in the house were: Tory John Vassal Jr, Commander of the Continental Army General George Washington, Apothecary General Andrew Craigie, and poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and family. Today the site honors both Washington and Longfellow in their tours of the home. Admission is $3 a person for everyone over the age of 15 and the house is open to the public May-October with 6 house tours a day (10:30 am, 11:30am, 1:00pm, 2:00 pm, 3:00 pm and 4:00pm). During the winter season the house is open to tours by reservation only.  About a mile past the house on the left at the intersections of Brattle and Mt Auburn Street is Mount Auburn Cemetery, which is the resting site for many famous 19^th century people, including Mr. Longfellow. (http://www.mountauburn.org/)

The tours of the Longfellow house last about 45 minutes and are led by park rangers who are passionate and animated by the subjects of their house. The tour I took was with a male ranger whose passion leaned towards literary history. He quoted 5 different Longfellow poems, some of which were recognizable, such as The Children’s Hour and Paul Revere’s Ride, and others not, like The Cross of Snow. (To read these poems check out: http://www.poemhunter.com/henry-wadsworth-longfellow/) Much of the tour focused on Longfellow, his friends, and his literary career as I was guided through the house room by room. Because the ranger was so passionate while he spoke I became absorbed in the story he was telling about the Longfellow’s and time sped by, it had not felt like I was in the house for close to an hour.

What I particularly enjoyed about the tour was that it made the people of the past some alive. Everything in the house is original to the Longfellow family, so it was easy to imaging the family moving through the rooms as the ranger told stories. I also appreciated that when he was asked a question to which he didn’t know the answer, the ranger was not ashamed to admit he didn’t know and would always offer to help find the answer at the end of the tour. The rangers never tried to make up answers, which is something I am generally weary of when taking tours of historic site, many guides do not know the surrounding history and often make up myths such as “they were just shorter back then” in order to explain why beds are so short. This myth is untrue, to see more on this check out: http://historymyths.wordpress.com/2010/06/19/myth-8-beds-were-shorter-back-then-because-people-were-shorter/

A few frustrating things about the house are: you cannot just walk through the house on your own, you must leave your bags outside the historic house in the visitor center (in a locked closet), and the upstairs is not accessible for people with a mobility handicap. I understand why visitors cannot bring bags into the house or wander around on their own, they have to preserve the collection, but it is a bit nerve wracking to have to leave personal items such as purses in a location away yourself, especially for those visitors who are tourists and nervous about being in a city.

The house does not incorporate any new media. A suggestion I would make, since the second floor of the house is not handicap accessible (apparently it doesn’t have to be according to ADA standards of historic house preservation: http://www.access-board.gov/adaag/html/adaag.htm#4.1.7) it would great if there was some sort of movie, slideshow, or touch screen with images of the interior of the rooms or close ups of some of the more interesting objects. This would allow visitors who are unable to access these spaces to still see what the house has to offer. Another way the Longfellow house could incorporate media would be to provide some sort of image progression of the house as it altered throughout its stages, again something as simple as a screen with rotating images could be very useful in this regard.

Despite a few inconveniences the tour is well worth the cost and travel time. If you are around Harvard Yard be sure to stop in!

Daguerreotype: Thomas G. Appleton, John G. Cosler, Julie Ward Howe, Fanny Appleton Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Horatia L. Freeman; 1852, Newport, Rhode Island. Object owned by the Longfellow National Historic Site