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(This book, Beacon Hill A Living Portrait, was a topic of conversation last night at the annual meeting of the Friends of the Public Garden. It was highly recommended by someone whose opinion I respect. Since I'm already a fan of the writers and photographer, I can't wait to spend time in its pages.)
You'll find the purple tinted windows at 173 Commonwealth Avenue. While Beacon Hill is more noted for its purple windows, we did find this set in the Back Bay.
In 1879 architects Peabody and Stearns designed a more typical brownstone townhouse at this address. Then in 1917 the owner, J. Harleston Parker (a partner in the architectural firm Parker, Thomas, and Rice) undertook a major renovation of the building. On the application for a building permit the work was described as, "Present front of building to be removed and new one built; also portion of rear elevation removed and rebuilt." The estimated cost was recorded as $6,000.
Thank you to an "Attention to Detail" reader for supplying a copy of the building permit after he correctly identified the address. If you would like to research the city records on a property you can do it at www.cityofboston.gov/isd/building/docroom/.
Here's more information about Boston's purple windows from a couple of other sources.
From: Apple's America, by R.W. Apple Jr.
The whole area on and at the foot of Beacon Hill is packed with lovely, ruddy, brick townhouses, a few of them with purple windows that have changed color because of an excess of manganese oxide in the glass. The area is one of the nation's splendid architectural ensembles.
From: Book of Boston by Robert Shackleton
Here on Beacon Hill some of the houses have panes of purple glass in their windows, and one learns that this empurpling effect makes the house owners very proud indeed. It seems that quite a quantity of window glass was made which contained some unexpected material, just when some of the best houses hereabouts were building, and that it was used in these houses, and that in course of time and the action of the sunlight, the glass containing the unexpected substance turned purple and that purple it has ever since remained. Just why it should be a matter of special pride to have too much foreign substance in one's window glass it is hard for even the Bostonians to explain, for they realize that the houses are just as old, and would look just as old, without the purple panes; but none the less, to them it represents vitreous connection with a proud and precious past. As a matter of fact, a similar pride used to be felt by the owners of some old-time houses on Clinton Place and Irving Place in New York City, which also possessed purple panes. One wonders if there is some subtle and subconscious connection between the ideas of purple glass and blue blood; at any rate, the owners have all the sense of living in the purple.
