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The West Barnstable Village—Meetinghouse Way Historic District is a historic district on Meetinghouse Way from County Rd. to Meetinghouse Road in Barnstable, Massachusetts. The district encompasses the historic heart of the village of West Barnstable. This is a roughly linear district, including all of the properties along Meetinghouse Way between County Road and the 1717 West Parish Meetinghouse, which is the district's most prominent building. Most of the houses in the district were built in the 18th and early 19th centuries, and are thus predominantly in Georgian, Federal, and Greek Revival styles. Later buildings include the First Selectmen's Office (1889), elementary school (1903), and railroad station (1910).〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=MACRIS inventory record for West Barnstable Village-Meetinghouse Way Historic District )〕 The area was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.〔 ==Timeline of West Parish Meetinghouse== 1712 – By 1712, the Barnstable settlement had grown so large, that the main concern of the annual Town Meeting for several years was the division of the town into two parishes and the building of two Meetinghouses. 1715 – A piece of high ground on the land of John Crocker was chosen as the site for the West Parish Meetinghouse. A proprietors meeting was held on April 11, 1715 and Colonel James Otis was the Moderator. Town land was traded, laying out 4 acres – three acres for public use (now the Town green below the Meetinghouse) and an additional acre for where the Meetinghouse would be erected. 1717 – The town of Barnstable officially voted to divide into an East and a West Parish. The present villages of Osterville and Cotuit were in the West Parish and the villages of Centerville and Hyannis were designated to be in the East Parish. According to records, an order for two precincts was passed on February 7, 1718 and appears in Province Laws, Volume 1X, page 575. 1717 – Construction begins on the West Parish Meetinghouse. Records are largely silent on who actually built it or how but the village craftsmen created a structure that later generations of architects and builders continue to marvel at. Nearby great oaks and pines were felled by hand; pine beams, posts and planks were sawed and trimmed over a saw pit dug at the building site; 12 inch square pine timbers were hewn with adzes and raised 48 feet into the air; oak roof buttresses were curved like a ship’s frame by hanging them with weights at either end for a year; chamfering, beading and woodworking on the high pulpit and sounding board, panels and sheep pen pews were all done skillfully with simple tools… 1719 – Construction took two years to complete and the first service of worship in the West Parish Meetinghouse was held on Thanksgiving Day, 1719. Now completed, the 1717 Meetinghouse not only became the permanent home of the church that gathered 103 years before in England but for the next 130 years was also to be the scene of Barnstable town meetings reflecting the close union of State and Congregational church that existed in early Massachusetts. As years progressed, the Meetinghouse would house the village public school. 1723 - Even after only 4 years, the Meetinghouse was deemed too small for its growing congregation and for its secular purposes so was cut in half, the ends pulled apart adding 18 feet of length in the middle. A ceiling exposing only the bottoms of the beams of the Meetinghouse was installed at the same time. A bell tower, one of the earliest in New England was erected. The gilded cock, ordered from England as a weathervane for the Meetinghouse, measures 5 feet, 5 inches from the bill to the tip of the tail and this same “Rooster” crowns the tower today. 1717 thru 1775 - Historians have researched that fifteen years before George Washington was born, the men of Barnstable debated town affairs in the 1717 Meetinghouse. Men who came back from the French and Indian wars recounted their battles. Tories and Patriots argued bitterly. Stormy town meetings, particularly during the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 periods, would often necessitate major repairs to the 1717 Meetinghouse interior as receipts for repairs found years later in records indicated. If these walls could talk….what we could learn about the people who lived in this community, worshiped at the Meetinghouse, were schooled in the Meetinghouse or served their community in a civic way at the 1717 Meetinghouse. Famous names of this era included James Otis, Jr., Mercy Otis Warren, “Mad Jack” Percival, Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw, among others. 1806 – The half-ton bell was cast by Paul Revere for the Town of Barnstable in 1806. It was given to the church in memory of Colonel James Otis, father of the Patriot. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「West Barnstable Village-Meetinghouse Way Historic District」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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