The Old Feather Store was a shop located at Dock Square

Dock Square (Boston, Massachusetts)

Dock Square in Boston, Massachusetts is a public square adjacent to Faneuil Hall, bounded by Congress Street, North Street, and Union Street. Its name derives from its original location at the waterfront. From the 1630s through the early 19th-century, it served boats in the Boston Harbor as "the...

 and North Street

North Street (Boston, Massachusetts)

North Street in the North End of Boston, Massachusetts extends from Congress Street to Commercial Street. It runs past Dock Square, Faneuil Hall, Quincy Market, the Rose Kennedy Greenway, and North Square...

 in Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

in the 17th-19th centuries. It was also called the Old Cocked Hat. Built in 1680 by Thomas Stanbury, it was demolished in 1860.

Brief history

Through the years, the building had several successive owners, and was used for varying commercial purposes. William Antram made hats, ca.1708. John Greenleaf ran an apothecary, 1766-1778. Samuel Wallis sold goods from West India, ca.1789. Samuel Richards sold hardware, ca.1789, as did Jonathan Phillips, ca.1803. Beginning in 1806, Daniel Pomeroy, John K. Simpson, Daniel P. Simpson, and William B. Simpson sold feathers. Charles Lovejoy sold clothes, ca.1806. William Tileston conducted business in the indigo trade, ca.1809.

Its timber-frame architecture featured multi-level gables, and facades embedded with glass.

The outside of the building was covered with a strong, and, as time has proved, durable cement, in which was observable coarse gravel and broken glasss, the latter consisting of fragments of dark-colored junk bottles. At the upper part of the principle gable on the Dock square front the date of the time of erecting the building, 1680, was distinctly impressed into the rough-cast cement in Arabic figures, together with various ornamental devices.

Further reading

• Edward Griffin Porter. Rambles in old Boston, New England. Cupples, Upham and company, 1887.
• Abbott Lowell Cummings. The Old Feather Store in Boston. Old-time New England v.48, 1958.
• Old Boston in early photographs, 1850-1918: 174 prints from the collection of the Bostonian Society. Courier Dover Publications, 1990.
• D. Brenton Simons. Boston Beheld: Antique Town and Country Views. UPNE, 2008.

External links

• http://www.bostonhistory.org/?s=librarymuseum&p=adopt
• http://digitalgallery.nypl.org
• http://www.bostonathenaeum.org/856images/454_15.jpg