Fruitlands Museums Historic District - Harvard MA - U.S. National Register of Historic Places on Waymarking.com

In 1910, a wealthy Boston Brahmin, Clara Endicott Sears, built a summer home on Prospect Hill. She soon discovered that her property included the dilapidated farmhouse that had been Bronson Alcott's "Fruitlands." Like Louisa May Alcott, Miss Sears was not a conventional Victorian woman. She had a deep interest in New England history and culture, and wrote several books, fiction and nonfiction, about it including a charming volume on American folk painting. She opened "Fruitlands" as a house museum in 1914. In 1917, when the neighboring Harvard Shaker community closed, the eldress asked Miss Sears to move the Shaker office building to the Prospect Hill property; it opened as a Shaker museum, the first in the country, shortly afterwards. In the 1920's, Miss Sears added an American Indian museum and a building that housed a collection of Hudson River School and American folk paintings. Although Miss Sears's house, the Pergolas, burned down years ago, the museum complex thrives today on Prospect Hill, in the countryside that she loved. If you go there, you may sense Bronson Alcott's spirit haunting the small red farmhouse nestled in the trees. Like all visionaries, he aspired to a life that was perhaps not possible in this world. He gave us his daughter, Louisa May, and perhaps that was enough.

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Street address: 102 Prospect Hill Rd Harvard , MA County / Borough / Parish: Worcester Year listed: 1997 Historic (Areas of) Significance: Person, Architecture/Engineering, Event Periods of significance: 1900-1924, 1925-1949 Historic function: Agriculture/Subsistence, Domestic Current function: Agriculture/Subsistence, Domestic, Recreation And Culture Privately owned?: yes Primary Web Site: [Web Link] Season start / Season finish: Not listed Hours of operation: Not listed Secondary Website 1: Not listed Secondary Website 2: Not listed National Historic Landmark Link: Not listed

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