National Park Service
National Register of Historic Places
Continuation Sheet
Section number 7
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Philosophy Department, 70 South Williams St., 1869
Just behind the Waterman Building and the Fletcher Allen Health Care complex on the University of Vermont Green is South Williams Street. Residential in character, the homes on South Williams are large, with spacious lawns for their downtown location. Many of the buildings have been acquired by the University, including 70 South Williams, which is now the home of the Philosophy department. The vernacular Italianate block has been added onto over time, but those additions have not greatly altered the historic character of the building. The main mass of the building is three bays wide by two bays deep, and is two stories tall on a slightly raised basement. The roof is very shallowly hipped, and is covered in light-green asphalt tiles. The building is of dark red brick, in common bond. The mortar joints are incised lightly and filled with a white lime. This treatment extends to the joints between the quartzite stones of the foundation. The porch and windows are wood, with all wood painted a pale yellow.
The dominant feature of the house is the wooden porch that extends across the front of the main facade, extending to the left past the corner of the building to become a porte-cochere. The porch also has a shallow hipped roof, which is supported by four wooden posts across the main facade, with the post at the left doubled to support the extending porte-cochere. Two sets of doubled posts support the far end of the extension. Half posts are attached to the facade, one at each end, approximately two feet in from the corner, to provide visual support for the porch roof against the building. The posts are chamfered at the corners and grooved down the center of each side. A stylized capital tops each post, with a molded profile rising from the center of each capital to meet the cornice of the porch. A simple square-balustered railing stretches between the posts.
Windows and doors are simply incised, with the only elaboration being a splayed brick lintel over each opening. All windows in the front facade are standard six-over-six wooden frame windows, with thin wood muntins. The main central entrance is elaborated within the central frame with wood trim and surrounding windows. The single wood paneled door with a hammered limestone lintel and sill is flanked by flat wooden pilasters with stylized capitals and three-quarter sidelights with panels below and topped by a four-paned rectangular transom.
The left side of the main block is accented with a bay window on the first story, in the second bay. The bay window features a large picture window topped by a leaded glass transom in the center, with narrow one-over-one windows on the sides. The other bay on the first floor features a standard window, as do the two bays on the second story.
Moving around the building to the right-side wall, the windows in the first bay are standard, and an addition covers the second bay. The addition is a very close match to the original building. The brick is slightly larger and of a more uniform color, and appears to be a veneer surface on a wood frame, as the entire addition is in running bond. The cornice and roof are exact matches, and the window framing is very similar to the windows on the main mass of the building, including identical splayed lintels. The windows differ from the standard type, however. On the front of the addition, the first floor window is a large picture window, topped with a transom. Above that is a set of paired one-over-one windows, set in a single frame. On the right facade of the addition is a standard window with sidelights, while the window above is a simple standard window. Moving around to the rear of the building, the rear of the addition is flush with the rear facade of the main block, where there is an obvious seam dividing the two different types of brickwork. The rear of the addition features a centered exterior chimney with narrow four-over-four windows flanking it on the first floor and a single narrow four-over-four to the left of the chimney on the second floor.
On the rear facade of the main block, occupying the right two-thirds of the facade is a three-bay-deep extension, though this one appears original to the building. The remaining bay is filled with a door and a narrow window on the first floor and a door and window on the second floor, with a metal fire escape stairway leading up to the door on the second story. The right facade of the rear extension features a door next to the main block and two standard windows on the first floor. The second story has two windows, one centered between the door and the first window, while the second is aligned with the second window on the first floor. The left side has three windows on the first floor and one on the second, in the bay closest to the building. There is also a small concrete extension on the first floor, containing a basement entrance. The concrete is painted yellow, to match the buildingās trim. From the rear of the rear extension is a later addition, this one gable roofed and wood framed, clad in brick-patterned asbestos tile. It is one story high, with two windows and a door on the left and three windows on the right. There are no openings on the gabled end facade.
Built in 1869 for local merchant Albert G. Strong, 70 South Williams Street appears in an 1877 bird's-eye view map with a cupola topping the roof. Considering the addition to the right of the main block, it is likely that the original structure had a three-bay façade, with a cupola on the roof and a bracketed cornice, giving the building an Italianate appearance, which would be appropriate for the time of construction. The home was acquired in 1940 by the University of Vermont, and has remained in the University's hands since then.