Local properties recommended for historic designation

Mar. 14—Local properties have been recommended for inclusion in the state and national registers of historic places.

Gov. Kathy Hochul on Thursday announced recommendations by the state Board for Historic Preservation to add 15 properties to the registers. The nominations include churches in North Harpersfield and a home in Mount Vision.

"New York is defined by its diverse culture and history, and we are continuing efforts to preserve and protect our state's inspiring stories," Hochul said in a media release. "With the addition of all 15 of these sites, we are encouraging the public to learn more about our past."

In North Harpersfield in Delaware County, the Methodist Episcopal Church and the Free Church were both built in 1857, directly across the road from each other, the release said. Each was built in a different style of architecture that reflected its doctrinal orientation. The local Methodist Episcopal congregation built its church using the traditional Greek Revival form and embellishment that characterized most traditional Protestant churches in the region at mid-century, while a small faction broke from the Methodist congregation to build a Free Church in a Gothic Revival style that would be available to "any and all religious denominations." The Methodist church was later modified with late Victorian decorative details and additions that reflect changes in Protestant church worship near the end of the nineteenth century, the release said. The nomination also includes a rare surviving example of a mid-nineteenth-century wagon shed.

In Mount Vision, in Otsego County, a house at 120 Balcom Road "embodies building characteristics brought by settlers from southern New England into Central New York during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries," the release said. Built around 1810, "this is a rare example of a subtype of the traditional New England Colonial house type called the New England Large House." A description said, "The two-story, five-bay form expands a single-pile two-room over two-room layout with a row of half-depth rooms spanning the rear of the house on both floors under the main roof. The house incorporates a massive center chimney and displays a roughly symmetrical exterior with influences from late Georgian and early Federal design."

New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation Commissioner Pro Tempore Randy Simons said, "New York's cultural and historic resources are extraordinary. They can range from large-scale manufacturing facilities to modest rural residences, but they are all tangible connections to our past. State and National Register listing is an important step to recognizing these sites. In addition to the honorific designation, the listing helps make the properties eligible for various public preservation programs and incentives, such as matching state grants and federal and state historic rehabilitation tax credits. With this support and with opportunities for investment, these resources can continue to be active spaces and contribute to the economic vitality and pride of place of their communities today."