3 Commonwealth Avenue

3 Commonwealth Avenue

3 Commonwealth Avenue was built ca. 1861 as the home of Benjamin Smith Rotch and his wife Annie Bigelow (Lawrence) Rotch, one of two houses (3 and 5 Commonwealth) designed in the French academic brick style and built at the same time.  5 Commonwealth was built for Benjamin Rotch’s brother-in-law and his wife, Abbott Lawrence and Harriette (Paige) Lawrence.  Both houses included stables at the rear of the property.

Benjamin Rotch was a merchant and founder of the New Bedford Cordage Company.  He also was an accomplished landscape artist.

He died in August of 1882.  After his death, his children (who included architect Arthur Rotch) established and endowed the Rotch Travelling Fellowship of the Boston Society of Architects, which provided grants to young architects, enabling them to travel in Europe and further their knowledge of the field.

Annie Rotch continued to live at 3 Commonwealth.  Her unmarried sons, architect Arthur Rotch and professor of meteorology Abbott Lawrence Rotch lived with her.

Annie Rotch died in 1893.  Arthur Rotch had married in November of 1892 to Lisette de Wolf Colt, and moved to 234 Beacon Street, and Abbott Lawrence Rotch married in November of 1893 to Margaret Randolph Anderson, and by 1897 was living at 235 Commonwealth.

3 Commonwealth was not listed in the 1894 Blue Book.

By 1897, it was the home of William Story Bullard and his wife Louisa (Norton) Bullard.  She is shown as the owner on the 1908 Bromley map.

William Bullard and his brother, Stephen H. Bullard, were partners with Henry Lee, Jr., in the shipping merchant firm of Bullard, Lee & Co.

William Bullard died in August of 1897.

Louisa Bullard continued to live at 3 Commonwealth until about 1915.  Her unmarried daughter, Katherine, and her husband's niece, Ellen (daughter of Stephen Bullard), lived with her.  Louisa Norton probably died about that time, and by 1916,  Katherine and Ellen Bullard had moved to 39 Commonwealth.

In 1916, 3 Commonwealth was purchased by John Stanley Ames and his wife Anne McKinley (Filley) Ames. 

John Stanley Ames's family had founded the Ames Shovel Company in North Easton and later became major investors in the Union Pacific and other railroads.  John Ames was a trustee and bank director.

After buying the house (and probably before they moved into it), they added a two-story brick addition at the rear, 22 feet wide and 14 feet deep.  The addition was designed by architects Little and Browne.

The Ames continued to live at 3 Commonwealth in 1937, and probably until his death in 1959.  They also  maintained a summer home, "Langwater," in North Easton, that had been built for his parents, Frederick Lothrop Ames and Rebecca (Blair) Ames.

The 1938 Bromley Atlas shows John Ames as the owner of this house.

In his will, John S. Ames’s left 3 Commonwealth to the Unity Church of North Easton.  His son, businessman and state legislator Oliver Filley Ames, decided to keep the home and in April of 1960, he purchased it from the church.  He subsequently leased it to the French Consulate.