59 Commonwealth Avenue

59 Commonwealth Avenue

59 Commonwealth Avenue was designed by architect Carl Fehmer and built ca. 1874, one of a symmetrical pair of houses (57 Commonwealth and 59 Commonwealth).

59 Commonwealth was built as the home of dry goods and textile merchant Amory Appleton Lawrence and his wife Emily Fairfax (Silsbee) Lawrence.  In 1872, they had lived at Longwood in Brookline with his parents, Amos and Sarah (Appleton) Lawrence.  Emily Lawrence is shown as the owner of 59 Commonwealth on the 1883 and 1888 Bromley maps.

Emily Lawrence died in April of 1895.  Amory Appleton Lawrence continued to live at 59 Commonwealth, remarrying in June of 1900 to Gertrude Austin Rice.  They continued to live at 59 Commonwealth until 1903, when they purchased and moved to 61 Commonwealth Avenue.
           
Although Amory and Gertrude Lawrence had moved next door, 59 Commonwealth remained in the Lawrence family.

By 1905, it was leased by Mrs. Alice (Greenwood) Howe, the widow of George Dudley Howe.  Her husband had died in March of 1903; prior to his death, they had lived at 179 Commonwealth Avenue.  Alice Howe was a close friend of the author, Sarah Orne Jewett, who dedicated her book, The Country of the Pointed Firs, to her.
           
Alice Howe also maintained a summer home in Manchester, built in 1878, the first residence designed by architect Arthur Little.

Mrs. Howe continued to live at 59 Commonwealth in 1913, but had moved to 265 Commonwealth Avenue by 1915.

By 1915, 59 Commonwealth had become the home of Amory Lawrence's son, wholesale cotton merchant John Silsbee Lawrence, and his wife, Emma (Atherton) Lawrence.  They previously had lived at 355 Beacon Street.

He is shown as the owner of 59 Commonwealth on the 1917 and 1928 Bromley maps.

John and Emma Lawrence continued to live there in 1927. They also maintained a summer home in Topsfield. 

In about 1928, they appear to have lived elsewhere temporarily, and 59 Commonwealth was listed in the Blue Book as the home of Mr. and Mrs. Westmore Wilcox.

By 1929, the John Lawrences once again were living there, and they continued to do so in 1932.

The house was not listed in the 1933 Blue Book.

By 1934, it was the home of Mrs. Susan Taylor Jones and her sons by a former marriage, W. Randolph Taylor and Winston Taylor.  Mrs. Jones also was listed in the Blue Book at 121 Beacon Street, which she owned.  W. R. Taylor (Susan Taylor Jones's son), et al, are shown as the owners of 59 Commonwealth on the 1938 Bromley map.

By the 1970s, it was owned by Chamberlayne Junior College, which used it as a dormitory.  After Chamberlayne College’s bankruptcy in the mid-1970s, it was purchased and converted into nine apartments.