A Jamesport farm is among 26 properties statewide that have been nominated for listing in the State and National Registers of Historic Places, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced today.
The historic Daniel and Henry P. Tuthill family farmstead on Main Road includes a Greek Revival farmhouse (1840), barn (1877), potato barn (c. 1930s) and a small, early 20th century outbuilding.
“The landmarks commission is delighted to have this move forward,” Riverhead Town Landmarks Preservation Commission chairman Richard Wines said.
The homestead is “one of the few Greek revival houses in the area,” Wines said. “Farmers here tend to be quite conservative. You see this style all over upstate New York and Massachusetts,” he said.
“It looks like a miniature version of the Parthenon.”
The fact that the whole farmstead is there makes the property rare. There’s the house itself and the barns, including “a very early semi-underground potato storage barn,” Wines noted. “Those semi-underground ones are quite rare. This all appealed to the state historic preservation office, which is why they nominated it and why the state board accepted it.
Only one other property in Suffolk was among the 26 to be listed on the state register, which is the first step toward listing on the federal register. The other is the Babylon Library, a Neoclassical Revival style building built in 1911.
Another property on the list announced today by Gov. Andrew Cuomo is the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair Carousel in Queens, a combination of two historic Coney Island carousels that features a wood-carved lion, two chariots, and 71 horses and is one of the rare surviving amusement park rides associated with the iconic New York World’s Fair of 1964-1965.
The Riverhead Landmarks Preservation Commission sought last year to have all of Main Road designated a historic district, but the effort was scuttled by landowner opposition. After an outcry of opposition, the commission withdrew the nomination.
“When that didn’t work, we turned our attention to getting individual properties on the registers. We contacted a number of owners,” Wines said. The current owner of the historic farmstead, Dayna Corilito, wanted to move on it right away, Wines said. She hired a consultant to do the necessary research, Wines said.
“It’s good to remind people that the designation makes the house and barn eligible for 40 percent tax credits,” Wines said, referring to the 20 percent state and 20 percent federal income tax credits available to owners for investing in restoration of listed properties.
A little history of the site
The farm was owned and operated by the Tuthill family for over two centuries, from 1733 to 1968, according to the National Register nomination document. The existing home was built c. 1840 by Daniel Tuthill (1818-1898), great-grandson of Daniel Tuthill (1700-1785), who bought the property from the Youngs family in 1733 and moved his family there from Cutchogue.
The great-grandson Daniel Tuthill lived there with his family. His son, Henry Pason Tuthill (1853-1937) built English-style barn behind the house. A potato barn was then constructed on the east side of the house in the 1930s and a one-and-a-half story wood frame structure was built to the west of the barn in around the same time. The Tuthill family sold the property in 1968, ending their 235 year of ownership and operation of the farm. The property to the north of the complex has developed.
The homestead has been converted to an office. Today, Century 21 Albertson Realty is headquartered there.
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