Grant to set Lynn cottage renovation in motion

LYNN – Renovating the stone cottage, which sits just below High Rock Tower, has long been on Community Development’s to-do list of projects, but a grant might just get it crossed off.Community Development Director James Marsh said they have received a $70,000 Massachusetts historical grant that will, at the very least, get the project started.”It’s a matching grant, so we’ll match the other $70,000 from my office,” he said.In 2011, Community Development’s director of project operations, Donald Walker, said the 163-year-old building was showing its age. Fast forward three years and the situation hasn’t improved, despite the fact everything around it has.State parkland grants allowed the city to renovate the tower and open up access by adding the steep front steps down to Essex Street. A bus turnaround off Hutchinson Court adjacent to the cottage was also established, but the cottage itself has remained untouched.Built in 1848, the tiny house was the first home of the Hutchinsons, a philanthropic family that was famous for what was considered at the time offbeat causes, such as the temperance, abolitionist and women’s movements.In 1988 the city purchased the building, and in 1991 the renovation of the tower, the park and the cottage were included in the city’s Master Plan. Up until about five years ago, the city rented the three-room cottage to a caretaker of sorts, but once he left, it was deemed no longer feasible because the building was in such poor shape.Marsh said the $150,000 won’t go very far, but it should be enough for a new roof and to shore up the exterior to prevent any more interior damage. Eventually the plan is to turn the cottage into classroom space where students can come and learn about astronomy. The walls of the tower would become a museum and the observatory a hands-on laboratory where students can get a first-hand account of astronomy, he said.Marsh called the renovation of the cottage the last real step short of hiring someone to man the tower, and he is hoping to find some state help to offset that cost as well.”Bunker Hill (monument) is staffed,” he said. “I know that is a lot about history, but we have a lot of history too.”