City Mills Painters — Main Street & City Mills Pond, Norfolk

Norfolk's Historical Commission describes the City Mills section as formally known as Franklin City and first called Jack's Pasture. A corn mill stood there by 1694. Major Eli Richardson ran a cotton factory on the pond and built a house and stone store beside it in 1819; the store later served as the Franklin City post office. In the spring of 1875 the dam upstream at Whiting's Pond, now Lake Pearl, burst, and the flood is said to have wrecked the original felt mill, which was rebuilt. Town tax rolls trace the mill owners' housing: 10 or 11 houses taxed in 1870, 1875 and 1880, six new ones in 1890, and 17 tenements under the American Felt Company in 1900.

Part of that village is still standing. The state historic inventory maps a City Mills Company–American Felt Company area that holds four houses recorded as City Mills Company worker housing at 363 to 369 Main Street, each dated around 1870, plus a Greek Revival house at 375 Main dated 1850 and two more 1870 houses next door. At 364 Main Street the inventory also records felting-mill buildings dated 1881 and 1889, along with the pond and its dam.

Beyond that cluster, housing is newer and mostly detached. In Census Tract 4091.02, which contains these Main Street addresses, 85.9% of the 1,933 units are single-family detached houses and 93.0% of occupied homes are owner-occupied. Only 5.8% were built in 1939 or earlier, while 45.4% went up in the 1980s and 1990s.

Plain company houses

The inventory tags only one of the four worker houses with a style (Italianate, at 369 Main); the other three are recorded as having no style. On any house dated around 1870, original clapboards, sills and window casings are worth repairing before recoating rather than covering over.

Lead in old layers

Paint on a house from around 1870 has had a century and a half to build up, and the earliest coats may contain lead. Scraping and sanding are done under lead-safe rules with ground covers, containment and a thorough cleanup.

Next to water

City Mills Pond and its dam fall inside the same mapped historic area as the worker houses. On a house near open water, check north and shaded walls for mildew; washing, letting the siding dry fully and priming bare wood before finish coats help a repaint hold.

Newer single-family homes

Houses from the 1980s and 1990s make up 45.4% of the tract, and only 31.6% of its units predate 1980. On those, a repaint centers on replacing rotted trim, sealing joints and deciding between a color refresh and a full change.