Arnold House is a rare surviving example of a stone-ender, a once-common building type featuring a massive chimney end wall. Sitting at 487 Great Road in Lincoln, the house was one of several that were open to the public on Great Road Day. Built by Eleazer Arnold in 1693, the house features stone work that reflects the origins and skills of the settlers who emigrated from the western part of England. Free tours of the house and several other Historic New England properties were offered as part of Great Road Day on September 20, 2025.

Arnold, a landowner with a wife and ten children, secured a license for a “Public House.” Tavern customers were probably served in the great room or hall of the house. The structure has sustained many alterations over the centuries. The house shows evidence of seventeenth-century construction methods, eighteenth-century additions, nineteenth-century graffiti, and the twentieth-century approach to preservation that restored the house to its present appearance.

Historic New England Regional Southern England Site Manager Dan Santos (above, left, and center in the top row) and Historic Preservationist Kara Evans led tours of the 17th century structure, noting the chamfered summer beam (left) and the two massive stone fireplaces.

(Above, left) The structure remained open during a renovation that took place during Hurricane Carol in 1954. (Above, center) The house was originally constructed with a dormer on the third floor that provided expanded living space. The dormer has since been removed. (Above, right) The Clemence-Irons House, a smaller stone-end structure built in 1691 in Johnston, RI, was privately restored (by Norman Isham/John Hutchins Cady) while it was owned by the Sharpe family. It was donated to the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities (Historic New England) in 1947.