Right in front of you, you’ll spot a big yellow house with dark red trim, a steep gambrel roof, and two little dormer windows peeking out from the attic-just look for the building set well back from the street with twin porches and plenty of character.
Now, imagine you’re standing here over 275 years ago, when Nehemiah Strong first built this sturdy, wooden house in what was really just a very new settlement-only six years after Amherst got started! In those early days, it looked a bit different-more like a classic saltbox. But Strong’s son, Simeon, who wasn’t just anyone but a local lawyer with a flair for leadership, decided the old place needed a little more pizzazz, so he gave it a stylish gambrel roof and those porches in the late 1790s. Simeon went from town meetings to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court-talk about climbing to the top, both literally and figuratively! After Strong’s family let it go in 1845, stories from fairs, family gatherings, and Amherst’s first days still lingered in its rooms. Since 1916, the Amherst Historical Society has kept the secrets of this house safe, and today, it’s your portal to the Amherst History Museum. It’s not every day you get to stand where history had such a strong start-pun absolutely intended!
