After 160 Years, Belmont Cottage Comes Down

The small, yellow house at the corner of Washington Street and Dalton Road had been standing at its location around the same time as Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" was published. 

And for the 160 years, the Gothic Revival house stood along Washington as it changed from a rural byway used by the myriad of farms into a busy suburban road. Known as "The Stone Cottage," the house at 245 Washington St. was built as a guest house for the former Stone Estate just up the road and after a century-and-a-half, it retained its original vertical board and batten sideing and its shed window stills.

Today, Thursday, Dec. 6, the cottage – which was on the list of the Historic Assets of the Commonwealth – was reduced to rubble as a crew from David G Vail Co. of Chelmsford began ripping apart a piece of Belmont's history.

Long-time owner David Babineau paid Vail $8,000 to demolish the house; it is not known the future for the site as plans have not been submitted to the town. 

The demolition of homes in Belmont is becoming a far more familiar outcome of older and threadbare structures as the land is far more valuable than the building. For example, the Thomas Clark House located on Common Street was sold for less than a million dollars last year; in less than a year, the property was subdivided and the two new homes built on the site were each sold for $1.8 million.