Oak View, Norwood, Massachusetts - History

History

The planning of the Winslow-Allen mansion, also known as Oak View, started in 1868. Construction began in 1870 for Francis Olney Winslow. F.O. Winslow was the scion of a local tanning family who expanded the family business interests on a large scale. Born in 1844, he constructed the mansion, which was finished in 1873. F.O. Winslow was only 29 as the home was being built, spurred by his brother, an aspiring architect and painter who lived for many years in Paris and who eventually became well known in European art circles. F.O. Winslow was a cultivated man with diverse interests in business, civic affairs, town and state politics, philanthropy, education, history and the arts. Winslow was the founder and for over 40 years the president of the Norwood Literary Club. In 1883 this group was formed originally as the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, changing its name ten years later to the Norwood Literary Club. It was known for dramatic and musical performances, outings, poetry and fictional readings and lecture series. The annual reception was a major social event in the Norwood social year and often took place at Oak View.

Across Walpole Street, Winslow Park (now known as D.A.V. Park) was the first public park in Norwood. It had originally been a semi-private park for the Winslow families, whose homes were in the surrounding area. In 1868 the Winslow family threw open the tract of land, laying it out for public enjoyment. F.O. Winslow died in 1926. Upon Winslow's death, Oak View passed into the hands of his daughter Clara Winslow and her husband, Frank G. Allen (married December 2, 1897) who was soon thereafter to become Governor of Massachusetts. During the late 1920s and 1930s, Oak View was the scene of almost constant socializing! Some of the most prominent figures hosted in Oak View during those years were President (and later a Supreme Court Justice) William Howard Taft, President Calvin Coolidge, Russian Composer Sergei Rachmaninoff, artist John Singer Sargent, Episcopal Bishop of Boston Phillips Brooks and philosopher William James, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Viscount Kentaro Kaneko of Japan, tenor John McCormack and others of similar stature. It can be said that Oak View played a pivotal role in affairs of the 19th and 20th centuries. Norwood, and associative connections can be considered significant not only regionally, but nationally and internationally as well.

In 1954, The Allen's sold Oak View to the Missionary Servants of the Most Blessed Trinity. The property was consecrated by Richard Cardinal Cushing and became known as the Cenacle. In 1978 it was sold to Barbara Rand and Robert Pegurri who own it still Oak View has been the site of Oak View Museum of Dollhouses since 1989.