First Harrison Gray Otis House, Historic house museum in West End, Boston, United States
The First Harrison Gray Otis House is a three-story brick house at 141 Cambridge Street in Boston's West End, built in 1795–96 to designs by Charles Bulfinch. It is five bays wide with a central entrance, a Palladian window above, and a lunette near the roof. The interior follows a central hall plan with two rooms on either side and a large salon on the second floor.
Architect Charles Bulfinch designed this house in 1796 for Harrison Gray Otis, a Boston businessman and politician. Otis later played an important role in the city's development and served as mayor.
The house displays furnishings and objects that reflect how wealthy Boston families lived in the late 1700s. The rooms are arranged to give visitors a sense of daily life and the habits of the upper class during that era.
The house operates today as a museum and administrative center and is open to visitors. Guided tours are a good way to learn about the architecture and Boston's development history.
The house was moved about 40 feet back from Cambridge Street in 1926, not 1925, when the street was widened. The original cellar was lost in the move, and the building now connects to row houses on Lynde Street used by Historic New England.
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