A large building on the southeast corner of the Choate Bridge was moved in 1940 to the former Wendel Estate on Jeffreys Neck Road at Strawberry Hill. The house was reassembled on the basis of physical evidence to its early appearance by Daniel Wendel, the son of the American Impressionist painter Theodore Wendel. Summer beams, overhangs at the second story and other First Period elements were uncovered when the house was dismantled. The location is now a parking lot for a commercial building.

The left hand portion was late First Period and the right hand part built about 1760 by Dr. Joshua Burnham.

Thomas Franklin Waters recorded that Isaac Fitts sold a lot “near the southerly abutment of the Town Bridge” to Thomas Burnham Jr., April 5, 1736 (72: 269). Fitts built or moved a small house after his purchase of the property in 1734. Dr. Thomas Manning sold the property to Jeremiah Ross, Nov. 12, 1809 (188: 36), who kept an inn in the greatly expanded building, known as Ross’s Tavern. It was sold by his heirs to Frederic Willcomb, July 13, 1888 (1231: 96).

The Ross Tavern on South Main St. Photo is from the late 1800’s

Rear of the Ross Tavern on S. Main St.

This 19th Century photo of South Main Street shows the Ross Tavern on the left, the Shoreborne Wilson – Samuel Appleton house in the middle where it still stands, and the Amos Dunnels house on the right, which was moved in the 20th Century to 45 County Street.

1832 Ipswich map, with the Ross Tavern circled

The reconstructed Ross Tavern at Strawberry Hill. The rear ell is the Lord Collins house (c 1690) which was moved from High St.

Sources and Further reading:

• Ross Tavern (full story)
• Waters, Thomas Franklin: Ipswich in the Massachusetts Bay Colony Vol. I
• Photos of “Proctor House” Library of Congress
• Download the full description at the MACRIS site
• Susan Nelson, report for the Ipswich Historical Commission
• Cummings, Massachusetts and its First Period Houses, Publication of the Colonial Society in Massachusetts 51:156-157
• Abbott Lowell Cummings, Framed Houses of Massachusetts Bay, 1625-1725. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1979: 127. t pp: 74, 76, 126, 127, 129,136, 137, 148, 150, 153, 162, 194.