Historic Houses
Samuel Pickman House
43 Charter Street
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Learn more about this house on our walking tour, Brick by Brick.
Listen now to the PEM Walks episode about this property! Behind-the-scenes audio storytelling that unlocks PEM’s historic houses.
Dating back to 1665, the Samuel Pickman House is a medieval or First-Period building, the earliest style of architecture found in New England.
The building stands on its original site, located behind PEM’s main building on Charter Street. The house was restored by Historic Salem, Inc. in 1969 and purchased by the museum in 1983. It’s listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Samual Pickman, the first occupant of the home, was a mariner. The Samuel Pickman House is an important first-period structure in many regards. It is one of few 17th-century Salem structures that survive on its original foundation and contains several rare and one-of-a-kind features, including elaborately carved interior post corbels.
Partnering with the City of Salem, the Pickman House functions as a welcoming center for visitors to the historic Charter Street Cemetery. This is the oldest cemetery in Salem and one of the oldest in the United States and it also abuts the Salem Witch Trials Memorial.
Photography by Kathy Tarantola/PEM.
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