Civil servant and businessman Alger Hiss paid $100 a month to rent this house in 1930. He was a clerk for Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. when he lived at this address. Hiss was involved in the establishment of the United Nations while he was a U.S. State Department and later U.N. official. He was accused of being a Soviet Spy in 1948 and was convicted in 1950(his second trial after a mistrial in the first) of perjury related to the charges. Hiss was imprisoned for just under four years. His innocence or guilt is still a controversial subject. Hiss had his law license reinstated in 1975, marking the first time in Massachusetts legal history that an attorney had been readmitted after a major criminal conviction. He maintained his innocence and vigorously fought his perjury conviction until he passed away in 1996 at the age of 92.