- McFaddin-Ward House
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McFaddin-Ward House
Location: 1906 McFaddin St.
Beaumont, Texas, USACoordinates: 30°5′14″N 94°6′55″W / 30.08722°N 94.11528°WCoordinates: 30°5′14″N 94°6′55″W / 30.08722°N 94.11528°W Built: 1906 Governing body: Mamie McFaddin Ward Heritage Foundation NRHP Reference#: 71000942 Added to NRHP: January 25, 1971 The McFaddin-Ward House was built in 1905 - 1906 in the Beaux-Arts Colonial Revival style in Beaumont, Texas. The historic home is 12,800-square-foot (1,190 m2) and furnishings reflect the lifestyle of the prominent family who lived in the house for seventy-five years. The house was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.[1]
Di Vernon Averill commissioned architect Henry Conrad Mauer to build the house, which was sold the next year to Di's brother, William P.H. McFaddin.[2] McFaddin and his wife Ida Caldwell McFaddin, from Huntington, West Virginia, moved into the house in 1907 with their three children: Mamie, age 12, Perry, Jr., age 9, and James Caldwell, age 6.
A substantial carriage house was added in the same year. The carriage house had a stable, hayloft, garage, gymnasium and servant's quarters. When the McFaddins' daughter Mamie married Carroll Ward in 1919, the newlyweds moved in with the McFaddins and lived their entire married life there.
Before Mamie McFaddin Ward died in 1982, she created a foundation to preserve the house and the house opened as a museum in 1986. The entire grounds are currently open to the public. Outside the three-floor home are spacious lawns and flower beds and rose gardens. Inside, a substantial permanent collection of antique furniture and household items are in view. The McFaddin-Ward House is one of the few house museums in which the home’s original furnishings are intact and on display. It is also one of the few Beaux-Arts Colonial homes still open to the public.
Educational programs focus on history and are geared toward children and adults. The museum hosts lectures, special celebrations, summer camps, and open houses. New exhibits and displays are changed out often, giving fresh interpretations of the home. Christmas time is especially celebrated with special events and Eggnog Thursdays when the public is invited to enjoy eggnog and the McFaddin-recipe tea-cakes before touring the first floor of the house in the December evenings.
In addition, it was named a Texas State Historic Landmark in 1976, and the home has been featured on TV's Arts & Entertainment's America's Castles as a Lone Star Estate (only 3 Texas homes were featured), and the house has been included in several important architectural books.
Once every three years, the McFaddin-Ward House museum hosts a historic house museum conference, inviting hundreds of other historic sites to participate. The next conference, to be held in november, 2010, is titled "Teaching The Past To Ensure A Future" and the speakers will discuss learning systems within the museum field and how new theoris can be applied in order to embrace every museum visitor.
References
- ^ "McFaddin House Complex". Texas Historical Commission. http://atlas.thc.state.tx.us/shell-county.htm. Retrieved 2007-03-05.
- ^ "The McFaddin-Ward House". http://www.mcfaddin-ward.org/history.htm. Retrieved 2007-03-05.
External links
Categories:- Buildings and structures in Beaumont, Texas
- Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Texas
- Historic house museums in Texas
- Museums in Jefferson County, Texas
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