field studies 04 - natchez

Field Studies Natchez Weekend

Anthony DelRosario

Studio in Building Preservation

Professors G. Cizek, M. Thomas, and H. Knight

Master in Preservation Studies

Tulane School of Architecture

1 PRST 6510 - Studio in Building Preservation – G. Cizek, M. Thomas, H. Knight – March 19, 2010

Anthony DelRosario – Master in Preservation Studies - Tulane School of Architecture

On Friday March 12, Studio in Building Preservation made our fourth field trip of

the semester to St. Francisville, Louisiana and Natchez, Mississippi. During the first

trip, we were able to compare two masonry fortifications, Fort Jefferson and Fort Pike,

which differed in time period, size, and amount of preservation work. On the second trip

we toured two Creole raised plantation houses, Destrehan Plantation House and

Homeplace Plantation House, that were built during the same period (and likely by the

same craftsmen) but differ in size and amount of preservation work. On the third trip,

we were able to compare and contrast two intact plantations of similar age but in

different stages of preservation, Evergreen Plantation and Whitney Plantation. During

the weekend trip upriver, we saw a plethora sites that are in the possession of a variety

owners from private citizens to churches to a local foundation to a state to the federal

government. From these different owners we learned about various fund raising tactics,

preservation methods, and interpretation approaches.

The initial stop of our three day endeavor was the quaint town of St. Francisville

thirty minutes up Scenic Highway 61 from Baton Rouge. The first site in St. Francisville

that we visited was Grace Episcopal Church (Fig. 1), second oldest parish in the

Episcopal Diocese of Louisiana. The historic grounds included a red brick Gothic

Revival church and picturesque oak-filled cemetery (Fig. 2). According to the National

Register of Historic Places nomination form, “Grace Church continues to stand in its

original naturalistic setting due to visual isolation by trees from the growth and change in

the surrounding neighborhood.” In the cemetery are many interesting features including

wonderfully detailed cast and wrought iron fences of the cemetery and of tomb plots, an

Egyptian Revival tomb (Fig. 3), and a deteriorating brick underground burial vault (Fig.



4). The Egyptian Revival tomb was for one of the church’s charter members, Dr. Ira

Smith, and was originally designed for multiple burials but was “rendered useless after

one of Dr. Smith’s descendents threw the key into the Mississippi River” according to a

Grace Episcopal Church brochure. The church was built between 1858 and 1860 by

Charles Nevitt Gibbons who based his design on English country churches (Grace

Episcopal Church brochure). The church contains several interesting features including

divided pews that were originally rented by families that wished to sit, Bohemian glass

door panels, large to sit, Bohemian glass door panels (Fig. 5), large rococo chandelier,

and a rare H. and W. Pilcher organ (Fig. 6).

After leaving Grace Episcopal Church, I drove along Royal Street to see one of

the principal streets of the St. Francisville Historic District which is listed on the National

Register of Historic Places. The street features several frame buildings from the

Nineteenth Century. Most structures were houses but I also noticed the interesting

Audubon Market Hall.

The second site that the class visited on the first day was Rosedown Plantation

Historic Site. According to the National Register of Historic Places nomination form, W.

Wright built the manor house for Daniel Turnbull in a transitional Federal-Greek Revival

style between 1834 and 1835 using cypress and cedar from the area. The house (Fig.

7) features an unusual double gallery with Doric columns. In Classical influenced

architecture, one would expect Ionic columns on the floor above Doric columns. In

1845, Turnbull added Grecian wings on both sides of the house. The north wing

features an inside shower which would become commercially available until the 1880s.

The walls of the main hall of the house have wonderful Zuber wallpaper (Fig. 8) with



panoramic sceneries called Hindoustan, according to the Zuber website. The gardens

of Rosedown are one of the best documented gardens in the United States. For nearly

sixty years, Martha Turnbull kept a garden diary. Currently the gardens are in the

historic layout of the grounds with a formal parterre garden (Fig. 9) on the south side of

the house and winding picturesque garden on the north side of the house.

The house remained in possession of the family through the first half of the

Twentieth Century. According to the Rosedown Plantation Historic Site brochure, in the

1930s grand-daughters of the Turnbulls “opened the house to tourists interested in the

remnants of the prosperous cotton culture.” In 1956, the property was sold to Catherine

Fondren Underwood who spent eight years and ten million dollars restoring Rosedown

to an 1850 appearance. After this restoration, the house was again opened to tourists.

In 1994 the property was purchased by a man who sold off original garden statues from

the 1850s and furniture including the Henry Clay bedroom suite which Clay would have

used in the White House had he won the 1844 presidential election. Today the grounds

are owned by the State of Louisiana which purchased the property for nearly six million

dollars. The State had the opportunity to purchase Rosedown in 1994 for around two

million dollars. One of guides has apparently been studying Rosedown for over thirty

years. As with many guides at home museums, she sounded a bit robotic.

We can learn several lessons about preservation from the recent history of

Rosedown. First, as we have seen with Evergreen Plantation and Whitney Plantation, a

substantial amount of money is needed to restore and preserve property with a large

house and several dependencies and many acres of land. With all three of these large

plantations, the money has first come from wealthy private citizens. Second, we see that



not all owners of historic homes care about the integrity of the structure and grounds and about

the preservation of these. Finally, we see that government can often be slow to realize the

importance of historic and unique properties.

After our time in St. Francisville, we headed to Natchez, Mississippi (Fig. 10)

which is about sixty miles up Scenic Highway 61. Our initial stop in Natchez was the

Historic Natchez Foundation where Executive Director Mimi Miller gave us an overview

of the foundation and its efforts over the last forty years. The Historic Natchez

Foundation was founded in 1974 and opened an office in 1979. The group targeted the

neglected downtown area for the first preservation efforts. According to the HNF

website, the foundation has, to name a few, stimulated development in downtown

through the Storefront Rehabilitation Program, rehabilitated historic houses for

affordable housing through the Heritage Housing Program, and provided tax incentives

and grant eligibility for rehabilitation of hundreds of historic properties. The foundation

is currently located in the Natchez Institute Building (Fig. 11) which was built in 1901.

Mrs. Miller mentioned the Antiquities Law of Mississippi that gives the state authority to

designate Mississippi landmarks and to issue permits for approved work. According to

National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers website, Mississippi is one

of fourteen states that have state statutes concerning preservation. With NHF, we see

a very organized and successful local preservation group similar to the Preservation

Resource Center of New Orleans.

For dinner, the class was welcomed to the home of Mary Jane and Ed Gaudet

(Fig. 12). In 1993 Professor Cizek designed the modern house that respects the

massing of other nearby houses in the historic neighborhood atop the bluff overlooking



the Mississippi River. At the Gaudet’s home, we met several people involved with

preservation and restoration in Natchez including our hosts for the next evening at

Traveler’s Rest. After dinner, a small group stopped for a nightcap at King’s Tavern,

built prior to 1789 and is the oldest building in the Natchez Territory.

The first stop of the event packed Saturday was the Visitors Center of Natchez

where we saw a short movie about the city. We then went to Longwood (Fig. 13), the

largest octagonal house in America. I was overwhelmed by this incredible house that

remains in the unfinished state from eighteen months of work that began in 1860. I was

also amazed by Professor Cizek’s story of seeing the tools lay where the workmen

dropped them nearly a century previous when the Civil War began in April 1861.

Samuel Sloan designed Longwood for cotton planter Haller Nutt as an Oriental Villa

reaching a total height of 100’ with a Byzantine-Moorish dome. The house remained in

the possession of descendents of Haller and Julia Nutt until 1968 when the McAdams of

Austin, Texas purchased Longwood. The McAdams presented the house as a

“gracious gift” to the Pilgrimage Garden Club of Natchez (Hendrix, 29).

As part of our tour, we were allowed to go above the two floors on which tourists

are allowed. Wayne Bryant escorted us to the top of the house where we were able to

go outside on the balcony of the dome (Fig. 14). This treat was by far the highlight of

the weekend for me. After this special tour, Mr. Bryant topped things off by welcoming

the class into his home for cocktails of milk punches and Bloody Marys. According to a

handout provided by Mr. Bryant, his home, which he and his partner have named Villa

di Caprone, is a modern home (Fig. 15) completed in 1966 and designed by Bertram

Bereson.



After cocktails, the next stop of Saturday was Stanton Hall (Fig. 16), a large late

Greek Revival mansion completed in 1857 after eight years of construction. The house

has several wonderful chandeliers created by Cornelius and Baker of Philadelphia. As

opposed to the double Doric columns of Rosewood, Stanton Hall features gigantic

Corinthian columns. As with Longwood, Stanton Hall is owned by the Pilgrimage

Garden Club. According to the website for Stanton Hall, the club began in 1932 when

“these ladies found that visitors were still willing to pay a fee to see” old homes “even in

the midst of Depression.” Both Longwood and Stanton Hall, like Rosedown, are house

museums with guides that repeat the same speech several times a day; however, unlike

at Rosedown, the guides wear hoopskirts to present what Professor Cizek calls

“Moonlight and Magnolias.” Stanton Hall is decorated with Zuber wallpaper like at

Rosedown. Longwood and Stanton Hall are examples of successful preservation

efforts run as a business by a local group, as opposed to the state run Rosedown.

After touring Stanton Hall, the class walked around the historic downtown area of

Natchez. First, we stopped at St. Mary Basilica (Fig. 17), a Gothic Revival which was

completed in 1843. Unlike the austere interior of Grace Episcopal Church, St. Mary is

very ornate with features such as stained glass windows from Innsbruch, Carrara

marble altars and communion rail from Italy, and trompe l'oeil murals (Fig. 18). St. Mary

Cathedral was elevated to minor basilica by Pope John Paul II in 1998. We continued

walking and stopped at a Greek Doric temple building, Trinity Episcopal Church (Fig.

19), where a trio was rehearsing. This church had divided pews similar to those at

Grace Episcopal Church.



Our next stop was the William Johnson House (Fig. 20) which is part of the

Natchez National Historical Park and was the home of a free man of color who kept a

detailed diary. According to the National Park Service brochure, the house was

purchased from the Johnson Family in 1976 by the Preservation Society of Ellicott Hill,

the preservation arm of the Natchez Garden Club. We also saw the new Natchez

Convention Center and the new Natchez Grand Hotel. Neither of these was very

inspired. The hotel is a fairly simple design using red bricks. The convention center

has facades (Fig. 21) that mimic the blocks of storefronts elsewhere in downtown

Natchez. The last stop of the walking tour was Memorial Hall (and the old Opera

House) (Fig. 22) which is now a federal courthouse. Mimi Miller gave us the

background of the building where the Historic Natchez Foundation was given the

property but held on to it for seventeen years until the right project was proposed for the

building. After the walking tour I drove down Silver Street to see Natchez Under-The-

Hill.

Saturday concluded with dinner party hosted by Steve, Wendell, and Mark at

Traveler’s Rest (Fig. 23). Steve and Wendell live at the house as caretakers for the

family so that an uncle of the family does not obtain ownership of the property.

According to Mississippi: A Guide to the Magnolia State, Traveler’s Rest was built in

1797 originally as “two buildings joined by an immense passage” (455). The building

could be considered a relative of a large dog-trot structure. Mark gave a tour of the

upstairs where he showed us rooms where people have written on the walls (Fig. 24)

over the years including a ghost story on one wall.



The final day of the weekend began with a visit to Melrose (Fig. 25), a Greek

Revival mansion of gigantic Doric order completed in 1849. The house was built for

John T. McMurran, a cotton planter like the original owners of the other manors that we

visited. The National Park Service has owned the house since 1985 and is part of the

Natchez National Historical Park along with the William Johnson House and Fort

Rosalie. Our guide was a very energetic park ranger, unlike the robotic sounding

guides at the previous houses. She explained the current restoration work (Fig. 26) that

was originally to be completed by May 2010 but will now be completed in May 2012.

The work started as a $90,000 paint job to recreate the pink and tan faux marble grain

the house had originally. However, during preparatory work of fixing a water leak, major

damage was discovered from the copper gutters and slate roof. The cost to repair the

gutters and roof will be about half a million dollars. With Melrose, we again see the

immense amount of money required to preserve large historic homes. However, this

was our first visit to a large antebellum home that is operated by the federal

government. Melrose was also the third house that we visited with Zuber wallpaper. If I

go to France, I would be very interested in visiting the factory where they continue to

use woodblocks for printing the wallpaper as they have done for over two hundred

years.

Our finals stops on Sunday were along the Natchez Trace Parkway, which

follows a 450 mile trail from Natchez to Nashville, Tennessee. First, we stopped at a

1950/1960s simple interpretive center for the Old Trace, which may have been an

animal migration route for thousands of years. In more recent historic eras, the trace

was a wilderness road used by Native Americans and a return route for Kaintucks who



would float flatboats down the Mississippi River to sell goods. We saw where the loess

soil has been worn down over the centuries by the innumerable animals and people

(Fig. 27). We also stopped at Mount Locust (Fig. 28) which was an inn where travelers

along the trace could rest and get a meal. The house is currently presented in an

1810/1820-era interpretation by the National Park Service. We also saw Emerald

Mound (Fig. 29), the second largest mound in America. The mound was built and used

between 1250 and 1600. Unlike Central America, the areas where Native Americans

lived in Mississippi and Louisiana did not have stone. Thus, no monumental

architecture structures were built.

I found a major difference in the interpretations of the homes presented by the

National Park Service and by the Pilgrimage Garden Club. The presentation or lack of

presentation of the story of the involvement of slaves at the homes was the biggest

disparity. As mentioned before, the Pilgrimage Garden Club gave a very “Moonlight

and Magnolias” interpretation with cursory mentions of slaves at Longwood and Stanton

Hall. National Park Service had a full exhibit about slavery in one of the cabins at

Melrose.

I thoroughly enjoyed my first trip to Natchez. I cannot believe that I have been in

New Orleans for almost twenty years and had never been to Natchez. I expect to make

more excursions up Highway 61 in the future.

i PRST 6510 - Studio in Building Preservation – G. Cizek, M. Thomas, H. Knight – March 19, 2010


Sources

Bryant, Wayne and Bob Canon. The Villa di Caprone handout.

Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration. Mississippi: A Guide to

the Magnolia State. American Guide Series. New York: Viking Press, 1938.

Grace Episcopal Church. Grace Episcopal Church Brochure.

Hendrix, Margaret Shields. The Legend of Longwood. Natchez: Maxwell Printing

Corporation, 1972.

Historic Natchez Foundation. <http://www.natchez.org>.

Louisiana Division of Historic Preservation's National Register Website.

<http://crt.louisiana.gov/hp/nationalregister/historicplacesdatabase.aspx>.

Grace Episcopal Church National Register document.

<http://crt.louisiana.gov/hp/nationalregister/nhl/document2.asp?name=63005001.

pdf>

Rosedown Plantation State Historic Site National Register document.

<http://crt.louisiana.gov/hp/nationalregister/nhl/document2.asp?name=63030001

pdf>

Louisiana State Parks. Rosedown Plantation Historic Site Brochure.

National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers.

<http://www.ncshpo.org/current/bestpractices/protection.htm>.

National Park Service. William Johnson House brochure.

Stanton Hall. <http://www.stantonhall.com>.

Zuber. <http://www.zuber.fr>.

ii PRST 6510 - Studio in Building Preservation – G. Cizek, M. Thomas, H. Knight – March 19, 2010


Images

Figure 1: Grace Episcopal Church Figure 2: Grace Episcopal Church cemetery

Figure 3: Egyptianl Revival tomb at Figure 4: Deteriorating burial vault at Grace Episcopal Church Grace Episcopal Church

Figure 5: Bohemian glass door panels Figure 6: Pilcher organ at Grace Episcopal Church

iii PRST 6510 - Studio in Building Preservation – G. Cizek, M. Thomas, H. Knight – March 19, 2010


Figure 7: Rosedown Plantation house Figure 8: Zuber wallpaper at Rosedown

Figure 9: parterre garden at Rosedown Figure 10: Natchez water tower

Figure 11: Natchez Institute Building Figure 12: Gaudet house

iv PRST 6510 - Studio in Building Preservation – G. Cizek, M. Thomas, H. Knight – March 19, 2010


Figure 13: Longwood house Figure 14: Inside the dome of Longwood

Figure 15: Villa di Caprone Figure 16: Stanton Hall

Figure 17: St. Mary Basilica Figure 18: Trompe l’oeile at St. Mary Basilica

v PRST 6510 - Studio in Building Preservation – G. Cizek, M. Thomas, H. Knight – March 19, 2010


Figure 19: Trinity Episcopal Church Figure 20: William Johnson House

Figure 21: Facades on Convention Center Figure 22: Courthouse (old Opera House)

Figure 23: Traveler’s Rest Figure 24: Writing on walls at Traveler’s Rest

vi PRST 6510 - Studio in Building Preservation – G. Cizek, M. Thomas, H. Knight – March 19, 2010


Figure 25: Melrose Figure 26: Melrose under construction

Figure 27: Natchez Trace Figure 28: Mt. Locust

Figure 29: Emerald Mound

All photographs were taken by the author.

field studies 04 - natchez

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