Gunston Hall facts for kids
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Gunston Hall
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View of Gunston Hall from the northwest
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 Location in Northern Virginia
Location in Virginia
Location in the United States
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| Nearest city | Lorton, Virginia |
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| Area | 555.7 acres (224.9 ha) |
| Built | 1759 |
| Architect | George Mason; William Buckland; William Bernard Sears |
| Architectural style | Georgian |
| NRHP reference No. | 66000832 |
Quick facts for kids Significant dates |
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| Added to NRHP | October 15, 1966 |
| Designated NHL | December 19, 1960 |
Gunston Hall is a beautiful old mansion in Mason Neck, Virginia, near the Potomac River. It was built a long time ago, between 1755 and 1759, by George Mason. He was one of America's Founding Fathers, important people who helped create the United States.
Gunston Hall was the main house of a large 5,500-acre (22 km2) plantation. Many enslaved people lived and worked there. The house is also close to Mount Vernon, which was George Washington's home.
The inside of Gunston Hall is very special. Much of its design was created by William Buckland, a skilled carpenter from England. He was an indentured servant, meaning he worked for the Masons for a set time to pay for his trip to America. Buckland, along with another indentured servant named William Bernard Sears, made the fancy wooden carvings and decorations inside. The house has unique styles like rococo, chinoiserie (Chinese-inspired), and Gothic designs. This was unusual for Virginia homes back then, which usually had simpler decorations. Gunston Hall is the only known colonial American house with this much chinoiserie style.
After George Mason passed away in 1792, the house remained a private home for many years. Later, in 1868, a famous abolitionist (someone against slavery) and Civil War Colonel, Edward Daniels, bought it. Today, Gunston Hall is a museum owned by the Commonwealth of Virginia. It's open to everyone who wants to visit and learn about its history. The house and its grounds were recognized as a National Historic Landmark in 1960 because of George Mason's importance.
Contents
A Look at Gunston Hall's Past
How Gunston Hall Got Its Name
The Mason family came from a place called Gunstone in England. They named their new home in Virginia after their family's ancestral home, Gunstone Hall, in South Staffordshire. George Mason's ancestor, Philip Mason I, moved to Virginia in 1651 after a war in England.
Building the Mansion
William Buckland agreed to work for George Mason's brother, Thomson Mason, in 1755. He was a carpenter and joiner, and in return for his work for four years, he received free travel to Virginia, a place to live, food, and a yearly salary.
When Buckland arrived, the outside walls of Gunston Hall were probably already finished. Buckland likely designed the beautiful porch that looks out over the garden. He also designed much of the interior. He and William Bernard Sears probably worked together on the detailed carvings inside the house. Buckland likely drew the designs, and Sears did the actual carving. They might have even worked on some of the original furniture, as architects sometimes designed furniture back then.
Who Lived Here Later?
The Mason family owned Gunston Hall until 1867. From 1868 to 1891, Edward Daniels, a newspaper publisher and former Union soldier who strongly opposed slavery, owned it. In 1912, Louis Hertle, a retired business executive, bought the house with his wife, Eleanor Daughaday. They worked hard to bring the mansion back to its original look and hosted many important guests. In 1949, Louis Hertle left Gunston Hall to the Commonwealth of Virginia to be a museum.
Pamela Cunningham Copeland, a gardener and history lover, helped a lot with restoring Gunston Hall. She helped bring back its historic gardens and find old furniture for the house. She also encouraged Mason family descendants to support the historic site.
Inside Gunston Hall: Architecture and Design
The First Floor's Unique Style
The front of Gunston Hall faces northwest. The first floor has a long central hallway that runs from the front door to the back door. A staircase goes up from this hallway.
On one side of the hallway, there was a main bedroom and a smaller, private sitting room. On the other side, there was a parlor (a formal living room) and a dining room. The central hallway has six fancy columns and a double arch with a carved pine cone.
The main bedroom was a private space, decorated simply. It was painted emerald green, a popular color at the time. The windows had special shutters and were likely the only ones with curtains.
The small sitting room was also private and had plain decorations. Its walls were a neutral gray. Above the fireplace, there was a special shelf where a painting or mirror might have been. There were also deep shelves on either side of the fireplace to store dishes or valuable items.
The parlor was a public room with very fancy decorations. Its walls were yellow, and the woodwork was in a Chinese style. The fireplace had carvings that looked like pagodas (Chinese towers) and pine cones. Above the doors, there were similar decorations that might have held Chinese vases. This Chinese-style woodwork was very rare in colonial America.
The dining room was the most decorated room in the house. It had classical woodwork with fashionable rococo designs. The fireplace wall was very ornate. On either side of the fireplace were shelves for display. The floor was made of expensive, carefully fitted wooden planks. The black-walnut entry doors had carved patterns. The walls were covered with painted or decorated paper. Two windows in this room looked out onto George Mason's garden.
The Second Floor: Bedrooms and Storage
The second floor of Gunston Hall is laid out differently from the first. A narrow hallway leads to seven bedrooms and a storage room. At the top of the main stairs, there's a three-part arch with fluted (grooved) pillars.
Only the four corner bedrooms had fireplaces, and these had some decorative details. The corner rooms had two or three windows, while the inner rooms had only one. The walls of the corner bedrooms were painted in more expensive colors like blue or green.
The Basement: Practical Spaces
Gunston Hall has a basement with a main hallway and four rooms, similar to the floors above. Three staircases lead down to it. The basement has brick arches supporting the chimneys and nine small windows. An old cast-iron stove from the 1700s or early 1800s was found here.
Beautiful Porches
The front porch of Gunston Hall is very special. Its classical design is thought to be inspired by an ancient Roman medal of a temple. It also looks quite similar to a porch on Honington Hall in England.
Gardens and Other Buildings
The garden is located behind the house, on the southern side. It was built on a flat area where there used to be a hill and is about one acre in size. A gravel path, once twelve feet (3.7 m) wide, runs from the back of the house to the edge of the garden. Today, this path is narrower because of old boxwood bushes, some of which are about 250 years old! The path ends at a lookout point where you can see the Potomac River. The view was even better in George Mason's time because the trees were cleared.
The other buildings at Gunston Hall, like the kitchen, dairy, smokehouse, and laundry, have been rebuilt. They show what typical support buildings on an 18th-century plantation would have looked like. George Mason owned about 90 enslaved people, but the exact location of their homes is not known.
Visitors' Center and Museum Shop
The visitors' center has a short film called "George Mason and the Bill of Rights." This film helps you learn more about George Mason's important role in American history.
The museum shop sells many interesting things, like books, gifts, and toys, so you can take a piece of history home with you.
Other Mason Family Plantations
George Mason owned several other plantations besides Gunston Hall. These included Hollin Hall, Woodbridge, Lexington, and Mason's Island. Gunston Hall itself was like a small village, with over a hundred people living there.
George Mason gave Hollin Hall to his son, Thomson Mason. This land was about 676 acres (2.74 km2) and was near George Washington's Mount Vernon. Woodbridge Plantation was given to his youngest son, Thomas Mason.
Lexington Plantation was originally part of the Gunston Hall land and was given to George Mason's first son, George Mason V. Mason's Island, now called Theodore Roosevelt Island, was given to his fourth son, John Mason. John built a summer home there.
Gunston Hall's Legacy
Gunston Hall was honored on a 3-cent stamp in 1958 to celebrate its 200th anniversary. The stamp showed the river side of the classic brick home. George Mason wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which helped inspire the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, known as the Bill of Rights.
Two ships in the U.S. Navy have been named after Gunston Hall: USS Gunston Hall (LSD-5), launched in 1943, and USS Gunston Hall (LSD-44), launched in 1987. Gunston Hall also gave its name to Gunston Elementary School in Lorton, Virginia, Gunston Middle School in Arlington, Virginia, and even a former athletic mascot for George Mason University.
See also
In Spanish: Gunston Hall para niños
