Parson Smith House facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
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Parson Smith House
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 Location in Maine
Location in the United States
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| Nearest city | South Windham, Maine |
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| Area | 5 acres (2.0 ha) |
| Built | 1764 |
| Architectural style | Colonial |
| NRHP reference No. | 73000237 |
| Added to NRHP | July 16, 1973 |
The Parson Smith House is a very old and important house located on River Road in Windham, Maine. It was built way back in 1764 and still looks almost exactly as it did then! This makes it one of the best examples of Colonial Georgian architecture in Maine. This style was popular when America was still a group of colonies.
The house was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973. This list helps protect special places in the United States. For 40 years, the Parson Smith House was a museum where people could visit and learn about history. It was run by an organization called Historic New England. Today, it is a private home.
What Does It Look Like?
The Parson Smith House sits on the east side of River Road in the very southern part of Windham. It's on top of a small hill, looking out over what used to be farmland.
The house is a two-and-a-half-story building made of wood. This means it has two full floors and an attic space that can also be used. It is five "bays" wide, which means it has five sections across the front, usually marked by windows or a door. The roof slopes down on two sides, a style called a side-gable roof. There are two chimneys, one at each end of the house. The outside walls are covered with clapboard siding, which are long, thin wooden boards that overlap.
The main front door has narrow windows on either side, called sidelight windows. Fancy molded wood trim goes around the door and the house's windows. Most of the inside of the house is still from the 1700s! Some of the old fireplace mantels (the decorative frames around fireplaces) were changed in the 1800s. You can even find tiny pieces of very old wallpaper on some walls. A part of the house that sticks out from the back, called an ell, was probably added in the mid-1800s.
A House with History
The Parson Smith House was built in 1764 by a man named Parson Peter Thatcher Smith. He was the son of Rev. Thomas Smith, who was the first minister of the Congregational church in Windham.
This house was built on a special piece of land called the "ministerial lot." The people who founded the town set aside this land specifically for their minister to use. The house stayed in the Smith family for a very long time, even as last names changed when daughters married.
In 1952, the house was given to the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities (SPNEA). This group is now known as Historic New England. They took care of the house and opened it as a museum for people to visit. It was a museum until 1991. After that, it was sold to a private owner. However, the sale included special rules to make sure the house's historic look and feel, both inside and out, would be protected.
