Salisbury House (Des Moines, Iowa) facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
|
|
Salisbury House
|
|
 |
|
 Location in Iowa
Location in the United States
|
|
| Location | 4025 Tonawanda Dr. Des Moines, Iowa |
|---|---|
| Area | 9.4 acres (3.8 ha) |
| Built | 1923 |
| Architect | Byron Bennett Boyd; William Whitney Rasmussen |
| Architectural style | Tudor Revival, Jacobethan Revival |
| NRHP reference No. | 77000551 |
| Added to NRHP | July 20, 1977 |
Salisbury House is a beautiful old mansion in Des Moines, Iowa. It looks like a grand home from old England, mixing styles like Tudor, Gothic, and Carolean architecture. These styles are known for their fancy details and castle-like feel.
A man named Carl Weeks, who made a lot of money in cosmetics, and his wife, Edith Van Slyke Weeks, built this amazing house. They worked on it between 1923 and 1928. Salisbury House was designed to look like the King's House in Salisbury, England. It has 42 rooms and is super big, covering over 22,000 square feet (2,000 m2)!
Today, the Salisbury House Foundation owns and takes care of this special place. You can visit it for tours, go to public events, or even rent it for private parties. Salisbury House was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977. This means it's recognized as an important historical site.
Contents
The Story of Salisbury House
Salisbury House sits on a lovely wooded hill. It offers great views of the area. The house is a wonderful example of old English-style architecture right here in Iowa.
How Salisbury House Came to Be
Building Salisbury House was a huge project. It was planned to cost about $150,000, but it ended up costing $3 million! That was a lot of money back then.
- 1923 to 1928: The house was built and filled with amazing furniture and art.
- 1926: Carl and Edith Weeks moved into Salisbury House with their four sons: Charles, William, Evert, and Lafayette.
Salisbury House Through the Years
The house has had a few different owners over time, but it has always been a special place.
- 1934: Carl and Edith Weeks gave Salisbury House to Drake University. They still lived there and paid rent until 1954.
- 1954: The Iowa State Education Association (ISEA) bought Salisbury House and its collections from Drake University and the Weeks family. They used it as their office space.
- 1993: The Salisbury House Foundation was created. Their goal was to protect, explain, and share the house with everyone.
- 1998: The Salisbury House Foundation bought the property and its collections from ISEA for $4.0 million.
- 1999: Salisbury House officially opened as a historic house museum.
Amazing Collections Inside
The Weeks family loved collecting beautiful and rare items. They gathered lots of fine art, decorative art, old books, musical instruments, and historical papers. Most of these amazing collections are still at Salisbury House today.
However, some of the collection has moved. In 2019, Grinnell College bought Carl and Edith Weeks' library. This collection included about 3,000 books and 2,500 historical documents. They moved these items to the Burling Library at Grinnell College.
Even though some items moved, the collection is still open for people to study. Grinnell College and Salisbury House work together to offer programs about this wonderful collection. When you visit Salisbury House, you can take different tours to see many highlights from the Weeks Family's collections. It's like stepping back in time!
