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Straw House
Straw House is located in Maine
Straw House
Location in Maine
Straw House is located in the United States
Straw House
Location in the United States
Location Golda Ct., Guilford, Maine
Area 0.5 acres (0.20 ha)
Built 1832 (1832)
Architectural style Queen Anne
NRHP reference No. 82000776
Quick facts for kids
Significant dates
Added to NRHP February 19, 1982
Removed from NRHP December 21, 2020

The Straw House was a special old building in Guilford, Maine. It used to be a bed and breakfast called the Trebor Mansion Inn. This beautiful house was built around 1832. It was later changed a lot in the 1880s by David Straw to look like a fancy Queen Anne Victorian style home.

Sadly, a fire in 2004 caused a lot of damage, but the house was mostly fixed up to look like it did in the 1880s. Inside, some walls had cool artwork by an artist named Moses Eaton from the 1800s. The Straw House was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982 because it was so important. But then, another big fire in 2019 completely destroyed it. It was removed from the historic places list in 2020.

About the Straw House

The Straw House was located on Golda Court, a street in the main part of Guilford, Maine. It was a large wooden house with two and a half stories. It had a special roof made of slate and a porch that wrapped around the house. There was also a tall, round tower with a pointy roof.

The outside walls of the house were made with different cool materials. These included regular wooden boards, fancy cut shingles, and a style called half-timbering. All these details made the house look very unique and interesting.

A Look Back at Its History

The Straw House was first built around 1830 by a person named John Monroe. In 1832, David Straw, a lawyer, bought the house. David Straw and his son later started one of Maine's first textile mills in 1865. Textile mills are factories that make cloth.

Around 1836, David Straw hired an artist named Moses Eaton. Moses Eaton was a traveling artist who added special stenciled artwork to some of the house's walls. This artwork was a hidden treasure inside the home.

The house became much bigger in 1894. This is when it got its famous Victorian features, like the tall tower. In 1976, the house became the Trebor Mansion Inn, a place where people could stay.

Fires and Restoration

The Straw House faced some tough times. In 1991, a tree hit by lightning damaged the house. Then, on January 24, 2004, a big fire started because of electricity. This fire almost completely destroyed the inside of the house.

But people worked hard to fix it. They made new windows that looked just like the old ones. They even found slate for the roof from the same place the original slate came from. During this repair work, they found Moses Eaton's old stencil artwork. Experts helped save this special art. Sadly, on July 20, 2019, another very large fire completely destroyed the Straw House.

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