Living Our Dream

Day Trip to Winter Park, FL

Wauchula, FL - Events of Monday, April 22, 2019

Some time ago when Margery was researching places to go and things to do, she came across the Scenic Boat Tour of several lakes and canals in Winter Park. Since Monday was Margery's birthday, she decided the boat tour would be a fun thing to do to celebrate. Winter Park isn't too far from OakWood Grill in Cleremont, so an early dinner at OakWood was also part of the plan.

The one-hour boat cruises depart every hour on the hour from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. We decided the noon tour would finish up about the right time to allow us a little time afterwards to explore the town of Winter Park and then make the 40-minute drive to Clermont in time for a mid-afternoon lupper at OakWood Grill.

Winter Park is located to the northeast of Orlando, which means we had to drive through Orlando to get there. When we checked Google Maps the day before (Sunday), the travel time was 1 hour and 49 minutes. We planned to leave around 10:45 to give ourselves 2 hours and 15 minutes travel time to allow for weekday traffic. Boy, did we figure wrong! When we checked Google Maps prior to leaving on Monday, we found there were two accidents in Orlando and the travel time was 2 hours and 15 minutes. That meant we would really be cutting it close, but we decided to persevere. If we didn't make it by noon, we would have a look around the town to kill some time, then take the 1:00 cruise and just have lupper an hour later than we had planned.

We got to the boat dock at 11:59. Paul dropped Margery off while he parked hoping we could still make the noon cruise. Fortunately, there is more than one boat at each designated departure time. The boats are pontoon boats that each hold 18 passengers, and there were at least 5 or 6 boats being used for the noon cruise on the day we were there. The first boat departed right about noon, and the other boats departed over the next 5 or 6 minutes. We got onto the third boat.

The photo below shows the 5th boat pulling up to the dock to be boarded as we were pulling away. The 4th boat is at the dock being boarded out of view to the right,

Another boat pulling up to the dock for boarding

We took a selfie shortly after we left the dock.

Selfie on the noon cruise

The tour guide began with a brief history of Winter Park. Winter Park was founded as a winter resort by wealthy northern businessmen in the late 1800s right after a rail line was built through the area connecting Orlando to the south with Sanford to the north. Winter Park is located on the banks of Lake Osceola, which is one of 7 lakes in the Winter Park Chain of Lakes.

Tour guide (to the right in the red shirt) giving history of Winter Park

The tour travels on three of the 7 lakes - Lake Osceola, Lake Maitland, and Lake Virginia. Canals connecting the 5 of the 7 lakes were originally dug to float logs to a sawmill located on Lake Virginia, which is the southernmost lake in the chain. The canals have since been deepened to make them navigable to boat traffic; but they are still narrow, which is the reason the boat tour utilizes several smaller boats for each tour rather than one larg boat. The canals also pass under low bridges and low-hanging branches, which means the pontoon boats don't have canopies. Therefore, you might want to take along some sun screen if you go because most of the tour takes place out in the open on the lakes.

Passing through one of the shady canals

Along the banks of the lakes are quite a few huge homes. We looked at Zillow after the tour and home prices started at $1 million and went up from there.

The tour guide gave us stories of some of the homes and of the current or original owners, but we were too busy gawking to remember most of them. Below are just a few of the many lakeside mansions.

The Isle of Sicily is a man-made peninsula jutting out into Lake Maitland. Off the Isle of Sicily was a lone cypress tree with an osprey nest. You can barely see the osprey. It it the dark spot at the very top of the tree.

Lone cypress tree with osprey nest

The tour lasted about an hour. Afterward, we made our way to Alabama Dr., which follows the southern shore of Lake Maitland. The tour guide mentioned it was a good street to drive down to get a closer look at some of the mansions we passed on the boat tour.

Located along Alabama Dr. is a home once owned by Fred Rogers of "Mr. Rogers Neighborhood" fame. He graduated from Rollins College, which is located in Winter Park, with a degree in music. When he first showed up for classes, there was no room for his baby grand piano in the dorm, so his parents bought him the house on Alabama Dr. shown in the next photo. Fred Rogers' father was a very successful businessman in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, which is located outside our old hometown of Pittsburgh. He was president of McFeely Brick Co., which was founded by his father-in-law.

House in Winter Park that once belonged to Fred Rogers 

Also located on Alabama Dr. are the Kraft Azalea Gardens. At the entrance to the gardens were a group of trees full of egret nests. There there lots of bird droppings on the ground, so we moved the car to another parking spot before heading into the garden.

Nesting egrets at Kraft Azalea Gardens

The Azaleas were done blooming, but the gardens are still very picturesque with lots of shade from mature live oak trees and a few colorful, sunny spots.

Margery at Kraft Azalea Gardens

The garden also has a walkway with pleasant views of Lake Maitland.

View of Lake Maitland from the Kraft Azalea Gardens

Another view of the lake from the gardens

We left Alabama Dr. and took a drive down the quaint main street of downtown Winter Park then made our way to the OakWood Grill Cleremont.

OakWood Grill in Cleremont

We liked to go to OakWood Grill in The Villages when we used to stay in Bushnell, Florida before we got our lot at the Co-op. Cleremont, which is about two hours away, is the closest OakWood Grill to where we live now in Wauchula. It's about two hours away, so we don't get to go often.

In addition to other smoked meats like pork, turkey, and beef, OakWood has delicious, fall-off-the-bone baby back ribs. Their ribs are usually specially priced at $13.99 (regularly $17.99) on Sundays through Wednesdays.

Baby back ribs

Since it was Monday and the ribs were on special, that's what we both ordered. Margery had slaw and mac and cheese for her sides, and Paul got slaw and lima beans.

Margery with her rack of ribs

The ribs were as yummy as they always are! After dinner, we headed back home, but only after making a stop at Dairy Queen for some soft-serve ice cream to top off Margery's birthday celebration.

Babcock Ranch

Wauchula, FL - Events of Friday, August 3, 2018

We spent most of the first week back at the Co-op after our 2½-week trip to Pittsburgh and to Ohio's Amish Country catching up with things like grocery shopping, grass mowing, and other chores. We took time out on Friday, however, because it was a special day. It was our 50th wedding anniversary.

We decided to celebrate our anniversary by taking a day trip to visit Babcock Ranch Preserve in Punta Gorda, Florida, which is a little over an hour from the Co-op. Babcock Ranch, also known as the Crescent B Ranch, was a tract of over 91,000 acres that was purchased in 1914 by Edward V. Babcock.

Edward Babcock, who was a lumber baron, used the land in Florida for cutting timber and for agriculture. He also has a Pittsburgh connection because he founded Babcock Lumber Company in our old hometown of Pittsburgh in the late 1880s. He was also Mayor of Pittsburgh from 1918 to 1922.

Edward Babcock spent little time in Florida. By the 1930s, his son Fred, who loved Florida, was managing the property on site. When Fred died in 1997, the Babcock family attempted to sell the land to the state. Florida wanted the land in order to help establish a conservation corridor from Lake Okeechobee to the Gulf Coast. This area is important environmentally because it supplies water to the western part of the Everglades.

In order to lessen tax liabilities, the family wanted to sell the land to the state by means of a stock transfer, but the state's constitution prohibited it from purchasing stock from a private company. When negotiations between the family and the state ended in 2005, the family began to seek private buyers. Fortunately, they found a real estate developer who purchased the land (presumably by means of the stock transfer) then turned around and sold 74,000 of the 91,000-acre tract (80%) to the state creating Babcock Ranch Preserve. The development company is using the land they retained to build a planned community called Babcock Ranch.

From what we can tell, the community of Babcock Ranch will be much like The Villages except it will apparently have less emphasis on golf and more emphasis on high tech and energy efficiency. They will supply some of their own electricity with their own solar power plant. Like The Villages, Babcock Ranch will be made up of a number of smaller neighborhoods each with housing at different price levels. Also like The Villages, there will be shopping, office space, light industry, a hospital, public areas, schools, and entertainment venues.

Anyway, enough about the community of Babcock Ranch and about the history of the ranch itself. We were interested in taking an eco tour of Babcock Ranch Preserve. The preserve is administered by the Florida Forest Service and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, but the tours are conducted by a private company in cooperation with the state. The address for the tours is 8000 State Route 31, Punta Gorda, which is located about 15 miles east of the city as the crow flies. Tours depart every half hour from 9:30 am until 2:00 pm at a cost of $23 for adults and $22 for seniors.

Putting the above address into your GPS will get you to the approximate location of the turnoff from SR 31, but the actual starting point of the tours is down a narrow road a little over 2 miles to the east of that turnoff. Paul was just beginning to question if we missed the place or if we were even on the right road when we saw a sign that said "almost there." After about another quarter mile, we finally arrived. We parked and headed to the visitor center to check in.

Visitor center for eco tour

The eco tours are given aboard so-called "swamp buggies," which are actually converted school buses.

Eco tour "swamp buggy"

We noticed when we first arrived there weren't many cars in the parking lot, and most of them were at the end where there was a sign for the start of a hiking trail. It turned out we were the only ones there for the 10:30 tour. It was great having a private tour because we could ask all the questions we wanted, and we could move from one side of the bus to the other to get a better view.

Shortly after the tour started, we came to our first of many alligators. The 'gator wasn't very big (maybe about 3'). The 'gator is a little hard to make out, but its scaly back is in the center of the picture and its head extends off to the left and is partially obscured by plants.

 
The first of many 'gators

The preserve is operated as a unique public-private partnership that uses income from eco-tourism and its ongoing logging, farming, and ranching operations to sustain itself. The preserve is made up of diverse habitats including scrub flats, pine forests, marshes, cypress swamps, prairies, and hardwood hammocks (a hammock is a tract of land that rises above the surrounding wetlands).

Grazing land

A few slash pines with lots of undergrowth

With all the marshes and ponds, we saw surprisingly few wading birds, namely a few snowy egrets. We also saw one anhinga perched atop a dead tree.

Anhinga

Although the preserve is home to a wide variety of wildlife, we didn't see that much of it. They did tell us there is usually much more wildlife in winter when water levels are lower. The tour guides are able to attract some wildlife because they carry buckets of corn to use as handouts. The first of the beggars were white tail deer.

White tail deer

They saw us coming and meandered in our direction as the tour guide dumped some corn out onto the ground, but they kept their distance until the bus had started to move on.

Less wary were the feral pigs. They charged right up to the bus and waited for the corn.

Feral pigs

The cattle were even more demanding. Several of them put their noses all the way into the bus through the open door and one even started climbing up the steps.

One of the many cattle looking for a handout

The cattle are "cracker" cattle whose lineage goes back to the time of the arrival of Ponce de Leon in the early 1500s. These cattle were brought in by the Spanish and adapted well to the heat of Florida. "Cracker" is the name given to Florida cowboys, who were more properly called cow hunters, because of the cracks of their whips as they drove the cattle.

Back in the day, the small town of Rouxville (population 200) was a logging town that supported Babcock Ranch. The commissary, which still stands, had a company store and a doctor who also served as a barber... or was it the other way around?

Rouxville commissary

Next to the commissary was a pond with a resident 3-foot alligator.

Alligator in the commissary pond

After passing the commissary, the road crosses a fast-moving creek. They always say don't drive through water where you can't see the bottom, but the driver was obviously familiar with the route and charged right in.

View out the front window as the bus was about to ford a fast-moving stream

When the bus was mid-stream, we could see the remnants of an old railroad trestle out the right side. The railroad ran right through the ranch and was important for getting logs to market.

View out the right side of the bus of the stream and the remnants of old railroad trestle 

Most of the second half of the tour was through a cypress swamp... and we do mean through the swamp. The bus was in the water up to its axles most of the way.

Cypress trees are conifers that grow in or near water. They have buttress roots at the base to help support the trees in the wet soil, and the roots have projections called knees that stick up out of the water so the roots can get air.

Cypress swamp

The red-brown color of the water is due to tannin. The tannin comes from leaves and organic matter that fall into the water and break down.

Tannin-stained water in the swamp

Near the end of the tour, the driver stopped the bus on Alligator Bridge where we watched about half a dozen alligators in the water below.

One of the alligators we saw from Alligator Bridge

The driver got out and came back with a baby 'gator. At first we thought she picked it out of the water, but she admitted it came from a holding tank mounted on the back of the bus. When it gets a little bigger, they will release it.

Baby 'gator up close and personal

From Alligator Bridge it was a short drive back to the visitor center where there is a small museum with early artifacts from the ranch. Adjacent to the visitor center is the Gator Shack Restaurant that serves ribs, east Carolina-style pulled pork, various kinds of seafood, and alligator (tastes like chicken).

Back at the visitor center there was also there was a taxidermy display of Lulu the three-horned cow. She was born on Babcock Ranch in 1967. She had 18 calves, all of which were two-horned.

Lulu the three-horned cow

The tours are led by the driver and a spotter who helps look for and points out wildlife. Both were excellent and very knowledgeable. We thoroughly enjoyed our eco tour of Babcock Ranch.

We do have one caution regarding the tour, however. The roads are very rough so you may not want to take the tour if you have severe back or neck problems.

After looking around the visitor center a while, we hopped in the car and headed to our next stop. We'll tell you about it in our next post. 

Edison and Ford Winter Estates Part II: Garden, Museum, and Lab

Wauchula, FL - Events of Wednesday, April 24, 2017

The guided tour of the Edison and Ford Winter Estates included much of the grounds, the two homes on the property, and a display of antique Ford automobiles in a garage that had been added by the subsequent owners of Ford's winter home. After we finished the guided tour, we went back to spend more time in the gardens.

One of the gardens is called the Moonlight Garden. Edison never wanted to be away from his work so the winter estate also had a laboratory where he could conduct experiments. In our last post, we mentioned Ford moved Edison's original lab to his museum in Dearborn after a larger lab was built in 1927 (more on that later). Mina had the Moonlight Garden created in the place where the old lab once stood.

Moonlight Garden with Edison's study in the background

We continued on through the gardens and eventually made our way back to where the museum and the newer lab are located. The gardens include many varieties of palm trees, shrubs, and tropical plants. Paul really appreciated the fact the plants are very well labeled. Shown below are just some of the many blooms we saw along the way.

Some of the many flowers in the gardens

When we got to the museum, we headed inside. One of the first things we saw was a 1916 Model T given to Edison by Henry Ford.

Model T given to Edison by Henry Ford

There are also lots of examples of Edison's many inventions. He is probably best known as the inventor of the light bulb, but he didn't actually invent it. At the time, there were many people working to develop electrical illumination to replace gas and oil lighting, but Edison was the one who developed the first practical light bulb with a long-lasting filament. His carbonized bamboo filament was patented in 1880 and could last 1200 hours.

Examples of early light bulbs

Edison phonographs and other recording devices

MSA, which is the company Paul used to work for, was founded in 1914 for the purpose of finding a safer mine lamp. Prior to that time, miners used lamps with open flames in coal mines. Methane (natural gas) is frequently present in veins of coal, and the open flames on the lamps would ignite the methane causing explosions that resulted in the deaths of many miners. The founders of MSA partnered with Edison to develop an explosion-proof, battery-powered mine lamp that was introduced in 1915. It saved many lives over the years. Pictured below is a later version of the safety lamp from around 1930.

Battery powered mine lamp

During WWI, Edison became concerned about our dependence on foreign sources for rubber. He partnered with Harvey Firestone and Henry Ford in 1927 to build a laboratory adjacent to his Florida estate to do research into finding a plant that could be grown in the U.S. that would provide a source for rubber. It was the construction of this lab that prompted Henry Ford to move Edison's old lab to Dearborn and for Edison's wife to build the Moonlight Garden we mentioned earlier.

Edison and his team investigated over 17,000 plants, including the ficus trees pictured near the beginning of our last post, before eventually finding a variety of goldenrod whose sap had a high enough latex content to be used in the production of rubber. Latex is the primary component of natural rubber. Although the manufacture of rubber from goldenrod would have worked in an emergency situation, it was never used commercially because of the higher cost.

The lab, which is adjacent to the museum, contains a machine shop, an area for grinding plant materials, a chemical processing area to extract the latex, an office, and a dark room.

View of the chemical processing area in the lab

We were hungry by the time we finished the guided tour and spent time in the garden, the museum, and the lab. We knew that would be the case so we checked out several places to eat in the area ahead of time. Unfortunately, our number one choice (Route 80 Grill) closed at 1:30, and it was almost 2:00 by the time we finished. Therefore, it was on to Plan B - Basil's Pizza and Subs. Basil's is located in an older strip mall, and the restaurant looks a little shabby outside, but it's nice inside. Unfortunately, they weren't serving pizza that day (they didn't say why), they were out of ham for the Italian sub that Paul wanted, and they didn't have ice for their drinks. Scratch Basil's Pizza.

We ended up going with Plan C, which was a Dairy Queen that was near the on-ramp for I-75 since we were planning to take the interstate part of the way back to Wauchula anyway. We always go to Dairy Queen just for ice cream, but they have some pretty decent fast food that includes a "$5 Buck Lunch" (Yeah, we know. The dollar sign and the use of the word "buck" in the name is redundant, but that's what Dairy Queen calls it.) The $5 Buck Lunch gives you either three chicken strips or a cheeseburger plus fries, a soft drink, and a small sundae. We both had cheeseburgers and they allowed us to substitute medium cones for the small sundaes. The burgers weren't huge, but they were pretty good. And you can't beat the price considering everything you get.

With our bellies full, we headed back to the 5th wheel. We were scheduled to head north the following week, so our plans for the rest of our time included running last-minute errands and preparing for travel. We'll tell you about our journey in our next post.

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St. Joseph Plantation

New Orleans, LA - events of Friday, May 3 and Saturday, May 4, 2013

On Friday, there was more rain. There is a seafood market that is made up of 15 or 20 individual stalls less than a quarter mile up the road from the entrance to Bayou Segnette State Park. Since sightseeing was down the tubes because of the weather, we decided to go over to the market and get some shrimp for dinner.

We have bought shrimp at the market on our other stops in New Orleans, but we never before noticed the masts of the boats that were docked at the end of the road that is next to the market. We decided to drive down the road and have a look. There along the Bayou Segnette Waterway were a couple of dozen fishing boats docked and a shrimp packing plant.

Fishing boats docked on Bayou Segnette Waterway

Later, we checked it out on Google Maps and found the waterway connects with Gulf of Mexico. We weren't aware Bayou Segnette was as big as it is and that it connected to the Gulf. That helped explain why the seafood market is located where it is.

When we stop at the market, we always have trouble deciding where to buy our shrimp. Each stall has several coolers filled with ice and different sizes of shrimp. The prices are all relatively uniform making it even harder to decide.

Seafood Market

 

After walking by and looking at a couple of vendors, we finally asked one woman when the shrimp were caught. She said "today," which is what they all probably say no matter what, but the colors on her shrimp were pretty bright indicating her shrimp probably were fresh. She also offered us a $.50 a pound discount for cash so we made our purchase.

We really got spoiled by Joe Patti Seafood in Pensacola where we got our shrimp cleaned, de-veined, AND steamed. At the market near Bayou Segnette, not only are the shrimp not cleaned, they also have their heads on. We figure about a 40 to 50% loss in weight for the heads and shells.

It's always Paul's job to take the heads off. It's not hard, just a little unpleasant.

Paul removing the heads of the shrimp

We had the shrimp sauteed with a little butter, garlic powder, white wine, and Old Bay seasoning. When dipped in melted butter, they taste a lot like lobster. Yum!

Saturday was a bit cool, but the weather finally cleared. We don't normally sightsee on weekends; but with so many cloudy, rainy days, we decided take advantage of the first completely sunny day since we arrived here to go to see one of the plantations located upriver from New Orleans.

There used to be over 1,000 plantations between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, but now there are only a handful left. We previously visited four of the dozen or so plantations that are located within about an hour of New Orleans that are open for tours - Houmas House, Laura Plantation and Longue Vue in 2009 and Oak Alley in 2010. This year, we decided to see St. Joseph Plantation.

St. Joseph Plantation

The plantation was started in 1830 by the Scioneaux family as a sugar plantation. Remnants of the old ways of producing sugar, like the sugar kettles shown in the next photo, can be seen around the property.

Sugar kettles in front of what was originally the smokehouse

Another of the early owners of the plantation was the Priestley family. Catherine Priestley married Henry Dickerson Richardson. In 1838, their son Henry Hobson Richardson, who became a famous architect, was born at St. Joseph Plantation. At that time, the plantation was known as Priestly Plantation. Henry Hobson Richardson developed an architectural style known as Richardson Romanesque. It is characterized by rounded turrets, Romanesque arches and heavy stone or brick construction. Some of the buildings designed by Richardson include the Marshal Field Store in Chicago, Trinity Church in Boston, and the Allegheny County Courthouse in our old hometown of Pittsburgh.

Priestley Plantation was purchased in 1858 by Alexis and Josephine Ferry using money given to Josephine by her father, Gabriel Valcour Aime, as a wedding gift. The Ferrys renamed the plantation Josephine.

Following the Civil War, the Ferrys could no longer support the plantation, and it was sold to Joseph Waguespack at a sheriff's sale. Waguespack renamed the plantation St. Joseph Plantation in honor of his patron saint.

The plantation, which is still owned and maintained by descendants of the extended Waguespack family, grows sugar cane to this day. The current owners of St. Joseph also own the plantation next door - Felicite. Felicite is not currently open to the public, but the family does want to restore and open it someday. Felicite was a gift from Gabriel Valcour Aime to his third daughter, Felicite.

Young sugar cane at St. Joseph Plantation

Tours of the plantation house are given on the hour. We arrived between tours, so we walked around the grounds first. The building in the next photo was the chicken coop. The tomato plants growing at the left of the chicken coop already had a number of good-sized green tomatoes on them.

Tomatoes growing next to the chicken coup

The house is built in a raised Creole style. The ground floor was originally open due to periodic flooding of the Mississippi River. It was enclosed by Alexis and Josephine Ferry.

St. Joseph Plantation - view from the river side showing enclosed ground floor

Also on the property are several slave quarters. Each house would have been inhabited by two families.

Slave quarters

The tour started on the ground floor with a short video on growing sugar cane and the production of sugar. Modern methods of producing sugar using vacuum kettles are much more efficient than the old method of boiling in open kettles.

Following the video, we went upstairs to the main living quarters. The house is furnished with antiques mostly from the time of Joseph Waguespack. Only a few of the furnishings and artifacts are original to the house.

Parlor

Dining Room

After the tour, we made our way back to Bayou Segnette, but we made a little detour to DiMartino's Muffulettas, which is located a couple of miles past the state park.

DiMartino's Muffulettas

 

Muffulettas (also spelled muffalettas, muffelattas, muffulettas or muffulattas) are sandwiches that are made from salami, ham, provolone and mozzarella and served on round, Sicilian bread that is covered in sesame seeds. The sandwich is topped with chopped olive salad.

We had our first muffuletta several years ago on our first trip to New Orleans at Central Market in the French Quarter where muffulettas were supposedly invented. On our second stop in New Orleans, a local resident who was spending the weekend at Bayou Segnette State Park, told us about DiMartino's right up the road from the campground. We tried the muffulettas at DiMartino's, and we liked them better than the ones from the Central Market. For one thing, DiMartino's serves their muffulettas warm, which toasts the bread to a nice crunch and melts the cheese.

DiMartino's has a fairly extensive menu of sandwiches and po' boys, but we have never considered anything except muffulettas. They offer two sizes - 6" for $9.20 and 9" for $17.10. The 9" easily feeds two, so we split one of those. DiMartino's has take out and dine in. We opted to eat there so we wouldn't have any dishes to do.

We each had half a 9" muffulatta

With our bellies full, we headed back to the motor home. We have more sightseeing planned, so look for our next post.

Frankfort, KY Part I: Liberty Hall

Frankfort, KY - Events of Friday, August 3, 2012

After picking up the motor home from Bluegrass Trucks on Wednesday, we chose not to do anything except chill out around the motor home all day Thursday. By Friday, we felt like doing some sightseeing. Unfortunately, Friday turned out to be a cloudy, rainy day; but our time in Frankfort was winding down, so we pressed on with our sightseeing plans in spite of the weather.

There are numerous things to see and do in both Frankfort and nearby Lexington, but we decided to limit our sightseeing to Frankfort since our remaining time in the area was short. We zeroed in on Liberty Hall Historic Site, which is the location of two historic houses in the old section of downtown Frankfort. Since rain was threatening, we thought indoor house tours would be a good idea.

The first of the two houses is Liberty Hall, which was built by John Brown over a period of several years starting in 1797. John Brown was a politician and statesman who was instrumental in the creation of the state of Kentucky.

Liberty Hall

Since his older son Mason would inherit Liberty Hall, John Brown divided the property in 1835 and built a second house for the younger of his two sons, Orlando. We'll have a little more on the Orlando Brown House a little later in this post.

John Brown was born in 1757 in Virginia and was the son of a Presbyterian minister. Brown studied law at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton), at the college of William and Mary in Williamsburg, VA, and at the law office of Thomas Jefferson in Charlottesville, VA.

John Brown served in the Virginia State Senate from 1783 until 1788. He was also sent by Virginia as a delegate to the Continental Congress in 1787 and 1788. After the U. S. Constitution became effective, Virginia elected John Brown to the U. S. House of Representatives in 1789 where he introduced a petition for Kentucky statehood. Kentucky was originally a part of Virginia. After Kentucky became a state in 1792, Brown resigned as a representative to U. S. House from Virginia and was elected a U. S. Senator from Kentucky. While he was a senator, Brown moved to what was then the frontier town of Frankfort, KY.

John Brown was still a bachelor when he began building Liberty Hall in 1796. It was one of the earliest brick homes in Frankfort, and the bricks were fired locally from clay dug from the cellar. At the time, it must have seemed a very lavish house with most homes in the area being of log construction.

Brown married Margaretta Mason in 1799, and the couple moved into Liberty Hall even though the house did not yet have glass in the windows. The window openings were probably covered by something like translucent, oiled paper, plus there were shutters they could use for really inclement weather. Glass, which was manufactured in Pittsburgh, was finally installed in 1804. John and Margaretta had 5 children; but only two of them, Mason and Orlando, survived to adulthood.

Our tour guide was the Tour Administrator, so she really had a lot of knowledge and her enthusiasm was contagious. We started our tour under a gnarled catalpa tree in front of Liberty Hall. The tree was growing there when John Brown first purchased the property.

Catalpa tree in front of Liberty Hall was growing there when the house was built over 200 years ago.

A second catalpa was planted from a seed pod from the first in 1900 (to the left in the foreground in the photo below), and the branches of the two trees intertwine.

Second catalpa tree (foreground) was planted from a seed pod from the original catalpa.

As we entered the front door, our guide pointed out the original locks on the doors that were still in excellent operating condition.

Liberty Hall has its original locks.

Liberty Hall remained in the hands of descendants of John Brown until his great-grand- daughter passed away in 1934. The house was then sold to a group of concerned citizens who formed a non-profit organization called Liberty Hall, Inc., which opened the house as a museum in 1937.

The structure itself has been stabilized and restored, and the interior is early in the process of being renovated. Some original furniture has been donated to Liberty Hall by family members, but it is from various time periods throughout the home's history. Photography without flash is permitted, so you will see in the following several photos that furnishings are fairly sparse.

Entry Hall

Period wallpaper has been hung in the parlor. Carpeting and drapes will be next. In the photo below, a sample of the proposed carpet lies in front of the fireplace.

Parlor

The master bedroom was on the first floor.

Master bedroom

Also on the first floor was John Brown's office where his portable desk is displayed with copies of letters he sent to Thomas Jefferson. As we mentioned, Brown studied law with Jefferson, and Brown continued to correspond with Thomas Jefferson over the years. Thomas Jefferson advised John Brown on the construction of Liberty Hall, and may have actually done some of the design work himself.

Portable desk with a copy of a letter to Thomas Jefferson

We also got to see the ballroom, guest rooms and kids' rooms on the second floor.

The kitchen wasn't a totally separate building like it was in many homes of the time, but it was in a wing separated from the main house by a porch. Liberty Hall has cooking demonstrations in the kitchen once a month.

Liberty Hall kitchen

They had an interesting display on the table in the kitchen. The dark block with the embossed pattern to the left is pressed tea leaves. Pieces were broken off and added to hot water to steep. The blue-wrapped cones are sugar, and the item in front of the sugar is a sugar nipper. It was used to pinch off small pieces of sugar from the solid cones. Although the sugar cones were displayed with the tea, it is likely the tea would have been sweetened using honey.

Display of tea-making materials in the kitchen

There is a garden area behind Liberty Hall that extends a couple hundred yards to the Kentucky River. It had started to rain, so we didn't spend much time exploring the garden.

Liberty Hall garden

From the garden, we walked to the other end of the block to the Orlando Brown House. As we mentioned, John Brown divided his property and built this house so both his sons would have an equal inheritance, although the Orlando Brown House isn't built on quite as grand a scale as Liberty Hall.

Orlando Brown House

Descendants of Orlando Brown lived in the house until 1955. When his last remaining descendant passed away, she left the house to the National Society of the Colonial Dames of America in the Commonwealth of Kentucky (NSCDA-KY), and the Orlando Brown house was opened to the public the same year. The Orlando Brown house looks a bit more finished inside than Liberty Hall, although some restoration is needed and it is also sparsely furnished.

Parlor of the Orlando Brown House

We were the only ones on the tour and were able to ask lots of questions, so we got a lot of interesting information. Our tour lasted a lot longer than we thought, but we still had a couple of things we wanted to do before the day was over. We'll tell you about them in our next post.