Harriet Beecher Stowe House (Hartford, Connecticut)
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Harriet Beecher Stowe House
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| Location | Hartford, Connecticut |
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| Coordinates | 41°46′1.14″N 72°42′2.81″W / 41.7669833°N 72.7007806°WCoordinates: 41°46′1.14″N 72°42′2.81″W / 41.7669833°N 72.7007806°W |
| Built | 1871 |
| Architect | Unknown |
| Architectural style | Gothic |
| Website | www.harrietbeecherstowecenter.org |
| NRHP Reference # | 70000710 |
| Significant dates | |
| Added to NRHP | October 6, 1970 |
| Designated NHL | February 27, 2013 |
The Harriet Beecher Stowe House is a historic house museum and National Historic Landmark at 73 Forest Street in Hartford, Connecticut that was once the home of Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Stowe lived in this house for the last 23 years of her life. It was her famliy's second home in Hartford. The 5,000 sq ft (460 m2) cottage-style house is located adjacent to the Mark Twain House and is open to the public. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1970, and declared a National Historic Landmark in 2013.
The Stowe House is a two story brick building, painted gray, resting on a brick foundation. Although the house is basically rectangular, it has a complex roof, with a jerkin-headed gable running parallel to the street, a hip-roof extension to the rear, and small dormers flanking a central dormer flush to the front facade. The gables are decorated with bargeboard, and the eaves have Italianate brackets. The interior of the house follows a fairly conventional center hall plan, with two parlors, dining room, kitchen, and pantry on the first floor, and bedrooms on the second. Though Harriet Beecher Stowe and her family had previously lived in several other homes, Oakhholm was the first constructed specifically for them.
Harriet Beecher Stowe had been living in Massachusetts with her husband Calvin Ellis Stowe, who taught at the Andover Theological Seminary. When Calvin gave his resignation, effective in August 1863, Harriet set to work preparing their first home in Hartford. Fluctuating costs caused by the American Civil War made the project difficult but Harriet enjoyed supervising the work. She wrote to her publisher James Thomas Fields, "I go every day to see it—I am busy with drains sewers sinks digging trenching—& above all with manure!—You should see the joy with which I gaze on manure heaps to which the eye of faith sees Delaware grapes & D'Angouleme pears & all sorts of roses & posies". She named the building "Oakholm". The home was complete enough that, by May 1, 1864, she wrote, "I came here a month ago to hurry on the preparations for our house, in which I am now writing, in the high bow-window of Mr. Stowe's study, overlooking the wood and river. We are not moved in yet, only our things, and the house presents a scene of the wildest chaos, the furniture having been tumbled in and lying boxed and promiscuous."
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