National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination Form 1
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NPS Form 10.900 (7.81) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination Form See instructions in How to Complete National Register- Forms Type all entries-complete applicable sections 1. Name historic Rebuilding St. Georges Hundred, New Castle County, 1850-1880 and/or common 2. Location street & number see individual nominations -not for publication - city, town -vicinity of congressional district state code county code 3. Classification Category Ownership Status Present Use X -district -public -occupied 2agriculture -museum building@) ,, private -unoccupied -commercial -park - -work in progress -educational L private residence -structure -both -site Public Acquisition Accessible -entertainment -religious -object -in process yes:restricted -government scientific x thematic -being considered x yes: unrestricted industrial transportation NA no miiiiary -other: 4. Owner of Property name see ?ndividual nominations street & number - - citv. town -vicinitv of state 5. Location of Legal Description courthouse, registry of deeds, etc. New Castle County Courthouse, Recorder of Deeds street & number 7th and French Streets Wil.mington Delaware city, town state 6. Representation in Existing Surveys Delaware Cultural Resource Survey x title CRS N-9567 has this property been determined eligible? -yes -no date -federal -state -countv -local - de~ositot'~for survev records --- citv. town state Condition Check one Check one -excellent -deteriorated -?- unaltered X original site 2.good -ruins 2altered moved date -- fair -unexposed Describe the present and original (if known) physical appearance The twenty-eight sites included in the thematic nomination, "Rebuilding St. Gec'rges Hundred, 1850 - 18801', are representative of a broad pattern of historically documented architectural, agricultural, and social change that swept through southern New Castle County, Delaware, in the second and third quarters of the 19th century. The selected sites all document one of three major areas of change in domestic architecture as it relates to rebuilding c3cles: the improvement of standing buildings, the replacement of standing structures, and the development of new sites (often at the cost of abandoning earlier settings). Also associated with these dwellings and the social processes they represent and articulate, are a number of agricultural buildings reflecting the new design options for work space developed in the course of the rebuilding. 1 Architecturally, all the individual components of the nomination are unified through their embodiment of the rebuilding theme. They are all rural farmsteads which survive in predomf.nantly agricultural settings, although those settings are threatened by the increasing demands of industrial and residential usage. All the buildings make use of a 1.ocally characteristic mix of Italianate, Second Empire, Gothic, late Federal, and Greek Revival architecturallelements. More significant however, is the way the new and rebuilt hciuses of the period redefine social and domestic relationships through the organization of household spaces. The appearance of center-passage plans coupled with service wings describe a pattern of usage fundamentally different from the mainstream of domestic architecture characterizing the same area prior to 1820,, The same distinctio~sextend to farm buildings, but in their design the form of architecture is more obviously symbolic in the flux ~f more slowly changing ettitudes to the actual use of work space. The preceding comments are intended to intrcduce the basic precepts t-ehind the nominatior,. TFese ideas are amplified and illustrated through the constiuent parts of the nomination and fully developed in the statement cf significance. 8. Significance Period Areas af Significance--Check and justify below -prehistoric -archeology-prehistoric . community planning -landscape architecture religion -1400-1 499 -archeology-historic -conservation -law -science -1500-1 599 -agriculture -economics -literature -sculpture -1600-1 699 -x- architecture -education -military -social1 1700-1 799 -art -engineering -music humanitarian -X -1800-1899 -commerce -explorationlsettlement -philosophy -theater -1900- -communications -industry -politicslgovernment -- transportation -invention -other (specify) Specific dates BuilderIArcAitect Statement of Significance (in one paragraph) The twenty-eight properties included in the "Rebuilding St. Gec:rges Hundred, 1850-!8801' thematic nominstion are eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places under Criteria A and C - historical events and architectural significa~ce.The properties selected for the nominati~n retain their architectural iritegrity as it relates to the historical period under consideration. In some instances the integrity of nominated buildings antesating the mid 19th century has been coml~romf.sed as a direct result of historically doclimented actions taker, in the middle decades of the 1800s. Historical.ly, the rebuildicg of St. Georges Hundred has its origins in the early 19th century in the years prior to 1820. Through the 18th century and into the first two decades of the 19th century, b~iilciingactivity in St. Georges Hundred moved thrcugh a series of building cycles. These cycles can be read as generally consecutive, b~tas also having substantial periods of overlap. In order they are 1) impermanev.t architecture replaced by 2) durable boucin~beginning as early as the close of the first generation of permanent English settlement, and 3)formally increased through the introduction of stair passage pla~types in the late 1740s. By the close of the: 18th century 4) the pattern of separate kitchen buildings began to be replaced by the clistom of incorporatir~gkjtchens onto the secondary and tertiary elevations of the main hcluse as service wings or ells. This general pattern of buildiag hzLs been docllmented throughout tte enstern seaboard of thc: UnFted States and the: Canadian ntaritimes. In the Chesapeake Bay region of the upper Soutt for el zrplc impermar.enc.e iri architecture remained a viable tradition we!l into the 18th eeneury, while in New England and southeastern Pennsylvaxia the ;noye to durable building bega2 to occur in the first geaeratioa of recorded settlement. By the third quarter of the 18th century the architectural traditions of southern New Castle Co:snty in general, axd St. Gearges Hundred in particular, 9. Major Bibliosranhical References See continuation sheet I0. Geographical Data Acreage of nominated property Quadrangle name Quadrangle scale UMT References 11)1111) Zone Easting Northing Zone Easting Northing Verbal boundary description and justification See individual nominations List all states and counties for properties overlapping state or county boundaries state code county code state code county code I1 . Form Prenared BY of Delaware 3-28-84 oraanization date -street & number I, telephone 451-34 I2. Slate Historic Preservation Officer Certification - - -- The evaluated significance of this property within the state is: -national -- state x.- local As the designated State Historic Preservation Officer for tne National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 (Public Law 89- 665), 1 hereby nominate this property for inclusion in the National Register and certify that it has been evaluated according to the criteria and procedures set forth by the National Park Service. State Historic Preservation Officer signature title date NPS Form 10900.# Dm) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination Form Continuation sheet Item number 61 Page 2- had been fully developed. At the time of the 1816 tax assessment, the majority of buildings in St. Georges Hundred were built of wood. Of the 567 taxables only 30 percent owned land and dwellings. Within that sample brick dwellings were available to only 5 percent of the total taxable population. The lack of owner-occupant housing for twc thirds of the population is significant. Almost 400 taxable individuals and their families were living in housing provided for them on other people's lands. Some of these dwellings were on out plantatAons, but the majority seem tc have been grouped around crossroads, in villages, or in close proximity to the owners' dwellings. The types of buildings these folk occupied were typically hall or hall-parlor plan dwellings with seperate outbuildings containing the cooking functions of the household and quarters for servants. There were, of course, the houses of the wealthy which incorporated fashionalle stair passage plans and attached service wings. In terms of long term durability, it is the latter which have survived and skewed our perceptions of what the normative range of housing included in terms of form and fashion. The period of the early 19th century witnessed several major economic, social and demographic shifts which set the stage for the rebuilding period to follow in the mid 1800s. First, there was a general population decrease throughout the hundred from 1800 to 1820. This was related in part to a break up of farms in terms of size over the predeeding century and a general decline in agricultural productivity. Second, in response to a perceived agricultural crisis, the New Castle County agricultural sc:ciety was formed with the goal of promoting agricultural refcrm and the methods of scientific farming. An unspoken aspect of this reform was the reconsolidation of land into larger holdings - an