Farmington, an historic site in

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border ...

, was once the center of a hemp

plantation A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...

owned by John and Lucy Speed. The 14-room, Federal-style brick

plantation house A plantation house is the main house of a plantation, often a substantial farmhouse, which often serves as a symbol for the plantation as a whole. Plantation houses in the Southern United States and in other areas are known as quite grand and e ...

was possibly based on a design by

Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was previously the natio ...

and has several Jeffersonian architectural features. As many as 64 African Americans were enslaved by the Speed family at Farmington.

History

The Farmington site was part of a military land grant given to Captain James Speed in 1780. His son, John Speed, completed Farmington on a tract of land in 1816. Built in the Federal architectural style, the house is based on plans by

, which are now in the Coolidge Collection at the Massachusetts Historical Society. Speed built the house for his wife, Lucy Gilmer Fry, daughter of Joshua Fry and granddaughter of Dr. Thomas Walker, the guardian of Thomas Jefferson. Her aunt and uncle's home in Charlottesville, Virginia was called Farmington and had an addition designed by Thomas Jefferson. Their son, Joshua Fry Speed, was an intimate, lifelong friend of

Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...

. While courting

Mary Todd Mary may refer to: People * Mary (name), a feminine given name (includes a list of people with the name) Religious contexts * New Testament people named Mary, overview article linking to many of those below * Mary, mother of Jesus, also cal ...

, Lincoln spent three weeks at Farmington in 1841 while recovering from mental and physical exhaustion. It was during this visit to Farmington in 1841 that Abraham Lincoln witnessed slavery on a plantation first-hand and he saw enslaved people chained together after he boarded a steamboat at the Louisville waterfront. In an 1855 letter to Joshua Speed, Lincoln wrote that the scene had continued to torment him. John and Lucy's son, James Speed, was appointed Attorney General of the United States by Lincoln in 1863.

Design

Farmington Historic Plantation main house profile

Farmington consists of a single story above a raised basement. The building is roughly a square shape, measuring wide by long. There are 14 rooms of living quarters on the first floor, with servant's and children's rooms on the basement floor. The first story is about five feet above ground level, with the basement windows completely above ground. All rooms in the basement are finished. A simplified classical cornice under the hipped roof helps give the house its pleasing, proportional appearance. The front entrance is a

tetrastyle A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cult ...

portico (porch) with slender Doric columns, reached by 11 steps. The porch's gable features a semi-circular ventilation window. The front door opens into a central hall which has a door at the back leading to a rear hall. These two halls give access to all rooms on the first floor, as well as stairs to the basement and attic. The stairs are hidden, which is a common feature of homes designed by Jefferson. A notable feature of the first floor are two wide octagonal rooms, another distinctive feature of Jeffersonian architecture. One of the octagonal rooms is a dining hall, the other is a parlor. Other rooms on the first floor are two bedrooms, a study and a family sitting room.

Preservation

Farmington Historic Plantation springhouse

Farmington has been restored as a tourist attraction and a re-creation of a 19th-century plantation. The house itself had been altered little at the time it was purchased by the Historic Homes Foundation for preservation in 1958. The only substantial change in its interior or exterior appearance since construction was the installation of a tin roof in place of the original wood shingles, which was done for fire safety reasons. As of 2011, Farmington and a small visitors center are open to the public for tours and the site is available for special events and rentals. In 2012, Farmington's owner, Historic Homes Foundation, Inc., entered into an agreement to sell 5 of the landmark's 18 acres to an adjoining landowner, Sullivan University, for use as a 300-space parking lot to be shared by both entities. Controversial questions about the proposal were raised in online media leading up to its consideration in the February 3, 2013 meeting of the Metro Louisville Landmarks Commission's Individual Landmarks Architectural Review Committee.Morrison, Curtis
"Updated Farmington follow: Amplifications and clarifications on Sullivan/Historic Homes relationship"
, '' Insider Louisville'', Louisville, 31 January 2013. Retrieved on 1 February 2013.

References

External links

Farmington official web site"Joshua and James Speed"
— Article by Civil War historian/author Bryan S. Bush
Google Satellite Map
{{coord, 38, 12, 51.69, N, 85, 40, 7.07, W, display=title Houses completed in 1816 19th-century buildings and structures in Louisville, Kentucky Houses in Louisville, Kentucky Museums in Louisville, Kentucky Tourist attractions in Louisville, Kentucky Local landmarks in Louisville, Kentucky National Register of Historic Places in Louisville, Kentucky Historic house museums in Kentucky Plantation houses in Kentucky Plantations in Kentucky Federal architecture in Massachusetts 1816 establishments in Kentucky

History

Design

Preservation

See also

References

Further reading

External links