Woodley Mansion
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Woodley is a
Federal-style Federal-style architecture is the name for the classicizing architecture built in the newly founded United States between 1780 and 1830, and particularly from 1785 to 1815, which was heavily based on the works of Andrea Palladio with several inn ...
hilltop house in
Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
, constructed in 1801.Maret School Website
/ref> It has served as the home to
Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...
,
Martin Van Buren Martin Van Buren ( ; nl, Maarten van Buren; ; December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was an American lawyer and statesman who served as the eighth president of the United States from 1837 to 1841. A primary founder of the Democratic Party (Uni ...
, and
Henry L. Stimson Henry Lewis Stimson (September 21, 1867 – October 20, 1950) was an American statesman, lawyer, and Republican Party politician. Over his long career, he emerged as a leading figure in U.S. foreign policy by serving in both Republican and D ...
, and is now the home of the
Maret School Maret School is a coeducational, K–12 independent school in Washington, D.C. It was founded by Marthe Maret in 1911 as a French primary school for girls and boys. History In the late 1800s and early 1900s, three French sisters, Mlles Marth ...
. When originally built, it was based on the Woodley Lodge in Reading, England. Coincidentally, given the mansion's original site, the word "Woodley" means "clearing in the woods."Kilborne, Allerton. Woodley and Its Residents. Arcadia, 2008 A Maret School-based organization called the Woodley Society was created in 1994 to study its history. Since then, it has become an association of students, faculty, and alumni, which has conducted research in a number of archives and libraries in the Greater Metropolitan Washington area and beyond. In 2008, the head of the group, historian Allerton Kilborne, published a book about Woodley. The group's podcast, Echoes of Woodley, is available on Spotify and showcases stories surrounding the mansion.


History of Woodley Mansion

In 1801, Woodley was built by Phillip Barton Key, the uncle of the author of "The Star Spangled Banner,"
Francis Scott Key Francis Scott Key (August 1, 1779January 11, 1843) was an American lawyer, author, and amateur poet from Frederick, Maryland, who wrote the lyrics for the American national anthem "The Star-Spangled Banner". Key observed the British bombardment ...
. In 1797, Key bought the wooded estate that Woodley would be built upon. Before the land was sold to Phillip Barton Key, it was owned by Colonel Ninian Beall and
Benjamin Stoddert Benjamin Stoddert (1751 – 18 December 1813) was the first United States Secretary of the Navy from 1 May 1798 to 31 March 1801. Early life and education Stoddert was born in Charles County, Maryland in 1751, the son of Captain Thomas Stoddert. ...
. Once the magnificent Federal-style house was built, it was home to multiple residents, including: Phillip Barton Key, President
Martin Van Buren Martin Van Buren ( ; nl, Maarten van Buren; ; December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was an American lawyer and statesman who served as the eighth president of the United States from 1837 to 1841. A primary founder of the Democratic Party (Uni ...
,
Lorenzo Thomas Lorenzo Thomas (October 26, 1804 – March 2, 1875) was a career United States Army officer who was Adjutant General of the Army at the beginning of the American Civil War. After the war, he was appointed temporary Secretary of War by U.S. ...
, the slave Lucy Berry, Robert J. Walker, Francis Newlands, President
Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...
, William "Billy" Phillips, Sallie Long Ellis,
George Patton George Smith Patton Jr. (November 11, 1885 – December 21, 1945) was a general in the United States Army who commanded the Seventh United States Army in the Mediterranean Theater of World War II, and the Third United States Army in France ...
,
Henry Stimson Henry Lewis Stimson (September 21, 1867 – October 20, 1950) was an American statesman, lawyer, and Republican Party politician. Over his long career, he emerged as a leading figure in U.S. foreign policy by serving in both Republican and D ...
and
Adolf Berle Adolf Augustus Berle Jr. (; January 29, 1895 – February 17, 1971) was an American lawyer, educator, writer, and diplomat. He was the author of ''The Modern Corporation and Private Property'', a groundbreaking work on corporate governance, a prof ...
.
Henry Stimson Henry Lewis Stimson (September 21, 1867 – October 20, 1950) was an American statesman, lawyer, and Republican Party politician. Over his long career, he emerged as a leading figure in U.S. foreign policy by serving in both Republican and D ...
left Woodley in his will to his alma mater Phillips Academy, Andover, which in turn sold most of it to the Maret School, founded by the three late French Maret sisters, Marthe, Louise and Jeanne, born and educated in Geneva, Switzerland. They became teachers, Louise in Russia, and Jeanne in Germany, in the Philippines and in Washington DC for the Taft children. Then, both Louise and Jeanne followed university programs in DC and Chevy-Chase, Marthe, who became blind at 18 was also teaching at Maret School, as were her sisters. Maret purchased the campus in 1950, after previously being housed in a 1923 building at 2118 Kalorama Road, N.W. Ever since 1950, the
Maret School Maret School is a coeducational, K–12 independent school in Washington, D.C. It was founded by Marthe Maret in 1911 as a French primary school for girls and boys. History In the late 1800s and early 1900s, three French sisters, Mlles Marth ...
has owned most of the land, while still taking great care of the well-known mansion. Currently, around 650 students attend the top-tier private school. During Maret's tenure, it has been used to house a learning center, a library, a business office, admissions office, as well as the head of school's office.


Residents


Colonel Ninian Beall

Ninian Beall was an immigrant from Scotland who started his life in America as an indentured servant and ended up as a major landowner and merchant. He bought the site of the future Woodley as part of the 795-acre tract to which he gave the name "The Rock of Dumbarton." It was on the
Potomac River The Potomac River () drains the Mid-Atlantic United States, flowing from the Potomac Highlands into Chesapeake Bay. It is long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map. Retrieved Augus ...
, where Georgetown would eventually be established, that he built a tobacco warehouse, a gristmill, and an iron foundry.


Benjamin Stoddert

Benjamin Stoddert was a successful merchant and veteran of the Revolution who went on to become the first Secretary of the Navy. The appointment came during the "Quasi-War" with France in 1798, when French ships were seizing American vessels on the high seas. Under Stoddert's direction, the American navy not only grew exponentially, but also won the undeclared naval war against France. Earlier in the decade, at the request of George Washington, he had formed a partnership with Uriah Forrest and purchased the site of Woodley and its environs to prevent the land from being bought up by speculators who would then have sold it to the government for huge prices.


Philip Barton Key

Philip Barton Key Philip Barton Key (April 12, 1757 – July 28, 1815), was an American Loyalist during the American Revolutionary War and later was a United States Circuit Judge and Chief United States Circuit Judge of the United States circuit court for the Fo ...
was born into a prominent family of Maryland planters. He sacrificed his inheritance to fight for a Loyalist regiment in the American Revolution and was eventually captured, paroled and sent to England, where he studied law at the Middle Temple of the Inns at Court. In 1789, he returned to Maryland, married Ann Plater and went on to become the only Loyalist to resurrect his reputation and rise to prominence. Before his death in 1816, he served as both a Federal Judge and a Congressman. During Key's schooling in England, he visited Prime Minister
Henry Addington Henry Addington, 1st Viscount Sidmouth, (30 May 175715 February 1844) was an English Tory statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1801 to 1804. Addington is best known for obtaining the Treaty of Amiens in 1802, an ...
at the Woodley Lodge. When Key returned to Washington, DC, he modeled his own home after the original lodge in England.


Martin Van Buren

Martin Van Buren Martin Van Buren ( ; nl, Maarten van Buren; ; December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was an American lawyer and statesman who served as the eighth president of the United States from 1837 to 1841. A primary founder of the Democratic Party (Uni ...
served as a Senator from New York and later as
Andrew Jackson Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was an American lawyer, planter, general, and statesman who served as the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before being elected to the presidency, he gained fame as ...
's Vice President before ascending to the Presidency in 1837. When he came into office, the country was plunged into its first depression so he could not do what all his predecessors had done: move away from the heat of Washington during the summer. Instead he rented Woodley because it was on cooler heights above the city and because it was considerably cheaper to run.


Lorenzo Thomas

Lorenzo Thomas Lorenzo Thomas (October 26, 1804 – March 2, 1875) was a career United States Army officer who was Adjutant General of the Army at the beginning of the American Civil War. After the war, he was appointed temporary Secretary of War by U.S. ...
was a Union general who played a number of roles during the Civil War era. He was serving as Adjutant General when he stood beside General Ulysses S. Grant aboard the ironclad U.S.S. Magnolia and watched the siege of Vicksburg. Later in the war, he served in Mississippi, where he raised 21,000 black troops. During an assignment in the West, it is believed, he rented Woodley to ex-President James Buchanan. After the war, Thomas served briefly as Secretary of War and was a key player in the impeachment trial of Andrew Johnson. In April 1862, Thomas freed the last of the Woodley slaves—Lucy Berry and her two small sons, George and Lorenzo. It is not known for sure whether or not Lorenzo Thomas fathered these two sons; indeed one son's name was Lorenzo.


Lucy Berry

Lucy Berry, the last of the Woodley slaves, was born in Charles County, Maryland in 1822 on a tobacco plantation called Equality. In 1853, she was bought by Lorenzo Thomas and installed in Woodley as his cook and laundress. In April 1862, Lucy Berry and her two small sons were freed by the
District Emancipation Act A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions o ...
. Four years later, she was reunited with her husband Denis and her four older children, and the entire Berry family were living together in their own house in East Georgetown. After the end of Reconstruction and the death of Denis Berry, Lucy moved to the Government Hospital of the Insane (now St. Elizabeth's), where she worked as a laundress until her death.


Robert J. Walker

Robert J. Walker was a Mississippi cotton planter, U.S. Representative, and Senator before 1844, when he helped to engineer the election of
James K. Polk James Knox Polk (November 2, 1795 – June 15, 1849) was the 11th president of the United States, serving from 1845 to 1849. He previously was the 13th speaker of the House of Representatives (1835–1839) and ninth governor of Tennessee (183 ...
, the first dark horse candidate elected president. Polk appointed him Secretary of the Treasury. In 1867, he helped persuade Secretary of State William Seward to purchase Alaska from Russia. To keep negotiations on track, the Czar paid Walker a $20,000 bribe, some of which went into the 1867 renovation of Woodley when a third floor was added.Woodley Calendar 2011


Francis Newlands

Francis Newlands Francis Griffith Newlands (August 28, 1846December 24, 1917) was a United States representative and Senator from Nevada and a member of the Democratic Party. A supporter of westward expansion, he helped pass the Newlands Reclamation Act of 1 ...
, a beneficiary of the Comstock Silver Mine, was both a politician and a real estate tycoon. As Senator from Nevada, he championed the Newlands Reclamation Act of 1901, which culminated in the irrigation of huge sections of the West. At the local level, he developed Chevy Chase and put in Connecticut Avenue so that the owners of his new development could reach downtown Washington by streetcar. He further enhanced the value of his real estate holdings by helping to create Rock Creek Park. After renting Woodley to the Clevelands in 1893, he added a block of rooms on the east side of the building and moved in himself (circa 1900).


Grover Cleveland

Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...
was the only President to serve two non-consecutive terms. When he lost the election of 1888, he sold his dream house on the corner of Newark and 36th streets. Therefore, when he won back the Presidency in 1892, he needed a new summer house within striking distance of the White House. His choice was Woodley, which had just been extensively modernized with electricity and state-of-the-art heating and plumbing systems.


William Phillips

William Phillips William Phillips may refer to: Entertainment * William Phillips (editor) (1907–2002), American editor and co-founder of ''Partisan Review'' * William T. Phillips (1863–1937), American author * William Phillips (director), Canadian film-make ...
was a career diplomat and a lifelong friend of Franklin Roosevelt. When he and his wife Caroline rented Woodley (1915–1919), he was Assistant Secretary of State and also the host of numerous dinners attended by the Roosevelts. Phillips went on to a career as ambassador to Belgium, Canada and Italy, where for six years, he tried to keep Mussolini's ambitions in check. He continued to serve in many vital overseas assignments under his old friend Franklin Roosevelt until his official retirement in 1944.


Sallie Long Ellis

Sallie Long Ellis bought Woodley in 1921. Her husband Captain Hayne Ellis had seen action in the Spanish–American War, the Philippine Insurrection and the Boxer Rebellion. He would later become Commander of the Atlantic Squadron. Among the guests who visited Woodley during those years was General
John Pershing General of the Armies John Joseph Pershing (September 13, 1860 – July 15, 1948), nicknamed "Black Jack", was a senior United States Army Officer (armed forces), officer. He served most famously as the commander of the American Expeditionary ...
, commander of the American Expeditionary force in World War I.


Henry Stimson

Henry Stimson, the owner of Woodley from 1929–1950, was a statesman admired on both sides of the aisle. During the Hoover administration, he was the Secretary of State that pushed Hoover towards preparedness, and during the Roosevelt-Truman administrations, he served as Secretary of War, presiding over, among other matters, the development of the atomic bomb. When Stimson and his wife Mabel bought Woodley in 1929, they added cloakrooms (now little offices) on either side of the portico.


Adolf Berle

Adolf Berle Adolf Augustus Berle Jr. (; January 29, 1895 – February 17, 1971) was an American lawyer, educator, writer, and diplomat. He was the author of ''The Modern Corporation and Private Property'', a groundbreaking work on corporate governance, a prof ...
, one of the architects of the New Deal, rented Woodley from Stimson in 1939. Once again, Woodley became the place of high drama. On the evening of September 1,
Whittaker Chambers Whittaker Chambers (born Jay Vivian Chambers; April 1, 1901 – July 9, 1961) was an American writer-editor, who, after early years as a Communist Party member (1925) and Soviet spy (1932–1938), defected from the Soviet underground (1938), ...
arrived at Woodley to tell Berle that
Alger Hiss Alger Hiss (November 11, 1904 – November 15, 1996) was an American government official accused in 1948 of having spied for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Statutes of limitations had expired for espionage, but he was convicted of perjury in con ...
, a highly respected member of the State Department, was passing top-secret documents to the
Soviets Soviet people ( rus, сове́тский наро́д, r=sovyétsky naród), or citizens of the USSR ( rus, гра́ждане СССР, grázhdanye SSSR), was an umbrella demonym for the population of the Soviet Union. Nationality policy in th ...
. That accusation would eventually culminate in the trial of Hiss. (He was found guilty of perjury and went to prison.) Among the many guests at Woodley during the Berle year was Secretary of State
Cordell Hull Cordell Hull (October 2, 1871July 23, 1955) was an American politician from Tennessee and the longest-serving U.S. Secretary of State, holding the position for 11 years (1933–1944) in the administration of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt ...
, who would sneak away during afternoons to play croquet on the Woodley
croquet Croquet ( or ; french: croquet) is a sport that involves hitting wooden or plastic balls with a mallet through hoops (often called "wickets" in the United States) embedded in a grass playing court. Its international governing body is the Wor ...
lawn;
Albert Einstein Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
, who came to a Woodley reception; and
Charles W. Yost Charles Woodruff Yost (November 6, 1907 – May 21, 1981) was a career U.S. Ambassador who was assigned as his country's representative to the United Nations from 1969 to 1971. Biography Yost was born in Watertown, New York. He attended t ...
, Berle's assistant, who was invited to view Julian Bryan's horrifying photographs of the Warsaw siege.


See also

*
List of residences of presidents of the United States Listed below are the private residences of the various presidents of the United States. For a list of official residences, see President of the United States § Residence. Private homes of the presidents This is a list of homes where p ...


References


External links


Amazon.com (Woodley and Its Residents)

Woodley Society Website
{{coord, 38.9285, -77.0602, display=title Houses in Washington, D.C. Federal architecture in Washington, D.C. Key family of Maryland Beall family of Maryland