Landmarks Around Town

335 Cold Soil Road - Cornelius Ferril/Slack House

This unpretentious 1-1/2 story high ca. 1820 vernacular farmhouse is across from Terhune Orchards. Clearly, it was not influenced by the Georgian/Federal design of the times. The most noticeable exterior feature of the house is the unusual asymmetrical placement of three six-over-six windows on the first floor and the single square three-over-three window above. This was due to additions on both sides of the original structure. The original clapboards were covered by stucco in the 1940’s. Inside, there is a large open fireplace, an in-wall stairway, old doors with cast iron hardware, and a beamed ceiling.

265 Cold Soil Road - John Hill Farm

This six-acre property, barely visible from the road, was part of a 114 acre farm from March 11,1768, when Joseph Pierson, Jr. mortgaged it, until the 1970’s. It is considered an excellent and unusual example of an historic farmstead, one of only a few that have retained the integrity of a farmscape setting. The farmhouse has an earlier stone section, ca. 1790, and a Civil War era clapboard wing. The stone section, with walls about two feet thick, is only one room deep. An 1860 map shows a distillery on the western edge of this property where applejack was made. It was torn down sometime after 1896. A portion of the existing house is suspected to be a portion of the distillery.

210 Cold Soil Road - Joseph Pierson House

The Joseph Pierson house is an amalgam of construction materials, time periods and architectural styles that results in a striking example of a well-preserved eighteenth century farmhouse. The house has four sections. The second, its earliest, dates from 1720 and has 30 inch thick walls. The main block was built in 1780 and the two clapboard sections are ca. 1860. They maintain the same tin-covered roofline from the earlier stone sections. The mortar for the early sections was mud mixed with lime and horsehair, standard at that time. According to Donald Tyler, there are two traditions about this house. One is about a Hessian soldier who was shot and killed when found in a bedroom closet by the colonial militia. The second story, “unauthenticated,” relates how the family silverware is buried somewhere on the property, hidden from the British prior to the home’s ransacking.

100 Cold Soil Road - John White House

This house, surrounded by trees, was originally accessible from Rt. 206 from a lane just below the Lawrenceville Cemetery. It stands on a knoll a half mile in from the street. Listed on the National Register since 1971, it has gracefully accepted twentieth century changes and additions. This is considered a superb and well-preserved example of a Federal style home. Built around 1810 on a farm owned by Benjamin Stevens as early as 1762, it is the township’s finest example of an early stone mansion house. The property, which was one of three farms owned by John White, has a smokehouse and large barn on it.

2750 Main Street - Ralph Hunt House/”Old Brick”

This landmark sits in the middle of The Lawrenceville School’s golf course. In 1935, a slab with the date of 1706 was found in one of its chimneys, which is believed to be the construction date of the older, higher section to the west. The older section has the date of 1742 on a hand-forged kitchen door latch. Prior to the Revolution, some “Towne Meetings” were held here. The home was purchased from the Mershon family by The Lawrenceville School in 1892. In the fields surrounding the house, Samuel Mershon drilled squads of green recruits for the Civil War. A large dairy farm operated on the property from 1892 until 1907 during which time a portion was turned into the golf course. The building has served as a school infirmary for contagious diseases and as a residence for nursing staff, instructors and students. It presently serves as faculty housing.

96 Denow Road - Scudder/W. Cook House

The original recessed section of this house may have been built as early as 1715 with additions ca. 1760 and in the early 1900s. The early stone section was originally 1-1/2 stories high as evidenced by the rubble stone first story and the random coursed square stones on the second story. The later main block of the home is wood frame, now covered in stucco. Although no 1-1/2 story houses from the 1700s survive in the Lawrence area, the Scudder House, because of its second story addition, raises questions about the original height of other early eighteenth century houses. The surrounding land was in Scudder family ownership for more than 100 years. This house was listed on the State and National Registers in 1988.

2083 Lawrence Road - Benjamin Van Cleve House

Owned by Rider College, this building’s history is unclear. This unusual example of an Italianate Style house shows no evidence of having been an eighteenth century house. It has a distinctive curved roofline and decorative trim. In the 1970s, Charles Tichy, then historic restoration architect for the State Division of Parks and Forestry, inspected this property. He noted that, internally, there was clear structural evidence that the current house was cleverly constructed around an earlier building.

144 Franklin Corner Road - Theodore L. Hill House

It may be hard to imagine the beauty and elegance that was once the Theodore Hill House. Left in its current state, it may no longer be possible for the township to save this Greek Revival farmhouse and restore it because of fire damage that occurred in 1987. It was a speakeasy in the 1920s and remarkably, considering the proximity to construction sites and Route 1, it was part of a working farm until the 1960s. It was built in four sections around 1850 and was never overwhelmed by twentieth century changes. The Hill House is the only surviving building of historical significance left on Franklin Corner Road, which was named for the old hamlet of Franklin Corner.

45 Pine Knoll Drive - Smith-Ribsam House

(not visible from road) Surrounded by development homes, this Italianate structure is located about 300 yards in from Princeton Pike. It is on land purchased by Jasper Smith in 1708. The house, listed on the State and National Registers, was built in several stages beginning ca. 1740. It continued to be in Smith descendant ownership until 1917. Early twentieth century landscaping contributes to the significance of the property. The interior features of this house are among the most outstanding and well-preserved of the eighteenth and early nineteenth century houses in town.

2685 Princeton Pike - Benjamin Johnson House

Built in 1881, this is an example of the French Second Empire style. The slate mansard roof is characteristic of that period. In the late nineteenth century, it and the once-connected tavern next door were part of a 260 acre farm. Some domestic outbuildings remain.

2681 Princeton Pike - Rising Sun Tavern

This is the one remaining tavern in the township that is outside the local and National Register historic districts. Its tavern section, atypically deep on the right (northeast) side, dates to 1821 and has low plastered ceilings and an unusually steep roof compared with other buildings of its period in the area. The back room on that side, the former tavern kitchen, has a large brick cooking fireplace with wood lintel. The tavern served livestock drovers who were traveling from Pennsylvania to New York City. John Harmon, the 1992 owner, is a direct descendant of Jasper Smith, a pre-1700 Maidenhead settler. Ownership of this structure has remained in the family since its construction.

700 Trumbull Avenue - Anderson/Capner House

This home, listed in 1972 on the State Register and in 1973 on the National Register, dates to 1764. Displaying severe facades of stucco in a cut stone design, this structure has an unusual appearance. It is a combination of a house of the eighteenth century built in two sections, an expansion in about 1850 when it was raised from 2-1/2 to a full three stories by Thomas Capner, and extensive restoration in the twentieth century by former owners Winona and the late John Nash. The mid-nineteenth century addition consisted of a one story lean-to kitchen with a cooling cellar from which cheeses and other dairy products were sold to the local and Philadelphia markets.

2167 Brunswick Avenue - Israel Stevens House

This Federal style house, built in 1804, was in the Stevens family into the twentieth century. It is located on a tract of land owned in 1750 by ancestor Thomas Stevens. Notice the fine, delicate roof cornice and molded belt course, both charming examples of a master carpenter’s rendering of details of Federal style architecture. The porch over the entrance is a later addition.

Carnegie Road - Canal House

This structure was built at the same time as the Delaware Raritan Canal (1830-34) to house the operator of the adjacent bridge. It is one of only two such houses in town and one of 14 that remain along the length of the canal. Its current resident is a descendant of the canal’s last bridge tender who worked here in 1932.

301 Lawrence Station Road - Mounts Mill House

This two-story structure with a gable roof has its original ca. 1770 section on the right. It was remodeled recently with cedar siding. An 1816 uncoursed stone section, three bays wide with an arched recessed front entrance and elliptical fanlight is on the left. It is a representative example of an early farmhouse and the last remaining structure in what was a busy manufacturing area on the Assunpink Creek.

4274 Province Line Road - Port Mercer Canal House

This former bridge tender’s house sits where Province Line Road crosses the Delaware and Raritan Canal. It is currently the headquarters of the Lawrence Historical Society. Like other wooden clapboard type canal houses of its day (ca. 1830s), it has a central chimney that helped conserve heat, as in the old New England houses. The small village around it arose after the canal’s construction. The front porch was added ca. 1850s - 60s. Alongside this structure today, the quietly moving waters of the canal and its overgrown banks suggest little of the canal’s early importance.

3850 Princeton Pike - John Feaster Phillips House

This simple Georgian structure, first built prior to 1811, is one of five existing township homes associated with the Phillips family, a prominent early family. It is built of stone walls that are about two feet thick. Its gambrel roof on a house of this style is unusual in this region. Donald Tyler reports that a marble slab under a tree, 100 yards behind the house, marks the grave of John Feaster Phillips who was given the house in 1854. He went bankrupt in the panic of 1893 and died two years later. In the early 1900s, it was owned by Mrs. Watson Zeigler, heir to the Calumet Baking Powder fortune. She spent a great deal of money on the property for extensive improvements and renovations. Around the time of World War II, the property was owned by Eugene Black, former President of the World Bank. It was later sold to William H. Jackson of the U.S. State Department and sold about 1957 to newspaper publisher David Stern. In the 1970s, the 13-1/2 acre estate became famous as the residence of Imee, the daughter of the deposed Philippines’ first family of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos. She commuted to Princeton University from here. In 1986, a Superior Court judge awarded the house and property to the Philippines’ government. It has since been sold privately.

4416 Province Line Road - Bainbridge/Phillips House (11 Buckingham Road)

This home, built ca. 1765, is significant as one of the six early structures associated with the Phillips family, a prominent local family. It is considered an interesting example of a colonial revival restoration of an earlier farm house. This was the only local farm confiscated from a Tory fugitive, Dr. Absalom Bainbridge. It was sold in 1779 to Benjamin G. Eyre as a 282 acre plantation. In 1935, the then badly run down property was purchased by William L. Day, the Chairman of the First Pennsylvania Banking and Trust Co. who hired a Philadelphia architect to totally restore the house. This landmark is now known as “Wynden”.

3801 Lawrenceville Princeton Road - Stokes/Mershon House

This ca. 1740 home straddles the border of Princeton and Lawrence townships. Its inviting entrance, topped by a semi-circular fanlight above paneled doors, five fireplaces and outlying pond and wooded areas, makes it a remarkable property. It is a small two-bay Colonial with a larger Georgian/Federal house built to the side a generation or two later ca. 1800, followed by a one story colonial revival bedroom wing built in 1933. Of the seven houses of this type in the township, the Stokes/Mershon House is one of the two best preserved on both the exterior and interior. The house has been in the Stokes family since 1925.

3641 Lawrenceville Princeton Road - William Gulick House

The William Gulick House, built around 1855, is generally viewed as Lawrenceville’s best high style example of Italianate architecture. It also features a variety of Colonial Revival alterations, such as the doorway, with its semi-circular fanlight and pedimented frontpiece. However, the basic form of the house with its broad cross gable roof, center hall plan and some prominent details, such as the window and roof trim, are Italianate. The two-story wing, however, is Colonial Revival. It is currently owned by Bristol-Myers Squibb

3461 Lawrenceville Princeton Road - Price/Lanning House

The wing on this landmark is the original ca. 1750 house. The evolution of styles of the house is Vernacular Colonial, then Federal and, finally, Colonial Revival. Its large barn (with a cornerstone dated 1866), which has a silo attached along one gable end, is one of a very few large nineteenth century barns that have survived locally. The land on which this farm property is located was acquired by a James Price, around 1696. Price probably built the original house, with the Lannings and Armstrong families as subsequent owners. Some of the changes to the house over the years include the addition of porches, dormers, and changing roof cornices. The Federal Style center hall plan was probably added around 1800. It is a good example of how a house in Lawrence Township could have changed in design from the 1700s to the early 1900s.

17 Carter Road - Cherry Grove Tenant House

This small stone house, built ca. 1730 stands at the northern corner of Cherry Grove Farm, which is at the southwest corner of Route 206. It was used to house farm help in its early days. When the house was first built, it only had two rooms on the lower floor and two above.

2942 Main Street - Van Cleve Homestead

This pre-1849 clapboard farmhouse has changed little over the years. It is set well back from the road. In 1696-7, Thomas Revell, as Trustee of the West Jersey Society, transferred the property to Joseph Sackett, who came here from Long Island. During the early 1900s there was a cider mill on the property. It passed into the ownership of the Progress Golf Club in the 1920s which went bankrupt during the Depression.

2 Lewisville Road - Isaac Brearley House

(Not visible from road) Dating from the early eighteenth century, this is one of the oldest structures in the township and is listed on the State and National Registers of Historic Places. Also called the John Brearley House, this landmark was built in two sections. The two-bay western section, built in 1785, burned in 1967 and was reconstructed as a one-story brick addition. The front is made of Flemish bond brick. The house is considered a significant example of Georgian architecture, built and lived in for several generations by Brearleys, who were early settlers in Maidenhead.

Meadow Road - Baker-Brearley House

This township owned property was the home farm of John Brearley, the settler. Its construction date of 1761 is unmistakably built into the east gable in contrasting bricks brought from England. It is a rare surviving example of a Mercer County eighteenth century house of Quaker-Georgian architecture. He was the grandfather of David Brearley, a lieutenant colonel in the Revolutionary War who signed the U.S. Constitution and was later the Chief Justice of the N.J. Supreme Court. This landmark was placed on the State and National Registers in 1979. The Brearley family (which traces back to James Brearley, born in England in 1515) sold the house in the early 1900s. The township has been contemplating the restoration of this important landmark and the use of the considerable surrounding land area for a number of years. At the base of Meadow Road, which leads to this house, is the Princessville Cemetery, noted for the graves of black Civil War soldiers.

Retrieved from "http://lawrencehistory.info/index.php/Landmarks_Around_Town"

Category: History

Landmarks Around Town

From Lhi

Contents