The Clemuel Ricketts Mansion is a Georgian style house made of sandstone, built in 1852 or 1855 on the shore of Ganoga Lake in Colley Township, Sullivan County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It was home to several generations of the Ricketts family, including R. Bruce Ricketts and William Reynolds Ricketts. Originally built as a hunting lodge, it was also a tavern and post office, and served as part of a hotel for much of the 19th century. After 1903 the house served as the Ricketts family's summer home, they kept it even as they sold over 65,000 acres (26,000 ha) to the state of Pennsylvania from 1920 to 1950. The house was included in the Historic American Buildings Survey in 1936 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983. The original mansion is an L-shaped structure, two-and-a-half stories high, with stone walls 2 feet (0.6 m) thick. It was built in a clearing surrounded by old-growth forest with a view to the lake 900 feet (270 m) to the east. In 1913 a two-and-a-half story wing was added to the north side of the house and the original structure was renovated. The house has twenty-eight rooms, four porches, and its original hardware and woodwork. Dormers and some windows were added in the renovation, and electrical wiring and modern plumbing have been added since. According to the NRHP nomination form, the Clemuel Ricketts Mansion "is a stunning example of Georgian vernacular architecture".
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_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1833:
The Parliament of the United Kingdom abolished slavery throughout most of the British Empire, with the exceptions of Ceylon, Saint Helena, and the territories owned by the East India Company. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_Abolition_Act_1833
1913:
The Buenos Aires Metro in Argentina, the first underground railway system in the Southern Hemisphere and in Latin America, began operations. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buenos_Aires_Metro
1934:
Soviet politician Sergey Kirov was assassinated at the Smolny Institute in Leningrad. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Kirov
1955:
African-American Civil Rights Movement: Seamstress Rosa Parks was arrested for violating the racial segregation laws of Montgomery, Alabama, after refusing to give up her seat on a public bus to a white man, precipitating the Montgomery Bus Boycott. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Parks
1990:
Channel Tunnel workers from the United Kingdom and France met 40 metres (131 ft) beneath the English Channel seabed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_Tunnel
_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
hebetude (n): Mental lethargy or dullness http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hebetude
___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
The AIDS crisis is evidence of a world in which nothing important is regional, local, limited; in which everything that can circulate does, and every problem is, or is destined to become, worldwide. --Susan Sontag http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Susan_Sontag