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| Glensheen | |
|---|---|
Chester and Clara Congdon Estate | |
 Glensheen's lakeside façade | |
    | |
| Location | 3300 London Road, Duluth, Minnesota |
| Coordinates | 46°48′55″N 92°3′6″W / 46.81528°N 92.05167°W |
| Area | 22 acres (8.9 ha) |
| Built | 1905–1920 |
| Architect | Clarence H. Johnston Sr. (house), Charles Wellford Leavitt (grounds) |
| Architectural style | Tudor Revival/Jacobethan Revival |
| NRHP reference No. | 91001057[1] |
| Added to NRHP | August 15, 1991 |
Glensheen is a mansion in Duluth, Minnesota, United States, operated as a historic house museum by the University of Minnesota Duluth. Glensheen sits on 12 acres of waterfront property on Lake Superior, has 39 rooms and is built in the Jacobean architectural tradition, inspired by the Beaux-Arts styles of the era. The mansion was constructed as the family home of Chester Adgate Congdon. The building was designed by Minnesota architect Clarence H. Johnston Sr., with interiors designed by William A. French Co. and the formal terraced garden and English style landscape designed by the Charles Wellford Leavitt firm out of New York. Construction began in 1905 and completed in 1908. The home cost a total of $854,000, equivalent to $22 million today.[2]
The home is a crowning example of design and craftmanship of the Midwest in the early 20th century. It is also famous as the site of one of Minnesota's most notorious murders, the 1977 killing of Elizabeth Congdon and her nurse Velma Pietila.[3]
The property was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991 as the Chester and Clara Congdon Estate for its local significance in the themes of architecture and landscape architecture.[4] It was nominated for its status as Duluth's finest mansion and grounds.[5]
Origin
[edit]Chester Congdon and Clara Bannister, children of Methodist ministers, met at Syracuse University in New York in 1871. They married and moved to Saint Paul, Minnesota, ten years later. After a slow start, Chester prospered in the law and took to real estate speculation, mostly in the Pacific Northwest. Overall, he lost money on his investments. The family moved to Duluth in 1892 when Chester saw opportunity in the booming city and the newly discovered Mesabi Iron Range. As a lawyer for the Oliver Iron Mining Company, he grappled with Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller—a competition that drew national attention to Minnesota—and made millions of dollars. In 1901, he formed the Chemung Iron Company and made millions more.[3]
In 1903 the Congdons chose land three miles (4.8 km) from downtown Duluth, facing Lake Superior, for a new residence. To design the house and grounds they selected Clarence H. Johnston, Charles Wellford Leavitt, and William A. French.[3]
Johnston, designer of many mansions along Saint Paul's Summit Avenue, produced a 39-room giant in the Jacobean Revival style that mimicked English country houses from four centuries earlier. The outside appearance is elegant: an asymmetrical mass of brick, with granite trim and prominent gables. Johnston and the Congdons paid close attention to infrastructure; the estate had its own reservoir, a coal delivery system, and central humidification.[3]
Leavitt, from New York City, designed the grounds. He included formal gardens, lakeside terraces, a bowling green, walking paths and footbridges, more than 30 species of trees, and thousands of shrubs.[3]
The name "Glensheen" reflects the site. Glen, a Scots word for a narrow valley, refers to the ravines of Tischer Creek and Bent Brook, which frame the estate; "sheen" either comes from Sheen, the Congdons' ancestral village in England, or from the reflection of light off the lake.[3]
Interior
[edit]Glensheen’s design star is French, a St. Paul interior decorator and designer. With the Congdons, he chose fine materials: silver for light fixtures, gold leaf for ceilings, oak and walnut woodwork, and Algerian marble. He used both art nouveau and Arts and Crafts styles, which were lighter and more elegant than the busy interiors of late-nineteenth-century mansions.[3]
William French's interior exhibits Late Victorian, Arts and Crafts, Federal Style, and Art Nouveau styles. French also designed the furniture for the house to coordinate with the style in each room. The rooms are trimmed or paneled in Circassian walnut, mahogany, cypress, fumed oak, enameled birch, and American walnut, with the furniture in each room made of the same wood used in the woodwork. The original furniture brought into the house in 1908 and '09 remains in virtually the same place it has been for 110 years. Some of the wall coverings and upholstery are also original. The hallways exhibit original stenciling in the Arts and Crafts style as well as beautiful wood carving. Wall and ceiling coverings are made of wool, silk, filled burlap, and gold leaf. The doors throughout the home are made of two kinds of wood, with oak on the hallway side and the variety of wood used in the room on the other side. The furniture in the eldest son's room, for example, is decorated with ebony inlaid motifs that are repeated in the oak paneled walls. Chester Congdon's art collection hangs in the home as it did when the Congdons lived there. The collection includes works by American artists Charles Warren Eaton, Henry Farrer, Childe Hassam, Albert Lorey Groll, Hamilton King, Lawrence Mazzanovich, Henry Ward Ranger, Peter Alfred Gross, David Ericson, C. F. Daubigny, Henri Harpignies, and many more. The house also contains a silk embroidery done by Japanese artist Watunabe. In addition to the main mansion, the estate has its own Carriage House, Gardener's Cottage, and Boathouse on Lake Superior.
The interior features hand-carved railings and art-glass windows. The dining room and library overlook the terrace and garden below and Lake Superior beyond. The breakfast room, designed by John Bradstreet of Minneapolis, is considered a highlight for its green tiled walls and floors, as well as for its lake views.[3]
Congdon family tenancy
[edit]Chester Congdon died in 1916, without completing his vision for a highway linking Duluth to Canada; it opened in 1923 as the North Shore Scenic Drive. Clara lived in Glensheen until her death in 1950. Their daughter Elisabeth Congdon, the longest-lived of their seven children, resided there for the rest of her life. She never married but adopted two daughters, Marjorie and Jennifer, in 1932.[3]
In 1968 the Congdon family willed Glensheen to the University of Minnesota Duluth.[6] At the time Elisabeth was given a life estate, allowing her to occupy Glensheen until her death.
On the night of June 26, 1977, Elisabeth Congdon and her nurse Velma Pietila were murdered by an intruder. Suspicion fell on Elizabeth's daughter Marjorie and her second husband, Roger Caldwell. Marjorie had lived a troubled life and, before the murder, demanded money from Elisabeth. Caldwell was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and received two life sentences. Marjorie was charged with aiding and abetting and conspiracy to commit murder but was acquitted on all charges. In 1982 Caldwell's conviction was overturned by the Minnesota Supreme Court. He was set to be retried but pleaded guilty and submitted a full confession. He was later released from prison, and in 1988 he committed suicide. Though Marjorie Congdon Caldwell Hagen inherited part of the Congdon fortune, her life remained troubled.[3] She was twice convicted of arson, for which she served 12 years in prison, and was once wanted for bigamy in North Dakota.[7]
Historic house museum
[edit]
In 1979, two years after Elisabeth's death, the mansion opened to the public. For years, the third floor and attic were closed to the public due to safety concerns over limited access, but both areas were opened to small group tours in 1992.
Out of respect for surviving Congdon family members, tour guides will not speak about the "incident in 1977" during tours, but can answer questions about it after the tour has been completed.[8]
Legacy
[edit]Despite Glensheen's luxury and size, architectural historian Larry Millett found it "warm and livable", with "a surprising sense of intimacy". Because the house remained in the Congdon family until 1978, little has changed over time. Millett called it the most intact house of its kind in Minnesota.[3]
In popular culture
[edit]The 1972 movie You'll Like My Mother, starring Patty Duke and Richard Thomas, was filmed at Glensheen.
The American/Australian documentary television series Behind Mansion Walls, on Investigation Discovery, dedicated half of episode seven in its debut season to the murders of Elisabeth Congdon and her nurse.
The American television show Mansions and Murders also featured the story of the murders. The show also spoke of some of the crimes that Elisabeth's adopted daughter Marjorie committed, such as arson and forgery, as well as her acquittal of the murders. The title of the episode is "Goodnight Nurse". It is the 3rd episode of the 1st season and aired on May 6, 2015.
In 2015, a musical based on the murders titled Glensheen was created by Jeffrey Hatcher and Chan Poling.[9]
The 2015 TV movie Girl Missing, starring Francesca Eastwood, was partially filmed at Glensheen, featuring the grounds, the shore of Lake Superior, and the exterior of the house.[10]
See also
[edit]- List of Gilded Age mansions
- List of museums in Minnesota
- National Register of Historic Places listings in St. Louis County, Minnesota
References
[edit]- ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
- ^ Ryan, Leah (2017-06-28). "The Mansion that Mining Built". Mesabi Dily News. Virginia, Minnesota. Retrieved 2018-09-13.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Nelson, Paul (2019-10-14). "Glensheen Historic Estate". MNopedia. Minnesota Historical Society. Retrieved 2019-12-22.
- ^ "Congdon, Chester and Clara, Estate (Glensheen)". Minnesota National Register Properties Database. Minnesota Historical Society. 2009. Retrieved 2019-06-29.
- ^ Koop, Michael (August 1990). "National Register of Historic Places Registration Form: Congdon, Chester and Clara, Estate" (Document). National Park Service.
{{cite document}}: Unknown parameter|accessdate=ignored (help); Unknown parameter|url=ignored (help) With 38 accompanying photographs from 1989 and 1990 - ^ Morse-Kahn, Deborah (2008). Lake Superior's Historic North Shore: A Guided Tour. Minnesota Historical Society Press. p. 50. ISBN 978-0-87351-621-1.
- ^ Boegle, Jimmy (2004-01-01). "????". Tucson Weekly.
- ^ Kimball, Joe. "Twists, turns never end for Congdon murder case figure". MinnPost. Retrieved 2009-03-16.
- ^ "Jeffrey Hatcher, Chan Poling turn Congdon murders into musical 'Glensheen'". Star Tribune.
- ^ "Francesca Eastwood movie filmed at Glensheen airs Sunday". Duluth News Tribune. 2015-10-24. Retrieved 2019-12-22.
External links
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