Tag Archives: Henry Clay Memorial Foundation

Ashland Restoration Raises Interpretive Questions

24 Monday Jul 2017

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1990s

The 1991-92 restoration was a major turning point in Ashland’s history.  Not only was the house repaired and renovated, but its interpretation was thoroughly examined, questioned, and redone.  The restoration project became a remarkable opportunity to consider the interpretation “from scratch,” curator Eric Brooks says.  For the first time people asked how the structure and furnishings could work for the interpretation of the house instead of treating everything as permanently located and bending the interpretation around it.[1]  Interpretive choices could be freshly made tabula rasa.  Now it became possible to actively plan the interpretation, room by room, era by era, and to place artifacts and furnishings in the most appropriate places.  Suddenly there was something of a master plan to interpret Ashland.  And better yet, there was solid research—instead of simply family memories and local myths—to back it up.[2]

A vital decision had to be made before work began: to which period should the house be restored?  The Foundation and Mrs. Seay had for decades opted to emphasize Henry Clay even though the house and much of what filled it were not his.  They did not seriously consider a multiple-generation approach; the 1850s reconstruction of the house was almost entirely ignored and the non-Henry Clay furnishings were, at best, downplayed and, at worst, considered irrelevant and expendable.

Could Ashland now be restored to Henry Clay’s era or not?  It was the consensus at the time that restoring to the second quarter of the nineteenth century would be impractical: expensive and too little extant visual evidence to facilitate the process.  The rebuilt house and remodeled interior were simply too far removed from Clay’s era.

But the Foundation looked to professionals to guide them in this decision.  Architects for Ashland’s restoration, Tim Mellin and Bruce Goetzman, made their recommendation: because of the changes that the McDowells (Clay’s granddaughter) had made in the 1880s, they said, “it would be most appropriate to interpret both the interior and the exterior, as well as the outbuildings, to the mid-1880s period.”[3]

Phase IV worked on Ashland’s restoration

Restoration in process

Restoration in process

In 1993 Ashland director Colleen Holwerk talked about the rediscovery of the McDowells’ artwork and furnishings:  “Looking at that [McDowell 1890 photo] album, we realized that the museum owned nearly everything in those pictures.  As we rearranged the house for the reopening of it, we used those photographs and rearranged it the way [“Mrs. McDowell”] had it when she lived here.  It’s very charming in a way…Almost everything in the museum is a Clay family piece.  It’s four generations of Clays’ life at Ashland, reflected in their collection.  That’s very unusual.”[4]  Not only did the furnishings and the photos drive the decision, the McDowell era was the most accessible because it was most recent.

A great deal of study and consultation with experts resulted in a close imitation of the McDowell-era Ashland.  Frank S. Welsh, a historical paint expert who had also worked on Monticello, the Lincoln home, and Independence Hall, conducted extensive tests of the various wall finishes at Ashland and his findings dictated the choice of paint colors.  Gail Caskey Winkler, an expert on historic interiors, was brought in to advise on interior decoration and furnishings.

Ashland’s decision to restore narrowly to one particular era, but to interpret multiple eras would later prove to be problematic.  The five-generational legacy at Ashland has been an ongoing challenge for the museum.  And with the 1991-92 restoration, its interpretation took a decided detour away from Henry Clay.

Yet the McDowell family emphasis was considered fresh and exciting.  A 1992 Lexington Herald-Leader feature declared:

Ashland isn’t just Henry Clay’s home place anymore.  Warmer, more inviting…[Ashland’s history] comes to life, enriched by the integration of day-to-day experiences and personal histories of the people who lived their lives and raised their families at Ashland.  It’s a place where families laughed and cried, lived and died…[5]

Entrance Hall after Restoration

Entrance Hall after Restoration

It appeared that Ashland could be significant and “hold its own” with or without Henry Clay as its focus.  Historian and Board member Thomas D. Clark said of the restoration, “‘I think they’ve done a lot to enliven it…The place has been enlivened so much that Henry Clay would not recognize it, but his granddaughter would feel right at home…’”[6]

It seems that the restoration brought with it a heightened interest in the decorative arts at Ashland.  Tours in the 1990s concentrated largely on the interior design and unique features of the house (lincrusta and anaglypta wall finishes, the ‘secret’ library storage, etc.).  Though there were a few designated spots on the tour when docents would discuss Clay’s life and career, tours focused more upon the McDowells because the rooms reflected their time.[7]  The interpretation was driven by what was in front of their eyes: rooms furnished to the 1880s.

Dining Room after Restoration

Henry Clay’s full significance was obscured in the enthusiasm for the McDowell family interiors and furnishings.  When the National Trust for Historic Preservation conducted a facilities survey at Ashland in 2000, their strongest recommendation was to return the focus to Henry Clay: “Henry Clay is Ashland’s raison d’être – both historically and at present.  He is the site’s founder and primary draw.  Visitors come to see Henry Clay’s estate; not just any old house.  House museums are a dime a dozen in central Kentucky; Ashland is one in a million…a Clay-based master plan is what the Foundation needs to guide all aspects of Ashland’s management.”  The Trust advisors were wise enough to recognize the futility of strict period interpretation:  “This does not necessarily impose an ‘either/or’ proposition that limits itself exclusively to Clay or eliminates the contributions of the McDowell family, but the ‘Henry Clay Estate’ part of the billing should take center stage.”[8]

But they acknowledged that Ashland’s interpretation presented a distinct challenge:  “As it stands – in an effort to be honest and comprehensive – the current interpretive themes try to be everything to everyone and consequently visitors often leave happy but bewildered.  The team certainly did.  By extrapolation, the same can be said about the Foundation’s staff and board.  They are a bit bewildered by having to tackle so much (interpretation, conservation, education, etc.) in a seemingly incongruous setting…”

Interpreting Henry Clay’s antebellum world while standing in an upscale 1880s environment had produced this “incongruous setting.”  They pinpointed the central challenge of Ashland’s interpretation: Henry Clay “out of context.”  But the Trust advisors had a suggestion:  “…the Foundation’s allocation and use of space should be tied more closely to a single theme – Henry Clay…Clay can still be appreciated and understood out of context, but to do so requires more attention on the man and his work and less on the trappings of the given context: the main house, the McDowells, and the decorative arts…The McDowells will get their due, but not until Clay gets his and the visitor is clear on the distinction between the two eras.”[9]

Previous efforts to make the house totally Henry Clay – and more recently, fully McDowell-centered – had always come up short.  Efforts to make the interpretation “everything to everyone” were also unsatisfactory.  But the suggestion to concentrate on Clay more than any other aspect – yet allowing them all to co-exist – would prove more successful.

One method the Trust recommended to accomplish the focus on Henry Clay was to create an exhibit space at the beginning of the tour that would feature his life and career.  This exhibit, they said, would “establish Henry Clay’s importance and explain away the potential confusion of touring what is not Clay’s.”[10]  The permanent exhibit room was completed for the 150th Anniversary celebration of Clay’s death and opened to the public in 2002.[11]

With the new century, Ashland’s vision for interpretation had expanded and was no longer forced to fit into neat little boxes of time.

Henry Clay Exhibit Room

[1] Eric Brooks, interview with author, Lexington, Kentucky, 8 April 2005.

[2] Eric Brooks, interview with author, Lexington, Kentucky, 8 April 2005.

[3] “The Preservation and Renewal of Ashland, The Estate of Henry Clay.”  Tim Mullin and Bruce Goetzman, architects.  c. 1991.  Ashland archives.

[4] Cubbison, Laurie.  “Ashland Worth a Second Trip After Remodeling Project.”  Winchester (Ky.) Sun, 27 April 1993.

[5] Farmer, Nancy.  “A New Page In Ashland’s History.”  Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader, 28 October 1992.

[6] Mead, Andy.  “Revisiting the Past: Ashland Reopens After $1.4 Million Restoration.”  Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader, 5 September 1992.

[7] Carmichael, Mary Ellen. interview with author, Lexington, Kentucky, 10 June 2005.

[8] “National Trust for Historic Preservation Recommendations to the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation for a Space Allocation and Use Study for Ashland, The Henry Clay Estate, July 2000.”  Ashland Archives.

[9] “National Trust for Historic Preservation Recommendations to the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation for a Space Allocation and Use Study for Ashland, The Henry Clay Estate, July 2000.”  Ashland Archives.

[10] “National Trust for Historic Preservation Recommendations to the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation for a Space Allocation and Use Study for Ashland, The Henry Clay Estate, July 2000.”  Ashland Archives.

[11] Ashland Celebrates the Life of Henry Clay invitation. June 2002.  Ashland Archives.

Ashland’s Opening Day

10 Monday Apr 2017

Posted by in Museum Era (1950 - ), Public Hospitality

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1950

April 12th is Henry Clay’s birthday – and the day chosen as Ashland’s opening as a public museum.

Ashland, the Henry Clay estate, has since the early nineteenth century been an important American historic site.  During Clay’s lifetime (1777-1852), the estate was often equated with the man and ‘Ashland’ became a household word.  After Clay’s death and while four generations of Clay’s descendants occupied the estate, Ashland served as a memorial to Henry Clay, symbolizing his life’s work and the period in which he lived.  In 1950 after his family relinquished ownership of the estate, Ashland became a historic house museum under the auspices of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation.  For more than half a century, this National Historic Landmark in Lexington, Kentucky has been open for public tours and has accommodated hundreds of thousands of visitors.

Even though this opening blog entry places us somewhere in the middle of Ashland’s story, it was a transformative moment in its history: the day it officially became a public place.

It was April 12th, 1950, auspiciously chosen because it was Henry Clay’s birthday.  After nearly 150 years as a private home, Ashland was officially opening its doors to the public.  Clay’s great-granddaughter Nannette McDowell Bullock, who had died in 1948, had been largely responsible for the formation of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation and for the preservation of Clay’s beloved estate.

Henry Clay’s original farm was more than 600 acres in size, but over the century after his death in 1852, the estate had shrunk to 17 acres in the middle of a burgeoning Lexington residential neighborhood.  Fortunately, the large mansion, a great number of mature trees, and a smattering of outbuildings remained.

For Opening Day, the Foundation set out its vision for Ashland: “The Henry Clay Memorial Foundation now has the pleasurable task of opening Ashland to the nation as a public memorial.  The Foundation hopes, in the next several years, to restore the stables, ice houses, the smoke house and other outbuildings, and to develop the gardens and grounds to the point where they will not only represent the finest Clay tradition, but where Ashland will be recognized as the loveliest spot in the bluegrass of Kentucky.  The Foundation hopes, further, constantly to increase the number of Henry Clay memorabilia to the point where Ashland will be a mecca for the research scholar as well as for the patriotic American who wishes to see the home of one of America’s favorite sons.”

Prior to Opening Day, the local papers built anticipation for the event.  A year in advance, plans for the museum were coalescing.  The Lexington Leader explained that no remodeling of the mansion was planned, only “reconditioning.” Landscaping of the grounds was a priority, as well as the collection of artifacts.  Maintenance of the museum was to be financed by visitor “fees” and Foundation membership. In the days before Opening Day, the papers ran photos of Henry Clay artifacts and the progress inside the mansion.  The April 10th Lexington Leader wrote that “50 groups” of Henry Clay items had been collected by the Foundation and placed in Ashland “to furnish authentic atmosphere of the time of Henry Clay.”

Opening Day festivities opened with a parade that began at the Cheapside square downtown. Students and faculty of Henry Clay High were to be dismissed as the procession passed the school on East Main Street to join it on its final leg to Ashland.  The dedication featured concerts by the Henry Clay High School and University of Kentucky’s bands.  Mayor Tom Mooney proclaimed it “Henry Clay Day” in Lexington and urged all citizens to attend the opening.

And, on that chilly April day, thousands (estimates from 3,000-6,000) gathered on Ashland’s sprawling back lawn.  Children climbed trees to get a better view. Photographers maneuvered to get the best shots.  Keynote speaker and fellow Kentuckian, U.S. vice president Alben Barkley declared: “This fine mansion now will rank alongside Mount Vernon, Monticello, the Hermitage, and other public memorials to great men of this nation….generations to come will thank you for preserving this shrine” (Louisville Courier-Journal).

While Barkley was a draw, his glamorous wife, Jane Hadley Barkley, was a sensation: “Mrs. Barkley was on hand for the event, too, to the great delight of some 3,000 Central Kentuckians who didn’t bother to disguise that they had come to see the charming ‘Veepess’ as much as to witness the dedication….[during Mr. Barkley’s speech] the crowd gave its attention largely to her…” (Lexington Leader).

Even with the “50 groups” of Henry Clay artifacts, the mansion could not to be interpreted strictly to Clay’s era.  Not only were there not enough of Clay’s belongings extant to do so, but so many of his descendants’ objects then filled the house.  The Foundation was careful to describe Ashland’s interior as “in the spirit of Clay’s time.”  The first rooms to be opened to the public in 1950 were all on the first floor: the entrance hall, dining room, drawing room, office, library, a room dedicated to Nannette, as well as the Henry Clay bedroom.

Two Clay descendants dressed up in historic clothing from Ashland’s collection – something that current museum practice would never consider – and acted as host and hostess for the reception held in the mansion.  Mrs. Stuart Platt, a great-great-great granddaughter of Clay, wore a ruby red gown which was mistakenly thought to have belonged to Mrs. Clay, while Goodloe McDowell, a great-great grandson, wore the dashing blue and gold ceremonial jacket donned by Clay when he signed the Treaty of Ghent.  The thin and wiry Henry Clay’s jacket proved to be even too narrow for the slight Mr. McDowell; a sleeve seam was torn that day.

Messy Generational ‘Layers’ Complicate Museum’s Task

03 Tuesday Jan 2017

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1950s

Historic house museums often face difficult decisions regarding which period of the house’s history to interpret.  This interpretive decision has proven to be a most complicated issue at Ashland.  Not only is Henry Clay’s original house gone, but five generations of his family occupied the estate and much of the remaining evidence of those generations remains at Ashland.

Great-great grandson Henry McDowell Bullock, with McDowell-era clock, c1950s

Historic house museums “are not always frozen as their last occupants left them,” as William Seale says.   “Their long histories have shown that to be impossible.” (Of Houses & Time: Personal Histories of America’s National Trust Properties, 1992).  Ashland reflects no particular era fully, not even the McDowell era that it visually most closely matches.  Rosanna Pavoni observes that historic house museums are “family homes reflecting the passage of time and the sedimentation of the history of generations…”

While Henry Clay has been the focus at Ashland, restoring the house completely to his time has never been feasible because of the generational ‘layers’ of James’s rebuilding and the McDowells’ remodeling.  Despite the descendants’ many changes, Ashland was nevertheless interpreted strictly as Henry Clay’s house from 1950’s Opening Day.

Because of the messy generational reality, the temptation for the institutional museum has long been to over-simplify Ashland’s story and to interpret it very narrowly.

In the 1950s when the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation wanted to emphasize that Ashland was the ‘real’ Henry Clay house, the solution was to gloss over (the many) non-Henry Clay realities.  Mrs. Seay and her colleagues must have recognized the impossibility of manifesting Clay’s early nineteenth-century environment, but the ideal of the “Great Man” memorial clung fiercely.  “Great Man” house museums, as Charlotte Smith labeled them, were the once ubiquitous patriotic shrines memorializing prominent white males, such as Mount Vernon and Monticello.

Lorraine Seay conducts a tour, Ashland drawing room, 1957

Probably with these ideals in mind, the Foundation hired Richard S. Hagen, a historical consultant recommended by the National Trust, to conduct a survey of Ashland.  Hagen was to provide recommendations for a period-proper restoration in preparation for great-great grandson Henry Bullock’s departure in 1959.

Hagen’s 1958 recommendations were adamantly in favor of returning the house to its pre-1850s, Henry Clay-era, state.  He could not countenance including any of Clay’s descendants in Ashland’s interpretation.  Hagen unmitigatedly rejected what he understood of James’s structural changes to the mansion.  For instance, Hagen found the façade cast iron balconies, which he erroneously described as late nineteenth-century additions, “poorly integrated with the façade.”  Hagen obviously did not realize that Thomas Lewinski had designed the balconies as an integral part of the second Ashland with its Italianate and other mid-nineteenth-century details.

Ashland facade, featured in a local business Christmas greeting

And faced with a house full of post-1850s furnishings, Hagen made some radical suggestions, such as the removal of most of the McDowell-era furniture, fixtures and wall-coverings and replacement with purchased, non-family antiques.

Addressing the second floor of the mansion in particular, he said “The present atmosphere of Ashland is that of a ‘reconciliation’ restoration…the home is presented as one in which the Clay family continued to live after the statesman’s death…An attempt should be made to return the second floor to its possible Henry Clay period appearance and the impression of later occupants minimized…certainly he and not his descendants are being memorialized there.”

Hagen felt very strongly that all things post-Clay were a major flaw in interpretation that must be corrected.   While Clay’s descendants would have agreed with Hagen that Henry Clay was the one to memorialize, they had long been happy to do so in a multi-generational environment.

Most of Hagen’s recommendations were not adopted by the Foundation; lack of funding was the probable reason since restoring as he prescribed would have been wildly expensive.   Another possible reason for the Foundation’s hesitation:  Hagen had carelessly decried the efforts and priorities of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation.  For example, the Foundation had set up one room in the house as the “Nannette McDowell Bullock Room” in honor of the woman who succeeded in preserving Ashland.  The room was atrocious to Hagen because of its overly-fancy Victorian furniture.  “This room is very much an intrusion upon the restoration of the house.  The furniture is too late to be very suitable…As a memorial room it has no function.”  He suggested retaining its name, installing a token portrait of her, and restoring it as an “authentic” bedroom.

Nannette Bullock room, c1960s

While funding likely drove ideology in this case, perhaps the Foundation in some way wanted to maintain the multi-era interpretation.  By 1961 and the execution of the second-floor restoration, Hagen had resigned himself to the “compromised” interpretation, as he wrote to Mrs. Seay: “…presentation of the house as representing many generations of the Clay family will continue…”

Come Along on A Tour of Ashland

25 Tuesday Oct 2016

Posted by in Museum Era (1950 - ), Tours

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1950s-1980s

From 1950 through the 1980s Lorraine Seay welcomed guests to Ashland at her desk in the front hall where registration was required or, in the case of large groups, she would greet them from the front doorstep.  The large groups would be led through the house by tour guides, but smaller groups of visitors were often allowed to freely wander through the house, limited only by the barriers erected in many of the rooms and closed doors that delineated off-limits rooms.   The second floor of the mansion was closed to the public until 1962 after descendant Henry Bullock had moved out.  SEE ALSO: New Life as a House Museum: Just Like a Real Home and Interpreting Henry Clay in a Charming Home Environment.

Mrs. Seay (far left) at front door of Ashland, 1975

From extant documents and first-person recollections, we know that one route of the 1960s-1980s guided tour went as follows:

After registering or getting tickets at Mrs. Seay’s desk…

Mrs. Seay at front desk, 1953

Proceed to the Dining Room…

View into Dining Room, late 1980s

Mrs. Seay in Dining Room, 1951

Drawing Room…

View into the Drawing Room

Drawing Room, 1978

Library…

Library, c1980s

View from Library into Lady’s Parlor (or Nannette McDowell Bullock Memorial Room), now known as the Billiard Room

The north wing of the house presented the next three rooms: the Lady’s Parlor…

Lady’s Parlor (or Nannette McDowell Bullock Memorial Room), 1978, now known as the Billiard Room

Day Nursery…

Day Nursery (more current view), now known as the Morning Room

Henry Clay Bedroom…

Henry Clay Bedroom, 1978, now known as the Ash Bedroom

Walking back toward the Entrance Hall, the tour went through the Museum Room…

Museum Room, now known as the Henry Clay Study

Up the main stairs to the Sitting Room…

Entrance Hall and main staircase (photo from early 1990s)

Sitting Room on second floor, c1960s

Sitting Room on second floor, 1960s

Master Bedroom…

Master Bedroom, 1978, now known as the Henry Clay Bedroom

Nursery…

Nursery, c1960s, now known as the Dressing Room

Ash Bedroom…

Ash Bedroom, 1978, now known as the Nursery

Children’s Bedroom…

Mrs. Seay in Bedroom or Children’s Room, c1960s, now known as the Daughters’ Room

Down the main stairs and outside – to view the kitchen and the outbuildings from the side porch.

Side porch, 1975

Kitchen, c1970s, now the Exhibit Room

One highlight of visiting Ashland was Gypsy the cat who lived for fourteen years in the mansion (until 1976).  She became quite well-known and “people…are disappointed if Gypsy does not meet them at the door…,” Mrs. Seay told the Louisville Courier-Journalin 1973.  Mrs. Seay considered her a person and a relative (“She must be related to Henry Clay, because he was such a charmer”) and dubbed her “Assistant Curator.”

Gypsy the Cat at Ashland

Gypsy had her own special chair by Mrs. Seay’s desk and she followed tours through the house and would “tug at the draperies” for attention, distracting visitors: “I’d lose them,” Mrs. Seay said of her tour groups, “they would want to know about the cat.”  Gypsy’s picture postcard was the largest selling after tours.  But this living novelty— as Mrs. Seay called her: “‘Henry Clay’s cat ‘in her ninth life’”—was good for attendance.  Mrs. Seay told Southern Living in 1968 that Gypsy served as surprise entertainment for “people who may have thought they were just going to tour the 157-year-old home of the distinguished Kentucky statesman.”  Gypsy died in 1976 and mourning fans raised money for a small tombstone, erected where the popular cat was buried under the larch tree on the front lawn, as if she had been a member of the Clay family.

Ashland’s Opening Day

27 Monday Jun 2016

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1950

Ashland, the Henry Clay estate, has since the early nineteenth century been an important American historic site.  During Clay’s lifetime (1777-1852), the estate was often equated with the man and ‘Ashland’ became a household word.  After Clay’s death and while four generations of Clay’s descendants occupied the estate, Ashland served as a memorial to Henry Clay, symbolizing his life’s work and the period in which he lived.  In 1950 after his family relinquished ownership of the estate, Ashland became a historic house museum under the auspices of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation.  For more than half a century, this National Historic Landmark in Lexington, Kentucky has been open for public tours and has accommodated hundreds of thousands of visitors.

Even though this opening blog entry places us somewhere in the middle of Ashland’s story, it was a transformative moment in its history: the day it officially became a public place.

It was April 12th, 1950, auspiciously chosen because it was Henry Clay’s birthday.  After nearly 150 years as a private home, Ashland was officially opening its doors to the public.  Clay’s great-granddaughter Nannette McDowell Bullock, who had died in 1948, had been largely responsible for the formation of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation and for the preservation of Clay’s beloved estate.

Henry Clay’s original farm was more than 600 acres in size, but over the century after his death in 1852, the estate had shrunk to 17 acres in the middle of a burgeoning Lexington residential neighborhood.  Fortunately, the large mansion, a great number of mature trees, and a smattering of outbuildings remained.

For Opening Day, the Foundation set out its vision for Ashland: “The Henry Clay Memorial Foundation now has the pleasurable task of opening Ashland to the nation as a public memorial.  The Foundation hopes, in the next several years, to restore the stables, ice houses, the smoke house and other outbuildings, and to develop the gardens and grounds to the point where they will not only represent the finest Clay tradition, but where Ashland will be recognized as the loveliest spot in the bluegrass of Kentucky.  The Foundation hopes, further, constantly to increase the number of Henry Clay memorabilia to the point where Ashland will be a mecca for the research scholar as well as for the patriotic American who wishes to see the home of one of America’s favorite sons.”

Prior to Opening Day, the local papers built anticipation for the event.  A year in advance, plans for the museum were coalescing.  The Lexington Leader explained that no remodeling of the mansion was planned, only “reconditioning.” Landscaping of the grounds was a priority, as well as the collection of artifacts.  Maintenance of the museum was to be financed by visitor “fees” and Foundation membership. In the days before Opening Day, the papers ran photos of Henry Clay artifacts and the progress inside the mansion.  The April 10th Lexington Leader wrote that “50 groups” of Henry Clay items had been collected by the Foundation and placed in Ashland “to furnish authentic atmosphere of the time of Henry Clay.”

Opening Day festivities opened with a parade that began at the Cheapside square downtown. Students and faculty of Henry Clay High were to be dismissed as the procession passed the school on East Main Street to join it on its final leg to Ashland.  The dedication featured concerts by the Henry Clay High School and University of Kentucky’s bands.  Mayor Tom Mooney proclaimed it “Henry Clay Day” in Lexington and urged all citizens to attend the opening.

And, on that chilly April day, thousands (estimates from 3,000-6,000) gathered on Ashland’s sprawling back lawn.  Children climbed trees to get a better view. Photographers maneuvered to get the best shots.  Keynote speaker and fellow Kentuckian, U.S. vice president Alben Barkley declared: “This fine mansion now will rank alongside Mount Vernon, Monticello, the Hermitage, and other public memorials to great men of this nation….generations to come will thank you for preserving this shrine” (Louisville Courier-Journal).

While Barkley was a draw, his glamorous wife, Jane Hadley Barkley, was a sensation: “Mrs. Barkley was on hand for the event, too, to the great delight of some 3,000 Central Kentuckians who didn’t bother to disguise that they had come to see the charming ‘Veepess’ as much as to witness the dedication….[during Mr. Barkley’s speech] the crowd gave its attention largely to her…” (Lexington Leader).

Even with the “50 groups” of Henry Clay artifacts, the mansion could not to be interpreted strictly to Clay’s era.  Not only were there not enough of Clay’s belongings extant to do so, but so many of his descendants’ objects then filled the house.  The Foundation was careful to describe Ashland’s interior as “in the spirit of Clay’s time.”  The first rooms to be opened to the public in 1950 were all on the first floor: the entrance hall, dining room, drawing room, office, library, a room dedicated to Nannette, as well as the Henry Clay bedroom.

Two Clay descendants dressed up in historic clothing from Ashland’s collection – something that current museum practice would never consider – and acted as host and hostess for the reception held in the mansion.  Mrs. Stuart Platt, a great-great-great granddaughter of Clay, wore a ruby red gown which was mistakenly thought to have belonged to Mrs. Clay, while Goodloe McDowell, a great-great grandson, wore the dashing blue and gold ceremonial jacket donned by Clay when he signed the Treaty of Ghent.  The thin and wiry Henry Clay’s jacket proved to be even too narrow for the slight Mr. McDowell; a sleeve seam was torn that day.

Ashland Grounds as Public Park: The Formal Garden

17 Tuesday May 2016

Posted by in Grounds, historic preservation, Museum Era (1950 - ), Public Hospitality

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1950s-today

When Ashland opened as a museum in 1950 the estate featured seventeen acres open daily to the public.  Although the mansion was the primary focus, from the beginning the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation emphasized Ashland’s spacious grounds and encouraged visitors to “pause” before entering the mansion to see the grounds, the Clay walk, his carriage, and the garden.[1]

Ashland Garden

For those locals who had not yet discovered the urban oasis, the Lexington Leader in 1966 put out the suggestion:  “For a Quiet Spot at Dusk, Try Ashland.”  The article lamented that, “unfortunately, too many of the local residents leave this spot only for out-of-towners….”  Locals were encouraged to enjoy Ashland’s grounds and garden:  “While this majestic old house offers visitors a grand view of furniture, architecture and household furnishings from 100 years ago, the grounds abound with tranquility and beauty…Henry Clay’s home provides an excellent destination for an after-dinner drive.”[2]

Although in a densely developed residential area and on a major thoroughfare, Ashland’s spacious grounds have created a welcome sense of remoteness in the center of Lexington.  A 1969 article touted Ashland’s “serene surroundings which belie the closeness of a busy state highway and nearby residential suburbs.”[3]  Its extensive collection of old and rare trees has further added to its oasis character.  John Martin recalls that Ashland’s densely wooded grounds long gave the estate an air of a private club.

The Ashland, Kentucky Sunday Independent described the estate’s allure: “Ashland, Henry Clay’s home, offers a pastoral visit inside the city of Lexington…Although the nation abounds with historic homes appropriately furnished and open to visitors, Ashland has a charm many lack.  It’s not just the house itself, although it’s well worth spending an hour or so taking the guided tour.  It’s the grounds as well.  There serenity of the gardens and walking trails belie its location near Lexington’s busy Richmond Road…”[4]

The Formal Garden

The Foundation faced some challenging decisions regarding the grounds.  Maintaining historically accurate surroundings came up against public need.   For example, visitor need prompted the addition of signage and restrooms…and the very practical, yet historically inaccurate, early 1950s construction of a paved parking lot; modern day vehicles soon filled the historic landscape.

Ashland 1975, from Lexington Herald-Leader

The attempt to make Ashland into a public recreation spot threatened to disconnect it from its historic roots when the question arose in 1950 as to what type of garden should be created at Ashland.  The Garden Club of Lexington was chosen by the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation board to create the garden and to this day, is responsible for all maintenance.

Ashland Garden, March 1956

At the garden’s inception, a tug-of-war ensued between historic preservation advocates and the Lexington Garden Club’s ideas about the public good.  The perceived need for a lovely community garden spot and the beautification of the neighborhood was the Club’s focus.  Harriett Holladay writes in “A Short History of the Ashland Garden,” that there were two factions within the Garden Club of Lexington. One faction was the “Old Garden” group that believed they should work from the overgrown but extant McDowell garden, while the “New Garden” faction wanted to build something entirely new.

The proponents of the New Garden won by a narrow margin.  One Club member explained their rationale for rejecting the McDowell garden: “‘The garden that is there now was just his granddaughter’s garden.  It had nothing to do with Henry Clay.  Nobody knows where that Clay garden was.’”[5]  Her comment reveals the thinking of the time: it had to be ‘all Henry Clay’ or nothing at all.  Descendants’ roles and motivations were disregarded.  Had they known how the McDowells tried to reenact Henry Clay’s Ashland in so many significant ways, including restoring his gardens, they would have thought twice about dismissing an entire authentic piece of Ashland’s grounds.  And with some research, they probably could have discovered a close estimate as to where Clay’s garden was and what it contained.[6]

Ashland Garden, 1950s

Louisiana Wood Simpson wrote in 1963: “No one seemed to know where the original garden was located or what it looked like so we built a handsome one in the period manner.”[7]  The Garden Club enlisted Cincinnati landscape architect, Henry Fletcher Kenney, a Lexington native and scholar of European gardens, to design the new garden.  In the resulting formal, walled parterre design, he emphasized the eighteenth century influences on the Clays’ original gardens and apparently used “archeological study” and the “study of plans…and publications of the period” to discern this.  Rather than recreate what he acknowledged was Clay’s likely incorporation of “informal and naturalistic” European garden design, he chose to emphasize the more traditional, formal type of garden that he asserted would also have been found at Ashland. [9]

Ashland Garden plaque

Even though the garden had little tangible historical precedent at Ashland, in the press the Garden Club was nevertheless emphatically lauded for its “restoration” of Henry Clay’s historic gardens.[10]  And its identification with Clay is promulgated by a posted sign that every visitor would see:   “Please hold little children’s hands while walking through Henry Clay’s garden…”  The decision to create a garden tenuously related to Ashland’s original gardens while referring to it as “Henry Clay’s” demonstrates a greater emphasis on public appeal than historical legitimacy.  The garden is clearly more a park feature than a historic portion of the estate.[11]

Yet Ashland’s garden quickly became a neighborhood treasure, “a source of pride and enjoyment for people who live in this historic area.”[12]  A 1998 Herald-Leader feature said that the garden had provided Lexington residents “a respite from the rush of daily life” for half a century, attracting “painters and artists capturing a bit of its beauty” and neighbors making “a pass through the garden as part of their daily walk.”[13]    And for all non-local visitors to the historic estate, the garden is undeniably a highlight.

[1] “You Are Invited.”

[2] Stephen Palmer, “For A Quiet Spot At Dusk, Try ‘Ashland.’”  Lexington (Ky.) Leader, 16 June 1966.

[3] Lemert, Ann. “Ashland.  Clay Home: Kentucky Showplace.”  The Christian Science Monitor, 20 May 1969, 12.

[4] “Ashland to Ashland.  Henry Clay’s Historic Lexington Home Visited.”  Ashland, KY: Sunday Independent, 7 April 2002.

[5] Harriett Holladay.  A Short History of the Ashland Garden.  1989, 3.  Ashland archives.  Emphasis added.

[6] The 1990s Landscape Master Plan study provided such answers, and expressed concern that the historic legacy represented in Ashland’s grounds was threatened by loss: of structures, trees, and plants.  The addition of interpretive signage over the past decade has both added to Ashland’s historical value and subtracted from its recreational park identity (there is concern that too many signs will cause unsightly clutter on the grounds).  Ashland Estate Landscape Master Plan.  The Henry Clay Memorial Foundation, 1996. Ashland archives.  Ned Crankshaw (Landscape Architect) and Jeff Singer (Certified Arborist).

[7] Louisiana Wood Simpson, The Cat Who Lived at Ashland.  Lexington, KY: Garden Club of Lexington, 1963, revised 1978.

[9]  “Garden Club of Lexington to Restore Historic Ashland’s Grounds, Gardens.”  Lexington (Ky.) Sunday Herald-Leader, Social, Club and Personal News, 1 October 1950, 26.

[10] “Garden Club of Lexington to Restore Historic Ashland’s Grounds, Gardens.”  Lexington (Ky.) Sunday Herald-Leader, Social, Club and Personal News, 1 October 1950, 23.

[11] Garden club members maintain the garden, tending it every Wednesday during growing season.  Funding has come from a gift shop (1965-1979), sales of popular cookbook, grants, and donations (especially of plants from members’ own gardens).

[12] Wendy Miller,  “Ashland Estate Houses a Wonderful Café, Too.”  Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader, 30 June 2000.

[13] Vickie Mitchell, “Lexington’s Beauty Spot.  Ashland’s Garden is Scenic, Peaceful.” Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader, 27 May 1998.

New Life as a House Museum: Just Like A “Real Home”

30 Wednesday Mar 2016

Posted by in Museum Era (1950 - ), Public Hospitality, Tours

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1950-1970s

1950s – Henry Clay Memorial Foundation

SEE ALSO: Opening Day!

Perhaps you will want to join the thousands who visit the historic old home of Henry Clay…

In the 1950s the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation had begun to advertise, inviting Americans to Ashland, the new patriotic shrine. The public responded wholeheartedly to these invitations.  Not only was visiting historic sites a popular activity, access to Ashland was relatively easy for American travelers.  Before the Interstate system was built, Richmond Road had served as a piece of the main travel route between Michigan and Florida, so Ashland naturally attracted tourists en route.

In its first five years as a museum, Ashland received 70,000 visitors from across the nation and around the world.  This popularity continued through the 1970s with some thirty to forty visitors arriving on bus tours daily.  The museum’s first director and hostess, Lorraine Seay, reported that in a single month in 1966, Ashland hosted a record 5,000 visitors and in August 1971, 7,500 people had visited.

Lorraine Seay

Lorraine Cloyd Seay was hired in June of 1950 as the first Executive Secretary of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation with a salary of $150 per month.  Mrs. Seay was the main tour guide at Ashland for over thirty years, but her roles were many: hostess, curator, director, and “administrator of the home.”  Seay took her hostess role exceptionally seriously, in a way believing that she was inviting people into her own home.  She personally took great pride in the fact that people felt as if they were visiting a ‘real home.’  After the first three years open to the public, it was reported that she had guided most of Ashland’s 40,000 visitors through the house.

People saw Mrs. Seay as the lady of the house and she did not challenge that perception.  When she died in 1998, her former assistant said that some people called her Mrs. “C” or ‘Mrs. Clay’ and that her tours made visitors feel they were in “a real home, not sightseers in a museum…”  The highest compliment for Mrs. Seay came from visitors who said, “‘I feel as if the family has just stepped out for the afternoon, and we’ve come in and just missed them.’” (Lexington Herald-Leader, 12 November 1998).

Mrs. Seay understood Clay’s national prominence and Ashland’s history of entertaining dignitaries, so she made a point of regularly inviting prominent guests to Ashland: President Eisenhower and President Johnson (who both declined), and Pat Nixon who visited Ashland in 1960 with a group of wives of senators and cabinet members.  In 1955, Mrs. Seay proudly told the Lexington Herald-Leader that among Ashland’s visitors in its first five years were “a vice president, senators, governors, a general, persons from all 48 states and many foreign countries,” but for all that, she emphasized, Ashland seems “a very personal kind of place, still very much a home.  And that’s the way it should be…” (20 February 1955).

Mrs. Seay at her desk in Entrance Hall

Mrs. Seay welcomed guests at her desk in the front hall where registration and payment was required, or in the case of large groups, she would greet them from the front doorstep.  The large groups would be led through the house by tour guides, but smaller groups of visitors were often allowed to freely wander through the house, limited by the barriers erected in many of the rooms and closed doors that delineated off-limits rooms.

Former Ashland director Bettie Kerr recalls how house museums were maintained in the 1950s-70s, the days before professional museum practices became common: “There were all these ladies’ organizations…and it was a hobby kind of thing and they meant terribly well, but they didn’t understand what we do now. They ran it like their homes.  They dusted the furniture and did all the proper things.”

Kerr explained Mrs. Seay’s great pride in tending to the house.  She remembered that they faithfully shuttered the rooms from the sun during different parts of the day, “so in her way, that preserved things…”  The mansion was kept exceptionally clean.  Mrs. Seay wanted to present the house at its best to her guests, as Kerr describes:  “The public wasn’t invited in to this grungy place – they were invited in to this place where the silver was polished (probably overly much).  But there were beautiful flowers …every room had a substantial arrangement…[Visitors] left here I think having had a lovely visit…”

Mrs. Seay sets the Ashland dining room table, 1951

Despite the absence of Henry Clay’s original house, efforts to make Ashland seem like Clay’s authentic home environment began the day it opened to the public as an institutional museum.  Clay descendants dressed up in historic clothing from Ashland’s collection and acted as family “hosts and hostesses” for the reception held in the mansion (SEE Opening Day!).  The museum’s goal was to evoke Clay’s home with a conspicuous attempt to make it seem as if his family still lived there.  Ashland was no longer a real home, but the enduring efforts to make it seem so had begun.

Spring Beauty at Ashland

16 Wednesday Mar 2016

Posted by in Grounds, Museum Era (1950 - )

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YOU ARE HERE -> today

Springtime at Ashland, The Henry Clay Estate is especially glorious with the carpet of tiny white blossoms that covers the grounds.  Spring Beauty—often referred to as “Spring Beauties” —has been blooming every spring on the estate for generations.  Claytonia virginica is the botanical name for this perennial, in honor for Colonial Virginia botanist, John Clayton (1694-1773).  It is also known as Eastern spring beauty, Virginia spring beauty, or fairy spud (!).  The individual flowers bloom for three days, although the five stamens on each flower are only active for one day. Mowing of the Ashland lawn cannot ensue until the Spring Beauties are done blossoming.

Spring Beauties. Photo c/o Ashland, The Henry Clay Estate.

Spring Beauties emerging by Ashland’s Dairy Cellar. March 10, 2012.

Photo by Elizabeth Ledford, featured for March in Ashland’s 2012 calendar.

Ashland in the Path of the Bulldozer

11 Monday Jan 2016

Posted by in Farm, McDowell Era (1882-1950), Preservation, Transfer of Ownership

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1920s

Ashland endangered

The people of America…make no mistake in paying homage to the memory of Henry Clay; but our debt of gratitude, my friends, will not be liquidated until the historic home of Henry Clay, his dearly beloved ‘Ashland,’ is rescued from the menace of encroachment by advancing civic development and a growing population and dedicated and preserved for all future time as a sacred patriotic shrine.

So urged Judge Samuel M. Wilson, the chief advocate for Ashland’s preservation in the 1920s.  By the fall of 1926, it had come down to a public vote: “Voters to Decide Fate of Historic Clay Estate,” the choice before Fayette County citizens: “whether Ashland…shall be sacrificed to the expansion of the city or be preserved as a beautiful city park” (Lexington Herald).

In the 1920s, great-granddaughter Nannette McDowell Bullock was the Clay descendant residing at Ashland.  Her father Major McDowell had intended that Ashland be preserved both for his family and for the public.  Upon his death in 1899, his will transferred Ashland to his wife and children, stipulating that the estate was to be held in trust until the last of his children died.  Land from the sizeable estate could only be sold if all of the siblings agreed.  The idea—and now the means—of preserving Ashland was passed on to the McDowell heirs by their father.  Major McDowell had planted these early seeds of preservation back in the 1880s when he spoke to the Chicago Tribune:

It is the Major’s intention that Ashland shall forever be kept as it is today, so that all who desire to visit the home of Henry Clay can do so without money and without price…Fortune has favored Major McDowell and he will no doubt be able to leave a fund sufficiently large for the maintenance of Ashland on the lines he has laid down…so that Ashland is likely to continue to be preserved for lovers of liberty and human freedom as long as there is a member of the McDowell family living.

For Major McDowell it had not been a question of whether his children would endeavor to preserve Ashland, but a matter of how and when.  After their mother’s death in 1917, the fate of Ashland rested in the hands of the six McDowell heirs.  The siblings wrote many letters between themselves regarding the ownership and maintenance of the estate.  One possibility they considered: would—and could—they preserve Ashland by passing on the estate to their heirs for private occupancy?  By the 1920s, this was not looking like a feasible option for them, the burden too great for any one family.  No one appeared interested in, or capable of, taking on the tremendous amount of care, upkeep, and hospitality to the public that the occupancy of Ashland would require of them.

With the dawn of the twentieth century, residential development was knocking on Ashland’s door and the cost of maintaining the large estate began to grow burdensome for the family.  Land values began skyrocketing: the land surrounding Ashland had become too valuable as residential property to retain for farmland.  Selling off some of Ashland’s abundant acreage for development was a logical action to ensure Ashland’s viability.

The sale of portions of the Ashland estate began in 1908 when the McDowell heirs made plans to sell about 95 acres of the farm for a subdivision. Lexington had expanded its city limits to include the Ashland estate and municipal services such as gas, water, and road maintenance set the stage for subdivision.  The family contracted with the renowned Olmsted Brothers landscape architecture firm of Massachusetts to design the development called “Ashland Park” and the first lots went up for sale in 1919.  The fact that the land was once Henry Clay’s virtually guaranteed its salability.

All of these changes in Ashland’s borders and surroundings were a cause of alarm for some.  They worried that the development would ‘steamroll’ over Ashland and the historic estate would be lost forever.  In the postwar period, critics decried the social and psychological consequences of the demolition by the highway and housing industries and argued that the destruction of communities and social networks was depriving people of connectedness to their history.  Now Lexington was facing just such a loss…which would be irreversible.

In this uncertain context, the McDowell siblings were seriously dealing with the question of the occupation and maintenance of Ashland—and now considering its inevitable sale.  Only weeks before she died in 1920, youngest sister and national suffrage leader, Madeline McDowell Breckinridge, wrote a letter to her brother stating that she and her husband had been seriously considering moving to and managing Ashland, but after much deliberation, decided against it.  The improvements needed on the estate were cost-prohibitive.

By the spring of 1922, the Louisville Courier-Journal reported that the McDowell siblings had indeed put Ashland on the market:  “The disposition of Ashland, the famous home of Henry Clay, is a question which has been much in the minds of Central Kentuckians in the last few months… Ashland is not only the most famous of the many old Kentucky homes, but it is practically the only one that remains in the hands of the original owners.”

It was at this time that the idea of Ashland as a “memorial museum” emerged.  The Courier Journal reported that it was “being urged in many quarters that Ashland be purchased by the State or Nation as a memorial museum…[and] that if such an offer should be made to buy this property for this purpose that the heirs should consent to sell it for a nominal sum…”

But even with the intent of selling for a reasonable sum, four years later Ashland still had not sold and the remaining heirs’ eagerness to unload the estate came to a head.  In the face of escalating costs and other burdens, their ideal of a memorial museum had to be abandoned.  It seems that the family felt limited in their options and in a hurry to act.  A local newspaper notice in February announced that, “…steps are now being taken by the owners of ‘Ashland’ looking toward the placing of the property on the market for sale as a residential subdivision and whatever action is taken in the matter should be taken speedily.”

The situation had become dire: Ashland was to be sold off as a potential subdivision.

Residential growth—the devouring of acres of open space, farmland, and signs of rural life—seemed frightening and uncontrollable.  If even Henry Clay’s historic property was in imminent danger, people wondered where it would stop.  So the public grew increasingly involved in the quest to save Ashland from what they dreaded would be certain destruction by greedy developers.

A figure who would play a crucial role in Ashland’s fate, noted historian and Henry Clay admirer Judge Samuel M. Wilson, accepted the leadership role in the campaign to save Ashland.  He announced in February 1926:  “Every Lexingtonian and every Kentuckian is interested in this movement…and the time is ripe to act.”

The idea and motivation to preserve the estate had germinated in the McDowell family for decades, but now Nannette and Judge Wilson would take concrete steps to make it a reality.  They determined that what remained of Ashland should be protected from encroaching development. Further, they returned to the idea of establishing Ashland as a public museum, one of the proven means to preserve a historic site.  Ashland curator Eric Brooks says that by the 1920s, “…setting aside Ashland as a museum…was one of the few options that existed for Nannette that insured that the last piece of the estate, Nannette’s family legacy and responsibility, would be protected from development.”

Some suggested that because Clay was a prominent national figure, the entire nation should be invited to take part in the preservation of Ashland.  National attention resulted through the New York Times which became a sponsor and supporter of Ashland’s preservation, as the Louisville Herald-Post explained the motivation, “…it will only be when the home of Henry Clay is actually made a part of us, by being preserved—and by being thrown open to the public that Henry Clay will again be what he was at an earlier period—very much more than a name…When Ashland is opened to a public which has given something from its pockets to make it part of Kentucky—then we shall have a beginning of appreciation for Henry Clay.”

The Henry Clay Memorial Foundation is established

Changes occurred rapidly in 1926.  In May, the McDowells decided that the large brick stable that stood in the way of the planned Sycamore Road had to be razed.  In July assurance that the Ashland estate was to be saved for the public was announced in the Lexington Herald:  “Instead of subdividing the grounds immediately surrounding the homestead, some 20 acres will be kept intact with the view of converting it into a public park.”

In August, the first recorded meeting of the Board of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation was held in Judge Wilson’s office.  At that meeting, the Board discussed raising funds to purchase Ashland by means of a city bond issue.  Judge Wilson explained that the Foundation had “proceeded to a point where municipal aid would be necessary to their efforts to preserve the historic house at Ashland.”  The Board voted unanimously to present to the Lexington Mayor and Board of Commissioners an ordinance asking that a $200,000 bond issue be submitted to the voters in the November election.

Public debate regarding Ashland heated up in the months leading up to the election.  While there was general city-wide agreement that Ashland was worth preserving, many felt that the asking price was too expensive for the city.  Judge Wilson argued the opposite:

It is contended by some that the price of $200,000 asked for the ‘Ashland’ property which the city contemplates buying, is too high.  How much too high, who shall say?…Nothing is ever ‘too high,’ if one really desires it and has the means to pay for it…will anyone say that it is beyond our means or that it is a prohibitive price, in view of the priceless asset we seek to save for the city of Lexington and the immeasurable loss that would be sustained, if this historic and hallowed home is not saved? (Lexington Herald)

Wilson’s rallying cry became: “Ashland must be saved eventually; why not now?”

Still, the citizens of Lexington were not proving enthusiastic about the bond issue.

Some found it inconceivable that the community would be so apathetic.  One such person was C. Frank Dunn who wrote to the Lexington Herald to argue for passage of the bond issue based upon Ashland’s modern status as a major tourist destination.  He criticized the city’s hypocrisy in having benefited greatly from Ashland, but not supporting its preservation:

Lexington should either join whole-heartedly in the movement to acquire what remains of the property, with a view to opening it to the public…or unanimously withdraw it from the list of noted attractions and shrines advertised so widely to visitors…Ashland has been heralded in railroad folders and Board of Commerce literature for years as the chief attraction of the city of Lexington, and…has been the greatest year-round drawing card that Lexington possessed…

Another wrote to a local paper:

Henry Clay…has been the greatest friend Lexington has ever had.  Although he passed away more than 70 years ago, he is still helping Lexington.  There is probably not a week but that someone comes to our city to see the home of Henry Clay…Those who come spend their money…and it has been this way, not only while [Clay] was living but for more than seventy years since his death.  I would say that in this long space of time,…fully two million dollars…has been spent by people who came and went, to the benefit of citizens of Lexington…from almost every country of the inhabited globe… (E.T. Foster, October 1926).

The widespread concern about the high cost in comparison to perceived value persisted.  To many, $200,000 seemed an astronomical amount of debt for the city to assume.  Thus the bond issue was soundly defeated on November 2, 1926.  The Lexington Daily Leader provided analysis the following day: “The defeat of the park bond issue in Lexington was foreseen by those who knew somewhat of the temper of the taxpayers… in the minds of many, the price placed upon the Ashland property was too high…”  Yet the paper insisted: “By all means the residence at Ashland should be preserved as a memorial and historical museum.”

Ashland’s fate uncertain

Now that the public—the city of Lexington—had opted out of purchasing Ashland, private citizens and the family were preparing to try.  It fell entirely to the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation to raise the funds to purchase and preserve Ashland.  They wisely ventured beyond Lexington to do so.  A November 14, 1926 New York Times article proclaimed that,  “…Ashland, the historic home of Henry Clay at Lexington—an ivy-covered mansion closely associated with the formative years of the United States—will be converted into a museum.  Its spacious grounds forming a memorial park, if the plans of a group of loyal Kentuckians materialize…so that it may be forever preserved from the spoliation of time and the exploitation of the realtor and give Kentucky a shrine to the memory of her illustrious son.”

For many years after the bond issue failure, Ashland’s fate remained uncertain.  The Foundation was still at work but without the city’s help, the fundraising process was a much slower one.  A local editorial argued that:

No restoration is needed at ‘Ashland.’  The home looks today as it did in Henry Clay’s time…yet no effort has been made to capitalize on a rare opportunity to memorialize…the memory of Henry Clay’s half-century of residence in Lexington.  Surely Lexington is not too busy…to pause and reflect upon the value of this estate to the city and to make plans for the acquisition of ‘Ashland’ at as early a date as possible and make it a public shrine that all the nation may visit and enjoy.  (Unidentified newspaper, 15 December 1935).

By 1942, five of the McDowell siblings had died, leaving Ashland resident Nannette as the sole living heir.  Nannette McDowell Bullock died on July 5, 1948 at 88 years of age.  A Lexington Herald-Leader article described the stipulations of her will: “Ashland, tree-lined estate where Henry Clay once lived, will become a perpetual memorial to the great statesman of early Kentucky if provisions of the will of Mrs. Nannette McDowell Bullock are carried out.”  Nannette’s will expressed her fervent wishes for the estate: “I make this gift to said Memorial Foundation in the hope that…said foundation may be enabled to acquire, preserve and maintain Ashland and the grounds immediately surrounding it as a public park and perpetual memorial; and the gift is made in trust for that purpose…”  In December 1949, the Foundation was finally able to purchase Ashland.

So the effort to preserve Ashland had come to fruition.  President of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation, Raymond McLain, wrote in 1950: “Without the sustained interest and generosity of both Mrs. [Nannette] Bullock and Judge Wilson, it would not have been possible to present this gracious home to the people of the nation as a reminder of the way of life of one of its most interesting, resourceful and valiant citizens.”

Living in the Museum

21 Monday Sep 2015

Posted by in historic house museum, Museum Era (1950 - ), Public Hospitality, Tours

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YOU ARE HERE -> 1950s

Many visitors to Ashland in the 1950s would never have realized that the mansion continued to be a private home.  This reality was downplayed—if not hidden—from public view for nine years.

Museum Director Lorraine Seay’s public hospitality was complicated by the presence of great-great-grandson Henry McDowell Bullock (1893-1976), who resided on the second floor.

Henry Bullock 1917

Before his mother Nannette died in 1948, she had granted him a life estate and provided for his residence at Ashland for as long as he chose to live there.  She knew that his health was weak.  His presence may not have been a cause for problems, but Henry suffered psychological maladies of some kind and his erratic behavior substantially challenged the museum’s operation.

Clay family historian Lindsey Apple relays that there are many stories about Henry Bullock’s antics: everything from shouting from the front balcony and shooting his gun to frighten children playing on the lawn to greeting a group of ladies at the front door with nothing on but an open robe.  During an ‘erratic spell’ he damaged oil paintings in the house with a sword.

Mrs. Seay and the Foundation had initially allowed Henry to conduct tours of the mansion, but he declined to follow instructions – preferring to do things his own way.  She expressed her frustration to the Board: “I tried to let him help show the house for quite some time when I first came, but found that he would not conform to what we thought was best…” (December 7, 1952.)

Henry was perhaps enjoying his role as proud descendant and imitator of Henry Clay when he conducted ‘unauthorized’ tours of the house after hours, including ‘off-limits’ areas such as the attic and basement.  In fact, he was so enthusiastic about welcoming the public that he petitioned the Foundation to open the house every day and night of the week.

Henry Bullock, 1950

He was also generous with artifacts in the home, offering to sell or give them away to visitors.  Seay found herself having to respond to an out-of-state visitor who had taken Henry’s unofficial tour and had been told that he could purchase a chair and picture frame from Ashland:

In the first place Mr. Bullock is not well and we do not want him to show people through the house particularly after hours.  Also, guests are not permitted to go all over the house – that is, upstairs and in the storage rooms.  Nothing in the house is for sale as in the future we plan to open the entire house and will need many things…I felt that you would appreciate a frank explanation of the situation. (March 13, 1953.)

Throughout the 1950s, the public and private realms clashed within the very walls of Ashland.   Public interests (represented by the Foundation and Mrs. Seay) came up against the private interests of the family (represented by Henry Bullock).  Henry’s mother’s dual desire to provide the public access – while providing her son a home – in a way prompted the struggle.  But Henry’s enthusiasm, zealous generosity, and unrestrained accommodation inevitably went too far for Mrs. Seay and the Foundation.

Henry’s unwillingness to comply with the museum’s rules may have arisen from his mental state, but may also have been due to the fact that, for most of his life, Ashland had been his private home and he naturally wanted some level of control over his private residence.  Perhaps the entire mansion—not just his second-floor apartment—still seemed his private domain.  Now a middle-aged man, he understandably thought it his right to do as he pleased there.

Henry Bullock, 1938

Mrs. Seay grew exasperated at some of Henry’s efforts at control.  Refusing to use the modern gas furnace, he would not turn the upstairs portion on, causing the downstairs portion to become “overworked” heating the entire mansion.  During the first three years that Ashland was open to the public, Mrs. Seay and the caretaker had no keys to the mansion and relied on Henry to open the doors for them each day.  But he refused to abide by daylight saving time, thus for much of the year his schedule varied by one hour, which resulted in “a great deal of confusion”  for Mrs. Seay.  The Foundation Board voted to give Mrs. Seay and the caretaker their own keys.

Henry’s problematic actions inevitably thwarted his freedom.  After giving tours during off-hours and in off-limits areas, the Foundation prohibited him from doing so.  After offering or giving away artifacts and destroying some of them, he was supervised and restricted by the Board.  After troubling and offensive encounters with the public, he was allowed less frequent contact with visitors.

His unpredictable behaviors prompted the president of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation board to write to Henry, pleading for his cooperation by appealing to the memory of Henry Clay, his mother, and the interest of the public:

It has been brought to my attention that you have given away certain pieces of furniture at Ashland…The board of the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation feels that it was the intent and purpose of your mother to leave Ashland as a worthy memorial to your distinguished ancestor, Henry Clay.  I feel sure that you will want to cooperate with all the good citizens interested in Ashland in keeping this lovely home intact…in order that visitors may find the same articles of furniture that have taken on such a rich historical interest. (November 18, 1952.)

This uncomfortable mix of public and private interests—a private person living within a public museum—lasted until 1959.  With the Board’s help, Henry Bullock moved into his own home and the Foundation began to renovate the second floor for opening in 1962.