“STATE-LY HOMES”: Hawaii’s executive mansion Washington Place is among the four homes featured in Morven’s “Grand Homes & Gardens” series. (Creative Commons)

By Anne Levin

It has been five years since Morven Museum & Garden began presenting its popular March series, “Grand Homes & Gardens,” devoted to stately mansions and lush landscapes. This year’s theme, “State-ly Homes: Exploring U.S. Governors’ Mansions and Gardens,” starts right here in Princeton with Drumthwacket, the official residence of New Jersey’s governors since 1981.

The series begins March 5 and continues through March 27, with a mix of live and online programs featuring additional governors’ mansions in Maine, Virginia, and Hawaii. Participants can experience the whole series or individual segments.

“One of our committee members came up with the idea, and we knew that Drumthwacket needed to be one of the four homes on the series,” said Greer Luce, Morven’s curator of education and public programs. “I don’t believe Morven, which used to be the governors’ mansion, has done a program with Drumthwacket in quite a while. So this is a nice opportunity for our two organizations to do something together.”

Each of the four — Drumthwacket; First House in Richmond, Va.; Washington Place in Honolulu, Hawaii; and The Blaine House in Augusta, Maine — are open to the public. “We want people to be able to tour these houses,” said Luce. “They need to be places that can be visited.”

In order to qualify for the series, homes must be architecturally significant, have notable interiors, and tell an interesting history, socially and otherwise. Drumthwacket fits the bill.

“It has a really interesting social history based on the people who have lived there,” said Luce. “It was built in the 1830s for Charles Smith Olden, a farmer-turned-businessman who would eventually serve as a state senator and governor. It then underwent this kind of crazy expansion and renovation during the Gilded Age, under Moses Taylor Pyne. So there is some Gilded Age décor.”

Drumthwacket docent Chuck Johnson is the guide for the March 5 talk. Next on March 13 is First House. Historian Mary Miley Theobald, author of First House: Two Centuries with Virginia’s First Families, is the host. The house was first inhabited in 1813 by Gov. James Barbour, and is the oldest continuously occupied governors’ residence in the United States.

“The Federal style mansion, little altered architecturally over its long history, has accommodated more than 50 ‘first families.’ In 1990, Virginia’s executive mansion became the residence of L. Douglas Wilder, the first elected Black governor in America since Reconstruction,” reads a press release from Morven.

Hawaii’s Washington Place is the only official governors’ residence in the U.S. that was also home to a monarch, Queen Lili’uokalani. Hawaii’s last reigning royal, she moved into Washington Place in 1862 as the bride of John Owen Dominis, son of Captain John and Mary Dominis, the couple who build the mansion. It remained her private residence until she died in 1917.

“We’re really excited for this one,” said Luce. “The speaker, who will be virtual, is the curator of Washington Place. The house has really preserved the history of her life there, and that history is so interesting.”

The other virtual presentation is “The Blaine House: Home to Maine’s Governors,” by Maine’s state historian Earle Shettleworth.

“Setting to one of the most wide-ranging careers in the history of American politics, The Blaine House is an architectural gem and home to Maine’s governors and their families,” reads the release from Morven. “In 1862, the house became the residence of James G. Blaine who would go on to serve as speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, a U.S. senator, secretary of state, and, finally, a Republican candidate for president in 1884. The home was donated to the state of Maine in 1919 by Blaine’s daughter, Harriet Blaine Beale.”

Each house in the series has its own style, character, and history. Luce, who has researched them all, was particularly taken with one of Drumthwacket’s residents, Abram Nathanial Spanel. A scientist and inventor, and the founder of Playtex, one of the biggest corset and brassiere companies in the U.S., Spanel lived at the mansion in the 1940s. Among his more than 2,000 additional patents are a pneumatic stretcher designed to carry wounded soldiers in water, and a spacesuit for the astronauts of the Apollo program.

“During Spanel’s time in the house, he actually patented many of his inventions,” Luce said. “People who worked for him would come to the house. His engineering staff lived there. It’s such an interesting part of Drumthwacket’s history.”

All of the talks begin at 6:30 p.m. in Morven’s Stockton Education Center. Doors and the virtual waiting room open at 6 p.m. A zoom link is sent to all virtual participants. Light refreshments inspired by each state will be provided for those attending in person. All of the programs will be recorded and shared with registrants following each event. Visit morven.org for tickets and details.