Silas Wright House
The
first stop we come to in our tour of the house is the exterior. The house
was built in 1833 by Moses Whitcomb, and consisted of only one or two rooms.
Silas Wright bought the house a year later, and within the next year started
expanding the house by adding a kitchen, enteryway, parlors, and second
story bedrooms. Inside the house, we start with the kitchen. At one point,
it contained a pantry and an exterior door leading to the garden. These
have since been taken out, with all the moving about during the last century
and a half. Now, one will see an accurately furnished kitchen including
a woodstove, handcarved wooden bowls and spoons, and a spinning wheel,
pictured here.
Next,
the tour moves into the dining room. This room was part of the original
structure, and was used as the kitchen and living quarters until the addition
of the ktchen and woodshed. Mrs. Wright would have used the fireplace and "beehve" oben
during the couple's first year in the house. The woodwork is original,
while the wallpaper suggess an oriental influence popular at the time.
The
study seems to have been the heart of the house in the 1840's, as it was
here that Wright spent much of his time writing letters and conducting
political business when at home. The mahogany and birch desk (c. 1825-30),
law books and Assembly records shown here belonged to Wright. Other furnishings
in the room once included a bed, case clock, a neo-Gothic bookcase, a mahogany
chest of drawres, and an Empire style center table.
The
spacious double parlors constituted the formal lifestyle exected of a Senator
and Governor. However, Wright makes no refrence in his letters to entertaining.
This center table belonged to the Wrights, as didsofa and stenciled rocker.
The piano shown below was manufactured by the Badla Piano Works of Ogdensburg
about 1850. The music sitting on it was composed especially for Silas for
one of his campaign parades.
