Glen Foerd | |
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| Location | 5001 Grant Ave., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
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| Coordinates | 40°03′06″N74°58′44″W / 40.05167°N 74.97889°W |
| Area | 17.8 acres (7.2 ha) |
| Built | 1850 |
| Architect | McAuley & Co. |
| NRHP reference No. | 79002320 [1] |
| Added to NRHP | November 20, 1979 |
Glen Foerd is a historic mansion and estate located in the Torresdale neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, overlooking the Delaware River near the mouth of Poquessing Creek.
The mansion, then named Glengarry, was built as a summer home about 1850 in the Italianate style by Charles Macalester, Jr., a prosperous businessman and banker. Mr. Macalester became the trusted adviser of the eminent philanthropist George Peabody, and afterwards a trustee of his magnificent bequest to the cause of education in the Southern States. Mr. Macalester held close personal relations with U.S. Presidents Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, James K. Polk, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, and Abraham Lincoln. From President Jackson, he received the appointment as one of the government directors of the Second Bank of the United States, and was serving in such capacity in 1836, when the charter of the bank expired (source needed).
In 1893, it was purchased by Robert H. Foerderer, a U.S. congressman and industrialist, who gave it its present name. He enlarged the house in 1903 in the Edwardian Classical Revival style. [2] In 1971, the estate was given to the Lutheran Church of America. In 1985, Glen Foerd Conservation Corporation and the Fairmount Park Commission assumed ownership of the property.
Today, the estate is operated as a historic house museum, whose grounds are a public park. [3]
Glen Foerd was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
In 2024, when Philadelphia was featured in the finale of Season 36 of The Amazing Race , Glen Feord Estate was featured as the season’s finish line.
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Woodmont is a mansion and hilltop estate of 72 acres (29 ha) in Gladwyne, a suburb of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. In 1953, it became the home of evangelist Father Divine, and the center of his International Peace Mission movement. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1998 for its well-preserved Chateau-style architecture, and for its association with Father Divine.
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Torresdale, also formerly known as Torrisdale, is a neighborhood in the Far Northeast section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Torresdale is located along the Delaware River between Holmesburg and Bensalem Township in neighboring Bucks County.
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Robert Hermann Foerderer was an American businessman and politician who served as a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives for Pennsylvania's at-large congressional district from 1901 to 1903 and Pennsylvania's 4th congressional district in 1903.
Samuel Sloan was a Philadelphia-based architect and best-selling author of architecture books in the mid-19th century. He specialized in Italianate villas and country houses, churches, and institutional buildings. His most famous building—the octagonal mansion "Longwood" in Natchez, Mississippi—is unfinished; construction was abandoned during the American Civil War.
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Rockwood is an English-style country estate and museum located in Wilmington, Delaware. Built between 1851 and 1854 by banker Joseph Shipley, Rockwood is an excellent example of Rural Gothic Revival Architecture. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1976.
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Gibraltar, located at 2505 Pennsylvania Avenue in Wilmington, Delaware, is a country estate home dating from c. 1844 that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It takes its name from the Rock of Gibraltar, alluding to the high rocky outcrop on which the house was built. It is located just inside Wilmington's city limits and originally stood at the center of a much larger estate which has over time been reduced to the present area of about a city block in size. The house was originally built by John Rodney Brincklé and inherited by his brother's wife and children, before being bought in 1909 by Hugh Rodney Sharp, who was linked to the Du Pont family through marriage and work. Sharp expanded and remodeled the house, as well as commissioning the pioneering female landscape designer Marian Cruger Coffin to lay out the gardens.
Charles Macalester was an American businessman, banker and philanthropist from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He served as a government director for the Second Bank of the United States and an advisor and friend to several U.S. presidents. His brokerage and financing activities made him one of the wealthiest people in the United States at the time. He bequested a former hotel property to a failing Presbyterian secondary school in Minneapolis, Minnesota that became Macalester College and was named in his honor. His Glengarry estate in the Torresdale neighborhood of Philadelphia was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
Ormiston Mansion is a 2+1⁄2-story, red brick, late Georgian period house located in east Fairmount Park, Philadelphia. The house was constructed in 1798 with a large wooden porch in front and a smaller porch in the rear. Many of the original interior features remain including fireplaces with marble mantles and a Scottish bake oven. The cedar shake roof includes a widow's walk and Federal-style dormers, while six large shuttered windows are on each side of the house, and five on the front. The first floor interior includes a large drawing room spanning the entire width of the house, a kitchen, and a dining room with a large door leading to the rear porch. The back of the house overlooks the Schuylkill River.
