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View of Mount Hope Plantation
House surrounded by gardens
Courtesy of Lagniappe Tours, the Foundation for Historical Louisiana
The
Greek Revival style Mount Hope Plantation House
Courtesy of Lagniappe Tours, the Foundation for Historical Louisiana |
Mount Hope Plantation House stands
as an example of the architecture typical of Southeastern Louisiana farmhouses
constructed during the 19th century. Built in 1817, it is the only farmhouse
of its kind remaining in the Baton Rouge area. Through the years this
plantation house has become part of the landscape of a thriving suburban
neighborhood, its Greek Revival style of architecture distinguishing it
from its surroundings. Mount Hope Plantation's mid-19th-century features
include its mortise and tenon construction. Mount Hope Plantation, like
many of its architectural type, embodies many traditional forms and characteristics,
including the period cabinets, the central hall, the gabled roof, and
the simple mantels. The one and a half-story house has a narrow central
staircase flanked by pairs of rooms and a front gallery, which encompasses
three sides of the house. The wide gable roof is a replacement of the
original one that was destroyed by a hurricane in the 1940s. Chimneys
are set between the front and rear rooms with simple mantels and exposed
ceiling beams that line the interior. The galleries have simple posts
with molded capitals on their upper portions. Mount Hope was originally
constructed of cypress from the plantation.
The spacious lawns, oak trees, and colorful flowers and vegetation
of the plantation itself find their origins from a 400-acre Spanish
land grant endowed to Joseph Sharp, a German planter, in 1786. German
families had settled in the region since 1718, when the Company of the
Indies recruited them for the then French colony. Most Germans became
culturally absorbed into the surrounding French Creole culture, but
even with their addition, the European population of the colony remained
small. When France ceded Louisiana to Spain in 1763, the total population
of the colony stood at about 5,000 Europeans and 3,000 slaves. Later,
during the Civil War, the plantation housed Confederate troops for the
war effort.
Mount Hope Plantation is located at 8151 Highland Rd. in Baton Rouge.
Tours are available 10:00am to 4:00pm, Tuesday-Saturday. Bed and breakfast
accomodations are also offered. Please call 225-761-7000 or visit plantation's website for further information.
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