Ashtabula Plantation House

Between 1825 and 1828, Lewis Ladsen Gibbes built the home with the intention to live in it year round, a rarity at a time when most upstate homes were summer homes.  He created Ashtabula to be self-sufficient, as the plantation either grew or made its own food, clothing, and farming equipment.  Gibbes’s son Charles took over the home after his father’s death and his older brother chose to study medicine; Charles Gibbes lived here until the 1830s and the home fell to the next Gibbes brother, who sold the home in 1837. 

The home then belonged to several more owners throughout the 1800s and 1900s, including Fred W. Symmes, the last private owner.  Symmes purchased the home, but never lived in because he wanted to preserve its history. After his death in 1957, the Mead Corporation purchased the property to produce pulpwood before the home was given to the Pendleton Historic Foundation for restoration in 1961.