Leland Stanford Mansion
this unique mansion was once owned by Leland
Stanford, the governor of the state from 1862 to 1863, then
became a US senator from 1885 until 1893, and was a railroad
tycoon, and leading member of the Big Four, as well as founding
Stanford University; and the mansion would become a National
Historic Landmark in 1987. The house had originally been
constructed for local merchant, Shelton C. Fogus, who was a rich
Sacramento building merchant, with the architect, Seth Babson
designing the renaissance revival house. In 1861, rising star of
the Republican party and president of the Central Pacific
Railroad, Leland Stanford would buy the house for $8000, just
before he would be elected to the governor's office, and while
he was the governor, the mansion would serve as his executive
office and living quarters, with the succeeding governors of
Frederick Low and Henry Huntly Haight using it as well. During
the two years of 1871 and 1872, the Stanford family would begin
a massive remodeling of the house, and since Leland had to
attend his inauguration in a row boat because of the flooded
areas from the Sacramento River, he would raise the house
another twelve feet above the ground. They would add another
story on the bottom and the top, and expanded from 4000 square
feet to 19,000 square feet and redesigned to look more like a
French second empire architecture that had become very popular
during that period. When Stanford passed on in 1893, his widow,
Jane would continue to live there, and then in 1900, she donated
the house to the Roman Catholic diocese of Sacramento so that it
could become a home for the children of the state. It would be
given to the Sisters of Mercy that ran the orphanage they called
the Stanford and Lathrop Memorial Home for Friendless Children.
|
