{"nrhp_refnum":"70000150","name":"Fort Ross Commander's House","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"N of Fort Ross on CA 1, Fort Ross State Historical Monument","address_restricted":false,"city":"Fort Ross","county":"Sonoma County","state":"CA","lat":38.51428746700006,"lon":-123.24357059458026,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1970-04-15","is_nhl":true,"nhl_designated_date":"1970-04-15","areas_of_significance":["Commerce","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["national"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A one-story log dwelling built in 1812 at Fort Ross, a Russian American Company fur trading post in Sonoma County, California, now within Fort Ross State Historical Monument.","why_significant":"The form describes it as an excellent, rare and little-altered example of Russian methods of log construction. It is largely an original building, still nearly intact when the site was donated to the State of California in 1906, and it was later carefully repaired and restored.","narrative":"Built in 1812, the Commander's House is a one-story dwelling at Fort Ross in Sonoma County, California, measuring about 36 by 48 feet. Fort Ross was founded as a Russian American Company fur trading post, and the house stood inside its stockade. Its walls are hand-squared redwood timbers mortised together at the corners, shaped with adzes, axes, broadaxes, chisels and planes rather than saws or augers. The walls are not parallel or at right angles, and the high hipped roof was made in two layers of split and hewn boards, some up to 23 feet long. The house has a hall and seven rooms, and by 1818 it had glass windows imported from Russia. It was largely original and little altered when the fort site was donated to California in 1906. It was recognized as an excellent, rare example of Russian log construction, and it is now part of a state monument, restored and open to visitors as a museum.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Colonial architecture (Russian log construction)","criteria":[],"status_note":"Condition listed as excellent (restored); State Historical Monument, open to visitors as a historic house museum.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:31.664812-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_CA/70000150_NHL.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/70000150/c4125d3a41-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/70000150/c4125d3a41-1600.webp","licence":"Public domain","author":null,"credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rotchev_House.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Unknown author</a>, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rotchev_House.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/123858115","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotchev_House","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q48815082"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/california/sonoma-county/fort-ross-commanders-house-70000150/"}