{"nrhp_refnum":"80004225","name":"Thomas, Abijah, House","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"SW of Marion on VA 657","address_restricted":false,"city":"Marion","county":"Smyth County","state":"VA","lat":36.774378194000064,"lon":-81.56998019499997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1980-11-28","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Art","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A brick octagonal house built in 1856-57 on a low hill southwest of Marion, near Adwolf, in Smyth County, Virginia. It was built by Abijah Thomas, a local industrialist.","why_significant":"The nomination calls it Virginia's finest and most sophisticated surviving 19th-century octagonal house, reflecting the 1850s enthusiasm for Orson Fowler's eight-sided home design. It keeps a notable variety of grained and marbleized baseboards and a rare marbleized plaster wall. It is also tied to the rise of the Thomas family, prominent in southwestern Virginia just before the Civil War.","narrative":"Set on a low hill ringed by mountains near Adwolf in Smyth County, this eight-sided brick house was built in 1856-57 for Abijah Thomas, the county's leading antebellum industrialist. Its design follows the octagon house idea promoted by Orson S. Fowler, and the nomination describes it as the most sophisticated example in Virginia. Inside are seventeen rooms with triangular closets, Greek Revival moldings, grained doors and two staircases. The standout feature is the set of grained and marbleized baseboards, different in every room, along with a marbleized plaster wall. Thomas built iron works and mills and held thousands of acres, but the Civil War destroyed his iron works and left him bankrupt. His widow lived in the house until 1885, and it later served as a barn. At the time of listing it was vacant and badly deteriorated, though the brick walls remained structurally stable. A smokehouse and a tenant house stand on the 2.75-acre site.","period_of_significance":"1800-1899 (specific dates 1856-57)","architect_builder":"Attributed to Abijah Thomas","architectural_style":"Octagonal house with Greek Revival interior detailing","criteria":[],"status_note":"Deteriorated and unoccupied; in poor condition from exposure and neglect, used as a barn for much of the 20th century. The owner intended to sell it to someone able to restore it.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:51:58.119666-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/54/6836/41683654/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_VA/80004225.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/80004225/9ffc7db4ec-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/80004225/9ffc7db4ec-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"RegionalGirl137","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Octagon12_8_07.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">RegionalGirl137</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Octagon12_8_07.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/41683654","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abijah_Thomas_House","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q4667736"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/virginia/smyth-county/thomas-abijah-house-80004225/"}