{"nrhp_refnum":"86000422","name":"Payne's Folly","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"Watters Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Fawn Township","county":"York County","state":"PA","lat":39.72560559600004,"lon":-76.50147434399997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1986-03-06","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Payne's Folly is a 2 1/2 story stone house with a full basement, built into a bank in Fawn Township, York County, Pennsylvania, with its facade facing south. It is dated circa 1750 and its builder is listed as unknown.","why_significant":"The house is regarded as a remarkably intact early Germanic residence whose circa 1750 date is early for its type in southern York County. It combines Germanic building practices, such as siting into a hillside near a spring and a cool basement room, with Georgian features such as flanking end chimneys and a pent roof. Its survival in nearly original condition, including plan, finish work, hardware and paint, is considered rare for the area.","narrative":"Built around 1750 as a stone house in Fawn Township, York County, Pennsylvania, Payne's Folly is a 2 1/2 story dwelling with a full basement, set into a bank on its western side and facing south. Its combination of Georgian and Germanic features reflects the two cultures that shaped the area. The house sits in a hollow close to a spring, and its western half is built into the hillside, a practice associated with German building traditions. The basement's back kitchen, or cooling room, was left with unplastered stone walls and beams still bearing bark. The first and second floors keep original plaster, pine paneling, hand-planed surfaces, molded trim, built-in cupboards and fireplaces, along with original hand-wrought hardware. The name Payne's Folly appears in a 1772 land survey made for John Payne. The house is considered an unusually early and high-style example for Fawn Township, where most mid-eighteenth-century buildings were log structures.","period_of_significance":"c. 1750","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Georgian influenced with Germanic characteristics","criteria":[],"status_note":null,"vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.1-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 17:11:34.274976-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_PA/86000422.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/86000422/aba558ed38-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/86000422/aba558ed38-1600.webp","licence":"CC0","author":"Smallbones","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Paynes_Folly_Fawn_Twp_York_Co_PA.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Smallbones</a>, <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/deed.en\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Paynes_Folly_Fawn_Twp_York_Co_PA.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71995585","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payne%27s_Folly","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7156797"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/pennsylvania/york-county/paynes-folly-86000422/"}