{"nrhp_refnum":"98001650","name":"Signal Hill","other_names":["Mount Castle"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"16190 Germanna Hwy.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Culpeper","county":"Culpeper County","state":"VA","lat":38.44864886700003,"lon":-83.95405970956821,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1999-01-21","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two-story brick farmhouse with outbuildings, built around 1900 at 16190 Germanna Highway near Culpeper, Culpeper County, Virginia, as the centerpiece of a dairy and sheep farm originally called Mount Castle.","why_significant":"The nomination finds the property locally significant under Criterion C as one of Culpeper County's finest turn-of-the-century domestic buildings. The house is well preserved and little altered. Together with its barns, silos and other outbuildings, it shows the county's agricultural development in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.","narrative":"Signal Hill, originally called Mount Castle, is a brick farmhouse built around 1900 about 2.5 miles from the town of Culpeper, at the base of Mount Pony. Its asymmetrical cross-shaped plan produces a pinwheel footprint, and a wraparound porch, standing-seam metal roofs and segmentally arched windows mark the exterior. Inside, the original plan and trim are largely intact, including heart pine floors, a paneled staircase, pocket doors and angled fireplaces with classical mantels. John R. Duncan, a self-made dairyman and horse breeder, built the house as the center of a large farm. Barns, a corn crib, a lamb shed and two concrete silos survive nearby, some dating to at least 1914. The property was listed for its architecture, as one of the county's finest examples of turn-of-the-century domestic design, and for how completely it preserves the setting of a prosperous family farm of that era.","period_of_significance":"ca. 1900-1948","architect_builder":"Unknown (built for John R. Duncan)","architectural_style":"Late Victorian: Other","criteria":["C"],"status_note":"The main house is in excellent condition with few alterations; outbuildings are in good to fair condition. The farm remains active and the house is still a single dwelling.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:52:00.951732-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/93/6802/41680293/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_VA/98001650.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/98001650/90f679e2b5-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/98001650/90f679e2b5-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"Ser Amantio di Nicolao","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Signal_Hill_through_the_trees,_Culpeper_County,_Virginia.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Ser Amantio di Nicolao</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Signal_Hill_through_the_trees,_Culpeper_County,_Virginia.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/41680293","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signal_Hill_(Culpeper,_Virginia)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q14713206"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/virginia/culpeper-county/signal-hill-98001650/"}