Abell-Gleason House

Built around 1859 for Alexander Pope Abell, this two-story brick house at the north end of North First Street in Charlottesville is a Greek Revival dwelling on a raised basement. Its three-bay front is divided by raised brick pilasters with stuccoed capitals, a local feature few surviving buildings retain. A deep stuccoed cornice with wooden Italianate brackets, a slate hipped roof and a monumental wooden staircase to the porch complete the exterior. Inside, a central hall and grand staircase organize the plan, and much original woodwork and glass survives. A four-room servants' house of the same date stands northwest of the main house. Later owners included the Page family, Gertrude Massie, Frank Burnley, and J. Emmet Gleason, who served as mayor in the 1940s and opened the house to public gatherings. Twentieth-century changes, such as plumbing, upstairs bathrooms and a 1970s window greenhouse, altered the form only modestly. The house remains one of few grand ante-bellum residences still in domestic use in the city.