Free House – The Hood Mansion

OHU50K Notes $FREE – UPDATE: Demolished in October 2024.

FREE HOUSE. The Hood Mansion is being offered for FREE to anyone who can move it off the lot. The home has been vacant for years , and the property on which it sits was purchased by a company with plans to develop it into a warehouse complex. The house needs to be moved as soon as possible. Although many of the interior architectural elements are missing, their whereabouts are known and will be shared with a new owner.

The 5,000-square foot mansion features 17 rooms, eight fireplaces, chestnut floors, oak beams and solid brownstone construction.

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Eastern Pennsylvania Preservation Society has reached an agreement with the current owner that the mansion can be moved off the property, for free, in a timely fashion. This is the last hope for us to #SaveHood. EPPS is a 501c nonprofit organization that advocates and raise funds for the preservation, restoration, and protection of the endangered historic structures of Eastern Pennsylvania; along with advocating for the structures future use.

• Circa 1834

Contact: [email protected]

Limerick, Pennsylvania  Free

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History

Per Eastern Pennsylvania Preservation Society

“The Hood Mansion “Bessie Belle” located in Limerick, PA was built in 1834 by John McClellan Hood, a 1st generation Irish immigrant.  He built it as a summer home for his wife and his thirteen children to escape the diseases that swept through Philadelphia in the early to mid 1800s during the summer months.”

Per Find A Grave

“John and Elizabeth were married on July 29, 1805 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. They were the parents of at least thirteen children including: Mary Elizabeth, Washington, Margaretta, Rebecca Sproul, Sarah Hamilton, Wallace, John McClellan, Jr., Anna, Catherine Wallace, Elizabeth McClellan, Emma Wayne and Montgomery Hood. John came to Philadelphia from Ireland in 1799 and started a wholesale grocery business “Hood and Hamilton” which later became “Hood and Wilson.” In 1834, John built his house in Limerick, Montgomery, Pennsylvania which was based on a mansion of a house he knew from Ireland. he named the house “Bessy Bell” after a mountain range in Newtownstewart, Ireland. In Pre-Civil War days, his house served as a stopover in the Underground Railroad for slaves who were making their way to Canada.”

Per EPPS

“Most notably, John’s son, Washington, was the 500th graduate of West Point Academy in 1827. He then went on to become Captain of the Corps of Topographical Engineers in the US Army, and he is attributed with mapping large portions of the Oregon Terroritory and the Northwest. Additionally, he worked quite a bit with Robert E. Lee. Unfortunately, he passed at the young age of 32 from Yellow Fever. His mother & father erected a monument in his honor at their beloved summer home in Limerick, just outside the family crypt where John, Elizabeth, and Montgomery Hood were later laid to rest alongside Washington.

The Hood Mansion is notable for its largely unchanged appearance from its 1834 construction. The home remained in the Hood family up until the 1980s.”

After it was sold to a developer, his plans were denied and the house remained abandoned but in relatively good condition until in 2016 vandals broke in. In 2021, the developer sold the property to a Brooklyn, New York, firm who plan to build a warehouse complex on the land. The house must go.

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See Demolition Video Here