Gallatin house tours a hit at New Genevas Friendship Hill

Public interest exceeded expectations for this year's top to bottom tour of Friendship Hill National Historic Site.

Initially, three tours limited to 15 visitors each were offered for March 28. But those filled quickly, said Brian Reedy, the park's chief of interpretation. We had reservations for 45 people within an hour of the announcement. So we scheduled two more to accommodate more visitors.

Reedy donated a day of his time to the event, as did several students from Albert Gallatin High School. Monies raised from a $2 fee will help fund displays and interpretive signs throughout the mansion.

The purpose of the one-hour behind the scenes tour was to allow public access to areas of the site that are usually closed off or behind locked doors. Visitors often express an interest in the wine cellars housed in the basement or the second floor of the 1798 frame addition. Another area usually closed to the public are the long second story porches added by Albert Gallatin where he entertained visiting notables of the day such as the Marquis de Lafayette who addressed gathered throngs of well-wishers there May 27-28, 1825, at the only time he visited the county that bore his name Fayette.

Friendship Hill is as perfectly set as a jewel in the foothills of Fayette County. The 35-room mansion is really a collection of homes and additions. Fifteen of the rooms date to the time of Albert Gallatin (1761-1849), one of the most important political figures in the history of the early United States.

Gallatin came to America, then still engaged in the revolution, from Switzerland in 1781 with the intention of making his fortune in land speculation and industry in the nascent United States. After teaching his native French at Harvard College, he was drawn to land situated on the Monongahela River eventually christening the area New Geneva in homage to his native country.

He began construction of a two-story brick home a mansion by the standards of the Pennsylvania frontier in 1789 which he and his Italian bride Sophia Allegro dubbed Friendship Hill. Tragically, Sophia was not to enjoy the new home that was still under construction at the time of her death in 1789, probably from complications due to childbirth, speculated Reedy.

A frame addition followed in 1798, and an imposing three-story stone structure designed by Fayette County architect Hugh Graham completed Gallatin's additions in 1823. Gallatin had retired from government to become a very successful private banker and used his country home as a place to woo investors and make business transactions.

However, his second wife, Hannah, bred to New York society, abhorred rural Pennsylvania and eventually persuaded him to sell his beloved Friendship Hill in 1832.

In addition to a stellar career as a financier his fortune totaled more than $100,000 at the time of his death he played a key role in founding the New York Historical Society, New York University and the beginnings of the scientific study of ethnography in the United States.

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Gallatin house tours a hit at New Genevas Friendship Hill