Gideon Cornell House    -    circa  1765 

     The Gideon Cornell House is a good example of a simple half house, also known as the three bay plan.  It has two stories, a gable roof, and a central interior chimney.  Parts of the house may date from earlier than 1765.  The doorway is Federal in style and was probably a later addition for purposes of style.

      With these very simple houses so prevalent in Newport, one way to keep up with the style of the day was change the doorway. Many of the simplest, early entry doors were changed to the Georgian style which included carved pediments over the door.  The Federal style that followed often included fanlights of glass over the door – something almost never seen in the Georgian period in Newport.  (Some Georgian doorways did, however, include square lights at the top.)  Greek Revival doorways with sidelights also found their way on to some 18th century buildings, as did even later recessed Victorian period doorways.

     The addition of a fanlight door often created some interesting problems for early houses not originally designed for the style.  The characteristic fanlight window over the door was certainly visible from the exterior - as was the intention.  But on the interior, lower framing girts partly or completely blocked the light since the interior room height had not been figured for such doorways.  

     As can be seen in the “before” photograph of the Cornell House, an addition to the south was removed during restoration, bringing the house back to its 18th century foot-print.  A multi-family apartment house, in deteriorating condition, had been jammed into the corner at Division and Touro Streets; this building was torn down to create parking and a yard for the house.

     The Gideon Cornell House is on its original site.  The house was purchased by NRF in 1969 and restored in 1970.