The Commodore Oliver Perry Farm is an historic farm on

United States Route 1 U.S. Route 1 or U.S. Highway 1 (US 1) is a major north–south United States Numbered Highway that serves the East Coast of the United States. It runs from Key West, Florida, north to Fort Kent, Maine, at the Canadian border, making i ...

South Kingstown, Rhode Island South Kingstown is a town in, and the county seat of, Washington County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 31,931 at the 2020 census. South Kingstown is the second largest town in Rhode Island by total geographic area, behind New ...

. The farm consists of of rolling fields and woodlands on the west side of the road. The main farm complex includes a wood-frame house, barn (since adapted for residential use), a caretaker's residence, and a number of other outbuildings, accessed via a winding private lane. The main house, a two-story

gambrel A gambrel or gambrel roof is a usually symmetrical two-sided roof with two slopes on each side. (The usual architectural term in eighteenth-century England and North America was "Dutch roof".) The upper slope is positioned at a shallow angle, ...

-roofed structure, is of uncertain construction date, and is generally dated to either 1785 or 1815. It has been extensively altered, and been the subject of well-meaning but historically problematic restorations in the first half of the 20th century. The property's significance lies in its association with members of the Perry family, specifically

Oliver Hazard Perry Oliver Hazard Perry (August 23, 1785 – August 23, 1819) was an American naval commander, born in South Kingstown, Rhode Island. The best-known and most prominent member of the Perry family naval dynasty, he was the son of Sarah Wallace A ...

, the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

commodore responsible for the American victory in the 1813

Battle of Lake Erie The Battle of Lake Erie, sometimes called the Battle of Put-in-Bay, was fought on 10 September 1813, on Lake Erie off the shore of Ohio during the War of 1812. Nine vessels of the United States Navy defeated and captured six vessels of the B ...

, and Admiral

Matthew C. Perry Matthew Calbraith Perry (April 10, 1794 – March 4, 1858) was a commodore of the United States Navy who commanded ships in several wars, including the War of 1812 and the Mexican–American War (1846–1848). He played a leading role in the ...

, who was responsible for the

Opening of Japan was the final years of the Edo period when the Tokugawa shogunate ended. Between 1853 and 1867, Japan ended its isolationist foreign policy known as and changed from a feudal Tokugawa shogunate to the modern empire of the Meiji government. ...

in 1854. It is plausible that Oliver Hazard Perry was born on this property, which belonged to his grandfather, and that he built the now-standing house on the site of his grandfather's mansion after acquiring the property at auction in 1814. The property was acquired in 1865 by George Tiffany, the son-in-law of Matthew Perry, and was used as a rental property until the 1920s. In the late 1920s it underwent a "restoration" guided by Tiffany's widow, which brought the house interior into a romanticized Colonial Revival state, and was open for a time as a museum to the two leading figures of the Perry family. After again falling into decline, it underwent a second rehabilitation in 1944-45 by private owners. A area of the farm was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artist ...

in 1982.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places Farms on the National Register of Historic Places in Rhode Island Houses in South Kingstown, Rhode Island Farms in Washington County, Rhode Island National Register of Historic Places in Washington County, Rhode Island

See also

References