Experience life on America's frontier in the 1797 house with acreage, exhibits and heirloom garden. Once considered "the most costly and most admired house in Tennessee,"it is one of the few surviving houses designed by Tennessee's first formally trained architect, Thomas Hope. In addition to its architectural significance, the house was home to the family of Col. Francis Ramsey and wife, Peggy Alexander Ramsey, influential in the development of Knoxville and the founding of the college that became the University of Tennessee. The Ramseys were responsible for the first steamboat, first steam locomotive and first medical facility. Of their sons, William became Knoxville's first mayor; J.G.M. wrote the first history of Tennessee and served as both a surgeon in the Confederate army and as Treasury Agent. Other sons and daughters also served the Confederacy, including Frank, who was surgeon-in-chief for the Confederate States in Tennessee.
