1668 House of the Seven Gables in Salem, Massachusetts

The House of the Seven Gables (also known as the Turner House or Turner-Ingersoll Mansion), made famous by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel, The House of the Seven Gables (1851), is a 1668 colonial mansion in Salem, Massachusetts, named for its gables. The house is now a non-profit museum, with an admission fee charged for tours, as well as an active settlement house with programs for children. It was built for Captain John Turner and stayed with the family for three generations. The earliest section of the House of the Seven Gables was built in 1668 for Capt. John Turner. It remained in his family for three generations, descending from John Turner II to John Turner III. Facing south towards Salem Harbor, it was originally a two-room, ​2 1⁄2-story house with a projecting front porch and a massive central chimney. This portion now forms the middle of the house. Four windows of the original ground-floor room (which became a dining room) remain in the house’s side wall.

In the first half of the 18th century, John Turner II remodelled the house in the new Georgian style, adding wood paneling and sash windows. These alterations are preserved, very early examples of Georgian decor. The House of the Seven Gables is one of the oldest surviving timber-framed mansion houses in continental North America, with 17 rooms and over 8,000 square feet including its large cellars. After John Turner III lost the family fortune, the house was acquired by the Ingersolls, who remodelled it again. Gables were removed, porches replaced, and Georgian trim added. In 1908, the house was purchased by Caroline O. Emmerton, founder of the House of Seven Gables Settlement Association, and she restored it from 1908 to 1910 as a museum whose admission fees would support the association. Boston architect Joseph Everett Chandler supervised the restoration, which among other alterations reconstructed missing gables. Information found on the House of the Seven Gables. Learn more about the House of Seven Gables.