The Peter Burr House is an eight room, two-story log, beam, and board building. The house was
built in three sections: the eastern portion containing two upstairs and two downstairs rooms
dates to approximately 1751; the first story of western, log portion appears to have been built
between 1760 and 1770, followed by the two-story middle portion (about 1804). The second
story of the log section was added in 1829.
The house has two porches (both on the north and south sides). It has a long sloping, steeply
pitched roof which extends out over the porches, giving the east end a wide inverted V shape
appearance. The roof is tin. Pre-WW II views of the house show a wood shingle roof.
The style of the Peter Burr House, especially the four-room section constructed circa 1751, owes
something to the so-called New England Colonial Style of the 1600-1700 period, which in turn
has its roots in Elizabethan and early Stuart period architecture of the rather plain house of the
English yeoman. Peter Burr, Senior and Junior were both natives of New England and their use of
this style and its related construction methods were a natural result of this heritage.
The house cannot be said to be a pure example of the New England colonial style, but it does use
several prominent features of that style, particularly the steeply pitched roof (a medieval form), a
tall, massive chimney and small windows.
The exterior of the earliest part of the Peter Burr House is of hand riven clapboard. It uses heavy
log uprights and beams, and the exposed parts are neatly finished. The outside walls were lined,
between the log beams, with brick and mortar and then plastered. The chairboard has a
hand-trimmed beading around the edge, which was put together with wooden pins. The flooring
consists of smooth, wide boards, and these were nailed with wrought iron nails, as are the
clapboard weatherboards.
The original doors are made of wide boards with long wrought iron hinges. The doors originally
fastened with a wooden bar. One door has an opening above the bar showing where the latch
string hung. The windows are narrow, with small panes. The center chimney in the original
section is approximately five by ten feet at the base. The chimney forms mantels or shelves in two
rooms. The top of the center chimney that extends above the house is not usually large compared
with its base.
The exterior walls of the middle section of the house, like the original portion, are filled with
brick. The single downstairs room is plastered and originally had a single window (north side)
and a single door (south side). Approximately 1900, the tight-winder staircase in the adjacent part
of the original section was removed and replaced by a passageway that communicates between
the the original and middle parts of the house. When this change occurred, a stairway was also
constructed from the middle part of the first floor to the second floor of the original house. A
crawlway communicates between the second floor of the original house and the upstairs room in
the middle section. The upstairs middle room was partially plastered but never finished and
contains a small window in the northern kneewall. A door on the west wall of the upstairs middle
room leads to the second story of the log portion of the house.
The first floor of the log section of the house is a single room with a large stone chimney on the
west wall. The room contains a single window (north), a door (south), and a stairway leading to
the second floor. Structural alterations indicate that the second story of this portion of the house
was built some time after the two-story middle section was completed.
There is a two-story stone springhouse to the immediate west of the house. The second story of
the springhouse, which was may have been used as slave quarters by a 19th century owner,
contains a large chimney that begins on that floor.
Since the early 19th century, there have been very few alterations made to either structure, and
these of a minor nature.
