Architecture
In both its form and style, Pebble Hill is typical of antebellum plantation houses in east Alabama. The house is a square, one-story, frame dwelling that is set atop a raised brick foundation and covered by a low-pitched, hipped roof. A small porch shelters the front entrance, while a full-width porch or gallery is located on the rear elevation. On the interior, the house features a wide central hallway with two rooms of equal size on each side of the hallway. The wide hallway with doors at either end, the tall ceilings, and the full-width porch helped cool the building in the hot Alabama summers. This basic form – a square, one-story dwelling with a hipped or pyramidal roof, a raised foundation, a full-width porch, and a floor plan that consists of two equally sized rooms arranged on either side of a central hall – is repeated in plantation houses throughout the Chattahoochee Valley, with some variations. The form persisted well into the 20th century. Although a few historians and architectural historians have investigated this form as a distinctive regional building type, further research is needed on its geographical range, as well as its origins and architectural legacy.
Like many other houses constructed in Alabama before the Civil War, Pebble Hill displays architectural details that reflect the Greek Revival style, which was immensely popular in the United States in the 1830s and 1840s. The house’s symmetrical façade and floor plan, as well as its low-pitched roof are characteristic of the style. Other Greek Revival features include the wide frieze below the cornice, the columned front porch, and the rectangular lines of the woodwork and windows surrounding the front door. Many of the antebellum Greek Revival houses in Alabama that are preserved and interpreted for the public are grand, high-style residences with ornate architectural details; Pebble Hill is a more typical example of how members of Alabama’s planter class applied the Greek Revival style to their dwellings in the 1830s and 1840s.
For much of its history, the house likely stood within a complex of outbuildings. One of the original outbuildings remains intact, and is currently attached to the southeast corner of the main house. Built at approximately the same time as the house, the building has several exterior design elements that mirror those found on the main house, including the wide frieze at the roofline and a low-pitched roof. Originally, the outbuilding stood elsewhere on the property and may have served as a kitchen; in the early 20th century, it was moved to its present location and connected to the main house. Members of the Yarbrough family who lived at Pebble Hill in the 1920s and 1930s remember a barn and chicken house on the property.
Highlights of the Collection
McKenney and Hall Portrait Gallery
On November 25th, 1825, President John Quincy Adams welcomed a delegation of Creek Indian headmen to the White House. Adams noted “they are almost all good-looking men, dressing not, as the Cherokees, entirely in our costume, but somewhat fantastically.” Th eir “countenances,” he observed, “were remarkable by a dark and settled gloom.” Th at “dark and settled gloom” was the result of tumultuous events in what are now the states of Georgia and Alabama, for Tustunnuggee Hutkee (William McIntosh), a leading warrior and chief of Coweta, had signed away nearly five million acres of Creek lands to Georgia and in the process enriched himself and his followers. This unauthorized action by McIntosh and a number of other minor chiefs was deemed treason under Creek law and the Creek Nation Council immediately repudiated the spurious treaty and sent “law menders” under Chief Menawa to execute McIntosh. McIntosh’s cousin, Governor George Troup of Georgia, demanded that the United States enforce the terms of the treaty, while the Creek National Council appointed a delegation of leading men to travel to Washington to secure peace with the United States and regain title to their land. Opothle Yoholo of Tuckabatchee was the designated speaker for the group, which included representatives from both Upper and Lower Creek towns. John Ridge, the Cherokee who served as advisor to the Creek delegates in 1825 noted that “this delegation is composed of the choice men of their Nation & as patriots are second to none in the world.”
Negotiations would drag on for months and, in the end, the Creek delegation was not successful in regaining control of their Georgia lands, but did regain land claimed by Alabama with a new Treaty of Washington, ratified in 1826. Thus, the infamous McIntosh treaty of Indian Springs was repudiated and stands as the first and only Indian treaty ratified by the United States Senate that was later set aside and renegotiated.
During their stay in Washington, the Creeks lodged at the Indian Queen Hotel, the most popular hotel in the city. Their chief contact with the Adams administration was the head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Thomas McKenney, who fell under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of War. Th e presence of the distinguished Creek delegation provided and unparalleled opportunity for McKenney, who, since 1821, had been developing an “archive” of Indian memorabilia and portraits of Indians who visited the federal city. Th e “Indian Gallery,” as McKenney’s collection of portraits came to be known, was largely the work of the famous portrait artist Charles Bird King (American, 1785-1862). The Creeks visited King’s studio to have their portraits rendered, and each sitter was also given a small version of the completed portrait as a souvenir. McKenney’s famous Indian Gallery eventually came to include nearly 150 portraits, the property of the American government.
When President Andrew Jackson replaced Adams in 1829, he soon fired most of those associated with Adam’s administration, including McKenney. Thus, when McKenney wished to use the portraits from the Indian Gallery to illustrate his forthcoming history of American Indians, he did not have easy access. The solution that McKenney and his partner devised proved to be providential for posterity, for they hired Henry Inman, a highly regarded portrait artist, to make faithful copies of the original Charles Bird King portraits. From Inman’s oil copies, the publisher used a new method of print reproduction, lithography, to produce stunning color prints to illustrate McKenney’s now famous three-volume History of the Indian Tribes of North America. The work, coauthored by James Hall, represented a triumph of American art and technology and established American lithography as equal in quality to the finest European productions.
There is no doubt that the lithographs—and Henry Inman’s oil portraits—were faithful likenesses. In a letter to the Secretary of War, McKenney praised the first lithograph produced for the book, and noted that “I consider the above copy, perfect; a perfect likeness of the man, who is known to me—and an exact copy of the original drawing by King, now in the office of Indian affairs.” Indeed, the first public exhibition of McKenney’s History was accompanied by Inman's oil paintings, so the public could appreciate the high quality achieved by the lithographic process.
The collection of lithographs presented in the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities includes William McIntosh, who originally signed the Treaty of Indian Springs, as well as the majority of the 1825 Creek delegates, plus the young son of one of the delegates.
The collection of lithographs presented in Pebble Hill includes William McIntosh and the majority of the 1825 Creek delegates.
Pottery Collection
These different pottery forms represent essential household items commonly used by households in the nineteenth century – jugs, storage jars, churns, bowls, and pitchers.
We can learn a lot about pottery traditions and eras by looking at their form, function, and glazes. The makers were artisans who worked in a family-based folk tradition in communities where clay suitable for pottery production could be found.
Steinway Piano
The manufacture of this Steinway square grand piano, serial number 1821, was completed in New York in June of 1858. The piano was originally sold to a Mr. Nicolas in Atlanta, Georgia on November 20th of that year. The piano was donated to the Center for Arts & Humanities by Mr. John D. Ford.
The piano has a seven octave compass and is finished in bookcased rosewood veneer, with solid legs carved in an acanthus motif. The original key coverings have been replaced, but the key fronts are original wood veneer. The original sharps are untapered rosewood, which have been ebonized at some time in the piano’s history.
The Steinway company discontinued the square piano design less than ten years after this piano was manufactured.
Steinway No. 1821 from Draughon Center on Vimeo.