Through the generations: One family inhabits Victorian home for nearly 130 years

The home at 406 W. Main St. in Georgetown is a family home, where the memories are depicted in the stained glass, scribbled in piles of letters and pictured behind gold, ornate frames.

The home’s owner, Jerry Greer, became the fourth generation to own it after his mother’s death. His great-grandfather, Kinzea Stone, completed the statuesque Victorian-style house in 1892. Stone owned the 1891 Kentucky Derby winning horse, Kingman, and had his hand in many important businesses in the region. Jerry’s mother grew up in the house, but raised Jerry in Nashville.

“When I was young, I came up (to this house) to visit my grandparents in the summer,” he said. “There were three or four boys in town I was friends with. I went out the door right after breakfast and came in before dinner.”

“Unless it was a rainy day,” said his wife, Pat. “He is an avid reader.”

Curling up in a big, comfy chair on the third floor of the house is an activity Jerry has carried into adulthood. When he and his wife are in town for their seasonal visits, Jerry still likes to climb the steps to the third floor, once the ballroom, and searches the bookshelves for an old book to read, probably for the hundredth time since childhood.

The family has maintained much of the house’s originality, including the hardwood floors.

“Each floor seems to have a different inlay in the woodwork,” he said. “And each mantle seems to be made from a different wood.”

The house has eight fireplaces, each made with different materials and design. The parlor fireplace is made from marble. Some are decorated with fleur-de-lis imprinted tiles, some with green tiles, some with purple tiles and made from bird’s eye maple.

They’ve kept a couple of the house’s most unique, Victorian-esque features: the bell box in the kitchen, which has arrows for each room of the house that move when a person calls into the kitchen; the communication whistles on the walls throughout the house; and the high step just outside the wrap-around front porch, where his great-grandfather’s carriage pulled up and he stepped right off into the house.

Jerry said the light fixtures are all mostly original as well. One particularly unique fixture in the music room is designed to accommodate electric and gas with both candles and light bulbs.

On the first floor, just beyond the intricate, hand-carved woodworking, gold trim along the ceilings and large 1920s-era family portraits hanging on the wall’s picture rail is the staircase with two colorful stained-glass windows depicting a young girl and a baby. Jerry said the baby is his grandfather, and the young girl his grandfather’s older sister.

The second floor walks up to a landing that leads to five large bedrooms. In one room is a sink with rounded, carved woodworking over a mirror. Jerry said it was once a dressing room.

“I’m pleased about the very large closets. They’re very generous for an older home,” he said.

The second floor has always been carpeted, and the third floor has always been bare board, with doors opening to nooks and crannies and spaces under the eaves. With more than 7,000-square-feet, the house has been a place where the Greers have enjoyed entertaining family and friends, but still provides an escape.

“There’s lots of room to just sit quietly and read when you want to get away from people,” he said. “I’ve used my time to do a lot of genealogy research here. There’s a lot of information left in the house. Everyone in the family wrote letters back and forth.”

As the house has been passed down, many memories remain, and Jerry recalls having a lot of fun in the house.

“I remember eating a lot of meals in the dining room with my grandparents and great aunt and uncle,” he said. “I ate beaten biscuit and I would sit in a big chair and read all day. It is my family home here.”

This story was originally published April 8, 2018 at 6:00 AM with the headline "Through the generations: One family inhabits Victorian home for nearly 130 years."