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DHR Administers Easement Over Ellen Glasgow House in City of Richmond

Published January 29, 2025
127-0056_Glasgow_House_2024_exterior_front_elevation_VLR_CCL

Virginia Department of Historic Resources
(dhr.virginia.gov)
For Immediate Release
January 29, 2025

Contact:
Ivy Tan
Department of Historic Resources
Marketing & Communications Manager
ivy.tan@dhr.virginia.gov
804-482-6445

DHR Administers Easement Over Ellen Glasgow House in City of Richmond

—The easement protects the famous Richmond home of the Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist known for her portrayals of Southern society and culture following the end of the Civil War into the 20th century—

RICHMOND – The Department of Historic Resources (DHR) announced today that a preservation and open-space easement has been executed and recorded over the historic home of Ellen Glasgow, an award-winning 20th-century American novelist, poet, and literary critic known for her realist depictions of Southern culture and society after the end of the Civil War. The easement over the Ellen Glasgow House, which is located at 1 West Main Street in Richmond, protects 0.287 acres of land, including a two-story brick carriage house built on the property in the late 1800s, from subdivision, alteration, and development. Preservation of the open-space and historic character of the property through the easement safeguards a local cityscape that attracts tourism and enhances the quality of life for residents.

As part of the transaction to convey the easement to the Virginia Board of Historic Resources, former owners John W. Pearsall III and Patricia R. Pearsall sold the house to Bryon and Nicole Jessee, owners of local Richmond dessert shop Shyndigz, and Ed Bowman, president of Richmond contracting firm W.E. Bowman Construction. The Jessees and Bowman have plans to convert the house into an upscale boutique hotel that will recall Glasgow’s legacy.

Born in 1873, Ellen Glasgow lived in the house on 1 West Main Street from 1887 until her death in 1945. Of the 20 novels that she wrote in her lifetime, all but one are set in Virginia and reflect the changing social dynamics of Richmond, the state, and the American South in the decades following the Civil War. Glasgow’s writing primarily focused on questioning patriarchy and traditional gender roles in Southern culture. Her works, such as The Deliverance (1904), Barren Ground (1925), and The Sheltered Life (1932), made her one of the most significant 20th-century authors in the United States. In 1942, Glasgow’s book In This Our Life (1941) received the Pulitzer Prize for best novel. The book was the first of Glasgow’s works to take a progressive attitude toward Black people. The story portrayed African Americans as main characters and depicted the blatant injustices they faced in society, exposing a realism in race relations that Glasgow had never touched on in her works before.

In addition to writing, Glasgow was an activist and local leader in Richmond. She marched in the English suffrage parades and became a member of the Equal Suffrage League of Virginia, founded in 1909. Her home served as a meeting place for this organization. Known for her nontraditional social and literary circles, Glasgow maintained friendships with writers such as Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings and Radclyffe Hall, author of The Well of Loneliness, an early lesbian novel. Glasgow also supported animal advocacy and the Richmond SPCA, where she served as President of the Board for 21 years.

The easement on the Ellen Glasgow House was recorded concurrently with a separate easement on an adjoining parking lot. The house was designated as a National Historic Landmark (NHL) in 1971 and achieved listing on the Virginia Landmarks Register (VLR) and the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) in 1972. The Ellen Glasgow House marks the 28th NHL property that contains an easement held by the Virginia Board of Historic Resources. The easement over the Ellen Glasgow House will limit new construction and alterations to the buildings located on the property, which will in turn protect scenic and historic views from West Main and Foushee Streets for the benefit of the public.

As of 2025, DHR has placed under easement more than 45,000 acres of land in Virginia. DHR easements are held by the Virginia Board of Historic Resources, and DHR staff monitor the eased lands. The agency administers 70 easements in the City of Richmond on behalf of the Board.

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