(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Photo Diary: The Gonzalez-Alvarez House, St Augustine FL [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-02-15 The Gonzalez-Alvarez House is the oldest home in St Augustine. For those who don't know, I live in a converted campervan and travel around the country, posting photo diaries of places that I visit. I am currently wintering in Florida. The city of St Augustine was founded by the Spanish in 1565, and it continued as a Spanish colony until 1763, when it became a British possession under the treaty which ended the French and Indian War. In 1783, however, Florida once again reverted to Spanish control under the terms of the Treaty of Paris, which also ended the American Revolutionary War and granted independence to the United States. The US would eventually purchase Florida from Spain and turn it into a State. The Gonzalez-Alvarez House in St Augustine is considered to be the oldest surviving home in the city. Unfortunately, none of the original structures from the city's founding in the 1560s still exists, and when the Gonzalez-Alvarez House was built in 1723, it was constructed on top of a previous building which no longer exists. When the Spanish first began to settle Florida, they had to adjust to the local climate. Unlike Spain, which had a warm and dry Mediterranean environment, Florida was hot and humid. So the typical early house in St Augustine was adapted to those conditions. The original Gonzalez-Alvarez House which was put up in 1723 by Tomás González y Hernández, who was an artillery soldier from the Canary Islands who had been assigned to the nearby Castillo de San Marcos. Arriving in 1721, he met and married Francesca de Guevera, whose family had already been living in St Augustine for three generations. At the time, their house would have been located near the barracks building and the church convent. It was a typical square Spanish-style one-story building, with a traditional loggia, or open-fronted room, that opened to the outside garden and served as the entrance-way. In Spain, these houses would have been built from wood lumber and plaster. But in humid Florida, wood structures decay quickly, so the Spanish adapted, and began to construct their buildings from quarried blocks of coquina, which was a local rock made of ancient seashells cemented together by sandstone. To prevent people from cutting themselves on the sharp seashells, the coquina walls would have been covered with a thick coat of plaster and whitewash. This wall material was cool in the heat of a Florida summer. For further comfort, the Spaniards began orienting their homes towards the southeast, which enabled the prevailing winds to enter the interior via the loggia and provide a cooling breeze which circulated the air. To enhance the effect, early homes in St Augustine often opened at the back through the loggia into the walled garden. Since St Augustine was far enough north to sometimes get cold in the winter, the thick coquina walls also served to trap and hold heat, which was usually provided by wood fires or charcoal braziers (these homes did not have any fireplace or chimney). This allowed the natural ventilation to blow away the smoke. The floors were also made from a local material, called “tabby”. This was a cement-like substance that was produced by mixing smashed oyster shells with lime mortar (produced by cooking seashells in a fire) and sometimes with sand. These floors would then have been covered with carpets or mats. The roof would have been covered with rot-resistant wooden cypress shingles. The windows would have been large to allow a nice breeze to enter, but they would not usually have glass, since that had to be imported from Europe and would have been exceedingly expensive (and not really necessary in Florida's heat for most of the year). To give some shade and to prevent rain and sun from entering in summer, and also to retain some warmth in winter, these windows would have had a series of wooden louvers called rejas arranged on the outside, and inside there would be wooden shutters that could be opened or closed. The kitchen, meanwhile, was located in a small coquina building outside. This was separated from the main house both to keep the living area cool in summer and to mitigate the danger from an accidental fire. González and his family apparently lived in the house for around 40 years, until 1763. For the past seven years, Spain, allied with France, had been at war with England, and when the war ended, it was the British who were victorious. France was forced to give up all of her territory east of the Mississippi River and south of the St Lawrence River, while Spain had to turn over the territory of Florida to British control. For a variety of political, cultural and religious reasons, most of the Spaniards who were living in St Augustine did not want to live under British rule, and González, like so many others, abandoned his life in Florida and moved with his family to the nearby Spanish colony of Cuba. He placed the house in trust with St Augustine city officials, perhaps hoping to return some day. Instead, when the British took over, they placed all of the abandoned Spanish property under the management of a trader named Jesse Fish. The Gonzalez-Alvarez House apparently sat empty for some years until 1775 when, records show, it was bought by a Sergeant-Major in the British Army named Joseph Peavett. Peavett modified the building to make it more like a typical English country cottage—adding a second story with six additional rooms, installing glass panes in all the windows, and adding exterior shutters to protect the glass. He also installed some British-style fireplaces, and opened a tavern on the first floor. By this time, Florida had reverted back to Spanish rule after the British defeat in the American Revolution, and Peavett, who had become a wealthy man with 3,000 acres of land and 47 slaves, decided not to move away to an English colony like Georgia or South Carolina, but remained in Florida and swore allegiance to Spain. When he died three years later in 1786, he was still making changes to the house. The House was then inherited by Peavett's widow Mary, but when she remarried and fell into debt (according to the records, her new husband was an unlucky gambler who was at one point arrested for “disrespecting” the Spanish authorities), the home was put up for sale in 1790. A newly-arrived Spaniard named Geronimo Alvarez, a hospital employee who had just become Mayor, bought the House (as well as the Taylor House next to it). He added a two-story coquina section with six rooms to the back of the home, and also installed a British-style roofed balcony. For the next 100 years, the house passed on from one family member to another, until 1882, when it was sold. After changing hands several times, it was purchased by the St Augustine Historical Society in 1918 (at that time, the building housed the South Beach Alligator Farm). After some archaeological work the Gonzalez-Alvarez House was restored and opened as a museum. It became a National Historic Landmark in 1970. Today there are regular guided tours through the house. The Tovar House next door is also part of the exhibit complex. Some photos from a visit. The house The original portion of the house. All the furniture is period, though none of it is original to the house. This room is also original to the First Spanish period, but is displayed to represent the British period The upper floor was added during the British period The upstairs bedroom These extra rooms were added during the Second Spanish period by enclosing the balcony Every house had a well for drinking water The detached kitchen is a replica made in the 1930s Inside the kitchen Live Oak in the walled garden Spanish family crest in the garden These statues represent the four seasons Inside the museum [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/2/15/2149074/-Photo-Diary-The-Gonzalez-Alvarez-House-St-Augustine-FL Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/