Upsala (mansion)

Historic house in Pennsylvania, United States

United States historic place

Upsala

U.S. National Register of Historic Places

U.S. National Historic Landmark District
Contributing Property

Upsala, October 2009

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Location| 6430 Germantown Avenue
Germantown
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
United States
Coordinates| 40°2′48.15″N 75°8′8.28″W﻿ / ﻿40.0467083°N 75.1356333°W﻿ / 40.0467083; -75.1356333
Area| < 1-acre (4,000 m2)
Built| 1798-1801
Architectural style| Federal
NRHP reference No.| 72001174[1]
Added to NRHP| January 13, 1972

Upsala is a historic mansion in Mount Airy, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Considered one of the finest extant examples of Federal architecture, the mansion is a contributing property of the Colonial Germantown Historic District and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places[1] and the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places.

During the 1777 Battle of Germantown, American troops gathered on the site before attacking British forces across Germantown Avenue at Cliveden, Benjamin Chew's mansion.[2]

## History

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In 1698, the first owner of the property, Heivert Papen, built a small house on the corner of present-day Johnson Street and Germantown Avenue.[3] The land passed to Dirck (or Dirick) Jansen, one of Germantown's earliest settlers, and was purchased in 1766 by John Johnson, Sr., son of the builder of the nearby John Johnson House.

The property was a staging ground of the Continental Army at the Battle of Germantown on October 4, 1777. Continental cannons were placed on the front lawn, and fired at Cliveden (Benjamin Chew House).

John Johnson, III inherited the property in 1797 and built Upsala Mansion.[4] Raised as an English-speaking Quaker, Johnson married Sally Wheeler in 1801, and together they had nine children at Upsala. The building may have been named after the Swedish city of Uppsala, though that is unconfirmed. There is additional speculation that one of the Johnson family members was quite taken with, and subsequently named the house after, the Swedish author, Fredrika Bremer.

The small house built by Papen was demolished in 1883.[5]

In the 1920s, the annual Revolutionary Germantown Festival began re-enacting the Battle of Germantown, including the attack from Upsala Mansion to Cliveden, on the first Saturday of October.[6]

Upsala Mansion was owned and occupied by the Johnson family until 1941. Dr. William Johnson, chief of staff of Germantown Hospital, died deeply in debt. In 1941, the property was seized from his widow, Sarah Trowbridge Bartow Johnson.

In September 1942, the property was vandalized, and the roof was heavily damaged by fire.[7] The property was put up for auction and the mansion slated for demolition. There were talks about building a supermarket on the site.

In 1944, a group of local preservationists led by Frances Anne Wister acquired the house and established a foundation to restore the property. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places January 13, 1972.

The house operated as a museum until the early 2000s, when the museum closed due to lack of visitors. The Upsala Foundation merged with Cliveden, which managed the property in cooperation with the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In 2016, they put the property up for sale.[8]

The house was sold to two preservation-minded millennials, Alex Aberle and Violette Levy, who are converting the house from a museum back into a single family home. To secure the deal, the new owners agreed to allow the annual battle re-enactment.[9]

## In Popular Culture

[edit]

Summer 1999[10] director Andrew Repasky McElhinney shot interiors and exteriors at Upsala as the primary location for his second feature[11] as a writer/director, the period art-horror film, A Chronicle of Corpses, starring Marj Dusay, Kevin Mitchel Martin, Oliver Wyman, David Semonin, Margot White and Ryan Foley.[12] A Chronicle of Corpses was praised by Dave Kehr of The New York Times as belonging "to the small but significant tradition of outsider art in American movies - films like Herk Harvey's Carnival of Souls or George Romero's Night of the Living Dead \- that reflect powerful personalities formed outside any academic or professional tradition.”[13] The original camera negative of A Chronicle of Corpses is in the permanent collection of MoMA \- The Museum of Modern Art (New York) along with other movies directed by McElhinney.[14]

## See also

[edit]

* National Register of Historic Places portal
* Philadelphia portal

* National Register of Historic Places listings in Northwest Philadelphia

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. January 23, 2007.
2. ^ "National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form: Upsala" (PDF). dot7.state.pa.us. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. 1971.
3. ^ Hotchkin, Samuel Fitch (1889). Ancient and Modern Germantown, Mount Airy and Chestnut Hill. P. W. Ziegler & Company. p. 283.
4. ^ Eberlein, Harold Donaldson; Lippincott, Horace Mather (1912). The Colonial Homes of Philadelphia and Its Neighbourhood. J. B. Lippincott Company. p. 255. Retrieved January 4, 2014.
5. ^ "Johnson House, Main & Johnson Sts. Oldest house in Germantown. Built in 1698 by Heivert Papen. Passed into Johnson family early in the 18th century. Demolished in 1883. [graphic] / John G. Bullock. | Library Company of Philadelphia Digital Collections". digital.librarycompany.org. Retrieved February 5, 2019.
6. ^ Wallace, Carolyn. "| Battle of Germantown 2018". Retrieved February 5, 2019.
7. ^ "Fire Damages Mansion". Bradford Evening Star. September 17, 1942. Retrieved January 15, 2017.
8. ^ Romero, Melissa (September 21, 2016). "Historic Upsala on American Revolutionary site lists for $499K". Curbed Philly. Retrieved February 5, 2019.
9. ^ Farr, Stephanie. "Couple's historic Philly home came with an unusual caveat: Annual battle reenactments | We the People". www.philly.com. Retrieved February 5, 2019.
10. ^ McElhinney, Andrew Repasky. "In Remembrance: Marj Dusay (1936-2020)." Film International [Bandhagen, Sweden], 30 January 2020. http://filmint.nu/rememberance-dusay-2020 Retrieved 10 January 2021
11. ^ "Andrew Repasky McElhinney", Wikipedia, October 18, 2022, retrieved February 10, 2023
12. ^ McElhinney, Andrew Repasky (March 24, 2000), A Chronicle of Corpses (Drama, Horror), ARM/Cinema 25 Pictures Inc., retrieved February 10, 2023
13. ^ Kehr, Dave (October 24, 2001). "FILM REVIEW; Decadence Meets Death On an 1800's Plantation". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved February 10, 2023.
14. ^ "Andrew Repasky McElhinney | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved February 10, 2023.

## Further reading

[edit]

* Marion, John Francis. Bicentennial City: Walking Tours of Historic Philadelphia. Princeton: The Pyne Press, 1974.
* Minardi, Joseph M. Historic Architecture in Northwest Philadelphia: 1690-1930s. Atglen, PA: Schiffer Publishing, 2011.
* Moss, Roger W. Historic Houses of Philadelphia: A Tour of the Region's Museum Homes. Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1998.
* Tinkcom, Harry A. and Margaret B. and Grant Miles Simon, Historic Germantown: From the Founding to the Early Part of the Nineteenth Century. Philadelphia: The American Philosophical Soc., 1955.

## External links

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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Upsala (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).

* Official website
* Historic Upsala Instagram
* Historic Upsala Facebook
* Article at UShistory.org
* Upsala data from the Philadelphia Architects and Buildings (PAB) project of the Athenaeum of Philadelphia
* Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) No. PA-1718, "Upsala", 3 photos, 1 photo caption page, supplemental material

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