Hovenden House, Barn and Abolition Hall#Abolitionism

The village of Plymouth Meeting was founded by a group of Devonshire Quakers who arrived in Pennsylvania in 1686. The Maulsby family, who later attained prominence, arrived in Pennsylvania in 1698, and came to Whitemarsh Township in 1705.Ella K. Barnard, Early Maltby, with Some Roades History, and That of the Maulsby Family in America (Baltimore: Ella K. Barnard, 1909).[https://archive.org/details/earlymaltby00barna]

File:1767 Maulsby deed & plan.jpg

Merchant Maulsby Jr. (1737–1772) was a millwright, who married Hannah Davis (1743–1807) in 1766. On June 20, 1767, he purchased a 100-acre farm with frontage on the "Whitemarsh great road" (Germantown Pike) and the "Plymouth line" (Butler Pike), for £651.{{efn|The seller was Hester Potts, widow of Nathan Potts, who had purchased the farm from Joshua Lawrence on July 24, 1739.Norristown Deeds Book 7, page 492, transcription and map in Barnard, p. 142.[https://archive.org/stream/earlymaltby00barna#page/142/mode/2up]}} The purchase did not include the 8.25-acre plot at the northeast corner of Germantown and Butler Pikes, which the 1767 deed described as "Elizabeth and Catherine Ellis's Land".

Merchant Jr. and his wife built a two-story stone house on their property.{{efn|Ella K. Barnard wrote that the "old Maultsby house" was located on a 15-acre tract "purchased by Charles Thomas at the time of the settlement of Samuel Maulsby's estate [c.1839], part of which property is now [1909] owned by David Marple." Barnard, page 143.}} They had two children: Samuel (1768–1838);[http://www.swarthmore.edu/library/friends/ead/5099maal.xml Maulsby-Albertson Family Papers], from Swarthmore College. and Elizabeth (dates unknown), who married a John Freese. In 1769, Merchant Jr. was taxed £10 on 100 acres, one horse and one cow.Pennsylvania Archives Tax Lists – 1769, quoted in Barnard, p. 145. He died in February 1772 at age 34.

During the early morning of May 20, 1778, ten-year-old Samuel Maulsby watched as British troops marched down Butler Pike to the meetinghouse, part of an unsuccessful attempt to surround the Marquis de Lafayette and 2,100 Continental troops at the Battle of Barren Hill. Maulsby's recollections, including his description of Redcoats looting his widowed mother's house, were recorded by John Fanning Watson in his Annals of Philadelphia (1830).John Fanning Watson, Annals of Philadelphia, Volume 2 (Philadelphia: 1830), pp. 61–62.[https://archive.org/stream/annalsofphilade02wats#page/60/mode/2up/search/plymouth]

Widow Hannah Davis Maulsby married David Marple in 1781, and was soon widowed again.Cora M. Payne, Genealogy of the Maulsby Family for Five Generations (Des Moines, IA: George A. Miller Press, 1902). She married Richard Corson in 1784, with whom she had two children, Richard and Hannah. Richard Corson and his wife occupied her two-story stone house in Plymouth Meeting for a time, but settled in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Samuel Dean farmed the Maulsby-Corson property in 1781; Enoch Marple farmed it in 1783; and seventeen-year-old Samuel Maulsby and his former schoolmate Joseph Corson, a nephew of Richard Corson, farmed it in 1785. Joseph Corson married Hannah Dickinson in 1786, and the young couple rented the two-story stone house until 1789. Like Samuel Maulsby, they became abolitionists, and decades later one of their sons would marry one of his daughters.

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File:Plymouth Meeting General Store & Post Office c.1827.jpg

On 3 February 1794, Samuel Maulsby purchased the 8.25-acre plot at the northeast corner of Germantown and Butler Pikes, for £137.Norristown Deed Book #9, page 180, transcription in Barnard, p. 146. The sellers were John Fontiles and his wife Elizabeth, who had bought the corner plot from Joseph and Mary Potts on February 2, 1789. The 1794 deed mentioned "a messuage" (house) on the property, but did not describe it. Maulsby later purchased adjacent plots at the north end of the farm, which expanded it to 128 acres (51.8 hectares) and extended it to Flourtown Road.

Samuel Maulsby was the owner of a large and fertile farm at Plymouth Meeting... It included the whole north east corner of the two roads, the Germantown turnpike, its south boundary, and the Plymouth and Broad Axe turnpike, along which it extended for half a mile, its western boundary. [I]n addition to the farming operations the burning of lime{{efn|Limestone was burned in kilns to produce lime, which would be mixed with water and sand to create mortar.}} was extensively carried on by him.

Sometime around 1795, Samuel Maulsby built a three-story, fourteen-room, Federal-style dwelling on the corner, diagonally opposite the meetinghouse. He seems to have incorporated an earlier stone house into his new house.{{efn|Nancy Corson, author of the 1969 NRHP nomination for these buildings, concluded that Samuel Maulsby's {{circa}}1795 house incorporated stone walls from an earlier house. This probably would have been the messuage [house] mentioned in the 1794 deed for the corner plot. NOTE: The earlier house could not have been Merchant Maulsby Jr.'s {{circa}}1767 stone house, since the corner plot was not part of his farm.}} He built the stone barn, perhaps around the same time,{{Philadelphia Architects and Buildings |pj=86682 |Hovenden House, Barn and Abolition Hall}} and is presumed to have built the carriage shed. In 1799, he married Susanna Thomas (1780–1818), and they had seven children.Ellwood Roberts, Plymouth Meeting: Its Establishment, and The Settlement Of The Township, (Norristown, PA: Roberts Publishing Company, 1900).[http://dunhamwilcox.net/pa/plymouth_pa_quakers_bd1.htm]

Maulsby altered the Cater-Corner House ({{circa}}1802), at the southeast corner of Butler Pike and Flourtown Road, possibly as housing for Thomas Davis, a free-Black limeburner recorded as living on Maulsby's property.{{cite web| url = https://www.dot7.state.pa.us/ce/SelectWelcome.asp| title = National Historic Landmarks & National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania| publisher = CRGIS: Cultural Resources Geographic Information System| format = Searchable database| access-date = 2012-05-13| archive-date = 2007-07-21| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070721014609/https://www.dot7.state.pa.us/ce/SelectWelcome.asp| url-status = dead}} Note: This includes {{cite web| url = https://gis.penndot.gov/CRGISAttachments/SiteResource/H050963_01H.pdf| title = National Register of Historic Places Inventory Nomination Form: Cold Point Historic District| access-date = 2017-09-14| author = Edward T. Addison| format = PDF| date = 1980–1983| archive-date = 2020-06-29| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200629043436/https://gis.penndot.gov/CRGISAttachments/SiteResource/H050963_01H.pdf| url-status = dead}} At 3-5 Germantown Pike, just east of his house, Maulsby built the Plymouth Meeting General Store and Post Office ({{circa}}1826–27). His son Jonathan (1801–1845) managed the store and served as Plymouth Meeting's first postmaster.Maulsby-Albertson Family Papers, 1763-1884, RG 5/099, Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College.

In 1832, Maulsby's daughter Martha (1807–1870) married George Corson (1803–1860), a son of Joseph and Hannah Corson, and a former clerk in the general store.Hiram Corson, M.D. [https://archive.org/stream/corsonfamilyhist00cors#page/112/mode/2up "George Corson,"] The Corson Family: A History of the Descendants of Benjamin Corson, Son of Cornelius Corssen of Staten Island, New York. (Philadelphia: H.L. Everett, 1906), pp. 112-17. Samuel Maulsby died on July 12, 1838, and was interred beside his wife in the meetinghouse's burial ground. George and Martha Maulsby Corson purchased the farm from her father's estate on April 6, 1839.Norristown Deeds Book 66, page 341. George and his brother Walter purchased the Maulsby limestone quarries, and founded G. & W. H. Corson Company – Lime Merchants in 1843."... G. & W. H. Corson Lime Merchants, dates from 1843; as of 1983 it was reputed to be the oldest continuously operated lime business in the U.S.” Ralph W. Richardson, Historic Districts of America: Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia (Heritage Books, 1991), p. 251.

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{{external media | width = 210px | float = right | headerimage = 210px | video1 = [https://vimeo.com/181567354 History at the Crossroads, The Activists and Artists of Abolition Hall], 11:20{{cite web | title =History at the Crossroads, The Activists and Artists of Abolition Hall | publisher =PFW Media | date = | url =http://www.abolitionhall.com/ | access-date =December 2, 2016 }} }}

The Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 made it a federal crime to give assistance to anyone escaping enslavement.

The earliest and only abolitionists in Plymouth and Whitemarsh townships were Samuel Maulsby, Joseph Corson and [his son] Alan W. Corson. Away back before 1820 they had been stirred by the scathing denunciations of slavery, and the horrors of the slave trade, made by Granville Sharp, William Wilberforce and Thomas Fouell Buxton, before the Parliament of Great Britain, to an intense hatred of slavery and the slave trade, and the abominations of slavery in our own country.

Maulsby and the Corsons co-founded the Plymouth Meeting Anti-Slavery Society in 1831, which initially had seven members and met at the Plymouth Friends Meeting House. They also were founders of the Montgomery County Anti-Slavery Society in 1837, which initially had about twenty members and met at various locations in Norristown.Hiram Corson, M.D., "The Norristown Group," The Abolitionists of Montgomery County, (Norristown, PA: Historical Society of Montgomery County, 1900), pp. 29–36. Frederick Douglass, a formerly enslaved man and abolitionist, was the keynote speaker at an August 1847 anti-slavery convention hosted by the First Baptist Church of Norristown. His lecture was disrupted by roughly sixty pro-slavery activists outside the church pelting its windows with rocks. A plot to abduct and lynch Douglass that night was thwarted.Charles Waddell Chesnutt, Frederick Douglass, (Boston: Small, Maynard & Company, 1899), p. 18.

Both George Corson's and Martha Maulsby's parents had sheltered people escaping slavery. But it was the couple's close friendship with Benjamin Lundy – publisher of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society's weekly newspaper, The National Enquirer (1836–1838) – that inspired them to fully engage in the cause. They turned their property into a major station on the Underground Railroad,{{efn|Robert R. Corson: "While at Uncle George [Corson]'s a slave would knock at the door after dark, be taken in and cared for till next day in the evening, when he would be taken on to Bucks county. At that time our first, great duty was to secure their escape from the slave-hunters, so kept no account of the number of slaves or their history. Sometimes two or three men would come together—at other times women and children, or a man and wife. All were received and well cared for."}} providing food and shelter to hundreds of escaped slaves.Thomas Hovenden: American Painter of Hearth and Homeland, Woodmere Art Museum, Philadelphia, 1995. {{ISBN|1-888008-00-8}}. Daniel Ross, a free Black man in Norristown, Pennsylvania, often acted as "conductor",William Still, The Underground Rail Road (Philadelphia: Porter & Coates, 1872), p. 723.[https://archive.org/stream/undergroundrailr00stil#page/722/mode/2up/search/corson] leading the fugitives by night to the next stationRon Avery, [https://web.archive.org/web/20150619201424/http://articles.philly.com/1995-06-19/news/25692432_1_underground-railroad-quaker-meetinghouse-runaway-slaves "Plymouth Meeting Quakers Hid Slaves – It's A Shrine Of The Underground Railroad,"] The Philadelphia Inquirer, June 19, 1995. — north to the house of William Foulke at Penllyn, Pennsylvania; or northeast to abolitionists living around the Quaker meetinghouses in Upper DublinAnnette John-Hall, [https://web.archive.org/web/20130114224233/http://articles.philly.com/2012-12-14/news/35822613_1_slaves-underground-railroad-canada-and-freedom "An underground story no more,"] The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 14, 2012. and Horsham, Pennsylvania.Hiram Corson, M.D. "Upper Dublin and Horsham," The Abolitionists of Montgomery County, (Norristown, PA: Historical Society of Montgomery County, 1900), p. 44.[https://books.google.com/books?id=6RkVAAAAYAAJ&dq=Upper+Dublin+and+Horsham+Wilmer+Atkinson%2C+editor+of+the+%22Farm+Journal%2C%22+writes&pg=PA44] The Underground Railroad route continued through Bucks County, New Jersey and New York, and to eventual freedom in Canada.William J. Switala, Underground Railroad in Pennsylvania, (Stackpole Books, 2001), pp. 160–61. In at least one instance, George Corson hid fugitives under a wagonload of hay and drove them to the next station.

The greater burden of the work [of sheltering runaways] was borne by George and his wife, Martha Maulsby Corson. Their residence in the old Maulsby home, right in front of the Friends' Plymouth Meeting-House, was so prominent a place, known by everybody for miles around, made it easy for slaves to find the place, when sent by those from a distance to "George Corson's at Plymouth Meeting." He it was who forwarded fugitives to Mahlon Linton, at Newtown, or to William H. Johnson, at Buckingham, or to Richard Moore, at Quakertown, Bucks county, time after time, during the whole period of the great struggle from 1830 to 1850.Hiram Corson, M.D. "The Plymouth Group," The Abolitionists of Montgomery County, (Norristown, PA: Historical Society of Montgomery County, 1900), pp. 41–43.[https://books.google.com/books?id=6RkVAAAAYAAJ&dq=george%2C+who+knew+no+fear+when+in+the+right&pg=PA42]

The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 increased the penalties for giving assistance to anyone escaping enslavement to six months in prison and a $1,000 fine. It allowed slavecatchers to pursue a fugitive across state lines into every U.S. state and territory. George Corson was involved in hiding Jane Johnson, whose escape to freedom exposed a loophole in the federal law.Phil Lapsansky, [http://www.librarycompany.org/JaneJohnson/ "The Liberation of Jane Johnson,"] The Library Company of Philadelphia, 2003.

{{center|{{cquote|George Corson, who knew no fear when in the right. — The Abolitionists of Montgomery County (1900)}}}}

File:Rescue of Jane Johnson.png, The Underground Railroad (1872).]]

On the morning of July 18, 1855, Jane Johnson ({{circa}}1822–1872) and her two sons, Daniel (age 5 or 6) and Isaiah (age 11 or 12), arrived in Philadelphia by train with their North Carolina enslaver, John H. Wheeler, and his wife and three children.[http://www.anb.org/articles/20/20-01881.html Jane Johnson], from American National Biography. Wheeler was U.S. Ambassador to Nicaragua, and the group was en route from Washington, D.C. to New York City, from which they would board a ship to return to Central America. At Philadelphia, they had to switch to a ferry to cross the Delaware River. Wheeler locked Johnson and her sons in a hotel room while he and his family took the afternoon to visit his wife's family.{{efn|Mrs. Wheeler was the former Ellen Oldmixon Sully, daughter of painter Thomas Sully.}} Pennsylvania had begun a gradual abolition of slavery in 1780, that was completed in 1847, and the state did not recognize the property rights of any slaveholder. Johnson sought help from a Black hotel porter in escaping to freedom. The porter contacted abolitionist William Still, who had been born enslaved, and Still and lawyer Passmore Williamson rushed to the docks as the 5:00 pm ferry was about to depart for Camden, New Jersey. They found Johnson and her sons with Wheeler on the ferry's upper deck. Williamson approached her and explained that Pennsylvania law guaranteed her freedom, if she chose to take it:

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{{blockquote|"You are entitled to your freedom according to the laws of Pennsylvania, having been brought into the State by your owner. If you prefer freedom to slavery, as we suppose everybody does, you have the chance to accept it now. Act calmly—don't be frightened by your master—you are as much entitled to your freedom as we are, or as he is—be determined and you need have no fears but that you will be protected by the law. Judges have time and again decided cases in this city and State similar to yours in favor of freedom! Of course, if you want to remain a slave with your master, we cannot force you to leave; we only want to make you sensible of your rights. Remember, if you lose this chance you may never get such another ..."

During the few moments in which the above remarks were made, the slaveholder frequently interrupted—said she understood all about the laws making her free, and her right to leave if she wanted to; but contended that she did not want to leave— ... [B]ut the woman's desire to be free was altogether too strong to allow her to make a single acknowledgment favorable to his wishes in the matter. On the contrary, she repeatedly said, distinctly and firmly, "I am not free, but I want my freedom—ALWAYS wanted to be free!! but he holds me."

The [ferry's] last bell tolled! The last moment for further delay passed! The arm of the woman being slightly touched, accompanied with the word, "Come!" she instantly arose. Instantly on their starting, the slave-holder rushed at the woman and her children, to prevent their leaving; and, if I am not mistaken, he simultaneously took hold of the woman and Mr. Williamson, which resistance on his part caused Mr. W. to take hold of him and set him aside quickly. The passengers were looking on all around, but none interfered in behalf of the slaveholder except one man, whom I took to be another slaveholder. He said harshly, "Let them alone; they are his property!" The woman and children were assisted, but not forced to leave. Nor were there any violence or threatenings as I saw or heard.{{rp|88–89}}}}

As Still led Johnson and her sons away, five Black dockhands prevented Wheeler from stopping them.{{efn|The dockhands were John Ballard, James P. Braddock, William Curtis, James Martin and Isaac Moore.}} Williamson remained to explain to authorities that this had been a lawful act, not a kidnapping.

Williamson, the only white man involved, was arrested and charged with violating the Fugitive Slave Act.{{efn|Judge John Kintzing Kane: "Of all the parties to the act of violence, he [Williamson] was the only white man, the only citizen, the only individual having recognized political rights, the only person whose social training could certainly interpret either his own duties or the rights of others, under the constitution of the land."}} Federal Judge John Kintzing Kane presided over his trial, and refused to believe that Williamson did not know where Johnson was being hidden. Kane found Williamson in contempt of court, and jailed him for more than three months, which attracted national attention. Williamson's successful defense was that Wheeler had voluntarily brought Johnson into Pennsylvania, a free state, therefore she was not a fugitive across state lines, and Pennsylvania law rather than federal law applied.[http://www.librarycompany.org/JaneJohnson/narrative.html Narrative of the Facts of the Case of Passmore Williamson (1855)], from Library Company of Philadelphia. Still and the five dockhands were charged with forcible abduction, rioting, disorderly conduct, and assault. On August 29, 1855, Johnson appeared as a surprise witness at their trial, and testified that it had been her own decision to walk away from Wheeler, freeing herself and her sons. The most serious charges against the Black men were dismissed, although the two who had restrained Wheeler were convicted of assault and spent a week in jail. Johnson was escorted out of the courthouse by abolitionists Lucretia Mott, Rev. James Miller McKim and George Corson.William Still, The Underground Rail Road (Philadelphia: Porter & Coates, 1872).[https://archive.org/stream/undergroundrailr00stil#page/96/mode/2up/search/corson]{{rp|96}} She was hidden at Corson's house in Plymouth Meeting to prevent pro-slavery activists from abducting her and returning her to slavery.{{efn|"The following night, in a close carriage, she [Johnson] was brought to the house of George Corson, at Plymouth Meeting, where for a few days in privacy, she received the kind ministrations of Martha Maulsby Corson, wife of George, and one of the earliest and most devoted of the abolitionists of the region."Hiram Corson, M.D. "The case of Jane Johnson and her boys of seven and eleven years," The Abolitionists of Montgomery County, (Norristown, PA: Historical Society of Montgomery County, 1900), p. 26.[https://books.google.com/books?id=6RkVAAAAYAAJ&q=jane+johnson&pg=PA29] }} At the end of her stay, Corson's thirteen-year-old son, Ellwood, drove Johnson in a carriage by night to Mahlon Linton's house in Newtown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QQVQAAAAYAAJ|title=Friends' Intelligencer and Journal|date=1898-01-01|publisher=Friends' Intelligencer Association|language=en}} From there she was smuggled to Boston, Massachusetts, and reunited with her sons.

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The Jane Johnson affair caused a national controversy—largely cheered in the North, viciously condemned in the South. The Plymouth Friends Meeting had permitted the anti-slavery society to use its meeting house for more than two decades, but, following the suspicious burning of a local church that had hosted abolitionist speakers, permission was denied in 1856 for the first time.Anne Gregory Terhune et al., Thomas Hovenden, His Life and Art, (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013), p. 101.[https://books.google.com/books?id=H2wUBAAAQBAJ&dq=abolition+hall+plymouth+meeting&pg=PA101] George Corson's reaction was to build a lecture hall over his carriage house to provide a space for abolitionist meetings.

He determined to build a hall, over which he could have control. He made quite a large one and furnished it well with seats, warmed and lighted at his own expense. And now we can see how convenient it was for the lecturers to make his house their temporary home. As time wore on more and more neighbors and friends were attracted to the meetings to hear the eloquent and earnest men and women who pictured the atrocities of slavery.Theodore Weber Bean, [https://books.google.com/books?id=3U88AAAAIAAJ&dq=helen+corson+artist&pg=PA1037 "The Corson Family,"] History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Volume 2, (Unigraphic, 1884), pp. 1036-37.

Abolition Hall could hold up to 200 people, and provided a meeting place for the Plymouth Meeting Anti-Slavery Society and for lectures by prominent abolitionists, including Frederick Douglass,Melia Bowie, [https://web.archive.org/web/20151228092549/http://articles.philly.com/2000-12-10/news/25577749_1_historical-marker-underground-railroad-antislavery-movement "Historical marker for a carriage shed called Abolition Hall,"] The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 10, 2000. Harriet Beecher Stowe, William Lloyd Garrison and Lucretia Mott.{{cite web| url = https://gis.penndot.gov/CRGISAttachments/SiteResource/H000564_01H.pdf| title = National Register of Historic Places Inventory Nomination Form: Plymouth Friends Meetinghouse| access-date = 2015-06-18| author = Helen Reichart Mirras| format = PDF| date = December 1969| archive-date = 2020-06-29| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200629053644/https://gis.penndot.gov/CRGISAttachments/SiteResource/H000564_01H.pdf| url-status = dead}}

George Corson died in November 1860. William Still eulogized Corson in his 1872 history of the Underground Railroad:

There were perhaps few more devoted men than George Corson to the interests of the oppressed everywhere. The slave, fleeing from his master, ever found a home with him, and felt while there that no slave-hunter would get him away until every means of protection should fail. He was ever ready to send his horse and carriage to convey them on the road to Canada, or elsewhere toward freedom. His home was always open to entertain the anti-slavery advocates, and being warmly supported in the cause by his excellent wife, everything which they could do to make their guests comfortable was done. It is to be regretted that he died before the emancipation of the slaves, which he had so long labored for, arrived.William Still, The Underground Rail Road (Philadelphia: Porter & Coates, 1872), p. 721.[https://archive.org/stream/undergroundrailr00stil#page/720/mode/2up/search/corson]

Image:'The Last Moments of John Brown', oil on canvas painting by Thomas Hovenden.jpg

The Corsons' daughter, Helen (1846–1935), trained as an artist at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. She subsequently studied in Paris, and exhibited at the Paris Salon, 1876, 1879 and 1880.[http://www.artprice.com/artist/226266/helen-corson-hovenden/biography "Helen Corson Hovenden,"] from Art Price. She met Irish-born painter Thomas Hovenden (1840–1895) in France; they were married at the Plymouth Friends Meeting House on June 9, 1881. The couple moved into her late parents' house, and raised two children, Thomas Jr. and Martha. Helen Corson Hovenden became noted for her portraits of children and pets.[http://woodmerecollection.org/martha-hovenden-and-her-dog/ Martha Hovenden and Her Dog (1888)], from Woodmere Art Museum.

Hovenden succeeded Thomas Eakins as professor of painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1886.[http://www.nationalacademy.org/collections/artists/detail/626/ "Thomas Hovenden, 1840 – 1895,"] from National Academy of Design. He specialized in genre scenes of rural life, using his neighbors, often African Americans, as models. He converted Abolition Hall into his studio, and the moral causes that had been championed there inspired some of his works.Lee M. Edwards, "Noble Domesticity: The Paintings of Thomas Hovenden," American Art Journal:19 (1987): 5-38. One of his most famous paintings – The Last Moments of John Brown (1882–1884), Metropolitan Museum of Art – depicts the radical abolitionist John Brown kissing a baby as he is led to the gallows. Hovenden was elected an associate member of the National Academy of Design in 1881, and an academician in 1882.

"Thomas Hovenden lost his life on an unguarded grade crossing of the Pennsylvania Railroad near his home, August 14, 1895, in an attempt to save the life of a little girl who was crossing in front of an approaching engine. Both were killed."Helen Corson Hovenden, "Thomas Hovenden," Historical Sketches: A collection of papers prepared for the Historical Society of Montgomery County, Volume 4, (Norristown, PA: Historical Society of Montgomery County, ), p. 5. The accident occurred about three miles from his house, near the south end of what is now Chemical Road. Rev. William Henry Furness gave the eulogy at Thomas Hovenden's funeral, and four male Corson relatives, Thomas Eakins, and sculptor Samuel Murray were the pall bearers.Ernest Pfattiecher, "Thomas Hovenden," The Book News Monthly, vol. 5, no. 25 (January 1907), p. 305. The advocacy of his widow, Helen Corson Hovenden, and a public letter-writing campaign by Quaker women pressured the Pennsylvania Railroad into elevating the tracks of its high-speed Trenton Cutoff, separating them from the grade level tracks of streetcars.

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The couple's daughter, Martha Maulsby Hovenden (1884–1941), a sculptor who trained at PAFA under Charles Grafly and at the Art Students League of New York under Hermon Atkins MacNeil,American Numismatic Society, [https://books.google.com/books?id=dEJmAAAAMAAJ&dq=hovenden%2C+martha&pg=PA138-IA2 "Martha M. Hovenden,"] Catalogue of the International Exhibition of Contemporary Medals (De Vinne Press, 1911), p. 140. later used Abolition Hall as her studio. Her limestone bas relief tablets, The Declaration of Independence (1926) and The United States Constitution (1936), were commissioned for the Washington Memorial Chapel in Valley Forge.

In 1939, Martha Maulsby Hovenden designed a bookplate for the Friends of the William Jeanes Memorial Library, which the library still uses to label its books. In October 2016, the Friends of the Library donated Hovenden's etched copper printing plate to the Woodmere Art Museum, in nearby Chestnut Hill. In the 1940s, the family of artist Edith Emerson, the life partner of Violet Oakley, commissioned Hovenden to create a grave monument for their late mother. The Alice Louisa Edwards Emerson grave monument features a bas relief panel of three grieving figures dressed in ancient Greek garb, and survives at Thompson Memorial Presbyterian Church Cemetery, near New Hope, Pennsylvania.[https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/178700236/alice-lovisa-emerson#view-photo=154588159 Emerson grave monument (photo)] from Find a Grave.

Nancy Corson (1920–2012)—a great-granddaughter of George Corson and a granddaughter of Dr. Ellwood M. Corson (the teenager who had assisted Jane Johnson on her 1855 return to Boston)—altered the Maulsby stone barn into a residence. She lived there from 1946 until her death in 2012. Nancy Corson worked as a draftsperson for an engineering firm, and was an amateur artist.[https://www.plymouthmeetingquakers.org/Articles/583078/Nancy_Ida_Corson.aspx Nancy Ida Corson] from Plymouth Quaker Meeting. In 1969, she was the author of the National Register of Historic Places nomination for Hovenden House, Barn and Abolition Hall.

{{Main|Plymouth Meeting Historic District}}

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The village of Plymouth Meeting was designated a Pennsylvania historic district in 1961, by a joint resolution of Plymouth and Whitemarsh Townships. The district encompassed 66 historic structures.

In 1971, the village of Plymouth Meeting became Pennsylvania's first National Register District. At the time, the Maulsby/Corson/Hovenden homestead was threatened by a plan to split Butler Pike into two one-way highways that would straddle the buildings on the property. The northbound bypass would have run alongside the east wall of the barn, and required the demolition of Abolition Hall. Nancy Corson authored a separate NRHP nomination specifically for the Hovenden House, Barn and Abolition Hall as a unit, which was also approved in 1971. Plans for the bypass were abandoned.

Nancy Corson and Charles L. Blockson, an authority on the history of the Underground Railroad, co-wrote the nomination for a Pennsylvania state historical marker to commemorate Abolition Hall. The marker was approved, and dedicated at 4006 Butler Pike (in front of the barn) on November 18, 2000:[http://explorepahistory.com/hmarker.php?markerId=1-A-198 "Abolition Hall (Thomas Hovenden) Historical Marker,"] from Explore PA History. NOTE: The article gets some of the dates wrong, and mistakes the barn for the carriage house.

An offer by Whitemarsh Township to purchase the eight acres of fields for open space was declined by its owners in 2014.Kristin E. Holmes, [http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20160509_Coexistence_sought_for_Underground_Railroad_site_and_townhouses.html "Coexistence sought for Underground Railroad site and townhouses,"] The Philadelphia Inquirer, May 9, 2016. The Township's 2014 offer did not include acquisition of the historic buildings.

File:Hovenden House & General Store from South 2016.JPG

In late 2015, K. Hovnanian Builders submitted a sketch plan to the township's planning/zoning office that proposed the construction of 48 townhouses on the eight acres of open space behind the historic buildings.[http://hiddencityphila.org/2016/04/historic-estate-and-underground-railroad-station-under-threat-in-plymouth-meeting/developers-sketch-plan/ Subdivision sketch plan for Whitemarsh Corson Estate], from Hidden City Philadelphia. The plan proposed the re-routing of Butler Pike between Hovenden House and its Barn/Abolition Hall.Sydelle Zove, [https://web.archive.org/web/20160531195452/http://articles.philly.com/2016-04-20/news/72457126_1_underground-railroad-runaway-slaves-zoning-variance "Underground Railroad site threatened,"] The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 20, 2016. This re-routing would have required the demolition or relocation of the Plymouth Meeting General Store and Post Office (also listed on the National Register).Brian Coll, [http://conshystuff.com/the-intersection-at-butler-pike-and-germantown-pike-could-change-as-well-as-the-entire-landscape/ "The intersection at Butler Pike and Germantown Pike could change as well as the entire landscape,"] Conshystuff, April 8, 2016.

Following vocal opposition, the Whitemarsh Township Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to deny the request for a zoning variance. In response, the developer requested a continuance of a scheduled April 25, 2016 zoning hearing.Michael Bixler, [http://hiddencityphila.org/2016/04/historic-estate-and-underground-railroad-station-under-threat-in-plymouth-meeting/#.Vxp7IzDEik0.twitter "Historic estate and Underground Railroad station under threat in Plymouth Meeting,"] Hidden City Philadelphia, April 20, 2016. In late August 2016, K. Hovnanian Builders submitted a revised Zoning Plan to Whitemarsh Township, asserting that the revised plan met the requirements for shared parking and emergency access (via a right-of-way through an adjacent property). In early November 2016, the Zoning Officer issued his Preliminary Opinion, concurring with the developer's assertion that the current Zoning Plan met the requirements of the code. With the second publication of this opinion, a 30-day period began during which any "aggrieved" party could file an appeal. Absent such an appeal, the Zoning Officer's opinion would become binding.{{Cite web|url=http://dced.pa.gov/download/pennsylvania-municipalities-planning-code-act-247-of-1968/#.WBQJvy0rKpo|title=Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code (Act 247 of 1968)}} (See Section 916.2--Preliminary Opinion of the Zoning Officer). On December 21, 2016, seven concerned Whitemarsh Township residents, represented by counsel, filed an appeal, challenging the Zoning Officer's Preliminary Opinion. On January 31, that appeal was heard before the Whitemarsh Township Zoning Hearing Board, and after three hours of testimony and questions, the hearing was continued to March 16, 2017. On February 15, the attorney for the appellants submitted a legal brief, further supporting the challenge to the Preliminary Opinion.

File:Love-In at Abolition Hall, Plymouth Meeting, PA.jpg

In Spring 2016, the Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia placed Abolition Hall/Barn and Hovenden House on its list of "Places to Save", a public registry that "focuses attention and energy towards special places at risk of being lost."[http://mydigitalpublication.com/publication/?i=326306&p=14 "Places to Save,"] Extant Magazine (Preservation Alliance of Greater Philadelphia, Fall 2016), pp. 14-15.

In September 2016, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission issued a letter to Plymouth and Whitemarsh Townships clarifying and reiterating the significance of the Maulsby/Corson/Hovenden homestead. Noting the "inter-related complex of buildings", the letter went on to state that their 1971 nomination to the National Register of Historic Places "reinforces the important role that these buildings played within the context of the village, as well as their individual historical and architectural significance."September 8, 2016 letter from the Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office re Plymouth Meeting National Historic Register District.

In February 2017, Preservation Pennsylvania (PPA) added the property to its 2017 Pennsylvania At Risk List. The organization also agreed to serve as the fiscal agent for Friends of Abolition Hall and raise funds to support the zoning challenge and protect the legacy of the homestead.

The grassroots battle to save the legacy of the Corson homestead continued as the Friends of Abolition Hall challenged the developer's application for conditional use approval. The application was under consideration by the Whitemarsh Township Board of Supervisors, with a Public Hearing that opened on March 22, 2018. Thereafter, the hearing was continued on six more occasions, with closing arguments scheduled for September 13, 2018.[https://www.chestnuthilllocal.com/2018/09/07/abolition-hall-advocacy-group-seeks-donations/ "Abolition Hall advocacy group seeks donations,"] The Chestnut Hill Local, September 2018.

The Friends of Abolition Hall organization was granted standing in the matter, as were a small number of nearby neighbors. Objections to the proposed townhouse plan were based on the assertion that it failed to meet the requirements of the Zoning Code, which was a prerequisite to conditional use approval.Dutch Godshalk, [http://www.timesherald.com/general-news/20180416/local-advocacy-group-continues-years-long-effort-to-preserve-abolition-hall "Local advocacy group continues years long effort to preserve Abolition Hall,"] The Times Herald (Norristown, Pennsylvania), April 16, 2018.

In July 2020, the developer withdrew its subdivision and development plan for the property (along with an adjacent parcel, consisting of just over two acres). The Corson heirs thereafter entered into an agreement of sale with a private investor, but he subsequently withdrew his offer. In November 2022, after months of negotiations, Whitemarsh Township and the Whitemarsh Art Center jointly purchased the historic Corson Homestead (10.45 acres, including buildings).http://www.whitemarshtwp.org/DocumentCenter/View/3553/AbolitionHallClosingFINAL?bidId= {{Bare URL inline|date=August 2024}}

The purchase was made possible by a combination of private and public funds--$1.95 million in Whitemarsh Township Open Space funds and a $2 million gift from the Karabots Family Foundation. Both the Township and the art center promised to engage the public in planning for the preservation and reuse of the property. As of June 2023, no such efforts had been announced. The land is accessible to the public, however the buildings remain closed. Whitemarsh Art Center plans to relocate from another township-owned building into Hovenden House; the future use of the Stone Barn and Abolition Hall remain unresolved.{{cite web | url=https://patch.com/pennsylvania/plymouthwhitemarsh/acquisition-historic-montco-property-formally-completed | title=Acquisition of Historic Montco Property Formally Completed | date=18 November 2022 }}

{{Slavery}}

• "Battle over Montco's ties to the Underground Railroad", NBC10, Philadelphia, May 7, 2016.Deanna Durante, [http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Battle-Over-Sacred-Ground-in-Montgomery-County-With-Ties-to-Underground-Railroad_Philadelphia-378487706.html "Battle over Montco's ties to the Underground Railroad,"] NBC10 (Philadelphia), May 7, 2016. The current owner of the Plymouth Meeting Country Store and Post Office took the news crew into the building's cellar and showed them the tunnels that he says were used as part of the Underground Railroad.

• "Plymouth Meeting Quakers hid slaves – It's a shrine of the Underground Railroad", The Philadelphia Inquirer, June 19, 1995.
• "Historical marker for a carriage shed called Abolition Hall", The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 10, 2000.
• "An underground story no more", The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 14, 2012.
• "Coexistence sought for Underground Railroad site and townhouses", The Philadelphia Inquirer, May 9, 2016.
• "Local advocacy group continues years long effort to preserve Abolition Hall", The Times Herald (Norristown, Pennsylvania), April 16, 2018.
• "Don't let developers degrade this historic Underground Railroad stop", The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 26, 2018.Sydelle Zove, [http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/commentary/abolition-hall-plymouth-meeting-underground-railroad-national-historic-register-opinion-20180426.html "Don't let developers degrade this historic Underground Railroad stop,"] The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 26, 2018. Op-Ed column by Sydelle Zove drawing attention to the fate of this precious Underground Railroad site.
• "Abolition Hall advocacy group seeks donations", The Chestnut Hill Local, September 7, 2018.
• "Pennsylvania’s antislavery history is under threat from suburban development", The Philadelphia Inquirer, October 26, 2018.[http://www2.philly.com/philly/columnists/inga_saffron/pennsylvania-anti-slavery-history-whitemarsh-plymouth-meeting-abolition-hall-hovnanian-20181025.html "Pennsylvania’s antislavery history is under threat from suburban development"], The Philadelphia Inquirer, October 26, 2018. Column by Inga Saffron, the Pulitzer-Prize-winning design critic for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

• "The Liberation of Jane Johnson", The Library Company of Philadelphia, 2003.
• "The intersection at Butler Pike and Germantown Pike could change as well as the entire landscape", Conshystuff, April 8, 2016.
• "Historic estate and Underground Railroad station under threat in Plymouth Meeting", Hidden City Philadelphia, April 20, 2016.
• "Places to Save", Preservation Alliance of Greater Philadelphia, Fall 2016.
• "2017 Pennsylvania At Risk Announced", Preservation Pennsylvania, February 2017 (PDF).
• "Hope and Despair Surround Philly's African-American Landmarks", Hidden City Philadelphia, February 28, 2020.

• Alan West Corson Homestead
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

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{{National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania}}

Category:Houses on the Underground Railroad

Category:Underground Railroad in Pennsylvania

Category:Houses in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

Category:Abolitionism in Pennsylvania

Category:History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

Category:Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania

Category:Federal architecture in Pennsylvania

Category:Tourist attractions in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

Category:Houses completed in 1795

Category:Houses completed in 1856

Category:National Register of Historic Places in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

Category:Individually listed contributing properties to historic districts on the National Register in Pennsylvania

Category:Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania