Yesterday I posted a photo of the McLean House where General Grant accepted the surrender of General Lee effectively ending the Civil War on April 9, 1865. After the war was over the house has an unusual story. The owner went bankrupt, the house went back to the bank, it became a rental for some years and it was purchased in 1891 by several investors from New York City. They planned to completely disassemble the house brick by brick and board by board, ship it to New York by train and reassemble the whole house for use as a museum. The house was disassembled and every part carefully catalogued. Then the investors ran out of money. The house then sat in piles on its' lot from 1893 to 1941 and yes, souvenir hunters made off with parts and pieces over that period. The National Park Service undertook the huge project of restoring the house in 1941. The project was halted by the outbreak of WWII and finally resumed in 1947. It opened to a crowd of 20,000 people on April 16, 1950. I took some photos inside the house and have a short story to go along with the photo above. Before the house could be reopened, it needed to be refilled with period furniture. A good friend of mine just told me where the high chair came from that is sitting at the kitchen table above. It was used by his father as a toddler growing up in Virginia in the 1930s. I didn't know this story before visiting the house...I lucked out and just happened to take this photo. Small world!