Farmhouse Plans: Cottage Plans

Cottage Plans

The Poe family—which included Edgar, his wife and her mother Maria—moved in around May 1846 after living for a short time in At the time, Fordham was rural and was only recently connected to the city by railThe cottage, which then on Kingsbridge Road to the east of its intersection with Valentine Avenue, was small and simple: it had on its first floor a sitting room and kitchen and its unheated second floor had a bedroom and Poe's study. On the front porch the family kept caged songbirds. The home sat on 2 acres (8,100 m²) of land and Poe paid either $5 rent per monthor $100 per year.Its owner, John Valentine, had bought it from a man named Richard Corsa on March 28, 1846, for $1000.

The family seemed to enjoy the home, despite its small size and minimal furnishings. "The cottage is very humble", a visitor said, "you wouldn't have thought decent people could have lived in it; but there was an air of refinement about everything. A friend of Poe's years later wrote: "The cottage had an air of taste and gentility... So neat, so poor, so unfurnished, and yet so charming a dwelling I never saw. In a letter to a friend, Poe himself wrote: "The place is a beautiful one. Maria wrote years later: "It was the sweetest little cottage imaginable. Oh, how supremely happy we were in our dear cottage home! Poe's final short story, "Landor's Cottage", was likely inspired by the home.