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The house where author Harriet Beecher Stowe lived when she wrote "Uncle Tom's Cabin"
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House where 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' was written sells at auction
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Thursday, January 28, 1999 5:03:05 PM
BRUNSWICK, Maine (AP) -- The house where Harriet Beecher Stowe lived when she wrote "Uncle Tom's Cabin" fetched $865,000 at auction Wednesday. It had been valued at $1.2 million.
The buyers, business partners George Elwell and Jim Koulovatos, were interested in the 192-year-old house both for its literary significance and for its business potential, said auctioneer Tom Saturley.
They plan to invest "significant money" to make needed repairs and continue operating it as an inn and restaurant, Saturley said. The previous owner went out of business.
The Stowe House was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1963 because of its ties to "Uncle Tom's Cabin," the most popular of more than 30 books by the abolitionist.
Stowe, whom President Lincoln had called "the little lady whose book started the Civil War," lived at the home for two unhappy years after her family moved to Maine from Cincinnati. Her husband worked as a professor at nearby Bowdoin College.
In a letter dated Oct. 29, 1850, Stowe wrote that the house was cold, crowded and chaotic. She noted that there was a schoolroom upstairs and a dining room next door, so there was no place she could take a nap without being disturbed.
"I'm delighted to hear it's not going to be torn down or done away with," said Charles Robinson Beecher Stowe, the author's great-great-great grandson and a business professor at Sam Houston State University in Texas.
"After all, preserving history is a way to capture some of the wisdom and lessons of the past."
Copyright 1999 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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