City Directories and History: Known for nearly four decades as the Fairfield Inn (Winnsboro’s Country Club) , it was erected in circa 1861 by James N. Shedd as his private residence. It was constructed of brick, the outer wall being 24″ brick, covered with stucco. This is one of Winnsboro’s elegant Italianate Revival homes from the antebellum period worthy of preservation and future restoration. [Courtesy Chamber of Commerce]
Informative link: National Register
This building was built on land owned by James N. Shedd, 1861. The outer walls are twenty-four inches thick and the interior partitions are twelve and eighteen inches thick. The original two storied house had a square center hall, with four large rooms, two on either side, upstairs and down, with kitchens and service rooms joined to the rear of the house. Following the Civil War, the Shedd family lost the property and it was acquired at auction by Thomas W. Erwin who a year later sold it at a handsome profit to S.B. Clowney. In 1878 the home was once again sold to Alexander S. Douglas. Later, the Winnsboro Mills, owned and operated by the U. S. Rubber Company, in planning expansion purchased several large areas of property, including the land and residence of Mary Kilgore, in 1923.
The residence was enlarged, necessary changes were made, and in the fall of 1924, it was opened as the Fairfield Inn. According to the original advertisements, it was an inn “of unusual and distinctive charm, where one may enjoy a quiet, restful vacation, devoid of the noise and the saxophone medleys of less discriminating hotels”.
Henry C. Everett, Jr., of Boston, was treasurer of Winnsboro Mills and it was his excellent taste which furnished the Inn, retaining the atmosphere of the earlier Colonial periods. The Inn is furnished mainly in Federal Period, with some rooms predating the formality of that period. Many of the pieces are authentic antiques, and others are excellent reproductions, in mahogany, maple, and pine.
In January 1942, the Fairfield Inn was closed to the public. Following the war, it was again opened to the public, on a reservation basis. In 1945, the Inn was redecorated, the new wall paper and paints forming a perfect background for the Colonial feeling throughout the Inn. One of the most interesting pieces in the Inn is the tavern table in the hall which was bought from the Boston Post Tavern. The sideboard in the main dining room is a fine old Sheridan mahogany, with exquisite inlay work, and has its original brasses. [Our Heritage Book]
In 1959 United States Rubber Company, or Uniroyal, depending on its corporate nomenclature at that time,decided to divest the 60 plus acre property surrounding this property and wanted to give it to a beneficial charity in Fairfield County. The then almost two hundred year old Mount Zion Society was selected to receive the properties. Within two years, the society leased the properties to a newly formed Fairfield Country Club as a to-be-constructed nine hole golf course, with tennis and swimming facilities. In the beginning of the racial debacle of the sixties, this selectively “whites only club’ was a Jim Crow extension of racial divides for many years. Though “the club” survived for many years until 2012, its management failed many years to sustain it. In 2012 the Mount Zion Society decided to sell it to a not-for-profit religiously exempt organization, Christ Central Ministries. They are the new owners in 2013. [Contribution of J.M. Lyles, III] Families associated with this property include; Shedd, Erwin, Douglas, Clowny and Kilgore.
Click on the More Information > link to find additional data – A Fairfield County Sketchbook, by J.S. Bolick, 2000 (Courtesy of the FCHS)
*** Winthrop Un.’s Pettus Archives has extensive drawing of the Everett School drawn by Rock Hill architect, Mr. A.D. Gilchrist between 1927-1930.
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