ELKINS - The years have not been kind to the outside of the 83-year-old house that Hazel Kump Burford is fighting to preserve. But the inside of Kump House, her grandfather's mansion, still has some original furnishings.
ELKINS - The years have not been kind to the outside of the 83-year-old house that Hazel Kump Burford is fighting to preserve. But the inside of Kump House, her grandfather's mansion, still has some original furnishings.
Burford's aunt, Mary Gamble Kump, was the last surviving child of West Virginia Gov. Herman Guy Kump, the governor who led the state in the depths of the Great Depression. She recently died and left the house at the intersection of U.S. 250 and 33 to the city of Elkins.
"What she wanted done is the inside of the house used for teachers or students," Burford said. "For people who are coming and going."
The Kump House is located near the turnoff for Canaan Valley.
Mary Gamble Kump, who never married and was 93 when she died, spent her life as a student or teacher. She held a Ph.D. and taught school at U.S. military bases around the world, with summers spent in her father's house in Elkins.
With that background, it should have been no surprise that Miss Kump's will gave the city the first option at owning the Kump House, as it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
"In the 1950s and '60s you needed places for teachers to stay," Elkins Mayor Judith A. Guye said. "In the 2008 period, that's not necessarily the biggest need."
A lawyer from Hampshire County who had moved to Elkins, H.G. Kump was mayor of Elkins in 1924 when he hired famed Washington architect Clarence Harding to design the 25-room Neo-Federal Revival-style brick house. Harding is also the architect who built what was then the tallest structure in West Virginia, the Alderson-Stephenson Building at Capitol Street and Kanawha Boulevard in Charleston. It is known now as the Union Building and still stands as the only structure on the river side of the boulevard.
Inside, the Kump House is in good shape.
"It was just like you walked out of the rooms 20 years ago," Guye said after she and City Council members toured the structure last week.
While there are leaks in the roof and hornets nesting in the windows, Guye was amazed at the mansion's interior condition.
"There was not one bit of squeak when you walked up the stairs," she said.
It's been decades since any work was done to maintain the old house.
"Nothing has really been done to this house since my Grandma Kump got sick in 1947," Burford said.
The will gives Elkins 180 days to decide whether to keep the mansion. Randolph County then gets an option to own it.
If both entities decide they cannot maintain the structure, it is to be put up for sale. "I've never heard anyone say they are against preserving the house," Mayor Guye said.
While the mayor and Burford don't want it to be sold, the development of the highway intersection adjoining the house and 6.5 acres surrounding it makes the property prime real estate.
"It'll cost money," Burford conceded.
But Burford said other grandchildren of Gov. Kump agree with their late aunt's ideas.
"Most of the grandchildren I talked to would like to keep it as it is," she said.
Some council members, however, believe the city should pass on the option to the county. They believe county officials may be in a better position to receive grants and other funding to upgrade the house and grounds.
Mary Gamble Kump, who had always been active as a 4-H'er, wanted the grounds dedicated to children.
Horses graze in the back yard. Burford explained that her grandfather still had enough political sway over the community in the 1940s that city leaders agreed to keep the land in the rear of the mansion outside of the city limits so the family could continue to have farm animals.
"The house is in city limits," she's quick to point out.
The old mansion hasn't been full of people in generations, either. In fact, the last time was closer to when Gov. Kump died there of prostate cancer on Valentine's Day in 1962 at age 84. He had 18 grandchildren from his six children, who all grew up playing around the mansion.
ELKINS - The years have not been kind to the outside of the 83-year-old house that Hazel Kump Burford is fighting to preserve. But the inside of Kump House, her grandfather's mansion, still has some original furnishings.
Burford's aunt, Mary Gamble Kump, was the last surviving child of West Virginia Gov. Herman Guy Kump, the governor who led the state in the depths of the Great Depression. She recently died and left the house at the intersection of U.S. 250 and 33 to the city of Elkins.
"What she wanted done is the inside of the house used for teachers or students," Burford said. "For people who are coming and going."
Mary Gamble Kump, who never married and was 93 when she died, spent her life as a student or teacher. She held a Ph.D. and taught school at U.S. military bases around the world, with summers spent in her father's house in Elkins.
With that background, it should have been no surprise that Miss Kump's will gave the city the first option at owning the Kump House, as it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
"In the 1950s and '60s you needed places for teachers to stay," Elkins Mayor Judith A. Guye said. "In the 2008 period, that's not necessarily the biggest need."
A lawyer from Hampshire County who had moved to Elkins, H.G. Kump was mayor of Elkins in 1924 when he hired famed Washington architect Clarence Harding to design the 25-room Neo-Federal Revival-style brick house. Harding is also the architect who built what was then the tallest structure in West Virginia, the Alderson-Stephenson Building at Capitol Street and Kanawha Boulevard in Charleston. It is known now as the Union Building and still stands as the only structure on the river side of the boulevard.
Inside, the Kump House is in good shape.
"It was just like you walked out of the rooms 20 years ago," Guye said after she and City Council members toured the structure last week.
While there are leaks in the roof and hornets nesting in the windows, Guye was amazed at the mansion's interior condition.
"There was not one bit of squeak when you walked up the stairs," she said.
It's been decades since any work was done to maintain the old house.
"Nothing has really been done to this house since my Grandma Kump got sick in 1947," Burford said.
The will gives Elkins 180 days to decide whether to keep the mansion. Randolph County then gets an option to own it.
If both entities decide they cannot maintain the structure, it is to be put up for sale. "I've never heard anyone say they are against preserving the house," Mayor Guye said.
While the mayor and Burford don't want it to be sold, the development of the highway intersection adjoining the house and 6.5 acres surrounding it makes the property prime real estate.
"It'll cost money," Burford conceded.
But Burford said other grandchildren of Gov. Kump agree with their late aunt's ideas.
"Most of the grandchildren I talked to would like to keep it as it is," she said.
Some council members, however, believe the city should pass on the option to the county. They believe county officials may be in a better position to receive grants and other funding to upgrade the house and grounds.
Mary Gamble Kump, who had always been active as a 4-H'er, wanted the grounds dedicated to children.
Horses graze in the back yard. Burford explained that her grandfather still had enough political sway over the community in the 1940s that city leaders agreed to keep the land in the rear of the mansion outside of the city limits so the family could continue to have farm animals.
"The house is in city limits," she's quick to point out.
The old mansion hasn't been full of people in generations, either. In fact, the last time was closer to when Gov. Kump died there of prostate cancer on Valentine's Day in 1962 at age 84. He had 18 grandchildren from his six children, who all grew up playing around the mansion.
Burford was one of those.
"I think [President Franklin D. Roosevelt] held me, but I was really little then," the councilwoman said. "They've told me that he did."
FDR made the long trip in the 1930s from Washington to Elkins at least once.
"Franklin was here. He came in one year for the Forest Festival," Burford said. That was during FDR's first term and Gov. Kump's only term as governor, 1933-37.
But the president's wife, first lady Eleanor Roosevelt, was a regular guest at the mansion during her husband's more than 12 years as president. "She was here quite frequently," Burford said.
Eleanor Roosevelt also stayed there later when she would visit the region.
"I have a picture of granddaddy, Eleanor Roosevelt and [former U.S. senator from West Virginia] Jennings Randolph," Burford said.
Kump was known as a "New Dealer," but had to deal with West Virginia's immediate problems first. He was governor when the state went to county school boards, instituted the sales tax and began unemployment compensation.
With 10 bedrooms and nine baths there was plenty of room at the mansion for everyone.
The first floor, however, was for living, not sleeping. It has the main stairway done in white oak, with the music, or piano, room all in cherry wood. It also contains the vestibule, front hall, living area, one bathroom, kitchen, dining area, butler's pantry and pantry.
"All of the original furniture is on the first floor," Burford said.
Burford recalls coming to Charleston as a small child after one of her aunts, twin Elizabeth, died. Her body was laid out on the second floor of the Governor's Mansion, then moved to the piano room of the house at Elkins.
Recalling that, she commented, "It's amazing what you do remember from childhood."
The second floor has four bedrooms, four baths and a sleeping porch.
"That's where the girls slept," Burford said of her four aunts. All six children slept on the sleeping porch on hot summer nights.
The third floor has six bedrooms and three bathrooms.
Downstairs is where the compressor that operated what was probably the first modern refrigerator in the region was located. There were few like it and Burford remembers retrieving cold water through a tap in one of the three large doors.
The mansion also had a laundry room, a playroom for children, the coal furnace room and Gov. Kump's office.
Mayor Guye said city officials plan to form a committee with local development office employees and county commissioners to see what they can do with the property.
"Everybody has ideas about what they would like to do with it," she said.
It would make an "outstanding entry" to the city from that side, she said.
"We've got a lot to discuss," she said. "But we certainly would like to keep it intact."
To contact staff writer Tom Searls, use e-mail or call 348-5198.
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