The use of fieldstone here is typical of the rocky Piedmont, as is the way the house was elongated over time in varying materials (the brick-and-stucco half is older). A datestone gives 1818 for the stone end, which has Federal detailing inside. Scots-Irish immigrant William McKennan, for half a century the pastor of Red Clay Creek Presbyterian Church, bought the place in 1756. After his death in 1809, the next owner, Frederick Klair, moved down from Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, and improved the property. His stone bank barn (1823) across the road was demolished in the 1970s; a spring house near the dwelling survives. One researcher argues that its cellar kitchen (entered through the gable end of the house) copies Swiss or German bank houses of Chester County.
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McKennan-Klair House
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