Kelley House Calendar: Celebrating 160 Years

“W. H. Kelly now in the house.”

This short entry in William Henry Kelly’s notebook from 1861 establishes the Kelley family in their new house 160 years ago. While it’s always remarkable when a wooden structure lasts so many years in this coastal climate, what is also noteworthy is this house was in the hands of one family for most of that time.

Unlike other pioneer families of Mendocino who left before the turn of the twentieth century, the Kelleys settled and stayed. Arriving at the start of European settlement in 1852, they played a significant role in the town’s growth and development until the great-grandchildren finally sold their holdings in 1974.

Over the next few weeks, in this column we will celebrate the Kelley family members and their accomplishments, telling the stories of William (born two hundred years ago in 1821!), his wife Eliza, and the four children they raised in the house on the hill above Mendocino Bay.

But first, we’ll introduce the Kelly’s house, as

it is the setting for these tales. Within its rooms, the family members lived their lives, gave birth, celebrated marriages, and drew their last breaths.

It’s a lovely old house, built in a New England

style with steeply pitched roofs and many gables. Ornate brackets decorate the wide eaves and embellish the four porches. Lapped virgin redwood boards clad the exterior walls, now painted a buff yellow.

Even though it was built by a family of means, this substantial house is not ostentatious. It is likely that William built it himself.

While today we think of the Kelley house as having an Albion Street or Main Street address, it originally fronted on the Coast Highway, now Lansing Street. There, visitors would open the elaborate gate and walk up a wide path that ran between a double row of apple trees, then around a circular “rock garden” surrounded by lawn, to a porch festooned with climbing roses and foundation plantings edged with large abalone shells.

Through the wide front door with its glass transom and sidelights, you would enter a hall that connected the back to the front and the upstairs with the downstairs, and then be shown into one of the parlors. Where today we have one large room for exhibits and gatherings, there used to be a front and back parlor with a dividing wall and a shared interior fireplace, now removed. Four sets of double French doors and two large south-facing windows make this a cheerful place, even on foggy win

A view of the south and west sides of the Kelley House c. 1880. This early stereopticon photograph shows the house, which looks much as it is today, with the kitchen addition on the west, and painted a light color with white trim. An unpainted Mendocino-style picket fence runs along Main Street. The small octagonal building on the left with the staff on the roof is most likely the outhouse. The major difference between this and the present day is the kitchen door on the south porch, which has a small ante-room that is no longer there. The statuary of the Masonic Lodge can be seen on the right side of the image.