Richardsonian Romanesque Mansion in Galveston TX

Willis-Moody Mansion, Galveston Texas

Date added: April 14, 2024

Do you have an update on the current status of this structure? Please tell us about it in the comments below.

Associated with two prominent Galveston mercantile and entrepreneurial families, the Richardsonian Romanesque Willis-Moody Mansion is an important document of the position Galveston once held in the economic, political, and social spheres of Galveston and Texas. The mansion was built between 1893 and 1895 by Narcissa Willis, widow of Galveston merchant Richard Short Willis, using the talents of English-born architect William H. Tyndall. Just five years after its completion, in 1900, the house was purchased from Narcissa Willis's heir by William Lewis Moody, Jr., whose business ventures over the ensuing five decades would play a key role in the development and definition of the economy in Galveston and Texas. Its adaptation of the Romanesque style to Galveston's subtropical marine climate, use of structural steel, and fine interior appointments make the Willis-Moody Mansion unique among Galveston residences surviving from the city's era of greatest affluence and one of the finest examples of this architectural style in the state.

Richard Short Willis was born in 1821 in Caroline County, Maryland. In June of 1837, Richard's older brother Peter returned to Maryland from Texas convinced of the new Republic's potential. Peter persuaded his younger brothers Richard and William III to return with him to Texas. They set out in October of that year and settled on a farm on lower Buffalo Bayou, near Houston, where they opened a small general merchandise store. In 1843, William III, died of malaria; the two remaining brothers moved to Montgomery County and established a larger business under the name of P.J. Willis and Brother. It was in Montgomery County in 1847 that Richard Willis met and married the 19-year-old Narcissa Worsham, who had moved to Texas from Alabama with her parents in 1835.

The Willis brothers' business acumen made them wealthy. In 1858, they purchased W.I. Hutchings's interest in the leading Houston mercantile firm of McIlhenny and Hutchings, creating McIlhenny, Willis, and Brother. They remained in this commercial house until 1862, when, following McIlhenny's death, the brothers purchased his share and renamed the firm P.J. Willis and Brother. At this juncture, their wholesale business operations began.

Antebellum Houston was becoming a center for the distribution of goods and commodities to the West, first by boat and wagon, and later by rail. The Civil War interrupted this development, and many businessmen, including the Willis brothers, relocated to Matamoros, Mexico, to have access to an open port from which they could more easily continue to supply the war demands of the Confederacy.

After the War, in 1867, the brothers moved their business to Galveston, a rapidly growing port city. In this new location, the Willis brothers expanded from their original wholesale grocery and dry goods trade and entered the cotton trade, one of the city's most important commercial activities.

Peter James Willis died in 1873, leaving Richard in sole control of their business interests. Richard S. Willis became an important figure in businesses and associations closely linked to the core of Galveston's economy. He was president of the Galveston National Bank and the Texas Guarantee And Trust Company, a director of the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe railroad, a member of the board of directors for the Southern Cotton Press and Manufacturing Company, and chairman of the Deepwater Committee for improvements to the harbor and port. Richard Short Willis died on July 27^th, 1892, leaving his widow, Narcissa, a wealthy woman.

The first Willis house in Galveston was located on Broadway between 26^th and 27^th Streets, on City of Galveston Block 206. Richard S. Willis bought the property in late 1871 or early 1872 for $24,000, a substantial sum, suggesting that a large house already stood on the lot. The deed expressly stated that the property belonged to Narcissa, not to Richard S. Willis. After her husband's death, Narcissa decided to raze the house; evidently, she wished to build a mansion to rival any on Broadway, the most fashionable street in Texas's most cosmopolitan city.

To fulfill her desire, she employed a local architect, William H. Tyndall, who had traveled from Louisiana to Galveston aboard the ship Cecelia in October of 1879. Tyndall was born in Birmingham, England in 1841, but little is known of his professional training or career before he arrived in Galveston. A Galveston Daily News advertisement of December 20^th, 1885 stated that Tyndall had been a pupil of the late Edward Pugin of England, son of the great 19th-century architect and critic A. W. N. Pugin. Research in England has provided sketchy information on Tyndall's life and career before he left for the United States. In its August 1874 issue, The Builder, an English architectural journal, noted that Tyndall was to be the architect of a hydropathic establishment called Thrale House in Streatham, in the present-day south London borough of Wandsworth. City directories from the years 1872 through 1877 list W. H. Tyndall as the proprietor of Turkish Baths at 98 Newington Butts in Southwark. He was no longer at that address after 1877, although the establishment continued as a bath. The Galveston News noted that before his arrival in Texas, Tyndall worked as an engineer at the American Rock Salt Company in Avery Island, Louisiana, in 1879.

Tyndall's name began to appear in the Galveston press in the early 1880s. He was listed in the architectural section of Galveston Daily News of September 24^th, 1882, as having undertaken interior improvements of Trinity Episcopal Church. The newspaper's architectural section noted that "W.H. Tyndall, who has but recently located in Galveston, is an architect of long experience, and is fast gaining popularity through the excellent merit of his designs and able supervision."

Along with Galveston's premier architect, Nicholas Clayton Tyndall was among the 22 charter members who organized the Texas Society of Architects in 1886, but was suspended for non-payment of dues in 1889. The Texas Society of Architects was incorporated into the Western Association of Architects, which was in turn incorporated into the American Institute of Architects. According to AIA proceedings of 1901-1902, Tyndall became a member of the Western Association of Architects in 1885, and became a fellow of the AIA when that organization subsumed the Western Association of Architects in 1889. Tyndall began to advertise his AIA membership in the 1893-1894 Galveston City Directory, and continued to be listed as a Fellow until 1905 when his name was struck from the rolls, with the handwritten note that he had resigned. By this time however, Tyndall had closed his architectural practice and taken a job as a draftsman with the Army Corps of Engineers, assisting in the construction of the Galveston seawall.

Only two domestic structures are now documented as Tyndall's work: the Willis-Moody Mansion and a more modest house at 1417 24^th Street. Tyndall is also known to have supervised the division and move of the Powhaten House for Mrs. Caroline Willis Ladd, a niece of Narcissa Willis, and to have designed a firehouse and commercial wharves. Tyndall died in Galveston in 1907.

When Narcissa Willis chose W. H. Tyndall to design her new house, she had to select from a variety of architectural styles popular at the end of the 19^th century. Queen Anne predominated in the city's residential East End, rebuilt after an 1885 fire devoured forty square blocks. The Willis house would be one of the last great palaces to be built on Broadway, the city's main thoroughfare. Lavishly planted with oleanders, this boulevard was lined with substantial houses that attested to the wealth of their owners. The Italianate Ashton Villa was built on Broadway in 1859; the exuberantly eclectic Gresham House (1887-93) followed the trend of sophisticated Broadway residences. Narcissa Willis's niece, Magnolia Willis Sealy, had hired the famous New York architect Stanford White in 1887 to build her chateauesque "Open Gates" just a block from her aunt's front door. These are just the extant examples of the houses that Narcissa could emulate.

Tyndall's house for Mrs. Willis followed the style named for architect Henry Hobson Richardson (1838-1886), called Richardsonian Romanesque, a heavy, stolid architecture usually more associated with the colder, northern climates of New England and the Midwest. American architects had experimented with a literal interpretation of the Romanesque in the 1840s and 1850s for churches and public buildings, using round arches, corbels and historically correct features such as chevrons and lozenges borrowed from the pre-Gothic architecture of Europe. An outstanding example of the style's early phase is the original Smithsonian Institution Building (1847-55, James Renwick, architect), Washington D.C., designed with irregular outlines, battlemented cornices and relatively smooth-faced ashlar walls. As interpreted by Richardson in the 1870s and 1880s, the Romanesque became a different, and uniquely American style. Still present were the round arches framing window and door openings, but gone were vertical silhouettes and smooth stone facings. Richardson's buildings were more horizontal and rougher in texture. Heaviness was an ever-present characteristic of the style, emphasized not only by the stone construction but also by the deep window reveals, cavernous door openings and, occasionally, bands of windows. These openings were often further defined by contrasting colors or textures of stone or by short, robust columns. Towers were often part of the design, with the best examples having a single tower, massive and bold in outline, crowning the ensemble. Richardsonian Romanesque was favored for churches, university buildings and public buildings such as railroad stations and courthouses.

Richardson's finest example of domestic architecture in this style is the John J. Glessner House, built between 1885 and 1887, on Prairie Avenue in Chicago. After Richardson's premature death in 1886, admiring architects adopted his style for schools, post offices, and commercial and federal buildings across the country. Although Richardson produced few domestic structures in his Romanesque style, there were enough to inspire a plethora of followers. A large house was required to support the massive stoniness of the style, but elements of Richardson's work; such as broad arches, squat columns, eyebrow dormers, and carved, intertwining floral details; found their way into the vocabulary of many regional and local builders.

Tyndall took Richardson's ideas and adapted them to Galveston's warm marine climate. Porches, tall windows, galleries, and rooms with south-facing exposures to catch the Gulf breezes were included with turrets, heavy arches, and massive stonework to produce a house for Mrs. Willis. The Willis-Moody Mansion became the only house in Galveston to exhibit direct characteristics of the Richardsonian Romanesque. Other large houses in Galveston, however, possess Richardsonian Romanesque influences in their massing and motifs. Examples include "Open Gates," the Landis-McDonagh house on Post Office and 16^th Streets, and the Broadway home of Mrs. P.J. Willis, now demolished.

It seems likely that the Willis mansion was Tyndall's largest domestic commission. The house's progress was noted in the Galveston Daily News; by late 1895 or early 1896, Narcissa Willis had moved into her new house, tastefully decorated by a major New York firm, an amenity not found in another Galveston house. Unfortunately, Narcissa had little time to enjoy the home, dying in September of 1899 at her son Richard's summer home in Bergen County, New Jersey. Ironically, Libbie Moody wrote to her husband, W. L. Moody, Jr., after the funeral, "I was sorry to hear of Mrs. Willis' death, but I don't suppose life was, or has been very much to her for some time. I wonder who will have the house, it will require a fortune to keep it up." Within a year, she and her husband would be the owners of 2618 Broadway.

The estate of Narcissa Willis was valued in 1899/1900 at $225,280.15. The house was appraised at $40,000 and the household property was valued at $3,500. In a codicil to her will, dated November 18^th, 1897, she gave to her youngest daughter "Olive Willis Walthew my Residence on Broadway and all that pertains thereto to have and hold forever in her own right." The family protested the will and it went into probate; the court's ruling ratified the codicil.

Olive Willis Walthew became the house's owner, and she returned to Galveston in 1899 to live while the estate was being settled. She had no intention of living in the mansion, preferring instead to return to New York. The house was placed on the market and several offers were made, including one of $20,000 from William L. Moody, Jr.

On September 8^th, 1900, a devastating hurricane pounded the Galveston. In its wake was the destruction of lives, property, and wealth. The offers for the mansion, which before the hurricane had seemed so promising, vanished. Only W. L. Moody, Jr., remained, offering his original bid of $20,000. It was probably clear to Mrs. Walthew that she might not do better in the circumstances. In mid-September, Moody wrote a series of letters to his wife outlining the negotiations on the house. On September 20^th, Moody wrote that "Olive Walthew offered me her house today by wire for $20,000 cash. I declined, but offered her the price on time if she would include the furniture and pictures;...". Five days later, he wrote, "I think the Walthew house good as ours; only $500 apart now." Mrs. Walthew must have relented, and agreed, for the next day Moody wrote to his wife, "deed for the Walthew mansion has been forwarded to Olive for her signature - Well Hib, we may live in a palace yet." The sale was consummated and the W. L. Moody, Jr., family occupied the house by Christmas of 1900. Colonel Edward Mandell House, a cousin to Mrs. Moody, wired W. L. Moody, Jr., on November 1^st, 1900, that "There is not another (house) in all of Texas to conform with it...Tell Lib that I have always contended that she was the luckiest girl I know."

That luckiest of Texas girls was married to William Lewis Moody, Jr., son of Galveston entrepreneur Colonel William Lewis Moody, whose namesake was born in Fairfield, Freestone County, Texas, on January 25^th, 1865. One of three children of Col. Moody and Pherabe Elizabeth (Bradley) Moody who survived to adulthood, he was a sickly child. He was sent to Roanoke, Virginia at the age of nine to avoid the rigors of the Galveston climate and to receive a part of his primary education at Hollins Institute, later attending two other Virginia boarding schools and the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington. In 1884 and 1885, Will and his brother Frank Bradley Moody traveled to Germany to further their education. After returning home, Will briefly studied law at the University of Texas before joining his father's cotton brokerage firm, W. L. Moody & Co., as a junior partner on his 21^st birthday in 1886. For nearly ninety years, these two men guided and shaped the economic development of Galveston, a city whose importance as a port tied it closely to the agricultural economy and commerce of Texas.

The firm that W. L. Moody, Jr., joined had been established by his father twenty years earlier as W.L. & F.L. Moody, Cotton Factors. During the closing decades of the 19^th century Colonel Moody worked energetically to improve Galveston's capabilities as a port and center of trade. In 1872, he was among the organizers of the Galveston Cotton Exchange, first of its kind in Texas. Colonel Moody was a founder and director of the Gulf, Colorado, and Santa Fe Railroad, whose terminal was located in Galveston. Hoping to secure federal funding for the improvement of Galveston's harbor, in 1884 Colonel Moody served as chairman of a committee that persuaded Congress to allocate the necessary funds.

W. L..Moody, Jr.'s passion was for business, and as a partner with his father, soon exhibited financial talents of his own. He persuaded his father that their business as factors, or commission agents, should expand to include banking as an enterprise apart from the cotton trade. As a result, in 1889 they formed a private bank that functioned as a part of W. L. Moody & Co., which in 1890 absorbed the National Bank of Texas, which Colonel Moody had served as president. In 1907, W. L. Moody Jr.'s interest in banking as an enterprise apart from the cotton trade led him to found the City National Bank, he acted as its president until his death. This bank was renamed in his honor in 1953 as Moody National Bank, and remains in business today.

Galveston was the center of cotton exporting in Texas and the Moody Compress Company (established in 1894) was one of the region's leading cotton processors. The commodity's vast bulk required that it be packed or compressed to make the most efficient use of ships' cargo holds. Earlier in the 19^th century, this was accomplished by skilled longshoremen called "screwmen" who packed cotton ships with the aid of manual screw jacks; these were superseded by mechanical presses that produced firmly compacted bales. As cotton transport and shipping shifted from a labor-intensive to a capital-intensive industry, the Moody firm was at the forefront of innovation and modernization in cotton transport and shipping, pioneering the erection of high density compresses, building the first shipside compress in Texas and taking the lead in employing motor trucks. In 1916, the Moody cotton and banking businesses separated along functional lines to form W. L. Moody and Company Bankers, Unincorporated and the W. L. Moody Cotton Company. Upon his father's death in 1920, W. L. Moody, Jr., succeeded to the presidencies of these companies.

W. L. Moody, Jr., expanded family business interests along profitable lines that conformed to broader regional patterns, moving from commodity-based trade to investment-oriented capitalism. In 1905, he entered the insurance business as a partner in the American National Insurance Company (ANICO) taking advantage of new state laws designed to encourage insurance firms. In 1908, Moody bought out his partner and expanded the company. Today, ANICO is one of the largest insurance companies in the United States. In 1920, Moody also established the American Printing Company of Galveston to serve all the Moody enterprises that in 1928 began printing for outside clients.

By the 1920s, Galveston had been an oceanfront resort for decades, but as Houston gained ascendancy as a port, Galveston's economy came to rely more and more on its beaches and hotels. In tacit acknowledgment of this shift, W. L. Moody, Jr., organized the National Hotel Company in 1927. Although the company would eventually become national in scope, listing among its properties the Admiral Semmes in Mobile, the Paxton in Omaha, the DeSoto in New Orleans, and the Hotel Washington in Washington, D. C., some of its first projects were Galveston's downtown Jean Lafitte and beachfront Buccaneer, built in 1927 and 1929, respectively. Having purchased both Galveston daily newspapers earlier in the decade (the Galveston Daily News, 1923, The Galveston Tribune, 1926), W. L. Moody, Jr., was in a position to help promote the city's image as an attractive island resort.

W. L. Moody, Jr., also owned as many as eleven different ranches in Texas, Oklahoma and Virginia totaling several hundred thousand acres. The ranches produced a variety of livestock, and although Moody himself was not a cattleman, he enjoyed his ranches and used them for duck hunting and fishing, his favorite recreations.

Changes in the structure of Moody business enterprises reflect those of the state's developing economy in general, as well as the evolution of Galveston's economy, in particular. First active in agricultural commodity brokering, the Moodys moved into banking and credit, then to insurance and investment, and finally into consumer-oriented areas like hotels and leisure. This pattern was especially common in the West, as extractive industries gave way to more sophisticated forms of capitalism.

While not as active as his father in Democratic politics, W. L. Moody, Jr., continued his father's support of William Jennings Bryan, and was involved in Pat Neff's bid for the 1924 Presidential nomination, attending that year's convention as a member of the Texas delegation. Moody generally avoided public life, but did serve one term, 1921-23, as Treasurer of the City of Galveston.

W.L. Moody, Jr., married Libbie Rice Shearn of Houston at Hull, Massachusetts, on August 26^th, 1890. After the 1900 hurricane, Moody purchased the Narcissa Willis mansion at 2618 Broadway, which remained his home until his death. The couple had four children, Mary Elizabeth (Mrs. E.C. Northen), Willian Lewis III, Shearn, and Libbie (Mrs. Clark W. Thompson).

Active until two days prior to his death, W. L. Moody, Jr., died on July 21^st, 1954; his legacy to the people of Texas: the Moody Foundation of Galveston. Established in 1942, the Foundation first focused on a small number of local projects, including the Moody State School for Cerebral Palsied Children. When Moody's estate was transferred to the Foundation on December 29^th, 1959, it became one of the largest in the United States and began a record of significant gifts in a variety of areas, including health, science, arts and humanities, and education. Since its inception, the Moody Foundation has carried out its founder's vision to work for the perpetual benefit of present and future generations of Texans, making grants to projects in 176 cities totaling over $350 million.

Building Description

The Willis-Moody Mansion is a 4-story Richardsonian Romanesque building built between 1893 and 1895. The asymmetrical facade employs many elements of this style, such as rounded arches, turrets, and heavy stonework, as well as porches, verandas, and a porte-cochere. The mansion's interiors, designed by the New York firm of Pottier, Stymus, & Co., employ decorative themes popular at the turn of the century. With its primary elevation facing south on Broadway, the main thoroughfare in the City of Galveston, the Willis-Moody Mansion's brick walls and limestone dressings appear very much as they did in the mid-1890s, thanks to a meticulous 7-year preservation and restoration project that culminated in April 1991, when the house was opened to the public as the Moody Mansion and Museum.

The Willis-Moody Mansion is of masonry construction on a brick foundation. Masonry features include a pressed brick and rough-faced limestone exterior adorned with white limestone coping, lintels, window surrounds, and arches. While all load-bearing walls are of brick, sections of railroad steel were incorporated as structural elements, primarily to support porch and conservatory floors on the first-floor level, but also to permit the 20-foot width of the dining room to be spanned by a load-bearing wall on the floor above. The tiled roof is complex in configuration; a large skylight tops the hipped roof of the central block, while pitched roofs cover projecting elements to the east and west, with conical roofs on the house's four turrets. Corbelled chimneys punctuate the asymmetrical roofline.

The south elevation, facing Broadway, features a ground floor of rough-faced, squared limestone enclosing an expansive first-floor porch that runs the entire width of the house, extending back on the west side and forming a circular projection at the southeast corner before turning back on the east, where it joins a porte-cochere. The limestone continues up to form a colonnade of heavy Romanesque arches that unify the porch and porte-cochere, where the heads are filled with filigree wrought iron. Approached by a flight of wide limestone steps, the main entrance is centered on the south facade, and is marked by a shaped parapet embellished with a carved limestone lion's head. The paired front doors are of oak, studded with brass rosettes, and flanked by two large ornamental iron lamps. The front porch is floored with English tile, most of it original.

Double-hung floor-to-ceiling windows on the porch's east side provide access from the ballroom to the porch.

The second and third stories of the front elevation continue the Richardsonian theme. The southwest corner has a 3/4-round window bay, balanced at the southeast corner by an engaged octagonal window bay. A small gallery with three round-headed arches connects these bays. The third floor centers a gabled dormer with paired windows between two flanking turrets, one conical enclosing a semicircular porch with three limestone arches on the southwest, the other octagonal on the southeast.

The mansion's east elevation, like the south, has a ground floor of rough-faced limestone. Beginning at the south end, it features a circular projection of the first-floor porch, a rectangular porte-cochere, a potting room having a radial corner and a doorway placed between two windows, all with segmental arches, and a continuation of the flat limestone wall, interrupted by two segmental-arched windows, to the northeast corner of the house. Along the first story, from the circular porch turret to the north side of the porte-cochere, the design is integrated by limestone arches embellished with molded coping. A conical tile roof completes the turret; a low-pitched hipped roof protects the porte-cochere. Behind the porte-cochere, a glazed, steel-framed conservatory is positioned to receive the morning sun. The conservatory joins the flat brick wall of the house, pierced on the first story by two flat-arched windows. At the south end of the second story, the southeast corner of an engaged octagonal window bay returns to a flat brick wall with paired flat-arched windows centered above the porte-cochere roof. Above the conservatory roof, a radial window bay also features paired windows. At the rear block of the house, the second story features the arched opening of a gallery and a flat-arched window. The third story is completed by the octagonal roof of the southeast turret, the hipped roof of the house's main block, a corbelled chimney, and the gable end of the rear block, featuring two flat-arched windows, an inset limestone carving, limestone coping, and a corbelled chimney.

The north elevation, in contrast to the other three, is relatively planar and without limestone ornament, except for plain window sills. Its shape is largely determined by the offset placement of the house's two rear blocks, the larger, west block advancing slightly from the plane defined by the east block. Centered on the east block is a rectangular projection, blank except for two small segmental-arched windows on the ground floor level, built to accommodate the large built-in sideboard in the first-floor dining room above. Slightly to the west of the sideboard projection, a second rectangular projection, one story in height, supports a tapering cylindrical wooden cistern. Fenestration of the east block is slightly irregular, owing to the sideboard; three windows on the first and second story levels with flat and segmental arches are slightly offset from two gable-end dormer windows on the third. Fenestration on the west block is also irregular, featuring the staggered windows of the rear staircase to the east of a more regular treatment of three ground-floor windows of uneven height with segmental arches, two flat-arched first-story windows, three segmental-arched second-story windows, and three third-story gabled dormers.

The west elevation is complex in its geometry, including the radial end wall of the house's west rear block, a projecting rectangular block with a corner turret, and the west side of the front porch. The rectangular west rear block, with its radial end wall rising to a gable, is faced with squared limestone capped with a limestone coping on the ground floor level, and features two segmental-arched windows. The first and second stories of the end wall each have two flat-arched limestone-trimmed windows; two smaller windows of like configuration fill the angle of the gable, topped by a corbelled chimney. Between the rear block and the turreted rectangular projection of the library, the plane of the west elevation recedes. A ground-floor doorway is set into the limestone-faced flat wall perpendicular to a small loggia opening off the south wall of the kitchen and supporting a gallery opening off the south wall of the living room above. Above the doorway, a large arched limestone-trimmed window frames the figural stained glass window lighting the main interior staircase. Molded limestone coping tops the wall at the second-story level; above it, a gabled dormer stands just north of a corbelled chimney. Squared rough-faced limestone continues around the ground floor level of the west elevation, where a rectangular projection with a squared southwest corner shapes the rooms and turret above. A blank rectangular projection rising from the ground floor level to the first story creates a skylight niche in the library. Windows above the projection, in the squared corner, and third-story turret all feature flat arches and limestone trimming. Farther south on the west elevation, segmental-arched windows open in the ground-floor limestone-faced wall beneath the arches of the main first-story porch. The rounded window bay of the second story continues to a circular, conical-roofed turret on the house's southwest corner.

Interior Features
All room numbers correspond to the floor plans below.

The ground floor, originally designed to contain servant's quarters and service functions for the house, has been adapted for the museum's visitor services. The northwest room of the ground floor (G-2) was the house's original kitchen, with a screened safe for provisions at the east end, and an enclosure for a range at the west. Two coal-fired furnaces supplied central heating; room G-15 was designated the furnace room. A laundry and wash house were located in rooms G-18 and G-19, respectively. In the rear stair hall (G-25) was a hand-powered elevator that ran between the two most important service areas, the ground and third floors. Food moved from the ground floor to the dining room (112) by way of a dumbwaiter in room G-24. A potting house (G-6) served the needs of the conservatory (111) above. Beneath the floor of the furnace room and the kitchen were two cisterns, part of a self-contained water system that included an external cistern and a cistern on the third floor. A pump would have been necessary to fill the upstairs cistern; this was probably originally located in the kitchen, along with a boiler for hot water. Some elements of the original service functions have survived; drying racks, call boards, elevator, electrical switchboard, back stairs, wine cellars, and conservatory boiler.

All architectural features in the first, second, and third floors of the house are original. The paneling has been cleaned and refinished where necessary. Damaged plasterwork was reproduced using castings taken from molds made from original plaster elements. Paint and textile colors and patterns were determined by research and sample analysis during the restoration. Light fixtures in the house are combination gas/electric, except those in the ballroom (110), which are all electric; all are original to the house. Plumbing fixtures vary in date, some being original to the house, and others being later replacements. Original folding shutters or blinds are found in nearly all rooms on the first and second floors. First-floor rooms have pocket doors, as do some of the second-floor rooms. Throughout the house are the original electric call bells and speaking tubes which terminate in the kitchen and servant's hall (G-4) in the basement.

The first floor comprises the formal rooms of the mansion. Its interiors were designed by the New York firm of Pottier, Stymus, and Co., who in 1895 counted among their clients Henry Flagler, William Rockefeller, and Leland Stanford, as well as the Plaza and Waldorf hotels. Following the fashion of the late 19^th century, each room is in a different style, employing various woods, finishes, and decorative motifs. The main entrance opens onto the hall (106). With classically inspired oak-paneled walls, a beamed oak ceiling, and a herringbone-patterned oak floor, this room functioned as both a living hall and a passage. Emphasizing warmth and hospitality, a large fireplace flanked by short benches dominates the north end of the hall.

Originally designed as a music room, the reception room (105), with a semicircular window bay and corner fireplace, is decorated in the Rococo style. The fireplace surround and overmantel, as well as the door and window casings, feature naturalistic carvings of scrolling foliage and flowers. The original ceiling painting of putti floating in a cloud-filled sky was probably painted by New York artist Virgilio Tojetti, who is known to have collaborated with Pottier & Stymus on other commissions, including the Ponce de Leon Hotel in Saint Augustine, Florida, now Flagler College. Hurricane Alicia destroyed the painting in 1983. Historic photographs and surviving Tojetti paintings at Flagler College guided the ceiling's reproduction. The silk lampas wallcovering is a reproduction of the original, woven to order by Scalamandre Company of New York.

The library (104) is decorated in the Empire Revival style. The bookshelves are mahogany, and are shoulder high to allow space for display. At the west end of the room is a niche for a desk or library table, with a skylight above for natural lighting. Other architectural features include a 3-sided angular window bay and an elaborately decorated fireplace and overmantel on the north wall. The restored plaster frieze is highlighted in 23K gold and the ceiling is painted canvas with 23K gold stenciling. The rose-colored damask on the wall is another custom reproduction by Scalamandre.

Across the hall from the reception room and library is the ballroom (110). Tyndall's original plans indicate that this room was intended to be a drawing room, but it was never completed as such by Mrs. Willis. W. L. Moody, Jr. finished the room in about 1910, but not in the grand Louis XVI style envisioned by Pottier & Stymus. Moody added a plaster cornice with rococo cartouches picked out in gold leaf, along with wooden moldings, and a console mirror. In contrast to the combination gas/electric fixtures throughout the remainder of the house, the ballroom fixtures, installed by W. L. Moody, Jr., in about 1910, are all electric.

The dining room (112) is said to be the largest dining room in a private house on Galveston Island, at 20 x 40 feet. It is decorated in the Renaissance Revival style with mahogany paneling, a built-in mahogany sideboard, a molded plaster frieze gilded in Dutch metal, and a coffered ceiling. A fireplace is centered on the east wall of the room, with a cast plaster overmantel depicting a hunting scene.

The conservatory (111) has doors opening from the dining room and ballroom. The room retains its original mock mosaic English tile floor, along with a cast iron fountain and a spiral iron stair that descends to a potting room (G-16) below.

Off the northwest corner of the dining room is the butler's pantry (113). Ceramic tile floor and walls, a cast iron sink, and oak cupboards with glazed cabinets above were all necessary for the room's function, as was the dumbwaiter that communicated with food preparation areas on the ground floor below. The pantry features one of the house's main speaking tubes and call bell system stations.

At the northwest corner of the first floor is the living room (101). This room is designed in the Colonial Revival style with flame-figured birch wainscoting, arches, and beams. Sponge-painted canvas covers the living room walls, the lower level of decorative detail signifying the room's informality in comparison to other rooms on the first floor. This room was originally designed as a billiard room, which may account for the centrally-placed ceiling fixture and the raised dais for spectators at the west end of the room. A fireplace with an overmantel mirror and flanking window seats is given further visual emphasis by an egg-and-dart molded arch supported by Ionic columns. A half bath (118) opening off the rooms' south side provided the only bathroom facilities on the first floor. A small porch or gallery opens off the south wall, reached through two walk-through windows.

The generously proportioned oak-paneled staircase (103) features a dogleg landing, above which a large stained glass window depicts a classically garbed family coming through a pedimented doorway. Quoting Shakespeare's "Troilus and Cressida," the legend beneath reads "Welcome Ever Smiles." Turned balusters and a newel post finely carved with swags of flowers and foliage complete the staircase detailing.

The upstairs hall (214) is finished with oak wainscoting and doorframes. Above this, sand-finished plaster walls are decorated with an aluminum lacquer stencil pattern that continues into the upper part of the stairwell.

The second floor comprises seven bedrooms and four bathrooms, two of the latter having bidets as well as toilets and tubs. The wood trim, tiles, pocket doors, ceramic bathtubs, and nickel-plated fixtures on the second floor date mostly from the original construction, although some bath fixtures are later replacements. All rooms have "run-in-place" coved cornice moldings, and are finished with woodwork in bird's-eye maple, birch, and sycamore.

The third floor is currently used for storage and curatorial offices. Access is by the back staircase, which runs from the basement level to the third floor. The walls and ceilings on this floor were originally stenciled with floral borders. Rooms on the third floor include a theatre (301) and lobby (302), a room with a fireplace (303) and one with a bathroom (304) (possibly designed as living quarters for a trusted servant, such as a governess or ladies' maid) and a sewing room (310). Also, a large cistern (314) with a capacity of over 10,000 gallons is located on the third floor. This water reserve would have provided the pressure necessary to have running water throughout the mansion's self-contained plumbing system.

The Willis-Moody Mansion is located on Block 206 in the City of Galveston. The building occupies Lots 10, 11, and 12 in the center of the city block. When W.L. Moody, Jr., purchased the house in 1900, he purchased only the three lots of the mansion site.

In 1903, he purchased the western 3/4ths of Lot 3 immediately to the rear of the mansion. Then, in 1905, Moody added Lots 8 and 9 facing Broadway to the east of the mansion, and the remaining quarter of Lot 3 and western 1/2 of Lot 4. The remainder of Lot 4 and Lot 5 were acquired in 1926, the last purchase on the block during Moody's lifetime.

During the summer of 1905, Moody's correspondence indicates efforts to find a suitable lot for a house then on Lots 8 and 9 to the east of the mansion. Complicated land titles delayed work on the property behind the mansion.

By 1906, Moody cleaned the area east of the house (Lots 8 and 9) and began to build fencing, walls, curbing, and sidewalks, while bringing in additional soil. He rejected an architect's proposal to build a pergola on the east yard in 1906, but built the existing pergola shortly afterward.

In 1911, Moody began alterations on outbuildings behind the mansion. In writing to his daughter, he stated "am at work on the stable, have torn down the old stable part and will use Cadillac place for cow stable, will let chicken house remain as it is... and will fix carriage house with cement floor." References such as this make it clear that the house had a collection of secondary buildings. Documentation of their placement and appearance is sketchy and incomplete at this time. None of the outbuildings remain.

Most plantings on the site, except for the older trees, are new and do not attempt to recreate a particular historical period. The seemingly random placement of trees to the rear of the mansion probably resulted from the removal of houses that once faced Avenue I (Sealy). The trees, once in the rear yards of several houses, now stand without the original building. On the principal street, walkways and fencing appear as they did in the early 20^th century with some in-kind replacement. To the east of the house is a large lawn, which during the early 20^th century served as a tennis court. The brick and concrete pergola, mentioned above, marks the north boundary of the lawn and conceals a drying yard.

Restoration of the Willis-Moody Mansion began after Hurricane Alicia struck Galveston Island in the summer of 1983. Early efforts were directed by the Preservation Technology Group of Washington, DC. Eugene George, AIA, of Austin, Texas, became architect of the project in early 1985, and oversaw many complex and difficult structural repairs, including the replacement of numerous badly deteriorated elements of the mansion's white limestone dressings. In 1988, Killis Almond and Associates, Inc., of San Antonio, joined the project as its architect, guiding it to completion. Dozens of subcontractors and craftsmen participated in the restoration effort during the years between 1983 and its completion in 1991. Cisi Jary and Restoration Associates Limited of San Antonio were responsible for the majority of the decorative paint and gilding in the mansion's interiors, relying on on-site research and analyses by Frank Welsh of Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. McLean's Blacksmithing of Galveston repaired historic ironwork. Important interior fabrics were reproduced from historic fragments and documentary evidence by Scalamandre.

The 7-year restoration left the Willis-Moody Mansion in excellent condition. It was meticulously researched, restored, and preserved to exhibit to the public its turn-of-the-century appearance and to interpret the architecture, decorative arts, and social and cultural history of that period. Created as a museum under the terms of Mary Moody Northen's will, the mansion fulfills her wish that her family's home and history be preserved for the benefit of the citizens of Galveston and of Texas.