Site Content

Location:  The Whipple House Museum is located at 14 Pleasant Street in Ashland village off Main Street (Routes 3 and 25.)   

Hours:  The Whipple House Museum is open from 1 to 4 p.m. on Saturdays in July and August. Special tours may be arranged by appointment.   

Admission:  A donation for each visitor over the age of 13 would be appreciated, as it will help to maintain the Museum and to further the work of the Historical Society.         

In 1970, Dr. George Hoyt Whipple generously gave his boyhood home to the Town of Ashland, New Hampshire to be preserved and used as a historical museum. The Whipple House, where Dr. Whipple was born, was built in 1837 by his great-grandfather Obadiah Smith and for 133 years was occupied by five generations of the same family.  Obadiah Smith was a merchant and entrepreneur.  His oldest daughter, Frances Moody Smith, married George Hoyt and lived on the other side of the two-family house.  Their daughter, Frances Anna Hoyt, married Dr. Ashley Cooper Whipple and the couple had two children, George and his sister Ashley.  Ashley, named for her late father, who died in a typhoid fever epidemic before she was born, married Charles Gavin Platt.  The Platts' three daughters, Frances, Elizabeth, and Dorothy, were the fifth generation to live in the house. The twelve-room structure was originally built as a two-family dwelling.  The central hallway divides the building into two residences, each consisting of a large kitchen, a dining room, a parlor and three upstairs bedrooms.  Many features of the house show an unusual care and quality of construction and workmanship, such as the kitchen fireplaces with their built-in ovens and laundry kettles.               

Currently, the central hall and three rooms on each of the two stories are open to the public. The lower hallway features an exhibit on Dr. Whipple's life, while the parlor contains exhibits on the family that occupied the house.  The upper level has two period rooms, a Victorian era bedroom and a children's room. The first story kitchen and the upper hallway feature displays of local history. An upper story room provides access to the Society's archives.