Narberth’s Last Lady’s Book House
In 1881 farmer Edward R. Price personally commissioned architect Isaac Harding Hobbs to design and build this house for the new town of Elm, later Narberth, on his 100-acre farm. Narberth began as a Godey's Lady's Book village, because Hobbs, publisher Louis Godey's favorite architect, was involved. By 1938, this was the only Hobbs house remaining.
Hobbs (1817–1896) purchased the land from Price, and constructed it between 1881 and 1883. Price, who held a mortgage on it (fully satisfied by Hobbs), bought it back through Hobbs's builder, to whom Hobbs had conveyed it in order to pay him for his work, and put it on the market.
Price sold it in 1885 to T. B. Belfield, who hired architect James Windrim (1840–1919) to do "fix-ups". Belfield invited Samuel Vauclain, soon to be chairman of the Baldwin Locomotive Works, and his wife and young children, to live there, which they did until November 1901.
In the Paris Exposition of 1900, Vauclain won a medal for locomotive design. Another medal winner there was George Barrie, publisher of classics, who subsequently lived at the house with his second wife Renee.
Many hundreds of Chionodoxa blue bulbs, planted by Mrs. Barrie, bloom in the front yard each April.
— Based on a letter by Victoria Donohoe dated April 10, 1998
Methodist Parish House 1956–2013
Following George Barrie's sudden death from pneumonia in 1918, Renee began to sell pieces of the 2⅝-acre property. The southern part became Barrie Rd. by 1926. In 1928 Renee sold a half-acre on Essex avenue to the Narberth Methodist Church for one dollar. By 1930, she had moved to Florida and the house became apartments. In 1956 the church acquired Barrie House from its last private owner, Pelagie Doane, for its parish house.
Dwindling attendance and resources forced the congregation to merge in 2013 with St. Luke's United Methodist Church at Montgomery Avenue and Pennswood Road in Bryn Mawr. The church and the house were sold to a developer who repurposed both buildings as condominiums and added a new one dubbed Vauclain Manor.
Updated August 12, 2024.
Montgomery County Property Record