Clara Barton Home and Red Cross Headquarters

Clara Barton Home

NPS / Nathan King

Quick Facts

Amenities

3 listed

Gifts/Souvenirs/Books, Historical/Interpretive Information/Exhibits, Wheelchair Accessible

Over the course of her lifetime, Clara Barton was a dedicated Civil War nurse, an active women’s rights suffragette, and the founder and first president of the American Red Cross. She lived in the house on the property for a brief time in 1891, and then again from 1897 until her death in 1912. 

From 1891-97, the house served as an American Red Cross warehouse, and it was the organization’s national headquarters from 1897-1904. The Red Cross continued to use the house as a warehouse for relief supplies, stationery, and Red Cross publications. 

Inside, the first floor includes a parlor room, dining room, offices, and a kitchen. The second floor was for bedrooms, including Ms. Barton's room at the rear of the house. Look up to the third floor and note the windows with red crosses in them. Some of the interior walls and ceilings are covered with muslin, the same material used in bandages.

During her residence here, Barton developed the landscape into a miniature farm that was primarily self-sustaining, including crops, stables, and a chicken coop. This agricultural use of the landscape is no longer evident; development at the Glen Echo amusement park including roller coasters and the modern parking lot built over most of the farming operation. Many of the trees and plants that grow today are not consistent with the historic function of the grounds. However, the Clara Barton House is the most significant building associated with her time at Glen Echo, and it remains intact.

In the years following Ms. Barton's death in 1912, her colleague, Dr. Julian Hubbell, replaced the porch with a columned, one-story porch. His twin nieces inherited the house in 1929 and converted the interior to rent-producing apartments, added baths and kitchens, and a garage with screened porches above at the western rear corner. 

Congress declared the Clara Barton House a National Historic Landmark on January 12, 1965, and in 1974 passed legislation establishing the house and grounds as the Clara Barton National Historic Site. This property was acquired by NPS in April 1975 through a donation from the Friends of Clara Barton.